A woman giving birth on a birth chair, circa 1515
And I still have a good 15 weeks to go. Whoosh. Things are gonna get real fun, real soon. The tales I hear from pre-natal yoga include: constant heartburn, severe middle-of-the-night leg cramps, and the thing that gets me the most from those women in the 37-week stage: the spreading of the pelvis. I envision a spreading much like jam on an english muffin and then try to imagine walking on two legs attached to this now amorphous, swilling, splitting, stretchy hinge.
So, I finally feel part of the club. I look pregnant. I feel pregnant. I am, dear friends, in-the-not-too-distant-future going to go through a life-altering event by which my vagina will expand to 10 centimeters and I become a mother. It is starting to feel real. Very real. And I am actually starting to read the books that have been accumulating on the various horizontal sources throughout my house. And though, there are many moments where I can suddenly feel not part of the club–like attending a birthing class where all the other parents-to-be are coupled, or when the convenient pregnancy app on the iPhone insists that at week 25, I should pay special attention to daddy–I will gladly take that seat that is being offered to me.
I kinda look forward to the punk rock part of being a single mom. It doesn't, after all, get more punk than that. I mean, I don't even know exactly how I would be getting to the hospital at this point. Hailing a cab? Thumbing a ride? Hopping on a bike? Kerouac ain't got nothin' on that. While the other mom-to-be's discuss the names they both can't agree upon, or the shortness of his paternity leave, I just smile and keep it to myself. I embrace the challenge. I succumb to failure. I arm myself with humor. And if I get one or two more tattoos along the way, you'll know why.
