Belly Laughs

by Jenny McCarthy

  The good doctor came back into the room and had me lie on my side with my bare ass hanging out toward him. He told me he was going to slide a tool inside my bum and remove a piece of stool. You think you’re surprised to read this? I was thinking, “YOU’VE GOT TO BE KIDDING! NO FREAKIN’ WAY!” But he lubed up and wazam . . . what’s up, Doc? But just when I thought it couldn’t get worse, it did.

  You’ll probably scream, but I have to tell you because I couldn’t believe it myself. This specialist, this “I Love Everything about the Butt Canal” guy, proved his love of the job: He pulled the tool out with the poopoo connected to it and sniffed it! No shit; pun intended. He totally sniffed it. He said, “I’m going to smell it now,” and boy, did he. I don’t know the medical reason behind the need to smell the ol’ stool. Maybe there isn’t one. Maybe he really loves his job, if you know what I mean. I should have asked my gyno about all this, but once I got the hell out of there, I never looked back. And I never went back.

  Instead, I took to heart what everyone had been telling me from the start: Constipation during pregnancy is normal. It isn’t pretty, it isn’t comfortable, and it sure doesn’t smell good. But relief will come. If not every few weeks, then after delivery! So just hang in there and stay far away from specialists. Constipation is normal in pregnancy, even if it feels like you’re passing Stonehenge!

  Is It a Penis or a Vagina?

  (Finding Out the Sex)

  I ’m one of those people who believes if you can find out something, you FIND OUT. Screw surprises. If I could’ve found out what this baby’s occupation was going to be, I would have. Speaking for my need-to-know self here, I simply felt that if I knew what the sex was I would be able to bond even more with my baby.

  That said, I didn’t have a firm grip on my preference. I kept bouncing from wanting a little girl to wanting a little boy. My wanting a little girl was for obvious reasons: someone to get my nails done with, to teach some cheerleading moves to, to pass down my jewelry and my Gucci dresses to. But then I would really want a boy, some little tough tyke who I could wrestle around with and who would be my little man. Of course my husband wanted a boy first. He loved the idea of having a mini version of himself running around in this world. But either way, it goes without saying that we both would have been ecstatic with a girl or a boy. Good thing, too. Chances are that we were going to get one or the other!

  Most people find out the sex of their baby (if they choose to) through ultrasound at about twenty weeks, but you can find out earlier and more accurately if you decide to have some genetic tests done earlier. For one, there is a test called CVS, which is short for chorionic villus sampling. Sounds bad but it’s ultimately good: It tests whether or not your baby has Down syndrome. It’s usually performed between nine and eleven weeks, and you find out the results within a week. Joy of joys, they perform this test by going up your wazoo and having a needle pluck through your uterus to gain some fluid for testing.

  Another test is called amniocentesis. This is usually performed at sixteen weeks. Instead of going up your wazoo, the needle is poked through your lower belly to extract fluid. With amniocentesis, it takes longer to find out the results because they count the chromosomes to make sure Junior has no abnormalities. Both tests are considered invasive, but if you’re thirty-five or over, the doc usually wants you to have one of these tests done because your chance of having a child with Down syndrome increases each year. So remember, not only do WE get old and ugly, our eggs do, too.

  I opted for amniocentesis. I was under the thirty-five age marker but I still wanted it done. I wanted to know that my baby was healthy so I could relax throughout the rest of my pregnancy. Even though I hoped for relaxation on the horizon, I was nervous because of how big that damn needle looked on all those pregnancy shows I had seen. Sorry to have to break it to you, but in reality . . . it’s still damn big.

  In preparation for sticking the needle in my belly, the doc looked around with the ultrasound. A woman this time, she checked to see if there was enough fluid for the baby to float around in and then began to check his or her extremities so that she wouldn’t poke one with the needle. My husband and I laughed as we looked at the little toes and fingers. Then the doctor told us that we might be able to tell what the sex was right then, just by looking on the ultrasound screen. She said she couldn’t be absolutely certain until the results of the amnio came back, but she said from what she could see, it would be a pretty good guess. So, of course we asked her to go for it, to go ahead and make an educated guess. As she moved the ultrasound camera down my belly, my husband and I held hands and smiled. We were holding our breath out of pure excitement. She stopped the camera on a certain spot, and without saying a word, my husband smiled so big it could have ripped his face apart. His eyes lit up as he shouted, “That’s a penis . . . YES!” Low and behold, he was right. There was the largest baby penis on that screen that I have ever seen (not that I’ve seen all that many, mind you). Even the doc looked a little surprised. She nodded at my husband and told him that it looked pretty good that we had ourselves a boy.

  A BOY!! I was so excited that my eyes filled with tears. I was having a little boy. YEAH!! But my little bubble of happiness was burst wide open when she told me she was preparing the needle. Uh-oh. Now I was scared again. I closed my eyes and tried to relax. I started envisioning me and my little baby boy playing on a beach. I saw his little smile as I threw him up in the air and heard his little giggles. By keeping my focus on my vision the procedure came and went. The needle going in sounded a little like piercing the skin on a nicely cooked Thanksgiving turkey, but it didn’t hurt at all. I opened my eyes, smiled, and looked at my husband. He was greener than a Martian. I guess watching something like that can’t be too good for the hubby. Of course, months later, at delivery time, he would get his fill of gory sights!

  A few weeks after the amnio, my gyno left a message on our machine that ours was a healthy baby and that we were right . . . the penis we’d seen was definitely a penis. A little boy was headed our way!

  I have to imagine that the joy of finding out your child’s gender would be just as powerful if you were to find out after all the pushing and grunting of delivery. But to this day, the memory of the moment we found out is deeply etched in my mind, and imagining him as a him for months thereafter was a luxury I wouldn’t have traded for the world.

  Can I Have a Mustard Sandwich with Pickles, Anchovies, Peanut Butter, and a Little Cottage Cheese? . . . Oh, and Throw a Few Fish Sticks on There!

  (Cravings)

  Why do we women have such unusual cravings during pregnancy? Food cravings, that is. No doubt our men crave other things, but this book is limited to the female experience!

  I used to think that our bodies knew what nutrients we needed and would crave that particular food. Could that be true? The experts say so, but I don’t know. Could there really be redeeming nutrients in some of the things we pregnant gals simply must have?

  All I know is that some of my cravings were doozies! And I had them really early on. Indeed, my cravings were one of the first signs that I was knocked up, before I officially knew. I woke up one morning and rolled over and told my husband that I wanted to squirt a bottle full of mustard in my mouth. Now, what’s important to understand here is that I hate mustard! My whole life I have despised the yellow mushy stuff. Until that morning, of course, when I wanted it so badly that I could have bathed in it.

  My husband looked at me like I was nuts, and then he began to smirk. He sat up in bed and shouted that I was SOOO pregnant. I laughed and thought he had lost his marbles. There wasn’t a tiny bit of hesitation about this. At that time (this is pre-dipstick in New Orleans), I honestly still believed I wasn’t pregnant. My husband teased me for days about this. I was so sure the mustard thing was a fluke, I bet my husband forty million dollars that I wasn’t pregnant. (No, I don’t have forty million dollars. It’s just a stupid thing my husband and I do for fun . . . by the way, even though I l
ost this one, he’s in the hole eighty million.)

  Later in the game, what really got my cravings all fired up were food commercials (the weeks of being nauseated clearly behind me). I would be plopped on the couch with my feet up like a good pregnant lady and bam . . . on the TV was the most delicious product I’d ever seen. In fact, it seemed to me to be the best Shake ’N’ Bake commercial ever made. I still can’t believe how good they made that chicken look. And they proved that it was easy! Shit, I had to get me some Shake ’N’ Bake right then and there. So, I went waddling off to the store. And this kind of thing happened almost daily. I would tune into commercials just to see what rang my bell, and that’s what I would go hunt down or make my husband go hunt down. I have to say, he was SO great when it came to this. If he had to drive forty minutes for a dozen Krispy Kremes at midnight, he would and did. (For the reason why, recall his brush with Psycho Chick.)

  Succulent, juicy TV chicken aside, my cravings were also triggered by the mere mention of some kinds of food. For instance, if someone innocently mentioned to me how great the steak was at a new restaurant, I needed a reservation STAT! And here’s where celebrity comes in handy . . . guess what pregnant lady was sittin’ her fat ass there that night? Abuse of power, perhaps, but I just couldn’t help myself.

  Not necessarily a doozy of a craving by content standards, my incredible need for homemade brownies must have set a volume record. Toward the last few months of pregnancy, my need for them was rapidly increasing. In the last month I made them every night and ate them ALL in one sitting . . . every night! No joke. No exaggeration.

  There’s no doubt that eating food felt so great after having been sick at the sight of most foods earlier on. But to this day, I simply can’t believe the orgasmic effect you can get from surrendering to your cravings. Since you don’t really get a whole lot of action in the bedroom (see page 147 for more on that), I advise all pregnant women to surrender to these cravings and get off by indulging in your favorite foods. Remember, you’ve finally got one of the best excuses in the world to pig out. Do what I did and enjoy every stinkin’ moment of it. If you’re just dying for a sardine sandwich with whipped cream, go for it, sister; it’s soooo worth it!

  Where in the Hell Can I Find a Muumuu?

  (Nothing to Wear)

  Clothes shopping when you’re feeling even a little bloated is tough on the self-esteem, if not on the wallet. Still, I’ve been pretty lucky, and with a stylist’s help (just one of those celeb perks!), I’ve never had too much trouble finding clothes that make me look good. That all changed when I first started to show. Actually, and you probably know how this goes, I was likely the only one who thought I was showing. I was just growing what I now refer to as “a protective fat layer” around my belly. To me it was obvious I was pregnant but to the rest of the world Jenny McCarthy was simply eating too many Krispy Kremes.

  One day I looked in my closet to put something on to start my day. I threw on a pair of pants only to realize that I couldn’t quite button them. I got the zipper up but that damn button just wouldn’t close. I thought to myself, well, this totally sucks. So I took them off and tried on all of my other pants until I found a pair that were always a little big on me. Except this time they just fit. I put on a nice fitted top only to look in the mirror and see that “protective fat layer” around my belly. So I proceeded to try on every other top I had until I found the loosest fitting one. I ended up with a massive pile of clothes on my closet floor and an outdated baggy look for the day. Ugh.

  Finding something to wear will only get worse before it gets better, so here’s my advice to you: Stretch this part out as long as you can and cram yourself into your regular loose-fitting clothes. You’re in that awful stage where you don’t yet look pregnant, just fat. No stylist in the world can really help you hide this. All of the pregnancy books will tell you to throw on one of your husband’s shirts. Not terrible advice, but at this “fat” stage, I don’t know about you, but I don’t look that cute in a flannel!

  Don’t go out and buy maternity clothes yet. With the exception of some basic black stretch pants, maternity clothes are made for women with bellies. Or for women who have told the world they are expecting to get one. Early on, you honestly won’t fit in them, and you’ll look like a jackass with all that extra floppy fabric.

  Of course, I thought I had it worse than anybody. Because of my work, I had to hide my pregnancy. Squeezing into my clothes and hiding my fat was freakin’ impossible. And okay, maybe this particular brand of impossible won’t happen to you, but national TV spot aside, you’re going to be able to relate to the theme of this next story.

  Dick Clark asked me to host the American Music Awards, and by the time I would have to do the show, I would already be a few months pregnant. Terrified to have my cover blown but excited about the job, I agreed.

  Poor little rich girl, I know, but my wardrobe stylist and I went through a horrific disaster in trying to help me dress cool but all the while hide my belly. Prepregnancy, I usually wore a size 4 or 6, but now I was only barely squeezing into a size 12. We had at least ten “try-on” sessions, which all ended in tears. I would seriously break down and bawl. All of my pre-interviews were about what I was going to wear (ah, Hollywood priorities!). For the first time I heard myself dissing style. “Who cares about clothes?” I said. “It’s about being funny.” Yeah, right, not to Dolce & Gabbana.

  Fast-forward to show time and I was about to go out onstage. I was feeling confident because no one had said anything to me about my weight gain. I was uncomfortable as hell, though, because I was wearing a corset so tight I couldn’t breathe. (Of course, I asked my doctor about wearing one at least a million times: “Am I hurting the baby?” No, he told me. “Am I smashing the baby?” No, he said. “Am I killing the baby?” “NO! You’re only hurting yourself. He’s not going to be in pain. You are!” “Well, okay then, as long as I’m the only one suffering I’m happy.”)

  The moment of truth: “Ladies and Gentlemen, here are your hosts Sean ‘P. Diddy’ Combs and Jenny McCarthy.” I walked out onstage feeling good, feeling fine, connected with my mojo. Some people made faces at my weird clothing choices (Did I mention the corset?), but I didn’t care as long as the world didn’t think I looked pregnant.

  Several hours later (I know, these shows really do go on!) and, to my relief, the end of the show finally arrived. I plopped down on the couch in my dressing room and welcomed my family, who had been sitting in the audience. “How did I do?” They all smiled and clapped and said I did really well except . . . “Except what?” I asked. My sister began to tell me how the people all around them had been commenting on how pregnant I looked. I guess it’s true: You just can’t keep a secret in Hollywood.

  Again, this might not happen to you, but national airwaves aside again, you may have had a nightmare experience along these lines. The next day Howard Stern went on the air and made comments about how pregnant I looked. He said I had pregnant boobs. Coming from him, I think that’s a compliment, but it’s not exactly what a girl wants to hear.

  First-trimester flab behind me (and on my behind), my next month was fun. I was obviously pregnant, the world knew it, and I could finally shop for maternity clothes. What I didn’t know was how awful some maternity clothes can be. They have gotten better, I think, but not good enough. First of all, they are so overpriced. But you’re kind of screwed—What choice do you have?—so you have to buy some. You have nothing else. Here’s what I know: The key to shopping at this point is comfort. I bought comfy tanks and drawstring pants and cozy turtlenecks. I wore them almost every day until my ninth month, when I porked out beyond belief. I refused to go buy still more and still larger and expensive maternity clothes to wear for just a few more weeks, so I begged my husband to go to Sears and get me a damn muumuu! I’m not kidding. I would beg anyone that heard my cry to go get me a muumuu. Nothing fit me right, and if it did, I just looked so incredibly large or I was really uncomfortable. I wanted a mu
umuu, just like the ones Mrs. Roper wore on Three’s Company.

  Then it happened! One of my friends heard my call. Behold the muumuu. She held up a giant, blue-flowered muumuu, and it had my name written all over it. I put it on and danced all around the house. My glory ended as soon as my husband saw me in it and begged me to take it off (not to get some action, believe me. Even the friend who bought it for me said it was just “wrong.” I say, “Bite me!”

  If you get to that point where you just can’t take it, please go get one. MUUMUU’S really do rock!

  Freddy Krueger Ain’t Got Nothing on Me!

  (Dreams)

  I’ve always been one to have wild dreams, but no one told me how bizarre they could be when you’re pregnant. Throughout my life I’ve always written down my dreams and looked their meaning up in my dream dictionary. Well, by golly, they don’t really have anything that falls under giving birth to a green slimy cocoon that wiggles and flies away. Desperate to find deeper meaning, I looked up green, but I’m pretty sure that “having great pleasure with simple things” doesn’t really apply. So far, this pregnancy had not been especially pleasant, nor had it been simple!

  Wacked-out green dreams aside, I had one recurring dream while pregnant that I still get a kick out of. To this day, when I think back I smile. And dream dictionary definition or not, it’s clear to me that it was a dream about looking forward to motherhood. It’s going to sound weird at first, like all dreams do, so just hang in there with me. Here goes.