Too Much Woman (Alt Title: Don't Read This Dad)

Once upon a 1991 in a faraway land called Right Off the 405 I was offered the chance to do a test shoot for Playboy. There are many things that should have tipped me off that this was not a good idea: the run-down office park location, the two modeling agents who said I was a shoo-in while glancing at each other, the fact that on my headshot my lipgloss was visibly applied over my natural lipline. But I was 18 and stupid so none of this deterred me. I said no only after calculating the time it took for the magazine to go to print and the thought that most likely both my brother and father would still be alive when my naked body hit newsstands. (This is also the story of How I Did Not End Up Dead in a Ditch off Miramar Road, though sometimes I admit to rewriting a draft and calling it When I Was Young and Hot, conveniently forgetting the subtitle: Don't Be Flattered When Scudsy Quote/Un-Quote Modeling Agents slash Opportunistic Pervs Want to See You Naked.)

Luckily for you, me and my boobs my brother and dad are still alive to this day, so it is not likely I will be posing for Playboy anytime soon, though surely that is the only thing stopping me. That and the fact that I am 38, love nutella, think Vitamin Water is healthy, don't exercise and will be 10 weeks pregnant tomorrow. My boobs are heavy, a roadmap of blue veins, my tummy a poooch with 3 oh's; I am the Venus of Willendorf had she been carved of gluten and not stone.

Redundant?

There was a moment in my last pregnancy that I stood naked in front of my full length mirror looking at what I had become. It was not in shock or even awe, and then Bryan passed by and said something like Wow--I'm pretty sure there are fetish websites out there that would love a picture of you right now. I think he was trying to say I was sexy (missing by a mile), but he was right. A pregnant woman is almost too much woman, all exaggerated breasts and stomach, overblown nipples and vagina--yes, vagina. There is even a name for this fetish, maiesiophilia, though it cannot be that common because as you type in "pregnant women fet..." Google finishes it off as "pregnant women feta cheese."

So that's where I am today, the heroine of a Once Upon a Time in a Land Called Suburbia, pop. +1. Nobody wants to see me naked except Zoey, who thinks the blue veins look like lace, the tale of a pregnant playmate who can eat feta cheese, so long as it's been pasteurized.