Caroline Verdon: Can we please stop talking about the pregnancy glow?

As a kid I remember being in my early teens reading gossip magazines where girls had written in, asking questions like “can I get pregnant from a toilet seat?” and “I went in a swimming pool with a boy, will I be having his baby in nine months time?” and thinking how terrifyingly easy it clearly was to get pregnant.

I remember having my first boyfriend and being completely paranoid each month.

Then I got to 30 and my husband and I started trying for kids and it turned out to really not be as easy as I’d thought and we were one of the lucky couples as we fell pregnant within six months each time, which is apparently pretty quick.

So that’s the first lie we’re all fed.

Then there’s the staying pregnant part and the statistics on that one are dire with one in four of us suffering from miscarriage or stillbirth.

We lost our first child which makes me hugely grateful for our healthy three-year-old but still anxious to be pregnant again now.

But it doesn’t stop me resenting the fact that that the lie we’re all spun about a pregnancy glow is just that, an absolute load of baloney, unless of course by glow they mean the uncontrollable night-time sweating.

My poor husband now sleeps in the spare room at least one night a week just so he gets one decent sleep that doesn’t involve him slipping and sliding in my perspiration.

Meanwhile, I’ve taken to sleeping on a towel and our electricity bill for washing is rapidly going up and up.

Then there is the morning sickness.

Clearly named by someone who has never been pregnant who just got sick of listening to someone moan about how ill they felt and so stopped listening by lunchtime because it’s not something that happens in the morning, it’s something that happens all day.

Food cravings are also less about ‘oooh I really fancy enjoying a cream bun’ and more about finding something, anything that your body is willing to keep down.

They’re also weird as they’re instant.

All day I can be looking forward to having spaghetti for dinner and then ten minutes before I start making I might see an advert for a curry and that’s it - I need that curry immediately.

Add to that the food aversions and it starts getting really annoying.

Last week my husband and I went out for breakfast and I ordered smoked salmon and avocado on toast with hollandaise sauce, it’s one of my favourite breakfasts and I was really looking forward to it up until the second it was put down in front of me.

It was at that point I had to call the waitress back over and apologise profusely as I asked her to take it away as the very sight of it was making me want to lose what very little was left in my stomach. That was a complete waste of £7.95.

I haven’t even touched upon the swellings, the sudden feelings of heavy arms, the shooting pains in the hips, the inability to find any shoes that fit properly, the breathlessness, the mood swings, the fatigue or the bowel issues.

You get to the point where you just need to find a sense of humour about it all.

I vividly remember day three in the hospital after having had Arthur.

I’d not slept in 72 hours, could barely remember my own name and I looked like I had been dragged through a hedge backwards.

Yes pregnancy is miraculous and a true wonder of life but if you’re thinking it’s all about shiny hair and beautiful skin, then it’s time to get real.