Been working pretty long hours this week. This is what happens when I'm not carpooling with DH, I don't have a forced "quittin' time", so I stay for hours trying to finish things. I didn't get home before 8:30 the last 3 days... But I have some hope that the busiest time is behind us (at work).
Things may be looking up at work because the fog of the first trimester finally seems to be lifting from my brain. I think I've been more productive this week than all year. Which is kind of sad, I know...
So I know a lot of people are wondering why I'm taking so long to "come out" and announce my pregnancy. I mean, I've posted it on the blog, but truthfully, I don't have that many readers :) In real life, both our families know, my boss knows, and 2 friends at work (both guys) know. I'm certainly out of the first trimester danger zone, so why the secrecy?
First off, I think I am still a little scared/disbelieving. It doesn't help that I pretty much jumped straight from a miscarriage into another pregnancy (well, ok, I did wait that month or so for things to get settled, but really, that was just enough time for the hormones to drop, and then they went up again). So I am still very skittish about the whole thing. I keep thinking "oh, once X happens, I'll really feel like it's real" (where X can be any of: 3 months are up, I see the ultrasound, I hear the heartbeat, I feel the first kick). But it's still not quite registering. Which is very annoying, because I'd always had this fantasy of enjoying every moment of my pregnancy, after all, it's such a short yet great time in one's life. So now I'm kicking myself in the posterior for not enjoying it more (which doesn't help at all with the enjoyment ;)). Sigh! Do I always have to over-analyze everything???
Then there's another factor. I have this thing where I really don't want to make a big deal out of this. You couldn't tell from reading this blog ;) I just don't want to be one of those obnoxious pregnant ladies that think the world revolves around them. And you know what's funny? I actually never really realized that they existed until pretty recently. So let me explain with an example: I'm having lunch with a friend, who's 5 months pregnant. This other friend or acquaintance of ours, also 5 months pregnant, walks by, and stops for a little chat. Obviously the talk turns to pregnancy (I have no issues with that). About halfway through the conversation, though, the second pregnant lady decides that I don't have anything interesting to contribute (neither lady knows that I am in early pregnancy at that point), turns completely towards my pregnant friend, and ignores me completely. She didn't even say goodbye, or have a nice lunch to me, just the pregnant one. Well, excuse me for not having a belly that's showing! Just cause I'm not obviously pregnant like you, doesn't mean that I don't know and don't care about anything related to pregnancy, or that I'm an inferior human being to you. Grrr!
Ok, so that was an extreme example, but there's plenty of others. Especially around here, where it seems like every woman in the office is either pregnant, thinking (and talking) about it, or on maternity leave... So for example you have the women who can spend hours telling you how unbelievably hard it is to chose the right colour scheme, or the right designer furniture for their baby's room. It's really not a huge deal for me personally (I can talk babies and decorating for hours), but I can see how annoying this can be for others, and how self-absorbed and self-important it makes one look. So in my effort to try and avoid being an annoying "look at me, I'm pregnant!", I'm sort of going to the other extreme of minimizing it.
Ok, now this blog post is certainly starting to look all self-important and self-centered. This is going to be an uphill battle!
Next time I'm going to publish a post I wrote after the miscarriage, just so that the whole episode is well documented on this blog. Like ying and yang, you have to take the bad with the good, so I figure I'd post some good stuff with some bad stuff, just life stuff I guess ;)
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2 comments:
I think that, in general, people talk about what is on their mind. Pregnant women and their partners talk about baby stuff. People who shop for houses talk about houses. People who are getting married or just got married talk about weddings. People who have deadlines talk about their projects, etc. I think the problem comes when people who are absorbed with X talk to people who could not care less about X. Or when people absorbed with X become obsessed with X and go overboard talking about it. I don't think this is specific to pregnancy.
Very good point. I totally agree that people can obsess about whatever is happening in their lives. And that's fine. I guess I am just concerned that pregnancy is one of those things that I could become a little obsessive about, and never stop talking about it to people. And though I've never really minded talking about pregnancy or babies with people, I know not everyone is that crazy about it :)
And of course the other side of the coin is that I know so many people who have had problems becoming parents, and I know first hand what it's like to be mourning your own loss while the people around you are celebrating their pregnancy. So I am a little uncomfortable "announcing" my pregnancy knowing what effect that can have on people. Especially since I know I am generally pretty loud and hard to ignore when it comes to talking about things :)
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