Travel Planning While Pregnant—or Hoping to Be
A year of family travel uncertainty
Thirty-eight weeks pregnant and just days away from giving birth for the second time, I find myself thinking back to our most recent international trip - taken in the early days of this pregnancy, eight weeks along.
When I wrote over the summer, I was low key preparing for a personal travel-with-kids first: a Europe trip with our newly turned two year old and her raspberry-sized sister growing in my belly.
An entirely new frontier after more than 30 flights with our daughter: first trimester pregnant travel… plus a toddler.
Shuffling through London Heathrow after our redeye at eight weeks pregnant, a smile crossed my face. Only the keen eye of a fellow pregnant lady, I thought, would clock the entire loaf of Trader Joe’s sourdough bread stuffed in my purse, carried across the world.
Ah, the exclusive bread diet of the first trimester. The inability to stomach local delicacies like sardines in Porto, not to mention traveling to the wine region of Portugal while pregnant, was only partially on my bingo card for 2024.
Changes started to take root as we embarked on this next phase of travel with kids. First trimester comfort bread was only the beginning.
Family Planning x Travel Planning
The paradox of planning travel (or, planning anything) while attempting to plan a pregnancy is undeniable.
The ephemeral purgatory of actual pregnancy is pretty obvious, with its months spent physically increasing in size and the inevitable aversion to certain foods. The purgatory of family planning, though, is less visible from the outside. The latter requires two options to be prepared for either outcome at any given time. Pregnant? Go down path A. Not yet? Go down path B.
As someone who can’t not travel, here is how I navigated the uncertainty of this transitional time. And, how I have endeavored to keep the dream of the next destination alive over the past year.
Planning Pregnancy While Planning Travel
I made more careful choices - but continued traveling and planning trips.
During the five (long, to me) months we spent trying to conceive our second, opportunities for trips naturally arose. This begged the question - what can we commit to?
Mexico City and Lake Atitlán, Guatemala were on the table for a weekend getaway in April, just Joe and I; however, we ended up staying stateside at the still admittedly fabulous Jacumba Hot Springs. Why? Because I did not know if I would become pregnant and, anticipating the first trimester nausea, potential risks of illness in these countries (my weak stomach has a history of food poisoning), plus my complicated first pregnancy, a “safer,” driving-distance destination ultimately felt right.
Of course, I ended up not being pregnant at this time. So goes the irony. We could have done the bigger trip. Not knowing pregnancy status during the planning stage led to a more conservative choice, and I can live with that.
Though I was not pregnant when we planned it, I became pregnant before the June/July trip to the UK and Portugal I mentioned above. We booked refundable flights for the entire trip to hedge our bets and only considered Airbnbs & hotels with flexible cancellation policies. The pain of more expensive flights was worth the comfort of knowing we could cancel without repercussion if I became pregnant and, for some reason, should not travel.
Not knowing how long it will take to become pregnant is just one bullet point on the endless list of uncertainties that follow us through parenthood. My goal during this time was to accept the purgatory that is intrinsic to this life stage without allowing it to halt my life.
The last thing I wanted was to look back on a period of time when I could have been traveling as a family of three and to have missed out because I was singularly focused on becoming pregnant.
First Trimester
I took it slower than usual - but still traveled & planned trips to take in the second trimester.
While theoretically a great time to travel, prior to having a belly and some of the challenges that come later term, many of us struggle in the first few months of pregnancy.
I had to nosh on that TJ’s sourdough loaf every few hours to get through the long cross-continental travel day with a toddler. I took more naps than I would have liked on that Europe trip, walked shorter distances (though that was partly toddler-induced), and certainly did not fully indulge in my food and beverages of choice while abroad.
But parenting (/ life) does not exist without compromise. My mantra? I would rather be nauseous and tired in Portugal than at home!
With the success of an early first trimester trip under my belt, I focused my energy on the rest of this pregnancy.
Second Trimester
I took my final trips and paused planning anything new.
It is the golden era of pregnancy for many. We start to feel better, we have an ever-growing bump, and it still feels like ages before the realities of newborn life will hit.
I prioritized two types of trips during my second trimester: a family summer trip to Maine (17 weeks pregnant) and a solo trip to New York in the Fall (22 weeks pregnant).
The summer trip to Maine unlocked my first flight alone with my toddler, something I wanted to attempt before having two kids. It also acted as a last hurrah for tackling long, cross-country flights with just one child.
On the other hand, I find that solo travel during pregnancy is underrated. Whether going from 0 to 1 kid, 1 to 2 kids, or more - with each child born, traveling alone becomes more complex from a childcare and logistics perspective.
I chose to spend a long weekend solo in New York visiting some of my best friends, haunting my old haunts, walking more miles per day than my pregnant California feet could fathom, and having adults-only conversations that would be otherwise impossible with a toddler at the table.
Sure, pregnancy got in the way. Seared into my brain is the worry-stricken face of the poor Uber driver as I vomited into my just-in-case plastic bag on the ride to LAX. “I’m not sick! Just pregnant!” I coughed out between breaths as our vehicle jolted through rush hour traffic.
From a planning point of view, the late second trimester facilitated the beginning of a hiatus.
I was not comfortable traveling pregnant after the point of viability due to my history of premature delivery, and the break in traveling & planning allowed us to refocus on setting up our new home for our growing family.
Third Trimester
Towards the end, I started planning future family travel.
Joe recently mentioned how nice it has been for him not to think about the logistics of traveling over the past several months. I responded quickly by saying there has been a void in my life. We both laughed as I hit “book” on an Airbnb for later this year.
Having spent the past few months nesting and preparing for our family dynamic to change, I am now forming a vision of what travel looks like once baby sister is here.
I am thinking about future family travel in two chunks of time. My maternity leave, approximately four months long, and the time after. With the benefit of second time parenthood, I am now keenly aware of how simple traveling with a baby is versus a toddler. Not to say it’s easy, undoubtedly there is a ton of stuff to bring, but up until about 9 months old we had an easier time traveling than the period from 1-2 years old when mobility hits but comprehension and verbal abilities are still developing.
To take advantage of my time away from work, while remaining realistic that the newborn period is a doozy, we are planning a few trips. A family road trip to the Southwestern US with both kids will be our first outing, likely about two months postpartum.
Next, I have the wild idea to do a solo trip, just me and the new baby, in order to use an Alaska Airlines credit that will expire soon. I will go during the week to capitalize on Joe having childcare for Mila and see how it feels to travel alone with a baby. I am thinking of visiting Northern California for a trip that entails a short flight while changing the vibe from SoCal.
Finally, we have a big cross-country trip to end my mat leave. Who would we be if we didn’t! Back when our first daughter was six months old, we traveled the East Coast for three weeks and hit four different states.
This time, our new family of four will spend a week in New York and a long weekend in Virginia visiting family & friends and attending my brother’s wedding. Speaking of, the cost and space issues of booking lodging as a family in New York City are a thorn in my side as a former New Yorker; more to come on this in a later newsletter.
The forthcoming milestones of these trips have been reinvigorating as I enter this next stage of parenthood. And interestingly enough, I look towards them with significantly less anxiety about traveling with two kids than I have felt in traveling with the first one.
Consider this: that Airbnb I mentioned booking recently? It’s in San Sebastián, Spain for this upcoming summer.
Going into planning our first international family trip to Mallorca, I labored over the decisions. This time, one third trimester date-night conversation with Joe combined with the consultation of a few trusted friends and I was all in on the destination and the timing.
Will we bring car seats overseas? TBD. Where exactly will the kids sleep? We’ll figure it out in due time.
It is doubtful that I will ever be an entirely care-free traveler. My brain overthinks too much for that. Coming out of maneuvering through this year of the unknown and adding an entirely new person to our travel agenda, I have a different goal. To let go and embrace the uncertainty a bit more each time we venture out together.
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