I eat, therefore I eat some more

I honestly don’t recall ever being THIS hungry before in previous pregnancies. I am ravenous. I am so hungry all of the time that I worry that I might lose control and eat a coworker or one of the other children in a moment of frantic starvation. If I go longer than 3 hours without consuming something substantial, I feel alternately faint and hysterical.

And I truly do crave specific things – already. It varies from day to day, but if I get it into my head that I want, say, warm brie on Food Club brand saltines, smothered in capers and Smuckers strawberry jelly, I become fixated. I will not rest until I have secured the food items in question, and have combined them in the desired way. God help anyone who gets between me and the saltines. It could get ugly.

Of course, after I eat the toffee dipped in orange juice, or the cottage cheese with chocolate syrup, or the cheese grits mixed with bits of peppermint candy, I don’t feel sated; I feel sick. Very, very sick. At which point I want to do nothing but take a warm bath and lie down.

Three hours later, the whole ugly saga begins again.

I am pretty certain I will have gained 10 pounds by the end of my first trimester.