Megan Stielstra's Blog

A rarely-discussed challenge of pregnancy is the need to accept just how ridiculous you’ve become.

To whit:

Christopher and I went out for fish-and-chips, and the host sat us in a booth, and I couldn’t … fit. We had to ask for another table.

In Baby Having Class—which back in my parents day was called Lamaze but is now Great Expectations and involves lots of scary videos and yoga balls and repeating HA HEE HA HEE HA HEE HOOOOO with several other nervous girls who want to laugh at how silly it all is but also know the damn HA HEE might save their friggin’ lives in the next three weeks—ANYWAY, they give you a doll to hold and swaddle and change its diaper and we (ACCIDENTALLY) broke its leg off.

I’ve rotated the same two shirts and two pairs of pants since September which is so totally wrong according to this maternity blog I read recently because it shows how I’ve “given up,” and I’m like, “You can SUCK IT, maternity blog, my ‘Unique Pregnancy Style’ is ‘Saving my cash so I can buy really expensive stuff later that I’ll wear longer than four months, plus I’m comfortable so who are you to judge?” although, between you and me, Internet, as soon as this kid is born I’m burning those f’ing clothes. I can’t stand to LOOK AT THEM EVER AGAIN.

Yesterday I watched Snakes on a Plane. Twice. In a row.

And the worst—the WORST—is this: I can’t bend my wrists. Like, I flex them and have to wince. The reason for this is I’ve been lying on my side all the time (first the left, then the right, rinse and repeat, although the switching from side-to-side part is getting difficult. That’s when you’ll REALLY start to laugh at yourself: you’re halfway through flipping over from left to right, somewhere in the vicinity of Flat on Your Back, and you get STUCK? HIIIII-larious). ANYHOW, I’ll be reading, or watching movies, or on the internet or whatever with my arm propped up on my elbow and my head propped up on my hand AND I’VE BEEN DOING THIS SO MUCH THAT I’VE BROKEN BOTH MY WRISTS, SITTING HERE TYPING THIS RIGHT NOW I AM BLEEDING OVER MY KEYBOARD. NOT REALLY. BUT YOU GET MY DRIFT.

The best part, though, is that all of this'll seem pretty mundane in a few weeks when my son is crying and I'm covered in poop and we're out of diapers and the dog has to go out and I haven't slept and the smoke detector is going off 'cause I'm burning dinner and do you try to stop it in which case put down the baby? which is really a moot question 'cause our ceilings are twelve feet so I couldn't reach it anyhow and THAT is when I'll sit down in the middle of the floor and laugh laugh laugh. At myself. And how funny and wonderful and insane it all is.