My Expanding Body

I shouldn’t be surprised by comments directed at my pregnant body, but I never anticipated the free-flow of cringe-worthy (but well-meaning) comments. “You look great!” Is there an assumption that I shouldn't look healthy/well while pregnant? “Wow!” Yes, I am growing a tiny human. “Look at you!” Yep, I am pregnant. “You’re much larger than so-and-so who is around the same week as you!” Do we compare non-pregnant bodies? Why are we comparing pregnant bodies? And my favorite, “you look farther along than you are!” Based on what? What am I supposed to receive from this comment? And as the third trimester rolls around, “you are huge!” Thank you? 

I have spent a lifetime battling the internalized patriarchal/misogynistic view that “smaller is better.” At times, these views and my own perfectionism have turned me against my own body. Welcoming a larger body through pregnancy has been a process of softening and loving parts of myself that I have previously been in battle with. I am in awe of how my body has expanded to accommodate my growing baby. My desire is for my baby to take up as much space as they need and want. And yet, when I hear these comments, I feel a familiar shame creep in and my body contracts. I then have to expend energy to soften again.

So, please. Let’s not make comments on pregnant bodies. Let’s love up each other’s life-giving bodies (pregnant or not pregnant!). The words I love to hear from others aren’t actually comments at all, they are questions: “How are you doing/feeling?” “What are you enjoying or disliking about being pregnant right now?” “Has anything been challenging?” “What feels different in this trimester and/or week from the last?”

—By Amy R.