It’s hard to be pregnant. I say this a lot. Because it sucks, for most people. I met a woman the other day whose children were 1 and 3 who said “I absolutely loved being pregnant,” and what I said to her was:
“SO YOU’RE THE ONE!”
But for most of us it’s just a time where we eat what sounds good/stays down/doesn’t give us heartburn, and then among other things, the time ends with a baby. Although when I say “ends,” I really mean “begins another stage,” which is the stage of losing the baby weight. For me, it wasn’t only the baby weight that I wanted to lose, it was all the weight that I thought about while pregnant:Â I wish I had been ___pounds thinner before I got pregnant. I thought it would be easier to start lower, so that there would be less to lose later. But I was wrong: it doesn’t matter where you begin. Eventually you won’t like your body. And that’s what they call post-partum.
Since this will be my last time being pregnant, I get an extra boon when I think of losing the baby weight this time. Because I won’t have a year or two before I do this again: I’ll have forever, and to me, that means that I can lose the weight and keep it off. Maybe to me it means I have time, too, time to get back in the swing of eating right and exercising more regularly. As in the rest of my life.
I remember well taking real person clothes to the hospital the first time. As in, an outfit I would have pulled on 10 months prior to giving birth. REALLY! I did! I thought, hey, I’m about to DO THIS THING! Let’s bring on the regular clothes again! Finally! But what happened? Well, my mom did try to warn me by saying “you might still feel 6 months pregnant when you come home,” which was more like 8 months for a couple of weeks. A lot of weeks.
I’ve written before about my terrible body image, far worse now no matter what I weigh than it was before kids. It may be partially a gender thing, although I know a ton of men who have bodily issues, but there is definitely pressure on today’s women to be young and hot and sexy all the time. But most of my bodily issues–that is, the ones that do NOT stem from my family–come from uncontrollable body changes. For me, that meant pregnancy.
So it’s the last several weeks of this, heartburn and not being able to move like I want, weight gain no matter what and swelling. Oh, the swelling. But you know what? I am going to try, just to try to live well and happily, knowing the eternal truth: that this is the end. And you know what? It’s also the beginning.
L’chaim!
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