There's something about pregnancy that seems to give people the license to make personal comments. Perfect strangers don't think twice about coming up to a pregnant lady, touching her stomach and asking personal questions about due dates and Baby's gender. Even friends and family, who are supposed to be supportive, will make snide remarks about the pregnant woman's weight or the sanity of having more children.

Katherine Cowan of Beverly Hills, Calif., is seven months pregnant. She tends to give birth to large babies, and for that reason, at seven months, she looks full term.

"A few weeks ago I was walking down the street and a man stopped and said to me, 'You are due any day aren't you?'" says Cowan. "Needless to say I was a little annoyed, but all I did was smile and continue walking. I was even more sensitive to these sorts of comments during my first pregnancy. I would have been stewing over that one for the rest of my pregnancy last time. This time I just started wondering where people like that man got the guts to make such statements. You would think that because of the wild hormones running through the average pregnant woman that would be enough to make most people avoid them as much as possible. But no – for some reason people tend to think that a pregnant woman is fair game and that she is just dying to talk about all aspects of pregnancy with no reservations at all."

Rudeness permeates society today, and it is a growing problem, according to Tina Tessina, a psychotherapist and author of It Ends with You: Grow Up and Out of Dysfunction (New Page Books, 2003). "The anonymity of urban living and the Internet contribute," Tessina says. "And the overwhelming level of choice also adds to the attitude 'if you don't like it, I can go elsewhere.'"

 

But when it comes to pregnancy, there is a certain irony to the rudeness women encounter. "Most people will do whatever they can to make sure pregnant ladies are comfortable and cared for at all times," says Landon Cowan, Katherine's husband. People will offer up seats on the bus, open doors, carry bags and do other kind deeds not usually offered up to non-pregnant women.

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