Is it possible to buy the essential maternity clothing items
for under £100? According to
Bounty, a pregnant woman can get a full maternity
wardrobe for a mere £77.
To be presentable at work I bought some black trousers, a
dress and long jumpers for my biggest months. I preferred wearing jogging
bottoms, trainers and hoodies at home but I never seemed to be able to find
suitable trousers that were quite smart. The most annoying thing was finding
trousers that would neither fall down nor be so tight as to cut off my
circulation. I seemed to spend all my time pulling the trousers up and
adjusting them as I walked. When I found some that fitted, they soon became
uncomfortable as my belly grew. My saviour was a
belly belt but even this was
outgrown in the sixth month!
I ummed and arred about buying a warm maternity coat. Could I make do with a cardigan? But as I do
not have a car and walk most places, I decided to splash out once winter
arrived. I often find myself on a freezing platform waiting for the delayed
train at 6 in the morning and without a warm coat that commute to work would
have been even more miserable. And I am proud (and astonished) to say that at one
stage I was going swimming three or four times a week, so I also bought a
maternity swimming costume (I might have just squeezed into my regular one but
it looked obscene and I would probably have been asked to leave the swimming
pool!). My other essential buy was a maternity summer dress from Jojo maman bebe (which I
actually used for my wedding during my first pregnancy) which I wore everyday for the last few weeks of my pregnancy during the heat wave:
So whilst most of my maternity clothes came from ebay I
still managed to spend about £200, including
- Coat,
£60
- Two
pairs of jeans, £30 each
- Wedding
dress, £20 (!)
- Swimming
costume, £15
I think it would be possible for a pregnant woman to spend a
much smaller amount if she 1) had friends to borrow from, 2) didn’t need any
specific clothes for work or for a wedding and 3) didn’t buy special clothes
for discrete breastfeeding. Still, these have seen me through two pregnancies
and I re-sold a bundle of my maternity clothes on ebay for the grand total of £15.