The Beginning of the End

I imagine it like a commercial.

It starts off with a montage of peaceful pregnancy shots: soft lighting, smiling women with gently rounded bellies in gorgeous homes, or moving in slow motion through flowered fields in perfect weather, maybe even a long french braid on the type of woman who can carry it off and still look like a supermodel, rather than a fundamentalist Mormon.  I'm imagining fundamentalist Mormons don't test well in commercial focus groups.

How many times I've thought in the past few weeks alone: One on my belly, and one in my lap, and I couldn't be happier.  She kicks when she hears her brother's voice, and I'm so full of joy I can scarcely breathe.

They'll have to get someone from advertising to punch up that slogan though.  It might be how I feel, but it doesn't sound like it will sell.

Then, like a TV ad for a rugged pick up truck, you'll hear brakes squealing over all the glowing gorgeousness and a loud, snarky voice over interrupts, and right away you can tell it's reality intruding into this perfect dream.

Reality, right now, is that my body has produced so much of that wonderful hormone, relaxin, which does exactly what the name promises, and relaxes the ligaments, especially around the pelvis, that my pelvis is looser than Elvis's.  So loose, in fact, that I have to watch out so my hips don't pop out of their sockets.  So loose that sitting quickly goes from uncomfortable to downright torturous because the hips want to spread out in the seat and don't have any sense of when to stop.  I spent the last two days in a conference that required sitting down all day long, and while it was incredibly interesting and valuable information, I know that what I will remember most about it is the agony of my lower back, butt and hips while I hobbled in the hallways between sessions trying to relieve the pain.

My happy, easy pregnancy has taken a sudden turn for the terrible.

Fortunately, I go to the doctor tomorrow, and I'm hoping for a remedy.  A friend told me this morning that she had the same affliction with her pregnancy and twice weekly chiropractic visits eliminated the pain within a week (although the treatment continued for a month).  She was also given a hip harness to wear, which I've read about, and is supposed to hold your hips in place, since the ligaments no longer have any interest in the job, being so relaxed and all.

I can only hope this means I'm a prime candidate for a successful VBAC.  If my hips can't be bothered to hold my legs in place, surely they're ready to slide to each side enough for a baby to fit through.

In the meantime, it feels as if I've been hit by that monster truck whose brakes were squealing right over the glowing gorgeousness of my previously perfect pregnancy.  That bastard broke my hips!  And my butt.  And the left side of my lower back.

So for now the ad ends with my hobbling about, and occasionally letting out a gasp of pain, perhaps a whimper when it gets really bad.  Yes, I know that's pretty much a terrible ending.  And I haven't even managed to figure out what I'm selling, let alone convince anyone to buy anything.

I knew there was a reason I never went into advertising.