tocophobia

this is a fetus 

I am a fearful person; I devote hours of my life to worrying about everything and then envisioning their worst case scenarios.  When I’ve sufficiently worried myself sick I move on to something else to worry about.

For about half my life there’s one phrase that tops that list of fears.

“I haven’t got my period yet.”

I am not alone in this, millions of men everywhere have the same fear.  That their wife or girlfriend or just some girl they met once at a party will come to them with the warning that her period has not yet come and that it is possible that she might be pregnant.

The other day Jaime uttered this phrase to me and my heart stopped, I got sick to my stomach and my mouth went bone dry.  This is my normal reaction, which I usually follow up with a question.

“Are you worried?”  I ask.

“No.” She replies.

Her answer doesn’t calm me because I wonder why she would mention that she hasn’t got her period if she wasn’t worried about it.  I will continue to worry and believe that surrounding me are signs of an impending pregnancy, at lease until I breathe a huge sigh of relief when she tells me that flow has come to town. (She’s never actually used that phrase before.)

At dinner that same night after nearly licking her plate clean and inquiring about more, I blurted out,

“Is this because you’re eating for two?”

“Do you want me to be pregnant?” She asked.

“No!”  I retorted without even thinking.  It wasn’t what I intended to say, it wasn’t what I meant, but that was the first word to reach my lips.  Jaime got up from the table and stormed out of the room.  As I sat there alone I asked myself, what is this fear and where did it come from?

It’s called Tocophobia, the fear of pregnancy or giving birth.  Not to be confused with Pedophobia which is the fear of babies.  I don’t have a fear of babies, I like babies and they usually like me back.  I will often catch them looking at me inquisitively and because of this I wonder if we share some sort of an unspoken kinship.  So it’s not babies I fear but pregnancy.

It might have began with that horrible movie For Keeps starring Molly Ringwald.  In the movie a young couple get pregnant and keep the baby.  What follows is 90 minutes of a house of horrors, frightening enough to keep young men everywhere from not having sex until they are well into their 30’s.  Having never seen the movie Fatal Attraction, I assumed for years that was the title of this movie.  Had I grown up today I wonder if I would feel different about the subject?  Juno, Knocked Up, and Away We Go all celebrate the joys of an unexpected pregnancy and how to deal with it.  They have conflicts, but lives are not ruined and the endings leave you with positive feelings.

Though Jaime and I have never had to make the decision, we’ve both acknowledged that abortion was on the table.  Not that it was definite but that there would be sincere consideration and many long discussions.  About at year ago during another such scare it occurred to me that the time for abortion had passed.  I was a mature adult, too old to resort to that choice.  I fully believe in the right to choose, but for me that was no longer an option.  I am old enough to handle and deal with the consequences of my actions.

I continued to sit and wonder further.  Were my reactions due to the fact that I have been so vocally against the idea of getting pregnant for so long that now I just didn’t know how to express any other feelings?  After all I want children, I want children with Jaime.  I look forward to raising them, teaching them, telling stories to them and everything else that goes along with their life.

I want to be able to embrace Jaime’s eventual pregnancy and ecstatically share the news with friends and family.  I want to go to ultrasounds with joyful tears in my eyes and support Jaime through Lamaze classes, and prepare the babies room with blissful anticipation.

Don’t get me wrong.  While I want to enjoy all those things, I’m still not ready.  I have places I want to go and things I want to do that babies just don’t factor into yet.  Selfishly I still enjoy being the baby around the house and I’m not sure I’m ready to give that up just yet.

Right now I want to get over this Tocophobia, so that next time Jaime utters that heart stopping phrase, I won’t cower in the corner like a scared little bitch.  Instead I will be a man about it, I’ll tell her that I’m there for her and ready for whatever happens.