knocking

Since I'm home due to Portland's inability to handle snow (daycare was cancelled due to PREDICTED SNOW), I'm surfing the internets. No, not getting ready for our epic holiday vacation. Not cleaning the house to prepare for the insanity of the next six months. The internets are way more fun.

Except also not fun. I blundered onto a blog called Knocked Up, Knocked Down, about pregnancy loss, and then onto a zine on the topic.  Reading these articles pointed out to me how hateful pregnancy can be for people who cannot get pregnant, or who have lost a child. One of my  friends expressed to me (in a nice way) some jealousy that I am embarking on my second kid, when she wants a kid more than anything.  I actually have experienced a faint shadow of this - when I see a pregnant woman, or a woman with more than one kid, I am jealous of them. Even though I don't WANT more than two kids, I have this weird reproductive jealousy. It must be hardwired.

But is is strange to know that now that my pregnancy is showing (though still muffled enough in fat that strangers hesitate to ask), I am a walking, complaining reminder for some people of the fertility that they wish for. With this pregnancy, as with the last, I try not to talk about it much unless I know I have an interested (or at least tolerant) audience, and I definitely avoid the smug-looking belly-rub maneuver. That's just annoying, regardless of the parenting/fertility status of the people around you. But... it's hard not to feel smug and excited about your tucked-away baby-to-be. It's hard not to reach out for the mysterious baby-to-be when it's wiggling around your insides.* It's hard to imagine how it would feel to lose a baby, to want a baby, and to have to watch other people gestating happily (or whinily) away.  Since I can't imagine, I think that the best I can do is pay attention, read the stories, not take anything about this pregnancy for granted, and not complain so much about how much I hate being pregnant. I'm lucky to have this pregnancy, with all its minor irritations, and I will be lucky to have a baby at the end. 

* Unless it's pretending your bladder is a trampoline, in which case you want to give it a timeout.