Enough About Me...

MORE ABOUT BEING PREGNANT!

Tuesday, March 1st, marks the end of my first trimester. Can you believe it? I tell ya one thing, being pregnant sure has tried my patience. Throughout my life, patience has never been a popular weapon in my aresenal. I'm just not very good at being patient. However, never in my life, has it been harder to wait. Unfortunately, unlike other things that require patience, this process cannot be hurried and the outcome cannot be forced to arrive more quickly (for the most, and safest, part) than at its own, sluggish pace. I am, along with every other pregnant woman and anxious fathers/father-to-be, subjected to the prospect of a FORTY WEEK WAIT (which can vary, as most people know). When we learn about pregnancy, we are told that it is a 9 month process. This is a lie. It is much closer to ten months. To be fair, two to three weeks are dedicated to a small time before your conception, starting with the first day of your last period. But, still, WE ARE PROGRAMMED TO THINK NINE MONTHS!

I see women who look like they are going to birth an elephant when they are 30 weeks pregnant. People say, "Wow! You look like you're ready!" Truly, they look like their child is MORE than ready and about come out moody and pimply, tweenaged and ready to go through puberty. You can only imagine that they will have reached young adulthood by the time those last ten weeks are finally over. I realize that I will probably be one of these women. Why? Genetics. People thought my mom was going to go into labor right in front of them and produce a set of cooing triplets. Perhaps they were saddened by the fact that, no, only one child was going to come out, and probably not for several more weeks. That child was me. Now, I was a big baby, but not monstrous. The average weight for a newborn baby is 7 pounds, 8 ounces. I was 8 pounds, 13 ouces. Although not quite the feared 9 pound baby, I was still rather big. My older sister and I were both the same weight and length (20 1/2 inches long) when we were born. My mother thought they had mixed up the records when she was told my weight and length, since we were both born in the same hospital. I'm also sure that, in order to spite me, my baby's father will have been an enormous elephant baby as well, making my pregnant belly (and birthing pain) that much more extreme.

However, God bless genetics as well. My mother came out of pregnancy with no stretch marks, having gained only thirty pounds (which she easily shed because she is the most incredible mommy ever, and I truly hope that I'm like her with my children [and not just with the weight loss]). My grandmother's skin and weight was rather resilient, as well. Even MORE spectacular, both my grandmother and mother had extremely short labor. When I first found out I was pregnant, I asked my mom about her labor with my sister and me. I was a C Section, but my sister was natural birth (and I mean ALL natural without any painkillers). She said, that for both of us, she was in labor for an hour and half (I was an emergency C Section, thankfully with just enough time to give my mom the proper pain killers so she could be awake when I was born; however, since it was an emergency, my mother was 10 cm dialated and ready to push by the time they decided she had to have a C Section). For my sister, she was only pushing for thirty minutes. So I am SUPER excited that I won't have the dreaded 20 hour labor with 2 hours of pushing.

Even if I am in labor forever and a day, I KNOW it will all be worth it. I can't wait for Goy to get here. I'm starting to have images pop in my head of what little Goy is going to look like and, if I do say so myself, they have all be EXTREMELY cute. I see lots of thick, brown hair in my future, as well as big brown eyes (although, they could be blue. I have blue eyes in my family, as well, so perhaps this recessive trait will come out). I wonder if Goy will look like me...