I didn’t have all the warm and fuzzy pregnancy memories that I imagine most people to have. I wasn’t trying to get pregnant, I was at the end of a relationship, and on top of it all, I didn’t even realize I was pregnant until month five. Needless to say, there wasn’t a lot of room for poetic moments and likening a growing fetus its comparable fruit size.
People ask and ask and love to ask how on earth did I not know, and how out of tune do you have to be to not even realize what’s happening, and I give a variety of answers every time, and I think I’m just now coming to grips with the real truth, which is, on top of those variety of answers that I like to give (I was busy, travelling, just didn’t notice, no morning sickness, I was running more and losing weight!), a large part of it was denial. Which still isn’t entirely true. Month one and two were denial, and then because I was busy, travelling, no morning sickness, losing weight, I just forgot about it completely.
Here’s my most delicious memory from being pregnant.
I was in Cambridge, England, living with family friends Bob and Jenny, and their two boys Duncan and Connor. We had some “arrangement” I guess, I sort of helped out and played with the boys a lot, babysat really only once while Bob and Jenny went out, but I basically got to visit for a few weeks over the summer while they were on a year sabbatical. It was really fun. I was 20, and I was a young 20, and I appreciated being part of that family unit, while also being on my own. I wasn’t that exciting, I spent most of my days walking around Cambridge, drinking lattes and writing and reading. Bob and Jenny were cool, they were adults but they weren’t my parents, I loved Duncan and Connor. Duncan was 4? then? maybe 5? and we listened to the Beatles on my iPod. Connor was this wonderful bundle of energy and happiness. And kids love people that they deem not-quite-adults and not-quite-kids. It was really fun.
They lived in this cool townhousey house within walking distance of “downtown” (European downtowns are different than like, Chapel Hill downtown. Anyway, it was in walking distance of the city centre.) And all the little houses were smushed together, and everyone had little fenced in backyards that went out into a street behind them. It was two stories, except for the third story which was an attic bedroom, and that’s where I slept. It had sloped ceilings, and pretty much just fit my queen size bed, and it had these great windows, kind of small, but you could look out and see all the tops of the houses. European houses, of course, with great cobbled roofs, and old-timey antennas, and if you looked out and down from those windows you could peer into other people’s backyards and see all their laundry hanging out to dry. I don’t know why I’ve been thinking about that attic room lately, but what I remember so clearly about it was just feeling so peaceful.
In retrospect, I did experience one first trimester/second trimester pregnancy symptom. I was so tired. I think I about slept 15 hours every day almost the entire time I was there. (Bob and Jenny must have thought I was crazy! Then of course it was all explained later.) I would go to sleep around 11 or 12, and I would wake up in the mid afternoon the next day. My attic room was so cozy and warm from the sun. I would wake up to the natural light, filling my room with a wonderful warm glow. I love waking up when the day has already started. Something about that has always been so magical to me. As if they day has been up before I was just getting ready for me. In that attic room, I felt so peaceful, so special, so deliciously lazy.
When I planned to go visit Bob and Jenny and Duncan and Connor in Cambridge, I had all of these grand plans of taking these weekend trips and backpacking around, and I must have bookmarked hundreds of websites of places I wanted to go, buses to the coast, trains to London, and what won out, what it turned out I most needed, was that attic room.
I was safe there. And that was a time that I didn’t know I needed to let my body be, and that was the most important thing I could do for myself.
Still to this day my favorite way to wake up is slowly, when the sun’s already been up for a while, and it’s had a chance to warm up my room, and I can just lie there, cozy and under the covers, blinking my hellos to the day.
People ask and ask and love to ask how on earth did I not know, and how out of tune do you have to be to not even realize what’s happening, and I give a variety of answers every time, and I think I’m just now coming to grips with the real truth, which is, on top of those variety of answers that I like to give (I was busy, travelling, just didn’t notice, no morning sickness, I was running more and losing weight!), a large part of it was denial. Which still isn’t entirely true. Month one and two were denial, and then because I was busy, travelling, no morning sickness, losing weight, I just forgot about it completely.
Here’s my most delicious memory from being pregnant.
I was in Cambridge, England, living with family friends Bob and Jenny, and their two boys Duncan and Connor. We had some “arrangement” I guess, I sort of helped out and played with the boys a lot, babysat really only once while Bob and Jenny went out, but I basically got to visit for a few weeks over the summer while they were on a year sabbatical. It was really fun. I was 20, and I was a young 20, and I appreciated being part of that family unit, while also being on my own. I wasn’t that exciting, I spent most of my days walking around Cambridge, drinking lattes and writing and reading. Bob and Jenny were cool, they were adults but they weren’t my parents, I loved Duncan and Connor. Duncan was 4? then? maybe 5? and we listened to the Beatles on my iPod. Connor was this wonderful bundle of energy and happiness. And kids love people that they deem not-quite-adults and not-quite-kids. It was really fun.
They lived in this cool townhousey house within walking distance of “downtown” (European downtowns are different than like, Chapel Hill downtown. Anyway, it was in walking distance of the city centre.) And all the little houses were smushed together, and everyone had little fenced in backyards that went out into a street behind them. It was two stories, except for the third story which was an attic bedroom, and that’s where I slept. It had sloped ceilings, and pretty much just fit my queen size bed, and it had these great windows, kind of small, but you could look out and see all the tops of the houses. European houses, of course, with great cobbled roofs, and old-timey antennas, and if you looked out and down from those windows you could peer into other people’s backyards and see all their laundry hanging out to dry. I don’t know why I’ve been thinking about that attic room lately, but what I remember so clearly about it was just feeling so peaceful.
In retrospect, I did experience one first trimester/second trimester pregnancy symptom. I was so tired. I think I about slept 15 hours every day almost the entire time I was there. (Bob and Jenny must have thought I was crazy! Then of course it was all explained later.) I would go to sleep around 11 or 12, and I would wake up in the mid afternoon the next day. My attic room was so cozy and warm from the sun. I would wake up to the natural light, filling my room with a wonderful warm glow. I love waking up when the day has already started. Something about that has always been so magical to me. As if they day has been up before I was just getting ready for me. In that attic room, I felt so peaceful, so special, so deliciously lazy.
When I planned to go visit Bob and Jenny and Duncan and Connor in Cambridge, I had all of these grand plans of taking these weekend trips and backpacking around, and I must have bookmarked hundreds of websites of places I wanted to go, buses to the coast, trains to London, and what won out, what it turned out I most needed, was that attic room.
I was safe there. And that was a time that I didn’t know I needed to let my body be, and that was the most important thing I could do for myself.
Still to this day my favorite way to wake up is slowly, when the sun’s already been up for a while, and it’s had a chance to warm up my room, and I can just lie there, cozy and under the covers, blinking my hellos to the day.
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