Ugh. That sucks, but maybe it will calm down when the progesterone drops off a little bit. Along with the "I'm gonna hurl any minute" stuff.

Pregnancy is SO. GODDAMN. WEIRD. Hang onto those tix, because by February, you'll surely be past this phase and onto something else, which is hopefully just insatiable curry/Chipotle cravings.

I think what most amazes me here is the number of nice people on the Metro. Otherwise, though, that's no good. Hope it passes soon!

I had that when I was pregnant. It was awful, and it was mixed with a huge amount of impatience. Waiting in lines for things would nearly send me off the edge. I even had trouble going to the grocery store. I completely feel for you.

Clearly my ASCII skillz are lacking. How about this:

..____..
./|...|\
|.|...|.|
.\|___|/

The "ropes" are the | lines in the circle.

I am sorry to say that it sounds a whole lot like some serious anxiety. I know you've struggled with anxiety and depression before, and it is not uncommon for women to have pregnancy-related depression and anxiety. Ugh. Of course, it probably also has to do with everything going on with your dad. I am so sorry -- it's a terrible feeling, I know. I have the crowd thing all the time, and the excessive noise thing that triggers my anxiety.

If you don't feel it getting better soon, you might talk to your doctor about it . . . don't let it get that much worse . . . Good luck!

Erin

By February you should be pretty visibly pregnant since this is baby #3 so I think if you really play up the belly you should be able to avoid the worst of the squishies.

I understand those feelings. I get panicky in large crowds, especially if they are amprphous crowds. Being short doesn't help at all. Whenever I was in a crowded club, I used to hold on to the shirt of my much taller friend so I would get lost.

you have my hugest sympathies. I've had that with every pregnancy and urgh it is hard to handle. With number 3 from the minute that second line popped up on the test my other half was no longer allowed to kiss me. Made me feel really breathless and not in a good way.Best of luck and I'd avoid the concert!

I had that with my pregnancy, but it was food issues instead of crowds. Certain textures made me feel panicky and like I was going to throw up.

Went totally away after MM was born.

I was at the rally as well. Drove down with a van full of college kids from NY, and parked at a friends house in MD. Yeah, we did not get on any trains coming from MD, so after the fifth one passed we got on and went to the end of the line. This worked, but once we got into DC and even within a mile of the rally site there were just people everywhere. Madness!

Just found out I am 4 weeks along last night! And experiencing a little of this, just on a personal level. I keep telling my husband don't cuddle with me! It's like I know my body is about to be taken over again and I just want a little space. My first is a month older than Ezra, so we are on the same sched, lol. Just missing the first one in the series.

Totally laughing until I cried at the picture of you at Lady Gaga trying to hold people back. Hehe.

Oh, and I definitely had a claustrophobic moment with my kids yesterday. It was just as you described!

Oh dude, that just sucks. I kinda want to hug you. But um...I will just stand way over here and wave. Promise.

I have a theory on how to get people to back away slowly. Ask them if your eyes look pink. Pink eye makes people run away. Doesn't matter if you have it, or if you've ever had it. It'll should give you a nice area of space. ;)

!!!

I totally thought this was just me! I nearly punched a guy out at a Potbelly's during my first pregnancy when he refused to back off. He kept bumping into me and there was NO ONE behind him. When I asked him to give me a little room because I was pregnant and feeling a little claustrophobic he told me that maybe I shouldn't leave the house. And then laughed in my face, no, really *IN* my face, leaning forward and making me len back.

It wouldn't have stuck with me so long except that he had a 13-or-so boy with him and I could just see him passing this attitude along.

So sorry. I feel that way all the time, not even pregnant. Surprisingly it has gotten a little better since I had kids. I think mostly because the rational part of my brain took over a little more and reminded me that when I'm with the kids I cannot have a panic attack. No advice, just sorry. It's a terrible feeling. I hope it will go away once baby is born. Pregnancy it does weird things to your body and mind, much more and different than you'd ever expect. Best to you.

Oh Amalah, I totally understand the train issue. I live in NYC, travel during rush hour times and somedays there is just no relief. I will decide to wait for the next train hoping it will be less crowded, the platform will clear for a few moments and then out of nowhere and new throng of people appear. When I resign myself to the fact if I want to get home before 9pm I am going to have to deal. Fortunately, for me I am 5'11 so I am one of those people with my armpit in your face (I do liberally apply deodorant) but sometimes when at each stop more people push their way in yelling 'coming through', 'move INTO the train (although I do heartily agree with that sentiment - people crowd the doors and it makes me CRAZY)' and my space gets smaller and smaller, my bags end up on the floor because i am more polite than most and choose not to wield them around bashing people in the face and back, my mind starts going to places it shouldn't namely thinking about how THIS train at THIS moment would be the perfect target for a terrorist attack. My eyes start wondering to people wearing backpacks, baby strollers, the other day two men where using sign language and I started thinking they were using some code. I have to close my eyes, take deep breaths and start imagining I am standing in this same train car but it is late at night and it is only me and scattering of other late-night commuters - who are NOT terrorists) I imagine all the space around me and how I can put my arms straight out and not touch anyone, I imagine looking down the length of the car and seeing it in all its empty, grubby orange seat spaciousness. And I imagine that hot, sweaty torso I feel pressed up against my back is my fiance behind me with his arms around me and if I try really hard I believe it enough that my minds-eye fiance magically grows a big belly, develops an apparent sweating problem, smells like yesterday's hotdogs and inexplicately grunts alot. I love mass transit.

During my pregnancy I became irrationally fear of stabbing myself in the eye with a knife. I have regularly carried a pocketknife since my teens but during pregnancy became so paranoid about poking my eye out that I had to stop using it. (I only use it for normal things like cutting apples and stuff, I swear). Even using kitchen knives creeped me out b/c i thought i might forget which hand it was in and try to wipe my forehead and get my eye. Pregnancy is strange.

Not trying to be freaky here, but you could be developing some serious anxiety, due to your dad's condition (coupled with those lovely pg hormones).
I would stay away from crowds until the panic attacks go away or you get a handle on this new "symptom." You're pregnant...take care of yourself & that presjis baby. No more concerts or standing room only venues for you!

I am so sorry Amy. You are turning in to me. I do that, all of the time. It IS worse when I am pregnant, but when I am not I have a hard time holding back the "GET OFF ME" from my own children even. It sucks. I will suffer for a show though.

Hey, I'm like that all the time! Like, literally, every day on my commuter train, and multiple times per day in the elevators at work. When I was pregnant, it was totally worse, and I couldn't rely on alcohol or xanax to make it better. So, I feel you (not literally. I'm way over here, leaving us both tons of personal space...).

Okay, I didn't even KNOW there was a term for crowd claustrophobia. That is totally me. All. The. Time. I'm the one that has my back to the elevator wall and who trades seats with folks so that I'm not sitting with my back to the aisle in the bar. My friends are good about trading with me, but I really can't stand people in my space. And I don't have kids - it's just my own personal quirk.

So I totally feel for you. I've had to take a crowded Metro after a concert or a baseball game here and I always board near the back or the front so I can have wall space. I've even asked if I can trade with someone because I need to stand against the wall so that I don't have a panic attack. People always trade because no-one wants to make someone else cry on them.

Girl, welcome to my world. Every. Goddamn. Day. For the past 20-some-odd years. My friends used to make fun of me because someone would get within a foot of me and I would vomit. It was like some terrible defense mechanism.

Aside from the oh-my-god-that-really-really-sux-for-you thoughts, all I could think about was what a great writer you are. Beautiful torturous descriptions. :)

Oh, and I am 23 wks preg:)

From someone who suffers from panic attacks that once landed me in the ER, I sympathize. I don't know what if anything is safe to take when pregnant, but I'd sure as hell ask your Dr. Mine didn't start until AFTER my kids, go figure.

OMG, I was the same way during my pregnancy. Which then led to agoraphobia. And then? MUCH relief when my doctor put me on bedrest at 34 weeks. I no longer had to force myself to leave the safety of my home. I had gotten to the point where I only left to travel 3 miles to work, stayed in my office all day, then drove back. Peapod by Giant saved any pesky grocery stops. The only other times I left my apartment was to go to the doctor. Everyone asks when we're having another... I'm still traumatized by the first pregnancy. It was horrible.

As I'm sure you have seen by a zillion comments, IT'S OK - you are entitled to that feeling. Lots of people would freak out on that train even if they were not pregnant. After laughing a little envisioning Lady Gaga in a hamster ball, I thought "I wonder if that's how Noah (or some of the preschool language impaired kids I work with every day) felt sometimes".

Just holler "I'M PREGNANT AND I'M GONNA GET SICK UNLESS YOU MOVE!"

Maybe you can bring an entourage to maintain your personal space.

I don't like crowds anyway but can usually walk fast enough to get through them. When I was pregnant I HATED crowds, but rather than get panicky, I would get very angry and want to yell at everyone to get the F**K OUTTA MY WAY! It only got worse as I got bigger. BTW, I live in San Francisco and don't own a car so I had no choice but to take public transit. I tried going shopping for Christmas downtown when I was 38 weeks pregnant. I lasted about 45 minutes.

I fainted at a smallish-venue concert before when I was pregnant too. Cool to share an experience with you, bummer that it has to be something like that.

I was 4 months along and it was Bryan Adams (old skool, so what??)

So apparently we're living parallel lives. I have two boys and when I was pregnant with my third (a girl, so congrats) I experienced, for the first time ever, panic attacks. Mine were actually focused on not being in control of my body (ahh, fetus invasion making me all sick and hurty and won't get out for a long long time, ahhhh), which sucked because I didn't have the option to get off the train, you know? Anyway, I visited my doctor after three in one weekend and she prescribed me an anti-anxiety I could take. I never actually took one, but knowing I *could* made me feel more in control. It was pretty sucky, though.

For your show in February, I suggest calling the 9:30 Club ahead of time and getting one of the "special pregnant lady Ineedtositdownrightnow" bar stools in the back balcony by the bar. My friend did that at 8 months pregnant and we all stood around her. She said it was the best decision she ever made. That way you won't have to wear the hampster ball, unless you want to!

You just described my life. There is not a trace of hyperbole in that statement. My claustrophobia is terrible and getting worse. I freak out in crowds, have gasping panic attacks on airplanes, black out when I go underground. Everytime I think I can get a handle on it, it comes and gets me from a different angle, (you thought it was crowd related! Ha ha, how about your knees give out in the Yuengling brewery cellars!)

I am now on Xanax for it. And this whole comment has no other point but to tell you that I FEEL YOU, OH HOW I FEEL YOU, and that I thnk I won't read the other comments because your post alone is making me antsy as hell.

I love posts that remind me that you and I are knocking around this big-ole town together. I have made repeated people scream with this, but..I drove to the rally. traffic was better than a work day morning. parked at union station, walked three blocks. I'm sorry. On the other hand I spent all my time there walking around the mall as the mall was insanely packed. Insanely. I too suffer from Metro-related freak outs, btw.