You Look Great - How Far Along Are You?

I have to tell you, I had a lovely 4th of July post all planned. Wanted to share with you our fabulous weekend - by the way, did you know cookie cutters work just as well on shaping your hamburgers??? Sadly, I do believe I was the most excited person when my girlfriend Michelle suggested we make Stars and Heart shaped hamburgers - but I do want to pass along that fabulous tip and let you know it really worked! I actually have picture, and I want to share them with you - but I need to get back to my post.

So, Missy Miss and I are shopping at the mall (which, I must tell you, I think when God passed out shopping genes, he clearly missed my child - and what is that all about? There are certain things that a mommy looks forward to sharing with her daughter and shopping is absolutely one of them! But, I digress. . .) and we are in a department store. Just as we are leaving the Hannah Montana/Camp Rock/HSM attire, I see someone I know from my synagogue doing some bra shopping. After I finally convinced Allie that it was perfectly normal for people to shop for and touch bras in public and that yes we can go into the bra department even if we aren't shopping for bras, we approach my acquaintance and as she turned and looked at me, she squealed with delight. Now, let me tell you, she is not a teenager, she is a very well respected woman in the community with 2 teenagers and well, she exclaimed, "Meryl, its great to see you. You look wonderful - and congratulations, how far along are you - you must be so happy?".

Ok, WTF??????

But I clearly couldn't say that to her, instead I just mumbled something about not being pregnant.

On just how many levels did this woman ruin my moment? Ok, no, I'm not pregnant! So, I'm immediately reminded of how much I want to be pregnant, how much the whole world knows that and how much I am so not pregnant. And so that leads me to the other way in which salt was thrown on the wound - if I'm not pregnant, then she clearly thinks I look that way - so that means she thinks I'm fat! Now its not a secret that I'm fat - I clearly know I'm fat and obviously someone looking at me knows I'm fat - but do we really need to tell someone that they look fat (and if someone thinks you look pregnant and you aren't pregnant, than you clearly appear fat to them, right?).

Now, as some of you know from previous posts, I was on Nutrisystem from January till Aprilish and I lost a little more than 20 lbs. I have managed to keep most of it off. . . but I still need to lose LOTS more. So, its not like I lost 50 lbs and was looking fit and fabulous and gained some weight back and appear pregnant. Its more like, a few months ago I was really fat and I lost a few pounds and now I'm just fat.

So, I'm still not exactly sure what to make of this - does this mean she thinks I look fatter than the last time I saw her? But then why the, "you look wonderful"? Does this mean she thinks I look pregnant? Well, let's be honest here - until I was like 6-7 months along with Allie, no one can really tell the difference between a fat person and a fat pregnant person - it all kinda blends in. . .

So, I have decided that I'm not really sure what she meant by anything she said, other than I have a few pieces of unsolicited advice for you:

1) If you don't know if a person is pregnant, please don't ask how far along she is!

2) Don't tell someone you don't know if they are pregnant that they look wonderful and then congratulate them on being pregnant because the only thing that woman will walk away with is the feeling that she is fat (okay, and maybe sad because she isn't pregnant. . .).

And the moment ends even better when my daughter (who ironically just 30 minutes earlier at lunch learned what the word pregnant meant) - who clearly caught bits and pieces of the conversation - looked at me as we walked away and said now she knows why my belly is so big, and when is the baby coming out?

So, I leave you with. . . WTF?