Hot Pregnant Sex: Urban Legend?

Now that Christmas decorations have been packed away, stores are dripping with the pinks and reds of Valentine's Day. My little girl has been asking about making heart-shaped cookies and, yesterday, my sweet husband suggested getting an overnight babysitter and heading into the city for dinner and a night at a nice hotel to celebrate the quasi-holiday.

I was really touched by his suggestion and, as his eyes sparkled with romantic intent, I pictured the fluffy bed of a hotel room I didn't have to clean, softly lit by candles. My heart skipped a beat, because I could only think of one thing.

A nap.

At seven and a half months pregnant, I am awkward. I am tired. I am gassy. I am not, despite my husband's daily protests to the contrary, sexy. My libido is as MIA as my waistline, and although sometimes I feel like I should throw my husband a bone, I'm at the point where when it's bedtime, I have absolutely nothing left.

Unfortunately, pregnancy books love to tout the aphrodisiac properties of pregnancy hormones. At dinner parties, husbands like to tell stories about how their wife's pregnancies brought them closer together, wink-wink-nudge-nudge. Having A Baby Improved My Sex Life

I just want to punch all of them in the face.

I have two small children already, and the little energy I can siphon off the oneish cup of coffee I'm allowed to have in the morning is long gone by the time they've made it through the day and are back in bed. Don't Let Kids Ruin Your Sex Life

And my lack of energy isn't the only obstacle cock-blocking my spouse. The physical logistics of third trimester sex are almost insurmountable. Having sex face-to-face allows only as much physical closeness as if we were smooshing a basketball in between us. (Know how the nuns at Catholic schools like to remind teenage couples to leave room for the Holy Ghost while they're dancing? With the space my bump needs, there's room for the entire Last Supper in between my and my husband's puckered and outstretched lips.) This may sound challenging and fun to you non-parental optimists, but I'm here to squash your dreams and tell you that it just isn't. It's awkward, especially when the smooshed basketball in question gets pissed off and kicks you to prove the point.

My ass is now roughly the size of Texas, and I still have enough pride left that this makes alternate positions humiliating.

Shaving my legs would require more flexibility than I was ever able to achieve in two years of yoga classes, and is a task that has fallen by the wayside. And we all know that nothing's sexier than prickly legs.

I'm exhausted in a way I can't combat. I wake up tired, and there are days when I'm so wiped out that even my hair hurts.

My husband is sweet and understanding, or at least as sweet as a man accustomed to averaging a minimum of twice weekly nookie can be. But hope springs eternal, and he still showers before bed every night, certain that tonight is the night that my sex drive will return, ushered on a wave of maternal hormones. Sex During Pregnancy

While he's waiting for the sex kitten he thought he married to return to the bedroom, I'm just waddling as gracefully as I can towards my due date.

I try to be as affectionate as I can without leading him on, so he still knows that deep underneath this cranky fat chick with heartburn lurks the girl who found him hot and wonderful enough to let him knock her up—twice. I have to be careful, though, because too much affection without follow-through is just plain cruel. And the fact that the boobs I prayed for at 15 have finally shown up—but are painful and off-limits—only rubs salt into his tortured wounds.

I tell myself that once our baby is here and our birth control is firmly in place, I'm really gonna blow his mind to make up for the drought.

I may try to muster enough energy to put out in honor of Valentine's Day. (I'm not totally heartless.) But in the meantime, those of you Angelina Jolie types who make prengnacy sound like a hot amusement park of sexual pleasures? Keep your husbands away from mine at the office parties. Thanks.