THE moment in your pregnancy that no one tells you about

I'm sitting at the table eating spaghetti and with a random strand of pasta, the tears come. It's just a bit too much. Not the plate of food, you know, but life.

Maybe because I usually eat on the couch, but that doesn't work anymore, because I can't sit with a plate. The baby belly is in the way. And when I think of the couch, I think of the new couch we bought and everything we still need to arrange for our move. Curtains that are not delivered on time. Curtains that are way too expensive. We still need a closet and where are we going to hang our coats? It's almost 2019 and in this year... I planned a wedding for 200 people, got married, traveled for three weeks through America, got pregnant, discovered it's twins, bought a new house, and we're moving. Come on, as if it's nothing. I understand those tears for a moment.

Because no matter how well you want to do in your pregnancy, there comes a point where you can't keep it up anymore. You're trying to keep all those balls you normally juggle still in the air. Working a lot. Seeing a lot of friends. Doing a lot around the house. Helping a lot with moving, being with family, buying baby stuff, having fun, being social. The moment is here now, for me, after 24 weeks: I just can't anymore. Everyone thinks: oh, she'll manage that and she'll do that, but actually, it costs just too much energy day after day. I want to enjoy the fact that I'm currently pregnant with twins – and that's not happening.

The hardest part for me is therefore admitting that I can't do everything I used to be able to do. Physically, that's just not possible. I really need to work less. Need to meet up less. You can't go to every birthday, every Christmas party, every work gathering, and every girls' outing. But that's not easy. It's already so exciting, everything that changes in your life with a baby (or two) in your belly, and then also realizing that you have already changed a lot as a person is confronting. Not to mention seeing that body grow. All those ailments that come with it. Embarrassing ailments, yes. A difficult moment in your pregnancy: you can't do everything you did in your old life anymore. Your old life is already a bit over. No one tells you that before you get pregnant. Because no one knows when that moment is exactly.

Feeling a bit gloomy, I go to bed very early. Just read a bit. I grab a magazine from a pile and the first story I read is about a woman who has been trying to get pregnant for years. She tries in all sorts of ways, with many hospital visits, IVF attempts, scary injections, and hormone therapy. It just doesn't work. She really wants a child. I swallow for a moment. And now I know: it's good this way. I'm going to enjoy.