Women: A Rant

Women who make pregnancy a Very Big Deal are the same women for whom everything is harrowing and stressful. Yes, it can be physically taxing. I know how lucky I am to not have been sick so far. Mentally and emotionally, however, I felt very weighed down, and at times so panicked I thought I might faint, or die from fear. But it honestly, it is what you make it. Your pregnancy is your own creation. If you want to worry about every little detail, every symptom, every anathema food item, it certainly can be all-consuming. If you are the sort of pain in the ass, high maintenance woman who demands back rubs and ice cream and needs everything just so in order to be happy, then pregnancy will be terrible for you and worse for the poor son of a bitch who married you. I would just like for once to hear someone echo my sentiments. Which are, essentially, it's fine. It's weird. And wonderful. Thrilling and paralyzing and bizarre and miraculous and beautiful and gross. And also, it's totally natural and what we are designed to do. I expect to encounter difficulty. Pain and discomfort and uglier manifestations of this other life beating inside me that makes it a little less lovely to walk around in my body. But acting so put out is nothing more than an act some women have adopted. I happen to have a different act. An "aren't I funny and one of the guys and aren't bitches crazy and dumb" trip that makes my life harder in some ways and better in others. But someone needs to stop perpetuating the notion that you stop being a normal person once pregnant. Because you don't. It's fine. I'm fine. You're fine. Think of anything else for a whole minute, read a book not about babies, listen loudly to music, have a shout at the sky, and stop complaining.