COUNTERPOINTS:

It is stylish to wear tight shirts to accentuate your bulging stomach, which is extremely refreshing

Elastic waistbands 4 lyfe

Ready-made excuse not to wear high heels

Ready-made excuse to leave boring company Christmas parties before they devolve into boring drunk company Christmas parties

Opportunity to feel badass about doing hard work you don't really have to exert any willpower to complete

Hmm all of my counterpoints involve being a lazy antisocial slob, I wonder if I should work on that.

I got my IUD put in Tuesday, and as such my cramps are especially lousy this month, so this made me feel much better. Thank you.

Heh, I'm 34 weeks and my reactions are STILL somewhat similar to yours except too late for birth control that ship has sailed.

My work makes people from my archive department introduce films on our YouTube channel of one of our film collections sometimes, and the one I had to do today was about an Irish woman in 1950 who gave birth to a 17lb 3oz baby, and I haven't seen the rushes of my intro yet, but pretty sure a face has never been so terrified.

Also I didn't know you weren't supposed to eat hot dogs.

"IT CAN CRY WHILE IT’S STILL IN THERE??"

LITERALLY THE CREEPIEST THING.

I'm 21 weeks right now and I like to occasionally stomp around the house with my arms over my head intoning, "I CONTAIN TWO BEATING HUMAN HEARTS. PROSTRATE YOURSELF BEFORE ME."

Embracing grandiosity makes up for at least some of the discomfort/lack of dignity/crummy digestive functions.

(Ed to add, nobody actually listens when I do this.)

I grew up in a super conservative town and then went to a catholic university so for a looong time I was fed a lot of "all women have children, those who don't are bad/sad/weird." It sounds strange but the day I realized I actually never had to go through pregnancy was such a great day. I still remember the feeling of relief vividly.

SmrtCookie plus Mirena = True Luv 4Eva

Pregnancy is one long Giger-esque body horror show, as far as I'm concerned.

My reaction is always "ohhhhh now you're always going to be too busy to drink with me".

I am about to graduate after 6 years of my MDiv. I will have money. I will have time to myself. And my husband is like " I've been waiting forever to become a dad I don't want to be old dad." And I'm like "YOU CAN WAIT A LITTLE LONGER PERSON WHO WILL NOT BE GESTATING A PERSON INSIDE THEM."

It wasn't that long ago I had the realization that people need doctors to tell them the sex of the baby and if everything is coming along ok because the call is coming from inside the house but you don't know a damn thing about it.

That and the first ultrasound picture I actually took the time to look at have made pregnancies and fetuses a mild phobia of mine.

PS yes Jaya they hiccup ALL THE TIME and it feels hilarious.

I learned the medical term for "constantly feeling like you have to poop" from a doctor friend when chatting with him and a mutual friend in her 37th week, because that's what was going on with her that week, and then PROMPTLY FORGOT IT, and I'm so mad because I feel like that's a great term to have in your back pocket.

(yes, I know I can google it, I'm just pouting)

Every time someone asks me if I am going to have children (which, MYOB), I make the Tina Belcher ehhhhhhhhnhhhh noise, which probably tells me all I need to know about that.

"You are a warrior and I am worthless. You are staring pain and hormones and care of another human life straight in the face and I am changing out of heels into flats because I have a teensy blister. You are magic and I am nothing."

Um... thanks for deriding women like me who don't want to have children?

Can we please, PLEASE stop categorizing women who choose not to have children, or who CAN'T have children, as "worthless"? This happens far too often in society and I'm really over it. Women are worth more than their wombs. I do believe that's one of the many points we've all been slugging to make the rest of the world see since the inception of the suffrage movement.

I have pregnancy body horror and my BFF is pregnant. Funnily enough her stories don't bug me because it's not me!

Ohhh I should be pregnant but I had a very early miscarriage five weeks ago and hopefully it will not be too long until I am pregnant again because I LOVED being pregnant and was very good at it and fingers crossed fingers crossed fingers crossed.

Ohhh man, I've had two babies, and no lie it is super weird being pregnant, but also awesome. I have always had a bit of a tummy, less boobage than I might like, and fine hair, so I have never felt more gloriously beautiful than the second trimester of each pregnancy. I dressed to flaunt the belly instead of hide it, my boobs were just amazing, and my hair was thick and shiny and YOU GUYS I MISS IT STILL. (In the third trimester of both my blood pressure shot up and I got stuck on bedrest and as the weeks went by and my muscles melted into jelly and I laid there like a human incubator the glamour kinda wore off.)

Side note, I too did not know the baby could cry in utero, though I *do* know from experience that they can get hiccups in there, because mine did. All the time. Felt like a tiny muscle spasm and was just the most annoying thing. DRINK SOMETHING, BABY, SHEEEEEEESH

Yes, but in fairness, those back-of-the-heel blisters from high heels are the worst!

(And flats and basically any shoe that decides that I looked at it wrong. One of the blessings of winter is that I can lace up my boots and never once wonder how far I'll be able to walk in them before worrying about a blister starting.)

I'm at a little over 20 weeks and have been surprisingly calm and content in the face of all the body changes. Until I noticed that my navel is disappearing. That well and truly freaks me out, and I can't even explain why. #omphaloskepsis

Yeah, but the week after I had my baby, I lost 20lbs (goddamn water weight) and my boobs grew three sizes. Internally I was a disaster, but I looked FREAKING GREAT.

I'm 2 days overdue and right now, if I walk towards you you'd be like, oh, why is that large woman waddling? And then I turn sideways and you'd be all 'HOLY SHIT THAT'S A BABY'.

The transformation is amazing.

Pretty much every time a friend is pregnant I learn a new and horrifying thing about pregnancy and I am so glad I have decided to opt out of that because it is the definition of body horror. (props to all you who have done it because GOOD LORD.)

I was a G cup BEFORE I got pregnant; my boobs ALREADY looked great!

Anyway I ate a giant platter of sushi last weekend and it was amazing. American pregnancy guidelines are bullshit.

I mean, once you've pooped on a table in front of complete strangers, your perspective on things just changes.

The best thing about pregnancy is the constant (joking) guilt-trip I get to give my husband. "Oh, you want me to take out the garbage? You want your nine months pregnant wife to lug a bag of trash outside in the cold? You know that I'm actively gestating your third son at this very moment, right?"

I am literally sitting on my hands and typing with my nose in order to not launch into my insane labour story, so I will definitely take any and all descriptions of any stage of pregnancy as superheroic ALWAYS. It's damn tough.

I started having contractions on Thursday afternoon—mild, easy-peasy contractions—and was like, "this is it! This baby is being born today! "
A full 24 hours go by. I'm reading the New Yorker and doing my birth affirmations. We're timing them: ten minutes apart. Breathing through them.
No baby.
Another 24 hours go by. We're listening to David Bowie and I'm sweating hard. My husband is saying things like"let it gooooo" every time I contract. Call the midwives. 3 centimeters dilated like a FUCKING CHUMP.
No baby.
More hours. Contractions five and a half minutes apart. I am barfing, and my lips are chapped and bleeding from doing my horse breathing. Birth affirmations out the window. My husband is squeezing my hips so hard he's leaving handprints. Nothing helps.
No baby.
Monday morning. Midwives tell me to come into their clinic for a stress test. I am DEFINITELY STRESSED, midwives. Contractions triggered every time I stand up, sit down, pee, roll over, change position, and also every five minutes. Throw up on the street. Six centimeters dilated. Go to the Birth Centre.
No baby.
Climb into the Birth Centre's hge tub. Nearly drown during a contraction. Legs are cramping. Get out and sit on the birth stool. Bellow, "I hate this fucking birth stool," at the midwives. Barf some more.
No baby.
Get transferred to the hospital for pitocin, and blessedly, an epidural. It takes the doctors three tries to thread the epidural needle correctly. I am so zoned on pain that I nod off during their last attempt.
No baby.
Monday evening, the OBGYN comes in, perky as can be, and informs me that the baby's heart rate is dropping after every contraction and also he has pooped in my womb. Time for a c-section.
During the c-section, the epidural medicine is everywhere, not just my lower half, which freezes me up to my jaw. Inform the anesthesiologist I feel fucked up. He tells me that this is because my uterus is outside my body and upside down. I hate him until the end of days.
Finally, FINALLY, FUCKING FINALLY: there is a baby. He is amazing.

But: he may not have any siblings.