Wednesday, September 14, 2011

"We" are not pregnant

From today's newspaper comes this: Levi Johnston writes in his book that Bristol Palin was so angry about her mother's pregnancy with son Trig that she wanted to get pregnant, too. He says she told him in 2008, "let's get pregnant." Deer in the Headlights: My Life in Sarah Palin's Crosshairs, comes out Sept. 20."

Of all the affectations of modern speech, for me the worst is "we are pregnant."

No, I'm not against pregnancy, and was happy when I heard it from the lips of my own dear wife 35 years ago. But there was no "we" in that pregnancy. We went through a lot together during that pregnancy, and it ended with a C-section to save the lives of her and our son. I stood hopelessly back at the time, because she was the one who was pregnant, not me.

Yes, I understand that "we are pregnant" means it is a shared experience between partners, that both go through many of the same things during that time. But I still hate it as a figure of speech. As for being pregnant, there is no "we," just thee, not me.

Was Bruce Willis pregnant when his wife was? I think not.

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