Maternity pants or a size up?

[Anonymous]

I'm almost 12 weeks, and my pants are getting a bit tight! I don't look pregnant though.

Would you recommend switching to maternity pants (would they be too big?) or just going up a size?

I'm usually a size 4-6

Thanks

[Anonymous]

I'd go with the maternity pants-- then you can wear them through your whole pregnancy. You will outgrow a size up.

[Anonymous]

I bought a Bella Band and was able to wear my pants for quite a bit longer...I also had some pants that were a size bigger, to that helped. Maternity pants are very comfortable...I found that my size stayed the same at the Gap....just the maternity style, but same size as normal.

[Anonymous]

For the early months--maybe up to month 5 if you are naturally thin, you can just size up. That is what I did and then used a rubber band or Bella band. Once you hit month 6 or 7, you're gonna want elastic and by month 8 or 9, you'll probably want full belly support. The nice thing about having a few size up pants is you can wear them after the baby is born, since you will still look about 3-5 months pregnant for a few weeks (or at least most normal/non-physically gifted women do.

[Anonymous]

I am almost 21 weeks and still wearing pants 1 size up. I have a pair of maternity jeans that I wear but I prefer non-maternity clothes.

[Anonymous]

I recommend the bella band, it's cheap and you can use it with anything and everything. I actually have the tummy sleeve from motherhood maternity (same thing as bella band, just different name). It cost $17 and I can use it with all my pants without having to buy maternity clothes yet.

[Anonymous]

For work, I bought a couple of pairs of pants that I would ordinarily have bought even if not pregnant, just two sizes bigger than usual. They're far, far, far better made than any maternity pants I've seen yet - especially ones in the same price range - and the fact that they're pants I would ordinarily wear makes me feel a little bit better about them. I bought them around 15 weeks, when I started not really fitting well into my regular pants, and they still work (unbuttoned, with a Bella Band), at 28 weeks. For outside of work, I've got a few pairs of really cheap non-maternity Old Navy pants from size 6-12 (I'm ordinarily a size 4) that will still fit in the spring after baby is born but before I can fit into my regular clothes again.

Most maternity pants didn't fit me right at all at 12 weeks - it really took another month or 6 weeks.

[Anonymous]

Hi there,

So far I've only had to size up (but of course now it's dead of winter and I'll be delivering in July, so I'm reluctant to size up on too many jeans and cords since I"ll hardly be wearing those in July). I was a 2 before pregnancy, so I didn't find any maternity wear that didn't make me look like a freak in too-baggy clothing. I noticed that Gap Maternity has lots of cute things in smaller sizes (if that applies to you). They also have "normal" sizes, too.

I bought a few pairs of jeans and pants from gap maternity just this week, actually. Some of those are just designed to be stretchy and lower in the front (higher in the back so you don't get the plumbers rear end problem). I bought them in my pre-pregnancy size with no sizing up and they fit like a glove and dipped below my belly. Added bonus, lots of things are on sale right now.

Another thing, sweater skirts and dresses stilll fit me right now -- too bad it's just too cold to wear them!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm almost 12 weeks, and my pants are getting a bit tight! I don't look pregnant though.

Would you recommend switching to maternity pants (would they be too big?) or just going up a size?

I'm usually a size 4-6

Thanks

I'm 17 weeks and definitely busting out of my pants, but only at the waist. So I wear my pants unbuttoned and fashion a hair band or rubber band around the button through the button hole. The result is that my pants sit lower, but overall work just fine!

[Anonymous]

I also recommend the Bella Band. I wore mine with my pre-pregnancy pants until about 24 weeks or so. Then I switched to maternity pants, but the belly wasn't big enough to hold them up, so I wore the Bella Band with my maternity pants. And now that I'm about 5 weeks away from my due date the maternity pants finally stay up on their own

[Anonymous]

how do the bella bands work? i mean, isn't it lumpy then when you have a shirt or sweater over top of it?

[Anonymous]

I'm 17 weeks and bought a coupla sizes up. NOT looking forward to maternity clothes shopping -- went into a store 2 weeks ago and had a minor freakout (but did come out of there with a pair of low-waisted pants I have yet to put back on).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:how do the bella bands work? i mean, isn't it lumpy then when you have a shirt or sweater over top of it?

They're really not lumpy, unless you wear really, really tight shirts. And I fold mine down. I'm 17 weeks and have been wearing one every day for about 4 weeks. They've worked very well for me, I highly recommend! (and second the motherhood maternity ones, which I belatedly discovered were a lot cheaper than the bella bands but exactly the same thing)

[Anonymous]

I started out as a 4 also and wore regular pants until I was almost 6 months pregnant. I tried maternity pants, but they seemed to be made for really pregnant women, and the waist band was huge. I'd go with regular pants in a bigger size. You can wear them again post-partum before you loose all the baby weight.

[Anonymous]

Just want to put in a vote for stretchy-waist pants! Whether they're "yoga pants" with a generous waist or knit maternity pants, I have found my stretchy-waist pants to beat "waisted" maternity pants at every turn.

A dear friend gifted me with a pair of black knit maternity stretch-waist pants from Old Navy that are absolutely they best piece of maternity clothing I own -- comfy enough to wear around the house, substantial enough fabric that I can wear them out as "nice clothes," and they have fit at every stage from barely-a-bump to my VERY large 8-month state.