Mindful Journaling: 30 Prompts for Your Pregnancy Journal

Mindful journaling with a pregnancy journal can help a pregnant woman remember this special time.

Tips for Your Pregnancy Journal

Indeed, many studies show that journaling can help pregnant women process their emotions, list their fears, better remember events and prepare for pregnancy better. However, for some, the idea of free-writing can be intimidating and difficult. As such, here are 30 prompts for your pregnancy journal. Use these prompts to get you started as you describe your experience with pregnancy.

1. How did you know? What made you take that pregnancy test? Was it something physical? Emotional? Both?
2. Do you know when? Do you know when your baby was conceived? Was it particularly special, or just a run-of-the-mill event?
3. The first entry. Describe your thoughts, feelings, fears and hopes, and dreams. What does being pregnant feel like to you? Use your pregnancy journal to describe these first feelings.
4. The first moment. Describe the story of how you found out you were pregnant with your child. You may want to use this one later!
5. Are you sick? Morning sickness is a common experience. Use your pregnancy journal to describe how you are feeling—both physically and emotionally.
6. Reactions. Telling people you’re pregnant can be a blast. What has the reaction been like from your friends and family?
7. Dreams. Not hopes, but actual, strange dreams, which are very common for pregnant women. Have you had any weird dreams? What have those been like?
8. What are you looking forward to? What things are you most excited about?
9. What will you miss? Being a parent means losing quite a bit. What are you going to miss about your child-free life?
10. The heartbeat. What was it like to hear your child’s heartbeat for the first time? What did it sound like to you?
11. THE FOOD. Cravings! Cravings! What are you craving and why do you think you are craving that food?
12. The preparation. As you get closer, describe your feelings. Your baby is on the way soon—how are you preparing? What are you packing? Did you take any classes?
13. The nursery. Putting together the nursery can be an amazing and exciting experience. Record these feelings.
14. The anticipation. Everyone handles the anticipation differently. How does it feel to be getting closer and closer? Have you hit the “I can’t wait” phase, or are you terrified of what will happen once you give birth?
15. Imagine your labor. Write down your ideal labor experience. How do you want your labor to go? Describe the details, the sensations and the emotions.
16. The reactions of others. Imagine how others will react the first time they see your child after he or she is born. What do their faces look like? How does it make you feel?
17. Your fears. You are giving birth to a child who will be born into a strange and frightening world.
18. Baby names? What baby names are you considering and why?
19. Terrible baby names! Pregnancy is stressful, and you need a laugh. What is the worst baby name you could come up with, either because of the name itself or the initials that the name would give your baby?
20. Your social group. No pregnant woman can do it alone. What sort of support are you getting? This is your journal, so be honest. Who is a hero, and who has disappointed you?
21. Is the baby moving? What does that movement feel like? And how does it make you feel?
22. What lessons do you want to incorporate into your parenting? What have you learned from your parents that you want to apply to your kids?
23. Is it what you thought it would be? What about pregnancy did you know, and what is a surprise?
24. In what unexpected ways has pregnancy impacted your life? What is new, and what isn’t?
25. What do you want that you are too embarrassed to ask for? Wouldn’t a bidet make your life easier right now?
26. What part of your body hurts the most? Your feet? Can you even see your feet?
27. What do you wish people would stop saying or doing? Do you hate when people rub your belly? Ask if it’s a boy or a girl?
28. What are you looking forward to doing again? Go for a run? Eat with reckless abandon?
29. What is your birth plan? Do you have one?
30. If your partner finds this journal—what do you want him or her to know? What do you want to say to your partner about how he or she may have supported you, or areas in which he or she may have let you down?