“What’s your fungus height? Are those mushrooms back again?”
I looked under my arm.
“Those are long gone. I harvested them and put them in the pasta, remember?”
“So . . . fungus height?”
“Right. It’s the size of my uterus.”
“Lee,” he said. “You’re pregnant. It’s normal.”
Sure. Nor-maall.
It was Week Thirty-Seven. I wrote it down.
I had just returned from another appointment with my obstetrician where I’d been weighed by two Thai nurses whose combined mass equaled one of my thighs.
I told Chris about my weight gain and made the mistake of sharing that I now tipped the scale—quite literally—at two bills.
“Really?” he said. “Wow, with your height and weight, you have great stats for a defensive back.”
I choked on my Häagen-Dazs.
“Tell me you didn’t just say that out loud.”
“What did I say?”
“You can’t play that card. I know you remember what you said.”
“It was a compliment.”
I gave him the finger with the hand not holding my halfeaten ice cream. Because that’s what self-help books for couples advise.
“Look,” Chris continued, making the grave mistake of trying to explain himself. “DBs in the NFL are fast. They have to cover wide receivers and—”
“Wide?”
“I need to shut up, don’t I?”
I pointed the now empty ice cream stick at him. “You thought telling me I have good stats for a football player would be funny?”
“Not any football player . . . a DB . . . and I thought . . . no . . . I didn’t think.”
Parenting Tip: During pregnancy (or any other time), if your husband comments that you have the measurements of an NFL player, it’s perfectly legal to throw this book at him.
DO YOU THINK IT’S HERETICAL IF I REFER TO MYSELF
AS THE TRINITY?
In one of my pregnancy books, I read that heredity is a major determinant of whether a woman gets stretch marks during her pregnancy. I can assert with confidence that this theory has the same scientific validity as Pamela Anderson’s breasts being natural.
I took more precautions to avoid getting stretch marks than I did to avoid getting pregnant. I collected lotions, potions, and emotions on my bedside table. I would’ve tried eye of newt and toe of frog if I didn’t have to go down to Chattuchuk—Bangkok’s crazy market that sells everything, including chicks dyed in primary colors (and no, I’m not talking about women, though in Bangkok, that was possible too)—to haggle for them.
Alas, all my belly rubbing was for naught. By the time I was well into my third semester, I had gained fifty pounds, and my skin stretched and turned bright purple. Easter purple. My stretch marks were well organized, seemingly etched by a city planner. They traveled in two distinct directions, avenues and streets intersecting each other on my own speed bump the size of Manhattan. My belly button was a statue lacking liberty.
Chris had the foresight not to comment on my marks. And being the good guy he is, they didn’t bother him.
Whenever I bemoaned the existence of my tattooed belly, he’d shrug and go back into his mode of denial, which involved watching TV and reading.
Somewhere in the middle of a Raptors game—it was, after all, Chris Bosh’s rookie season in the NBA—I sat on a chair in underwear.
“Do you want to play checkers?” I asked.
“What?” Chris answered, still looking at the TV.
“Checkers,” I said. “You know, the game?”
“I know what it is,” he said, eyes still focused on the Pistons’s domination of the game.
“Well, do you want to play?”
“No thanks, Lee. I’m just trying to lose myself in the game.”
“Are you sure?” I said. “Because I thought we could play checkers on my stretch marks.”
Finally, he looked at me.
Then Vince Carter, the Raptors’s star player, received a technical foul.
“#$%*!”
“I guess that’s a ‘no,’” I said and began looking around for tongue of dog, my latest potion.
The next night I told Chris, “You know, pregnancy should be measured in seconds.”
He looked up from the serial killer novel he was reading. Evidently, the NBA had the night off.
“It should be,” I continued. “I mean, they used to measure it in months. Now it’s measured in weeks. If we’re going for realism, it should be measured in seconds.”
“You’ve been thinking about this.”
“I’ve had a lot of spare seconds since I stopped working.”
“You have a point,” he said, trying to dismiss me so he could get back to his fictional world of carnage and ex-army badasses. I suspected this was more manageable than real life.
“In case you’re wondering, nine months equals twenty-four million, one-hundred-and-ninety-two thousand seconds.”
He looked up from his book. “You memorized it?”
Parenting Tip: Measure pregnancy in seconds, not weeks. It almost makes gestation seem as endless as it feels.
“Yup. I used one hundred and twenty seconds to do the math.”
“Right.”
“But since we’re having twins, I’ll likely be pregnant for a shorter time, maybe just under twenty-three million seconds.”
“You didn’t memorize that one?”
“Nope. Didn’t want to waste any more seconds.”
“Can I read my book now?”
“Sure. Go wild,” I said, eyeing his book. “Jack Reacher will save the day, you know. With a toothbrush in his pocket.”
“I know.”
“OK.”
At various times in the nine longest months of my life—usually while Chris was on his escape–reality mission—I played with words. I debated if the plural of fetus was fetuses or feti. And if it was feti, what is the plural of fetish? Could a person who was overly enamored with twins in a pregnant woman’s uterus have a feti feti?
Chris, like a good husband, pretended to be amused. Together, we referred to our fetuses as Baby A and Baby B, Lefty and Righty, and Thing 1 and Thing 2.
We chose not to find out their sexes, so we had to be vague. Still, as the pregnancy dragged on we became more inventive, giving them names such as Alpha and Omega, and Engine and Caboose.
Parenting Tip: Give bizarre names to your fetus. Like Cletus.
One day, I met Chris at work and rode home with him in a tuk tuk, a three-wheeled motorized rickshaw that’s half motorcycle, half tin can. Amid the noise and the crowded streets, I shouted, “Do you think it’s heretical if I refer to myself as the Trinity?”
“The what?” Chris asked, yelling above the din of traffic and two-stroke engines.
“The Trinity,” I said. “You know, the three-in-one.”
He laughed. “Call yourself whatever you want,” he said, rubbing my bouncing belly. “This tuk tuk is likely going straight to hell.”
WHY DO SO MANY PEOPLE SAY STUPID THINGS
TO PREGNANT WOMEN?
Before I had kids, I approached childrearing like a new project: I researched it with the goal of becoming an expert. In retrospect, this approach was as successful as a nineteenyear-old who has completed Biology 101 performing a DIY appendectomy.
I read all the books on pregnancy.
And like a good wife, I shared what I read with Chris, not caring that he was trying to multitask by watching the NHL and NBA playoffs simultaneously.
“Listen to this,” I said.
I took his grunt as assent.
“This book says that if you have large breasts, you should try putting a rolled up pair of socks under the boob the baby is feeding on.”
Another grunt.
“I think mine qualify as large.”
A third grunt. I was getting somewhere.
“We need to buy some tube socks.”
&n
bsp; Nothing.
I continued. “Some tube socks that would fit Shaq.”
“What did you say about Shaq? Neither he nor the Lakers are having a great game.”
“I don’t care, but I need his size socks. You know, for my Shaq-sized boobs.”
“You need socks for your boobs?”
“Weren’t you listening?” I asked.
“Yes. I mean not really. I kind of zoned out to my own world when you mentioned your knockers.”
“The book says I need to put socks under my boobs while I breastfeed. I have basketball breasts, so I need Shaq socks.”
“What book?” he asked.
“The one I’m reading.”
“Right,” Chris said. “Do your breasts need anything else?”
I finally had his attention.
“Look,” I said, distracting him. “Halftime’s over. What’s the score?”
In those last weeks of pregnancy, sleep was as elusive as an Oscar nomination for the average reality TV star. I started a sleep debt that I’d spend the next ten years trying to recover from. Often I woke up and read. I was on Pregnancy Book #83.
Some nights my hip went numb. Some nights I’d urinate hourly. Some nights I’d be karate kicked in the ribs by a fetal black belt.
I emailed my pregnant cousin: “Lefty has taken up the pommel horse. This is likely the only time either of my kids will be small enough to contemplate gymnastics.”
I waxed on about stats and bodily functions, and I pressed send.
I found Chris watching sports again—this time hockey playoffs—escaping into a world where the season didn’t last for the rest of his life.
“We need to preregister our kids for speed skating,” I said.
“We need to what?”
“Preregister them for speed skating,” I explained. “With our genes, each babe is bound to be a head on thunder thighs.”
Chris smiled. “Short track cycling is an option too.”
“True,” I said. “And it has a complementary off season.”
We laughed.
“Speaking of compliments, I could use one,” I said.
His smile grew. “You look good knocked up.”
Parenting Tip: Before placing your children in sports activities, consider their genetic limitations. Blame your spouse for any shortfalls.
Hard as those hot, smelly months may have been, they weren’t as difficult as other people’s verbal blunders. Friends, colleagues, and relatives, perhaps well meaning, trespassed into what was, in pre-pregnant days, forbidden territory: commenting on my weight, mood, and appearance.
It started in my first trimester, when I was two months pregnant and on modified bed rest. An acquaintance visited me and shared that she had miscarried twins three times. Thanks, I thought, I’ll sleep way more soundly now.
When I was back at work in my second trimester, I attempted to resolve a minor conflict with a colleague. He said, “Do you think you’re being oversensitive because you’re pregnant?”
No, I thought, I’m being oversensitive because you’re an idiot with a teaching degree.
When I was seven months pregnant, I arrived at a party wearing a funky T-shirt with a wild print. A single woman came up to me with her martini and said, “It’s hard to get nice maternity clothes, isn’t it?”
I’d like you shaken, not stirred, I thought.
One month later, I was an inflatable oven lacking an off switch. I visited with a woman in the supermarket line, who announced, “Oh my God, you’re so small for being eight months pregnant.”
Finally, I made it to month nine. I put out an APB for my ankles, which had been missing for a few weeks. As I watched a school baseball game, my colleague’s brother said, “You look like you’re carrying a really big baby.”
Parenting Tip: Record all the stupid things people say to you while pregnant. Stop after you give birth; you won’t have enough free time to jot down the stupid things people say to parents.
After hearing the last of these comments, I waddled home and whined. I sat under that lone ceiling fan once again, put up my feet, and looked at that-body-part-formerly-known-as-my-ankles. Chris brought me yet another glass of water, condensation already dripping, and a paper towel to catch the falling droplets.
“Why do so many people say stupid things to pregnant women?” I asked.
Chris sat down beside me. “Do you think they’re jealous?” he said.
“Of this?” I pointed to my belly, which may have contained Goliath’s offspring.
“Yes,” he said, patting my belly in deep appreciation, “of this.”
“Maybe,” I said, guzzling the water, wishing it were a beer.
“At least it only lasts nine months,” he added.
“True,” I said, wiping my forehead with the paper towel.
“This means we’re a week or two away from people starting to criticize how we’re raising our kids.”
CAN YOU IMAGINE IF TARANTINO MADE A FILM ABOUT
PREGNANCY AND BIRTH?
On the Monday before our twins were born, we met with our doctor for the last time. We knew he’d set a date for the delivery; we’d just assumed it’d be the following week. Somehow “next week” had very different psychological ramifications than “this Saturday,” the date he gave us. Moments after the appointment, we walked towards the pharmacy. My pulse raced and I understood why people have babies in hospitals: because it’s highly likely the adults will pass out at some point. We held hands and spoke in jumbled thoughts.
“This Satur—”
“I know. I can’t even—”
“—day. That’s not even next—”
“—imagine that. I have so much—”
“—week. It’s this week. Do you think—”
“—to do. Mom and Patti fly—”
“—we’re ready to be parents? I guess we—”
“—in Saturday night. Can you pick—”
“—don’t have a choice.”
“—them up?”
As we waited for the pharmacist to fill my last prescription of Ventolin tablets, the anti-contraction medicine I’d been on for ten weeks, we replayed our conversation. Chris assured me that he’d meet my mom and sister at the airport Saturday night, a dozen hours after the scheduled birth of our insta-family.
Then we went to preregister for our hospital stay.
“What package do you want?” the woman asked.
Package?
Our choices were the three-night/two-nurse option that included doctors’ fees for 32,000 Baht ($1,040), or the four-night/four-nurse option that did not include doctors’ fees for 38,000 Baht ($1,235). Of course, there would be “an additional surcharge for the extra baby.”
It was more than a bit surreal, like checking into a four-star hotel on Jupiter. I wanted to ask if I could book a facial or if they took frequent flyer miles.
“So,” the woman said, “how many nurses would you like?”
“How many nurses?” I repeated. “I’d like one more than I’ll need.”
She smiled, lips pursed like she was expelling gas. “We don’t have that option.”
“I don’t think I’m qualified to make this decision,” I said. “Shouldn’t someone who has a medical degree be making it?”
She smiled again.
“How much does our insurance cover?” Chris asked.
I glared at him as only a very pregnant woman could. “Just put us down for a fleet of nurses,” I said.
“Feet?” the Thai woman said. “I’m sorry, I do not know what ‘feet of nurses’ means.”
“Just a lot. I’m going to need a lot of nurses.”
“Of course you will,” she said, noting something on my registration form, likely “Psych Consult Recommended.”
Later at home, the pace continued. Chris was maniacally opening and shutting DVD cases.
“Can you please stop what you’re doing?” I asked.
“Sorry,” he said. “I have to get this
done.”
I watched him reorder DVDs on our bookshelf.
“Are you alphabetizing them?” I asked.
“Maybe?” he said, half embarrassed.
“Come sit down,” I said.
He flopped next to me and playfully whacked my thigh with Pulp Fiction.
“You know,” I continued, “the babies won’t care if your DVDs are alphabetized.”
“True,” he said, “but it’s one thing I can do where I can see the result.”
I nodded.
“Do you want some help? I’m pretty good with A to G, thanks to fluctuations in my bra size.”
Parenting Tip: Embrace fluctuations in your bra size; the fluctuations in your other sizes aren’t nearly as fun.
“I think I’m OK,” he said.
“Can you imagine if Tarantino made a film about pregnancy and birth?” I said.
Chris laughed. “I think that would be the start of the end of the human race.”
THE SAPPY FILES, PART 1 (OR WHY MY KIDS’ FUTURE
THERAPISTS SHOULD BE KIND)
Dear Babies,
It’s just over twelve hours until the scheduled C-section . You’re going to be born on May 29 around 8:00 AM. That’s twelve hours from now, not even a blink in the universe’s concept of time.
I don’t really know what to say to you, so I’m going to tell you about this week.
Your dad seems to have gone into overdrive, with anticipatory stress invading his body. His jerky movements and inability to focus make him seem like he’s had sudden onset ADHD. He’s a gamer, however, and will be a star tomorrow. I hope I will be too.
But the real stars are you two. I don’t yet know if you’re both boys or if you’re both girls or if you’re one of each . Regardless, you two are loved, not just by us, but by a bevy of people. Your birth is almost an event. People are genuinely ecstatic for us. We’ve had sincere offers from people to drive us places, to cook for us, to play tour guide for your grandma and auntie when they arrive, to sit with us. Today, we’ve had phone calls from Jerusalem and Singapore, and your dad received so many handshakes, good wishes, and free food at work that he’s probably contracted (or ingested) some tropical virus.
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