Many women are used to living in bodies that are outside the perceived “norm” (if we want to avoid even trying to define what the “norm” is anyway).  But there are times when our bodies seem to intersect.

For example, it’s generally assumed that all brides will try to lose weight.  It’s just the accepted norm, in my experience.  If I had a friend or coworker getting married, she was probably talking about her diet and the boot camp classes at her gym.  I didn’t do that, though.  Actually, I had to exchange my wedding dress for the next larger size a couple of months before the wedding because I had gained weight since buying it.  I didn’t try to gain weight, but I was stressed due to graduate school and I’m a stress eater.  But that’s a different discussion.

Weddings are one of those experiences where people sometimes have behavioral and physical expectations of others.  Another one of those experiences?  Pregnancy.

It seems fairly simple, right?  A woman gets pregnant, the baby grows, the woman gains weight, her shape changes, and so on.  We’re all roughly familiar with the expectations of the process.  If you read enough articles or blogs written by pregnant or formerly pregnant women, you also learn that people feel free to comment (often!) about the size of a pregnant woman’s belly.

Even that, in a way, is the norm.  But that wasn’t my experience and, even now as my son nears three months of age, I’m still trying to fully process my pregnancy experience.

I didn’t have the big belly.  I’ve been overweight or obese most of my life, yet during pregnancy, I didn’t gain much weight.  By the time I went in to give birth, I had gained 10 pounds.  My son weighed 8 pounds, so I was back at my pre-birth weight before I even came home from the hospital.  I was healthy throughout the pregnancy and my son is perfectly healthy, so it’s not that anything was wrong – but by the reactions of people throughout my pregnancy, you might think so.

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Sometimes I think I shouldn't read BabyCenter at all, but I can't help myself.  I get an email every morning with the updated posts for the groups I belong to (May 2010 Moms and Plus-Size Moms).  Six to eight weeks ago it was tough because everyone was talking about morning sickness and some members would write good-bye posts after having a miscarriage.  I wasn't feeling ill, so I was convinced something wasn't right.  I'm glad for all the information I have from reading these pages, but a lot of it just doesn't fit me.

Like now everyone is concerned about popping - you know, when you go from not looking pregnant or just looking like you put weight on to looking actually pregnant because your belly is now "popped" out.

Yeah.  Reading the word "popped" makes me gag a little; I don't know why.  It probably goes back to my whole thing about being grossed out by pregnant bellies.  So far I can't tell if my belly has changed at all.  My pants still all fit, so I'm going to guess no (unless somehow my ass is shrinking, lol).  I like that right now my pregnancy is still my news and that only people "in the know" - well, know.  Eventually it'll become everyone's business, in a way, and I think I'm nervous about that.

When you're fat growing up, your body already feels like everyone's business.  Everyone in your life (teachers, parents, doctors, strangers) feel like they have the authority to tell you what you could do to lose weight.  As you get older, peers and strangers feel the authority to yell mean things at you on the street or from their cars.  I know that not only fat people have to deal with this, but I feel like it's harder to know that a wolf whistle is sarcastic, not complimentary and that having people fling Jenny Craig brochures at you from a car is different than having someone ask you for your number.  I know we all deal with unwanted advances or comments, but... there's just something about it being a critique on who you are every day.

So, partly, I feel a bit removed from the pregnancy experience.  I'm not concerned about stretch marks - I've had them for as long as I can remember.  I'm not concerned about sagging skin; I already have it and have dealt with worse, too.  I'm not looking forward to a belly pop because I've never seen an expanding belly as a good thing; it was always a sign of failure before. 

But then there's this: I'm not petrified of gaining weight because I've seen the scale go up before (and certainly recently) and now I feel like for the first time in my life, I don't have to care if it goes up because it needs to.  I'm obviously paying attention to how much it goes up (no weight gained yet) and I'm mindful of what I eat, but I don't feel this dread or, alternately, an exhilaration about finally "being allowed" to gain weight that I see other women seemingly revel in.  I think I can write more in depth on that another time, though, because I see a lot of layers to this particular aspect of the experience.

I like my not-so-secret secret pregnancy right now.  I can think about all of these things and not actually be asked to answer for them yet.