Sunday, January 11, 2009

On pregnancy

I'm not pregnant (sorry, parents, all of you). But one of my very best friends is, and she's due literally any minute (technically, tomorrow). I'm so extremely excited for her, and can't wait to meet the new little one! I have been obsessively checking my phone this weekend, just in case I somehow missed the call that they were at the hospital. Which is impossible, because I have also been obsessively carrying my phone everywhere, so that I wouldn't miss the call that they were at the hospital.

Watching my dear friend go through every step of pregnancy has reminded me how much I like not being pregnant. I've only done it once. It was reasonably pleasant, actually, as far as pregnancies go. I would probably remember more of it if I'd had a blog then, because I could have typed everything out. As it is, I didn't write very much down about it, so I don't remember a lot of it. I do remember that I didn't have morning sickness, but I had something flu-like for pretty much the whole second half of my pregnancy. I had a lot of fevers and coughs and couldn't take anything good for them. Having the flu stuff for the second half worked out, because for the first half my skin was so bad that I was embarrassed to have to go out into the world (in a PR job!!) and talk to people. Again, couldn't take anything good for it. So having them both together would have pretty much done me in...although if I'd had them both together, I suppose I could have just stayed home sick and avoided seeing people. I had a lot of very weird food issues. It was the only time in my life I've been a vegetarian, though briefly. But I had this very textbook delivery, with nothing weird, and a great epidural. And I came home with probably the best little girl in the entire universe (no offense to other mothers of other wonderful little girls). So it was worth it. And I know that I was very, very lucky to skate through as smoothly as I really did.

But you know what? Being pregnant isn't really very fun, and it really feels like it takes forever. (Anyone who says, "I LOVED being pregnant!" is either lying or doesn't accurately remember the details. These are also often the same people who say, "Oh, you forget the pain.") I don't feel this big urge to do it again anytime soon. I may, someday. I don't know. We've decided we're not going to think about having another baby for awhile - at least not till we know we can't live without one, the way we knew we couldn't live without Hannah. I say you know when it's time to have kids, and it has nothing to do with calendars or finances or anything else - it has everything to do with that feeling in your gut that your life is not going to be complete or fully happy until you have a child. That's when you know. And if you don't feel like that, don't do it. That's what I say, anyway. And we are just really happy being the Three Musketeers right now. But if we ever feel like that again, then sure, why not?

But the last thing I will say about watching my friend go through pregnancy is that it goes WAY FASTER when it's not you!

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