It was a tough week to be telling everyone we're expecting, because I've been so busy with OTHER things at the same time that it's been hard for me to be excited about stuff (I don't know how excited I'll be, after all, there's a whole lot of responsibility involved with a baby...) ANYWAY, it's becoming apparent that being pregnant and people knowing means a whole lot of things that I wasn't hoping it would mean. Here's just a FEW examples from the last week:
*Being called mom or my personal non-favourite "Preggers" rather than Deb. Suddenly I have completely lost my identity.
*The entire span of my conversations with most people go from "so how far along are you" to "when I gave birth..." and that's about it.
*On the opening night of my play (which I spent hours and months on - based entirely on my skills in theatre and directing) what gets announced to the entire audience? That I'm pregnant. Oh yeah...I wasn't asked beforehand...
*"Are you sure that's good for the baby?" A question I heard from someone who's basically a stranger...how is this your business? Are you really calling me a bad mother?? (If I'm to pull it to the extreme)
*Belly touching...from aquaintances...men...people invading my personal space just to touch my belly, even though at this point, my baby is so LOW down that if someone ACTUALLY wanted to pat my baby I could sue them for sexual harassment.
*Suddenly there's a whole lot of personal space and personal questions that people feel they can ask just because I'm going to give birth to our child (and it has no connection with those people who are invading).
What do I like? That Brad & I are finally both able to accept the fact that we're pregnant. That we can talk about the baby and it's a good thing. That I can look at pictures of the ultrasound and know that little baby's ours (I also love it when people tell me the picture looks like me...and I say it looks like his father, of COURSE). That although I'm tired & feeling just weird, there's still the knowledge that this pregnancy seems to be working, and that's a great thing. God is good, even when people are insensitive.
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6 comments:
AARRRGGG! I SO HEAR YOU!
Know that I am right on board with you disliking all the advice and belly touching going on. I feel like saying half the time... "No that isn't the baby... that's my fat." when people come up an touch my stomach, because even now the baby only comes up to just above my belly button... all the other roundness.. yeah, thats me just being fat... but thanks for pointing it out! And this morning I made the big mistake of letting some of my co-workers see me with a coffee mug... 3 people said "GASP your not drinking coffee are you?!?!" in like less than 5 minutes!
But God is good. And our babies are great! And I tell myself that, that is all that matters at the end of the day.
It's your story, so you are in control of it. Feel free to begin conversations about things that you want to talk about and change the subject when you feel like you need to.
And feel free to tell people to keep their paws off. (Is this like some vestigial good-luck charm thing? "Rub a pregnant belly, and good fortune will magically befall you..."? It's very odd.) You can come up with a nice way of saying it. Something like "I'm so not in the mood to be touched right now" seems to suffice with me! ;-)
I've always been fond of dodging unwelcome hands and saying, "Parking by permit only."
Caryn - I like to think of it as less fat and more my uterus is pushing all my OTHER insides out because my stomach just doesn't have room to stay in when it gets full now that there's all that other stuff going on in there.
Brad - I feel terribly comfortable talking to you - so I feel like I can say things like "I'm so not in the mood to be touched right now". I would like to point out that it seldom stops you from touching me either though. It's the quick, I think they're going for a hug and NOPE...it's just a belly touch that I'm not expecting (or appreciating). I tell people who know me well, others, I just don't know how to react.
Rob - maybe you should market t-shirts with that sign on them...
I have to admit I favour the quick dodge. Or pretend they're trying to shake my hand. I remember a lot more belly touching the first time around, and almost none the last time, so I must have gotten better at the body language that says, Don't touch.
Good for the baby? Of course she's calling you a bad mother. Get used to it. I carry a hat in my pocket so whenever a concerned Grandma tells me my baby will catch cold if it's not wearing a hat, I can whip one on. Then I just pocket it again when she (baby) whips it off in 30 seconds or less, and the Grandma has gone on her way. It's not worth trying to explain myself, in fact, I don't have to explain anything to her.
I almost panicked when Mom sent me a "Mom-to-be" snowman early on with Matthias. Stay Deb. Little Jarvis won't be able to say Mom for a while yet. Preggers is, in my book, such a bad word I wouldn't even "hear" it. Along with others I won't even type. Or answer to.
Enjoy the fact that you being pregnant makes lots of other people happy -- I just realized, the third time around, they're not just happy there's going to be a new cute little baby in the world, they're happy someone else is doing the work!
Enjoy it when people hold the door for you, carry your shopping, stand up to give you a seat, etc. For now, it makes you feel special (and after all, you are really tired), and at the end, you may really need it!
Enjoy the invasion of personal space -- of baby, who is breathing your air, eating your food, kicking your belly (even if you don't feel it yet), and generally making himself at home in your body. It doesn't last long (thank God!) in the great scheme of things.
Lots of love,
Rebecca.
preggers is crass but fun to say. . . I love the euphemistic ones, like "in the family way" myself.
some english guide here in Korea told everybody that it's not OK to say die, so every student I have insists on saying "pass away" almost to a fault. maybe it's a cultural thing, too -- the number 4 is unlucky in Korea because it sounds too close to the word for death.
who knows.
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