When a gal announces she's currently got a baby baking in her oven, it's amazing how the general population perceives it as an open invitation to throw social niceties out the window (along with some common sense) when it comes to interacting with the latest member of the gestation club. And when the lady doth protest too much at being spoken down to or being asked too personal a question? "Aw hell those are just the hormones talking!" Really? Because I believe my pre-preggo self would be just as piqued at the observation of "there she goes, stuffing her face again!" as I am now. This particular comment sticks with me to this day, due to the unfortunate timing the person chose to make it, which happened to be during the height of my morning sickness. Only an hour earlier I had lost the tug of war battle my stomach and I were having over the 12 cheerios I had gritted down my throat, and having just found an unexpected reprieve from the nausea, I was very happily munching away on some chips, minding my own, when this person thought they'd gaily call the comment out to me like it was the cutest thing in the world to say to an expectant mother.
My pregnancy is one that announced itself before I ever even articulated those first two words of "Guess what?!" My husband and I had this fantasy to make a big production out the announcement of it, but it only took a couple days of being several shades of green one moment to happily skipping down the halls the next to just turn around and drag around like I'm at death's doorstep an hour or two later, before I was outed. Of course, it was almost always at a time when I was edging my way to the closest toilet, that someone would find the cajones to ask me if it was indeed a little bundle of joy that was causing such misery. Since I've never been able to pull off a lie (thanks Mom!) I didn't bother to deny the reason why the bathroom was a new favorite hangout of mine. Amazingly enough, more often than not, the first question typically asked was "Is this a 'happy' event??" I guess you'd look less than happy too if you were about to go stick your face in a toilet that God only knows how many asses have graced since its last cleaning....
Another conversation sticks out in my memory, about 8 or 9 weeks in, where a person informed me, "When you get mean with me, I'll just chuckle and say 'Bless your heart!!'" Confused, I looked at this person and said "Have I been mean to you?" and this person said "Well no, but when you are, I'll just look at you and say 'Bless your heart!'" and then thoughtfully continued on with the explanation "I remember when before you got pregnant, that you said when you did get pregnant, you didn't think you'd be mean." Taking a moment to attempt to process this logic, I decided to ask again, "So have I been mean to you?" and the response? "Well, no, not yet, but when you are I'll just say 'Bless your heart!'" At this point, I decided to go ahead and make my retreat since I knew we were fast approaching the point where my heart was gonna need a pretty thorough blessing.
The other pet peeve I've developed is a certain number of people seem to think they know what's going on with my body and make certain assumptions. For example, you can ask me day in and day out "Have you been craving anything?" and it doesn't bother me a whit. But the person that asks "So what are you currently craving?" using an 'all-knowing' tone of voice just seems to chap my hide. As it turns out, I haven't had any cravings, so acting like you know I'm having them just seems just a tad on the presumptuous side to me.
Surprisingly, I haven't really had to deal with what is a common complaint among pregnant women, which is people touching my belly uninvited. I'm definitely not the type to be perturbed by a friend or family member wanting to reach out and lay their hand on my stomach to feel for a kick or tell the baby hello. I have yet to have a complete stranger attempt it, which is probably where I'd draw my line. As I'm now starting my final trimester of baby baking, I'm hoping that it's simply not an issue that's going to come up for this pregnancy.
Now, it seems that getting knocked up has been pretty popular idea as of late, as there seems to be a bit of a baby boom going around. Being part of a crowd doesn't bother me, in fact at my job I'm one of three (that I know of). What I find disturbing is that there seems to be the assumption going around that because I am and because the others are, it must mean we know everything about each others pregnancies and the respective progression of it. In terms of due dates, one girl was ahead of me, and the other is behind me. The one ahead went into labor and delivered her son just yesterday. As word got out she was at the hospital, people started coming to me to get information on the latest updates. While this girl and I are friendly with one another, we certainly weren't bosom buddies, and while I enjoyed hearing how she was doing as much as the next guy, it's not like I was the authoritative source of information on what was happening over at the hospital. If I hear one more person call out to me and ask how she is doing, I swear I'm going to react in such a way that I'll be needing some profuse heart blessings....
In any case, despite all the assumptions, despite the uninvited advice or the unwelcome lectures on what I should or should not be doing, I've found that I've so far really enjoyed this particular journey. When things get particularly annoying for me, I just try to step back and remind myself that I'm getting these reactions, this advice, these lectures because people are just as excited as I am about the prospect of a new baby coming, and this is their way to be a part of it. Plus I suppose it's the warm-up to the inevitable advice, lectures and assumptions that's going to come my way when pregnancy phases into motherhood.
