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Not to get all braggy, but my last post about German pregnancy terms was just reposted on one of my favorite pregnancy resources, Pregnant Chicken. I'm feeling pretty good about this absolutely crucial contribution to such a helpful pregnancy and parenting website... I mean, the indispensable information I have provided expecting parents by expressing my love for my Stolzlippe is most certainly going to help them care for their newborn. I'm feeling pretty great about it, although truth be told I'm also feeling pudgy, swollen, sweaty, impatient, anxious, and extremely physically uncomfortable as I am officially three days past my due date, but this fun news has briefly muted those discomforts (oh ever so briefly). I've been using Pregnant Chicken to keep my first-timer anxieties in-check and with all the overly-precious, not-so-helpful, generally-only-written-for-a-US-audience advice flooding other pregnancy and parenting websites, it has been not only a helpful resource but is also very, very entertaining to read. It was started by this rad lady named Amy Morrison and her voice makes me think of my days interning at The Stranger in Seattle, which basically means her writing is sassy, opinionated, and she swears a lot. Sometimes it's nice to read and learn from someone that sounds and thinks like you and not like a robot regurgitating cliche garbage that they think you want to hear about your 'bump'. There is so much stupid, one-dimensional, cloying, and just plain bad writing on the internet concerning all things pregnancy. My favorite is the pregnancy tracking app that tells you when you're full term that your baby is as big as a watermelon. Perhaps it may be more helpful for them at this point to describe the likeness of your full-term baby as being as big as, well, a newborn fucking baby. Just a thought. Although some watermelon right now sounds delicious...
This may come as a real shocker but a first pregnancy can be a real mindfuck. It has been for me, for a million reasons, of course the German component being one of them, and through this experience I've learned it's really important that women have accurate, digestible information made available to them so they can better make decisions about their health and well-being-—not only in pregnancy but that just sounds like a solid plan for, like, always. Surprisingly, during my pregnancy I found this information to not always be so easy to obtain. This is quite troubling to me as EVERY HUMAN BORN ON THE PLANET CAME OUT OF A PREGNANT WOMAN!? So why isn't there better information available on this fundamental component of our biology? Seems like a gross oversight and I can't help but feel that if pregnancy happened to males, this would not be the case. There, I said it. But many women have said this before me and some are still saying it. Add me to the list. As a 40 weeks + 3 days preggo lady about to give birth in 2019, I'm thankful for sites like Pregnant Chicken that are proudly providing women with honest and accurate information, empowering us, informing us about the scary stuff, the good stuff, some of my German stuff, and all the while without making us feel like we're reading an issue of Cosmo or like your pregnancy is supposed to be like a fluffy pink cloud stuffed with rainbows and roses. Because it's not. And that's OK. And, just for the record, it's also OK to eat a whole watermelon in one sitting. A delicious, baby-sized watermelon.