Touching my belly

as2581a · June 2012

Hi Ladies,

I am not even in the trying stages yet. Hopefully, next year my husband and I will start planning. However, I am HORRIFIED by stories of how many women have strangers come up and pat their baby bumps! I might karate chop anyone that does that to me. How do you avoid this? Has anyone tried strategically placing a messenger bag across their stomach? :S

biomaj5 · June 2012

I have serious issues with people getting into my personal space, and I don't like being touched by anyone except for my husband. I'm fully prepared to tell people to get the hell away from me. I'll be the angry pregnant woman. I also found a shirt on Etsy that says, "touch my belly and die."

biomaj5 · June 2012

Also, is it bad that I sort of hope certain coworkers will try to touch my belly so I can punch them and get away with it?

Unknown · June 2012

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Ms5586 · June 2012

I didn't have one stranger or coworker do this. My family rarely touched my stomach.

The nice way would be (if they have already reached out), to step back and say "Please don't touch me. You're in my space." The snarky way would be to pat them on the stomach right back, and say "So, how are you today?"

gogadgetgo · June 2012

I also never had a stranger touch my belly. Comments, yes, but no touching. My mom would try to kiss my belly when she saw me. That weirded me out but I knew she was just excited. A coworker always tried to rub my belly but I was close enough with him to tell him to stop in a sarcastic manner (this sounds much creepier than it was - there aren't many boundaries working in film sets).

Ashleyallsmiles · June 2012

I was in a work meeting last summer, filled with senior management, and on my way out of the conference room my boss was congratulating another co-worker on her pregnancy and rubbed her belly without even asking. It turned out to be a huge deal, she was so pissed and my boss had to make a huge formal apology.

Ever since that experience I know to NEVER just go ahead and touch a baby bump, no matter how close you think you are to someone, it's still their body

magdalina.h · June 2012

No one ever touched my belly without asking

sevans1975 · June 2012

My aunt is the only person who ever touched my belly without asking. I was sort of in shock and it almost turned into a slow-motion scene where I saw the hand coming for me and was powerless to do anything.

Aaaaannnd, she did it before I was ever really showing and DD would've still been really tiny and way low, so I felt like asking her how my fat belly felt because that was NOT baby. But, I didn't because my aunt is very sweet and she was just really excited for us. I felt awkward.

thefarmchick · June 2012

I never had this problem. I'm a super nice person but I think I have that "touch me and die" vibe. DH's youngest sister is the only one who ever touched my belly and I love her enough it didn't bother me. She also talked to the baby all the time. My dad patted the air in front of my tummy 1 time but that was the closest anyone else got, lol.

I did notice that I usually stand with my hands in front of my stomach or me elbows kind of out, so that is probably a really big part of it.

bugandbibs · June 2012

No one, not once, every touched my belly without asking except for MH and DD1. They didn't need permission though.

misspunky · June 2012

I haven't had too much trouble with people touching my belly. If I had a problem with it, I would probably just stand a good distance away from who I was talking to, which I usually do anyway. Personal space is a biggie for me.