Little Time Left

At 38 weeks pregnant, I'm doing a little reflecting. I can't wait to meet my little boy, but I'm in no hurry to have him out of his safe first home and in this scary, unpredictable world. I think about him in his little cocoon right now, wondering what he might be thinking. I picture him all cozy and snuggled up tight, wondering if he wonders what's going on out here as much as I'm wondering what's going on in there! I feel his little body come to the surface of my belly, and I touch his back so gently - only a few layers of skin, fat, blood, and uterus separating us. I wonder if he's thinking, "What's that?" And, pretty soon, neither of us will have to wonder at all. How very exciting!

But, in the little time left with a bun in this oven, I am finding myself feeling a little sad, too. Just like in my previous posting about having Sam all to myself right now, here I am with this little guy inside me all to myself. As soon as he comes out, he belongs to the world - to his father, his aunts, his uncles, his cousins, his grandparents, his friends, his teachers, etc. I will have to share him with so many people. So, I'm enjoying having him all wrapped up in me, while I'm all wrapped up in him all to myself.

Call me selfish, but it's the coolest thing - as I've mentioned to Sam - having both of my guys to just me. I can't wait for them to meet each other, of course, but it's neat to know I get them both to myself right now. I know I would much rather have BBJ in my arms and not in my belly, and I can't wait to see his little face and hold his tiny hands, but I'll miss being pregnant with him. I'll miss knowing that he's in the safest place he could possibly be. He's so well protected; I know where he is at all times; no one can cough on him or spread their germs to him; he can't trip or bump his head; he's fully nourished and sleeping well; he's developing more rapidly now than he ever will later.

I also know that as soon as BBJ is born, there is no turning back! There will be no more days of childless life. No more sleeping in until noon, no more running a "quick errand" or going to a late movie at a moment's notice. No more sleeping through the night without hearing every tiny noise. No more doing what I want to do - when I want to do it. No more not worrying about the last time someone else ate or slept or peed or pooped. Even our soon-to-be pediatrician said goodbye to us after an interview a couple months ago saying to embrace this time we have left without a child - he encouraged us to go to movies and go on dates. Of course, we have done those things, and we will continue to do them even with a baby, but it certainly won't be as often or as easy an outing as before.

With the little time left before we meet our son, we are taking full advantage of our baby-less time - cleaning house, shopping for last minute baby items, grocery shopping, preparing meals to freeze, writing our wills, paying bills, writing thank you notes, spending time with friends and family, cuddling on the couch, taking in the dry cleaning, getting hair cuts and car washes, installing the monitor and the car seat, washing baby clothes and sheets, and taking care of as much as we can at work before B-Day arrives. But, I know with the little time left, there's always going to be more to do before BBJ is here. Yet, oh, how exciting that he is almost here - that there is such little time left!

Things No One Should Say to a Pregnant Woman

I love being pregnant. There's something so amazingly special about having this little baby of ours move around inside me, having him with me all the time, watching my body change in order to take good care of him, and awaiting the arrival of my son to enter the world! It really is pretty darn miraculous, and I don't ever want to come across as complaining about something I have wanted since I was a little girl. Waiting for that positive pregnancy test for months and then the grueling minutes that special day was rewarded with the fabulous outcome I had been wanting, so why would I possibly complain about being pregnant at all? The truth is, though, in addition to these excited, grateful, appreciative feelings, there ARE ailments and annoying side-effects of being pregnant. I can completely tolerate those frustrations. What is difficult, though, is the comments I hear - or my friends have heard - that just kinda get under our skin. Specifically, I'm referring to comments made by a) people we don't know at all, b) people who think they know us but don't really, c) people who think they know everything. Typically, the "bothersome-ness" of the below statements is greatly decreased or non-existent if made by best friends, sisters, mothers, a fellow pregnant lady, AND if it's said with concern or curiosity. Those people seemingly get a pass. Sorry, but that's the truth. Why is that? Well, because best friends tell you like it is anyway, sisters and mothers share common genetics so they are more curious or interested in your body as it might pertain to their own, and fellow pregnant people make themselves vulnerable to the same kinds of comments, so it's all okay.

I am not trying to sound bitter or rude in any way, but I wouldn't be true to my purpose in creating this blog if I didn't voice my honest opinions - you know, those opinions that we all really have but don't say or are too afraid to admit. So, dedicated to my original goal of starting this blog, I'm going to be completely honest and forward about what we pregnant individuals can't stand from non-pregnant people in an incomplete list entitled....

Things No One Should Say to a Pregnant Woman:

• "You're enormous!" (This one's pretty obvious to me.) Other comments in this category include: "Are you sure you're not having twins?" or "You sure are getting rounder/pudgier/bigger.")


• "You won't be able to wear THAT for much longer." (And YOU won't be able to talk much longer! No, really.... what's this comment about, anyway? I can't stand people telling me what my future holds - like how much bigger I am going to get, how I'm going to have to do things differently, or "just you wait until . . . " comments. No one knows how big I'm going to get or how difficult it's going to be. Every person's different. My experience will be different than yours, and my experience this time around will be different than my own experience next time. People have warned me about my stretch marks that are on the way, my belly button that will pop soon, and so many other things about doctor's appointments or other physical ailments. So far, they've been wrong. I know I still have 3 weeks, which is a long time at this point, but still... predicting the future is a difficult task; let's just wait and see what happens without your input.)


• "You must be having a girl. Your hips are huge/you have so much acne." (Not really a compliment, huh?)


• "Did you use fertility treatments?" (Many women will just tell you if they want you to know this. If not, it's really none of your business, nor does it matter.)


• "I feel so fat! I'm so out of shape." (You're saying this to ME?!)


• "Your boobs are huge!" (Yep! And, they're gonna get bigger... and uglier.)


• "You're still pregnant?"


• "It's way too early for you to be waddling." (Someone once said this to me and I wanted to hit her. Not only was I probably NOT waddling, but who is she to tell me when it's an appropriate or inappropriate time to walk in a way that is more comfortable for my changing gait?)


• Any horror stories about labor and delivery.


• "How much weight have you gained?"


• "Should you really be eating that?"


• "Aren't you worried about pushing that baby out of you?" (Well, NOW I am!)


• "You look miserable!" or "You look like you can't walk." (Well, growing a person inside you can take lots of hard work. What's YOUR special talent? And, at least I'll be back to "normal" after I push him out of me! )


• "It must be pregnant brain!" (No, really... it's not my hormones making me forget. You really never told me that story before... or asked me to run that errand...or asked me that question. Don't try to get away with remembering something wrong by blaming ME!)


• "You weren't trying, were you?" (I have a good friend who recently told me, about her second pregnancy, "I like to keep my sex life relatively private and having gone through this before I know that my body, medical choices and most things that were once deemed private become very public." Keep this in mind when your reaction to a second/future pregnancy seems a little too shocked.)


• "There's no way you're 8 months along; you're barely showing." (I get this one a lot, and it pisses me off. One person has told me in the same day that I look "only four months pregnant," and then later "you look about six months pregnant" when I was really 8 months. Well, which is it? People probably think they're being nice because it's not like the obviously rude "You're so big" comments, but it only makes me think the person saying it believes there is something wrong with the growth of my child. I'm becoming a mother - code for "worrier." Don't give me a reason to think you think my baby's not growing right. I'll trust my doctor to tell me that my baby and my belly are growing just fine.)
  

I realize this covers a wide variety of topics that should be off limits, and it makes it hard to know exactly what to say to a pregnant person, but I've included these items just as a "heads-up" to protect the innocent. I'm not saying that every person will find these comments offensive; in fact, there are some comments listed above that I'm not really upset by. I'm also not suggesting that pregnant people are entirely too sensitive to handle any of these statements, but you just never know how someone will interpret them, so it's best not to say them at all. Of course, many of these comments were ones I never thought anything of until I, myself, was a pregnant lady, and then I "got it." It's hard to know what goes through the mind of a person who is worried about her baby, worried about her changing body, or worried about how others view her new form without having gone through that experience. I'm sure there will be more for me to learn along the way, later in this journey. . . like the ever-popular complaint many postpartum moms hear, "When are you due?" months after their babies are born, or the comments I know many new moms get right after birth: "You still look pregnant." I'm sure those will annoy me like they annoy those other mothers - I mean, think about it... it took months to get to be this round, it's going to take just as long or longer to get remotely back to the size you were before, right?

Anyway, I just wanted to reflect on some of the interesting comments heard by so many of my friends and me. Do you have anything to add to this list? Oh, and I'd like to thank the ladies who also contributed to this post, whether they explicitly told me comments they heard or if we talked about it in various conversations. So, thank you fellow pregnant ladies: Logan, Lisa, Randi, Julie, Casey, Jenny, Kristi, Laura, and Lindsay. And, well, since this blog is entitled "Journey to the Knot" and has mostly been about marriage and family - I'll also thank my most amazing husband for helping me reflect on why these comments can be so bothersome, agreeing with me, and empathizing when he hears them, too! I love you, Sam! :)

Poor Moms, Poor Dads

"Choosy Moms Choose Jif"

"Kid tested, Mother Approved." -Kix

"Recommended by Dr. Mom" - Robitussin

"Moms depend on Kool-Aid like kids depend on Moms."

"Kid delicious. Mom nutritious." - Nestle Nesquik

Have you ever thought about how society views mothers? If you know me, you know I have - and a lot! The above ads came to me pretty quickly when I thought about how TV commercials help perpetuate the way we view parents. More than how this affects mothers, I've thought about how this affects fathers. I asked Sam the other night, after several "parenting" conversations that had come up last weekend with friends and with family, if he ever gets annoyed that most people tend to look to me when it comes to decisions about our child. It kind of annoys me, so I wondered if it annoyed him. I recognize that women are seen as the primary care-takers of their children, but should we just accept that stereotype/assumption without questioning it? The concern is definitely a feminist one - that men and women should be equals. I'm not complaining about how it makes me feel as a woman; I'm worried about how it makes our men feel as fathers.

The fact is that I want Sam to be just as active in our child's life as I am. I want him to make decisions with me; I want his input and his help; I want him to be just as involved in child-rearing and care-taking as I am. It bothers me when people assume he doesn't care or doesn't have an opinion about something. It also bothers me when people assume I DO. It's kind of the same way I felt with the wedding planning - the original reason I started this blog in the first place. I was not one of those women who had envisioned my wedding day with the minute details already planned out since I was 2 years old. I hated when the vendors would look at me (and not at Sam) with the expectation that I knew the answers to their questions when I may have never thought about what I would like/want. I desperately needed Sam to talk about what he wanted as well. It's pretty much the same thing now. . . our friends and family ask us questions and look to me for the answers - not to Sam.

The worst part is that I understand the stereotype. I work in a school with children, and when there's a problem or I need to talk to a parent, the first one I'd rather talk to is the mother. Is that because fathers, in general, are not expected to know the answers about their own children? Is that because they really aren't involved? Or, is that because I find it easier to talk to a woman? So many internal questions with this one... and, again, what's worse is that my own brother is extremely active in his kids' lives. He is with them more than their mother is. I know many dads who attend parent/teacher conferences and are more communicative than the moms are. And, I know many single dads who are raising their kids on their own, so why would I feel that I can't talk to a dad as easily as I could talk to a mom? I guess I blame society for these messages that dads just don't know what's going on with their kids or don't care - - even though I KNOW that message is not true.

I want Sam and I to be the parents who show up to the pediatrician together, who attend parent/teacher conferences together, who would know all of Baby's friends, his grades, when his next soccer game is, etc. without having to consult with each other. I don't want Sam to feel left out of decision-making when it comes to our child or our family. I just don't want everyone to assume that I'm the only one with knowledge of our child or that I'm the only one making the decisions for our kids.

During our conversation last weekend, we talked about how sexist our society is. The wedding was just as much Sam's as it was mine - and who did people look to when asking questions about what we wanted to happen at this event? Me. This baby is just as much Sam's as he is mine - and who do people look to when asking questions about how we will raise him, care for him, etc? Me. Yet, when this house belonged solely to me, and Sam was in town from school helping me with some house maintenance, we'd go to Home Depot, and who did people look to when asking questions about the house? Sam! The same is true when we were looking at buying a new car last summer. The car was for me, but who did the salesperson ask questions to when discussing preferences or payment plans? Sam!

We both decided, after this interesting conversation, that we really haven't come as far as we think we have (as a society) since the 1950s. This is a problem, in my opinion, for both moms and dads when it comes to parenting. Moms feel the pressure to know everything, to have decisions made, to be the primary care-taker. Dads feel left-out, as if they don't know or care.

I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong, but those ad slogans seem to really favor moms as the primary care-taker and decision-maker. Just watch TV commercials more closely - you might start to notice, if you haven't already, how dads are treated as additional children or non-existent in their kids' lives. Poor Moms. Poor Dads.

The Empathy and the Empathy Belly

Every Thursday in April, Sam and I participated in a Prepared Childbirth Class which took place at our hospital. Each class started with a lecture segment led by our instructor, Jessie. Then, we would watch a video of some kind, and then we would practice relaxation techniques from breathing to massage. Sam and I both learned a great deal about various topics from the stages of labor to postpartum care. We got a chance to talk to other couples, to hear about the hospital policies and procedures, and to voice our concerns and fears. We had a chance to really discuss our hopes, desires, and expectations with each other, as well. One assignment was to delegate percentages of responsibilities for various household and baby care chores after the baby is born - like who is mostly responsible for laundry, yard care, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, feeding baby, bathing baby, house maintenance, etc. Another assignment was to discuss our fears about medical intervention with another couple in the class. During class discussion, we talked about our expectations for who we wanted to be allowed in the labor room, what should happen immediately after the baby is born, and how we wanted to handle guests at the hospital ( as well as how to share that information with our family and friends). I, personally, liked the videos we would watch. Even though they would scare the ba-jeesus out of me (and the other women as we watched women give birth and nurse their babies - both completely natural activities that looked entirely unnatural!), it was really Sam's first experience seeing anything like this. Oh, you should have seen his face - more specifically his eyes - when he'd see such sights - especially just how much of the breast goes into a baby's mouth! Too priceless! :)

I would come home from these classes with a better understanding of what we've gotten ourselves into, and I'd feel understood by the instructor, by the other women in the class, and most importantly, by Sam. Some people have told us that these classes are worthless, and that, in the heat of the moment of labor and delivery, you forget everything you've learned. Well, my response to that is that I don't really care. There's a lot I DIDN'T get out of the class; for example, I already know how I handle pain - and having Sam tell me a funny story will NOT help me in the moment, or having him touch me if I'm hot and sweaty will NOT be beneficial for either one of us. Yet, the discussions and assignments we had during these classes have, at the very least, opened up more conversation for Sam and me to understand each other better.

Throughout my pregnancy, my dealings with the medical professionals has been just that - medical. It's been very black and white, very unemotional. Our classes have allowed us to handle our emotional reactions to the medical side of being pregnant. Honestly, there have been very few emotional supports from doctors in my life during this emotionally charged time. I'm not saying they are un-feeling or not supportive, but no one has really validated my fears and concerns about sustaining pregnancy, about labor, and about delivery with words of encouragement and understanding like, "I know you're worried, but most babies are born healthy," or "I can understand your concerns, but there will be so many people to help you through this," or "I will be right there with you helping you when you're scared." Maybe it's my counseling background that makes me just wish these medical professionals would be a little more empathic to the fear and worry of this scary, new event in a woman's life.

Sam agrees with these comments, as once I have voiced them to him, he nods and mirrors my concerns. He has told me he is just as scared and worried as I am. He worries about me, and he worries about our baby. He doesn't want to see me in pain, and he wants to know what he can do to help me through it all. I'm so grateful that he seems to get it all; even if he doesn't have to be the one to go through it all personally, he certainly seems to empathize with what I'm saying and sees my perspective as best he can.

One additional way that Sam was able to see my point-of-view, even if not exactly the same way, was the Empathy Belly experience in our last class last week. I've posted some pictures below, so you can see how he was given the opportunity to wear a weighted belly and breasts to feel the cumbersome pregnant body. Most of the men in the class put the belly on, tried to pick something up off the floor, and then passed it along. I asked Sam to just experience what it's like to lay down, try to turn over, and then to get up on your own. He had quite a reaction to this experience - saying, "Oh, wow! That kinda hurts my back!" The other women in the class laughed a little, too. And, although these activities don't hurt my back like he experienced, he got to experience the awkward change in maneuvering your body a different way when you're pregnant. Sam has always been helpful, and he's been even more helpful while I've been pregnant - even more than I really need him to be. I can bend over, I can reach things, I can carry things, I can get off the couch, etc., but it's just more difficult now. So, it's nice to know that he's there to help, and now, after the Empathy Belly, he's even more understanding of just how awkward my body feels for me - without thinking I'm weak or "playing the pregnancy card."

So, whether or not others think these classes will benefit us on B-Day, they were certainly well worth it in the meantime and in helping both of us understand the process, the body, and the emotions we are both feeling. And, well, we got these great pics, too! Thanks for being such a great sport, Sam! Baby will love these pictures one day - of his mommy and daddy being "pregnant" at the same time! :)