Welcome to my diary. These are entires I wrote during my own pregnancy. What youâre about to read is unfiltered, unedited, and perhaps a bit uncanny. But these are my raw feelings written in real-time. Everyoneâs perspective and journey is different. This is mine.
There's Nothing Wrong With You
She tells you that all of your biggest fears will come true and for the first time, in months, you exhale louder than the roars of the ocean.
You donât know this woman, which makes you want to tell her your deepest darkest secrets even more.
That youâre 8-months pregnant and youâve been hiding it from the world.
That youâve done a lot of wild and crazy things in your life but nothing makes you more than scared than becoming a mom.
That youâre not ready. That you donât know if you ever will be.
And yet none of this is strange to her. She looks into your eyes like sheâs seen them before. She finishes your sentences like sheâs heard every word of it some other time.
Minutes earlier, you were just walking on the beach. It was cold and snowy. Nobody was around. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, you see a woman and her poodle running toward you.
I saw you from above and thought Iâd come say hello.
She tells you that her dog hasnât played with anyone in days. That the wind from the beach has kept her inside.
She has this dazzle about her that makes her ears look like they are buzzing. She has this way about her that makes you want to pretend your fingers arenât freezing so you talk to her forever.
You jam all 10 of yours in your coat pocket. You keep the conversation going.
Iâve just spent 5-minutes telling you my life story, she says. Come on, tell me yours.
You toss out the basic, boring, stuff.
You live in Brooklyn. You have a dog. Over there, in the distance, is your husband.
Youâre so good at hiding who you are from people, but youâre even better when they let you off easy.
But she did not.
You look great, she says, her eyes twinkling around your stomach.
Ohhhhh, yeah. You start to add. You are also 8-months pregnant. You tell her you forgot. You wonder how she knew.
Youâre in a large winter jacket. Your belly is pushed behind a tight pair of leggings. Three layers of sweaters. You donât show a thing.
You hide so well, she says, about everything.
Maybe it was the falling snow that made your words slip, but for some reason, in that moment, you decide to ramble off the truth.
You tell her that youâre scared to become a mom. You tell her, with ugly words, that you are totally freaking out.
It seems impossible. What If Iâm not good at it? What if my child doesnât love me? What if I donât love my child? What if I miss being so selfish? What if I just canât do any of this? What I never stop being so scared?
She lets you throw it all up to her and waits until youâre finished to say:
All of your fears will come true and you will be happy that they did.
You ignore what she says. You tell her that there must be something wrong with you. Most pregnant women are excited. Arenât they?
What about them? You are not them. And thereâs nothing wrong with you.
She has three kids. She was a developmental psychologist for babies ages 0-3. You donât know much more about her but you think she has the credibility of the kind of expert you need right now to set you straight, to shake you silly.
So you exhale, slowly, as she shares her advice.
Donât read all the books. She read them all as a development psychologist and then had her first kid and thought: wow, all of this is such bullshit. Every kid is different. Spend time learning about your own kid once they are born - what they like, what they need, what they are trying to tell you before they can actually tell you.
Babies come out of us helpless. They need us. You have to wonder why that is. Other species like cats or birds, they are born, they stay for a little, and then they leave. Not babies. They come out relying on you, learning from you, bonding with you. They stick around, close by, for life.
You might not like your baby. Thatâs okay. Nobody else might tell you that - but it happens, itâs real, and itâs OK. You might start to resent them, be frustrated by them, be upset with this new life. But eventually, you bond, and that resentment turns to love.
Even when everything feels like chaos, there are two things you can do with your baby: get to know her and connect with her. AND that doesnât have to be an all-day thing. If itâs one hour a day youâre able to do this, thatâs enough.
Itâs been almost an hour and you watch her nose start to run from the cold.
One more question? You know you will never see her again. You know she has no reason to lie to you, like other people in your life might, the ones who have to deal with you today, and then tomorrow. Itâs harder for them to be honest when they have to love you.
Will I be okay? Will I survive?
She wants to give you hug, but she doesnât. Instead, she tells you this:
It might not be okay, at first, but you will survive. If you didnât, that would say a lot about humanity. Youâre not the first person to do this, and honey, you wonât be the last.
It turns out, at week 33, you find what youâve needed all along.
Someone to tell you that youâre right:
That itâs okay to be scared.
That none of this will be easy.
That you will never know what to do before you do it.
That you donât have control over so many things.
But mostly, more than anything else:
That there is nothing wrong with feeling the way that you feel right now.
Thereâs nothing wrong with you.
The women tells you her name is Ethie, short for Athena.
Athena, goddess of wisdom.
She tells you sheâs glad she saw you from above and came down to say hello.
You thank her for everything. You wish her well.
And as you walk away, in your own direction, you look up and see that there is no above. In the distance, just flat land. Just a parking lot without any cars.
Maybe itâs the hormones or dehydration. Maybe itâs frost bite or brain freeze.
But all of a sudden, you believe in the impossible, you believe in something that just canât be real.
You believe that this woman found you so she could tell you:
That Jen Glantz, youâre going to do this, before youâre ready, while youâre scared, and during it all youâll learn that that there is nothing wrong with feeling the way that you feel right now.
My love, there is nothing wrong with you.