Pregnancy is not for ladies
Check your self-esteem at the door
It’s not so obvious at the start
When your breasts turn into
Self-inflating grapefruit
Tempting the touch
But so tender
That you want to scream
If anyone even looks at them the wrong way.

But as time passes
So does your dignity
While you trip, tumble and roll
Your cumbersome way
Through the next few months
Snatching sleep where you can
Though it is never enough
To keep the baby-growing mechanism inside you
Purring and contented.

As you move zeppelin-like
To the last stages
All your bodily functions explode
Sometimes literally
Till you become
A sniffling, spitting, belching, farting machine
With no control
No dignity
And seemingly no end in sight
(though it can’t be long now).

And then there’s the birth
They never say how much it hurts
When they’re selling the miracle myth
It’s no miracle,
Just hour upon hour of bloody hard work
To produce the result of a few moments’
(or months if you’re lucky) pleasure.
Moaning, groaning, screaming, sometimes swearing
While a medical football team
Peers up your fanny with a torch.

No, pregnancy is definitely not for ladies.
It’s not sugar and spice and everything nice,
Keep your legs crossed, and play nicely, dear
It’s raw, brutal, painful, almost animal
In its intensity
Though maybe
Just maybe
The baby
Is worth it.

(Originally published on RITRO)