Project: MOMS ON MARS

As a comic artist-- one who specializes in sex education and autobiographical stories- I was honestly confused when two scientists approached me to design functional clothing for pregnant people to wear on Mars. 

What?

Never one to let my lack of experience or knowledge hold me back from getting involved, obviously I said YES. Kelly Weinersmith and Cat Bohannon, it turns out, were figuring out how to facilitate pregnancy and post-partum on the big red planet and decided to share their findings via a real life Moms on Mars fashion show at MIT. Fortunately, this was a purely conceptual show, the designs didn't need to actually for reals work, they just needed to represent what the real solutions might look like. Soooooo, I'd get to just have fun and somebody else would make the prototype that doesn't need to actually work? I'M IN.

They showed me their research on the various issues a pregnant/post-partum body would have to navigate while on a planet inhospitable to life. Stuff like morning sickness, bleeding, mental health, mastitis, incontinence, and a host of other challenges that Earth-bound preggos already have to deal with in normal gravity and ample oxygen.

My task was urine collection.

 This was when I learned that pregnant horse urine has some ingredient in it that increases the odds of a human successfully getting pregnant and it's commonly utilized during IVF treatments. As it stands, rocketing pregnant horses for years through space just isn't a priority right now (boooo) so the next best substitute would be to collect the human pee of our Mars-bound pregnant astronauts who are already there and creating a milder dose of that hormone.

 Rather than reinvent the wheel (The... pee-l?), I dove into my own research on the urine collection tools that already exist. Turns out this is a well-established market! With a better understanding of the kind of device that would be needed for this task, I then brainstormed how to create clothing that would support it to keep everything in place.

In my primary design, the device itself is tucked up against/in the person's vulva inside their pants, and then the pee tube would exit through a hole in the pants to come outside. The tube is held in place down the length of the person's leg with velcro'd fabric strips that cover it, guiding it down to the pee pouch pocket by the person's ankle.

This design made the most sense to me, but I also sketched up a few other variants, just to provide some choices for my clients.  

Fortunately, they preferred my favorite design too, so I went ahead and finalized it.

Weinersmith and Bohannon then connected me with Lina Putman, a professional sewist with experience making costumes. She made some tweaks and...

Lookit that! My pee pants are freakin' REAL. I'm so stunned to see these things actually existing, being worn by Kate Villenova and photographed by Christopher Scalzi. Like. Dang. What?

 And then they got worn in a friggin' fashion show???? (Model: Eve Rachel Meltzer)

Oh, right, I named them Number One Cargo Pants, because... "Number One", you know?

Yeah.

You know.

So many thank yous to Weinersmith and Bohannon for reaching out to me and opening my eyes up to the realities of being pregnant on Mars-- I can now make an informed decision knowing that I do not ever want to be with child on this or any other planet.

----------------------------

Post Script:

After I started working with them, I looked up both of their respective books on the subject of Mars and pregnancy and honestly they're super interesting! I definitely encourage you guys to check out:

  ● A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought this Through? by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith 

and

 ● Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution by Cat Bohannon