Skippy Says: 22 Weeks (Pregnancy Journal)

22 Weeks

Dear baby girl,

Well, this week has been infinitely better than the last one. Thank goodness. Maybe I'll take back that spanking I was going to give you after all. You haven't pulled any crazy shenanigans. Aside from kicking me all the time that is, but that's a shenanigan that makes me smile so I'll let it slide. You're welcome. Your kicks have been getting stronger and stronger, and daddy is able to feel them now as well. Every night when he gets home from work he makes me lie down, puts his hands on my belly, and tells you to move. Often you comply, but not always. If you decide to be rebellious, he squishes my belly around trying to wake you up, and if that makes you give him a kick he gets a really goofy grin on his face. I hope you inherit that goofy grin of his.

This past weekend the San Francisco public library was having a fundraiser selling old books, so daddy and I went and got you 28 books. I thought I'd maybe find one or two, but two minutes in I instructed daddy to go grab a big cart as I attempted to balance 8 books in one hand while using the other hand to browse through more. I couldn't help myself. So many good books! To read to you, and, eventually, for you to read to me. Plus, they were only $1 a piece, and you know how mama loves a good bargain. I hope you inherit that love of mine. But maybe not quite to the crazy extent I have it. Case in point, I hope you don't buy really bad tasting B12 vitamins that you have to let dissolve under your tongue instead of the more expensive kind you simply swallow just because they're buy one bottle, get the second one for 1 cent. I know that sounds like an amazing deal, but there's a reason it exists. You'll never take them except when daddy physically holds your kicking and screaming body down and shoves them in your mouth makes you.

I'm just about 5 months pregnant now, and I can't believe how many people still can't tell I'm pregnant. I feel huge. H.U.G.E. It just boggles my mind people aren't making the connection yet. In fact, it's like people purposefully refuse to believe it. Just a few days ago, I was reading a book on childbirth when a woman came up to me and asked me if I was a midwife. Really? A midwife? That's your question for me when you see me reading Birthing From Within? Not "when are you due?" or even a more modest "are you expecting?" but "are you a midwife?" It took every ounce of strength I had not to punch her in the face. I think I now understand why pregnant women rub their belly so much- they do it when they want to let others know they're pregnant. That's when I rub mine anyway. On the bus wanting to sit down? Rub my belly. Someone looking at me like I'm really fat? Rub my belly. In a bar for a friend's birthday party? Definitely don't rub my belly.

Love,

Mama