Still Kicking

Yes, I am still alive. So is the baby. The Internet, however, died.

During its absence much has been accomplished, mostly of the eating candy and drooling on books variety. I am too fat to do much more than sit around these days. How I got this fat is beyond me. I haven't gained a pound all month. I blame my fat baby for making my butt look big.

Yes, my baby is fat. At least this is what the good doctor would have me believe. Around 35 weeks he politely recommended that I have the baby as soon as possible since it would only get bigger. While I have no qualms with my pregnant girth, as the person doing the squeezing out, I was alarmed at the suggestion that the baby may reach proportions not conductive to exiting the uterus. I called around. Turns out I am destined to have a "big" baby. My husband was over 8 pounds, my brother was over 8 pounds (and three weeks late to boot), and my sister had two babies over 8 pounds. While the girth of my husband and siblings was no consolation the revelation regarding my sister's children was.

My sister is tiny. Not petite tiny- she's too good at beating me up to be called petite. She's borderline "little person" tiny. A former pro-jockey she stands well under 5 feet and weighs all of 90 pounds soaking wet. She squeezed out her first giant baby in four hours with no drugs and no tearing. My sister had a midwife who was of the opinion that it's better to find out how huge the baby is after you get it out. My sister's midwife spent the months leading up to the birth going on about how small the baby was. This was an obvious lie. My sister was as wide as she was tall the month before the baby was born.

However, if my sister was that small and had a child weighing 8 pounds 10 ounces, does this mean I'm destined to give birth to a monstrous 11 pound baby? Do they even let you birth those yourself anymore? My mother, always skilled at saying exactly the wrong thing, gently reminded me that if I couldn't squeeze the baby out that, "they have things to help you. You know, like a vacuum..." Thanks mom! Now I'm having strange dreams involving that ad where the little old man stands on a ladder, holding a bowling ball high above the ground with only the power of a vacuum cleaner.