mama drama

Yesterday, in a much needed tête-à-tête with my dear amigo Madi, we discussed all of the things that incensed us this weekend. During our mutual therapy session, we carped on our deleted projects, zippers, deadlines, headlines, shared family phone lines, and friends who say things that sometimes make us cringe.

Pregnancy. A bête noir of the highest degree. Sometimes it seems that Madi and I sail this boat alone. We don't get it. We don't like it. And we're condemned for that reason.

It appears to be an elemental part of our female genetic makeup that we are both missing. Neither of us will coo with delight when encountering a fat-ankled mother-to-be struggle to get out of her car, while our friends gush, and smile softly to one another, with anticipation and envy.

Life is a beautiful thing. Sex aint that bad either. It's what happens between the exchange of sex and the arrival of life that I can't figure out.

I have felt like this for years, even though I myself was carted about in my mother's belly like a hippo in a handbag. When my Ma was pregnant with my kid sister, I had little interest in touching the belly, seeing the belly, knowing anything about the bulbuls, polished belly – and I was only nine years old.

The opening credits for TLC's "A Baby Story" make me squirm, and I close my eyes through child birthing scenes in even the most G-rated films.

Because of this, I have always felt alienated, set apart from my baby-crazy girlfriends.

First, I thought I was detached, or inherently impassive. Not ideal, but no one's perfect.

But, unsatisfied with just being "frigid" I set out to unearth my predicament. Now, after researching my plight, I find out that although I am an emotive, normal being, I am also a bona fide Tocophobic.

Tocophobia is a certifiable aversion to the general state of pregnancy and the act of childbirth. Many women are born with it, and many women develop it after having a child of their own. It is created by the subconscious as a protective mechanism, and is usually the product of a suppressed catalytic memory or event.

I guess my escape from the womb was particularly traumatic.

So next time you point at a roly-poly Sally in a Gap Maternity tracksuit and beam, don't fault me, or my kind, for recoiling in disgust.

We’re human. We like moms. We like kids. We want kids. We do. We want to be able to have our own little things to love, and nurture, and inevitably fuck up.

We’d just prefer you direct your congenial gawking toward our surrogates. Thank you.