Since When is Pregnancy Disgusting?

My sweet little baby I just have to show off!

Ever since I found out I was pregnant, I've been bracing myself for the tactless comments women find themselves receiving from friends, family, acquaintances, and strangers throughout their pregnancy.

"Wow, you're HUGE!"

"Are you sure it's not twins?"

"You should..." (insert unsolicited advice here)

I've also been preparing myself for all sorts of fun comments regarding breastfeeding when that time comes.

Luckily, since I look more like a sorority girl who had one too many wine coolers than a pregnant woman, I haven't heard anything other than "You're tiny for being five months along!", which doesn't bother me much, so long as nothing is said about me being a bad mother for not eating enough.

However, I never in my life imagined hearing a comment I heard about a month ago on Memorial Day.

Disclaimer: Yeah, it happened awhile ago, and I should just get over it, but it has been irking me since it happened, so I'm writing about it.

Every year on Memorial Day, my immediate family, plus my grandparents, an aunt and one or two of my cousins go to a small town nearby Le Mars for the day. There is a delicious breakfast of pancakes, eggs, and sausage in the morning at the park, followed by a service in the cemetery, and then a hamburger picnic type lunch afterwards at the community center. It's one of my favorite family traditions and I look forward to it every year.

Well, this year, I was in a great mood. I woke up with zero nausea, a rare blessing these days, and was ravenously hungry by the time we arrived for the breakfast. We all got in line and I got lots of eggs and sausage scooped on my plate. When I came to the pancakes, a middle aged man asked me if I wanted one or two. The breakfast is all-you-can-eat, and I knew I'd come back for seconds anyway, so I asked if I could just have three right then.

He gave me a really weird look, that can basically be summed up as "God, you pig."

I laughed a little and said "Sorry, I'm just really hungry. I'm pregnant and need a little extra food these days!"

He looked back at me, disgusted, and said "Ew. I really didn't need to know that."

I raised my eyebrows and stared at him in shock for a second before I said "Pregnancy isn't a disease, you know."

He replied again with a single "Ew."

Believe me, it took every ounce of patience, grace, and self-control not smash his face on the griddle. If a 13-year-old boy had said something like this, I would have laughed it off with a witty comment. But a middle-aged man, who had a boy standing next to him who was very clearly his son?

You've got to be freaking kidding me.

He received my death glare every chance I got the rest of the morning. I hope he's still having nightmares of the disgusting pregnant woman who wanted three pancakes for breakfast. How gross! Jerk.

I looked around the web for women who have experienced similar encounters, and was shocked at how common stuff like this is. Women with male co-workers telling them flat out that they think they're gross, women who have been accused of "harboring revolting parasites", women who have been asked to leave public property for fear that they'll pee or have their water break all over something...the list goes on and on.

Since when is pregnancy disgusting? Since when is it something that is taboo to discuss? Since when it is "Ew"-worthy?

I guess not everybody realizes that they also hung out in somebody's uterus for nine months, and that most of them came out of somebody's vagina, too.

Has something similar happened to you? How did you handle it? Please share in the comments. I look forward to hearing from you!

Love,
Ellie

P.S. At least the curmudgeon gave me three pancakes.