Who ARE you?

So I'm riding the bus into work the other day, just like I do most days.  While riding, I am quietly reading one of the multitude of our new pregnancy/baby books (note to self: no more family planning on the bus), minding my own business, when a well-dressed, seemingly normal woman standing near me on this crowded bus pleasantly asks if I am pregnant. In my best distant, genial-but-not-interested-in-conversation (gbniic) manner, I nod in her general direction with a half-smile, making absolutely certain not to make eye contact and thereby in any way actively engage her, and I go back to my book.  Unfortunately, she didn't notice the not-interested-in-conversation part of the exchange, and then begins to do that thing where people go on about how great it is to be a mom and how exciting it was for her and how excited my husband and I must be (I know, huh? Hello? Presume much?) and what a fantastic experience it will be, yadda, yadda, yadda......and she's doing this at a normal-to-loudish conversational level in a packed bus full of strangers.  Oh wait, that's right, she is ALSO a STRANGER.  But OK, so I haven't had my one measly-ass 8oz cup of morning coffee yet (I could cry about the coffee thing, really I could), so maybe I'm just being cranky and touchy, and she certainly seems to mean well, she's just....you know...a little too familiar for my taste.   So I buck up, work hard to be civil, put a smile on my face, do that thing of making a show of putting my finger in that precise spot on the page where I'm being interrupted, look up and give her my next-best-gbniic manner, and I thank her as nicely as I possibly can (when all I really want to do is ask her to please shut up) and then I go back to my book.  I do notice, with dismay, that we are a looooong way from my stop, but I'm hoping that she has gotten the picture.  She hasn't.  She then proceeds to ask if we are considering natural childbirth.  I KNOW!  Who goes there with a stranger on a bus?!?  So now I'm actually sort of getting wigged out, but there's nowhere for me to go, so I just ignore her and keep reading my book. Luckily - sort of - she doesn't actually seem to be interested in my answer as much as she is interested in telling me her whole birth story, complete with the bazillion hours of hard, painful labor, all the gory, bloody details, the excruciating levels of pain that she thought were going to tear her apart inside, the various bodily substances ending up on the table, the number of stitches she had, and how many transfusions she had to have after all the terrible hemorraging.....and believe me when I tell you that I am paraphrasing.

I kid you not.  At 8am, on a crowded bus full of strangers including little kids plus some high-schoolers on their way to school, to a barely pregnant mom-to-be, she is telling this story.  And did I mention the not using her 'inside' voice part?  Oh no, she is not being quiet with this story, and people all around us are quietly wigging out too.   INAPPROPRIATE barely begins to cover this, and I am appalled, not so much at the birth story - because those CAN sometimes be less than storybook, I know, and I'm fine with that, I am - but that she is telling me, well, ALL of us on the bus, this story.  Call me a prude, or maybe it's just my Southern upbringing, but this stuff is better discussed quietly and privately, or in a group of girlfriends, or even in a public forum like this one where we're openly asking each other for support and information.   It does not, however belong on a crowded bus with trapped, unsuspecting, uninterested strangers.

Anyway, I can only guess that the being appalled showed on my face because she suddenly seemed satisfied that now I knew the dangerous lay of the birthing land and was prepared to face my own bloody childbirth demons thanks to her kind intervention thankyouverymuch.  She was, as a matter of fact, almost smirking in that way that people who think they are telling you Important Things Everyone Should Know But No One Tells You sometimes do.

For my part, I stopped using the genial-but-not-interested-in-conversation manner, and instead used my best offended-and-disappointed look, quietly told her that I thought her story was ill-suited for that particular location, not to mention possibly bad form for her to tell anyone not specifically asking, much less a pregnant woman that she has never met before.  I then asked her to please stop speaking to me AT ALL.

And then I dashed off the bus at the very next stop as if it was my intended stop, because I am a coward in the face of the crazy-peoples.

Comments

[jodi]

Ugh. Just, ugh.

[Carole]

How awful. And wait until strangers try to pat your belly. That's just gross.

[sarah b.]

Look at you, I don't think I would have had the gumption to say anything. I was just talking to a girl at work today about how people think every topic is fair game when you're pregnant...like commenting about your weight...seriously!

[claudia]

Dude. iPod.

[Kathy]

Oh my. How completely unpleasant.

[maryse]

i think it's awesome that you told her off, even in a gentile manner and even if you ran off.

[Chris]

Oh, so sorry you went through that. And as Carole said, watch out for the belly patters. And carry a 2 x 4 since poison arrow looks do not deter them.

[colleen]

You rock! Tell off the crazy bitch!

[elisa]

You were much more pleasant than she had any right to expect, let me just say...

And Carole is right - wait until strangers start trying to pat your belly. When my friend S was pregnant with her first daughter and people would try and touch her, she would use her very best "oh no you didn't" voice and then ask the stranger just why they would think it was okay to touch a stranger's stomach.

And seriously? I'm totally up for stranger blocking for you. It'll help me work out some of my agressions. Garrrrrrr...

[aija]

O.
M.
G.

People are too weird.

[The Feminist Mafia]

OMG. I am so impressed that you told her to f-off. You go!

[Debbie]

Please do me a favor. When, and I say when because I know it will happen. When some stranger touches your belly, please for the love of all that is wooly, please touch their belly right back! Please?

I will give you anything from my stash if you make that a regular habit. Seriously. I just want to see how people react.

[martha marin]

You should also make sure to tell these types of people that your baby will be delivered in a cave by some druids and you will name it Zoltan.
Unless of course you actually will be, in which case never ever tell them that.

[PumpkinMama]

Oh yes, did no one tell you that now your body and all of your decisions about your pregnancy, and later how you choose to raise your child are now public domain? Anyone at any time can touch you/expound upon the "right" way to be pregnant/give birth and raise the baby. Work on building up your psychic armor.

[Chris]

I second the Ipod. But seriously, I doubt that would have stopped her. Good for you telling her how inappropriate she was being. People can suck majorily. And I for one was quite good at avoiding people touching my stomach....ewwh!

[Martha]

I really don't miss the city crazies. I had a total stranger come up to me in a restaurant once as my friend and I were eating dinner and proceed to tell us how she stood on the toilet to pee. I just did the nod, smile, ignore and never had the nerve to tell off anyone. These things just don't happen in the suburbs. Good for you for telling her off! I think you are anything BUT a coward.

[Rachel H]

Next time bring a book about phsyco serial killers, and make sure to giggle every now and then while reading it. That should keep everyone away.

[Juno]

Ah, the competitive birth story. Have you not encountered this before? Women who want you to know that your experience could never, ever, ever be as terrible and dangerous as theirs.

And yes, when strangers touch you you should totally touch them back.

[Marcy]

Oh, eww! Well done on telling her off--that took some nerve. And do it all: iPod, not baby books on the bus, tell them off, and touch the belly-touchers' bellies right back. Or hit them as if they were ass-pinchers. Gah.

[Kristel]

Eww! I've got two kids, but luckily pregnancy barely shows on me at all (might have something to do with all the extra kilos I have ;)) so I've avoided most gory childbirth stories and belly-patters...

I can sort of understand why the birth stories you usually hear are the painful ones, since it's sort of therapeutic to speak about those experiences, but I don't think you should tell them to pregnant women, specially those who are expecting their first, and NOT TO A STRANGER ON A BUS!

[melanie]

Are you sure that wasn't my mother in law?

:)

Well done telling her off. Half way through your post I remembered a time when someone wouldn't stop talking to me and I finally said "you need to stop talking to me RIGHT NOW." Worked like a charm. You and I are clearly from the same planet.

[Carla]

Good for you! My life seems to consist of a series of such unpleasant conversations - my husband jokes that I have a "Please share too much information with me" bumper sticker on my head. Unfortunately, I haven't quite worked up my gumption to tell these people off... you are an inspiration to me! I hope you respond similarly to the strangers that will undoubtedly feel comfortable putting their hand on your visibly-pregnant belly - that is one of my pet-peeves of all time.

[Scoutj]

What a FREAK! (her not you! lol)

[Manise]

Gah! Ewww! Glad you told her off! You did it with class, something she obviously lacks. " Hands off the Bellee" indeed!

[Laurie]

You did good. TMI, indeed.