Friday, June 15, 2007

Litany Against Fear

On Wednesday I had a circuit training class at the gym. I spent all the next day being sore. Today the aches subsided everywhere but for one new location - my extreme lower abs. I haven't been so aware of that region since I was pregnant.

It's really odd because I can feel the muscles slightly contracting and flexing and it feels just like fetal movements felt. It's the same kind of fluttering. I stood in the breakroom today, nuking my lunch, and contemplated just where my uterus lies within me. It's hard to believe how much abdominal space was taken up by carrying a baby. I tried to mentally picture how big my belly had gotten by the end. And then it hit me: that anonymous fetus I was envisioning is Kirk.

It's strange how easy it is to separate pregnancy from the actual child. But I wonder if it's another maternal coping mechanism to get us to do it again? As we get closer and closer to September and the much joked about going-off-the-Pill-while-in-France trip, doing it again becomes a much bigger possibility. Am I ready for that? Even having been through it, pregnancy still freaks me out. Just because I can remember what it was like doesn't make it any less odd. Sure, there's no fear of the unknown like when facing down childbirth for the first time. But now there's something worse: fear of the known. I'm going to have to focus on my Bene Gesserit training to get through it.

2 comments:

Zany Mama said...

It is for this exact reason (fear of the known) that I can never understand how people who already have children can accidentally become pregnant again.

I mean, you know how overwhelming and hard (and joyous and awe-inspiring) parenting is, how could you go into that decision as an "oops"?

(But of course, I know that things are a lot more complex than this. But I do think that the fear of the known is very real.)

belsum said...

You know what though? Sometimes I think that an "oops" is the way to go. Because knowing what you're getting yourself into - yikes!

Mostly, I'm just glad to read that you know what I mean!