I’ve Said It Once And I’ll Say It Again.

I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again.

As much as people romanticize pregnancy, it is NOT A HEALTH NEUTRAL STATE.

That’s not even touching on the fact that yes, pregnant people get murdered all the fucking time.

In general pregnancy is terrifying if you aren’t ready for it, or even if you are and something goes wrong that you can’t control. And everybody acts like you should have sunshine and rainbows coming out of your ass just because of the potential of new life.

I’ve never been pregnant. I want kids in my future but definitely not now, and if I was currently pregnant I’d be fucking terrified to know I live in the US.

I’m serious. Eclampsia. The shots so you don’t kill a baby with a different blood type than you. Being unable to keep foods down, being unable to sleep due to constant pain in your back, the expensive and yet still necessary doctors visits. The potential for anencephaly. Constant pain from your organs being shoved aside in your own body, by your own body. The potential for your fetus to die and being unable to get it removed because abortion is inaccessible in your state. Miscarriage. Bleeding out. Ectopic pregnancy. Sepsis. C-sections, which on their own are horrifying until you remember that those doctors cut through 7 fucking layers of flesh, rummage around in your abdominal cavity, pull your organs out and put them on a table to get a fucking baby out of you, and then just stuff that shit back in Willy-nilly and sew you back up- which is PAINFUL. The potential for your body to be so strained from pushing out a baby that you literally split open and tear yourself from cooter to poop shooter. Even more fetal Complications. Back-labor. Post-partum depression, anger, suicidal ideation, anxiety or psychosis. Pregnancy induced constipation, incontinence, or even diabetes.

All. of. it. Is. Terrifying.

But nobody talks about the fact that people are somehow expected to want this for themselves. To be happy because pregnancy is sunshine and rainbows according to a male societal standard. And that somehow if they don’t, they’re the weird ones for not wanting to torture themselves and put their lives on the line for a human being they’ve not even had the chance to meet yet. That doesn’t truly exist outside of their body or think or have conscious thoughts yet.

Genuinely. It’s FUCKED UP. And the US also just leaves moms to fend for themselves too without any support for recovery after having a baby too. Maternal or paternal leave isn’t guaranteed. Some jobs won’t even grant it to you (if they even offer it) if you fall pregnant before working there for a certain period of time. You might get six weeks. You might get less. But then you have to figure out what to do with a six week old infant that needs to be fed, like every four hours, your titties hurt, you’re leaking milk if you’re able to lactate, you can’t pee without using lidocaine, you still can’t sleep, baby is crying all the damn time, and you now, while still dealing with post-partum side effects, have to find a stranger to sit around and leave your newborn with and pay a ridiculous amount to do so, because you can’t not survive without working. Even if it feels like you’re running on the fear of death and adrenaline, you are still killing yourself to suddenly make these new changes work and just survive, and that’s supposed to be a happy thing?????

No, I wouldn’t blame a damn soul for getting cold feet and backing out of having a kid. That sounds like the most horrifying reality to live in, and yet people are forced into doing it all the time. That’s actually fucked up and twisted in ways I cannot put into words. It’s worse than any war crime I can imagine, which are already vile and unforgivable, but this finds a way to somehow be even more depraved because a government is letting lobbyist and religious zealots force this upon its own people. The people it relies on to give itself funding, arms and most importantly, its power. A power that is supposed to be use to protect its people that is being horrendously abused.

I don’t think anyone needs to be a woman to be scared that we’ve fallen to this point.

The number one cause of death in pregnant women is murder. Think About That.