The Indignity of
Pregnancy in New York City
This morning I did the unthinkable. I, a 33-year-old
gainfully employed, successful woman, was forced to take a shit into a grocery
bag in my kitchen. Why? Because I live in New York City.
Let me backtrack a moment if I may. It is a truth, almost
universally acknowledged, that when you live in New York City you will pay an
outrageous amount in rent for an apartment that the rest of those living in the
United States (and maybe the world) would scoff at. My husband and I pay about
$3600/month for a two-bedroom, one bathroom apartment in the West Village, and
that’s considered a bargain. After five years of living in New York City, it’s
easy to become so jaded that you can convince yourself that having one bathroom
isn’t the worst thing in the world. After all, it’s never been a problem
before. And then you get pregnant.
At first, being pregnant in New York City doesn’t seem so
bad. That lasts about four weeks, or until your super-sensitive sense of smell
kicks in. Then, the smells of the city don’t just haunt you, they stalk you:
the garbage, the urine, the traffic, it just doesn’t end. Simply walking down
the street can bring on massive bouts of morning sickness, and you haven’t even
made it to the subway yet. Perhaps the best part of being in your first
trimester and feeling sick is that since no one can tell that you’re pregnant,
you get absolutely no special treatment from anyone. No one offers you a seat
on the subway, so you’re forced to stand like a sardine on the train, hoping to
God you don’t get stuck next to someone with awful body odor. And forget about
asking someone for their seat – cynical New Yorkers aren’t about to give up
their seat for someone who may be faking it.
By the time your second trimester rolls around, you’re
feeling better and start to think, “Hey, I can do this!” Then you realize
you’re going to have to find space for your little bun once he or she is out of
the oven. Someone named Judith Stone once apparently said, “In New York City,
one suicide in ten is attributed to a lack of storage space.”[1]
Trying to find space for all of the baby gear you now have to squeeze into your
already tiny, over-priced apartment can certainly make this seem true. Oh, and
you still don’t look pregnant enough to warrant a seat on the subway. You
probably just look a little bit chubby and there is no sympathy there.
Once your third trimester arrives, you’ve come to realize
that getting around this “great” walkable city isn’t quite so great anymore.
You’re carrying around extra weight, which means you’re winded going just about
anywhere. You have to take your time, and there’s no sin like being a slow
pedestrian in the city. Cabs are too expensive to take on any regular basis and
are reserved for those glorious times when it can’t be helped – like, for
example, when you get kidney stones for the first time. There’s nothing quite
like having to moan in agony in the presence of a cab driver. Chalk that one up
to not having a car. Why? Because you live in New York City.
So where does all of this leave you? Pregnant, miserable,
and probably constipated because hey, that’s what happens when you’re pregnant.
Which brings us back to the start of our story, me, taking a shit into a
grocery bag in my kitchen. This is because my husband was using our one
bathroom at the time and, as men are wont to do, generally takes a while in
there. So as he was sitting in there, perusing the latest GQ or Esquire or
whatever, I found myself with the sudden urge to go. This after giving it a
champion try earlier that day with no results. And given where I was at in
pregnancy, this was a must-go situation. So what was I to do? My thoughts were
racing, my palms were sweaty and then suddenly the answer appeared: D’Agostino.
I grabbed a bag, hitched one end onto a knob on a kitchen drawer, held the
other end in my other hand and took a dump in my kitchen. I was relieved and
then mortified, truthfully in about equal measure. Then I quadruple-bagged the
evidence and made a hasty trip to dispose of it in the basement. The only
question that remained was whether or not to tell my husband. After about a
minute I decided that the laugh he would get would be worth it (it was). But I
still cannot get over this simple fact: I pay $3600/month in rent and I was
forced to take a dump in my kitchen. The indignity of pregnancy in New York,
indeed.
[1]
Ecosalon.com/50-best-quotes-about-new-york-city
**Do you really have to ask? I basically hated New York for most of my pregnancy.**
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