Work Schmirk and other thoughts

I'm back to work and once I actually got there, I felt OK. It was just the prospect of going back that worried me. I also let my family know that I wouldn't be attending the family reunion that has long been planned. I just can't do two 10 hr drives in one weekend! I wish I could. It looks like it's going to be loads and loads of fun.

I had lunch with a friend today and I told her my (many) opinions, but I've noticed one thing while pregnant, upon which I shall expound. People who are not pregnant LOVE to regale people who are with stories of triumphs and/or horrors of people who they have known who had such and so happen to them. Like the woman who was back in her size 2 jeans by the time she left the hospital. Or the woman who worked/ran marathons/bench pressed her weight in iron/ fill in the blank here...until the DAY she gave birth and then, bounced back to herself so quickly you'd never even know she gave birth. I used to do this to pregnant people too. I guess I thought I was either:
1. Giving them hope or
2. Trying to convince myself that I would not be reduced to a weak, blubbering version of myself.

For the record, I now know that it makes pregnant women feel like crap, or like they're doing something wrong. At least it does me. I always thought I'd be so great at it (being pregnant) and the truth is, I'm not. I am the weak, blubbering version of myself (which I hated for a long time). But the other truth is, I'm not alone. If pregnancy was easy, they wouldn't write books, websites, movies, TV shows, and whatever else form of media the world can supply to help women get through it. There wouldn't be any humor about the raving insane beasts we turn into when growing a human. I tell my stories to other mothers and say how I feel insane (pregnancy tantrums, sobbing at 2am because my muscles are cramped up, sleeplessness, worry, jumpy about babies, crying over the news, crying at commercials (and the olympics - I'd do it too if I had TV!), and guess what...they have all been there too!! I'm perfectly normal and normal for me may look like insane to everyone else, but it's OK. It's where I'm supposed to be.

So to those women who ran marathons etc up until the day they gave birth and then sprang instantly back on the bike/treadmill/elliptical machine...bless your sweet over achieving hearts! Why did you not give yourself a break? It's OK to look like the human equivalent of an ice-cream cone! It's OK to take naps. It's OK to not look like a supermodel within 2 weeks of birth. I no longer envy you. I wish you had the opportunity to relax and enjoy the place you were in life and the life you were bringing into the world, even if your rump was a dimpled mass for longer than you'd like.