Experiences of pregnancy as an aspie

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I am soon planning to have a baby and am a abit worried about how I will cope with pregnancy.

I (just) get by day-to-day with my AS, but I am easily unsettled by change, overwhelmed by tasks, etc. I worry that these feelings will become worse while pregnant, and that I will begin to panic. And nine months is a long time to panic. I am also very concerned about morning sickness (nausea is the ultimate in sensory overload for me).

Deep down I know that I can do this. My mental and physical health is very good and I always find the reserves I need to keep going. I have very few concerns at all about actually having children or giving birth- It really is just the pregnancy that scares me.

I would love to hear from anyone who has experience with pregnancy to give me their insight into any particular difficulties their AS threw up at them.

I didn't enjoy pregnancy, but AS wasn't really the problem with it.

There was the nausea, the bloating, the discomfort, the backaches, the peeing every half hour, the extremely weird feeling of an alien life kicking inside of me, the doctors and nurses poking up my vagina constantly, the numerous appointments. I just didn't like it. But luckily each specific symptom comes and goes in its own trimester, so you get a variety.

Now I don't know if anyone else had this happen to them, but the hormones made my usually kind and peaceful nature turn into a Wicked Witch. All my neighbours became afraid of my suddenly vicious temper. Luckily, though, this made them stop coming around to complain about petty things so it was not entirely bad.

My social skills improved immensely. And then they went right back to terrible after my daughter was born.
My intellectual skills did the opposite. My thinking felt very slow and cow-like - and that, more than any other pregnancy symptom, is why I only have one child.
The rest of it wasn't nearly as big of an issue as I thought it would be. I have severe PTSD on top of AS, so we actually had a plan in place for if I became suicidal while pregnant (I was stable normally, but I was afraid that the physical changes would be too much and would make me freak out). I went to a birth center, and the midwives were very accommodating of my sensory issues. I highly recommend a birth center if you have the option because you have far more control over your environment than you do in a hospital.
For me, morning sickness was awful, I won't lie, but I got through it. I just drank a lot of herbal tea, but they also have medications that you can ask your doctor about if it gets too bad.

You worry about nothing, you will cope.

there are lots of physical aspects that are uncomfortable (sciatica, hip pain, swollen feet, etc.). but i found the experience of having another person inside of me extremely comforting****. it felt like a hug that continued for several months. when my daughter was born, i was actually slightly wistful on a certain level, as i knew i would never again be that physically close to another human being.





****in context: prior to pregnancy i thought that foetuses were parasites akin to disgusting alien life forms. people can sometimes change.
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I thought pregnancy itself was a piece of cake compared to the work and worry that came after my twins were born. My hormones were more or less out of whack for a couple of years. Drove my husband nuts.

But I got through it (with his help, plus that of others). My hormones eventually got back on track, my sex drive returned with a vengeance, my girls were adorable and wonderful beyond words, and I was very happy.

I think having help and support is a very big thing. Do you have a sister ... aunt ... cousin ... good friend ... who can hang out with you and lend moral support?

I hated this awful feeling from the time I missed my period to the start of the second trimester. I know it was hormonal but it left me with a sinking feeling and no enthusiasm. It did pass and then I just dealt with the physical discomfort as birth was near. I was totally clueless and my child developed fine despite my lack of maternal skills.

my experience was that after giving birth was the difficult - to put it mildly - time. The pregnancy was a very creative time both inside and out and I got a lot of crafts done. In retrospect, I definitely had post partum depression and felt horrible for about a three months. At the same time my baby was wonderful and I absolutely was bonded to her. If you can find some kind of support that you trust and who will help with some of the work of having a new baby is the advice I would give. If only I had had someone to help so I could have gotten some sleep it would have been so much better. I really didn't get back to my normal (ha!) self for three or four years. But everyone is different and I was very isolated - like hermit type isolated.

Mixture of panic and happiness at the start. I enjoyed pregnancy, much easier than looking after an actual person! For a couple of weeks after I felt panicky and couldn't think ahead beyond the minute, not that anyone knew though. For about 3 months I guess I wasn't as happy as I thought I was. I was moody for about a year after but all of that I think is normal for anyone AS or NT

My social skills did improve massively, I miss them now.

My pregnancy was fine. I felt good and did not have morning sickness. I took prenatal classes and practiced daily for over two months. I learned how to relax every muscle in my body during a contraction and not get uterine cramps during labor. My husband took a picture of me in transition during a contraction. It looked just like I was sleeping. I only had moderate pain with contractions. I actually enjoyed my births.
Postpartum was another matter. I had a thyroid crisis after my first one. I was weak and starving. I had to eat a full meal every two hours around the clock. My poor husband felt like he was on 24 hour KP duty. I lost 25 pounds the first week postpartum. I was too weak to push the vacuum cleaner until three months later. After my second child, my immune system was low. I was sick for ten days of every month for six months. I ran a fever as high as 105. After my third one, I had arthritis for eight months.
For me, pregnancy and birth were easy compared to postpartum.
My first baby only slept two hours at night for the first seven weeks. None of my kids slept through the night until past one year old.

My pregnancies were all fine until the third trimester, when I developed severe preeclampsia all 3 times. Ugh. Bed rest, c-section deliveries 3, 3, and 5 weeks early. Headaches whenever I got out of bed, horrible boredom whenever I didn't. I was *so* glad when all 3 of them got born because that meant the end of bed rest!

~Kate

I'm now mother to a 3-week-old little boy. Technically he's a preemie, as he was born over 5 weeks before due date. We were fortunate that there were no major complications, the most serious issue was jaundice and the feeding problems that followed from that.

Physically, there were no Aspergers-related issues with my pregnancy. Otherwise...

Even though I had clear symptoms like nausea, it didn't feel real until the first ultrasound week 12, when I realized that someone was actually growing inside of me. I don't think I quite got used to the idea all through the pregnancy even with growing belly and the baby doing acrobatics inside me (or that's what it felt like...). I took it a day at a time, and didn't really feel any different, aside from the physical changes. Even with later complications with infection and preterm delivery four weeks after that, it all still felt like "business as usual". Even with the threat of premature birth week 30 and five days in the hospital all I could think was that it was an interesting experience. As such I don't think I took the doctor's advice to rest seriously enough, as I didn't feel any different.

I'm more worried about how I'll cope as a mother, as I have the very aspie tendency to immerse myself into new special interests. I'm afraid that I manage to forget that I have a baby to look after. Fortunately we can always go to Grandmother's if necessary.

Another concern is whether my son will be an aspie as well. I estimated before birth that the likelyhood would be aroung 50 %. AS runs in my family, and it looks like those with AS in my family have that fifty-fifty chance of having a child with AS or a least AS-like characteristics as well. Additionally there's the age of the father (almost in his fifties) and complications with the pregnancy that have both been factors in previous generations. It wouldn't really bother me, I know it isn't the end of the world. I know though how difficult life can be for an aspie, and that's what worries me more.

I was fine. I was proud of being pregnant. I felt some nausea because I smoked cigarettes. I stopped taking medications which my doctor advised against. I got anxiety attacks. That ceased. Then I got attacks of dizzness and nausea which was related to my hearing. I rarley felt hungry. I took calcium and folic acid tablets except I was still slighty anemic. My baby was born healthy. The nurses said I did beautifully, even though I was induced and couldn't move.

All the nurses in the ward were nice. They liked me and made me say goodbye to them as I was leaving. I stayed in the hospital for 8 days because I wanted to know how to look after a baby.

I remember after he was born of having partial seizures because I was tired.

I was actually very lucky during my pregnancy. The first one, I felt like garbage. My skin and feet itched, I felt bloated, I kept getting rashes, my boobs were sore, I had menstrual like cramps, and I felt hungry all the time and my pee smelled different.

But my second one I felt normal. Sore breasts again off and on and I hardly had any cramps. I only did for like a couple of days and then I went number two so that was maybe due to constipation. I didn't feel pregnant at all. I didn't feel bloated either. My guess was because it was because it wasn't summer and it was spring so I didn't feel like garbage this time. My pee smelled different again.

Throughout my pregnancy I had no symptoms except sore boobs, I was more emotional but not very emotional compare to other pregnant women, and when I got to around 27 weeks, I started to feel uncomfortable when I sit and then around 33 weeks, my back would feel uncomfortable when I sit but not much. Whenever my baby moved or kicked, it didn't hurt and I liked feeling him move in there and seeing my tummy moving and my skin popping in and out. My tummy itched sometimes but not much. My legs also started to get sore when I be on them for too long like two hours when I got to eight and a half months. But I still walked on them and still worked. Even putting up Christmas stuff made me sore in my back and legs I had to rest. These things were results of my body supporting the baby's weight and the placenta and the fluid. But it didn't bother me. Sometimes if I walked too fast, my tummy start to feel sore like I had been working out too hard. I felt always hungry at times and then didn't feel hungry at all in the middle of my pregnancy and towards the end. But I had a hard time eating every two hours. I have a hard time eating if I don't feel hungry because it feels like a chore to eat so I get lazy to eat. I either get lazy or forget. Luckily the baby was born healthy.

If my body stayed pregnant in the first one, it may have been a bad pregnancy so I was lucky then I lost that baby. I didn't feel like garbage during the summer either in my second pregnancy. I drank lots of water and stayed cool. Only time I ever cramped was when it be hot out and I didn't drink enough water. So just as long as a I drank one cup of water every hour, I felt normal during the heat. I didn't feel bloated either. I bloated a few times but then it go away because the pants feel less tight around my buttocks and waist. I also didn't gain lot of weight. I ate healthy and didn't eat lot of sweets or candy. I didn't start until October and I still didn't gain a lot so maybe it was because I limited myself to sweets. Also the pregnancy made me be more affectionate and express my emotions easily. It just made me more NT. The obsessions got less but that trait never recovered after I gave birth so it's like my pregnancy still made me more NT.


The delivery was normal. I tore a little but everything else was perfect. I had him in seven hours after arriving at the hospital. I was in labor for 29 hours but I didn't know it. I didn't even know I was in labor until my husband told me so that explained the very bad pain I was getting and the doctors didn't think I was having a baby because I "didn't act like it." Reason why I didn't think I was in labor was because I had read online that in real labor you can't talk as you are contracting. I guess I took that information too literal. I did cry when the pain was bad and then stopped when my husband told me it was labor. I even talked on the way to the hospital and while I was there. I even got an epidural because I was afraid of the pain getting worse I wouldn't deal with it anymore. Then pain did come back three hours later but I bet it would have been worse if I didn't get the epidural. When I pushed him out, I felt nothing. It took me 45 minutes of pushing and finally I pushed very hard and his whole head came out. Then the nurse pulled the rest of him out when I pushed. He even cried when he was halfway out. He cried right after his head came out. Then he stopped crying when they placed him on my chest. I didn't even feel the placenta come out either nor even saw it come out. When I saw it, it was in the bag and it was huge and purple looking. I had no idea it was that big. Plus my belly was never really big either during my pregnancy, it was huge but not very big compared to other bellies I have seen. It's amazing how my baby and that placenta were all in my tummy that weren't very big compared to other pregnant bellies. I had him at 39 weeks even. My husband joked that our baby wanted to come out for his Christmas present. My in laws got him a Christmas present and gave it to us for him. But honestly I don't think the labor was bad. I wonder now how much worse the pain would feel if I didn't get an epidural and how well I would have done during it? Once he came out, the pain was gone. I have no memory of the pain from the placenta coming out. Maybe because it didn't hurt and there were no contractions. Once the cord was cut, the nurse told me I had to push it out now and I did. I wonder if I would have felt it if I didn't have an epidural? But all the doctors said I did very good during the labor and most women don't act that well.

But after I came home from the hospital, I rested because I hardly got any sleep at the hospital. Insomnia. Then I was cleaning and already on my feet and my husband told me I had to give it a rest. I told him the doctor told me I had to be active and he said "No that active, you're being too active" and told me I needed to be less active. Despite that I felt sore for like two weeks and a half, I still moved around but I didn't go for my walks for a while. It was cold and rainy out anyway and the doctor told me I would bleed again if I was too active. I bled for about a month and then haven't bled since. I haven't had a period in over a year now. I even was back down to my normal body size within two weeks and I was skinner. It took me about a week to get below my pre pregnancy weight but it took longer for my belly to get back to its normal size.

I was no different while pregnant than I am now (10 yrs later) or that I was before. You will do fine. If anything, having a little one is of great comfort in that people "expect" you will have them on a schedule and thus, YOU TOO will be on a schedule...people hate interrupting "baby's schedule"...which of course will ALSO be your schedule.