And Now We Have Everything: On Motherhood Before I Was Ready

by Meaghan O'Connell

I had the litany of pregnancy symptoms memorized, though. All women do.

I’ve been reading a book called Spiritual Midwifery and want a hippie childbirth, one where no scary needles come near your spine and you can brag to all your friends about it later.

The authority of the pregnant person. I can see that it’s there in the way people treat me, in their endless questions and concern. But I don’t feel it in myself at all.

Getting a C-section has become a sort of moral failure in my eyes. I haven’t read much of anything about preparing for or recovering from one, convinced that I don’t need to know. Ignoring the possibility entirely feels like a way to keep it from happening.

This was MEEEEEEEEEE

At this point I didn’t believe, really, that either of us, me or the baby, would make it out alive, but the numbers argued otherwise. As long as I kept watching them, I felt like we would be okay.

Maybe all it takes is distraction. For you and the baby, for everyone. Think about other things. Stop thinking about all the bad things that could happen. Not because they can’t happen but because it’s the only way to calm down.