It hit me last night that maybe this situation really isn’t about me anymore. You might be saying “DUH!” and I might have said that had I read someone else writing this before I was pregnant myself. I know people who, the minute they get a positive pregnancy test, or before they even conceive and start inhaling spinach, have this perspective of “it’s not about just me anymore.” But I didn’t have that. To me, the cupcake was a little bundle of cells slowly forming into something kind of nebulous and intangible, whereas I was very tangible. I was the one with the nausea and the pot belly for the first few months. Then I was the one with the pregnancy-chic second trimester bump, buying and sporting increasingly more maternity clothes. And for the past couple of months, I’ve been the one with increasing pain in my ribcage; I’m the one who has to come home at night and wrap an ice pack around her ribs in order to achieve any semblance of comfort. The cupcake is safe, sound, and comfortable in her little waterbed, oblivious to all of this. Of course, I’m taking care of myself and following the rules about pregnancy in terms of what I take in and share with her, but it’s still me that has to order water instead of the Harpoon IPA that I salivate over at restaurants.
But as I reach this funny place of being pregnant for nearly a month now after I was actually born (I’m almost 30 weeks and I was born around 26 weeks), and as my belly gets noticeably bigger and I feel noticeably more limited physically and even mentally as exhaustion and frustration set in more frequently, I’m starting to come around to that “it’s not about me anymore” understanding—perhaps as a coping mechanism as much as anything else. These last two months are more about keeping her safe and in the womb so that she can finish developing and get ready for her big debut. It’s less and less possible for me to do the things I’m used to, so it necessarily becomes more about me being a vessel than me being an active participant in the life I’m used to living. And that’s a tough adjustment to make—I think it’s what I’ve been struggling with for the past week or so, feeling a lot of loss of what I’m used to doing, and for me that has translated into who I'm used to being. Maybe if I can shift my thinking towards slowing down and being a human incubator, then I can still feel productive even if the framework is so different.
Not that I’m going to now sit on the couch and watch Oprah all day long. That’s not being a very good vessel. I’m still going to the gym and doing light cardio (on machines that minimize bouncing of the bladder) and light weights, and I’m committing to weekly prenatal yoga again. I’m seeing friends, just earlier in the day or evening. I’m working a few times a week, but for shorter shifts, doing less physical tasks while there, and occasionally putting an ice pack in my bra band to ease the pain in my upper back/ribs. I tell people I’m doing a reality show and it’s my mic. I thought I’d have another good month or so before I had to make these kinds of accommodations. (Why? No reason. I don’t think anyone expects to have a tough pregnancy. You just go in hopeful then adjust with what you get.) I need to accept that the shift is happening sooner than I’d hoped.
So as I tried to explain to Anil last night, it’s not that I had this epiphany and am ready to become a martyr, but I’m working on a subtle shift in attitude that I hope will ease the frustrations I’ve felt as of late of all the loss and sacrifice I’m starting to feel. Because that’s still what it is—loss and sacrifice. I don’t buy that it’s ever so black and white that you’re so happy for the baby you’re expecting, or the baby that you then have, that you don’t feel the sting of loss of your former self and a lot of what defined that self for you. It’s only natural. But maybe I can start to accept those losses more if I can re-frame them. Or if I can reframe my “job” for the next two months. After all, I’m asking other people to adjust their expectations of me. Anil is doing more around the house and with Bailey. Bailey isn’t getting as much exercise when it’s just me at home. My friends agree to earlier dinners and less adventurous day plans. I don’t like cutting back—it’s hard because it leaves these open gaps of “Who am I now if I’m not doing what I usually do?” But if I can start thinking of it as for a reason rather than as a loss or a demotion (and again, from an outside perspective I know that this "for a reason" thing earns another resounding DUH, but again, it's just not that simple in real life), maybe I can get through these next two months with a better attitude. And more blog posts J.
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