INDEPENDENCE FROM ...ENVY (BUMP ENVY)


- Sylvie Greil, Contributing Writer

My baby bump is five months and 21 days big. And I’m obsessed with its size. Among some circles, I’ve heard, bigger is better and I, too, couldn’t wait to strut around showing off my pregnant belly in tight little T-shirts. But I don’t belong to any circles and the size of my bump is a constant source of confusion.

It’s like this: I went grocery shopping yesterday in a really pretty green cotton dress. The check-out clerk asked me how far along I was. I told her a little over five months. She gasped. Wow, you are small. Small? I yelped. I’m huge! Everyone says so. Who does?  All my friends and neighbors. The girl, a pretty Latina, shook her head. Nah, I’m around pregnant women all the time. And you are small. I carted out my groceries, elated. Elated? Yes! Because all of a sudden I felt normal again. Normal-sized that is. You see, my best friend calls the baby Maximus, “because he’s so big.” And for a while I was hiding my bump because I was afraid people would ask me how far along I was, and I would have to confess to a measly three or four months, and they would shake their heads in disbelief. Wow, you are huge! All the mujeres in my Echo Park neighborhood say so, and they have had what seems like hundreds of kids between them. They should know.

On Memorial Day we went to a barbecue and I was excited, because I knew my friend Helen would be there. We have the same due date. When she arrived with a huge water melon I was relieved. See, I said to my husband? She’s even bigger than me. I was beaming throughout the whole party. When we left and kissed goodbye, her boyfriend looked at me and said, oh, you’re kind of lopsided, huh? Funny, Helen is more compact. Gah! The audacity. Lopsided! I looked down at Maximus and indeed, it looked like everything had shifted to the left, baby, burgers, guacamole, and the bag of salt and vinegar-flavored Kettle chips I had devoured.

Ever since my bump obsession has grown. I know it’s kind of neurotic, but a long time ago I read that Uma Thurman said that neurotics make some of the best parents. And she knows. After all, she’s an actress. So, yesterday in my pre-natal yoga class I looked at the other women. Everyone had this neat little—or extra-large—package, like a perfect gift-wrap. I’ve never been good at wrapping neat gifts and I looked more barrel shaped in comparison. Believe it or not, at the same time I worry about my belly being abnormally large, I secretly fear that it’s actually too small. None of this makes any sense, I know. At my last ultra sound, the nurse said, Wow, you got a big baby in there. Two minutes later it turned out that she thought I was there for my very first visit and she apologized. Then the doctor came in. I love my doctor. She checked the fetus and measured him again. Is he huge? I whispered. No, if anything, he’s on the small side. But we call him Maximus, I said! No, he’s just fine, she said. He’s perfect.

I wish I could confess that my obsession has turned to my ever-increasing rear part, which has gotten so big you’d think that babies came out of there. But no, I’m still looking at bumps all over the place, wondering how far along they are, examining their shape, scanning them for hints of lopsidedness or barrel patterns. I know size does not matter, that it’s all relative and that some women don’t show at all at five months and others look huge. Some carry water melons, others burgers and chips. As I’m heading toward month six, I’m ready to bump up to a bigger size. Happy and proud of both bumps---the one in the front and that other one in the back.