Avoid mercury-laden fish, soft cheeses, raw sprouts, foods containing large amounts of vitamin A, and deli meat. Have someone else clean the cat litter box. Sleep on your left side to optimize blood flow to the placenta. Floss! Cut back on the coffee. And for god's sake, you took the prenatal vitamins before you got pregnant, right?

It seems like there are a million guidelines for having the healthiest pregnancy possible, and I swear they're always changing. My youngest is only 3 years old, but I never heard a damn thing about the Deadly Horrors of sprouts, vitamin A, or hot dogs when I was pregnant. (Also, I only took the prenatals after peeing on the stick. I'M SORRY, I'M SORRY, I ... I DIDN'T KNOW!)

As if it's not hard enough to stay on top of the things you're supposed to do or not do when you're knocked up, a few of these guidelines are downright impossible. I mean, it's like someone just made them up to screw with our bloated, farty pregnant brains. For instance:

Only consume an extra 100-300 calories during pregnancy. The experts say that the extra caloric nutrition you need during pregnancy is 300 calories per day at max, which you can get from, say, a small cup of yogurt and some apple slices. Ha. Ha ha! HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAA oh god my permanently compromised pelvic floor someone pass me a Lightdays®.

Whew, a small cup of yogurt—god, that's hilarious. Try an entire box of rye-flavored Triscuits sprayed with EZ Cheese and a Ben & Jerry's chaser, experts.

Get plenty of sleep. Let's take all the people who earnestly remind pregnant women to "sleep now while you can!" and jettison them into space, with perhaps a small yogurt as a snack. Because even the sporadic, frustrating amount of sleep you get with a newborn in the house is better than whatever it is that happens between 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. when you're pregnant. Between the congestion, the constant peeing, the random aches and pains, and the general ridiculousness of finding a comfortable position when you're shaped like a biological practical joke, THAT'S NOT SLEEPING.

Don't strain when you're having a B.M. Look, I'm sorry to bring this up, and I'm sorry to use the oddly uncomfortable abbreviation of "B.M." when clearly I'm talking about POOP here, but all I'm saying is when your digestion has slowed to freeze-framed-Matrix speeds and there's a growing human pressing on all your relevant body parts and that prenatal vitamin you should have taken 13 months ago is making things even worse, nothing is coming out without a little extra effort. Yes, lingering on the toilet may result in those festive hemorrhoidal butt-balloons (it's like your ass is throwing you a party! The worst party ever), but the alternative is being, well, full of shit. You know, sort of like some of the oh-so-expert advice you'll continue to get after the baby is born. (Nap when the baby naps! HAAAAAAAAAA.)

Did I miss anything? What's the most annoying pregnancy guideline you can think of?



Image via Flickr/futurestreet