Baby Bumps: From Party Girl to Proud Mama, and all the Messy Milestones Along the Way

by Polizzi, Nicole

  © 2013 by Nicole Polizzi

  Published by Running Press,

  A Member of the Perseus Books Group

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  Library of Congress Control Number: 2013950312

  E-book ISBN 978-0-7624-5165-4

  987654321

  Digit on the right indicates the number of this printing

  Cover design by Dan Cantada

  Interior Design by Maria Taffera Lewis

  Edited by Jennifer Kasius

  Typography: Gotham, Chronicle, and Thirsty Rough

  Running Press Book Publishers

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  Philadelphia, PA 19103-4371

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  Dedication

  This book is dedicated to my beautiful son, Lorenzo.

  Without him, I wouldn’t know the true meaning of life and how awesome it feels to be a MILF!

  I’d also like to dedicate this book to my fiancé, Jionni.

  Without him, I wouldn’t have Lorenzo or unforgettable gas pains when pregnant.

  CONTENTS

  Introduction

  Chapter 1: Three Out of Six Pee Sticks Can’t be Wrong

  Chapter 2: The Endless Hangover

  Chapter 3: It’s a Meatball!

  Chapter 4: MILF in Training

  Chapter 5: Whale Sex

  Chapter 6: Swinger

  Chapter 7: She’s Always Right

  Chapter 8: The High Price of Gas

  Chapter 9: Princess Nicole

  Chapter 10: Butt Paste and Boogie Wipes

  Chapter 11: Bump vs. Blimp

  Chapter 12: Super Mommy

  Chapter 13: Does the Crib Come in Leopard Print?

  Chapter 14: The Oldest 24-Year-Old in History

  Chapter 15: Labor Day

  Chapter 16: Firsts

  Chapter 17: Moo

  Chapter 18: Shit Happens

  Chapter 19: Lorenzo Has Two Moms

  Chapter 20: Back to Myself

  Chapter 21: Back in the Saddle

  Chapter 22: That’s How We Roll (With a Stroller)

  Chapter 23: Next!

  Epilogue: Mother’s Day

  Acknowledgments

  Introduction

  My pregnancy began with the thought, “Holy shit! My egg hatched!” I didn’t think I could conceive. Over a lot of years of not using birth control (I know, bad idea), nothing ever happened. I was shocked my body actually did what it was supposed to do. But after the amazement, I got a rebound reality check and thought, What am I going to do? Can I really pull this off?

  When Jionni and I realized we were knocked up, we weren’t engaged. We’d been together for a year and had had plenty of ups and downs. We’d only just settled into a great, stable relationship. I thought our bumps were behind us. But as it turned out, a big one, the biggest, was starting to develop.

  There was no question. We were in love; we wanted to keep the baby. But that didn’t mean I felt ready to be a mom. I was 24. Jionni and I both still lived with our parents. I had next to no experience dealing with kids, and zero exposure to infants. Babysitting jobs in high school? Uh, no. (Hey, I don’t blame my neighbors. I wouldn’t have hired myself!) I’d never held a baby or changed a diaper. Wait, that’s not entirely true. I did try to change a diaper once, but I had to stop mid-wipe and run out the room. I just didn’t like kids.

  I still wanted to have some, though. I figured I’d grow to like kids when I was older myself, like 27 or 28. Then I’d see about becoming a young, sexy mom with four tan babies. So my plans were fast forwarded. Of course I was nervous! The idea of being responsible for a small helpless creature—other than myself—had me quaking in my booties.

  In my fantasies about becoming a mom, I blipped over the pregnancy part. Good call. Those nine months turned me into a slobbering bitch from HELL. I wanted to crawl in a hole. The “kill me now” queasiness was one among dozens of miseries, all of which I’m going to describe in florid, fetid detail in this book. Better brace yourself for some serious disgustingness. You might have to read with one hand over your eyes and the other holding your nose. Pregnancy is not for the faint of heart or bowels. It’s a leaky, oozing, gassy mess. If anyone tells you different, she’s sugar coating like a candy factory.

  According to my doctor, my conception and pregnancy were “easy.” We didn’t need test tubes or turkey basters. No frozen eggs defrosted in a microwave. No scary bleeding, false labor, or mandatory bed rest. We didn’t have to race to the hospital in the middle of the night. I wasn’t wheeled on a gurney into emergency surgery, screaming, “Save my baby! I don’t care if I live or die, but SAVE MY BABY!” For once in my life, I got through a summer with minimal drama. Calling a pregnancy “easy” is a relative term, though. Mine didn’t seem easy to me, not by a long shot! I couldn’t wait for it to end.

  And then, it did. Lorenzo was born in late August. Pregnancy was over, but motherhood was just getting started. Despite my nerves and fears, being a mom came naturally. Moments after the birth, when the nurse plopped Lorenzo on my chest, I knew instinctually how to hold him and talk to him. And if I hadn’t, I would have had to figure it out ASAP. Motherhood comes at you like a speeding Range Rover. You have to throw away doubt and immediately care for your child. You might want to take a two-week vacation after pregnancy and labor. But your baby needs you now. You hit the shit running. That’s actually a good thing. You don’t have any time to worry about whether you’re a good mom. In fact, if you do have lots of time to think about it, then you’re not doing it right.

  As I write this, I’ve been a mom for nine months, as long as I was pregnant. I’m not scared anymore. The opposite. I’m strong and confident. Motherhood reminds me of this line from A Midsummer Night’s Dream: “And though she be but little, she is fierce.” (Yeah, I can quote Shakespeare.) Until I had a baby, I had no idea what it meant to be fierce. I thought I did, but I was way off. I went from wearing leopard print to really feeling like a leopard. Just try to touch my baby, and the claws will come out.

  Not to say motherhood is easy. It’s natural, but it’s a challenge. Jionni and I live in a constant shit storm. I do mean that literally. The shit actually rains down on us sometimes. And guess what? I don’t care. I clean crap off the walls, and I laugh because Lorenzo is the most precious, incredible thing in my life. I got through the pregnancy, the labor and delivery, and that so-called fourth trimester when Lorenzo was a newborn. I feel happier and stronger than ever. If I can do it and come out in one piece, anyone can.

  My so-called ordinary road to motherhood was anything but. It was an extraordinary roller coaster ride. Every day of the experience blew my mind—and blew up my body to unbelievable proportions. No matter how uneventful a pregnancy might seem to outsi
de observers, to the woman who’s experiencing it, it’s enormous and epic and makes her feel like she’s the first woman who’s ever done it. I know that people have been getting pregnant since the dawn of time, that billions of women have done it before me, and billions more will do it after I’m long gone. But when you feel life growing inside you, the most basic, common aspect of human existence seems like a friggin’ miracle.

  One tiny baby can change the world. Lorenzo has certainly changed mine. Since my “egg hatched!” moment, my life has changed 180 degrees—all for the better. I’m a different person now. I love who I’ve become. Like too-trendy clothes from another time, parts of my old personality don’t look right on me anymore. I’m sure people who think of me as a wasted smurf on Jersey Shore might find it hard to believe that, these days, the only bottles I care about are full of formula or milk. I’d rather go to the gym than a club. The only men who see my boobs are my fiancé and my son. Instead of sleeping all morning, I’m up early playing with Lorenzo. While he sleeps, I just stare at him. Don’t get me wrong. I am and will always be true to myself. I still want to look good and have fun. But my definition of “fun” has been turned inside out.

  This book is about what I went through, my ordinary/extraordinary journey from Party Girl to Proud Mama. Since I’m not a doctor or a childbirth expert, I’m not about to rattle off advice on that level. I wouldn’t want to. I am the last person to tell others how to live and what decisions to make. I don’t judge, and I don’t preach. That is not my style at all. I am an expert on myself, though, and I’m just bursting to tell you my whole story, from the first pee stick to the last breast pump. Warning: You will not find “I’m a radiant pregnant woman, watch me glow!” stories in here. That’s not how it was for me. I want to tell the not-so-glamorized truth about the dirty job of becoming a mom. Maybe other women really do have the smiling, rocking chair pregnancy that you see on the cover of other books about it. I know each pregnancy story is unique. But we all deal with a lot of the same issues and weirdness. I hope sharing my crazy thoughts and gross moments will give readers some relief when they have theirs.

  Basically, I feel your gas pain.

  After reading this book, you’ll definitely feel mine!

  Chapter 1

  Three Out of Six Pee Sticks Can’t Be Wrong

  Before I write another word, I have to say the truth. Pregnancy is disgusting, and I hated it. It hurts to breathe. You pee yourself. You become obsessed with farting and pooping.

  It takes about five minutes to figure that out for a lot of pregnant women. As soon as they put their heads in a toilet to puke that first morning, they realize, “Creating human life is a nightmare!” Yes, it’s beautiful and a miracle, whatever. But it’s no picnic. It’s like a horror movie, with blood and farts and fluids flying everywhere, then later, boobs and milk spurting out of control. I am not shitting you. When I was pregnant, I could barely shit myself from constipation.

  Before I even knew I was pregnant, I was having a great time with my hot husband (I called him my husband even though we were just boyfriend-girlfriend then). When we started out, we were a one-night stand on the Jersey Shore. He was just some beefy guido I kidnapped from Karma to get busy with. We had a good time, but in the morning, I thought, I’ll never see this guy again. Before leaving the shore that summer, though, I ripped his number out of the house phone book. I thought he was forgettable—I could barely remember his name—but then I found myself thinking about him and wanting to see him again. When filming ended, I decided to text him. I still didn’t think it would be a major relationship. He was hot and might be a friend with benefits. We started hanging out a lot. Before long, I realized, Not just a smush buddy. It’s more than that. A little while after that, I realized, Not just a boyfriend. He’s the sauce to my meatball. I simply couldn’t do better. Jionni was tan, sexy, good in the sack, and hysterical. What more could a girl want? Plus, there was the intangible factor: I just loved him. I missed him when we were apart for a day. I craved him. I could not imagine life without him. He felt the same way about me. I’d been through years of soul searching for my dream boy. I thought it was the hardest thing in the world to find a good man and fall in love. Turned out to be incredibly easy. A one-night stand turned into the love of my life.

  A year later, we were pregnant. Maybe it shouldn’t have been such a surprise. Breaking news: If you don’t use birth control, you might get knocked up. We did use condoms in the beginning, when he was a random guy I picked up at a club in Seaside three summers ago. But as soon as Jionni and I fell in love and decided to be exclusive, we stopped. No discussion. No, “Hey, we’d better be super careful.” We smushed like drunk bunnies without bothering with protection. Of course, it was crazy pants. It was like a sexual high wire act or a game of Russian roulette using Jionni’s sperm for bullets.

  It might be possible I subconsciously wanted to get knocked up by him—or to see if I could. I’d never been pregnant before. I thought I was infertile. We had a lot of unprotected sex. Like, a lot. But every month, my period came. It was late sometimes from traveling and going wild. But it always showed up eventually. I would feel relieved and disappointed at the same time.

  Then, in December 2011, my period was a week late. It’d never been that late before. I thought to myself, Hey, hon, get a pregnancy test! But I blew it off. It was the holidays. We were traveling a lot. I forgot about my lateness for another couple of weeks. We celebrated the New Year in Las Vegas and partied hard. A few days later, we flew to Los Angeles. When I was packing, I thought, “Should pack some tampons.” And then I tried to think back to my last period. When had that been? November? I couldn’t remember.

  We were sitting in our hotel, and I said, “I’m really late. Beyond unfashionably late. I might’ve skipped a whole period. Does that happen?” It’d never happened to me before.

  Jionni went out and bought a pregnancy test. We went into the bathroom together. Jionni sat on the edge of the tub while I whizzed. Then we hunched over the stick, staring nervously and waiting for something to happen. The window turned pink.

  “Holy shit!” we said, and started giggling.

  Then, at the same time, we said, “We’re keeping it.”

  I glanced in the bathroom mirror, rubbed my tummy and grinned. I pictured a little spermie and eggie chilling together in there. A baby. Really? Me as a mom?

  Yup. We weren’t exactly ready for the challenge of parenthood. We weren’t married or engaged. So what? We were in love, and made a baby in love.

  Look, we weren’t delusional about the situation. It wasn’t the ideal time or stage of life to get knocked up. But as soon as we realized what was happening, we shifted focus. Our lives changed on a dime. Fingers snap—poof!—we made the change. It really was that fast. But it wasn’t easy!

  Before we got really excited, though, we thought it’d be a good idea to confirm the first test’s results. Jionni ran out and got five more pregnancy tests.

  He was back in the room within a half an hour. He unwrapped five sticks and had them lined up and ready to go. I doused them all, one after the other. I could have hosed down a dozen. I never have a hard time peeing. I am a whizzing champion.

  The results this time were mixed. Three said negative, and two were positive. According to our six sticks, I was half pregnant—which I knew wasn’t possible.

  So was I knocked up or not?

  We called the helpline number on the instruction sheet and talked to a lady who explained that, basically, you can get a false negative, but if any test shows a positive, you are way pregnant. We then called Jionni’s pregnant sister who said the same thing. But those three negatives bugged me. I wasn’t 1,000 percent convinced that the three positives were right. If there was any chance I wasn’t preggers, we wanted to change that. Once the idea of having a baby took hold, we couldn’t wait to do it. It wasn’t on the radar an hour before, but now it had to happen, right away. We said, “Let’s do it!”

 
Jionni and I were so excited at the thought of becoming parents, we wanted to guarantee it. So right away, we ripped off our clothes and hopped in the sack. It was a total smush fest of laughing and saying, “Woohoo, we’re making a baby! I’M GONNA BE A MOM!” not knowing for sure we already had a little baby on board. That was a fun and crazy night. We didn’t go to sleep until dawn. We flew back to Jersey a day later and went straight to the doctor. He confirmed the great news. A little zygote was definitely doing handsprings in my uterus, and had been getting cozy in there for two months already. We were officially pregnant. Yes! It was the perfect way to kick off 2012.

  What an incredible feeling! I’d just been living my life, but my body had been up to something amazing while I wasn’t paying attention. The fact that Jionni and I reacted the same way to the pregnancy proved to me beyond a doubt that we were meant to be together. It was only a matter of time before we got engaged.

  Bonus: Just as I’d always dreamed, my future husband’s name ended with a vowel.

  Here’s Jionni

  Nicole and I hadn’t been using birth control for a while, but I didn’t think about whether she would get pregnant any more than she did. I was one of those people who thought, It won’t happen to me. And then it did.

  My first thought? Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit! Not in a terrified way. Well, a little shocked. I was just as excited as Nicole. I knew we’d be together forever, and I always wanted to marry her. The surprise pregnancy just meant we’d do it sooner than expected. Neither one of us had any hesitation. No regrets, no doubts. Not once did we think, Should we do this? It was “yes” from the first pee stick, all the way through. My two brothers and sister have kids, and they’re all happy with their families. I thought, It’s my turn now. I’m going to have a family.

  My first pregnancy chore: cleaning out the junk. I threw away the cigarettes and vodka bottles, and mentally closed the trash can lid on all of that for the next seven months. I know a lot of people recall Jersey Shore and think I’m a hopeless drunk. Not true. One day, I was a drinker and a sometimes smoker. The next? Completely sober and cigarette-free. It wasn’t so hard. I just made up my mind to cut it out, and that was that. I might’ve wanted a drink in an abstract way, like, “I’m starving, get me a scotch.” Smoking and drinking had always been fun stuff I enjoyed doing, but it wasn’t something I needed. I didn’t crave alcohol or nicotine like an addict. I peed on those sticks, and flushed away the desire to drink and smoke. I never wavered about that. No fetus of mine was going to swim around in a uterus full of vodka, batting away floating cigarette butts and olives.