Annnnnd it happened anyways...

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I had posted about possibly getting pregnant a little while ago, and asked whether I should wait until school was over or not. With the help of the insightful comments here, my husband and I ultimately decided to completely wait until school was done. I was really happy with that decision...but I just found out I'm pregnant! Of course that's how it would happen. :roflmao: I had a miscarriage last year that I thought was horrible, but it ended up being what was 'right' at that time, so I'm just going with the assumption that the universe knows what it's doing, and things are happening this way for a reason.

In our original plan, we would have our baby over summer, but with this little surprise, I am due March 1st, smack dab in the middle of the semester. Not ideal, but we'll see how things go! Fortunately Spring Break is in the middle of March. By the end of next semester I'll be about 7 months pregnant, so hopefully I'll know how things are progressing in my pregnancy and if I want to have my baby mid semester, or take a semester off. At the moment my plan is to have the baby mid semester because I have a GREAT support system, I'm incredibly smart (I say this in the most humble way, but it's the internet and will probably get construed differently!), and determined, but obviously that all depends on the health of me and my baby. I am a very healthy person (live the paleo lifestyle, mountain bike, lift weights, don't have a lot of stress, etc) so I'm hoping that will help!

So if there are any other pregnant ladies out there (or men with pregnant ladies), chime in so we can support each other! Of course, any advice from those who have gone through this is welcome.

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Congratulations! Although certainly unexpected, it's such a blessing to have a little one on the way. Being pregnant on top of school will definitely be a challenge, but it is certainly doable. Hopefully, it will be a safe pregnancy and no complications will come your way. My prayers for your family, and good luck in school! Try not to be overly stressed during school as it is not good for you or the baby.

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Congratulations! ! Let us know how it goes for you :-)

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Specializes in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology.

Congratulations! The second cohort ahead of mine had a girl who had her baby 4 days before finals and she did them LIKE A BOSS -- clearly it is doable. It's definitely going to help being in such great shape! Mazltov!

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Thank you guys! I'm really looking forward to this next year of my life. :)

And cracklingkraken, I will definitely keep my stress levels down! Already have my soothing essential oils ready. ;)

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Specializes in Hospitalist Medicine.

If it's any consolation, a classmate of mine had her baby during the semester. She only had the baby on a Wednesday and was back in class on Monday. And she got a 4.0 in the class. I call her Wonder Woman! :)

Good luck & congratulations on your upcoming arrival :D

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Congrats on baby!

I'm just curious, how does it work when you get pregnant and deliver while still in nursing school? I'm about to start a 1 year ABSN and don't plan on becoming pregnant, but am wondering if I'd be kicked out or failed if I had to take some time off..

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Specializes in Critical Care, Med-Surg, Psych, Geri, LTC, Tele,.
Congrats on baby!

I'm just curious, how does it work when you get pregnant and deliver while still in nursing school? I'm about to start a 1 year ABSN and don't plan on becoming pregnant, but am wondering if I'd be kicked out or failed if I had to take some time off..

In my school, they still required the pregnant women to complete the same number of clinical hours. One lady who had her baby during our last term took on extra clinical hours to stock pile them before she gave birth. She only took off less than a week, I think.

My school did the same for those who wanted to go on vacation during school. It was rough for the lady who had a baby but she did pass and graduate with us.

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In my school, they still required the pregnant women to complete the same number of clinical hours. One lady who had her baby during our last term took on extra clinical hours to stock pile them before she gave birth. She only took off less than a week, I think.

My school did the same for those who wanted to go on vacation during school. It was rough for the lady who had a baby but she did pass and graduate with us.

That's essentially the way it worked for us too. Front load the clinicals if you can.

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It is funny how things turn out sometimes. I had 2 women in my class give birth. One returned to class that same week without any problems. The other took a full week off and had some difficulty with making up clinical time (she had a c-section and could not take pain medication needed for that and back issues before clinical) so she took a few weeks off but was allowed to do double time after that to finish on time. If your school will allow you to do extra time before delivery I think that would be excellent. Nice to see another person following the Paleo lifestyle, there are some excellent books of Paleo and Pregnancy you can look at. My advice would be if you think it even might be too much, take a semester off. The stress of school and a newborn is too much for a lot of women, but you know yourself best. Best of luck!

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You guys are seriously so awesome!

zoubisoubisou: My school is not as lenient as a lot of other schools I read about on AN! My cohort is only 30 people, with our clinicals split up into three groups of 10. Because the maximum is 10 students/teacher, I cannot make up any clinical time at all because there is always 10 people in each group. This past semester we had some make-up days at the end of the semester so that students who wanted to take the CNA test would have enough hours (we only had 36 clinical hours for first semester, and you needed 40 for the CNA exam), but I don't expect it happening in the future! I plan on talking to my teachers about it as it gets closer to the start of the semester so I'll know if I have any more options. Hopefully they'll let me front-load some clinicals, but I can't see that happening. The school has to offer 'reasonable accommodations' to me, so we'll see what those are. If I were to take too much time off clinical or take medical leave, I'd be dropped from the program and I'd have to reapply. Because there is a max of 30 students, I'd have to hope that someone in the previous cohort had dropped out so that there would be a spot for me to start in the appropriate semester. (So I wouldn't have to start the whole program over, just the semester I dropped out of.) It seems pretty common for a cohort to lose 1 or 2 people, but I'd hate to have it be full and not get in again! Keep in mind that I am in the traditional program…I can't say I know anyone who has had a baby in the accelerated program, and I'm not sure if it would be possible at my school because it's 5 days/week and you definitely can't miss more than a day.

My goal is to make it to full term, then when it feels right and with the approval from my doctor, pick a week to essentially induce myself using things like herbs, essential oils, pressure points, walking, etc. Then I can 'plan' it so that I go into labor after my last class of the week so I'll have some time before my first class the next week. (We only have class/clinical three days a week.) Obviously we live in the real world and it may not happen, but I can have my hopes up for it!

LoveNeverDies: Hopefully I'll be like the first girl! ;) I agree with you, if I feel like it might be too much in any way, I'll definitely take the semester off! And yes, I'm excited to dig into some paleo pregnancy books! I've already read a couple and look forward to more.

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Specializes in Emergency Room.

Congrats and good luck!

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