I’m about to say something absolutely crazy here, and my only explanation is that having a baby has completely turned my brain into a smothered pork chop.
In a tiny way, I miss the feeling of being pregnant.
Or maybe I should say that I am sad I missed the opportunity to appreciate the experience or even (gasp) ENJOY IT. At the time, I couldn’t see past the constant discomfort and the feeling like it would never end, that I would never be normal again. I worried about stretch marks and weight gain and how I felt like the muscles in my legs were turning into jell-o. I even resented the fact that this little parasite whom I’d never even met was keeping me from all of the things in my life I enjoyed: contact sports, long distance running, bloody medium rare steaks, sushi, and beer. Oh, how I missed beer.
The funny thing is, after Sophie was born, all of that stuff didn’t matter. And here I am at almost six weeks post partum, not really caring about consuming cocktails or lacing up my skates. I’ve still got ten baby-related pounds to lose before I even tackle the 20 lbs I needed to take off before that, and I don’t care. Sure there are days when I look at my body and think Whisky Tango Foxtrot, but that’s only when I’m not completely captivated by The Cutest Baby In The World, which isn’t too often.
While I’m on the topic of crazy talk, I should also mention that I really wish I had a more detailed memory of delivery and exactly what it felt like. Yes, I had an epidural and boy oh boy, am I a huge fan of the epidural. And yes, from the moment Sophia crowned to the magnificent instant she completely exited my body, I felt EVERYTHING. There was no feeling of Hmm, this is an odd sensation that I can’t quite describe because I have no feeling in the nether regions. It was more like a HOLY CRAP YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME PLEASE PLEASE LET THE NEXT CONTRACTION COME SO THAT I CAN GET THIS OVER WITH BECAUSE THIS IS THE WORST PAIN I HAVE EVER FELT IN MY LIFE kind of feeling.
That memory stayed with me for a few days. I laid on the bed while my doctor stitched me up and thought, well, I’m never doing that again. And then I held my daughter and could do nothing but just be amazed at the fact that she was what I had been carrying for the last 40 weeks. And then my memory started to fade, and body parts started to heal. And when I tried to remember the entire experience, I started to have serious memory gaps. I couldn’t remember what it was like to be pregnant, even though I had bitched and moaned about it for the duration. I remembered that her birth hurt like a mother, but I was hazy on the specifics.
And then there I was, on the morning I was to be discharged from the mommy vacation resort hospital, and I caught myself thinking, I suppose I can see why women do this more than once. On purpose. I guess that’s nature’s way of setting you up for a repeat. It’s like how you can forget the sheer agony of running the last few miles of a marathon, leading you to sign up again the next year. Mother Nature is one masochistic motherfucker.
I know I had a hard time enjoying my pregnancy due to a lot of reasons I don’t want to discuss publicly here on this blog, and that I often times didn’t allow myself to be happy about the baby. And how was I to know? I’d never done this before. Pregnancy was this awful, scary, inconvenient monster that had totally disrupted my relatively happy life. It seemed ridiculous to me that this was something that could actually be enjoyed.
I suppose if I went through this again that I’d have a completely different perspective, though it’s not like that’s on the agenda. I don’t see Sophia being a big sister in her lifetime, which is another topic for another day when I have the energy to delve into that emotional guilt-ridden can of worms. And the past is the past, so there’s no use getting hung up on what I wish I would have done during those nine months.
Instead, I’m just going to keep marveling at my beautiful, perfect kid, despite my swiss cheese memory. At least I know I won’t have any difficulty remembering how much I freaking love her.
Oh man, I feel EXACTLY that way now. Exactly. Exactly. No running, no sushi, no stinky cheese, no beer, oh my god, no beer! I suppose that pregnancy sets us up for what my friend calls the Death of the Self, which most people (dads too) have to go through when the baby is born. It’s not about you anymore, and some things are easy (vodka shots) and some are harder to fathom.
But after reading this, maybe I’ll try harder to be one of those Happy! Kitten! Bicycle Time! pregnant people, who looks all glowy and happy and pats their own belly all the time…wait, I want to kill me already.