How to Avoid Someone Touching your Pregnant Belly

Before I got pregnant, I always heard people talking about how perfect strangers would walk up to them and touch their bulging stomach. It always perplexed me and I often wondered how in the world anyone would think it possibly would be okay to put their crusty, crawly, creeper, germ-infested, scaly, smelly hands on another person period, but especially in such a personal way. Once I became pregnant, all those little voices whispered in the back of my head and I found myself determined that no juicy nub would be touching my belly.  Not only did I want to avoid germs and the ever-lasting grossness of being touched by a stranger, I also did not want some freak putting a spell on me or my baby through their touch! So here are some tips for you if you'd like to avoid those pesky, unwanted belly touches.

1) The most effective way to avoid getting someone else's dead skin cells on your precious tummy is the look on your face. You must always, always look mad and avoid eye contact at this point. No matter that you're just glowing pure sunshine out of every pore on your body because you are growing a human, you have to stay focused. Practice it in the mirror if you have to. This was never hard to accomplish for me. I am really super great at the angry face. It was always the polite, sweet face that gave me trouble. I know, you're shocked. 

2) Usually an angry face really will do the trick, but if you spot someone that is sweetly looking in your direction and staring at your belly (or just staring at your belly and drooling a little), this is a sign that the angry face is not working. These people are usually not very smart and need extra help. My first go-to with these people is to grab my cell phone and stare at it like something very important is happening. You have to enlist another facial expression here: the furrowed brow. While you are looking down at your phone, brows furrowed, you must still maintain your angry face. I recommend practicing in the mirror a few times. You can also try it on your unsuspecting husband when he walks in from work. If you looks at you and turns around and goes right back out the door, then I would call your experiment a success. 

3) As unbelievable as it sounds, there are actually people that are immune to these tactics. This means they are probably closing in on you and your belly quite fast at this point. You must do something soon or else your baby might get dirty when they touch your stomach! While I usually suggest avoiding any type of eye contact or even acknowledgment that the belly toucher exists, you may need to use eye contact as a tool if they haven't picked up on your other clues so far. Here, you have to implement a variety of mechanisms at once to ensure the person's belly scratchers don't reach your precious cargo. Your angry face needs to continue to be implemented, as well as the furrowed brow, but now I suggest you look them straight in the eyes. You will feel bad about what you're doing because you will see shear delight in their face as they gaze at your blossoming belly, but a clear head and focus will get you through your guilt. Just remember that this person is about to invade your belly with their hand--a hand, mind you, that you have no idea what they've just done with. Let that thought propel you through even if the said hand belongs to a little old lady, which Im sorry to tell you, often times is the case. Now, you've got your brow furrowed and your angry face in place--look at the threat dead in their face, imagining you are shooting lasers out of your eyes at them and sigh. Sigh very, very dramatically. This will usually deter even stubborn belly rubbers away from you.

4) If none of the previous tools have worked for you, then honestly, you're probably doing it wrong. I never, in all of my ten months of pregnancy (that's 17 billion years in pregnant woman's time by the way)--I never had these tactics fail me. Here are a few last ditch efforts you can try if they are within feet of you and your tum-tum and still closing in: put your hand over your mouth with one hand and hold your nose with the other while looking at them--they will hopefully develop some insecurity about how they smell and become too embarrassed to get any closer to you. If you'd like to take it a step further, you can always gag. Nobody wants to be in the path of projectile vomit. Another option is to grab your belly as if to imply that you are having a contraction, but I caution against this as it may give you the opposite of your desired outcome and people could flock to you from all over to assist. It may be worth a try though, if your incoming belly grabber is at all squeamish, he/she may turn on their heels and bolt. 

Like I said, if none of these work for you then you are seriously doing it wrong. Practice more and more in the mirror and practice on your unsuspecting husband. Its important that he not know that you are practicing this on him because he will probably laugh at your swollen face pretending to be mad. This will remove some of your confidence when you are faced with a real, live stomach grazer and you don't need that to happen.  

If you're stomach has been touched, go home and take a shower. Pay extra attention to your stomach area and lather with soap 3 times. Your baby will probably be fine, although I can't say the same for your pregnant mind. 

And in case you didn't know: it's illegal here! 

A year has passed--Potatoes, eggs, and a NEW BABY!

Well hello there. You may remember me. I used to blog here and on occasion offended people...made fun of people, etc, etc, etc. All of this pretty much came to a screeching halt last year when I got pregnant. That's right, there is an offspring and its a she. She's already given me the finger several times, thrown up all over me, pooped ALL over me, and yanks my hair out hourly with her tiny demon fingers, so it is clear to me that she has inherited my genes and I will be repaid ten fold for how I have lived my life. Ehh, not to mention her father is a real ass too, so we are in trouble. Anyway, I digress. I stopped blogging because well to be honest, I was in the trenches. I was in the dirty, evil trenches of the 7th layer of hell also known as pregnancy. I was too busy trying to keep my head above water, err, out of the toilet to blog. I mean, it was a real, real hell of a time. And what really pissed me off was that nobody told me how awful pregnancy could be. Nobody warns you which, in my opinion is a complete and total betrayal among the female race. Aren't we supposed to stick together you bitches?! Ha! (No is the answer to this question obviously.) I finally decided it was because the women in the world want all the other women to go through what they went through. Its like this secret among mothers and they are all in this little mommy club just mothereffing the hell out of the cute little naive, newly pregnant girl that has no idea what she is walking into.

Are you puzzled? Are you thinking, "I never felt better than when I was pregnant." Well go straight to hell I say! Do not even bother doing the dishes. Just get up , go find the nearest bus and stand in front of it because you are hated by many women…even if they don't say that to your face. Or whatever, don't go to hell. Just know that one day you may say that to the wrong woman and she may lose it and I can't say I'd blame her. Especially if she's pregnant…and having a hard time. Especially if she spends her whole day swallowing just so she doesn't throw up all over everything around her. Especially if she has popped every pill the OB prescribed to her to help her be able to eat something other than a baked potato and all she got in return was 9 days of constipation from the pills. And especiallyyyyy, if her husband just happened to walk through the door from an emergency grocery store run because she ran out of potatoes and when she looked in the bag, she wanted to shove them down his throat because the only explanation for the size of these damn potatoes is that he got them from Saturn or Neptune or some-freaking-where in outer space and she knew they would NEVER microwave properly.

**Here is where I will stop pretending that this story happened to someone else. It isn't about someone else. Its actually about me, sadly.**

So, I go into the kitchen, wash the giant brick of a potato, all the while knowingggg its fate. I slammed it into the microwave and after 5 minutes, I retrieved the still hard as a rock potato. After 3 more minutes, then 4 more minutes, the damn thing no longer looked like food. The ends were wrinkled and the pure life had been nuked out of it, yet the middle was still hard as a rock. This was not edible. Translation to a pregnant, miserable, sick, irrational girl=breakdown. Full on total, uncontrollable emotional breakdown. I started stabbing it. Hard. With a really sharp knife. Which alerted my husband who was sitting in a nearby room, probably oblivious to how much his potato purchase had knocked me off my rocker. Stab. Stab. Stabstabstabstab. Long sigh. "Stupid, stupid, potato." STAB. Stabstabstab. Stab STAB. "Grrrrrrrrr." Another sigh. Tears. Tears. Can no longer see through the tears, yet still stabbing the potato and calling it stupid. And then I couldn't get my breath, but don't worry, Im still stabbing it with the extra sharp knife. I think this is the point where my husband finally was able to catch my hand that was doing the stabbing and take it out of my hand. And then I fell into his chest, sobbing and crying, and drooling all over his shirt as I tried to tell him what was wrong, but only spit bubbles gurgled out of my mouth.

What?? Don't act like you've never cried like that. Maybe it wasn't over a potato but you know you've cried like that.

I finally was able to say, "I hate that potato!!!!!" He was able to look and see what the problem was, although there were bits and chunks and pieces of potato all over the counter at that point. Long story short (ha), he made me another one while I sat on the couch and caught my breath and wiped my nose.

And this was my life. This was my life for 10 months. Oh, you thought pregnancy was 9 months?? Nerp, its 10. Surpriseeee bitches! There was also a little thing called gestational diabetes that occurred very shortly after I was able to actually eat and enjoy food again. And really, I could not think of anything except the fact that I was pregnant and was forced to eat a very limited diet, lacking anything and everything I actually enjoyed eating including pasta, pizza, cupcakes, chocolate, pie, cookies, and soda. It really was just bullshit. Near the end, I had to leave a restaurant because I was crying due to the fact that I had to eat eggs for breakfast for the 3rd month in a row. Yes, eggs every morning for three months because this kept my blood sugar under control. Holy holy holy balls. It was like a torture prison. I didn't want to blog! I didn't want to live!!!

So anyway. Here we all are now. Baby T is 2 months old, so I survived. My husband survived, luckily. Zeus and Fritz made it. Louie the first, our fish, sadly didn't make it, but I guess all wars have casualties.

So, now I'm one of those annoying people that only post pictures of their baby. I used to hateee people like that. I know people hate me and my baby posts. Oh well. Its my life now. Sometimes I brush my hair, but mostly I just take pictures of baby T doing the same thing she did yesterday and the day before that. I mean, she's two months old. She can't like really doooo a whole lot. I'm thinking of starting a separate blog about motherhood, so this one can continue to be about how much I hate people. No blurred lines here. Ugh, hate that song. Do I sound like my brain is smaller than the last time I blogged? Because I am pretty sure it is. The baby took a lot from me. But in all seriousness, I've heard pregnant women's brains literally get smaller. But I thought it grew back?? Its going to go back to normal size soon right? Oh yea, none of you bitches will tell any of us other bitches the truth about anything anyway so why am I asking?!

Welp, I need to sign off. My husband just said I was being vile to him. How is that even possible when all I'm doing is sitting on the floor writing this blog? Silently writing a blog, and still manage to be vile. That, folks, takes true talent.

Hope you've all had a really swell last year and were able to eat things other than potatoes and eggs. (Not really.)




Disclaimer:

It took me a long, long time to get pregnant. Roughly 3 years. A lot of shots, and procedures, and uncomfortable doctors appointments later, I managed to get pregnant. Something so many people take for granted. (hate you all too, by the way) Do not think for one second that I am not overwhelmingly, monumentally, insanely grateful for this precious little miracle baby girl. My heart is overflowing. I still, however, hate eggs and martian-grown potatoes.  

**No, I did not stab Louie the first with a knife. I assume he died from natural causes.**