The not-so-beautiful baby bump and other side effects
So I had another look at my growing bump today, I mean really looked (since most of the time I’m racing against the clock to pee, change or shower). After the initial shock of the size of me wore off (not like I don’t feel huge without seeing my reflection), my eyes were immediately driven to how to how pronounced the veins are underneath my skin. They look like an upside down forest, beginning at chest level, then picking up underneath my breasts, and running down across the expanse of my belly. They’re dark green in colour, like a forest too. Stretch marks would be far better than these, wouldn’t they?
I know I should be marveling at the miracle that is happening in my body; however I can’t help but stare incredulously at these branches. It looks like a child had a field day with a green marker and I wonder whether these marks will ever wash out.
Another shocking discovery I made recently had me almost shrieking. While bathing, I sudden learned that the lower part of me didn’t quite feel like me. I had to quickly ensure that the baby wasn’t emerging out of me as I stood completely unaware because there had to be some explanation for the new edges/curves. (After all, there are all those stories of women birthing children seemingly spontaneously into toilets, and such). Then my mental faculties returned to me after that momentary lapse (one of many these days) and I asked myself how could I be birthing the baby, when my water hasn’t broken.
So to be clear, I’ve realized the baby is making his descent downward. Once again, things are slightly different this third time around for me. Only this third time around am I noticing the remodeling he’s decided to do with my body. For all I know this baby is thoroughly incensed with jealousy that he wasn’t the first to walk these halls and out the doors, nor the second, so perhaps he wants to spruce the place up a little and make it more roomy for himself. Hopefully he’ll get comfortable soon, because I’m becoming, as you can well imagine, increasingly more uncomfortable.
This is yet another fact of pregnancy that mothers don’t share with their fellows when it comes to the toll that pregnancies can take on women’s bodies and how that toll sometimes costs a little more of your body than you had expected.
