On Grocery Shopping While Pregnant

Today, I had an adventure at Sainsburys, the UK equivalent of ... hmmm, Publix? Tesco is more like Kroger, so it would have to be Publix, since S'burys is pretty much the same stuff but slightly more expensive. It is also next door to our apartment complex, and since I have to carry the groceries home in my weak, pregnant arms rather than the car, we'll take the slight expense with less hassle.

Grocery shopping while pregnant should have warning stickers or something. In the first trimester, it was really hard because of the SMELL. Everything (at least to me) smelled overwhelming and awful. I spent a lot of time grocery shopping trying to find something, anything, that seemed appetizing. Now that I'm in my second trimester, the danger is that everything looks delicious. Seriously, even dog food smells good walking down the aisle.

Here's the thing about pregnancy cravings (for me): nothing has been bad enough where I was desperate for it. But now that I am slightly underweight and smallish, I feel like it's a free license to eat nice junk. Dried mangoes and pineapples are SO GOOD, but they are also expensive, and I'm unemployed. Going on holiday with my in-laws was awesome, mainly because it was like a foodie vacation in a Cornish fishing village. One night we had a 3 course dinner with 2 courses of lobster, courtesy of my husband. It. Was. Delicious. (Although I paid for it with a REALLY bad case of indigestion.)

Anyway, back to today's adventure. I have never liked fennel. The smell, the taste of anything like fennel, including liquorice, aniseed, star anise, sambuca, et al. make me sick to my stomach. They always have. Today, I was minding my own business, buying some fresh corn, planning our dinner, when it hit me: fresh fennel bulbs.

I did something I'm not proud of, something that I reprimanded my brother-in-law for only a few days ago. I puked on my shoes. It was so fast, there was no way I could even move. The overwhelming smell of fennel is clearly too much for my pregnant belly. Three old ladies and two store employees rushed over to help me, but I just wanted to get my shopping and get out.

Know this, pregnant people: things you don't like pre-pregnancy can become delicious (i.e. mangoes) or evil puke-inducers. This is why grocery shopping is dangerous.