8 weeks

Just because I stopped nagging at my husband, that is not to say I stopped nagging altogether. The new victim is my doctor.

Out of desperation, in an effort to point out the symptoms I keep asking her about, she asked me if I was experiencing mood swings or anxiety attacks.

Mood swings? But you see, that wouldn't be the differentiator, doc, because mood swings are my natural state of being! You mean I should expect to become even more neurotic? Is that even possible?

Quite the reverse actually. I think this pregnancy is having an oddly calming effect on me:

1) The daily bouts of road rage have disappeared. No matter how bad the traffic is, I no longer find myself feeling intense - if temporary - hatred of everyone who happens to be using the roads at the same time as me.

2) I am more patient with clients at work. Ironically, I am doing less work for them. For one thing, I don't spend hours researching my projects at home anymore. I've lost the ability to read for any length of time without falling asleep. It's hard enough at the office, but when I'm comfortable at home? Forget it.

It appears the two are related. I used to regard every project as my baby, becoming more royalist than the King, so to speak. And so, stupid choices by the client, which I saw as detrimental to the project and all my hard work, were particularly galling. Now I am more laidback. I have less at stake. And ironically, it's making me a more pleasant person for my clients to deal with!

3) My sister doesn't get to me as much as she used to. Even though she's going through a remarkably unpleasant phase at the moment. To be honest, I am much less interested in her at the moment. Not nice I know but I really can't be bothered right now. And so her usual antics just slide off.

4) Am I less obssessed with my husband? He would say so. I wouldn't agree.

The reason he thinks that is again ironically enough, that I am so much more tolerant and understanding with him. I am not as sensitized and reactive to every perceived lack of attention on his part. Truth is, I feel like I can forgive him anything right now because he got me pregnant!

I miss him a lot, in more ways than before. But missing him doesn't make me angry with him anymore. It makes me want to do nice things for him. Like email him nude photos - something he's asked me to do before and I haven't exactly refused to do but just never had the nerve to actually do. Not completely nude anyway.

Now I do it, because we don't live together and I don't want any changes in my body to be a complete shock to him when we see each other next. So I'm trying to send him one per week.

Then we have long telephone conversations about how and where I have or have not changed.

So far he thinks my breasts are getting bigger. I don't argue because bigger breasts are something I've always wanted and it so obviously turns him on. But they don't really feel any different to me. I'm still the same cup size and everything.

Our relationship is less confrontational now, more flirtatious and sexual and light-hearted. Which you would think a man would appreciate.

But my reduced appetite for fighting seems to confuse him. It's a sobering thought to think that I have expressed my love for him by being angry at him for so long, that when I am not angry he feels less loved somehow.

Talk about Pavlov conditioning! Poor K.

Not sure how long this calm will last though if I don't start feeling those symptoms pretty soon. Here's hoping..............