I’m referring to what seems to have become a national, if not global, obsession: celebrity pregnancies. From Christina Aguilera to Cate Blanchett and the Richie Rich of offspring – the recently conceived Packer heir – the unborn babies of the loaded and famous have become the most talked about item since Britney Spear’s last exploit. So what is it about Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban, or Erica and James Packer, or Toni Collette and what’s-his-name, expecting that generates so much interest and apparently has the public waiting with bated breath for the next instalment in the trimester? Do we really care whether these people reproduce, or want to digest stories and pictures about the minutiae of what becomes nine interminably long months? Well, if sales of magazines – as well as the ratings of programs dedicating airspace to forthcoming birth announcements, revelation of names and first glimpses of the blessed progeny – are any indication, apparently we do care. Very much. Not only is pre- and post-natal celebrity gossip big business, with magazines and/or newspapers prepared to pay millions for exclusive photos of celebrity scions, it’s also lucrative. From speculation, to announcement, to birth, the media bleeds every inane moment out of a famous person’s pregnancy and then some. Media outlets pore over the anticipation, the emotion, the difficulties and joy – in fact, every aspect that can be creatively reinterpreted for the reader, with the exception of the most obvious and intimate of moments. Though that didn’t stop one magazine editor exclaiming joyously that Kidman and Urban’s baby was most likely conceived in Australia . . . oh please. I would say, chances are, the baby, like many others, was most likely conceived in a bedroom. Why is it that being an expectant celebrity exempts them from some of the more negative aspects of child-bearing? Most pregnant celebrities manage to look incredibly glamorous, are devoid of stretch marks, excess hair, weight, drooping and sagging. Even their mood is described as being in a constant state of bliss. No mornings spent with heads in toilets for them. In all fairness, if a celebrity does slip out of the house appearing "ordinary", then the paparazzi has a field day, and images of their fall from grace (ie. that is, looking like you and me), are beamed around the world to reassure us that their bed-of-roses life does have some thorns. Even so, rarely do we discover a celebrity suffering from post-natal depression, a prolapse of the uterus (despite one in three vaginal births resulting in this) or other more mundane ailments such as poor teeth and hair, and perpetual tiredness. A fairy godmother waves her serenity wand over the entire nine months plus, distinguishing celebrity motherhood as different from, and much better than, that experienced by mere mortals.

Parenthood is also different for these fabulously wealthy and privileged beings. Not only can they afford to take time out from their "horrendous" schedules to enjoy simply being "mum", their bodies snap back into shape (with the help of chefs and trainers) and their nights are uninterrupted as the hired help rises to attend to the newborn. Now that’s fine, when your face and body are your ticket to success, but to suggest that this is "normal" and that we too can experience the pleasures of this kind of parenthood is completely unrealistic. Yet, keen to share their greatest and most rewarding role – often divided among an army of employees – these celebrities persist in maintaining the delusion that they’re just like us – because they’ve given birth. Of course, the media is compliant in this, transforming the new celebrity mothers and fathers into role models first and, if they’re willing, parenting experts as well. Hauled through the talk circuit – channelling Dr Phil McGraw – these new parents opine long and loud about raising children . . . even if they’ve only been doing it for five minutes. No longer does mother or father know best – the greatest teacher in the new millennium is the celebrity. The superstar appears to have become the yardstick by which we measure and set our expectations with relationships, looks, pregnancy, childbirth, and the list continues. Unlike these A-listers, with their air-brushed lives, we don’t have the resources to draw upon to make our lives and that of our children easier. Nor should we want to. Yet the media persists in holding them up as a type of blueprint of perfection to which we should aspire, even when their lives are vacuous or without purpose. Children are life-changing in a very personal and immediate way, not in the superficial, meaningless manner to which magazines and TV stories reduce them. Pretending that pregnancy and childbirth is like a Disney movie, with happy endings and where everything fundamentally stays the same, only better, sets up unrealistic expectations and eclipses the realities of bringing a child into this world. The road to parenthood is not smooth; it’s an astonishing roller coaster that, despite the roughness of the ride, with its incredible ups and downs, you wouldn’t want to get off, even if you could. It’s not called a baby "bump" for nothing. And it’s the "bumps" and all they entail that make life worth reproducing and living.

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