Full disclosure

Just to be clear about what you're getting yourself into, my dearest AnnaRay, (in case you have forgotten those 9 months of my misery - I certainly have,) let's take a look at a few entries in the journal I kept during my pregnancy with The Boy.

On July 29, 2002, less than a month into my pregnancy, I wrote the following:

"I have been duped! I have been queasy morning, noon and night for the past three days. I don't know how I could ever have felt that my life would be incomplete if I never did this. My own body conspired against me along with every woman who's gone through this before me and prattled on about what a wonderful experience it is. The irony is, of course, that I will happily join that conspiracy as soon as I've popped out the pooper and all this misery is a dull memory. I don't know how I'm going to get through two more months of this. And this is what I wanted! At least I no longer worry about whether or not I'm really pregnant."

Then, on September 19, I wrote:

"I am not finding this at all enjoyable. ... All I want to eat is cheese sandwiches, which doesn't help my uncontrollably neurotic feeling that I'm gaining way too much weight way to early. I try eating fruit, salad, nuts, whatever, but the only thing that makes me feel better is cheese sandwiches.
I really can't recommend this to anyone."

It goes on like that for a while, then the suffering eases up and somewhere around the fifth month, when the baby was kicking all the time, I even acknowledged that I had reached "the fun part." On November 15 I wrote:

"I cannot remember how miserable I was a few months ago. I hear myself talking about how cool this is; I make pregnancy sound wonderful, so I make a point to mention that it can be pretty crappy too. But my heart's not in it."

But that delusional state did not last long. It was soon followed by a slightly more aware yet forgetful one. On January 21, I wrote:

"When people ask me how I'm feeling, I say great! And I mean it. But it occurred to me last night that I'm actually quite uncomfortable. I guess I only notice it at night - the bloated feeling, back pain, and difficulty breathing that makes it hard for me to fall asleep, not to mention the constant need to pee, which keeps me from staying asleep - so it's easy to forget during the day, when people are most likely to inquire after my physical well being. During the day, I just feel tired. Wiped out really."

I won't even get into the labor and birth, since you already acknowledged your terror of it. The funny thing is, (and by funny I mean completely and diabolically wrong wrong wrong,) that even after I experienced 30 hours of labor followed by a c-section, labor is the one part of pregnanacy I'd like another shot at. If that isn't evidence enough of how f%&$#@ up this whole biological urge is, well, I got nothin'.