Before I fell pregnant I was a tea addict. Every day without fail I would wake up, pop the kettle on, have a cup of tea and get on with the day. At work, colleagues would describe me as a Tea Jenny, forever popping the kettle on and very rarely seen without a cup of tea on the go. If someone was stressed, simple, offer them a cup of tea. It’s the good old British go-to when you don’t know how to help someone. Essential office etiquette!
So when the pregnancy test showed up those lovely two little lines, one of my first thoughts was (after the sheer excitement and joy of course!) “but I’ll have to give up tea.” I remember lamenting to my best friend that I was really scared I was going to harm my baby because I just didn’t know I was going to give tea up. I can’t stand decaf tea so that wasn’t an option. I was genuinely worried.
And then one morning it all changed. The thought, the sight, the smell of tea made me want to throw up. It felt like the most disgusting thing in the world. It was so bizarre. Thank you body for not making me go through the pain of weaning myself off my much beloved cup of tea.
My poor boyfriend and friends felt like they didn’t know me anymore. “You don’t want a cup of tea? But you love tea.” I know, I know. I couldn’t believe it either! I was also slowly learning that I really was apparently a tea addict.
But with it still being before the 12-week mark, a whole new panic set in. How was I going to explain this to my work colleagues? Surely they’d know straight away as soon as I uttered those never heard words of “no thanks” to the question “do you want a cup of tea?” It was simply unheard of!
So after a short while of accepting cups of tea but not actually drinking it, “Oh I forgot that was there, silly me!” and carrying on the pretence of making and drinking tea, it all became too much. I just couldn’t take the cup of tea staring at me from the corner of my desk anymore. Combined with the ever-present nausea, it just felt like the tea was taunting me, and what was once my best friend, had now become a detested enemy so out came Plan B – a rather elaborate lie about migraines which was so long and boring that people had probably forgotten what they had asked me in the first place. Bingo!
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