A Year of Commitment

I’m 39 weeks pregnant today and absolutely loving my baby belly. I’m normally very shy and self conscious about my body, but at the moment all my clothes are tight fitting, showing my curves, my boobs, my bump.

I’m so proud to have the ultimate womanly shape.

Yet today I went shopping for ‘loose, floaty tops’… the kind I know that I’ll be desperate to wear in a week (or hopefully less!) once the baby is out. That’s when I’ll start covering this belly up, feeling bad about the sag, and start trying to get rid of the evidence of the incredible thing my body has done – grown a whole other person!

Why is that, I wonder? Am I only being influence by all the stars and celebs that ‘lose their baby weight’ in record time?

I’ve already ordered the Weight Watchers ProPoint pack so I can start losing that baby weight whilst breastfeeding – I’m very aware that in less than 3 months I need to be on the beach in France with my ultra skinny in-laws.

But I hope I can still be gentle on myself, and that some of the pride I’m currently feeling will stay.

I’m shocked and disappointed this evening, after watching a clip online from last night where well-known 60′s feminist Germaine Greer ridiculed the Australian PM’s dress sense, saying ‘”What I want her to do is get rid of those bloody jackets … they don’t fit,” and ”You’ve got a big arse Julia, just get on with it.”

Seriously?

Don’t women get picked on enough without feminist icons joining in? And does anyone ever comment on how a male politician is dressed, or the size of his arse? Aren’t we above all of that yet?

It just makes me so mad – how can I portray to my daughter that what matters in life is what you do, how you do it, who you are and how you manage yourself when the most powerful woman in the country (technically, at least) is being picked on for… her dress sense…? The size of her bum…?

This is not acceptable from anyone, but hearing it from Germaine Greer just makes it that bit worse.

About  2 weeks ago, I gave into technology and bought myself a Kindle. For those who don’t know, it’s an electronic e-book reader, they have been around in the US for quite some time, and are now rivaled by the iPad in a big way.

I remembered that when I was breastfeeding my daughter, 3 years ago, what got me through those long sleepless nights was not the joy of nurturing another small person, but being able to escape into book after book after book. My daughter was born 2 days after Christmas, and I luckily I had had the foresight to give my husband 10 novels that year – mostly classics – but things I felt we should both read. Guess who read them all first?

So, given that I’m doing the whole baby thing in much better style this time – bigger place, live-in wonderful ‘helper’, and the baby actually has a cot waiting for it IN IT’S OWN ROOM, unlike Miss A who slept in a basket on our kitchen table in a very tiny Parisian shoebox for many months – I thought I would upgrade my reading technique too. I remember holding the baby, and the boob, and turning pages of the book was rather tricky.

So I bought myself a Kindle Touch – certain that I wouldn’t really like it, and only use it for convenience during night time feeds. I’m an old fashioned girl, I like to hold my books, turn over corners, keep them and go back to them, like old friends.

But I am in love. This machine is AMAZING, I can not rave about it enough. Especially since I have discovered that all books over 50 years old are out of copyright, and therefore FREE! I have just spent the evening downloading enough F. Scott Fitzgerald, Agatha Christie and Jane Austen to keep me a very contented reader for many nights.

And when I eat alone in restaurants, I don’t have to block my book under my plate, hold my sandwich with one hand, will turning pages with the other. Perfect.

I realise it has been about 10 days since my last post, which is pretty awful. I often think ‘oh, I need to write on my blog’… but the truth of the matter is that I don’t have much to write about at the moment.

I’m waiting.

36 weeks pregnant today, with a baby that is apparently already over the 4 kilo mark, all I can do is wait.

Probably it looks like I’m getting on with life as usual to those around me, but I’m not. At this point there is just me and the baby, in our own little cocoon, him wriggling, me only thinking about him, about giving birth, about meeting him, about coping when he is out.

Waiting.

Whilst I am very, very impatient for this Boy Child to move out of my body in 7 weeks time – sooner if he wants, I’d be thrilled – I have to admit that part of me also wants the next few weeks to go very slowly.

The reason is that I am blissfully enjoying these last precious moments where it is just my Little Girl and I. My husband has gone away this week, so we have six days together, just the 2 of us, and it is magic.

Last night we watched ‘Tangled’ over dinner – normally a big no-no in our house – and the bedtime stories I make up for her are all about elephants getting dressed up for weddings, wearing unlikely colours, ribbons, bracelets and earrings. Fabulous, froufrou, girly stories.

I snuggle and kiss her at every opportunity, and yes, I’m indulging her a little too much. But I don’t care. This is OUR time, and although I know that we will have many special moments together in the future, it will never really be the same again. Because once the Boy Child is ‘out’, a part of me will always be with him, just like when my Little Girl is away from me now, a part of me is always with her.

So I’m making the most of being her Mummy. Of being the most important person just for her.

It’s wonderful.

I have to admit, this is not the kind of post I am used to writing. At all. I’m pretty good at listing things I DON’T love about me, which is why the Glowless’ idea is such a good one… I’m linking up with her today.  It’s quite nice to reflect on something(s) that I really do appreciate about myself, rather than the things that need fixing or changing.

It took me a while to find these things, I admit, and you’ll note there is nothing physical in here like ‘I love my legs’ or ‘my sparkling eyes’ because at the moment my legs are like elephant stumps with cankles and my eyes are puffy. Pregnancy. Eerk.

But here are 2 things that I really do love about me…

1. I’m a very loving, generous person. My husband is always telling me that I do ‘too much’ but the fact is, once I love you – you are in for life. I’ll take care of you, let you know how I feel about you and how important you are to me. Not in a weird stalkerish way (I hope), but just so that you know you can count on me for anything you need.

2. I’m super organised (when I want to be) and I really get a kick from it. I used to work as a Personal Assistant in a high profile job in Paris. When people ask me what I did, I always say that being a PA is basically being a babysitter for an adult… but truth be told, I kind of loved it. And I was good at it. Organising someones life, making sure they are in the right place at the right time with the right people and the right documents – it gives me an cheap thrill. Now that I’m no longer working I get these easy kicks from doing things like organising our medical reimbursements  - this involves bills from an obstetrician who likes to see me and charge through the nose every 2 weeks, 3 different insurance companies on 2 different continents and… wait for it… and excel spreadsheet. Sad, I know. But I still love it.

What do you love about YOU?