‘Why didn’t anybody tell me how miraculous my body is?’

Jessica Rudd Tuesday 17 January 2012 12:05pm

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Man, I love being pregnant. It’s the first time in my womanhood during which I’ve been so proud of my body I can’t help but boast about it. I mean, guys, it’s growing a human.

Inside me right now is a perfectly formed little person with eyebrows and fingernails. Can you believe it? I often can’t, but then there’s that little nudge in the internal organs or the somersaults in the ultrasound to remind me.

This is miraculous. Why didn’t anybody tell me how miraculous it is? To be fair, Mum did, but she should have shaken me and yelled ‘THIS IS BLOODY MIRACULOUS!’

What’s more amazing? My body just knew how to do it. It didn’t bitch and moan about it. It didn’t call Roadside Assist. It didn’t swear at the instruction manual and snap an Allen key. No. My body, this body, the one my Mum grew for me twenty-eight years ago, just knew what to do. It is a certifiable genius.

Gosh I’ve been cruel to it. I’ve stood in front of the mirror grumbling at it for refusing to tone after twenty squats.

I’ve poked and stuffed my belly into too skinny jeans.

I’ve cursed tight hamstrings for preventing my fingers from touching my toes in yoga. Blasted hamstrings.

I’ve been short with it when it wobbles and shakes after a big night out.

Foot cramps. Hairy legs. Cellulite. My period. Crooked teeth. Even a stubbed toe—it’s all my body’s fault.

Then, with the help of my wonderful husband, it up and forms life. Brilliant.

When I was at the Sunshine Coast with family over Christmas I got out my bikini, a simple black bandeau with halter tie and hipster brief.

Ordinarily, getting ‘bikini-ready’ goes something like this.

I would body brush for about a fortnight beforehand and scrub with about half a kilo of something with the consistency of liquid sandpaper.

Then I would engage in what can only be described as deforestation with the help of my good friends Veet, Nair and Venus.

I would obsess over every ingrown hair, spot on my back, pimple on my chin. Should I put some concealer on that? Maybe if I put giant sunglasses on nobody will notice I have a pimple on my chin. So logical.

I would then marinade in self-tan, paint my toes in a bronze-enhancing nail polish, find a sarong or kaftan to cover up all my hard work and waddle down to the beach or pool wrapped in a towel.

Now for the reveal. Suck gut in. Unwrap towel. Slide into water and hope to God nobody is looking.

Ridiculous, isn’t it?

This time getting bikini ready went something like this. Remove clothes. Apply sunscreen. Put on bikini. Grab hat, towel and thongs. Head for pool.

Eighteen weeks of alpine-white baby bump stuck out and proud from my torso. Blue veins beamed through the paleness of my fresh-out-of-Beijing-winter chest. There was a pimple on my cheek, a skin tag under my arm and a few milimetres of fuzz on my legs.

I’ve never felt more fabulous.

Apparently some find the pregkini offensive. There’s a ‘put it away’ brigade, the same tut-tutters who take issue with breast-feeding in public. ‘It should be illegal,’ said someone on Twitter.

Well phooey to them. There is no body more awesome than the body of a pregnant woman. We all came from one, so we should all rejoice in them. I am.

Here’s a gallery of more glowing pregnant mums showing their miraculous bodies:

Beyonce

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Jessica Rudd, is a Canberra-born, Brisbane-raised ex-lawyer, ex-campaign worker and ex-PR consultant who lives with her husband in Beijing. She has written the occasional column, a host of legal letters, countless press releases and two novels.

Have you ever looked at your body and realised how miraculous it really is ?