"I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant" In Real Life

I went to visit Ari's doctor on Friday, because he had been complaining that his feet hurt for some time. While I was in the waiting room, I met a dad who was playing in the play kitchen with his daughter. The daughter was around Samara's age, she had just turned one. The baby and Samara were fascinated by each other. They kept touching one and other's faces, and trying to bite each other. It was very cute. While the babies were playing, Ari was occupying himself in the refrigerator playing with the pretend eggs.

The dad was young looking, if I'd have to guess, I would say around 25. He had square rimmed dark brown glasses, dark brown spiked hair, and was dressed in a black tee-shirt, jeans, and high top Adidas. He and I got to talking, and it turned out that he worked for Trader's Joe's. We talked about my intense obsession for the store.

A few minutes later, the baby's mom came out. She was petite, and had short black curly hair, which was held back by a tan headband. She appeared to be biracial but I couldn't tell what her heritage was. She was beautiful. He was holding her son, who was around two. I asked them how far apart their kids were, they were 15 months apart.

She and I got to talking about how crazy two and three-year olds are. Her situation is a little more intense than mine, having two kids just over a year apart. We were particularly dwelling how difficult parenting boys can be.

Before we left, we exchanged information.

The next day, I got a text from her asking if we'd like to join her and her family for a birthday celebration for her daughter. I text her back an enthusiastic response.

We came to her place in crown heights, which was huge, had beautiful wooden floors, two bathrooms, and I don't how many bedrooms.

We got to talking about labor. And she opened up about her pregnancy story with her son.

"With my son, it's a crazy story. I stopped getting my period. So I went to the doctor, and they said, I wasn't pregnant. In fact, the doctor said that it was very unlikely that I could ever get pregnant, and that I had endometriosis. I continued to feel weird, and I knew something wasn't right, so I eventually I went back to the doctor, and they were like...oh, yeah, that's because there's a giant baby in your belly! It turned out I was six months pregnant!"

"Whoa," I said. I didn't quite know what to say. "What did he say when you told him?" I said gesturing to her boyfriend.

"He basically threw up in his mouth."

"What did you think?" I asked him.

"Um, I freaked out, went to sleep, woke up and gave her a key to my apartment."

And the rest was history. I cannot even imagine being six months pregnant, and not knowing the whole time. She delivered her son with a midwife, and was able to have vaginal birth in a hospital.

Her son, by the way, is lovely. He is a charismatic rambunctious healthy two-year-old.

But this story got me thinking, what is going on with western medicine that these sorts of situations are able to happen? The women in question are made to think that they're crazy and delusional. They believe they may be pregnant, but are shamed into thinking that there is some other bizarre heath concern going on.

It's a shame that anyone would have to go through what this woman went through.

What are your thoughts? Have you ever been made to feel "crazy" by a western medical professional? I know I have.