Today I was having a conversation with a lovely woman who I know only slightly. The flow of the chat included the following, “Blah, blah, blah. And, plus, you’re pregnant so you might want to be taking it easy right now. Blah, blah, blah.” I never quite made it to the rest of the blahs-blahs because I couldn’t get past the sentence where she began, “And, plus, you’re pregnant….”
By the time I recovered, the line of talk had traveled to the point where it seemed less than gracious to say, “Um, can we back up a minute here? Because just so you know? My fallopian tubes? Totally non-functional. When I went in for the surgery I told the doctors not to be shy with the scalpels. I wanted those baby chutes severed, burned AND tied in knots. No, make that double knots. That means no baby baking in my tummy.” So I kept my mouth shut and quietly laid a hand on my gut in some sort of hopes that just by touching it the size of all things me might diminish.
Only once before have I encountered this comment. The previous encounter happened at a wedding where I was wildly drunk and the bride, who had not invited me, asked just how far along I was. Although she was a bitch, she had some right since I was an unsightly nuisance and mussing her perfect day. So I forgive her for it. But this afternoon’s gaffe? Ouch. The thing of it is I have actually lost about 16 pounds in the last four or five months. Sure, another 15 need to go but I don’t think that merits a comment about the signs of a bun cooking in my oven. And also, the business up top? My busty girls? They continue to maintain a formidable presence on my chest. I have gone down a whole bra size, though the cup has unfortunately remained the same double letter digit size. This sort of top region issue leads to problems with finding tops that fit properly. Most shirts drape over my party girls and leave billows of fabric over my belly area, perhaps this excess of fabric lead the woman to assume there must be some sort of fetus brewing in all that cloth. I’ll give her some slack there. And the shirts that do fit are skin tight in the ab region. And really? Nobody on earth really needs to be subjected to that sight. The whole incident made me want to come home and exercise obsessively for several hours and then go on a fast for two weeks. Instead I made a cup of tea and sat down at my computer to lick my wounds and do an online search for better fitting shirts.
damn bitch!
yeah, well TWICE (2X) in the past month I have been asked if JK was my “grandbaby” by strange passerbyers. Yeah. There you go.
I find it incredibly rude when people assume someone is pregnant. If that person WAS pregnant they would say so. So many women worry about their weight that I’m shocked that another woman would say something like that.
teri´s last blog ..Bad body image