Stop touching me! Bumps are not public property.

Hannah Mearns - 16 Jul 17

I ended up with a really big bump. People described me as blooming. Once I was really showing, it was the summer. It was so hot (by London standards anyway) and I wasn’t wearing many layers. My bump was basically screaming “Touch me please!” And wow, I got some touches.

Complete strangers, people I kind of knew at work, relatives who’d not so much as hugged me for years, my father in law who still looks uncomfortable with a kiss on the cheek – they all got involved. It made me wince every time.

I mentioned it to my husband. He got it. I mentioned it to my friends. They kind of didn’t. I was the first to be pregnant and I was clearly failing to get across just how weird it was to go from being a person who had complete autonomy over their body to one who was frequently touched by people they didn’t know, on the bump and now in much more intimate places too.

Touch is a big deal. Does anyone remember when they were single and you hadn’t so much as had a hug from someone, anyone, in ages and then someone knocked into you on the Tube and you all of a sudden remembered what it was like to have someone to hug? How nice it was?

Ok, well, being pregnant is like that but in reverse. It’s too much touching! And now because you’re all maternal and loving, you’re expected to be ok with it. As a hypnobirthing teacher, I know all about the positive power of touch so maybe I should have been cool with it. Putting it bluntly though, people are basically touching your massively enlarged uterus, mostly without your permission.

Maybe it’s nature’s way of preparing you for what’s to come –  the need to breastfeed brazenly wherever you are, how you need to accept this new, strange body you end up with when the baby is on the outside and you’re not showering much or even how you might still be discussing scars or leaky breasts once your baby is more than 6 months old.

My little girl is 1 year old now and finally, finally, I’m getting some of my body back. We made it to 10.5 months with the breastfeeding (which was never a plan, it just kind of happened, I’m still amazed) but now, I guess because she still craves the physical contact, she spends the day with a least one little hand somewhere on my person.

Sometimes it’s a really cute little hand on my knee when we’re at a playgroup, sometimes she looms up close to me to give me a slobbery, toothy mouth touch that is her way of kissing. A lot of the time it’s her gripping my top (or worse, my nipple) so she can stand up or giving me a swift headbutt to the nose because I happen to be above her.

I fantasise about being able to sit in nice, clean, light coloured clothes that look good when ironed, on a chair instead of the floor, not having to share my food and not having to constantly repeat “Gentle hands darling, gentle hands”. I’m sure it will happen… and then I’m sure I’ll think it’s a good time to have another baby.

Hannah Mearns

Hannah Mearns is a KG hypnobirthing teacher, writer and feminist. She’s passionate about women’s and children’s health, and runs HM Hypnobirthing, helping parents to be in south London plan for empowering, confident births. She's mama to a little girl, Zoe, who's a feisty little insomniac and wife to a man who gets really grumpy when tired #justtheonethen

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