Frequent Urination
Frequent urination problems are one of the most common pregnancy symptoms. Now that you’re knocked up does it seem like you’re in the bathroom ALL THE TIME? You’re not alone! Having to pee constantly is a pregnancy symptom caused by the increase in blood in your body, which in turn increases all the fluids inside of you … including pee. Thus, you will have frequent urination problems. What’s worse? As the baby grows he or she is putting pressure on your bladder which makes you have to go, go even more!
The reason you have to pee even more at night than during the day is that when you lie down, the fluid from your legs and feet moves back into your blood and hits your bladder just when you’re trying to get some sleep.
Pregnancy symptoms can be so unfair, can’t they?
While there’s not a ton you can do to stop the urge to pee every 10 minutes (given that baby is parked on your bladder 24/7), there are a few ways to extend the time between trips to the potty a little (to, say, every 11 or 12 minutes!).
Try these tricks for frequent urination
■ Lean forward and rest your elbows on your knees while peeing. It’ll help you to fully empty your bladder, which will at least cut out a few of those 17 middle-of-the-night bathroom trips.
■ Drink most of your liquids earlier in the day and taper off before bedtime. Just make sure you don’t get dehydrated. If your urine is almost colorless, you’re doing OK. The more deeply yellow it is, the more you probably need to drink. (Yes, kinda gross, but consider it early training for your upcoming obsession with everything that your baby excretes.)
■ Avoid drinks that have a diuretic effect (aka, make you pee more), like coffee, tea, and soda. This is the easiest measure to come to mind against frequent urination.
■ Do your Kegels. The stronger your hoo-hoo muscles are, the better you’ll get at holding things in which will be especially key after you have the baby and you face postpartum bladder control problems.
