Sunday, July 05, 2009

10 things you shouldn’t say or do to a pregnant woman

or to be more specific THIS pregnant woman especially if you like all of your body parts attached, what can I say I am a bit short tempered at the moment, and since these are the things that are annoying me the most I may as well journal about them so when I feel more normal I can scrap about them. Who knows maybe one day when the boys have pregnant wives/girlfriends of their own they will appreciate knowing all the things that they shouldn’t say lol. Or maybe once they are written down they will seem less significant and I might be able to just ignore the comments from now on, instead of them being something else that stresses me out. If nothing else this is just a much better thing to journal about than say Mark going out yesterday to get Lukas a happy meal and being knocked off his bike by some idiot in a car, how lucky to walk away with nothing more than a trashed bike, cracked helmet and some nasty cuts and bruises or how we now have to find the cash to replace the bike and the crash helmet. Maybe I will feel like talking about that tomorrow, but for now every single time I think about it I feel sick.

1. “Wow you are looking huge/massive/ready to pop/bigger every time I see you”. None of those are a good thing to say to any woman at any time, but when you are pregnant and well aware of how huge you look you certainly don’t need anyone to remind you of it.

2. Reach out and touch her stomach. It is not I repeat not suddenly ok for you to touch me, my stomach is not public property and I am certainly not inviting you to touch, stroke, rub or have contact with me in any other way. This is bad enough when family and friends do it but it’s even more annoying when it’s strangers doing it especially since when you touch mine it hurts.

3. “When are you due?” I’m sarcastic and I usually end up replying with something along the lines of whenever he feels like being born lol. It gets frustrating when people ask you this over and over again, but to be honest it has more to do with the fact that however close or far away your due date is when you are having a bad day and hurting it’s too far away because it’s not right this second.

4. “Still pregnant then?” Few things are guaranteed to annoy me more than anyone asking a question the answer is obvious to. If the huge bump and the shitty mood I am in doesn’t give away the answer to that question you seriously need to go and get your eyes examined.

5. Anything at all along the lines of “be glad you are still pregnant” I fully understand that in most people’s opinions the longer you are pregnant the better, I even get that they would expect you to feel like the longer the baby stays there the healthier they will be. The thing that everyone seems to overlook though is that everyday I am pregnant I am feeling worse, it’s getting harder and harder for me to do everything. I would be lying if I said that I am not scared that these problems won’t all go away once the baby is born, I know how hard taking care of Leo in SCBU was and I am really worried that if I get much worse I won’t be able to manage it. I am struggling with everything and really feel like I am being a crappy mother and wife at the moment so you will have to forgive me if I don’t exactly share your sentiments and just want this baby to finally be born. Call it damage limitation since right now I can just about hold it all together and struggle to get things done. I am not the only one who is surprised I am still pregnant even the hospital were expecting him to have been born by now.

6. “You must be getting so excited” actually no I am terrified about a lot of things (most of which I have already talked about on here") but I don’t really want to stand here and explain that to you, so I am just going to grit my teeth and nod politely while I wish you would go away and stop talking to me.

7. “Oh you had a breech baby, how was your c-section” or “are you having a c-section again this time” actually I had 2 breech babies and neither of them was a c-section. It’s very frustrating to me when people assume that just because they were breech I would have elected or had to have a c-section. The last thing in the world I would ever want is someone to cut into my stomach especially with my 2 previous experiences with general anaesthetics.

8. “At least this one is head down” this comment annoys me even more than the one about c-sections. I know that it’s normal for babies to be born that way around but I haven’t ever had one. I am not exactly a fan of the unknown and there are a lot of things that worry me about this baby being so different from the other two. I had super quick labours with the other two I am scared that this one will be longer and harder and I won’t be able to cope.

9. Don’t make a comment about my name choices. Yes I do know that there are 25 other letters in the alphabet I could have chosen from for a first name but for some reason unknown to me, each time the only ones we have liked have started with L. I understand that it’s not exactly normal for a baby to have so many names but all of mine have. Lukas has 4, Leo had 4 and this one has 4 too since it seemed wrong for him to have less. I had a really hard time settling on his name and this one clicked, Lukas liked it and Nan can spell it which is always a bonus. I don’t really care if you like it or not since it’s not going to be the name of your child please mind your own business.

10. “How are you feeling” you really don’t want to hear about how ill I am feeling and I really don’t want to stand here and sound like I am whining about every little thing. It’s sweet that you are making the effort to ask but we can all hear the unspoken words inside your head if I do tell you I am fed up or feeling ill “your only pregnant” if only things were that simple. You won’t ever begin to understand that most of these problems exist even when I am not pregnant and he just happens to make it worse as well as adding his own complications into the mix.

Anyway since Lukas and Mark have gone to Tesco to do some shopping, I am going to go and lay down until they get back. I have been feeling really ill since I got up this morning, and it’s not exactly the usual pregnancy related stuff. I am shivering and feeling really sick, I keep getting issues with my vision and coming over all lightheaded and dizzy. I am hoping that a bit of rest might help if nothing else maybe it will stop making me want to throw up for a while. I might be back a bit later if I can find some motivation to do anything at all today.

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