Here Be Monsters...*chapter seven*

Chapter Seven:

'Here Be Monsters'

Well, the prolific puking didn't dissipate, indeed, it gathered momentum!

Mad and unexpected things would set me off on a spontaneous spewing spree. I  also realised that not only had I adopted certain characteristics resemblant of my being demonically possessed but elements of werewolf were beginning to emerge!.

No, I wasn't howling at the moon and reaching for the Gillette Lady Shave, but I was quite bestial in temper and my sense of smell had become so sharp I could identify family members without having to look at them (that probably tells you more about their personal hygiene than it does about my sensory 
adeptness).


Yep, a few whiffs of my old Aunt Mary and for me, it was the white knuckled grasp around the toilet rim for the rest of the day!

Other changes were taking place too but none of them included my adopting this glowing feeling of well-being and mother-to-be-bliss that some expectant mothers droned on ...and on...AND ON....about, especially at the local clinic I attended for check ups.

I found the rosy cheeked, syrupy cooings and jabberings of these post copulative females, each enthusing about the wonders of pregnancy, highly irritating and acutely nauseating...and I certainly didn't need more stimuli to send my diaphragm into pre-barf contractions!

And that's another insufferable thing that came with pregnancy, my having to sit in the same room as these clucking harpies, each hocked up on folic acid and coal. It was torturous. 

You see, the thing is, I've never 'fit' with the mumsy gang, not then nor four children later. You know the kind of female I'm talking about, those 'mother earth' types who feel the need to document and share with anyone possessing ears, every tedious, coma inducing stage of their offspring's evolution.

I worried it was only a matter of time before one of them whipped out photos of the conception!

That did not mean I loved my children any less, it simply meant that I had no want to use my womb, nor its occasional inhabitants, as weapons to beat the joy out of another individuals life by submitting them to my own monotonous neonatal narrative!

The Alternative Pregnancy Guide!

I recall one particular occasion, as myself and others sat in the hospital's holding pen waiting to go in to see the doctor, when I looked around me and there was barely a bump that didn't have 'The Pregnancy Book: Your Guide To Becoming A Mother' splayed before it. 

Yes, there they were, the Magna Mater Collective, flicking perfectly manicured finger nails through the instruction manuals they were studying in preparation for their next bore-athon! 

(ha! I wonder how long those nails lasted once their 'centre of the universe' arrived!) whilst I....

...well, I had a Cadbury's Crunchie in one hand and Ira Levin's 'Rosemary's Baby' in the other! My tongue lapping around a few slivers of raw liver would have enhanced the contrast even further but I waited until I returned home for that.

For a myriad reasons this pregnancy lark was turning out to be nothing as I had expected. Mind you, as an only child, surrounded by a family mostly devoid of rug rats of their own, I'd never been in contact with anything remotely attached to the expectant state, let alone the produce of it!

My school pal, Jennifer Eccles, once let me hold her bucket of freshly scooped tadpoles but apart from these spermatozoic mimics...that's as close as I'd ever been to anything resembling embryonic.

And when I felt movement within my nesting area for the very first time, I was not suddenly flushed with a feeling of wonder and awe at the miraculous machinations of the universe, as the more nurturing amongst us had led me to believe I would be....oh no indeedy!...

...In actuality I was overwhelmed by a feeling of utter, unequivocal repulsion (if any of my beloved children are reading this, there is nothing personal to be construed here, as said, I love you dearly and I'm certain that any day now, that feeling of repulsion will wear off).

Yes, the sensation of having something alien slowly making its presence known through a medley of  soft, sinister tappings and preturnatural proddings is not dissimilar to certain aspects of Ridley Scott's 1979 film 'Alien'... 

...and some first scan photos seem to suggest, I'm not far from the truth.

To be continued:

Next time: Chapter Eight:

'Things Can Only Get Fatter'

© Copyright Lynn Gerrard