7/11/21
Today worked with R all day on our house. In the same room sometimes, watching him go back and forth for hours from his miter saw outside, back in, and back out with his sweaty hair curling up, us smiling frequently when we passed each other. I still can’t get enough of him- the sight of him- and his company too. We’ll be married two years, this August.
Tonight while driving back from our house to parents’, a single sentence just came to mind, and I said it out loud to R. It was: “Shit, now I have to give a fuck about the world.” Then I tried to explain what I meant: I meant that before I was pregnant, I recycled and was a decent citizen or whatever. But now, with a baby, it’s different, I feel. Your care about the world (the state of it, how things are done, policies, procedures…) has to go deeper, if only because when you leave this place now, this person that you love and birthed from your body will still be here. I’m just realizing that one day I’ll be leaving him here, as if this world is a room I will never come back to. So in my mind, it follows that this place has to be as good as I can make it while I’m here- I feel like I can’t look away from problems as easily, I think. Especially problems within my power to fix. I never had to think like this before. But him about to be born makes me think like this.
7/12/21
personal epiphanies this week:
That…good is waiting, and stores of love are infinite.
Like: if you need a jumpstart, it’s ok to ask for one. You don’t have to generate all the electricity yourself.
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Past maybe two weeks, cannot eat much; all my meals are relatively snack size. Figured it was cause of the heat, but I think also cause the baby’s getting bigger (my stomach’s bigger at least) so there is less room in my stomach. I get full pretty fast compared to the beginning trimester(s).
7/13/21
I feel like I’ve really gotten bigger lately- my belly. When I look in the mirror, I look like a “normal” unpregnant person from all angles, but when I turn to the side, it looks huge. And maybe if you’re straight in front of me, you can notice if you scrutinize. But I keep having a weird thought lately and idk why I keep thinking it (I thought it like 3 times in the past few days). It’s that I wish ____ could see me like this. I don’t know why. I guess because….it’s kind of sexy to be knocked up because…it means (unless you had like in vitro fertilization?) that someone banged you and came inside you, and…maybe I want him to think of me like that – as sexy/sex-worthy? Before I become an “unsexy” mom? I also think maybe because…I think my body looks pretty all curvy like this, or at least it’s very attention-drawing, sensual, this physical state, and…idk. I just wish that he could see me – see my body, how it can change, how beautiful it looks. R is super appreciative; I love how he says my belly is cute and sexy and everything- I know he loves it and I’m lucky to have him pat it every night and kiss it and put his ear to it and adore it – I know I could not flourish without this support from him- my husband, my love. Idk why I still want to know like…how another man feels about my changed body. His opinion, his reaction. Do I derive too much satisfaction from the male gaze (this may have become an unconscious habit during my formative years..maybe just because it was an easily-acquired habit)? Am I greedy or vain – not satisfied with just one admirer? Or is it something else? I feel like, in a way, right now I’m in this…super-fleeting state, like a physical state that I may never be in again – like when you spend hours getting ready to go out somewhere and…that makes you feel like being seen by other people. Like on your wedding day, or just a night out on the town. I think this is kind of how I’m feeling. Even though it’s hard to walk/bend over/get up and even breathe sometimes: I feel proud, I guess, and pretty, and in a super-feminine way, very vulnerable. Like I’m reaching the pinnacle of something, and once I’m past it, it might be gone forever. So I think maybe the biggest reason (besides the other little reasons) I keep having this thought of “I wish ____ could see me” is that I feel like I’m right in the middle of a very special time and…I just wanted him to see it, to share it, be a little part of it- a witness. But we don’t even talk or see each other from the shoulders down anymore, we’re still remote working (which I actually thank God and am glad for, and I hope continues, so I can breastfeed for as long as possible.) P.S. just realized I’ve also wished recently (though not as often) that my grandmother could see me too in this state, so…maybe these thoughts were not as adulterous as I first thought?
Baby is moving so much inside me today – it seems twice as much as usual.
Marriage Journal 