5:45 p.m. - 2006-08-24
The Best I Can
In a surprising display of self-forgiveness, I've developed a new mantra for myself: I'm doing the best I can.
I find myself repeating it over and over, mostly in my head, to justify why I move at a snail's pace in late pregnancy. Honestly, I *am* doing the best I can. Think I'm walking through the parking lot in the grocery store too slowly? I'm doing the best I can. You didn't get that memo back from me yet? I'm doing the best I can. I've become Anthony Robbins!
I'm 32 weeks today, which gives us about 8 weeks until Pumpkin's arrival. I'm starting to develop a complex. I've been pretty good about this whole waiting game, but now I'm getting really excited, and anxious. I'm not considered full-term until 37 weeks, but even if she were born now, she'd be fine. Not that I want that -- she'd be underweight, with under-developed lungs, and would have to spend weeks in the NICU -- but it's reassuring to know she'd make it. Everywhere I go, though, I imagine labor scenarios: the mall, the grocery store, the restroom at Target. Can you imagine a worse place to deliver? They'd probably steal my baby, thinking it was someone else's, and I'd find her in the small electronic aisle.
You won't believe I'm saying this, but part of me is also anxious about not being pregnant anymore. It's become such a part of my identity that I can't imagine what it's like anymore to not be knocked up (and here I would just like to mention that my chiropractor recently used that term in front of me, to describe me. I was appalled. I use it regularly, but I almost failed biology. I don't expect to hear it coming from the mouth of a licensed medical practitioner.).
For the longest time, I couldn't understand women who said they loved being pregnant. I was plenty happy to be pregnant, don't get me wrong, but I couldn't see loving it. What did they love? The puking? The ever-present nausea? The acne? After hearing my coworker Maureen say this for about the fifth time recently, I asked her, exactly what was so good about being pregnant? Her answer was succinct and on the money: People are nice to you, and you don't have to suck your stomach in.
That's an idea I can get on board with.
