Bring Back the Brain

'Baby brain' is an awful, awful side-effect of pregnancy. I suspect some, (men) think that baby brain is an excuse to forget to clean the house, cook dinner or have sex. Actually, now I think about it, that is quite a brilliant excuse. (Memo to self... er... what was that again?)

It's all because of those meddling hormones. They gallop wildly about with the gayest of abandon having not had such free rein since puberty, before coming together in a large amorphous cloud and smothering everything in your head.

The Fog of Baby Brain

The fog descends. Vagueness becomes a natural state of being. One drifts aimlessly from one room to another like Casper the Forgetful Ghost. Tasks are half-heartedly begun, only to be abandoned. Conversations always seem to end with, "um.... never mind."

The worst thing is that you don't even notice you're doing it. You don't register the eye rolls and the irritated tut-tuts of your colleagues. Those snappy comments from your long-suffering family are just because they're being mean, (thus a reasonable excuse to sob and eat everything in the house). You simply don't realise how often someone else has had to jump in and finish whatever task you were supposed to do but didn't because you were clicking on onesies on Trade Me.

Baby brain is a burden everyone around you has to suffer.

'Never mind,' you think comfortably, patting your fat belly with the self-satisfied smugness of the fecund woman. 'My brain shall return after the baby is born. La la la.'

Newsflash. It bloody doesn't.

I go to playgroups and music classes with my children (aged one and two) and return home absolutely exhausted - merely from having to make conversation with other mums. And it is the act of talking, because the most physically strenuous thing I've done is march around the room, banging on a drum singing, 'The Wheels on the Bus.' And I don't bang that hard.

I'm terrified about going back to work and having to talk like a grown up again. I used to say things like, 'My client wants to incorporate both call-to-action and brand awareness in one campaign." Now, I say things like, "Have you done a poo-poo?"

Am also really scared I'm going to refer to myself in the third person as I (scarily) do at home, eg "Mummy is going to the loo now" and "Mummy is going to count to three and if you do not (insert reasonable request here) then you are going straight to bed!"

Try that in an office environment: "Excuse me Peter, Mummy is going to the photocopier now. Have you done a poo-poo?"

So if you're out and about and happen to trip over a random, squishy, grey thing, please be aware that it's probably my brain. I would like it back now.