So what end was your husband at?

So a little bit more on my penis envy complex, but it’s only because I’m convinced that men have it a whole lot easier than women.  If you don’t believe me, then I’ll ask you again if you agree with me when it’s that time of the month and your belly is bloated as if you are 4mos pregnant, your cramps are causing blinding aches, you are uncontrollably crying, or worse you are throwing fists in the air.  Sometimes, it just plain sucks to be a woman.  However, it’s important to remember that we have a lot more power, especially brain power.  We’re just too hormonal to use it to its full capacity on occasion.

As women, we bear the heaviest load even in the traditional sense of being a matriarch.  As modern women, we bear an even heavier load given that we have also assumed upon ourselves the tasks of our men.  This begs the question: What are we trying to prove by doing that?  That we can?  Why must we take on more than we have to just to prove to our men that we can?  Sure, the downturn of the economy has forced many housewives to go to work to supplement the income for our families.  In my case, I fall under the category of going back to work part-time voluntarily, but for several reasons and mostly to justify my expensive taste, which I refuse to sacrifice.   Call me selfish, but you only live once and I know what I like.

Now that I’ve started working again, after only one month off my previous full-time post, I’m getting frustrated by the crazy hectic mornings.   Get up at 5:30am to drink my coffee.  Jump into the shower and try to keep hair dry so I don’t have to spend time drying and styling it (and therefore sacrifice a good hair day), squeeze into jeans that I’m growing out of at 5 months pregnant, and then get my son up and ready for daycare.  My husband rolls out of bed at quarter after 6am and has an easy time taking a quick shower, barely combing his hair, and slipping into clothes that never change fit, thereby making it much easier to look good and put together.  And he ALWAYS looks good....jerk (but that's why I love him). As I walk around doing plie’s just to stretch my jeans out and catching quick glimpses of my expanding ass in the mirror, I send loving curse words towards my husband under my breath for getting me pregnant again.  I quickly recall the first time around when in the third trimester, I think I literally went insane with the hormonal changes (I remember one day a pyscho period of nesting, only I took it out on the car by getting a car wash, oil change, tires rotated, and car seat installation all in one morning), then there were the cankles.  And I didn’t just get cankles, I got redwood trees for legs, the kind that you can friggin’ drive a car through.  I would wear shoes and my skin would literally roll over the top.  I got a massage, it was actually a massage interview during my spa director days, and I think the girl was grossed out by the fact that she could see her handprint in my gel legs.  Gross.  I apologize for the TMI, but ladies you know what I’m talking about and you know how much it can SUCK.

During my first pregnancy, I had an emergency c-section for Che (please hold back your judgments because the cord was around his neck and dramatically slowing his heart rate) and the recovery was brutal.  Even though I was back up on my feet at the Fairmont Miramar Christmas party working within 5 days of Che’s emergency delivery, it was only to prove that I was a soldier and to show my son off.  This time, my best friend is encouraging me to consider a VBAC (Vaginal Birth After Cesarean).  I’m sorry to say that I’m deathly afraid of trying that and the possibility of it really has no room in my book.  Nope, I succumbed to the fact that the recovery of the Cesarean, though difficult and longer, will be a lot more enjoyable than worrying if I’m going to rip myself open during the pushing phase.  I think my husband is actually relieved at my decision because he gets really skeeved out at the sight or thought of a vaginal birth.  Yes, of course, he loves the naturalness of it, but he has already refused to be “at that end” during delivery.  I don’t blame him.  But look at the easy decisions men get to make?  Which “end” to be at during delivery?!  Rather than decide to be cut open or push it out through your vajajay?  The thought of how easy men have it makes me go bonkers sometimes.  From clothes and getting dressed, to childbirth, to weight control, to work (and automatically having a higher salary), to social life, and all the way to child rearing.  The only times that a man has to work the hardest are during sex and in understanding their wives, especially while pregnant.  ;-)

Ladies, we have a lot to endure in a lifetime and it certainly feels like an uphill treadmill, so please stop fighting each other with jealousy and mood swings, and start rallying together.  Men will never understand us or our emotions.  They just don’t get it.  Realize that we must go to each other for the kind of understanding that trumps therapy.  Therapy is a waste of money. Let's go get cocktails instead.