I would say that 1st tri and having a new baby are both absolutely exhausting, but they are a different kind of exhausting and usually you're in very different places in life when you are going through them. I found that 1st tri was exhausting in the sense that I wanted to go to sleep by about 7pm every night, found it hard to function at work during the day, my productivity and just quality of my work was down. I didn't have energy for things I normally would have done. It was a physical sort of exhaustion, like the kind where you just need a nap.
2nd tri and 3rd tri were easy. I felt great and had loads of energy.
But having a new baby is a totally different, more all consuming kind of energy. It's mental and emotional rather than just physical. It's like just being overwhelmed with exhaustion and never being able to sit down or finish a meal or do more than doze off for an hour at a time. It's just different. I wasn't working obviously then, so it wasn't like I had to function at work or use my brain (thankfully). But it was more just the kind of exhaustion where you just want to cry because you're so tired, not like the kind where you just need a nap, if that makes sense. If I had to choose one to never have to go through again though, it would be the newborn stage. At least when you're pregnant, it's only one of you who is tired and the other one can keep life moving along and functioning. When you're both up all night with a baby and trying to adjust to all the changes that come along with being new parents, it's different. It all falls apart a lot faster, I think!
