Pregnancy Fears

Most of my life I’ve suffered with anxiety disorders.  They run in the family.  For me my anxiety has manifested itself in various odd ways, the most odd being the decade-long run of “trichotillomania” I had in jr high and high school.  Here’s a little known fun fact about me: I spent most of my junior high years with no eyelashes.  Why?  Because I obsessively, compulsively plucked them out, one by one, over and over again.  My mother knew about this, but was pretty helpless to stop me; after all, in the 80s nobody knew about OCD, panic attacks, anxiety.  Things like picking your eyelashes was considered a “bad habit”.  “Why don’t you just stop?  You have to stop doing that,” was what I heard most, and boy did I want to stop.  I knew I was ruining my looks; I was terrified one time the eyelashes just would never grow back.  But grow back they did, only to face another onslaught from my sharp little fingernails.  How did I eventually stop?  The answer is…I don’t know.  By the time I was in high school this activity had tapered off considerably; by the time I graduated it was pretty much over.  It’s not that I finally conquered my fears and anxieties or that I had amazing willpower and just stopped.  It’s that it suddenly became unappealing and I no longer felt like it.  To this day I don’t know why I started or stopped; my theory is it was some weird hormonal thing that hit me at puberty and then slowly ended. 

In my adult life I suffered from horrendous panic attacks – the worst being the two year period during which I was being sued.  There was something about the depth of terror this lawsuit put in me that brought normal low-level anxiety into full on panic.  I would freak out while driving on the freeway and have to pull off the road and sit and breathe.  I would be in the middle of chewing something and suddenly become convinced I was going to choke and actually feel my throat closing up.  I was terrified to leave the house.  As I predicted, once the lawsuit was over (I won), the panic attacks completely subsided.  However, they weren’t gone forever.  They would still pop up at random moments – on air planes, on amusement park rides.  A couple of years ago I decided to try to really get a handle on this, but without medication.  I started taking yoga, I worked on “re-wiring” my brain to be more positive in general.  And I’m not going to say I will never have a panic attack again, or that I don’t still occasionally have them now.  But the difference is night and day.  Now when I feel one coming on I can nip it in the bud or just ride through it with minimal discomfort.  I’ll tell myself, “Ok, we’re going to have a panic attack, but it’s ok.  You’ll get through it, and just do your breathing.”  It’s amazing how well this simple method works (you should try it!).  And so I had been having a pretty decent couple of years where I felt very calm and peaceful.  Until I started thinking about having a baby.

Now you’ve heard me talk at length about my fears of being infertile.  So the best case scenario is that I whoopee! - actually get, and stay, pregnant.  There was a time when I would think, “if I could just achieve a pregnancy, then all my worries would be over” (I know, I can hear you all chuckling now).  Thinking about actually going through a pregnancy has brought out all kinds of weird thoughts and fears.  I’m going to lay those out for you now.

I’m afraid of losing my body. Yes, I’m afraid of looking like the picture above.  Not that I’m afraid of being a big pregnant girl (after all, it’s natural and healthy).  I have a real fear, and I think about this way too much, of never being skinny again.  And I don’t mean skinny as in crazy Hollywood size 2 or less skinny (I haven’t been that size in 15 years).  I mean just a normal body weight, not overweight.  I have a fear of never again wearing my most beloved clothes, having to buy a whole new wardrobe (although this would be fun, I certainly can’t afford it).  And yes, I’m afraid people will look at me and go, “God, what happened to her?  She used to be so cute.”  I know, I know, it’s vain and I shouldn’t care what people think, shouldn’t care about being overweight if I’m a new mom, etc etc.  And I’m quite proud of myself when I remember all the times a snatchy single friend of mine would make a comment about a new mother being a little pudgy and I would right away jump in with, “hey, give her a break, she just gave birth!”  I guess all I can hope for is someone will champion my cause like that.  But since I’ve never been the gym addict/salmon and salad type, I think the odds are pretty good I’d better get used to the idea of being a little big for a while.

I’m afraid of losing my mind.  You always hear the term “pregnancy brain” or “mom brain”.  And these are real chemical reactions that happen to nearly everyone, and like every symptom of pregnancy/early motherhood, serve a biological purpose.  So, again, normal, natural, healthy.  But I’m afraid of becoming a total fuzz brain and not being able to do my job.  Hopefully I’ve timed this all so that at the end of my pregnancy and at the beginning of the baby’s life there isn’t that much for me to do…but eventually I have to focus on my business, and I am afraid I won’t be able to.  I’m afraid I won’t care that I won’t be able to, that all I’ll give a damn about is the quality of my baby’s poo this morning. 

I’m afraid of losing myself.  I think this is the biggest fear for me.  I’m afraid I’ll morph into someone I don’t recognize, or like.  And again, that I won’t care I’ve morphed.  When I was ten, I spent my entire birthday sobbing my eyes out, scared of growing up.  I was convinced I was “losing my childhood.”  I have the handkerchief I used to sop up my girlhood tears in my purse right now.  All through my childhood and teen years I was terrified of being an adult.  Was it like Ally Sheedy said in “The Breakfast Club” – “when you grow up, your heart dies”?  I was afraid I would turn into someone I didn’t know; that I’d be cruel and heartless and crass and jaded.  Years later I related this story to my therapist and she said, “how did your mother present adulthood to you?”  I thought for a moment and said, “Pretty grim.  She was always bitching about things, always saying things like ‘just wait’ or ‘get a job’ whenever I had a complaint about something.  She made it sound like adulthood was hell.”  Bingo.  And of course as an adult I didn’t become cruel, heartless, or jaded (maybe a little crass).  I’m still me.  Will I still be me after the tremendous hormonal/brain/life change that is having your first child?  Will I, like some of my mom friends, turn into this judgmental witch, constantly picking on everyone else’s parenting and acting like they have everything figured out?  Will I (horrors) suddenly have the urge to go to church? 

I would like to sit down right now and make a pact with myself:

I will still be me.

Any changes can only make me a better me.

Change is constant.

Being a mom can only make me more compassionate, thoughtful, caring, and loving.

That doesn’t sound so bad, does it?