Confessions of a Pregnant Mama

I don't know why but I find public mass confession so soothing and cathartic. Here I go again.

I am pregnant, for the fourth time. I should be used to this by now. I should be an old hand at birth and mothering. I am not. I am scared. And I am scared of lots of things, many of them stupid.

~I am scared to death of going shopping with three little ones hugely pregnant with number four and having people STARE at me and tell me my hands are full. I am scared of what they will think of me. I am scared they will see that I am actually not handling things well and that they really KNOW that my hands are full and I NEED HELP. I know I should just say, "Oh my hands are full of blessings!" But, sometimes they just feel FULL.

~I am scared to death about screwing up yet another perfect child with all of my parenting mishaps and mistakes and horrors. Will they need therapy? Probably. Will I be able to afford it? Probably not.

~I am scared of fat arms again. Yes I realize that this makes me sound vain and selfish and downright silly. But I don't like it when my arms are fatter. I just don't. I am vain. So there.

~Birth- yes I have had three (count them!) three natural births. You know what. They each get faster and so they each get a little more intense and harder. People say you forget what it feels like. Well, I have news for you. If you have three kids in 5 years you don't forget.

~Performance anxiety. I have birth performance anxiety. Yes, I know, once again I am being vain and foolish. I am fully AWARE of my silliness! I teach natural childbirth. I am a vocal proponent of natural and home birth and I don't want to screw this up! I don't. That is a really dumb reason to be afraid of birth but there it is.

~My children will take advantage of me in my slow and cow like state. That is for sure. I know for experience that a two year old can EASILY outrun me when I am anywhere near full term. Baby number three will not even be two when this one is born and let me tell you, she is already my most feisty. This could get interesting.

~Money. Money is an issue. I wish there were more of it. Wait, there is plenty of it. It just is not in my bank account. I know that money technically doesn't not bring happiness, but as they say in How To Marry A Millionaire, "It doesn't exactly depress me either."

~I am pretty sure I can not handle this. Yes, pretty sure. If I am not doing that much of a bang up job with three then it is a given that four will be even more, shall we say, interesting. And you know what, because I have more kids than average, I desperately want to appear as though I am ACTUALLY handling things. Yes, I know I care to much about appearances.

Ahh, Ladies. Thanks for letting me get all crazy and hormonal and self obsessed on you. I sincerely hope that I can learn to handle life better than I do currently, and that my children will know, in the end, that no matter how badly I screwed up, I loved them so much through it all. Yes, that is what I want most, for them to know that I loved them.

Wish me luck, and of course, good luck to you.