While I managed to avoid having my belly touched while pregnant, I wasn’t immune to the judgmental comments of strangers. People I didn’t know seemed to love to assume that I was either due to give birth at any second or was carrying twins because of my size.
A fascination with size has come up in conversation again, this time directed towards Levi. One particularly frustrating interaction with a woman in the children’s section of Half Price Books went something like this:
“How old is she? Three months?”
“No, he’s almost six months old.”
“Oh, I thought he was a girl because he’s so pretty. If he’s six months, he must have been premature, right?”
“Um, no. He was a hefty 8lbs 5 oz. And f*ck you.”
And she isn’t the only one who has questioned Levi’s age based on his sized. Several other strangers have assumed that Levi is younger than he is. Why do people think my baby looks so small? At his last doctor’s appointment, he measured in the 90th percentile for height!
Maybe it’s because he’s not particularly chubby. He doesn’t have the Michelin Man rings of baby fat stereotypical of infants. And that’s ok. Apparently, some babies are too fat.
But worse than the ignorant comments of strangers are their unwanted touches. At the supermarket, two passersby actually reached out and pet my son. They ruffled his hair and stroked his arm.
Do you ever feel like telling people to keep their hands — and comments — to themselves?
