Landlord came round to replace our fridge while I was at home and my husband was out. ‘There,’ he says, ‘all ready in time for when the baby comes. I know how uptight pregnant women can be about this sort of thing.’ ‘I bet your pardon?’ I reply. ‘My point exactly!’ was his retort. Of course, his position of power over me is such that it would be unwise for me to call him out, and thus the patriarchal status quo is maintained.
I’m about 8 months pregnant, this experience I had was a couple of weeks ago. I live in gated military housing, and I was walking down the street to the mailboxes. There were two male maintenance employees finishing painting a fence, and one of them started catcalling me. I whipped around just in time to see the other smack him and say “Don’t do that!” I was relieved, until it was followed by “She’s pregnant, dude!” I rushed to get my mail and nearly jogged home trying not to cry. I thought for a moment that he was coming to my aid because he respected ME. In reality, his respect was only for the father of my child. As if, were I not pregnant, it would be totally fine to speak to me like that.
Dealing with a very creepy recruiter who has already made me feel so uncomfortable that I didn’t meet up with him, talking under his breath on the phone to me and telling me I’m amazing in a really weird way when I answer the phone. I sent a list of questions to ask a potential employer and added maternity information to the list. He then asked me if I was pregnant?! Which I have now found out is completely illegal, so I will be writing a huge complaint. I now feel like the employer will think that too, I guess if they do I won’t want to work there anyway. I’m entitled to know about women’s rights in a work place without even wanting to have children if I don’t want to.