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Sixteen weeks pregnant
By ella | October 4, 2007
It’s been a crappy week but that’s nothing to do with being pregnant (for a change).
Although I still feel slightly nauseous I am feeling so much better. I have energy to do things. I have a bit more of an appetite. I can go out and about, feeling good and looking better than I have in weeks. I finally got my hair cut, having been unable to brave the smell of a hair salon for months.
As I am so clearly pregnant now I am getting lots of questions about the baby, especially from the new mothers I am meeting at Harry’s new school. As the new face in the playground and being tall and pregnant with three, noisy, small children running circles around me I am quite ‘visible’ and therefore have been the centre of much interested questioning. All fine because I have been pretty invisible for what feels like months. Additionally, when I found out I was pregnant I just could not be excited, knowing how awful the next few months would be. Now the worst is over I am so looking forward to meeting this baby. I am so looking forward to people cooing over him/her. I am so looking forward to people helping me out because I have been so ridiculously stupid to have so many children so close together.
Telling people I am pregnant has been interesting. Those I don’t know well have been as one would expect: lots of ‘you’ll have your hands full’ and ‘congratulations, you’re very brave’. Family and close friends have also been as one would expect: thrilled. Also wondering privately how I will cope. It is those in between whose reaction has been strange. Some have been muted in their response, which I can only take to mean they disapprove in some way while others have been oddly rude in their assumption that this baby must be unplanned or that I am only having it because I must be desperate for a girl. ‘What will you do if it’s a boy?’ one mother asked, as if I would return it or something.
As she had her two girls with her, I swallowed my surprise and replied, without missing a beat, ‘I think…. yes…. I’ll give it to you of course. You must give me your number.’
Mean - and silly - I know. But answering her question with gobsmacked silence seemed just so much less satisfying.
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Categories: Pregnancy
Props for a stunning reply to a ridiculous question.
That wasn’t a mean response in the least…Witty and entirely appropriate for such a question. Classic.
I still constantly get the “hands full” comments. Now I just go “I suppose” and smile. I’ve heard it so many times, it’s getting a little old. Perhaps I will just start each conversation with, “Yes, I KNOW, I’ve got my hands full, thank you.”
Glad to hear you are feeling better! I desperately need to get my hair cut as well…
What a great answer to a daft question. I guess people blurt out their own fears and project them onto others.
I hope things are settling for Harry more now.
You are the greatest. You thought of something right-on - and said it out loud!
I cannot BELIEVE how rude people can be about something so deeply personal and so distinctly NONE of their business. People used to count us - out loud. Then ask my parents, “are they ALL yours?” Lectures about contraceptives were especially elegant.
These days, even otherwise educated, civilized adults will say the worst things to me if they find out I’m the oldest of a gazillion.