Sharing My Controversial Pregnancy, Birth, and Travel Plans!

Tune in or read the blog version below!

 I am 20 weeks pregnant this week, which means my pregnancy is halfway over!

Time has flown by the past few months, and I feel like I’m still at a point where I look bloated rather than pregnant. I haven’t officially popped yet.

No one in public has been able to recognize that I am pregnant, so I’m still waiting for bump to fully make an appearance.

Pregnancy Updates

if you missed on Instagram, we are having a baby boy! I am so freaking excited and I really had no gender preference at all.

For the longest time, I thought I was having a baby girl, but what was really crazy was two days before getting my blood test back with the gender results, I had a dream that I opened up the results in my email and that it said boy.

I write down my dreams very often, especially when I have really vivid ones like that, so I have a note from two days before I got my test results saying “I had a dream that I am going to have a baby boy.”

And lo and behold two days later I get the test results back and it’s a baby boy.

Thankfully I’ve had barely any pregnancy symptoms, I’ve had no morning sickness, barely any food aversions.

The only thing is I did have to start taking iron supplements because my iron levels were on the low side. So I’m taking these supplements every day and everything else is going really well.

I feel amazing and I’m just really excited for this new chapter!

Controversy Around Birth and Travel Plans

So in today’s episode I want to kind of have a heart to heart, friend to friend, sharing my pregnancy, birth, and travel plans for the next few months, all of which are quite controversial as I have learned.

I’m going to be just answering really common questions that I have been getting and a lot of which has come with a lot of pushback, especially from my American friends, and I’ve I mentioned this in a past podcast episode, that when it comes to pregnancy and babies, people can be so opinionated even if they don’t have children themselves.

It’s just like for some reason one topic that anyone and everyone think that they have a right to kind of interject and offer their opinion when it wasn’t even asked for or it wasn’t even welcomed.

If you are on this path or if you are planning to eventually have children in the future, I just want to kind of give you a snapshot of where I am right now and hope that it serves as a guiding light for those of you who want to take a more untraditional route with your life, with your birth plans, with your travel plans, and with your new family.

Living Against The Norm

I do want to preface this episode by saying that my plans are controversial because it isn’t the norm.

Similarly to how my life can be controversial, my business can be controversial, only because people tend to get triggered when they see something that is just so different from their own, right?

Like when I was working in corporate and I told people I wanted to quit my job and start my business, to them it seemed so frightening.

Over time what I’ve learned to accept is that I don’t live a normal life. I understand how it can be so foreign to some people.

After so many years of doing this, there’s no expectation that my pregnancy, birth and travel plans are going to be normal.

Like at this point, they’re going to be different and they’re going to be somewhat controversial.

I haven’t lived in America for over six years now, so I’m not going to be giving birth in America. I will say most of this pushback I’m getting is from Americans more or less only because they feel like I should identify as one for the most part.

But ultimately the people giving me pushback are the ones living in their own narratives.

So if you are planning to have a baby, I do want to be a light to those of you who have followed me since day one, who have tuned in since day one, because of my unconventional ways. So let’s get started.

Am I Still Going to be Traveling?

The answer is, of course, yes.

I am currently in England right now and we will be flying to New York next month and then we’re planning to fly to Brazil in December after a few weeks visiting friends and family in New York for Thanksgiving.

I truly don’t believe that you need to be stationary as in in one country or one place for the entire duration of your pregnancy.

It’s not recommended to travel really early on and in your third trimester, but I was still traveling my first trimester. I was in Japan when I found out I was pregnant and then we went to Rote and then we went to England and everything was fine.

I am going to limit my international travels, my third trimester however, only because I can imagine it being somewhat uncomfortable like being on long haul flights with a giant belly.

But I still have plans to travel within Brazil during my third trimester for flight times no longer than like an hour.

I am definitely still traveling I am minimizing it when and where possible, but I feel really comfortable with flying.

It keeps me happy, keeps my baby happy, and I am a fit individual, I feel like if it doesn’t stress me out, I’m just going to be living life as normal and doing what makes me happy.

Surfing While Pregnant

The next most common question I’ve been getting is, are you still surfing?

And the answer is also yes, however, I surfed this past weekend and the waves were not as Ideal as in the waves were kind of messy.

It was closing out on shore It just wasn’t great longboarding conditions, and it was also in England so it’s it was really cold, and my fin my surfboard fin hit my calf.

It startled me pretty badly because I usually never really get hurt or injured in any way, like I’m really good at holding onto my board, so when that happened, I kind of took it as a warning, like even though I’m a really good surfer, when the conditions are less than optimal, it’s out of your control, right?

Where I Will Give Birth

Now I feel like I can finally share the plans are somewhat concrete now: we are planning to have the baby in Brazil!

That is why we are going to fly there in December. The baby is due March, very early March, kind of like late February, early March, and it’s going to be summertime there.

They have amazing private hospitals that we’ll just pay out of pocket for, and the baby will get Brazilian citizenship because he will be born on Brazilian land.

We’re also going to be flying business class so making sure that every moment of the journey is comfortable. I can lay down flat. I’ll probably take an overnight flight.

I’m feeling really excited by this idea and just being in warmth, probably spend a lot of time by the beach.

That is really important to me and that’s how I kind of envision the first few months with my baby, and that is how I’m going to make it happen.

I am currently taking Portuguese lessons, and if those of you who have been listening from day one (first episode is linked here) remember, this podcast was birthed in Brazil.

We spent nine months there during COVID, and so we’re very familiar with the Florianópolis, and we are also excited to explore other parts of Brazil as well.

My Birth Plan

This is also quite controversial because this option actually doesn’t even exist as an option in the States, and that’s a whole other can of worms topic that I’m not going to dive into now because I just have so much to say about the American healthcare system.

But anyway, I am choosing to have a planned cesarean, also known as an elective cesarean, for the birth of this baby, where you essentially pick a date and they perform a surgery on you to remove the baby.

This ideally won’t require any active labor on my part, usually you try to kind of schedule it before you physically go into labor.

And of course, there’s always a risk that I go into labor before but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

I align the most with this option personally, it’s a very personal choice.

What’s really incredible and kind of funny the more we did our research, in Brazil in the hospitals, they actually have photographers, videographers, hair and makeup artists, and private viewing rooms for your friends and family where you can watch the birth from another room.

It’s just treated so differently, you can hire all these people and kind of make it a production.

They compare it to having a wedding and it’s something to be celebrated. You want to look beautiful for it.

So I’m diving in headfirst. I’m like, yes, give me all of that, it’s going to be so fun.

I know it’s probably unheard of in most parts of the world, but that is the beauty of being able to travel and be exposed to so many other cultures around the world.

Balancing Business, Traveling & Being A Mom

Next question, how do you plan to balance running a business, traveling, and being a mom?

My answer to that, because I honestly don’t know and won’t know until the time comes, but I’m going to do the best that I can given my resources and circumstances.

That is a mindset that I’ve carried with me throughout my whole life, just being resourceful and finding the best case scenario and finding the best solution.

In this case, because we’re going to be in Brazil, thankfully we plan to hire help and have a night nanny and maybe a cleaner and a chef if needed.

Thankfully also Ragz (my partner) and I, we are able to work from home and be with our newborn. We don’t have jobs to go back to. We don’t have a set amount of maternity leave. We’re able to stay home.

And so I think that will make a big difference, but I am so willing to accept help when I need it.

I’m very good at pinpointing what I need help with and then finding the solution to that, so I’m not going to be egotistical and be like, I can do it all myself.

I’m going to prioritize my sleep and my mental health and my sanity. So whatever and whoever can help me with that, I am more than happy to bring on board.

I can’t give a definitive answer about balancing business traveling and being a mom right now.

I’m probably going to tackle the being a mom part first and then see how I feel about that, so we will revisit that question when I can give a better answer!

Will I Take Maternity Leave?

The answer is hell yes! I’m treating maternity leave differently.

As of now and for the past few months, we’ve been setting up the business to be running mainly on passive income.

We’ve been really scaling our passive income streams because I know that i’m probably going to want to spend as much time with my newborn as possible.

And I don’t want to be pressured to have to show up on social media, have to take a bunch of calls every day when I have a newborn.

So we’re going to have this baseline, very comfortable level of passive income coming in.

And I’m still going to be sharing what I feel like sharing. I’m not going to be pressured to share for the sake of generating income and making ends meet, but I’m going to be sharing my motherhood journey.

I will still probably be sharing on this podcast because I love recording these episodes and it really is so cathartic because it just feels like I’m talking to a friend and like updating all of you on my life.

I think it’s a very pivotal chapter for those of you who are also full time travelers, digital entrepreneurs, and who maybe wondering like, how is it going to work with motherhood or parenthood?

So I do want to keep an open and honest conversation, all the ups and downs.

So I will be sharing, I still will be working in the parts of my business that don’t feel like work and I’m not pressured to kind of perform.

But then other than that, I won’t be taking on any new clients, I’m not going to be hosting group programs, I don’t need to actively be working in the business.

That is my concept of maternity leave. Setting it and forgetting it, bringing multiple five figure months in of passive income, spending time with my child, and then also filling my own cup by sharing with all of you what the new chapter looks like.

Travel Plans With Baby

Next question is, where are you planning to travel to next year? All of these travel plans are tentative, of course, and we’ll see how everything goes.

But as of right now after Brazil, we’re probably going to fly back to New York to introduce the new baby to all of my friends, then we will fly back here to England where the baby can meet his grandparents on Ragz’s side.

And then we will probably head back to Rote, Indonesia because hopefully by then all of our land that we purchased will be under our name and then we can start building which is another project that I’m really excited about in 2025!

Expected Challenges

Last question, what challenges do you anticipate with pregnancy and travel?

Honestly, the only thing I can think of is a crying baby on a plane. I’ve been told that babies are really easy to travel with when they are newborns, because they just sleep all the time, and I’m really hoping for that.

But with any airline, babies travel free before the age of two, and so I guarantee you, the baby will be very, very well traveled.

We’re planning for him to visit four continents before the age of one, so I think it’s going to turn out even better than I can currently comprehend or imagine right now.

I’m the type of person that focuses more on the opportunities rather than the challenges. I think other people, many, many other people have done it before me, traveled before me, traveled with an infant before me, so I’m sure if they can figure it out, I can too.

Conclusion

Those are all of the questions that I will be answering for today. If you have any other ones, feel free to DM me on Instagram and ask away.

I know that some of my answers can be controversial depending on what point of view and where you’re coming from.

I’m happy to share more of my plans, more of why I’m planning for these things, and what I’ve researched to get me here.

As always, thank you so much for tuning in, and I hope you all have a fantastic week. Love you all!

If you’ve enjoyed this episode, it would mean so much if you could leave a review on Apple Podcasts. This helps us spread The Wanderlover mission to those who need a dose of inspiration today.

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