Zwangerschap Dreams
I woke up with my first “I’m zwanger” panic attack a few days ago. Funny that it had nothing to do with the concerns about being zwanger and becoming a moeder I would have expected, though, like “Will I wake up when the baby is crying” (as in, I've been known sleep through fire alarms...more than once) or “I have to give BIRTH?!?!” (as in, I have to give birth).
It had a lot more to do with navigating the differences between the Dutch and the American approach to zwangerschap and moederschap (OK, I don’t know if moederschap is a real word, but it sounds good.) This expat-zwangerschap-panic-attack-nightmare was founded on my deeply embedded and highly important concerns of giving birth while the midwife refused to speak English to me, trying to convert grams to ounces so I knew how much the baby weighed, and not knowing how to use the Dutch stollers/prams/buggies/kinderwagens.
It had a lot more to do with navigating the differences between the Dutch and the American approach to zwangerschap and moederschap (OK, I don’t know if moederschap is a real word, but it sounds good.) This expat-zwangerschap-panic-attack-nightmare was founded on my deeply embedded and highly important concerns of giving birth while the midwife refused to speak English to me, trying to convert grams to ounces so I knew how much the baby weighed, and not knowing how to use the Dutch stollers/prams/buggies/kinderwagens.
posted by Beth at 12:46 PM
1 Comments:
I can't help you too much with the giving-birth thing (except to say that I'm confident Dan will do his duty), but I can say with some surety that (neither of) you will not sleep through the baby crying: nothing pierces a parent's soul more than their baby crying. I start to sweat just thinking about a wail in the middle of the night. *shudder*
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