Naughty Fishies

Prior to my pregnancy with Mina, Zary knew me to be kind of over the top on fitness and energy. I’d run her to every playground, sometimes 3 or more a day. We might even hit the grocery store on our run home to grab special snacks. I’d do squats while pushing her on the swing. Forget kettlebells, I’d just throw Zary gleefully shrieking into the air whenever my arms needed a pump. I was up early to cook gourmet breakfasts for her, cutting her fruit up with cookie cutter shapes and drizzling freshly melted chocolate on her bananas. I had energy for every game of pretend, every song and dance. Baby girl had it made.

One night I singlehandedly killed a bottle of champagne in my best friend’s basement while losing match after match against her husband’s ping pong robot (who the heck has one of those?) The next morning, I woke up dry heaving and life as Zary knew it was over. The positive test on the counter meant Mina was on her way!

Poor kid got her world rocked with that pregnancy. First the nausea and fatigue hit, and that meant she got a lot more dry cheerios for breakfast. Then SPD and chronic sciatica forced me out of running. Zary noticed quickly and was sure to question why we no longer had time for the extra playgrounds and treats on our walks. When she inevitably stopped getting air-time, and even had to learn to walk down the stairs by herself, it was time for me to explain the pregnancy to her.

I tried to dumb it down and make it silly. I wanted to help her understand that mommy’s body was just changing quickly and that’s why I couldn’t carry her a lot anymore. I didn’t want to blame it on the new baby, so I tried explaining hormones to her.

“Inside my body there are these little itty bitty things called hormones. Think of them kind of like fishies swimming around. And the hormones’ jobs are to protect the baby, and help my body grow the baby.  But mommy’s hormones kind of get confused sometimes… and it makes my tummy sick.  And sometimes those silly little fishies, well they’re trying to make my belly bigger for the baby, but sometimes they accidentally push too hard on my back while they’re doing that, and it hurts. And I’ll be ok. But I just have to take a break from all the play right now.”

Zary’s a smart cookie. On good days, she’d compliment my hormones for letting me play a little rougher. On bad days, she’d ask if my fishies were being mischievous. Here we are two years later and life is mostly normal again. We got through it!

This week we were sitting around the table and Zary reminded Nick and I for the 3,000^th time that she wants to be a baby doctor when she grows up.  But this time she adds, “and I don’t want to be a mommy. JUST a baby doctor. But not a mommy, too.” I figured Mina had pissed her off again and I tried to get to the bottom of it. We asked her why she doesn’t want to be a mommy anymore, and she threw her head back and wailed “Because I don’t want HORMONES!”

Nick tries to pacify her while I lose my shit laughing behind a napkin. He gently lets her know that everybody has hormones, even him. And everyone’s hormones do slightly different things. Not everyone has naughty fishies like mommy (Gosh, if anyone ever hot mic’ed our house, WHAT WOULD THEY THINK?!)

You can see her brain ticking through all available future career options like an old school Roladex until she finds her hormone-free solution… “Do priests have hormones?”

 Nick stutters. “…Yes. Yes, even priests have hormones.”

I barely get a chance to squeak out, “Also, you’re a girl, so….” before Zary’s pitiful wail fills the kitchen. God help me when this child turns 14.