Obsessed

For the past two years, I'm pretty sure the people handling television programming have been stalking me to determine their season line-ups.

I got engaged 2 years ago and everything was all "Say Yes to the Dress," "Bridezillas," "A Wedding Story" and so on. Now that I'm pregnant, I'm inundated with "Bringing Home Baby," "One Born Every Minute," "Teen Mom," and my personal favorite "I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant."

Brace yourselves, because it's confession time again.

I'd like to say I'm above watching such tripe, but let's face it...I lap up every frickin' episode.

Please don't get the wrong idea. This is not sentimentality or hormones taking over. This is me in my most comfortable element: Unfettered judgment of others.

I'm one of those (awesome) people who turns everything into a competition. "Oh, you're doing a crossword? Bet I can do it faster or figure out more clues." "What's that? You dropped an earring? I'll find it first." "You can't remember the name of that movie? I'll think of it before you."

The competition is all in my head naturally, because people don't like overly competitive individuals. But I assure you, if you're in the same room as me, there is likely a secret competition going on that you don't even know about. And I'm going to win.

OK. Tangent done. Back to how this relates to baby shows.

For me, these shows are the prime opportunity to be in a competition with every woman who has ever been pregnant. But the game is almost too easy. I mean, it's not fair to compete against people who say things like:

"I thought having a baby would be like having a puppy. But it's really not."
...and...
"I know my husband will be a good a father because he likes video games and cartoons."

And I'm really fascinated by the women who moan for 28 hours straight, refuse to listen to the nurses (who have delivered about 500 more babies than they have) and are so married to their birth plans they put everything in jeopardy.

You know what my birth plan is? To get the baby out of me. Good plan, right?

Nothing pleases me more than sitting on the couch, watching one of these shows and gleefully tallying up how much better I'm going be at delivery than everyone. Ever. Even though all these women have actually delivered a baby and I've done nothing more intensive than playing some tennis.

So when Michael and I were talking about what this child is going to be like, naturally, competitive was one of the first attributes we came up with (Michael may or may not be uber-competitive. Hint: he is.). The scenario we came up with went something like this:

Jen: [Pushes the baby out and wins the best delivery of a baby--ever--award] I win!

Baby Bean: [Turning to the doctor] So, how'd I do? I mean compared to the other babies you've delivered? Was I the best? You can tell me. I won't let it go to my head. What about compared to the other babies in the nursery right now? I just want to know who will be in the room with me. I mean if someone was better, I'd like to know about it. It's just this thing I need to know...yeah, I was the best. You don't have to say it.

Yep. We've lost our minds.