Amy and motherhood
Some meta to tide me over til the next series…
According to my Eleventh Doctor Companion, Amy tells the Doctor she’s not pregnant with the words “My little problem, it went away.” The line wasn’t just cut, but redubbed- quite probably because it would have made it sound like Amy didn’t in fact want a child, which would have been incredibly problematic considering what came next.
As it is, there isn’t really enough data to let us know how Amy felt about having a kid- which is a flaw in itself, really. Obviously, there are many people out there who go into labour without knowing they were pregnant- but I really wish we’d been reassured, basically, that Amy wanted a baby. We’re not told she didn’t, but we’re not told she did.
In Amy’s Choice, Amy says that the reason she got pregnant was because she was bored. “That’s why I got pregnant, so I didn’t have to watch them doing Oklahoma.” She’s probably joking, but it seems reasonable, I suppose, that she wanted a baby because she thought it would be interesting? She seems perfectly happy to have that baby- the nursery is decorated and everything. Yet, she’s quick to forget about it after Rory dies, and if she had been wrong about which reality was real she would have killed the baby along with herself.
Amy does seem to like kids, I think- she seems very protective of Toby in Curse Of The Black Spot, and that’s a child she’s only just met. And it’s noticing how the Star Whale reacts to the children that forms part of her realization in The Beast Below.
We can assume that in the opening scenes of The Impossible Astronaut, Amy knows she’s pregnant- the Doctor points out she’s put on weight. And after the Doctor says this, Amy gives a little smile-
but then instantly she notices the Silence and the smile fades. That little smile, I think, is pretty much the only hint that Amy wanted a baby-
Although Amy is drinking wine in this scene, wine is actually okay to drink during pregnancy as long as it’s in moderation (and being married to a nurse, Amy would probably know that.) On to Day Of The Moon- when Amy tells the Doctor she isn’t pregnant, she sounds neither particularly sad nor happy. She only sounds a little anxious when talking about the possible effects of TARDIS travel on a pregnancy- this was clearly something that was weighing on her mind.
Her conversation with Rory is interesting:
RORY I’m a nurse, I’m good with pregnancy.
AMY Not, as it turns out, that good.
Meaning either that a) Rory can’t be that good or he would have noticed earlier she was pregnant, or b) Rory isn’t good enough to handle a TARDIS, time-head pregnancy. I think she was worried about giving birth, worried about what the child would be…
It’s rather hard to forgive the Doctor for knowing exactly (after a point) what was going on with Amy and not telling her. Had he sat her down and told her, “Your mind is in a Flesh avatar, your actual body is elsewhere, and it’s pregnant” -would that have been so hard? Pregnant women should always be given all the information, and Amy wasn’t.
Doctor Who is always going to have difficulty with this stuff because it’s a children’s show- they’ll never show anyone considering an abortion, for starters. (Although by all means, prove me wrong…) And we know nothing about the night River was concieved- did the Ponds choose not to use contraception, did whatever they used just fail…? We’ll never be told anything other then “River was concieved on the bunkbed ladder”, which makes me think that Moffat et al didn’t really think about it. This quote rather confirms that-
“If you’re a married couple and you don’t have a kid, you’re just dating. You think you’re married, but you’re just dating.”
(Oh God, I hate that quote.) So yeah, Moffat seems like the type who wouldn’t consider the things women consider, about pregnancy- am I in the right place in my life, to have a baby? (Amy would, I imagine, have liked the idea of her baby calling the TARDIS home- of her, Rory and the Doctor looking after it while also travelling the galaxy) Will the baby be born healthy? (She considered this- and she was right in that River wasn’t completely human.) Will I always be able to look after it, will pregnancy take a toll on my body, what are my options for where and how I give birth? All questions Amy didn’t get to answer. And what happened to her is really horrific when you think about it (which children watching the show won’t do, but we did)- Madame Kovarian must have undressed her, while she was unconcious. Blegh.
When Amy actually has Melody, she’s nothing but loving towards her. She’s nothing but loving towards River, too. I just wish we had known for certain, you know? That she wanted to be a mum in the first place. I’m sure she did, but…
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