The Day I Was Excited To Have Gained Weight

[contents: fat-hate, weight loss/gain, medical, disordered eating]

You know, and I write that headline as if any other time I gain weight, it's a fucking tragedy, which is just not the case. Interesting to see how much that dominant narrative still sticks with me, though. For the most part with my body, my weight fluctuates and does its thing and that's fine, and I only notice based on how my clothes fit. I was pretty upset the time I gained 50 pounds in under a year, but not so much because of the weight as the fact that my doctor at the time didn't take it seriously. Still, it's unusual for me to have strong feelings about weight changes, so this day kind of stood out, partly for that reason.

ANYWAY. I've mentioned before that I lost quite a bit of weight early in my pregnancy. By "quite a bit", I mean "about 20 pounds in 3 months" a bit. There were a couple of weeks when I lost 3+ pounds, just that week.

Part of it I'm sure is just because I could not eat much my first trimester. I had really bad, constant nausea until not that long ago, so food sounded pretty much terrible all the time. Usually I could get one meal a day in, because my body would finally need food badly enough that I was capable of coming up with one thing that didn't make me want to vomit just thinking about it. This was McDonald's or KFC more often than I can count. I went through a stage where all that tasted good was chicken mcnuggets, fries, and a strawberry banana smoothie. I also went through a stage where all that tasted good was boneless chicken tenders, potato wedges, and biscuits. (Mostly, the theme has been CHICKEN AND POTATOES, PLEASE.)

Clementines have also consistently been delicious for me, so I have had a bag or box of them in the fridge nearly since day 1. I eat two to four of them a day. But clementines and some nuggets are not in fact sufficient calorie intake for the day, even when I'm not pregnant.

Another part of it I'm sure is just genetics. I've been talking to my mom a lot since I got pregnant, and she mentioned that she lost weight in her first trimester with all of her pregnancies. So while apparently my pregnancy has strangely seemed a lot more like my mother-in-law's than my mother's, this probably played a role. Plus, it's common for pregnant fat folk to lose weight anyway in the first trimester. (Well-Rounded Mama talks about that a bit here.)

The biggest factor for me, though, I think, is that I've been losing weight steadily since July, when I finally got appropriate treatment for my hypothyroidism, probably Hashimoto's disease. (I have the antibodies indicative of Hashi's, and it certainly matches my symptoms for the past TWENTY YEARS, I just haven't had the "gold standard" diagnostic done yet.) Turns out when I started taking iron supplements for the severe, nearly "wait how are you ALIVE" iron deficiency I had, I started losing weight. It accelerated when I started taking Vitamin D and B12 (turns out I was pretty "wait how are you ALIVE" deficient in those too). I did not change what I ate, I did not start exercising more (or at all). But suddenly I could fit in to jeans I had last worn just before I got married.

Tell me some more about your "calories in, calories out" theory.

So finally I was at an appointment around 15 weeks, got weighed, and FINALLY, I had gained two pounds. Watching my weight drop and drop through each earlier appointment, I had started to get worried. Part of it was just being up in my feels about changes to my body that were clearly not deliberate or under my control. Part of it really was "okay, at what point do we start worrying here?" Because I was pretty sure that if I'd lost weight again by that point, we would have reached WORRY.

When I saw the midwife, I mentioned that I was in fact really excited to have gained two pounds, FINALLY. Welllllll, she tried to quash that right quick. "You should only gain 10 pounds in your pregnancy." And the look on her face... you could tell that she was really displeased that I was excited. It was definitely "YOU'RE FAT ENOUGH, FATTIE."

I gave her a Look of my own while she blathered on. In order for ANYONE to only gain 10 pounds in pregnancy, they would have to either have a very, VERY small baby, or lose weight through their entire pregnancy. 10+ pound babies run in my family, and bigger people just tend to have bigger babies, so I'd have to continue losing a LOT of weight. Also in pregnancy, the placenta is another couple pounds, amniotic fluid is another couple pounds, your boobs gain a couple of pounds, your body stores some extra fat to prepare for childbirth and nursing, your uterus literally grows, you literally MAKE MORE BLOOD... there's a lot of things that are added to one's body during pregnancy. Even the IOM recommends "11-20" pounds of gain for "all obese [people]" during pregnancy. (warning: there is a LOT of BMI and fat hate and gender essentialist bullshit in that report.)

Plus, this idea of "only gain 10 pounds in pregnancy" is still based in the same "calories in, calories out", "if you just diet and exercise, you can be THIN HEALTHY", as if the functions of our body are completely within our control and if we would just use some WILLPOWER already, all of us fatties could stop being such a blight on society and an offense to people's tastes. There's a lot of research that thoroughly debunks that idea - Fat Nutritionist just posted another article about some of it here - and that idea directly contradicts the lived experience of me and most people I know, yet it persists. The fact that we already know that diets don't work, and weight doesn't usually stay off long-term, is one of the many reasons I know that the "diet and exercise" thing isn't about my health, it's about other people's aesthetics.

I also note that not once did she bring up the idea of disordered eating with me. (In fact, no medical professional ever has, even when I've disclosed that there have been times when I've gone four or five days without eating, and not because I was ill or couldn't keep food down - it was because I deliberately did not eat.) Any time someone loses twenty pounds in three months, that's an instance where you go "hey, let's figure out why, that's a big change." Moreover, eating disorders are incredibly common and incredibly dangerous. That shit can kill you. That shit can end a pregnancy real quick. And a lot of diets are pretty disordered eating. But no mention of it. In fact, she gave me recommendations for foods to avoid - which, if I were as bad off as I've been in the past, would quite easily lead to my going further down the "nope not eating" path.

This post is also long enough without getting in to the dangers of restricting weight gain in pregnancy - or inducing weight loss - but I really recommend you check out Well-Rounded Mama for some thorough write-ups of the problem. In short, restricting weight gain is associated with way worse outcomes than "excessive" weight gain, and what a bullshit term "excessive" is.

So I will not be seeing THAT particular midwife again, thanks for telling me I have to do something that most likely will be dangerous for me and The Kid. And I'm still gaining weight, I think - suddenly my loose jeans aren't as loose anymore HOORAY. So I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing, which is try to eat on the regular, make sure to drink enough water and juice and milk etc., try to take more walks and shit but whatever if I don't I don't (especially given some of the pain I'm already in), and my weight (and The Kid's weight) are going to be what they're going to be.

Mostly I'm just glad that it seems like the extreme weight loss has plateaued. That shit was getting scary.

Things Happening to My Pregnant Ass This Week

[Contents: TMI, medical, eating, mention of weight loss]

While I will be doing much ranting and swearing on this blog, I also just want to talk about what being pregnant is LIKE for me. Some of the things I find most helpful are just people's descriptions of what they are going through with pregnancy. As much as I have and I'm sure will rant about "anecdata", I love hearing people's stories. And in so many cases, it's those stories that make me realize that "I'm not alone." So I want to both document my experiences, and give that to other folks.

Especially since so, so many of these stories are written by not-fat folks. Which doesn't mean they're less valid, just that I already know that their experience is different than mine. And yeah, I'm fat, which doesn't mean every fat person who goes through pregnancy will have the same experience as me, but shit let's get some variety in this piece.

SO. Things this week.

One of the neatest things for me is just feeling where my uterus is. I've been able to find it since, mmmm, around week 13 or so. I used to have to lay on my back to find it. My lower abdomen is normally squishy. I have a floppy layer of fat there, that jiggles and wiggles and yes, squishes pretty easily. I was poking around one night (no lie, because I'd read in one of those pregnancy calendars that The Kid by this point could react to stimuli like pokes, and I wanted to piss them off :D) and was like heeyyyy, that's not squishy. I palpated all around - at this point I had to press pretty hard, but I could feel the firm, rounded edges and was like HEY THAT'S PRETTY NEAT. Then I grabbed The Man's hand so he could feel.

I check on it every so often, especially since I get so many reminders in pregnancy calendars that are like "Oh the top of your uterus is 3" below your belly button!" and so far it's been right on target. This Monday though, was the first time I felt it NOT laying down on my back. I was in the shower, soaping up and all of a sudden it was like WHOA. There it is. Starting right at the bottom of my belly button and spreading out to the sides. It's part of why I mentioned in Monday that it sure seems like the uterus is pushing the fat out of its way, because I could NOT feel this earlier. And I can't feel it while sitting down yet (at least not from the outside), it's really easy to feel while I'm standing up.

The Man also said to me this week, literally, "You kind of look... wider." I laughed and laughed and laughed. It was fricken' adorable.

I'm not a small person, okay? For various reasons, I wound up losing a lot of weight the first three and half months of pregnancy. The most visible way most folks would notice is that my face got really thin - I had slight hollows in my checks, and my bone structure really stood out. My face looked way longer than wide. I noticed my face had filled out and gotten rounder a couple of weeks ago, but I hadn't really noticed anything else. The Man was talking more about my hips and thighs and stuff. Given that his powers of observation when it comes to me are acute as hell, I completely believe him.

The "spread", as it were, also explains why standing up hurts. I'm about 99% sure it's pelvic girdle pain, even without talking to my OB or midwives. It's not in a spot I usually get pain, and it's definitely a perfect fit for the descriptions. It was worst a week ago Monday, after I got groceries, and I'm pretty sure it was exacerbated significantly by the shoes I was wearing. They were a low heel, which is most comfortable for me right now, but they have wood heels and about no padding. So my hips and knees and feet took the shocks of walking. But the clearest way I can describe it was that for a day or two afterwards, my hips felt like they were in the wrong place, and the pain from it, I felt in what sometimes is called the "pelvic saddle", and radiating down my thighs. I also had trouble standing up straight.

It's better this week, although it still aches when I first stand up. It's worse first thing in the morning, after everything has relaxed more. And usually walking for a few steps helps get things back in to place. I also find that a technique I was advised to use for my back helps a lot. My PT told me that your glutes, PC muscles, and abs all do the bulk of the work in stabilizing your spine and pelvis. So I make sure to have all of those tightened a bit when walking - which also improves my posture - and that seems to help a lot. If you read the Wikipedia article on PGP, it mentions that in some cases, yes, the muscles can compensate in whole or in part for pelvic instability, and that's what I'm doing. But shit, it works. The other thing that's helped is better shoes. I bought ones that have low heels, and have way more cushioning and softer soles, so they absorb more shocks. I know those things aren't options for everyone, but I wanted to put them out there in case they're options for others.

Finally, I think I need a timer. It needs to go off about every one to two hours, half an hour before the hunger gets critical and I lose my ability to coherently, calmly think about what I should eat. I am so hungry, y'all. And hungry really, really regularly. Problem is, I can't eat much. Sunday night I made fried chicken, which is one of my most favorite things in the world (it's also one of my sister's, and it was for her birthday). I've also craved chicken and potatoes pretty hard throughout this entire pregnancy. I ate like six bites of chicken, and a dozen fries, and was FULL. It was such bullshit; I was so upset. Then I was hungry an hour later, to my frustration. The hunger is definitely fiercest and most frequent in the afternoon and evening, but yeah, seriously, I need to shove food in my face about every hour to two hours. And I can't eat that much. UGH.

STOP CALLING ME "MOM"

[Contents: gender essentialism, mentions of forced birth and miscarriage]

So I'm 18 weeks pregnant today.

A big part of my learning style is reading. I will devour any book, manual, essay, what-have-you on a subject that interests me. (Makes watching Jeopardy! with me either fun or super fucking annoying.) So because I find pregnancy interesting, and while I have been pregnant before, have never gotten this far before, I have been reading oh-so-many pregnancy books, websites, etc.

They are so. fucking. gender. essentialist.

They are all like "THE EXPECTANT MOTHER" or "HERE'S WHAT'S GOING ON THIS WEEK, MOM" and "MOTHERHOOD" this and "MAMA" that and HOLY SHIT STOP CALLING ME MOM.

First and foremost, "Mother", "Mom", "Mama", "Motherhood", etc. are highly gendered terms. WOMEN are "moms". MEN are "dads". So every time you use one of these (or any related) terms to refer to a pregnant person, you're assuming that person is a woman.

You can't assume that.

There's a reason that unless I'm quoting, I refer to pregnant PEOPLE. That's because the ability to get and stay pregnant is not actually dependent on gender. People of all genders can get pregnant, provided they have a uterus. Used to be you needed ovaries too, but with the state of technology today, you don't even need those. You need a uterus capable of sustaining a pregnancy.  That's it. Doesn't matter what your gender is.

Secondly, while I myself am cis, and call myself "the pregnant lady" on the regular, YOU'RE NOT MY KID, STOP CALLING ME MOM. "Mom" is not and never will be my ACTUAL NAME. Perfect strangers calling me by something that's not my name? I find that profoundly disrespectful. I wouldn't stand for it even from members of my family. Ask me how "being a mom" is going? Sure. "How's it going, Mom?" Fuck you. That's not my name.

Furthermore, it's so reductionist to just refer to pregnant people as "mom" or any of those variants. Even once I have The Kid, and start filling that "parent" role, even if I go by "Mom" to The Kid, that will be but one part of my life and identity. Yes, it's going to be hugely important to me, and almost certainly take up a lot of my time and energy. But I'll also still be Wench, I'll also be my mom's daughter (and have relationships with the rest of my family, etc. and so on), I'll also still be married to The Man, I'll still be a knitter and a sewer and all of the other things I am. Continually referring to me and all the pregnant people reading this stuff as "Mom" just reduces us to that one thing.

Thirdly, the assumption of automatic "motherhood" upon getting pregnant and giving birth is troublesome. Not just because of the gendered nature of the term, although that's a big part of it. But not everyone who gives birth becomes - or wants to become - a "mother". That might be because they're not retaining custody of the person they birth, because they don't identify as a mother, don't want the kid and were forced to give birth... I mean the potential reasons are endless.

It also totally ignores other ways to become a "mom", like adoption. Or, for example, all of the folks in my life that (with their permission), I also refer to as "Mom", in addition to my mother. It's such a narrow definition of what "motherhood" (and by extension, parenting) is. When parenting is so much bigger than that.

I don't have a problem with however folks want to identify. Like I said, I'll likely go by "Mom" to The Kid. (Note: TO THE KID, NOT TO ANYONE ELSE, GOOD LORD.) You're "Mama"? "Hey Lady"? "[first name]"? "Parent?" "Dad?" Whatever? Awesome. But when everything is written with the assumption that "Mom" and variants is how every pregnant person identifies, that's hugely problematic. It erases everyone who doesn't, and doesn't even give a hint to folks that there are other possibilities. It's one-dimensional and reductionist. I don't give a shit about your excuse that "well ALMOST ALL pregnant people are women", I don't give a shit about "WELL WE JUST WANT TO BE CLEAR", you can do better. Stop shoving me in to a box and a narrowly defined and prescribed role.

Shit Fat Pregnant People Get Told: "Fat [people] won't feel their babies move as early as thin people"

[Contains: fat-hate, gender essentialism]

I mean, I am pretty fucking creative at swearing, and I have yet to come up with a profanity-riddled screed that adequately describes the levels of rage, frustration, anger, and disdain this statement engenders in me. (By the way. Well-Rounded Mama covers this particular myth far more kindly and way less-profanity-ridden-ly than I am going to here.)

I started googling "quickening" and "fetal movement" right around week 12 of my pregnancy, because I was pretty sure that fucking weird popping sort of sensation I was feeling was The Kid. I was laying on the floor one night, watching The Man play Assassin's Creed 4, felt this sort of tapping pop-pop-pop down low on the left side, and thought "... the fuck is thAT THE KID WAIT". Especially since it really wasn't like anything I'd felt before. And some sites were okay, but then I would come across things like this (gender essentialist language in this quote):

Most women begin to feel movement somewhere between weeks 18 and 22, though veteran moms tend to feel the baby moving a little sooner than first-timers. Chalk it up to laxer abdominal muscles (there has to be some benefit to those!) or merely the fact that second-timers are more likely to recognize a kick when they feel it. Thinner moms-to-be may also feel movement earlier and more often than those carrying a lot of extra weight, since there's less padding to serve as insulation.

Emphasis mine.

That's not as bad as some I've run across, especially in forums or websites for pregnant folks. There it tends to turn in to "thinner women will feel their babies move sooner than heavier women." The absolute, instead of the "may". (Emphasis mine again... usually.)

To which I reply: BULLLLLLLLLSHIIIIIIIIITTTTTTTT

I know one of the super-fuck-popular fat-hating trends right now in "health" circles is "visceral fat". It's this special SUPER-SCARY fat that YOU CAN'T ALWAYS SEE and it's AROUND YOUR ORGANS and OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG.

Note though, that it's AROUND your organs, not IN THEM. And when you're a pregnant person feeling those first early weird little flutters, you're feeling them from the INSIDE of your uterus. Where there is not a layer of "padding" "insulating" you from the fetus, besides the placenta. (Having an anterior placenta CAN make it harder to feel kicks and movement... but it's not because of fat either.) Your particular fetus is kicking, punching, or just slamming itself in to the inner surface of your uterus, where I assure you, you do have some nerve endings. At 12 weeks pregnant, the fetus is pretty small, so if you don't feel it, that's okay. And it's not because of your weight. It's because it's really small and it might just not have enough force for you to feel it yet. I promise, I PROMISE, that regardless of your weight, regardless of your size, even if your BMI is 40 or above like mine, if you carry a pregnancy to term? YOU WILL FEEL THE FETUS MOVE AT SOME POINT. IT WILL HAPPEN.

Now, if we're talking about, say, your partner or spouse or bestie or whomever being able to feel the kicks and punches from the outside of your belly? There I can buy that fat may play a role... but I also don't think it plays a big one. Turns out my fat at least tends to jiggle and transmit movement pretty well. Also, So once The Kid is capable of generating enough force that The Man can possibly feel it outside, yeah, my fat miiiight mean that it'll be a little harder for him to feel it, and he might not feel the full force at first. But I also have very clear memories of my mom's last pregnancy (I was 12 at the time), and I have virtually the exact same body shape and size as my mom, and we could 100% feel the baby that turned in to my sister kicking with zero problems.

Something I've also noticed as my own pregnancy has progressed, and which gets hinted at in some discussions of diastasis recti and such, is that my uterus is kind of just... pushing things to the sides. Like it's definitely expanding forward, not just upward. So there's just less fat covering it than there was in a few weeks ago. That fat for me, has been pushed to the sides. So I buy the "oh fat padding" argument even less, really. Again, every body is different. My experience is not universal. But given how often I see "remedies" for diastasis recti, I'm betting it's at least pretty common.

I do think that some folks who tell you this mean well. Pregnancy can be incredibly anxiety-provoking, and I know my experience is that I like to know reasons for why things are happening like they are. And "it's just your fat getting in the way" is way more reassuring of a reason for not feeling anything than "something's wrong with the baby", which it can be really easy to default to. But one, it's not true, and two, it plays in to this whole idea of "well fat people don't deserve nice things" that is so incredibly common. Well-Rounded Mama touched on this too - "you get to be pregnant fattie, but you don't get any of the fun stuff like we virtuous thin folks do!" And while I do think that fat folk and not-fat folk experience some parts of pregnancy differently - it's part of why I started this blog - the underlying idea behind this, that all fat people don't get to experience the "fun" parts of pregnancy, or not as much, is just so much bullshit.

Besides which, intent is not fucking magic. (Does anyone know who first came up with this? Because I see it everywhere, but first came across it at Shakesville, and a search is not helping me.) I don't really give a shit if you intend to comfort me by saying "oh it's okay fat people don't feel their babies move as early." It's still wrong, it's still contributing to fat hate, and it's still bullshit. Please talk all you want about how everyone is different, and everyone feels their baby move at different times. That is absolutely true. But stop blaming it on fat.

Pregnancy as a cause of disability

[Contents: ableism, gender essentialism, medical]

So I have a lot of thoughts related to the #solidarityisfortheablebodied tag that I've been watching (and participating in) on the Twittermachine, especially in relation to pregnancy. This will probably turn in to a whole series of posts, but to start with, I wanted to record some of the tweets and talk a bit about how pregnancy can cause disability.

(Just as an FYI, #solidarityisfortheablebodied was started by Neal Carter to talk about ableism. It was inspired by #solidarityisforwhitewomen, which was started by Mikki Kendall to talk about racism in social justice movements, especially feminism. I really recommend checking them both out.)

So while participating in the tag, K Boyd, Cabell Gathman, and I were talking a bit about the intersection of pregnancy, ableism, and disability. Here are some of the highlights:

#solidarityisfortheablebodied when pregnancy cn only be "inconvenient," never disabling. Pregnant ppl even ashamed to name it to themselves.
— Cabell Gathman (@cabell) November 16, 2013

"@cabell: #solidarityisfortheablebodied when pregnancy cn only be "inconvenient" never disabling. Pregnant ppl even ashamed to name it to themselves."

@kingdomofwench and just btw, I do become physically disabled when pregnant. :/
— K Boyd (@MendyLady) November 16, 2013

"@MendyLady: @kingdomofwench and just btw, I do become physically disabled when pregnant. :/"

MT @MendyLady: @me Many people do not, and so it's awful that society assumes they do. But then for those of us who do, it's ...
— Wench (@kingdomofwench) November 16, 2013

"@kingdomofwench: MT @MendyLady @me Many people do not, and so it's awful that society assumes they do. But then for those of us who do, it's..."

@kingdomofwench miserable to get our condition taken seriously. #solidarityisfortheablebodied
— K Boyd (@MendyLady) November 16, 2013

"@MendyLady: miserable to get our condition taken seriously. #solidarityisfortheablebodied"

One of the things that continues to strike me about pregnancy is this overwhelming assumption of it and framing of the experience that it is the best, most fulfilling thing that a woman [sic] can ever do. That you will feel SO WONDERFUL in your second trimester, even if you felt horrid in your first trimester! It's fine! It's all great! (Don't believe me? Start looking at pretty much any pregnancy book or website out there.) And while the sites and books will talk about "round ligament pain", and "sore feet", and "mood swings", and while they'll often go in to detail about all of the things that can go wrong with the pregnancy, like placental abruption, they don't generally talk about how pregnancy can really be disabling.

The exception to that seems to be pelvic girdle pain, which is mentioned specifically both as "common" and "potentially debilitating". The Wikipedia article is way better (even if it does assume that all pregnant people are women). It's more detailed as to symptoms, potential effects, and way more thorough in terms of what treatment is available. "What To Expect" - which, I seem to recall hearing that this was so detailed it was too detailed about pregnancy and that's why no one liked it - has scant information, and scant options. And beyond that first mention of "debilitating", doesn't really go in to much else.

But PGP is far, FAR from the only change in pregnancy that can disable someone. Some of the easier ones to figure on are things like the loosening and spreading of your joints causing foot pain, or the lower back pain that can also be very common in pregnancy. Even in those cases though, the response often is "well get new shoes", "it's not that bad", "if you exercise more it will feel better". And yeah, foot pain and joint pain doesn't sound so bad. Until you have it, like I do, and when I went grocery shopping last Monday I could barely make it out of the store, hunched over the cart, unable to carry my groceries in, and having to slowly, painfully lurch my way up the stairs to my apartment, and immediately lay down. If you'd like to inform me that that's not disability, that that kind of pain isn't disabling, you can fuck right off. CAN'T. GET. MY. OWN. GROCERIES.

Then there's the nausea and vomiting, and the extreme nausea and vomiting known as hyperemesis gravidarum. HG can get people hospitalized. They literally cannot keep anything down, and are so dehydrated they usually wind up getting IV fluids and nutrients. It's incredibly dangerous both for the pregnant person and the embryo/fetus they're carrying. And even milder forms of "morning sickness" can be disabling. It's hard to function if you can't eat, if common smells make you ill, if you just feel like shit all the damn time with no relief.

Pregnancy doesn't just affect you physically though. There are so many mental and emotional changes that happen. Those often get dismissed as "hormones". And while hormones may be the cause, they're not always. Even if the cause is hormones, that doesn't make the effects any less real. Plus, any sort of mental health issue is incredibly stigmatized, and especially in women, tends to get pooh-poohed. "You're just lazy", "oh take a deep breath", "it's all in your head". Well that's fine and dandy (asshole), but when you're so ill you can't get out of the house, can't get out of bed? When you're afraid to move because WHAT IF IT HURTS THE BABY, and a part of you knows that's not really rational and it's the disease talking, but you still can't move? All the deep-breathing in the world ain't gonna fix that, and to suggest that it's such an easy fix, and that it's not disabling, is incredibly shitty.

And like was quoted above, lots of people do NOT experience debilitating, disabling side effects during pregnancy (and the ones I mentioned above are an extremely abbreviated list, mostly drawn from my own experience). That is genuinely awesome for them. My problem is when that becomes the only acceptable narrative for pregnancy, as it often seems to be. Again, the narrative we're presented about pregnancy so often is along the lines of "it's the most fulfilling, wonderful thing you can do!" and that completely erases people for whom it is emphatically not (such as myself!). It's one thing if you want to say "I found pregnancy amazingly fulfilling" or "I felt wonderful during my pregnancy", but to describe pregnancy in general as those things is bullshit. The kindest thing I can say about being pregnant is that it's incredibly uncomfortable and undignified, and part of the reason I use that phrasing is because if I tell it how it really is, I have gotten people jumping down my throat about how WELL JUST DO THIS and YOU'RE TERRIBLE and OH IT'S NOT THAT BAD etc. and so on. Many people are sympathetic - but that's also a function of the fact that I largely surround myself with people who aren't shitheads.

Which brings me to another point: I've gotten to the point, even this "early" in my pregnancy, a few times where I have significant trouble standing upright or walking. And even I hesitate to call that "disabled". I can't get groceries on my own, I have to plan dinners so that if I cook something that involves more than five minutes of effort one day, the next day I have to have something that only requires five minutes of effort, I'm back to doing PT exercises for my fucked up back and hips, I hate hate HATE that I have to pee all the time because goddammit I just got comfortable and standing up is going to hurt, and I dread the possibility of The Kid laying on my spine as they get bigger and aggravating my degenerated disks. And this is all shit that started after I got pregnant.

There's incredible stigma against disability, being disabled, and identifying as disabled here in the US. Being a pregnant person on top of that? There should be a really elegant math metaphor here, but I'll settle for "it way more than doubles the bullshit and stigma".