“Beautiful…perfect ovaries…just perfect..”
“What do you mean perfect?” I ask suspiciously
“Perfect. They’re perfect. No lesions, no fibroids..’
“What about cysts?”
“No…no cysts….”
“Well my Doctor thinks I probably have Endometriosis …”
“No sign of that. I would be able to see blisters on your ovaries but yours’ are perfect. Absolutely perfect,” says she, happily waving around a very invasive little instrument that is internally taking happy snaps of my secret women’s business.
Who would have guessed that I have perfect ovaries? Not just good or well formed but perfect. Bloody perfect! But what of this suspicious pain on my side? I was nearly sure I would be rushed off to hospital for some emergency procedure. Could it be something more sinister?
“There’s nothing there. Your fine,” says Dr Quah Smith my acupuncturist as she hastily holds my ultra sound image to the light.
“But what about this pain in my side? Could it be something more… serious…” my voice trails off as I encounter a 60min flashback: an interview with a woman in her final stages of chemo, only tuffs of hair remaining on her head, a pallid shade of yellow -”I had no symptoms except for a nagging pain in my..”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dr Quah snaps as she jabs needles into my flesh.“Not with this weight,” she says gesturing a hand carelessly over my semi naked torso. “I mean people with cancer are thin and you’re…well it has to be hormonal or it’s just in your head because you don’t want to have a baby.”
The nerve! One minute she attacks my full figuredness out on show in my new lacy underwear set that I had just acquired from Myers and the next moment I’m a mad hypochondriac inventing mystery aches and pains to avoid having a baby for a while longer. Outrageous!
Admittedly, I have developed procrastination into an art form. It is one of the things I do best and as for procrastinating about having a baby…if only I could make a career out of it. My fears are certainly not assuaged by those wily Mums and the deluge of mixed messages I receive.
I was in the make-up room the other day, a breeding ground in it’s own right (how I haven’t fallen pregnant yet by just drinking the water is the real breaking news) when I was privy to a conversation between two of the Mums: one with babies, the other with tweens and teens.
“I can’t remember life without children,” says newish Mum.” I wish I knew then what I do now. I wish I enjoyed all that time I had. Wish I had travelled more. And the money! I wish someone had told me how expensive having children is…”
“Tell me about it,” says veteran Mum.” You know, I love my kids but if I had my time over I don’t think I’d have them. It’s just as soon as you give birth, on that day forward you are constantly worried about someone else…I’d be just the fabulous aunt…”
The fabulous aunt? That sounds glamorous. A lot more appealing than sleepless nights and teenagers giving you the finger. The eccentric aunt who never had kids and spent the rest of her days travelling the world in designer clothes, having plastic surgery and breeding Chihuahuas whilst being the ultimate of confidantes' to all the angsty nephews and nieces. I am loving the sound of that.
So the confusion is to someone like me who is abundantly confused-is having children the most incredible experience of your life or is it in fact just a case of when misery wants company? It’s mostly hard to tell when you constantly get: “think your tired now, wait till you have a baby”, "think your busy now, wait till you have a baby”, “think it’s hard to get out of the door now wait till you have to take a baby.” This all sounds like shit guys, do you mind if I pass?
Yet they still ask,” Are you trying yet? How old are you again? You don’t want to miss out! You are going to love it!” And then the next sentence, it surfaces they haven’t showered for three days because they haven’t had the time.
“You won’t know yourself when you have a baby!”
Of course I won’t know myself. The person I know showers daily, goes out when inclined, buys herself new dresses just because and likes to lie on the leather lounge in the middle of the day with the two cutest dogs in the world, read the paper and channel surf.
That’s the person I know…the one with the perfect ovaries.
.
