Pregnant Ladies Are Crazy, and Other Myths From the Patriarchy

Before I got pregnant, I thought I knew a lot about pregnancy. In retrospect, I realize that I knew a lot about pregnancy as it’s generally portrayed on TV and in movies.

It turns out, the entertainment industry is mostly lying to us. (I know. I was surprised, too.) Being pregnant is almost nothing like it seems on TV.

I guess this means I probably won’t give birth in an elevator, or in a car speeding down a highway — although I do know one woman who gave birth in a New York taxicab, which means that her kid will win every “who is a Real New Yorker” contest from now until the earth is swallowed by the sun.

On the downside, I can already tell that I won’t have one of those cute, photogenic baby bumps that you see on your favorite sitcom. I’ll be 19 weeks pregnant this Wednesday, and I’m already roughly the size of a barge, despite only gaining the recommended weight.

As Adam said recently, pointing to my belly, “That thing is serious, huh?” It truly is. I’m already having trouble figuring out how to deal with tables and countertops, and yesterday I hit myself in my own stomach with a doorknob trying to get into my house. Thank God for amniotic fluid, or we’d all be born with creases down our middles from when our moms tried to make a sandwich and the kitchen counter got in the way.

But the biggest surprise so far about being pregnant might be how relatively normal I feel. I mean, don’t get me wrong: I spent most of the first trimester feeling like I was on a rough ferry crossing, and when I need to eat or sleep, it’s an eating- or sleeping-emergency. But I still feel exactly like myself, which was something I was sort of led to believe wouldn’t be the case.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but I thought I’d be crazy, perhaps in the sense of being legitimately mentally ill, but definitively in the sense of being a hysterical female. I was led to believe (again, by popular representations of pregnant ladies, not necessarily by actual pregnant people) that I would weep all the time, and get really mad at Adam for no reason, and just generally act like a big, hormonal mess.

That hasn’t really happened. Sure, about eight weeks in, we tried to watch a documentary on penguins and had to turn it off when a penguin baby froze to death and I couldn’t stop weeping, but that’s not necessarily new. I’ve never been great with the part of nature documentaries where we’re reminded that nature is cruel.

And I definitely have a lot less patience for bullshit now, which has had the unfortunate effect of making me snottier than usual with courtesy callers or unhelpful clerks — not a great look for anyone. (Cashier at the grocery store: “You can recycle this bottle at Customer Service.” Me: “No, you can recycle it right here for me, like they usually do.” Cashier: “Oh. OK.”)

But in general, I’m pretty much myself, with fewer fucks to give. And I’m not sure if the fewer fucks are because of hormones, or because I’m so happy to finally be pregnant that the fog of low-grade depression from the past few years has finally burned off. It’s hard to be yourself when you’re so sad all the time, and now, miraculously, I’m not.

The other day, I asked Adam for his thoughts on the matter.

“This isn’t a trap,” I said, carefully leaning my side and not my belly against the kitchen counter as he put away the clean pans.

“Uh oh.”

“No, no, really. It’s just that I was thinking the other day about how everyone makes it sound like pregnant women are crazy, and I just don’t feel that way.”

“You’re an A+ pregnant lady,” he said, closing the cabinet doors and looking relieved to have something nice to say. “You haven’t even really complained that much about anything, even when you were nauseated. I think you’re the happiest I’ve ever seen you.”

“So, I’m not secretly hysterical and deluding myself?”

He paused.

“Uh oh.”

“No, it’s not that. I’m just trying to figure out how much trouble I’ll get in if I say that life is easier when you don’t get your period.”

I laughed so hard I accidentally leaned the wrong way and bumped my stomach on the counter. “Ow.”

“Are you OK?”

“Fine, just unwieldy. Also, happy to know that you feel that way, since with the timing and all, I’ll probably go through menopause about a half hour after the baby is born.”

So, there you go. Something to look forward to, and a reminder never to believe anything that you see on TV. Of course, these days, it’s also a good idea to be skeptical of anything you read on the internet, so if you’re pregnant or planning to get pregnant in the near future, keep in mind that no one knows anything about what your pregnancy will be like but future-you.

And no matter what, don’t ever let anyone tell you that you’re crazy.