I know better than to mention the B-word on the Internet. (Oh, alright – it’s ‘breastfeeding’). The hot potato of the ‘is breast best’ debate rages online, with howls of protest on either side and plenty of nonsense shovelled in for good measure.
For a while, it looked like the next contender for Most Irritating Discussion on Any Given Mums Forum was going to be over home births, low-intervention labour and medically-assisted births, but since how that all pans out is largely down to the luck of the draw, it sort of stumbles on the starting block. So instead good old body hatred bingo is back again, rearing its ugly head for a round of a game anyone can play.
I first became aware of it at an ante-natal yoga class. One woman had apparently expanded quite a lot in the previous week and now had a high and compact bump, quite obviously a pregnant one because of her otherwise slender frame.
“Ooooh,” cooed the teacher. “What a neat bump! Well done!”. She went on to repeat this about five times, whilst caressing said dome, while the woman thanked her slightly awkwardly.
Neat? What’s neat about it? In fact, what’s a messy bump, I remember thinking. And why are we congratulating this woman on it? There is absolutely nothing she could have done about it either way. Carrying high, low, wide, narrow, big or small is not something that can be controlled or altered.
Of course, once I knew this peculiar concept was out there, I noticed it everywhere. Naturally the Daily Mail was quick to pitch in with an article about how lovely, ‘neat’ and small Claudia Schiffer’s seven-month bump is, replete with comments about how fat women should be ashamed of themselves. (I’m sorry, but I just can’t dignify it with a link).
Except that – case in point above – the relative size of the mother has very little to do with the actual shape and size of the bump. If anything, on thinner women bumps can sometimes tend to be more prominent or show a little earlier, in the same way that the same size double-D breasts look huge on a size 8 and only reasonably generous on a size 16.
I’m no anti-health campaigner. I know that pregnant women only need about an extra 250-300 calories a day (more for a multiple birth, but not that many more), and that’s only from about the fourth month. I know that half an hour of daily exercise is recommended. I know that it’s sensible to try to restrict your weight gain to baby plus amniotic fluid plus placenta not cake plus cheese plus crisps. And I know that it can be hard to stick to this when it feels like your insides empty out within twenty minutes of scoffing your what seems like your body weight in everything.
But this ‘neat bump’ commentary is nothing to do with the above. It’s to do with the abject modern fear of perceived ‘fat’. It’s the phobia of bumps appearing over which women have no control. It’s the need to keep women in a tight pen, no longer needing to be controlled by men while they’re controlled by their own fears.
Bumps are not made of fat, however (though like me you might have a handy layer on top). Pregnancy bumps are not an alien lard-based being, come to mark you out for the slovenly binge-eater you secretly believe yourself to be.
Diet can have some bearing on higher and lower birth weights, neither extreme of which is to be encouraged. But it is not the only factor in this, and believe me what with being told how much you’re allowed to drink, what you’re allowed to eat, how to sit down, when to stand up and just generally how much it’s all your responsibility how your baby turns out, you really don’t need an extra element of guilt to pile on your overburdened shoulders.
Yes, it’ll help you and your baby if you keep healthy to the best of your ability. But please, don’t be fooled by the nonsense of the ‘neat bump’. It’s just body fascism by any other name.
Image via Pete Barr-Watson's Flickr