expecting #2

as i approach the last trimester of this pregnancy, i am purposely reminding myself of the hell that childbirth is. how do i do this? i youtube videos of women in third world countries who give birth on floors of cow dung huts who receive their episiotomies via machete. in reality, my own baby story will be nothing like this. truly, the only thing i have in common with those ladies is the fact that our nipples are the size of dinner plates and i may have been speaking in zulu when roz started crowning.

by nature, i'm a worrier. this is how t.j. and i really differ: although i worry about anything and everything that could happen, when catastrophe strikes, I'm cool as a cucumber. t.j., on the other hand, worries about NOTHING then drops f-bombs over spilled milk. this is why i am constantly struggling to educate him on the ins and outs of bringing a human into this world without terrifying him. my somewhat limited experience in the health care industry - combined with my addiction to google - has enlightened me to the many things that can go awry during labor and delivery. i do not torture him with the childbirthing classes offered by the hospital; i feel like these classes are more for women who choose to feel childbirth. people like me who would prefer a horse tranquilizer from the neck down do not benefit from lamaze. i like to enjoy bringing my girls into this world the same way i enjoyed my 20's: intoxicated.

so, what is the biggest fear i have? birth defects? pulmonary embolism? toxemia? shoulder dystocia? hemorrhaging out and dying leaving t.j. to raise our precious girls all alone? although these things do cross my mind, they don't come near my deepest, darkest fear of completely shitting all over the table while pushing a human out of my vagina.

yep - pooping. pooping myself is what i fear. many of you cannot believe i'm saying this out loud. i, however, know for a fact after talking to my girlfriends that i'm simply doing the world a favor by bringing this to light. think of it as the kony 2012 for expecting moms. did we know pooping during childbirth was possible? sure - anything is possible. but did you know that this phenomenon strikes around 65% of us?

bam! now you do.

so what do you do with this information? if you are an expecting mom you might be comforted by the fact that someone has finally verbalized your biggest fear. if you are an expecting mom who has never thought about this, you are cussing me out. and, if you are an expecting dad - well, chances are you just shit yourself after learning that this even happens, so we'll just call it even now and go on with our day.