so far nothing has ever turned out even remotely how I pictured it. in most cases, it's better than I could have ever imagined. I spent my life picturing scenes from other people's lives, not my own. and I never understood the gravity of how meaningful the best parts of life would be until they were actually my own.
I always pictured myself as this laid-back, reality-embracing mother, who rolls with punches and allows her children to explore and figure life out on their own, and lets them get owies and self-teach most things with just a little supervision, and not much intervention.
I've never been a big worrier. I definitely overthink, because it helps me understand, but I rarely worry. things usually work themselves out, and the less meddling from me, the better. every time.
but since I've been pregnant, I worry ALL. THE. TIME. i have literally driven myself crazy obsessing about nutrition, and birth defects, and sleeping positions, and food-borne illness, and chemicals, and cancer, and abusive pre-school instructors, and fabrics treated with formaldehyde, and gluten and rBGH, the effects of pre-conception processed food consumption on your eggs, and so much shit it makes my head spin.
I've always believed that lack of information is where most fear stems from. so off to google I've been, for hundreds of hours, researching spina bifida, and club foot, and fetal heart defects, and chromosomal abnormalities, motor skill delays, tongue ties, stillbirth, gestational diabetes, and every kind of structural and functional birth defect known to man, and sometimes when I can actually convince myself that my baby will survive birth, I research things applicable to having an actual infant, like how to identify colic, and the difference between a pain-cry and a hungry cry, and proper car-seat buckle placement since most people get in wrong and choke their babies or bruise them terribly, and cloth diapering and sleep schedules. 1 in 33 babies have some type of birth defect, so I started counting all the babies I know to get a completely inaccurate idea of my odds.
after a terrifying research session about how long after a fetus dies you start to miscarry (um, it can be weeks.), the stress ball I allowed myself to become walked in to the kitchen to ask for a new piece of bread since the one I had been given was rock-hard, and when the chef threw my whole sandwich away to start a new one (don't worry I had already microwaved the meat to kill the listeria) I stood in disbelief for about 30 seconds and then started sobbing! like real-life ugly-crying, and I had to do that guttural throat-babble noise thing to say "I'M JUST PREGNANT AND EMOTIONAL AND I'M SO SORRRRRYYHEEHEEHEEEEE" to a whole kitchen staff.
you guys, I cried about a sandwich. it's like puberty all over again where I have no idea why I'm crying but I am and proud of it, damn it, and just leave me alone if you don't want me! I UNDERSTAND, YOU HEARTLESS MONSTER! you've clearly never experienced real feelings so you can't relate!
and I walked away and shook my head in shame like Rachel Anne, WTF. was. that?
I am watching myself turn in to one of those creepy-ass overbearing mothers who wraps their kid in hemp bubble wrap and spritzes them with organic non-GMO sustainably grown Lysol before handing them a BPA-free hermetically sealed lunch box with a perfectly measured macrobiotic meal, made up of pesticide-free hydroponic produce and organic free-range protein sources.
and why?? because I have way too much information. no wonder people are becoming such shitty parents with research-based excuses for every disease and type of ridiculous display of childish behavior from their kids. I've actually felt annoyance that after how far we have come as a society, nobody has figured out how to install a window on my uterus so I can check in and make sure my not-even-conscious peach-sized fetus is comfortable and still alive every 90 seconds.
but what ever happened to just hoping for the best and not automatically assuming that every little thing that could go wrong will, and believing that whatever is going to happen is going to happen anyway, and it's all okay because you will love your child's beautiful soul no matter what?
so anyway, let it be, let it be! ..this has clearly not been my motto lately, so I'm taking the internet away from myself. I'm going to start picturing my scenes, not images from someone else's.
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