The Irrational Pregnant Britt

Anxiety and irrational fears are a common part of pregnancy.

During all of my pregnancies, I worry more than usual. I have generalized anxiety anyway, but it gets worse when I'm knocked up. I'm always a little more afraid of traumatic things happening to my family. I worry about natural disasters, car accidents, deaths, and all of that other good stuff. I also always worry about slipping and falling in the shower. This is probably because I do slip and have a close call every time I'm pregnant (this pregnancy when I slipped, I hit my leg on the edge of the tub. That was almost two months ago and my leg still hurts where I hit it. I'm not sure if that;s okay).

I think those are probably pretty common fears during pregnancy, but I've also had some fears that are a little more irrational.

During my pregnancy with Nicky, a man died at Disneyland and a boy died at Disney World. This made me paranoid of dying at a theme park. I vowed that I would never go on another ride as long as I lived, and I would never take my family to a theme park. I thought about it all the time and spent a lot of time researching every death at a Disney resort. Obviously I've gotten over it since I've been to Disneyland with my family approximately twelve times since then.

While I was pregnant with Daisy, I knew (knew!) that Scotty was going to leave me someday. It wasn't going to be within that year or the next, but three years down the road or more, he was going to realize that I wasn't treating him very well, and he was going to tell me he wanted a divorce. His new wife was going to be a much better housekeeper and a much more affectionate woman who might as well raise my children for me. I would cry at night because each time I went to bed, I was sleeping away my remaining time with Scotty.

With Zoe, I was worried about being stalked. I thought someone was out to get me - following me, watching my house, and so on and so forth. I was worried that my son was going to be taken from school, so I talked to the front office and told them I had reason to believe that someone might try and get my son from school. I was always jumpy when someone would knock on my door or call my phone. I had to change my ringtone eventually because it started making me ill to hear it.

This time, I have a lot of smaller fears, but one of the dominant ones is my fear of passing out in the shower. I've been sick a lot this during this pregnancy with head colds and sinus infections. I have had fluid in my ear almost the entire time I've been pregnant, so I am always trying to force it out by plugging my nose and blowing (this is what my doctor told me to do). It doesn't ever work for me, but sometimes it forces the fluid toward the outer ear enough that it stops bothering me temporarily. Whenever I try to blow the fluid out, it always makes me feel like I'm on the brink of passing out, and one day, our of sheer stupidity, I did it in the shower. I realized that if I were to actually pass out in the shower, I would probably drown. How long would my kids leave me naked and dying in the shower before they checked on me? Now every time I shower, I imagine my death because I'm either going to slip and fall or pass out.

So those have been my fears. Some are irrational, some are a little more understandable, but either way, I look forward to a decrease in my anxiety someday.