There’s a level of care people often take around a pregnant person. They want to ensure no one is hurt, and the baby is fine.
So when Redditor TFTerrible decided to try and avoid possibly hurting a pregnant woman, the original poster (OP) found themselves on the receiving end of an insult and being kicked out of their gym.
OP isn’t so sure they were wrong, and decided to ask Reddit’s “Am I the A**hole” (AITA) about their situation.
Were they wrong to avoid playing with a pregnant woman?
“AITA for not wanting to play volleyball with a heavily pregnant woman?”
OP explained the situation that led to their query.
“There was a volleyball night at one of our local gyms. It’s competitive, not outrageous or anything, but people know what they are doing and there are some heavy hitters there.”
“There was a woman there, 34-weeks pregnant, who the gym allowed in. Now I understand that volleyball isn’t football or rugby, but you can easily knock into other people in the middle of a play or make incidental contact, lots of times which ends up with someone falling over.”
“I don’t want to be responsible for some woman’s miscarriage on the damn volleyball court, so I refused to play with or against her. This was easier in the beginning when there were a lot of people, but it got called out near the middle when the numbers made it obvious something was up so I explained my hesitation.”
“The woman immediately got super heated, went and got the guy running the night, I was asked to leave, and was actually called an a**hole by the pregnant lady who said she had a right to be out there also.”
After their post, OP updated with a little clarification on the specifics of their worry with volleyball.
“Edit/Clarification:”
“Instead of responding over and over to people claiming that volleyball is not a contact sport, I just wanted to put it up here.”
“Again, no it isn’t football, but you do regularly come into aggressive contact with other players, especially in these open gym scenarios where semi-competent athletes have varying degrees of body awareness and control.”
“No, you shouldn’t be colliding every play, but running into your teammate is not by any means uncommon.”
OP is certain they did nothing wrong. They didn’t want to prevent the woman from playing, but felt uncomfortable playing with her themselves.
Redditors judged whether OP was wrong to refuse to play by including one of the following in their response:
- NTA – Not the A**hole
- YTA – You’re the A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everybody Sucks Here
Maybe the woman’s doctor said she was fine to play the sport, but volleyball can still get physical. OP was uncomfortable playing, and merely requested they be left out of it.
On the other hand, the woman got OP kicked out of the gym just because they were uncomfortable.
Because of this, the board voted that OP was NTA.
“Yes, she has every right to be there, but you have every right to be concerned about playing volleyball with a woman who is 8 months pregnant. That would have alarmed me as well.”
“NTA” – SimplySam4210
“NTA. Yes, she had a right to be there. No, she is not entitled to having you or anyone else as an opponent.”
“Like, yeah, the risk of injury to the baby is there. If she’s willing to take that risk, that’s on her. But she doesn’t get to involve you in that risk against your will.”
“Especially since who knows who she’ll try to sue if something does happen.” – N_Who
“Ding, ding, ding. He can’t force her not to play. She, by that same token, can’t force him to play against her. Fair is fair.” – No-Row7553
“NTA. It’s as much your choice to decide whether or not you’re comfortable playing against her as it is hers to decide whether or not she wants to play.”
“If your wanting to decide whom you play against is incompatible with the tournament format, then it’s also fine for them to ask you to leave, but it sounds like they could have been nicer about it.” – biCamelKase
That said, some commenters explained their own experience with pregnancy and sports. It was their own choice to play, and their teammates chose to play with them.
But in the end, the fact that everyone involved said ‘yes’ made it so different.
“Just my point of view as someone who continued to play sports while heavily pregnant. I played basketball up until the week before my water broke.”
“The people I played against definitely used more caution but they still accepted playing with me for many reasons but the main one being that it was my decision to want to play.”
“I don’t necessarily think yta as in it should also be your choice to not want to risk accidentally injuring her but she knew the risks and made the choice for herself.”
“I think your best bet would have spoken to her yourself with your concerns of why YOU don’t want to play with or against her but also should have considered just trying to be a little more cautious.”
“To each their own. I still stand by my decision I don’t think you’re necessarily TA here but you could have went about it differently.” – Happy_Zucchini_3953
“Thank you. I appreciate the point of view.” – TFTerrible (OP)
“Thank you! I played moderately competitive volleyball up until 4 months, then COVID happened so we all had to stop.”
“I would have kept playing until my doctor told me I had to stop. I assumed the risk and understood that I couldn’t physically do some things (like diving) and needed increased court awareness to prevent teammate collisions but having played and coached for years it was completely a non-issue.”
“It’s up to this lady and her doctor to decide if volleyball is safe for her, no one else’s opinion matters.” – Jmh072920
OP came back to provide another update to clarify a few things they believe and thank the board for their support.
“This seemed to have blown up over night. Allow me to clarify a few things.”
- “To the armchair psychologists trying desperately to use the word ‘allow’ as some sort of gotcha statement that reveals my deep-seated misogyny and desire to control women’s bodies: get a grip.”
- “Miscarriage was the wrong word considering how far along she is in pregnancy. I learned something new today about terminology, so thank you to those who pointed it out.”
- “‘iT’s BeTwEeN hEr AnD hEr DoCtOr’ There are certain common sense things that don’t take a medical degree to know is a bad idea when heavily pregnant. Even if I was a doctor, you all would say ‘but you’re not HER doctor’, and if I was her doctor, you’d say ‘she knows her body better than you anyway!’ As we can see with these comments, turns out a lot of people don’t know sh** about volleyball, gyms, or physical exercise in general. Shocking on Reddit, I know.”
- “Speaking of medical resources, I am still waiting for someone to provide one that says that contact sports in the third trimester are an acceptable form of prenatal exercise.”
- “Thank you for the support, it feels good to be pretty definitely NTA.”