on being pregnant

i've looked back over the pictures from the last two years to find the ones i want to put in the album from that year and i noticed something.

there are, like, no pictures of me pregnant.

my first thought was, will this make my children sad?


but then i remembered that there are literally NO pictures of my mom pregnant and i'm just fine (right?). so now i don't feel bad. but i do feel like i owe my current children and future children an explanation which is as follows:

you try waddling around with a pelvis that is so loose and slippery you feel as if one foul step will result in your entire skeleton rearranging itself so your head is hanging from your knee and your ankle is sticking out of your neck and looking good at the same time.


i remember being at the very end of my pregnancy with ava and in a very emotional and desperate moment crying out, "is there no other way?"

and ryan answered, "no. there isn't."

and then i tried to attack him but the sheer bulk of holding that six pound and thirteen ounce baby and all of her baggage kept me from moving quickly and since ryan had no baby and no baby baggage, he nimbly leapt away from me. at least he looked terrified. i think it's because when i attempted to attack him i also growled.

oh, pregnancy.

it is not a good sign that as i am trying to motivate myself toward thinking of a third child with welcoming thoughts instead of murderous ones that these are the memories i have.

want to hear another funny pregnant story? before i even knew i pregnant with ava i made the same enchilada recipe three times. in one week. and then, when i was folding laundry in the bedroom one day, ryan came in with a sandwich to chat with me during his lunch break. having cut the sandwich into two halves and, being in the habit of eating only one half of the sandwich at a time, ryan rested the remaining sandwich half on my jewelry box until he was ready for it.

"please get your sandwich off my jewelry box," i said in a condescending and pretend-patient tone.

ryan looked bewildered. "why?" he asked.

"it'll get crumbs all over my jewelry!" i exclaimed as if, DUH! WHY DO YOU THINK I DON'T WANT YOUR SANDWICH ON MY JEWELRY BOX? (note: i don't own any jewelry. i think that box was filled with a few coins from different countries and a bunch of st. christopher charms a nun in rome gave me tied to a ribbon)

"what?" ryan asked. yeah, he was completely confused. my behavior and my sudden concern for my jewelry box was rendering him motionless.

so i freaked out. it was the next logical step. and i GRABBED that sandwich and i THREW it into the trashcan. all the while weeping about how he never listens to me and how he doesn't care how i feel and how i am JUST SO TIRED OF BEING TREATED LIKE THIS.

you'd think ryan would take this moment to recognize that perhaps, with a wife this crazy his best bet might be to run out and fetch me a bouquet of flowers, but ryan's ability to deal with women is something he's learned through the years of our marriage. and at this point, he hadn't racked up too much experience. so he grew indignant and said, "you threw my sandwich away! i worked hard on that!" WHILE I WEPT. i know. how could he? am i right?

i don't remember what happened after that. most likely i kept crying and ryan ran as fast s he possible could to get away from me.

but only a week later i stood on one side of the bathroom door and he stood on the other side of the bathroom door and i watched to see if my pregnancy test was going to be positive or not (ryan wasn't allowed in the bathroom because i prefer to pee on sticks without witnesses). and when that little pink line appeared (by now i had thrown the bathroom door open to make ryan watch the stick with me because the anticipation was nearly killing me), ryan said, "so that's why you threw my sandwich away!" (i promise you, he's much better at dealing with women now).

oh pregnancy. slowly i'll chug chug chug towards the happy place that will make it possible for ava to get that baby sister she's been begging for. you know what's in that place? that feeling of a quiet morning where i lay on my side and watch the roll of a new life under the layer of skin stretched to its maximum in the morning. the line of little clothes neatly folded and placed in an empty dresser drawer. that moment, when it is all over at long last, when that BEAUTIFUL baby is placed on your chest, sticky and wet and squinty and just so, so beautiful. did you know, that the moment they placed seth in my arms, i felt, overwhelmingly so, that i knew him? i knew him! my sweet, sweet baby.

when seth was brand new he'd fall asleep on the couch and instead of moving that tiny baby off of that big couch so i could take a nap, i'd curl up in a ball on the chair so i wouldn't have to leave the room my sleeping baby was in.

i feel better now. it's still too bad there's no other way, though. because really? nine months? isn't that a bit much?