In an era when we garden and hunt for leisure instead of survival, it is easy to overlook the reproductive side of sex. People have sex for fun, for spite, for pleasure, for intimacy, for sport and sometimes for food. Whether it’s the primary motivation for sex or not, sex can and often does lead to pregnancy.

I found out I was pregnant on a hot day in July. I had gone to the doctor’s to receive the results of a biopsy, expecting to hear the worst. Surely I was dying; my period had disappeared, I was nauseous all of the time, I was fatigued and my lower back hurt.

“You’re pregnant; did you know you were pregnant? I can’t write you the prescription I had planned, but the good news is the pregnancy will resolve the problems we were treating,” my doctor told me, glancing over the chart in her hands. With that and a bottle of prenatal vitamins, my journey through pregnancy began.

My first trimester reminded me of the requisite “becoming” scene experienced by superheroes like Spiderman. I was changing, and I would never be entirely the same again. The most “super” of my new powers was the development of a lupine sense of smell. At first this was novel. I could tell you what you packed for lunch from outside the refrigerator. I could tell where someone had been by the odors that clung to them. I could literally smell fear — including my own. Then, my power grew and took a sinister hold over me. Suddenly, the amplified smell of food left me reeling. Visits to the grocery store became impossible; the cans on the shelves would leer at me, their contents perfuming my nostrils in a horrible olfactory cacophony.

So it was that my talent for smelling became my kryptonite, and my morning sickness lasted throughout the day and into the night. I dreaded food. All I could eat were mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables. All I could drink was lemonade. It reminded me of the worst hangover I have ever had, and it lasted for three months. To make things worse, the hormonal fiesta in my body left me extremely congested, and I felt as if I had a never-ending cold.

My second trimester was, by comparison, a golden age. Finally, I was far enough along to look measurably pregnant instead of oddly plump. I could wear my maternity clothes and tell the world, “Hey, look what I’m up to — I’m building a person in here!” The public, as it turned out, responded with an eerie gusto. They loved me. They rubbed my belly in the post office, in book shops and once while serving me dinner in a restaurant. They gave me their seats on the bus and in waiting rooms. It was a nice change, perhaps augmented by my move from North Carolina to Tacoma.

It was in this second trimester that I started to get to know the parasite/blessing inside of me. I referred to it as ‘Rowdy’ and looked forward to counting its kicks. I imagined the baby was communicating its likes and dislikes to me through this private code. I felt an incredible sense of connection and comraderie with Rowdy. We were a team, and I talked to my belly as if I were strategizing with a friend.

By week 20, my morning sickness subsided to a banal twice-daily period of retching. I felt reinvigorated by the life inside me. I could finally talk to people without looking for the nearest trash can or bathroom. It was also in week 20 that Rowdy’s sex was revealed with the aide of some cold jelly and an ultrasound machine. The news filled me with the joy and sadness that any equally agreeable choice presents. I was gaining a son, but not to be gaining a daughter weighed on me as the loss of a future of a different person who was never truly there — but whom I would miss.

Assuming the downward dog position in prenatal yoga began to border on the ridiculous during my third trimester. I had gone from looking fat to looking pregnant to looking fat and pregnant. I had stopped glowing and sporting the prego-fashion-savvy looks perfected by the recent onslaught of expecting celebrities. I had reverted to wearing anything with an elastic waistband.

Getting out of bed had also become an ordeal because of the number of pillows sandwiched around me. One pillow was placed under my ankles to prevent swelling. Two more were nestled under my back and belly because the baby books advocated sleeping on one’s side. The fact that I woke up an average of four times per night to pee made my supposedly restful hours into a looping comedy of errors.

When the time came to deliver the baby, my mother and my partner accompanied me to the hospital. For 37 hours, we waited while I suffered through contractions. Contractions feel like having horrible cramps that pulse within you. They are a series of human earthquakes, moving the tectonic plates of the body to clear a path through which a baby can pass. While I slept in my hospital bed, my partner and mother curled up in a chair and on the floor and waited, equally worried and excited about the coming event. When the pain became particularly bad, they rubbed my feet and lower back, one posted at each body part. I cannot imagine how horrible it is to watch somebody you love actively writhe in pain for so long, but perhaps it is easier when that person is doing so for a purpose. My support squad weathered their fatigue and concerns to keep things upbeat for me. They even snuck in a burrito to help me keep my strength up after the nurse said no more food.

When it came time to push, my midwife arrived. She was a willowy woman, a major in the Army and a mother of two. I chose a midwidfe because I wanted to be involved in decisions during my labor and because my mother had one when she delivered me. With a doctor, a woman usually lies on a bed to deliver her baby. This is not so with a midwife. She and I tried positions that would put a courtesan trained with the Kama Sutra to shame. It seems funny to me that in the western world, with so much access to pornography and sexual experimentation, that sexual positions aren’t applied in the birthing process more often. You can do it on your knees, squatting, with your legs on someone’s shoulders, even in the water. Shifting position facilitates the baby’s journey from uterus to the outside world.

Unfortunately, after three hours of pushing, the baby was stuck. I felt like a failure, and I began to worry about the baby’s safety. Luckily, the midwife, whom I trusted, had experienced a vacuum birth with her second child and reassured me about the process. It is as silly as it sounds: they put a suction cup on the baby’s head and suck with a vacuum pull while the mother pushes. It was on our second attempt with the device that my son was born, just after midnight on Saint Patrick’s Day. I noticed quickly that the midwife was not cheering our success.

My son had been trapped for a long time and was born slightly gray. He wasn’t crying, and nobody would tell me what was wrong. My partner rushed over to hold him while the doctors who had appeared in the room assessed the situation. Finally, they got him to breathe and pronounced him a healthy baby boy. Only when I read through his medical file later did I realize just how close I had been to losing him.

My pregnancy was an interesting journey and one I would go through again — though I would prefer it be all second trimester next time. I felt closer to the world and to all the living organisms in it as I, too, had succeeded in reproducing. I also felt like I had somehow cheated fate. If I had not delivered my baby in the hospital, he and I would both have died. I used technology to outwit evolution.

The best way for the sexually active to avoid pregnancy is by taking contraceptive measures, but even these have been known to fail. If you are lucky enough to end up happily pregnant, know that you can get through it — even as a student.