Things That Go 'Bump'....

Oh God. There’s something in my room. I can sense it. The darkness is hiding it, but I know it’s there. I can feel it’s there. Oh God, it’s not just in my room - it’s in my BED. Please go away; please go away. Leave me alone. Stay calm. Stay calm. If I don’t look at it; it’ll disappear. It won’t exist. Oh God, what IS it? It’s not just in my bed; it’s on TOP of me. Oh GOD, it’s INSIDE me. It’s IN MY BODY. Get OUT! Get OUT!

I’m not sure that my attitude to my bump is entirely healthy at the moment. I haven’t properly looked at it; I haven’t touched it; I don’t want to. I feel invaded and infected. Whatever is inside my bump has turned up uninvited and I’m disgusted by its presence.  I wake up in the night and feel sick about it. When other people get all coo-ey, I want to thump them. When my husband-to-be wants to  touch it, I want to thump him too.

I am in denial. I’m still not sure how this pregnancy happened (yes, I know the biology) - I’m used to planning things; surprises are normally accompanied by panic. I thought I could decide when was the ‘right time’...if there ever was actually going to be one.

I know that these thoughts and emotions indicate that things are a bit squiffy in my mental department right now. Unsurprisingly, my therapist picked this up immediately, when I referred to my bump as ‘it’ and couldn’t quite say the words ‘baby’ or ‘he’ or ‘she’. So, for homework, he’s given me a ‘simple’ task - I have to ‘love my bump’. I have to ‘make friends with my bump’. I have to ‘rub oil into my bump’. I have to listen to these instructions without wanting to thump my therapist in his man bumps. Luckily, I managed to reply ‘please don’t make me rub oil into my bump - you’ll be making me do bloody hypnobirthing next’. Sorry, those who swear by hypnobirthing, but do you honestly believe a ‘painfree birth’ is anything other than a never-given-birth delusion? Are you utterly mental? You’d need a helluvabucketwadge, that’s all I can say.

There is, of course, another explanation for all this. I haven’t had my 20 week scan, yet. Perhaps I’m refusing to bond until I know everything is OK? Perhaps I’m being entirely sane and sensible? Perhaps this is actually quite ‘normal’? Having a mini-being inside your belly who still at this point has the genetic potential be a whole host of organisms which aren’t entirely human is quite freaky, anyway, isn’t it? People keep asking ‘ does your son understand what’s going on?’; I keep replying ‘ do I? Do you?’. No-one truly understands it. It’s one of the bloody weirdest things in the world.

But, anyway, my therapist knows what he’s talking about. He steered me through the storms of my first bout of PND and I have to trust him not to be distracted somewhere off the coast of Italy this time around. So, I must make like a somewhat niche lap dancer and oil myself up good and proper. Before I get into bed, I must look in the mirror, accept my bump and love it via an over-priced bottle of almond oil. At least if that monster creeps into my bedroom again tonight, I’ll be able to slither through its claws before it can do any real damage.