Nesting and Retail Therapy

I have a thesis: retail therapy can be a real and effective anxiety aid, especially during pregnancy. No, I'm not saying that because I want to justify being a shop-o-holic! Here's what I mean...

What comes up when you search for a "pregnant shop-o-holic" stockphoto

About two months into my pregnancy, I was a bundle of nerves. I knew I should be elated, excited, totally and completely on cloud 9 that I was going to be a mother. Our baby had been planned (almost too planned even; my husband had to ask me nicely more than a few times to stop obsessing over my cycle calendar during the "trying" stage). This growing child was thoroughly wanted and already surrounded by love. However, I was keenly aware of things like my "advanced maternal age," only a mild but still notable improvement in terminology over the previous term of "geriatric pregnancy." In those first weeks, I spent almost every day thinking about the possibility of miscarriage, obsessing over my nutrient levels, and just generally worrying about every action I took or choice I made. I wanted to be excited about my pregnancy, and at times I mostly was, but I often found myself more cautious and fearful than anything else. But I didn't want to feel this way. I wanted to be excited. I wanted to feel as easily celebratory as the friends and family who had begun to offer me congratulations. 
In a moment of weakness and a desire to claim some of that elusive feeling of excitement, I did the unthinkable: I clicked on a sponsored Facebook ad. 
I know, I know! The horror! Seriously, as just one of many articles reminds us, "Facebook has become the world’s largest marketing company" and they've done so by using all of our activity data to grow its "knowledge of users" so that targeting "gets better and ad click-rates get higher."
There are legitimately good reasons to avoid clicking on Facebook ads like a plague... but I clicked anyway. What I clicked on was an ad for a pregnancy gift box subscription service (one of many out there; I'm not going to do free advertising for the company, but I'll just say that they have garishly bright pink boxes). 
Now, perhaps that makes it even worse; subscription boxes are rarely worth the cost. One often receives unwanted items that will never see use. For many of these services, customers don't know exactly what they’ll receive each month... but, then, that kind of felt like the point. As Michael McCall, consumer behavior expert and chair of marketing at Ithaca College, explained in a Forbes.com article about subscription boxes, "part of the subscription box magic is the thrill of wondering what you’ll receive in the mail each month."
That was, indeed, the "magic" I was searching for. I wanted to feel surprised, to feel celebratory. I was paying for some anonymous group on the internet to send me a pregnancy-present. I was, in a way, buying excitement.
And the crazy part? It worked. I remember the bit of emotional rush I got when I saw the bright pink box on my doorstep one afternoon, my eagerness to unwrap the gifts inside. Besides some spa and pregnancy-comfort items (some which I have used since and some which still sit in their packages unopened), there was also something in the subscription box that I didn't expect: a onesie. That subscription box actually gave me what was officially the first clothing item purchased for my future child.

My future baby's first onesie 

Suddenly, it felt real. That "realness" and excitement also continued to grow the first time I went shopping for baby items at a local consignment store, the first time I pressed "buy" in an online cart full of baby gear, and the first time I opened up a package from my mother that contained the most adorable tiny hats, pants, and shoes she’d bought for the growing child in my belly.
I know I'm not the only future-parent for whom "retail therapy" has had a surprisingly real impact. On the Parent Footprint podcast with Dr. Dan Peters, author Alena Dillon spoke candidly about both her prenatal and postpartum anxiety, and she mentioned that "nesting" and buying items for the nursery helped ground her. One of my co-workers also told me a story about wrestling with her own emotions after she found out she was having a boy. "I remember crying in my car," she explained. What helped her transition into not just acceptance but excitement? "I went out and bought a ton of little boy clothes."

A few of the items my co-worker bought that day

The broadness of this experience made me wonder if there was something more going on than simply the joy of gifts in the mail or the fun of shopping. It turns out, there's some science behind this too. According to the American Pregnancy Association, nesting is the "overwhelming desire" to get things ready for a new baby, and most pregnant people will experience this drive to an extent (though, it is important to note, not everyone will, and there's nothing wrong with not experiencing it either!). However, it's not just those weird pregnancy drives and hormones. For some, it's just having something concrete to focus on rather than their more abstract thoughts. It can be a kind of "exciting mental journey" that helps with grounding.

"Retail therapy" can actually have a real effect on non-pregnant people as well! A 2014 study from the Journal of Consumer Psychology found that retail therapy not only makes people happier immediately, but it can also fight lingering sadness. Another 2014 study by University of Michigan showed that making purchases is an effective way of giving someone a "sense of control" and that those in the study that purchased items reported being "less sad" by more than three times compared to those who merely browsed. The dopamine releases, clinical psychologist Scott Bea explains, when one "get[s] a reward or purchase[s] an item," and it can even release "before you make a purchase, as you’re delighting in all the possibilities.”

The shift from anxiety and worry to excitement and possibility is a powerful one during pregnancy. While we now have what can probably be called "way too much stuff" for our soon-to-be child, I smile as I look at the little toys and imagine him playing with them, or bouncing in his baby seat, or even spitting up and needing to be wiped up with the burp-cloths a friend gave me.

"Retail therapy" is obviously no substitute for real, actual therapy, which I also support and highly recommend! However, it's amazing what the brain can do and how one can refocus... just by going to a store or being suckered in by a flashy Facebook ad.