Chapter 4: The Birth of A SuperMom
Remember that scene from Alien?
Come on, you know which scene I mean. Where the little green toothy fella pops right out of that guy's stomach in the middle of mealtime. Oh yeah. That's the one. Well, welcome to the wonderful world of pregnancy, birth (see reference to scene above), and coping with the seemingly unreasonable demands of a newborn baby. The screaming, the crying, the sleepless nights...but enough about the husbands. You're about to enter the world of the SuperMom, and it's a scary world sometimes, right from the start.
Having been through the pregnancy mill four times myself, I experienced most of the pain and trauma that the majority of women do, and that includes conception. No matter how good or bad the "performance" was that evening, that truly was the fun part of this deal. The rest of the experience may be rewarding, fulfilling, yada, yada, yada, but "fun" is not a word you will hear very often when describing any pregnancy, unless in your circumstance it involves an ex-husband, his new but oh-so-sadly barren wife, and a sizable property settlement. But I digress.
Your body will go through changes you cannot be prepared for. Have you heard about the shoe size thing? The tear duct challenge? The line down your stomach? The vaginal dryness? Ouch. Okay, I didn't need to mention that last one, especially if you're in the last stages of pregnancy and even a tampon won't be welcome for the rest of your life. Well, buckle up, gals. It's going to be a bumpy ride, or rather a ride that produced a bump, in this case.
Companies that manufacture Early Pregnancy Tests know what they're doing. Their design makes it impossible not to pee on your own fingertips. If this grosses you out to the point of nausea, then you're clearly not ready for motherhood. You'll come to embrace the notion of only getting hit with urine, which is, we are lead to believe, sterile. This will also begin your training for the urine sample Olympics, which you will be entering as a full competitor once your pregnancy is confirmed.
Ah, urine. You'll see a lot of that stuff. Both of my sons have urinated into their own mouths-not as tricky as it sounds when they're lying on the change table with their permanent chubbies. Each time I would pray that urine truly is sterile. My husband told me that urine is sterile up to the seventh consumption. Panicking, I counted on two hands the number of times this had happened to my sons, until I realized that he meant the seventh passage of the same urine.
Back to the pregnancy test. So you've washed your hands (three times, with disinfectant soap), and you're waiting to see if the thin blue line will confirm your worst fears, one way or the other. Congratulations, you're pregnant. Now what? Shouldn't you feel different, act different, be different? You are. You have joined the ranks of "those who have no life." And I couldn't be happier for you. All of the things you thought were important yesterday, are not so pressing today. You are growing a human life, and for that you should be rewarded. (My children are entering their teen years, and I'm still waiting for that reward, but that's another story.) If being a parent teaches you anything, it's faith. Faith that you'll get through another day with the little rats, and faith that any "bad Mommy" moments you'll undoubtedly have will not be captured forever on video.
