The Thread: All in My Head
I am in a war, and some of the toughest battles happen in my head.
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Posts Tagged: pregnancy
The Body That Is Terra Nullius
My body is a terra nullius, belonging to no one, not even me.
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What Would Hannah Gadsby Do?
Hannah Gadsby reminds us that our stories matter.
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That Balancing Act: A Conversation with Vanessa Hua
Vanessa Hua discusses her forthcoming novel, A RIVER OF STARS.
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Rumpus Original Fiction: The Earth Revolves around the Sun
I imagined myself from the outside: the picture of a woman waiting.
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You Can Never Escape the Jersey Shore
To watch Jersey Shore is to watch my fantasy, only it’s an imperfect recreation.
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Making Deliberate Choices: A Conversation with Sheila Heti
Sheila Heti discusses her new novel, MOTHERHOOD!
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A Part of Me
Now my not wanting men to be front and center in my life capitalized sperm into a rare commodity. Empowered reproduction is largely a myth.
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The Ritual
It’s not easy being the mother of a dead child. In fact, it may be the hardest kind of mothering there is.
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Voices on Addiction: Spontaneous Combustion
I remember hunger the way other children remember love.
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Rumpus Original Fiction: She Hated the Child
She didn’t want anything to change. She understood it would be easier if she loved the child. But she did not want to love it.
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Mothering Our Children and Ourselves: Molly Caro May’s Body Full of Stars
As May moves through what she now calls her “postpartum challenge,” she does not return to her old self, but instead becomes someone new.
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Effacement of the Mother
When I came home from war, I felt relief. Now that I’m home after childbirth, I’m still waiting for relief. War ends. Motherhood does not.
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Like Juggling Knives: Talking with Rumaan Alam
Rumaan Alam discusses his new novel, That Kind of Mother, the limits of the employer-employee relationship, and the grossness of heterosexual sex.
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Spotlight: “Survivors” by Aubrey Hirsch
But more and more I began to wonder if you needed to be human to be a person.
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Mom Vagina
When the physical therapist explains the electric dildo she holds in her hand will reset the nerve endings in my vagina so I won’t need to pee every hour, I say, “Get it in me and let’s go.”
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R.I.P.: Labor In, Labor Out
Being reminded of your mortality on a constant basis makes your life so much better.
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It’s Just Reality: Talking with Meaghan O’Connell
Meaghan O’Connell discusses her new memoir, And Now We Have Everything, perfectionism in motherhood and writing, and being pregnant again.
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Body Fluids: An Exploration of Motherhood
I think fresh semen smells like aspirin, which is made from a mold that grows on birch trees, which of course are phallic.
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Rumpus Exclusive: “The Last Civilized House” by Lee Martin
Once upon a time, there was a man and a wife and a child that the wife decided she didn’t want.
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The Girl Next Door: Pot Docs and Loss on the California Coast
[A]s with any documentary, every one of our stories eventually becomes a ghost story. On a long enough timeline, that is.
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Paying It Forward: Meaghan O’Connell’s And Now We Have Everything
[O’Connell’s] baby, once born, is not the answer to any question, but rather the genesis of a thousand new ones.
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Portrait, Not Polemic: Laura & Emma by Kate Greathead
[S]quint at the story one way and you see a woman’s life hollowed out by the very privilege that allows her to coast; look at it from another angle and you see a regular person living a multi-faceted, flawed life.
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By Accident and On Purpose: A Conversation with Leesa Cross-Smith
Leesa Cross-Smith discusses her debut novel, Whiskey & Ribbons, what it takes to return to a story after a long time away, and how her faith influences her writing.
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What Did You Expect, Though?
The immune system, meant to protect a body from foreign invaders, works too assiduously, sees danger where there is none, turns on itself. Such conditions lend themselves to metaphor.
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A Source of Life: Red Clocks by Leni Zumas
There’s a lot left unsaid between the women of Red Clocks; not even they know the extent to which they’re all connected.
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Rivers of Babylon: The Story of a Third-Trimester Abortion
She said something to me, then, that has been a great comfort. “You had a choice,” she said, “but you did not have free will.” A choice that was no choice at all.
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Voices on Addiction: Dead Eyes and Bob Barker Crocs
Broken people are drawn to other broken people. Comparing scars. Laying belly to belly. Two similar pieces of different puzzles.
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