Pop Goes the Belly

On the joys of getting bigger and bigger...and bigger.

By Meagan Francis

I'm not sure when, exactly, it happened, but sometime over the past month my belly really popped. No, more than popped: make that "bloated like a tick about to pop" or "swelled up like a water balloon left on the hose." Suddenly, I'm walking more slowly, bumping into things, and feeling more than a little achy at the end of a long day. I no longer have any waist whatsoever, the stretchy panel on my favorite maternity jeans is snug, and it takes me a bit longer to get out of a chair than it used to--accompanied by lots of little sighs and huffs.

And I've still got over three months to go, yo.

Each time I'm pregnant I go through the same process: by about 6 months, I can't believe how big I'm getting; by 7, I feel like I must be breaking some kind of record. By eight months my belly looks like a TV reality-show gag, like at any moment a beach ball is going to fall out of my shirt. Women in line at the grocery store or bank start giving me those sympathetic looks and asking me if I'm past my due date...when I still have at least four weeks to go (more, if you consider the fact that I generally go at least a week overdue.) By the end, my maternity shirts no longer cover my whole belly anymore, so I've got several inches of blue pants panel material hanging out, I can't see anything below my belly button, and people eyeball me nervously in public, as though a baby might drop out of me and land on their feet.

You'd think, after having done this four times, that I'd be so used to my belly's usual progression that I wouldn't be at all surprised to catch a glimpse (oh man. I just accidentally typed "catch a blimpse"--talk about your Freudian slip) of myself looking suddenly rotund at 6 months.  But it still startles me every time. And though I know there are women who get even bigger than me and who show earlier and more obviously, it is still such a strange thing to see my own body change and grow and know that it's just going to keep getting bigger and bigger...and bigger.

All that said, I have a great body image while I'm pregnant. It's not that I glow, or have a serene beauty about me or anything like that. In fact, with my scrawny legs, I think I look a little bit ridiculous, like a watermelon on toothpicks. It's just that I don't care. For nine glorious months I welcome each new soft spot and roll on my hips and back and thighs with cool acceptance: "Oh, yes, I remember you. Welcome back. Stay awhile. Would you like a cookie? Want me to make you a twin?"

This pregnancy thing brings along with it some lumps and bumps, aches and pains and other irritations, but how fantastic is it to live inside a body for nine months that's doing exactly what it needs to do without any input or worrying from me? I eat when I'm hungry, I expand as the baby grows, and I don't worry about any of it.  Sure, I could really live without the stretch marks, but they've been a fact of my life for over eleven years now, so what's a few more?

And the new cleavage? Well, she can hang around as long as she wants.