The first three months of pregnancy, a time that parenting magazines and Hallmark cards often portray as magnificent and carefree, can actually be a wretched experience for many women.

As many as 90 per cent of mothers-to-be experience some degree of nausea and vomiting, and scientists have long speculated about what, from an evolutionary standpoint, the function of all that unpleasantness might be. The leading theory has to do with food.

I hadn't thought much about how many kids I wanted until my first was born. Immediately I was confronted with decisions: Should I get rid of my maternity clothes? Should I be saving these newborn onesies?

My partner (now husband) and I pretty quickly decided we were all-in on the baby thing and we'd go for another. But when? A friend I asked for advice told me she spent four years blissed out on motherhood with her first until one day she just felt her ovaries screaming, "I need another baby!" Before she was done, she had four more.