Yes, it's big.

So number four on my list of things I do not enjoy is the unwelcome advice and comments one tends to receive while pregnant. Sometimes these comments are well-meaning and sometimes they are just rude. For instance, when I was 14 weeks pregnant with Shira a woman came up to me in synagogue and asked if I was that “overdue pregnant woman” someone had told her about. Translation: “I heard someone was overdue and since you’re pregnant and enormous, it must be you!” 14 weeks pregnant, people. Yes, I had a bump already, but was she really mistaking me for a pregnant woman of 41 weeks? (In an unpleasant follow-up, a few weeks ago, just four months after giving birth, I ran into this woman again. The first thing she did was crane her neck to look at my stomach and asked: “you’re not pregnant again, are you?” Evidently she didn’t get the memo that not every mother is back in shape in four months--and I wasn’t skinny before I got pregnant--or the memo that told her to keep her mouth shut).

All of this is long way to introduce an essay that my wise, pregnant friend, Sheena wrote this week. I’m thinking of sending a few hundred copies to this woman I know.


Tonight’s post is dedicated to all those enormous, beautiful pregnant bellies.