Pregnant women ARE smug

Because this is my blog and I'm allowed to say whatever I want, whether it's offensive or not, I'm just going to say this: pregnant women are smug. Everyone knows it. But nobody says it. Because they are pregnant.

Yes, it's absolutely jealousy.

Yes, if you're currently pregnant, I want to gouge your eyes out.

If you believe in 'nature taking its course' and refused to have any ultrasounds or medical care during your pregnancy and you've still ended up with a healthy baby, I especially hate you.

If you're so confident that nothing could possibly go wrong that you're happy to risk your baby's life in a home birth so you can have your 'ideal' birth experience, I want to hit you across the head with an ear trumpet and yell into it at the top of my voice 'DON'T YOU KNOW THAT BABIES DIE!'.

Of course, only a short time ago I was a smug pregnant woman too, and if it makes you feel any better I hate myself for that too. I, too, was stupidly naive about the tragedies that could befall me. I was blissfully unaware that there was a series of events going on inside me that would lead to my baby's premature birth and therefore death. I didn't even know that it was possible. I complained about being pregnant with the best of them. In fact, as anyone who knows me would attest, I pretty much hated it from Week 6 onwards. I was hospitalised with hyperemesis and I suffered severe antenatal depression that often ended with me sobbing to my heartbroken partner that I just wanted to die. I didn't like putting on weight and couldn't bare to look at my expanding tummy at times. The list goes on.

I don't believe that these things make me a horrible human being. I think they make me normal. But I also think that admitting them makes me an unusually honest person. To hell with the bitches who gloat that their pregnancy was an amazing experience, that they 'just love' being pregnant, that 'my body's just made for it'. If such things are true then you're pretty fucking lucky and should just shut up about your good fortune. And if you're bluffing because you're afraid to admit that what the mummy bloggers or nipple nazis might say about you then you're just a fool.

Why can't we all just be real?

Pregnancy and baby-making is an inexact science. Fuck ups abound, it's just that until now you haven't had to know about them. Loving your baby and 'doing the right thing' in your pregnancy offers you no immunity to nature's fuck ups. Likewise, some women can mess up their bodies in the most unimaginable ways and go on to have completely healthy babies. Love pregnancy or hate it, you've got no control over how and when the ride stops.

This post started because I just wanted to post a link to a funny video my friend Kate sent me when I first got pregnant. It has ended with an angry tirade against strangers who don't deserve it. You've just spent five minutes in my head. Imagine what it is like to feel this angry ALL OF THE TIME. I'm only days away from the kind of meltdown that Annie had at Lillian's bridal shower in Bridesmaids. Wish I could post that clip but I can't find it on YouTube which makes me even more pissed off.

Thanks for listening, and hey, please enjoy the funny video that started all this.