I am not a woman, so there is no way I could have known what being pregnant feels like. However, I have been privileged to stay 24/7 with a pregnant woman, not once but thrice. Ipso facto, I can be able to say a thing or two about the morphological, behavioural, and perhaps physiological changes that happen in pregnant women.
In addition to my own experiences, I have stories and personal testimonies from pregnant women themselves or those that have stayed with them concerning my topic - pregnancy cravings. Yes, there is more than enough anecdotal evidence to show that there are some special cravings that come with being pregnant in some women. There might even be a scientific side to it as we will see later in this post.
Before we got the news that my wife was pregnant for our first child, I have always suspected something to be amiss based on certain things she eats or craves. My wife can leave all the delicious foods in the house only to go and buy the same food in a local restaurant talking about 'I just want food that is cooked with firewood'.
One particular event will always stick to my memory. It happened in the middle of the night and that was after it has been confirmed that we will be having our first baby. My wife just woke up in the middle of the night and started sobbing. I woke up a bit scared because I have never witnessed her cry before then. I thought it must have been a bad dream and started consoling her without saying any word. We have a tradition of not relaying bad dreams to anyone in the family, not even your dearest wife/husband.
I was able to calm her down after about 5 minutes.
'It was just a dream, everything will be fine'. I said with the presumption that it was a bad dream that was making her sob.
'No, it is not about a dream. I am hungry and the only thing I feel like eating is boiled unripe plantain.' She replied.
I almost went berserk. I mean, here we are, a few minutes to 1:00 am, and my wife suddenly waking up and started sobbing just because she craves an unripe plantain - boiled. I had to force myself not to react the way I felt because on one hand, there is no unripe plantain at home, and on the other hand, I did not want to spend the entire night consoling an adult.
I once saw a thread on Twitter where married men were sharing their experience with their partner's cravings during pregnancy.
My wife once took a bike instead of following me in the car because she wanted to perceive the smoke from the bike's exhaust.
Mine once woke up in the middle of the night to request Coldstone's ice cream. We had Mr. Biggs's ice cream in the freezer.
We once gatecrashed a burial ceremony because my wife was craving burial's jollof rice and she would not let me rest.
A few women actually joined the thread to confess their own cravings during pregnancies:
I slept on the rug during my first trimester because of the smell emanating from it.
I made my husband to travel about 300 km just to get a specific food.
It is however important to know that these cravings vary from individual to individual and do not apply to all pregnant women as some just go about their pregnancy period without any cravings.
Is there a science side to it?
Some scientific inquiries have been made to see if there are physiological reasons behind the cravings of some pregnant women. While a large percentage of the reasons that have been provided remain hypothetical, a few have been logically backed with evidence.
One explanation that has been given for certain food cravings during pregnancy is nutrient deficiencies, although this remains largely unproven. A pregnant woman that is deficient in a certain nutrient may crave for foods rich in such nutrient. A few investigations to see if there is any form of correlation between craved foods and deficient nutrients have all come back negative.
A change in the activities of the brain during pregnancy has also been fingered in the issue of cravings. Research has shown that some changes occur to the structure and functions of a woman's brain during pregnancy. The brain's gray matter has been found to be shrunk due to the hormonal changes during pregnancy. However, very little to no inquiries have been made to determine the impact of the reduction in the size of the gray matter in cravings.
One established fact, though, is that pregnant women become resistant to leptin at the latter stages of gestation. Leptin plays important role in metabolic homeostasis in pregnant women at the early stages. Ordinarily, leptin is implicated in the regulation of appetite. Being resistant to this hormone at the later pregnancy stage means that pregnant women are liable to have a voracious appetite at some points during gestation. Someone with a voracious appetite will definitely be having different cravings.
Lastly and the most supporting evidence for pregnancy craving is that it is largely psychological. This article by BBC did justice in explaining the psychological aspect of cravings.
What is your experience like during pregnancy? Do you get certain cravings? Have you experienced someone else's pregnancy cravings?
Feel free to share with me in the comment section.
Thank you for reading through.