The bump arrives.
>> Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Complaining about body image while pregnant automatically groups you with the women who keep smoking, who complain about their babies' sex, who just aren't appreciating the whole thing enough because a lot of women can't even get pregnant so how dare you do anything but smile?
But I wasn't expecting to be pregnant right now, so when a stranger stopped me yesterday and asked if I'm pregnant, my first impulse was to be upset. It took a few minutes of rationalization, going back and forth between "I am pregnant, but she didn't know that for sure, but I actually am so she wasn't saying something negative about my body, but what if I wasn't pregnant and she'd asked that and been wrong, but I AM so that's not an issue," before I really came to grips with the fact that I am now--officially--showing.
One of the anchors at my station is also pregnant and only a few weeks ahead of me.
I also come up to this woman's belly button.
No matter how good you might feel about yourself, any smidgen of confidence easily floats out the window when you're side-by-side with a local celebrity giant who gets voted on Nashville's Most Beautiful People List every year. She's still not showing at all. At all. I asked her yesterday, the same day a stranger had noticed my bump, how it was that she wasn't showing even the slightest bit on her second child? Her answer was that she's just so tall, there's too much room in there for it to grow.
Women can't help compare themselves to each other. It's in our DNA, or at least an undefined portion of our DNA created by an image-obsessed society. One girl I know said she didn't start showing an inch with her first pregnancy until she was 7 months. Another swore to me she was in bikinis for all three trimesters, and no one ever noticed she was pregnant (I'm not saying I'm jealous of that girl, 'cuz to be honest that freaks me out just a little).
But here I am, 4 and a half months, five feet tall, with strangers already reaching their grubby paws at my convex stomach.
And I know it makes me sound like a selfish bitch to confess feeling uncomfortable with gaining constant weight and watching my shape shift without my control, but there it is. At least I quit smoking.
4 comments:
Maybe this will make you feel better:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/missmarovich/sets/72157617228268510/
I started showing the day there was two lines on the pregnancy test. I'm only sort of kidding... There are just some women that barely show and some (ME!) that look like they have a freakin prosthesis attached to their front by the end. And yes, there was only one baby in there.
Ha! You don't sound remotely like a "selfish bitch"! In fact, you sound incredibly thoughtful to even think of the fact that other women can't get pregnant.
And I had to get new pants at 12 weeks.
Miss M- I think you have an adorable bump! It's so unarguably bump-like. Whereas mine, right now, kind of looks like a quasi-bump/I ate one-too-many twinkies. I either look really bloated or with child. I want one or the other!!
Variations- I would have needed new pants then if I actually wore pants. But I hate pants. I always, always wear dresses in the summer, and luckily have been able to get away with mostly that. But I've now broken down and bought some maternity pants. The time has come.
I most detested the phase when I just looked fat instead of pregnant. I'm only 5' 2ish, so I showed pretty early in all of my pregnancies. With my second one, my stomach muscles were like, "Oh! We know what this is all about - let's just relax and let it all hang out right away." So I was showing about 2 days after conception...
I honestly think it's so much better to just be honest about all of this. Not all of pregnancy is wonderful awe-inspiring stuff. Some of it sucks and women who won't admit that just make me annoyed.
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