Pip Pellens reveals baby gender: ‘Hopefully just as cute as Pim’

Image: Pim Wessels

How do you feel?
“Good! Maybe I’m lucky or it’s the genes, but I’m in a good period. I am very hungry, very hungry. Nauseous I’ve only been there for two weeks. Just when I thought: I hope this isn’t going to last very long, it was already over. I am now really pregnant-pregnant. The midwife already warned me that at some point I would roll in and out of bed on my side. ‘Bye, I’m really not going to do that’, I said then, ‘I already feel like such a manatee’. Now I’m at that point, haha. We live on the third floor; those stairs are getting harder and harder. Yet I notice it mainly in my brain, which is not cooperating. Coming up with words is really a disaster and I forget entire conversations. I find that feeling, as if my brain is failing me, difficult.”

What went through your mind when you held the positive test in your hands?
“Pim and I were in the bathroom together, waiting for what would appear on the screen of the test. I didn’t want a hassle with dashes or crosses and that I had just misremembered what meant what. When ‘pregnant’ appeared, it was not a euphoric moment. Rather very down-to-earth; beautiful, fine. This was the intention, now let’s see how it goes. That’s exciting. I also didn’t feel pregnant at all, so in the days that followed I often opened the trash can to see if it still said ‘pregnant’. Fortunately, that battery worked for a while, haha.”

“When ‘pregnant’ appeared on the test, it was not a euphoric moment, rather very sober”

Did you find keeping secrets difficult?
“All! My two sisters live two streets behind me and we share everything with each other. Still, we didn’t want to tell until we had a good first ultrasound. I also thought it would be nicer that you also have something to show. I love wine and everyone knows it. Fortunately it was January, otherwise I would have fallen through the basket immediately. At a New Year’s party, I was having tea and struck up a conversation with a girl who “kept Dry January a few more months.” I can recommend that excuse to everyone, haha. She later turned out to be pregnant.”

Do you still have crazy cravings?
“I thought it wasn’t too bad, but opinions are divided about that. For example, I recently made a nice drink plate with Bugles, wasabi rice cakes with Hüttenkäse and Liga Evergreen. The combination was perfect and everything I was in the mood for exactly. Pim looked at me crazy and said: ‘you are really pregnant’. I felt mostly fulfilled, haha.”

Do you see Pim from a different side now?
“He is even more caring. I’m actually not allowed to do anything in the house, but I can’t avoid grabbing my own drink. He takes on all sorts of chores, those little things – skirting boards that don’t fit properly, an unmopped floor – that always irritate me. Those kinds of things. Pim is very busy with the pregnancy, reads everything. I gave him that book by Kluun (Help, I got my wife pregnant, ed.), but he didn’t like that. “If this is how fatherhood is viewed, I don’t need it,” he said. I understand that: society often pretends that the father ‘actually doesn’t feel like having that child’, while we have consciously opted for it together. Now he reads books that fit in better, I also read a lot and we talk about that at length.”

“Society often acts as if the father ‘actually doesn’t feel like having that child’”

Does such a conversation ever turn into a hormonal discussion?
“I can still control those hormones. I often cry when I find something really cute. Or because I’m just really happy. Pim is not all that bad, he says. Of course we think differently about some things, that is also allowed. We’re pretty much on the same page when it comes to names. We have three or four more on the list. Some people say: you automatically see which name fits best when the child is in your arms. But what if it isn’t? I find that difficult; a name is something she carries with her for the rest of her life.”

You say ‘they’. Will there be a little Pip?
“We both felt it was going to be a girl and that feeling turned out to be true. That’s crazy though. In hindsight I would have liked a fun ultrasound, I thought it was a long time to wait until we knew. A boy would have been just as welcome, but when you know the gender, it’s even better to make a performance and fantasize together about what it will be like. I hope she’s just as cute as Pim. And just as smart.”

“I hope she’s just as cute as Pim. And just as smart”

You are the Instagram account No Mother Mafia Allowed started. Why?
“I didn’t want my Instagram to turn into one big pregnancy spam and needed a place where you can give each other tips and advice without moms throwing each other off. A positive sound is important to me: there is no one way of raising children and we should be more open to other people’s ideas. Do I already suffer from the mother mafia? Since I’ve been pregnant, more and more messages are coming into my inbox that are probably well-intentioned, but which I can’t handle very well. For example, I had to ‘really be careful’ with my supplements, even though I take them on the advice of my midwife. I can be quite excited about that. You will not see our child on social media. You never know where those photos will end up. Because of my work for Free A Girl I am more aware of that.”

You didn’t know for a long time whether you had a child’s wish. When did that change?
“Last year, when Pim and I were in LA for a while, that conversation started. The two of us sat there, in peace, in our own cocoon, thinking about our lives. I felt that desire to have children more strongly than Pim, perhaps also because I am a woman. No idea. It was always a ‘no’ before that, also because we were still so young when we got together (Pip and Pim have been together for 10.5 years, ed.). Then you first want to travel, set up a company… life just passed by. A colleague once said: ‘you should only start having children if you can let go of life as it is now – with complete freedom to do what you want’. I thought that was a good one and I’ve always kept that in mind.”

Is there anything from your own upbringing that you would like to pass on?
“I hope to be a loving, warm and honest mother. I inherited that warmth from my parents and I always liked it very much. Everything could be discussed at home: it was important to have your own opinion, to stand for what you think. I come from a family of girls and I have also learned that as a woman you have to work a little harder for what you want. I really want to pass that on to her. Just like being open to your gut feeling at important moments: does it feel good what I’m doing? Then she will get there.”

Read also – Josje Huisman: ‘Being pregnant is a kind of superpower’