The Lies Women Tell New Moms
Before I had children, I would ask every mother I saw about their experiences with pregnancy, newborns, and life in general. I thought if I just asked enough questions I would be prepared for what was to come, ready to deal with the ups and downs of being a new parents. It was a perfect plan! Except for one minor detail:
EVERYONE IS A LIAR.
No, I’m not over exaggerating at all. (Well, maybe just a tad. But still!). From the remedies for heart burn, to the irreversible damage done to my sweet, little vagina, very rarely did anyone tell me the honest truth. I know now that everything was a shade of truth with generous doses of creative lying. There seems to be a cult of women who are scared to tell the real truth about most important time in your life, so I’m here to fix that shit.
Anyone who knows me know I don’t sugar coat the truth or minimize reality. What I am about to tell you is 100% true. You can choose to believe me, or lie to yourself and say it isn’t the truth in your case, but at the end of the day you’ll all have a better insight into what it really is like to ‘become a mother’.
The first lie we love to tell: “Pregnancy is a beautiful, magical time!”
See me? See me there? Oh, how miserable I felt. That glow? I was trying to hold in a fart. Pregnancy farts are toxic. No one told you? I’m not surprised.
Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. I have never been more miserable than when I was pregnant. It started out with sickness, moved into constant urination, continued with violent internal outbursts from my clearly possessed child, pushed onwards to heartburn, and ended with me shitting on a table. Put some Mickey ears on me and call this vacation because I am fucking done.
Why in the world would anyone call pregnancy magical? I mean, getting the little bastard in there was magical. I’m willing to bet I was twisted in some Cirque de Soleil moves during that romp. However, from the moment my genetics and the Hubs shook hands, it was as if a really shady rental agreement was taken out on my body, and Canada’s Worst Tenant parked his ass down in my belly, ready to make the next nine months as shitty as humanly possible. Sure, to the outside world I looked glowing. People commented on how cute my belly looked. I almost fell into the lie of telling people how wonderful it all was! And then Baby A would kick me so hard in the cervix I would buckle over, piss myself a little, and fart a little thanks to the constant battle between constipation and liquid ass fire.
As I entered the later stages of pregnancy, it only got worse. Around the time it became 100% impossible for me to see my vagina, I realized that my entire body was as fucked as Jenny McCarthy after she jumped on the anti-vaccine bandwagon.
From the back, I looked like a loaf of bread with an ass crack. Gone were the days of a sexy curved waist, smooth skin, and a flawless complexion. At seven months pregnant, I was being ravaged by hateful little pregnancy hormones. Acne popped up in the weirdest places. Random fat dimples speckled my body as the weight came on. And don’t get me started on the hair! Holy balls, the hair. I was pretty much the female version of Ron Jeremy minus the impressively massive penis that gives him a free pass at life.
My once beautiful breasts ballooned in to something that I still can’t quiet describe. They were big, but once the milk started coming, I was fearful of them developing their own gravitational pull. These massive mounds of flesh never fit in to shirts properly, gave me cleavage no matter what I wore, and felt like they were constantly being ripped from my body in the most violent manner possible. Showers felt like torture and sleeping with them was impossible. If it wasn’t the heartburn or the pissing keeping me awake, it was my bowling ball titties trying to smother me in my sleep. Feeling claustrophobic in your own skin is not my idea of a good time. There is so much more I could write about. So much more.
I feel beautiful! I feel Womanly! I have hairy boobs! Wait, what? You mean I will grow hair there? WHY HAS NO ONE TOLD ME THIS?
The second lie we tell: “The delivery will hurt but once you see that baby’s face it will be all worth it!”
It was at this moment, just before induction, that I knew it was all over. Fuck me, this shit is never going back.
The baby is awesome, but I wouldn’t say it’s worth the pain. Don’t get me wrong – I love my kids and wouldn’t give them up for anything – but it’s 2014, people!! Can’t we find a better way to get these little fuckers out? Saying that babies are worth the pain like saying that severing your own arm with a butter knife is worth the drop in weight. Seriously, something so precious shouldn’t burst in to your life under such hateful circumstances.
With my first baby, I was put on bedrest for a week for a stupid reason, and then forced to go through an induction. I know, I know – tell me how it is easier when you go when nature intended – that doesn’t mean squat to me. It all hurts no matter how they come out. When I was given the drugs to induce they ended up over stimulating my uterus resulting in my body wanting to go through three contractions in a row before I had a break. As I sat there, trying not to vomit up my own tongue, the nurses kept telling me to walk. “Walk! Walk! Get that baby really low! Keep walking!”. Fuck you and your walking! Picture the worst diarrhea cramp in the world, mixed with extreme fatigue and hunger, then add the feeling of your insides attempting to explode out of your body at any moment… and now walk! Let’s toss in a husband trying to touch you while you sway and curse in the hospital hallway, and you have a fucking party. On a good day I hate being touched when I am in any type of pain, but during labour, the touch of my husband felt like being cuddled by Rob Ford. I hated it. HATED IT.
After I finally vomited all of my popsicle during a particularly hard contraction, I was finally offered a epidural. The one shining moment of labour! It didn’t hurt that the anesthesiologist had THE BEST moustache I have ever seen. For a brief time I managed to sleep, only to awaken when someone decided it was time to dig around in my vagina. (Another thing I learned that day was an adult female can actually go elbow deep inside my vag. You mothers know what I’m talking about.) The moment you realize that little cervix check is actually the doctor giving the baby his first real hug, you know your under carriage is forever fucked.
As they turned off my magical medicine drip (What.the.actual.fuck.), and I started to push, I never realized it would be hours before I was done. With every push I thought I was there, and with every wipe of the shit that I deposited on the table in place of a baby, the nurses told me I was still a ways away. I pushed for two hours. I was done. All I wanted was a god damn Pepsi, and everyone said I couldn’t have it until the baby came. Maybe, just maybe, if the assholes had brought me that Pepsi I could have had the energy to push more.
After the obstetrician finally waltzed through the door, he ordered that they break out the vacuum. That’s right – my vagina was vacuumed. I don’t know if it was because I stayed relatively calm, or if it had something to do with my super inviting blood hole, but the doctor decided to use me as a teaching tool for residents. Here, Dr. Chicky in training, take this vacuum and jam it up her insides to get that little shit disturber out.
Attempt #1. Fail. I sucked up that little bundle as if he was attached to a spring connected to my tonsils. Attempt #2. Almost out, then the suction breaks. Right back up there. By the time they jammed me full of equipment and started tearing him out of me again, I was pretty sure I would die on the table along with my soon-to-be headless child. The doctor decided that on attempt #3 he would butcher my vag, you know, to make space. Apparently the elbow deep fist bumps with baby just hours earlier didn’t do jack-shit for stretching out my vag.
Finally, baby came out. I didn’t know until later that the Hubs was crying because he thought they had killed the baby – silly me for thinking he was just overwhelmed with joy! There was no joy. There was blood, placenta, tears, nurses, and stitches. As I fought with the nurse who was stitching up my vagina that I could, in fact, feel her pushing strings and needles through my skin, did someone finally decided to put my dirty little prize on my chest. I won’t lie – he was worth some of it. His little lizard face and lumpy head made me feel things I had never felt. But the chick stitching up my vag at the same time also made me feel things I had never felt. True bonding with a child can’t possibly happen until you don’t have sixteen people standing around sizing up for formerly beautiful fun hole.
The third lie that should die a fiery death: “Your body knows what to do! It’ll snap back in no time!”
See this? See this finger? This is for you, you bunch of lying bastards. My poor, poor body. The body that I never really appreciated until it was gone. The things pregnancy and childbirth do to a body, seem like a cruel joke. As I lay there after being totally violated by a vacuum, cuddling my prehistoric lizard baby, I was relieved to finally get my body back. The heart burn that haunted me for months was instantly gone. My bladder let out a sigh of relief, and my back already felt better. However, no one sees your insides. No one cares about your insides. No one tries to stuff their insides into a pair of skinny jeans on the rare occasion that they get to escape the house.
Hey, hey. Want to hear something funny? We’ll never have sexy sex again. Get ready to board the queef train!
After the first day I knew my boobs were shot. They had grown ENORMOUS from the milk building up. My nipples took on a life of their own. Even the most dense person could have guessed that the limits of stretching were being met and eventually, like all things forced to uncomfortable limits, they would sag like the face of a Real Housewife. The skin on my belly no longer had that tight, youthful feel. It now looked and felt like a bowl of risen bread dough. Even now, after almost two years after delivering my last, the texture of my stomach is odd. I’m sure there are some out there who spring back, but not all of us. Not all of us will return to our old body. Stop lying and start telling the truth!
The biggest change of all, as you could guess, would be in the vag department. I remember reading online about how the body returns to normal after pregnancy. You hear the ‘Hot dog down a hallway’ jokes all the time, but the internet promises that it’s not true, and I’m happy to say it isn’t true! But if the only issue after pregnancy that I had to deal with was a cavernous vagina, I’d take it!
No, women don’t get off that lucky. Instead, my vagina has taken on a personality of it’s own. My once, perfectly perfect organ is now a raging, hateful little bastard. Gone are the days of jumping and yoga. I totally took for granted what it was like to jump rope, skip, or laugh. These days, at the slightest attempt of anything that would cause my lower abs to contract, I piss myself. You heard that right – I piss myself! I could kegal all day long, but the minute I relax my muscles I’m a piss wreck waiting to happen. I know I’m not alone here because although they never come out and say it, those Poise advertisers toss in those young chicks in their commercials to make dirtbags like myself feel better about considering adult diapers. If I ever get to take the adult ballet class I’ve been stalking, you can bet your past penny that I’ll be packin’ a diaper under my tutu.
The other tidbit – the most annoying one of all – that no one EVER warns you about it is farting. Not just the ass gas – no, that happens anyways – but the vag farts. HOLY MOTHER OF GOD! WHY VAGINA? WHHHHHHY! After having my first, I thought it was just my body getting rid of gross inside stuff. Bubbles here, bubbles there, panty bubbles everywhere! I figured it would stop after a few months. I was wrong. As time went on and I was able to heal, move more, and return to a semi-normal existence, my vagina continued to gulp up air like it was taking its last breath. It had nothing to do with being ‘loose’ after pregnancy at that point. Trust me, I asked the hubs. I grilled him! Forced him to tell me the truth of my disobedient fun bits. According to him all was normal in that department, yet every attempt at excercise ended in a musical interlude from my loins. It was so bad one day, as I sat with my mother attempting to follow along with a Pilates video, trying the whole time to muffle my vag farts, that I freaked out and asked Mom what was up. All she had to say was, “Oh, yeah. That happens.” SERIOUSLY? Why does no one tell people this shit!? For every moment my vagina physically took a breath (Like really, I can feel it!) I thought there was something wrong with me. No one told me that shooting children out your vagina would forever make you that chick with uncontrollable queefing.
I know, I know. You’re all disturbed now. You know too much about my vag. I didn’t force you to keep reading – you all know you’re sick little bastards and couldn’t stop – honesty is fun! If more people were honest then there would be a lot less shock for new mothers. Do the world a favor and stop hiding behind the lies women tell. It’s not like we are going to stop having babies any time soon, but atleast now when it sounds like an army of ducks are coming around the corner, you’ll know it’s just a group of new moms out trying to reclaim their former glory.
Ah, my sweet baby asshole. I’ll love you forever despite your insistence on making sure I will never be sexy again. Don’t worry though – you’ll still get siblings. I’m pretty sure I can already feel your father’s hand on my ass. He’s a determined little fucker, that one.
(For the prudes out there worrying about what my father would say: News flash! He is aware I have a vagina. He also has a wife who delivered four kids. Nothing I say will shock him. Well, almost nothing.)
Born and raised in Eastern Canada, I was surrounded by humour and raised by a ridiculously funny family. I always knew I wanted kids, but when I left a museum manager’s position to become a stay-at-home-mom of two little boys, I was in for a whole new kind of life. I learned quickly that you can love your life and family, and still being honest about the unglamorous parts. I prefer using humour and satire to express my truth. You may not like what I have to say, but I always welcome you to take a glimpse in to this crazy place I call home at Cold Coffee Confessions. You can also find me on Twitter.
