Methobaby

It’s been a tough week.  Sunday and Monday were spent mostly in the bed, suffering from what I discovered on Tuesday was an infection.  I also found out Tuesday that Baby may be bigger than she’s supposed to be at 26 weeks AND that I have gestational diabetes.  So, I’ve spent most of the rest of the week in bed, on antibiotics, mostly far away from D., and worried about Baby.  What is it about us that makes us automatically blame ourselves for potentially “dangerous” things that face our children?  Mine isn’t even born yet, and it’s entirely possible that at least one bit of bad news we received this week is completely out of my control.  Yet, I spent a lot of time this week worrying: will she be born with remnants of or ill-effects of the infection I had?  Will the antibiotics cause her harm?  (That one came mostly from the pharmacist not wanting to give them to me and saying things like, “helpful efftects outweigh potential harm to the fetus”.)  Will she now not be able to be born naturally because I have consumed too much sugar and starch in my lifetime?  That’s not HER fault, I kept saying to myself.  

Then I got around to the silliest one of all–this is how I KNEW I had just done a cannon-ball off the diving board attached to sane reactions in the 16-ft. deep water of blowing things WAY out of proportion: will she be too fat?

I don’t mean that in the scary, mom-who-forces-her-daughter-to-be-in-beauty-pagents way.  I was worried that she would spend all of the life she’ll be able to remember worrying that she is too fat, just the way her mommy has.  And for the first time in my life I had stopped worrying about that and about what I was eating.  Irony!  

But don’t worry; I’m not going to starve her or only feed her half as much as she cries.  I think chubby babies are cute.  I just worry that she’ll live with even worse influence from the world concerning body image than her mom has had to live with–and that’s been no picnic, let me tell you.  

In then end, with the help of D. who has taken tremendous care of us this week, some good friends and helpful family members upon whom I can really count, and some extra time to give myself a few “You’re being silly!” lectures, I’m feeling better now.  Much better.  I’m out of bed, medicine is working, Baby is using my insides to train for what already seems to be a promising future in martial arts (I picture her doing those flying/spinning kicks you see in movies–just NOT in slow motion), she’s not too fat–she’s perfect just as she is (thank you Mark Darcey in Bridget Jones’ Diary) and I’m learning to deal with carb cravings.  We’ve had a life-long love afair, carbs and me.  But I think I’ve made a clean break.  Pray for me.

So what if Baby turns out to be “big-boned”?  It hasn’t ruined my life, and she’ll be the most beautiful thing in the world to D. and me, ALWAYS.  It’s just like my dad said on the phone the other day: “I can’t wait to see her!”