After the initial excitement of finding out I was pregnant had eased ever so slightly, I remember sitting there thinking...
“I don't even know what I'm meant to do now.”
Like, genuinely. What do you do after you find out you're pregnant?
Do I book a doctor's appointment? Do I need to book an obstetrician now? Am I supposed to call the hospital? Do I need blood tests? When do I have an ultrasound? Is there something I should be taking? Something I should stop taking?
What now?!
You spend so much time thinking about getting pregnant, taking the test and imagining that moment when you finally see those two little lines... but nobody really talks about the weird little period immediately afterwards where you're just sitting there, newly pregnant, with absolutely no idea what you're supposed to do next.
And being me, naturally, I wanted to know everything.
I wanted to know what appointments I needed to make, when I needed to make them, what I should and shouldn't be doing, what I could eat, what I couldn't eat, when we'd get to see our baby for the first time... basically, if there was something I could Google, I probably Googled it.
So, if you've just found out you're pregnant and you've landed here thinking the exact same thing I was — firstly, congratulations. 🤍
And secondly, this is exactly what those first few weeks looked like for me. Not a medical checklist or a “this is what you have to do” guide — just the steps I took, what I learnt along the way, and a few things I wish someone had explained to me when I was staring at a positive pregnancy test thinking...
Okay... now what?
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First Things First… The Doctor
The first thing I did was book a doctor's appointment, because by this point I had approximately one million questions running through my head. 😂
I knew I was pregnant — the collection of positive tests at home had made that pretty bloody clear — but beyond that, I genuinely had no idea what happened next.
At my appointment, my doctor referred me to have blood tests done to officially confirm the pregnancy and talked me through some of those very first things I needed to know.
One of the biggest things he stressed was the importance of taking a prenatal vitamin every day, which was something I knew about, but I don't think I'd realised just how important it was to start taking one consistently from the very beginning.
I went and had my blood test done that same day, and suddenly it all started to feel a little bit more real.
I'd gone from sitting at home staring at a positive pregnancy test thinking, “Okay... what the hell do I do now?” to actually taking that first proper step.
And honestly, just having someone tell me what came next made the whole thing feel a little less overwhelming. 🤍
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What Prenatals Am I Taking?
One of the things my doctor spoke to me about at that first appointment was making sure I was taking a prenatal vitamin every day.
I personally take Elevit Pregnancy Multivitamin aswell as Folic Acid, and taking it each day quickly became one of those little things that just became part of my routine.
There are plenty of different prenatal vitamins available and what works for me won't necessarily be the right choice for everyone, so this definitely isn't me saying “you need to take this one.” It's simply the one I've chosen to take throughout my pregnancy.
If you've only just found out you're pregnant and aren't sure what you should be taking, it's a great question to add to that million-question list for your doctor.
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The Wait for That First Little Glimpse
After the doctor's appointment and blood test came the part I'd been waiting for most — our first dating scan.
A dating scan is one of the early ultrasounds you may have during pregnancy. It's used to help work out how far along you are and give you an estimated due date, as well as check on how things are progressing in those early weeks.
Ours was booked for around 7 weeks, which doesn't sound like much of a wait... unless you're someone like me who found out ridiculously early.
You know there's this tiny little life growing inside you, you've seen the positive tests and you've had the bloods to confirm it... but you still haven't actually seen them yet.
And when you're waiting for that first scan, every day somehow feels like forever. But eventually, the day we'd been counting down to finally arrived.
There's something I don't think I'll ever forget about lying on that table, looking over at the screen and seeing the smile on Tenison's face when the two of us saw our little mini for the first time.
Were they particularly baby-looking yet? Absolutely not.
At that stage, they looked more like a tiny tadpole wearing a motorbike helmet than the little person we'd eventually meet — but that didn't matter one bit.
Because that funny little shape on the screen was our baby.
And after weeks of knowing I was pregnant but having nothing more than positive tests and blood results to prove it, suddenly there they were, right in front of us.
During the scan, they took measurements to help determine how far along I was, and from those measurements we were given our estimated due date — an actual date on the calendar when we might finally get to meet this tiny person.
Of course, it's called an estimated due date for a reason — babies aren't exactly known for sticking to our schedules. 😂 But having that date made everything suddenly feel so much more real.
I think that's when it really started sinking in.
This was actually happening. We were having a baby. 🤍
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And From There...
Those first few weeks felt like such a strange mixture of excitement, nerves and constantly wondering whether I was doing everything I was supposed to be doing.
But looking back, the first steps were actually much simpler than they felt at the time.
For me, it was booking a doctor's appointment, having my bloods taken, starting my prenatal vitamins and then counting down the days until that first dating scan.
After that, things slowly started falling into place.
There would be plenty more appointments to book, decisions to make and approximately 4,726 more things for me to Google 😂 — but I didn't need to have everything figured out the second I saw those two lines.
So if you've just found out you're pregnant and you've landed here because you're sitting there thinking...
“Okay... what am I actually supposed to do now?”
Start by making that first appointment and take it from there. Ask the million questions. Write them down if you need to. And remember that everyone's pregnancy and care can look a little different, so your doctor or healthcare provider is always the best person to guide you through what comes next for you.
And somewhere amongst all the appointments, blood tests and endless questions, try to enjoy the fact that you've just found out something pretty bloody incredible.
There's a little person on the way. 🤍
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