When you feel the baby move, it will feel like a unicorn farting into a pool of rainbows, and other lies

As I’m rounding the halfway mark of my pregnancy, I am being inundated by emails from Belly-Bumpy-Pregnancy-Tracker-Whoosie-Whatsies galore about feeling the baby move and the sensation I can expect on the receiving end. These sites and forums all promised me one of the following sensational (in the literal sense) options:

1. It feels like bubbles popping

2. It feels like a goldfish swimming around

3. It feels like butterflies

CORRECTION: It feels like a mini-human is inside my stomach punching me. Sometimes it feels like that mini-human has put on snowshoes and decided to forage around in my intestines searching for gold. But in no way does it feel like a goldfish. Or a butterfly. Or a bubble. Who makes this stuff up? This is the weirdest thing: it feels exactly like what you would expect it to feel like, so why all the weird analogies? How many of us have felt a goldfish swimming around in our stomach for that to be an accurate analogy anyway? Well there was that one time… but alas, I digress.

On a more nurturing note, it is like the coolest feeling in the world. That little mango moves All. The. Time. and it makes me oh-so-happy to know my baby is wriggling away the days safe and sound. But each time I get an email telling me I am going to feel a goldfish holding hands with a butterfly inside a bursting bubble, I have to laugh to myself.

On a fun note, we find out the gender in two weeks! I’m hoping it’s a dragon.

A Lesson in Physics

While grocery shopping yesterday, I was completely and utterly shocked, downright aghast, when I went to gracefully slide my oh-so-slender frame politely between two people also browsing for Double-Stuff Oreos in aisle 6, and managed to brush, nay, grind my ass against one old lady and my stomach against the display of Fritos cheese dip, knocking them to the ground. What the hell?! A polite “excuse me” hardly seems sufficient for what in some countries might constitute harassment. Oops. Grab Oreos and move on.

Hence we come to the subject of physics and the accompanying lessons learned while pregnant.

I’m in my fifth month and have managed to gain around ten pounds. I’m pretty sure it’s all in my boobs and butt, but those extra pounds have had a noticeable effect on things like my balance, and underwear drawer. Normal activities can suddenly turn in to something resembling the hula-hoop game on Wii Fit. Direct your attention to scenario A:

I’m standing around the work room, chatting with older colleagues who already think I should be on the next episode of “16 and Pregnant” (sometimes they forget I’m a teacher and ask me to show my student ID). There I am, filling up my water bottle and wearing the normal footwear of any high-school teacher: five inch heels. Also, it bears mentioning our school is pretty much made of tile mixed with mashed up Cheetos. And I’m pretty sure the cleaning team just started using castor oil to clean the floors. Suddenly, am I tipping forward? Are my boobs actually pulling me toward the ground? Why is the earth moving? Anyone else feel this? Cue the Wii Fit hula-hooping workout routine annnnd call it a normal day in the life of a pregnant person.

Furthermore, all previously adequately sized spaces immediately get smaller when you become pregnant. Each morning I pull into the parking garage at work and slide out the door with my softball bag, purse, and computer bag, all in the five inch heels and while managing to not knock a hole in the car door next to  me. These spaces got a hell of a lot smaller, and I’m pretty sure everyone got worse at parking because now when I get out I feel like a T-Rex playing dodgeball in a wind tunnel. Fun way to start the day? Mostly for the people who get to watch me get out of the car. So long pride and dignity! Fare thee well!

So, I put the baby in the crib naked, right? Immediate panic.

So here I am, four months pregnant, a little fatter, and a lot gassier.

Four months have come and gone faster than my students on the Friday before Spring Break. What the heck happened? How did I get here already? I had a little panic attack this weekend reaching Week 15 (baby is an orange!) and realizing I had no idea what I was doing and how I was supposed to be doing it. I keep hearing women tell me, “your mother’s instinct will kick in honey,” or “don’t worry. It will all be natural once the baby comes.” I, however, am less than certain this will be true. Point in case to follow:

Lonnie and I were home over Spring Break to visit family, announce our pregnancy at Passover (what better time to answer “Who knows nine?), and get a rapid tutorial in mothering from the two people I know who have children (my mother and my mother-in-law).

While browsing the aisles of Babies’R’Us with my mom, sister, and husband, we stopped alongside the cribs. I proudly announced to my family that I knew how to put a newborn to sleep. I had just learned about when to start Tummy Time (a no-no until they can flip themselves over, I hear). So, I proceed to declare babies sleep on their backs. With nothing in the crib. And they should be naked. My mom and sister look at me, laugh hysterically, then freak out that I will be 3,000 miles away giving birth to this poor child whose mom is probably going to put it in its crib totally naked and make it fend for itself. This is the extent of what I know about parenting, and so begins this adventure.

I will probably be the only woman whose maternal instinct decides to malfunction for the first three years of my baby’s life. Poor kid.

So here’s to my learning curve, which will truly be more of a right angle. I plan to blog my way through it to mask my sheer terror, and it may prove an amusing read for all you other naturally maternal mothers out there. Rawr!