Bigger By The Belly

We've moved!!!

2010-04-20T13:34:00.001-07:00

To our new secret location! Please follow us there.

If you didn't get the URL and you want it, please email me at babechilla@gmail.com and I'll be happy to send it over!!

Breastfeeding from the world of a 2 week old mother....

2010-04-10T14:23:00.000-07:00

Ok so here is the deal, the problem I see with breastfeeding is the complete lack of knowledge most of us have about it. Maybe not most of us, but at least me.

When I was pregnant I assumed of course, like many other women, that I would breastfeed with no issue. I never really put any thought into the pros and cons of breast over formula feeding, and admittedly even now I haven't done the research necessary to effectively comment on either method. However, I know the drill. I know the benefits of giving your baby the boobie juice, and why so many of us just blindly enter motherhood with the assumption that we'll be feeding our babes from the very body they were created and grown inside of. I attended a child birth class, which included 3 hours on breastfeeding and walked out of there thinking "obviously" and never thought any further.

And herein lies the problem. I, like many, assumed breastfeeding was a no brainer and I for one, was wrong. At least I was wrong for myself.

The thing is, I do not recall anyone at anytime ever telling me that I would need to have my child attached to my body for at LEAST 6 hours of every day, or in the case of my child closer to 9. I don't remember hearing about latching troubles, or the fact that those first few weeks would be excruciating while your nipples toughened up. I don't think anyone talked much to me about bleeding nipples, or rock hard breasts that shy away from the delicate shower spray. And I definitely know no one told me about the guilt, stress and fatigue 1 bad breastfeeding day would create.

Like I said, I went to 3 hours of breastfeeding class. I sat in a poorly lit community centre room, with photos circa 1967 spread across the walls of latched on chubby babies sucking happily from their mothers breast. Me, the hubs and 14 other sweaty soon to be families crammed into this room, to be enlightened about this thing they call breastfeeding. I listened to a hairy, crunchy woman excitedly detail every benefit of the boobie juice to us, while highlighting the bonding and loveyness that come from such an amazing time. I held a 4 ounce doll to my clothed breast, a doll who didn't move and didn't cry and didn't have a mind or insatiable hunger of her own, and practiced the different holds. I watched a video of 3 hour old babes bobbing their way over to their mothers breast and latching on like champs, just like that (I am now convinced they filmed 10,000 babies to get those 8 to do that so effortlessly, and just neglected to mention that part). I played a game in which we put a series of photos in order from start to finish, showing a successful feed. I got a pamphlet which showed me the holds again, and further reiterated why I am only a good mother if I feed from the breast.

That was all well and good. At 37 weeks pregnant, perhaps that was all I could handle, but the class was seriously misleading. What it didn't tell me was the challenge of getting a dopey newborn to open her mouth wide enough for me to shove my cantaloupe sized breast into it. It didn't talk too much about how to get a good latch, just briefly showed what one looked like...and that shit isn't easy my friends. They told me how if done properly, breastfeeding doesn't hurt, but they didn't tell me what to do when it hurt like someone was holding a hot fire poker against my nipple. They told me to buy nipple cream, in case my nipples cracked but they didn't tell me that by crack they may mean bleed so heavily it would cause my 5 day old baby to vomit green chunks (of partially digested blood, I later learned), and send us on a trip through the emergency room.

My point is this - those of us who choose and are able to feed from the breast need more than just support in the form of "it's good for your baby and your wallet", and more even than all the support we so desperately need to feed without ridicule in public. We need reality. We need lactation people at the hospital to come for a visit and show us what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong. Not just burnt out nurses who handle babies like pot roasts, latch them for you and move on. We need to hear how hard it is in the beginning, and how absolutely devastating it will feel when things aren't going the way they are "supposed to". We need to hear that breastfeeding a baby is a serious time commitment, which lasts around the clock and sometimes seems like it will never end.

I am infinitely lucky to be supported by an AMAZING group of people - men and women, on Twitter and through this blog who have been there with me, at 3am, when I'm crying and screaming and needing help, but not everyone has that. I've got friends who have chosen to formula feed for various reasons, from convenience through to a sheer and painful inability to produce enough milk, and I'm not going to lie lately, I've been a little envious. I shouldn't be I know it's not an easy choice, but I've got milk and a kid who wants to non-stop eat, so to me I have less reason to consider formula. I know I can make the switch at any time I like, and I would be lying if I said I hadn't considered it. But I'm stubborn, and poor and I truly do believe in the benefits of breast milk.

I've committed to 6 months, and I'm learning that I'll need to take that 1 day at a time. It isn't easy, and it isn't always hard but when your breasts are aching, your baby is fighting you and you have not slept more than a total of 6 hours in the last 15 days, things just seem impossible. When your baby screams at you in hunger, but refuses to latch on and looks at your with desperation, it seems like you will surely go crazy before you reach 6 weeks, let alone 6 months. When you sit lonely in the dark, trying to rationalize with a 2 week old infant that if she eats she can sleep, and if she sleeps she will feel better, makes you question if the craziness started around 6 days.

So to all of you who have fought the breastfeeding battle and won, I commend you. You are my inspiration and I thank you for your support. I think you are super women who have come through this challenge and truly done something wonderful for your children. I had no idea how hard it was, NO idea. I really thought I'd just put her on the boob and away we'd go. I want it to be easy, but right now it's still a struggle. My stubborn nature will ensure I keep on keeping on, at least a little bit longer. And I hope I am able to join you on the other side of this insanity as a successful breast feeder.

That said, to those of you who have formula fed out of necessity or sanity sake, I respect and commend you as well. Because I, like Mandy am a fan of feeding babies. And I don't think formula is evil. My niece and my BFF's daughter were both fed formula and are both two of the raddest kids EVER. I know now more than ever how hard breast feeding is, and like I said, I'm one of the lucky ones that this works for. I cannot imagine where I'd be if I had inverted nipples or a low supply or any of the other many things that plague many a breast feeding wanna be. Actually, that's not true, I know where I'd be. I'd be locked up somewhere with padded walls, crying over my inadequacy and feeling like a horrible person. And not because I should, but just because that it was happens more times than not.

So that's my piece on breastfeeding, from a 2 week veteran. Hardly as profound as what The Feminist Breeder posted, which broke the internets and was reposted, tweeted and Facebooked linked an unprecedented amount of times. Nor is it as heartfelt, candid and lets face it cute as that of Miss Mandy, who really just wants us to feed our babies and stop arguing about it. It's not even as Switzerland as Jill from Baby Rabies response to the above two ladies. But it's real, and it's coming from a new mom who is reeling and overwhelmed by all the insanity of late. And I hope it helps the rest of you mommy's to be know that it is effing HARD and you will feel like quitting, but if you want to do it, and you have your own reasons for it, you can! And if you don't want to do it or you simply cannot, then don't. And do not spend 1 minute feeling guilty about it, because it really won't get you anywhere and us new mommies? We have enough guilt about everything else without adding to it.

(As an aside, as I wrote this post this morning there was a knock on my door. And the hubs came back up the stairs with a small case, 6 cans, of Enfamil. Which the post man delivered especially for me. No pressure though, cause at 4am when the nips be burning and the babe be crying, I won't be tempted to just give it a shot).

The 3pm Mother vs. The 3am Mother

2010-04-06T17:18:00.000-07:00

My darling daughter is 2 weeks today, and I feel the fog starting to lift. I know I am supposed to post a big long poetic piece about how in love I am with her. I know I'm supposed to talk about the sparkle in her eye, how warm and fuzzy she is and how totally in love I am. I know I'm supposed to be beaming with new mother pride, viewing the world through rose tinted glasses and reveling in every poop that comes rocketing out of my daughters soft little cutesy bum.

And you know what? I am. I am so much in love with Everly it almost hurts. I cannot stop kissing her little face or staring at her while she sleeps. Even when I should be sleeping in the night, I get up to make sure she's breathing, and just to stare at her in wonderment. I cannot believe that only 2 short weeks ago, she was that faceless body that shook my belly all night long and made me have to pee every 15 mins. I cannot believe that she came from me and the hubs, that I grew that person from 2 pieces of DNA to a whole human, that she is part of us. I love her and I cannot get enough out of every single moment we spend together. She changes a bit every day and I feel as though time is already moving too fast. It really does happen, this instant love and I could not be more proud of my little girl. The love I feel for this child has shown me a kind of love I did not know existed, and my heart feels bigger and my life fuller just for having known her.

All of that said, there is a dark side to the first few weeks of motherhood that I am sure everyone experiences. And maybe I've ignored the warnings, maybe I didn't think they would happen to me, maybe I thought people over exaggerated. Or maybe, most new mothers out there experience what I have just gone through and the guilt and shame of the situation keeps them from speaking out or being honest.

It sounds like I going to confess a bunch of crazy thoughts full or rage and anxiety that I need to be medicated for. And I'm not. I have not felt the least bit angry this entire time, and at no point have I worried about my mental health or the safety of my child in my care. I have however sat, alone in the dark, while the hubs sleeps soundly, the baby fights me for a piece of the boob and I sob uncontrollably over her, tears streaking down and staining her precious new little head.

It's new mommy guilt and it hurts. I am sure this is equal parts sleep deprivation and hormonal imbalance, but as you're living it, you cannot rationalize. It's amazing how different 3pm can feel versus 3am. At 3pm, I am confident, I am with it, I am changing my daughter, she is eating like a champ and we're totally in a groove. At 3pm I am happy. I am beyond delighted with my new life and I can't wait to take my daughter out to experience the world. But at 3am, it is dark. I am alone and things are infinitely harder. It is at this time that the sleep deprivation has killed my ability to be rational. It's this time of the night, where my darling is crying out of hunger, but will not WILL NOT just latch on and eat, even though she's done it 15 times (literally) before that very same day. It's around this time where the pain in my back rivals the pain in my breasts and I wonder how people do this. It's around this time I'm on Twitter, screaming profanities and thankfully being talked down from the ledge by a collection of other mommy's doing the same thing.

This new mommy routine causes my chest to fill with tension and anxiety at 3am, to feel like I could scream, to look at my daughter and BEG her to just EAT like she's done so many times before. And this kicks in the guilt, which causes the tears, which exacerbates the guilt even further. How can I honestly expect my baby to do what I want, what I need? Life is about her now, and she deserves a kind mother, a patient mother, a mother who understands that she does not understand. And at 3pm, I am so that mother. We joke, I call her silly names and tell her she's being a goof when she's so busy cramming her hands in her mouth and screaming that I cannot get the boob in there. But the 3am mother, that's the one who feels like she failed. Who wonders what is wrong with her for being frustrated with a baby who is so perfectly innocent, who cries as her child eats and her husband sleeps.

The days spent in the hospital were completely sleepless. The hubs and I traded off 2 hours at a time through the night, but between the uncomfortable beds, my surgery, hospital staff coming in every hour to check us and tell us not to sleep with the baby in our beds, the heat in that place and the fear our daughter might just forget to breathe, we did not sleep. For 55 hours I laid trapped in that room, no window to the outside, not sleeping, not knowing what to do with this life form I was now responsible for. This does not set anyone up for having a good time when you get home.

And coming home from the hospital is the biggest shock I've ever had. Suddenly I am in my home, in a familiar place with an unfamiliar face. I'd done all the reading about the pregnancy, I was obsessive about my stats and literature. I read and studied up on labour and delivery for so long I bet I'd make a kick ass doula. I even researched enough on c-sections to be prepared to do the incision on my own, but I did not prepare myself to arrive home from the hospital. It was both terrifying and exhilarating. When we got home, I simply looked at my husband and said "now what?" And neither of us knew. And then the first night happened, where we couldn't sleep, where the baby wouldn't stop crying because she was hungry and where I could not get her to latch or eat. And so began the tears.

Breastfeeding is by far one of the most challenging things I've done in my life. It hurts, it's difficult to hold her properly or to get her to latch on and stay on. I don't know if she's getting enough, if she's in the right position, if she's enjoying the bonding we're supposed to be having. It makes your mind swim with thoughts of failure. Am I doing this right? They say this shouldn't hurt? Aren't I supposed to enjoy this? How much longer is she going to feed for? What kind of mother rushes her child? At no point in my childbirth class did they touch on the stress and fatigue that comes from breastfeeding, or the innumerable ways you can fail at it. At no point did they tell me that being unable to properly nourish my child would feel like a ton of bricks crushing my chest, would make me want to scream out loud, would make me feel like less of a woman. And do you want to know what's scary? I'm not even really having that hard of a time in the grand scheme of things. I mean, it SEEMS hard to me, but I've got milk, my baby can latch 98% of the time and she is gaining weight like a champ. So if I feel this way, I cannot imagine what the women with real challenges feel like. Those like my sister, whose milk refused to come in, who spent hours pumping or trying to feed with no success. I think about her often when it's late and I cannot calm the stress I have over it. And I don't envy the decision she had to make to move onto formula, though I respect it more now that I ever could before. Sometimes you've got to do what's best for you and your child, and that includes feeding them without going completely crazy in the process.

And this is not the only challenge. When my daughter cries my heart breaks. I must have cried uncontrollably in the hospital at least 3 times when they came in to check her vitals, prick her heel or otherwise harass her and she cried. It hurts so much when I know she's hurting, and my eyes leak just as much as my nipples when she cries (yes, this really DOES happen). The helplessness that I felt the first few times she really cried is beyond anything I've ever felt. I wanted to comfort her, to make it all better, to stop the crying so I knew she felt safe, but you know what? In those first few days, your baby is still a stranger. You've carried her for 9 months, but it's been on your terms and you never had to hear her cry. In all the time she was in the womb, I assumed she was a happy little girl, and never felt the pain of knowing she wasn't. Thankfully, this is getting easier. She still cries, but she does it every time I change her, or she wakes up, or she decides she is bored and I'm getting much better at scooping her up and solving the problem than I used to be. I'm learning as much about her as she is about me, and our relationship is starting to work. But this is only in the last 2 days, before that it was still so overwhelming and still had me wondering what I was going to do.

Another thing I didn't anticipate was having a super zen husband, who could keep it together when I was losing it. This is a blessing beyond blessings. Partly it's because he sleeps more than I do, so his sleep deprivation isn't causing him to go as crazy. And partly he's not fighting the breastfeeding fight so the patience he has is better saved for other things, like those DAMN sleeper snaps you just CANNOT get done up properly when your eyes are burning and your kid is screaming and squirming. I never thought I'd have a moment in my life where I sat, crying helplessly as my husband soothed the child I once carried for 9 months. And this is another mommy guilt instigator.

Over the last 2 weeks things have gotten infinitely easier. We've all started to get to know each other. My husband is no longer a husband, but a father. I am no longer a wife, but a mother and our baby is no longer an internal human but a real live person, with a personality all her own.

I am enjoying the journey, it's rewarding and now that I am getting some confidence in my skills, it's getting better. Parts of it are harder than I thought, and parts of it are so much more wonderful than I could have imagined. But this is 3pm mom speaking. When 3am mom comes out, things get difficult and sometimes the tears flow. I am getting used to it though, and trying not to be so hard on myself. My friends, both real life and online, have helped me through this time. I am slowly trying to move past the guilt feelings and realize this is normal, that everyone must go through this, and that most of all, my daughter will never remember that I cried over her sweet little head over these first few days.

So to all mothers, new or old, give yourself a break. We're truly doing the best we can, and the pressure to be a stepford wife and the guilt you feel for needing a break doesn't help. I am telling this to myself as much as anyone else.

Now back to my silly baby who is cramming her fists into her mouth with such voracity, you'd never know she's already eaten a total of 15 times since midnight, for an astounding 4 hours and 27 minutes (thank-you iPhone app for your tracking awesomeness!)

Welcome to Mommyhood!

2010-03-27T20:27:00.000-07:00

What a strange and unusual week it's been. It's been the most wonderful, more emotional and most exhilarating, and most exhausting 5 day stretch of my life. I'm so happy, I've felt so up and so down. I've had amazing successes and the crushing feeling of failure. I've had to so quickly learn a new kind of patience. I've had to succumb to the inability to control everything. I've had to realize that everyone is learning here and not instinctually just knowing how to be a mother doesn't not mean I cannot do it. Coming home from the hospital is a shock, and then you have to just learn as you go.

There is obviously a long story about our birth, the c-section, the recovery and the coming home. I want to share it and I will but right now is a small quiet moment and all I want to do is watch my daughter sleep and be.

I'm having the best time ever, and I cannot believe I have the most beautiful little daughter. And I have her almost all to myself.

Until I'm back with the rest of the story, here are some photos of our new addition Everly Delilah:

We're having a baby....TOMORROW!!!

2010-03-22T11:31:00.000-07:00

Yes, tomorrow. I got a phone call this morning from the crazy receptionist at my OBGYN's office and we're scheduled for our c-section tomorrow!! (as an aside, the crazy receptionist really is crazy. Her name is Saffron and she multi-tasks like no one I've ever seen before. I've had the birth date of my daughter in the hands of a crazy lady who is named after a spice for the last few weeks).

The appointment is at 11am, so we need to be at the hospital at 9am.

I am scared, I am excited, I am all sorts of things. I don't know what to do with myself.

This is a short post, I just wanted to let you all know why I may be missing in blog land for awhile. Hopefully when I come back, we will have moved to our new URL (you can email me for that at babechilla@gmail.com).

I will be updating on Twitter when I can, if you want to keep up!

And for fun, here is my 39 week belly shot (I am SO glad that I didn't get any stretch marks, so that my scar can shine alone in all it's glory, ugh).

Baby Girls Red and Aqua Nursery

2010-03-21T11:54:00.000-07:00

My nursery looks so much better than I ever could have imagined! I REALLY wish I was capable of taking even half decent photos because this room deserves my better than my photo skills but, here it is:

I'm not sure about my mobile? Is it too much?

Our "no closet" solution. Also known as the shelf that tried to ruin my life:

Books, blankets and other random things are well hidden in here :D

Dresser/change table, full of cloth diapers and a million tiny baby clothes :D

View from her crib. The picture is level, the room/ceiling is not.

Our awesome light!!
On:

Off:

Just another view:

Up close of our Vinyl Birds over the crib:

I need to tidy this up a little bit, I think I need some baskets.

Her view (ti's cloudy but there are mountains):

Are you ready?

2010-03-20T10:30:00.000-07:00

Suddenly last night, I got this overwhelming need to meet my baby. I don't know what it was. I've been feeling cautiously optimistic the entire time I've been pregnant. I know for a fact I am going to love her with every ounce of my soul and not one part of me has any regret or hesitation about becoming a mother. That said, this whole process is still scary as hell and the idea that I will soon be solely responsible for a precious new life can give me a little anxiety.

People ask you the same questions when you're pregnant, especially at this stage. They ask you how you're feeling (and for some reason 'fine' is not a satisfactory answer, because if you don't elaborate, you are then asked how you are sleeping, if you've got energy and if your back is sore, if your breasts are sore ). They ask you if you're excited (nah, whatever, it's just A BABY I HAVE GROWN FOR 10 MONTHS YO!), and they ask you if you are ready.

That last question has admittedly been hard for me, and for the hubs. He gets away with it as new dad jitters, and people tend not to push him for fear of making him feel bad or awkward. I, on the other hand, am expected to perform some sort or preggo cartwheeling miracle, complete with pompoms and the shrill voice of a high school cheerleader - "I AM READY. R.E.A.D.Y. READY!!!!" And if I don't, I get the sympathetic side glance, with the "you'll do just fine" chaser.

I know I will do just fine. I am confident that the hubs and I will not be the first couple in the history of the world to simply implode from an inability to handle our new life. Sure things will be hard and I will cry when the baby won't latch on but is screaming from hunger and he can't help me so he get's frustrated and all we want is to go back to Saturday nights when the biggest problem was that I had to pee and the line up for $0.99 pizza was 20 mins long. I know things are about to change so epically that there is no way for us to fully be prepared for it. And I also know that my little sister, my BFF and countless other friends have managed this process, and all of them still have all their hair.

What is hard to answer, or at least has been, is 'ready' part of the question. Not because I am not ready, but because who is ever ready? And what the hell is ready? Is it having enough diapers? Is it having no fear (because then honestly, no ones ever ready)? Is it giving up all selfishness? What is ready? Sure I tried for 14 months to make this human. Sure I've had the last 35 weeks to wrap my head around it. Sure we've bought every. single. baby. item. EVER. And sure, putting my shoes on without a head in my ribs will be a welcome change, but to say I'm ready would be a lie.

I am not ready to share her with the world at all. She has been with me, experiencing every up and down I've had for the better part of a year. I was the first person to know what it felt like when she moved, and the first person to feel her hiccup. I know what it's like to get a punch to the cervix by a frustrated little girl who just wants to flip around (her hands are under her butt in this breech position, so my cervix is still ripe for the kicking). I know when she is awake and when she is asleep, and I know that she is safe. There is no risk of her falling to the floor, or getting a cold. She's safely living in my body, and to date, caring for her only requires I care for myself. And that I got the hang of over the last 29 years.

I've just been feeling this sense of apprehension about having a real live baby, in my house, that I am responsible for 100% of the time. And I am pretty sure this is all normal. Then last night, a weight lifted and all I can think about now is holding her (but just me, I'm still not ready to share).

I could take this as some sort of cosmic sign that she is on her way shortly. That this calm that has come over me is her way of signalling she is also ready, and that it's ok to take the next c-section appointment that comes my way, instead of running screaming in the other direction. I could assume this means labour is imminent shortly, and that I should stay close to home. I could take comfort in the fact that I got here before she did, and know everything will work out for the best. Or, I could be honest and realize that this feeling stems from jealousy over having a few of my internet friends recently have their babies, and me wanting mine too!

I am actually pretty sure it's a combination of factors, one of which is certainly the jealousy. The good news is, I'm not getting impatient yet, I am just getting more and more excited. And I think this is a good way to be, after having felt the crazy mix of emotions as of late. I am over the loss of my natural vaginal birth experience, and am prepared to kick c-section ass. I am ready to meet my darling daughter, set my eyes on her for the first time and hopefully not be too drug induced to remember. I am ready to look at my husband, and give this child the name she will carry for her entire life. I am ready to be a mom, and see what kind of craziness that brings.

So if you need me, I'll be sitting over here, tapping my fingers and waiting :D

So far, I've got a dog but not a baby....

2010-03-18T00:14:00.000-07:00

Alright, let's get back to having our eyes on the prize here people...in less than a week (ok well the exact time is STILL undetermined but, we'll assume) this baby will be here. In my ARMS, relying 100% on me to care for her. I will be responsible for someone else's entire life, and that quite frankly it both exciting and terrifying.

Let's think about this from my point of view, remembering of course that I may be certifiably insane. The only other "life" I've ever been solely responsible for maintaining thus far is my little monkey Tuker. Ok, he's a dog but I call him monkey. And I can't say I've always been great at that. Forget for a moment that I revel in the fact that I can feed him for 3 months on only $100, or that on particularly lazy days I forgo walking him in exchange for yelling "go poop" from the porch and hoping he chooses to do it outside and not in. Forget that I throw bacon flavoured treats down the hall so I can sneak out unnoticed every morning, or that I lie CONSTANTLY by telling him I'll be "back in 5 minutes". We can forget that sometimes, I bring him along for the day on errands, so he can sit in the car, in hopes he again, won't poop inside. Also, let's forget that he has no only been saved 1 time from certain drowning death, but 4 different times, for different reasons and NONE of which I've done on my own. Forget all that, and let's look at some of the serious issues my Boston faces.

For one, the dog lacks a certain survival instinct that I can't help but wonder if I should have taught him. Seriously, if left unattended for more than 30 seconds, this dog would be dead. He sees large shiny objects, moving towards him on wheels and thinks he should go play with them. Roller bladers, skateboarders, cars, trucks, bikers, this dog will throw himself in the path of any rolling object, tongue out butt wagging, in hopes of some love. Ai ya. I've seen him put his entire face underwater, trying to get a ball (stick, rock, barnacle) and breath in. Eyes wide open, he dives under, and breathes as usual. And if he's not almost drowning that way, it's because he's jumped into a raging river and it's sweeping him out to sea. And if a bear wandered into my yard with her cubs right now, he's be licking them in the face faster than you can say "THE DOG!". One time, the hubs threw a GIANT piece of driftwood, but it slipped from his hand and instead of the dog moving from it, he watched it as it came at his head and clocked him so hard, he dropped and was actually paralyzed for a moment. He trusts everything and everybody (EXCEPT the sound of fireworks, which makes him put his head under the bed because, you know, if he can't see you he must have gone invisible) with a completely open heart. He loves everything in life, and I've not taught him to fear anything, even the scary stuff.

And beyond all these things, let's think about the fact that just this past January, my dog had the ENTIRE FRONT SET of his teeth REMOVED. Not 1 or 2 teeth, but 6; and the only reason there weren't MORE, is because he'd already lost most of them. How you ask? Well let's see, there are the times at the cabin where he drags giant driftwood 3x his size up the beach, and then proceeds to eat it. And there is his OBSESSION with tug of war, and my husbands obsession with doing parlour tricks with a dog lock jawed on the end of a rope toy - passing him through his legs and over his shoulder. There is also the simple fact that 2 grown adults and a tube of chicken flavoured toothpaste (which is perfectly disgusting by the way) cannot brush the 11 teeth of a 10 pound dog.

Anyway, I realize I will have a baby and not a dog, and that hopefully my child will grow up with a slightly more enhanced sense of reason and comprehension than my fartastic Boston, but it's what I've got for now. And while my dog is fundamentally healthy, overly loved and completely and utterly snuggled beyond all reason and necessity, I still leave him at home alone all the time and only worry he's eating the molding (which he does ALWAYS). While I've managed to keep him alive the last 6 years, I think I could probably have done a better job at raising him to be a good dog. Sure I have regrets about that, but at the end of the day he's a dog and he's cute, and I can always claim he's insane and not take responsibility. With a BABY, I am much more responsible for ensuring she grows up to be a well adjusted, respectful AND respectable little girl, young lady and WOMAN.

I'm being silly, I realize but in all honestly, my dog has been my baby all these years, and soon I'll have a real flesh baby, and I cannot use the things I've learned on him to raise her. Unless of course I want her to hump the arm of unsuspecting strangers and find it acceptable to eat from the garbage if it contains meat remnants (the answer to this is obviously no). I want my dog and baby to be the best of friends, but I need to figure out how to curb his incessant desire to mouth kiss....especially since he's got death breath. And most of all, I need to figure out how to make the dog know he's still my #1 little man, even when the baby is taking up every moment of every day from here on out. Bottom line is, my dog has been my baby so long, I just hope I can quickly make the transition to managing a helpless human, while still caring for him.

Ok seriously, this post just went all sorts of sideways. But it's late, and I've eaten too many peanut butter eggs to know what to do about it. I could go down and hit 'save now' and fix this into some sort of coherent non-sense tomorrow but instead, as a special treat, I'll let you have a sneak preview into my tired and overworked mind.

Enjoy...I suspect there is more insanity of this nature coming post-baby!

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She's having a baby....

2010-03-16T18:19:00.000-07:00

Yup, that's me. I'm having a baby. In fact, my doctor thought I was going to have her tomorrow. Because his completely banana's receptionist (her name is Suffron) called me at 10:00am to inform me that my "surgery" is scheduled for tomorrow at 7:45am.

First of all, please do not refer to the birth of my daughter as surgery. I may have been referring to it as "gutting me" and "cutting her out of me" for the last 2 weeks, but I'm allowed. You are not. And second of all, please give me slightly more than 24 hours NOTICE about said surgery. Not 21.25. And third of all, you're insane and I know you can multi-task like no ones business, but could you pretend to listen to me?

I realize that my baby could, at any point, decide today is the day and we'd be off to the races, but that is OK. This is her birth, so she can dictate the time. But in absence of being afforded that possibility, I will control it and that means keeping her in my womb until the latest possible moment. And the latest possible moment is not 7 entire days before she is DUE! So no, she will not be born at 7:45am tomorrow, despite it being St Patrick's Day, and everyone thinking I should have jumped at that chance. I cancelled that appointment, and asked to be placed BACK on the wait list. She thought I was crazy (along with a few other people in my life) but thankfully obliged. I will now be waiting for a phone call, giving me less than 24 hours, but at least occurring, for my daughters BIRTH on Friday or Monday.

I am feeling much better these days. We met with the midwives this morning, and she was very optimistic about the c-section, and said something I hadn't really thought about properly. She said "no matter how this baby comes into the world, this is still her birth and a moment to be cherished. Whether she is born vaginally, or through an incision, it is her birthday, it is still special and we will still celebrate it". And she is RIGHT! And I am happy to hear that she will be there, doing many things to help this experience be positive, wonderful and exciting.

I also need to give mad props (yes I just said that) to 3 bloggy women who have helped me immensely over the last 3 weeks. I had to explain to the hubs that while he might not GET this whole blog/Twitter world I have found myself living in as of late, he should appreciate it. If not for all of my Twitter friends, and these 3 in particular, I definitely would have wallowed longer in my self pity than I did. I needed someone to help me pull my fat head from my tiny ass. And none of my real life friends have had an experience like this that could empathize and then kick my butt into gear. My real friends are awesome, and have helped me just get through the last weeks on a personal level, but in terms of getting out of my head and learning to keep my eyes on the prize, I need to say THANK-YOU to 3 very special people.

First of all, Mae from Parenting in Progress. She has spent a ridiculous amount of time emailing me, and really making me THINK about all my issues with the c-section process. It's 1 part tough love and 3 parts sincere desire to help me have a wonderful birth experience like she did with her daughter Piper. Due to a medical condition, Mae needed to choose between a c-section for her daughter, or a labour which would potentially leave her blind (to read Mae's story, go here: The Story and then here: The Slice...The Yank ). So while the catalyst for her decision was different than mine, she shares my experience of having to make this choice. And she has done wonders for helping me get over myself. So thank you Mae, because you have certainly stopped the flood of tears I was previously experiencing. And she is the first one to tell me that this birth will be special, no matter how she arrives, and she even beat the midwife to making me realize it. Unfortunately though, the midwife will be with me when Mae cannot, so I needed to also hear it from her.

Then we've got KristiMaristi who is super cute, super awesome and super funny. She not only walked me through HER c-section experience, which she went through for EXACTLY the same reason we are about to go through this one, but she sent me a photo of her little Milo's cute baby butt in the tub which made me laugh and smile on a day I couldn't swallow without the tear bubble popping up. Not to mention she is sending me a baby gift AND watches 16 & Pregnant with me...she's a friend and I'm so happy to have met her....even if it's been only virtually (and one day, it will be IN REAL LIFE).

And last, but certainly not least, is Emmie Bee . I think she is my first official twitter/blog friend! She's the first one to ever find me on Facebook and friend me. And let's not forget, she has hds 3, count them 3 babies via c-section. 2 of them just 2 short weeks ago. Emily helps me by telling me not to take it so seriously, and giving me pep talks, sometimes 140 characters at a time. She's shared her experiences with me, and helped me stop freaking out about major abdominal surgery. She's a friend, who also watches 16 & Preggo with me (and may have introduced me to it?), and who bought baby girl something from baby gap (how DID I get SO LUCKY?). And when I make the trip to see Kristi, it will also be the trip to see Emily. And there will be perfectly round headed babies EVERYWHERE!

I honestly didn't know blogging would ever result in meeting so many wonderful people. I know, everyone says this, but I really wasn't expecting it. And I am so lucky that these 3 women, and many others out there (hopefully you know who you are) have helped me. Because honestly, I don't know where I would have found this kind of support, and I've truly needed it.

Stay tuned for updates on when Baby Chilla will be here....OH and I'm moving to my mommy blog...as soon as the design is ready...I will let all my Google Friends Connect followers know by message, but if you're a lurker who doesn't follow there, and you want to know where you can find it, please email me at babechilla@gmail.com for the URL. I won't be posting it here for my special reasons :D

And since you've read ALL the way down here, I think you should probably give me a click, because I've slipped off page 1 to #28, since I've stopped harassing people while being completely self absorbed this week.......and doesn't my baby deserve to come in on page 1?

Reveling in my non-success.....

2010-03-12T21:51:00.000-08:00

So I've tried a lot of things over the last 2 weeks to get this baby to flip. And although she has yet to flip, I feel proud of all the things I have done. I won't say I failed, because I don't really believe this is a failing or succeeding thing. Sure I tried, and sure she didn't flip, but this isn't a black or white situation. We don't know why she flipped, and in fact many a medical professional have studied this phenomenon and have yet to truly settle on why some kids do this. It could be an issue with my pelvis, it could have been a cord in the way, or she might just be that stubborn. Whatever it was is keeping her locked and loaded into the butt down position, and after 2 weeks of insanity, I need to just settle in and accept that my daughter would like to start her life mooning you all.

So, because I am proud of how hard I've tried to turn my little one, I am going to brag about it to the internets. And I do this not for reassurance, but because I really am happy with what I've tried and I think putting it out there will help me remember that. We've decided that unless she turns, which isn't that likely, we will be having a scheduled c-section....when we don't know, because we're currently on a c-section wait list, if you can believe that. This is probably a whole other post, so I'll save that for Monday; because Monday folks is my first official day of maternity leave. Which is another post of it's own.

But today, I revel in my non-success to boost my confidence, and remind me I did everything in my power to get back to the original birth plan. She was clearly not on board with it, and I refuse to believe she's upside down...I think she's just exercising her individuality already. I can be proud of her for that.

So here is the list of all the things I've done. And while I am not insane, I have been about 1 step from calling in a Voodoo witch doctor for the past 2 weeks. I figure if all these things don't work, maybe that will?

Acupuncture. I've sat through a total of 3 acupuncture appointments, and I have 2 others coming up. Total cost so far - $210. Total cost for all 5 - $350.
Chiropractor. I've been to a total of 3 chiropractic appointments, attempting the Webster Technique, and I've got 2 more coming up. Total cost so far - $145. Total cost for all 5 - $225.
Moxibustion. If you don't know what this is, it's the act of taking a stick of mugwort root, lighting it like a cigar until you get a hot end, and then circling it over the acupuncture points for 15 mins 3 times per day. I told you, I'm 1 step away from calling the voodoo doctor.
Pool Handstands. I've spent 4 evenings, floating around my girlfriends common pool area in my 2 piece swimsuit, doing at minimum 15 handstands per occasion. (I'll give you a moment to picture that, because honestly there isn't much about a 9 month preggo in her tiny pre-preggo bikini doing pool handstands that isn't hilarious). I've tried somersaults (and failed...all I accomplished was water up my nose. Apparently I am no longer 10), I've tried crawling in the pool, and I've tried to cat/cow in the shallow end. I swam laps, I did pelvic tilts, and I even hung upside down off the side of the pool for a few minutes until my bestie got nervous.
Inversions and positions. Holy gawd have I done inversions. Whatever one I can find time for, for as long as I could do it. I've put my butt up on a pillow, I've leaned on my elbows on the floor, with my knees on the couch. I've done the cat-cow all over the house. I've crawled, I've done the knee to chest position. I have all hardwood and my knees and elbows are bruised to shit. I have inverted and positioned myself in every way imaginable. I have not slouched or sat comfortably in 2 weeks. My back aches from my stellar posture. I have exclusively used the yoga ball at work, and all but stopped sitting on the couch in exchange for a nice yoga pose on the floor. I have done every spinning babies move there is, and even made up some of my own for variety.
Pulsatilla. I've tried 200ch pulsatilla for a few days in an attempt to flip this love of mine. This is a naturopathic remedy that was recommended to me somewhere along they way.
Cold Hot Light Music. I've put the cold pack on the top of my fundus, with the heating pad on my pelvic bone. I've run the flashlight all over my lower belly, in hopes of coaxing her down there. Go towards the light bambino, go towards the light. I've played music near my hooha, and had the hubs talk low on my belly. I've done all of this about 15 times.
Baths. I've tried to have baths. Someone told me this might work, so I gave it a shot.
Visualization and connecting with the baby. I've tried to envision her flipping 200 times. I've rubbed my belly and tried to coax her over. I've told her it's ok to flip and get ready to come into the world, and worked on any internal feelings I have about trying to hold her close to my heart. I've laid in the calm quite, and tried to convince her this isn't about me, but her, and that flipping over is in her best interest. I've bribed her with My Little Pony's, I've appealed to her sense of reason, I've promised her the moon.
Prenatal yoga and breathing. Bending, flexing and creating space for my baby to move.
ECV. The big guns. I went in, as you know from my previous post, and had my funny, buddah shaped doctor try to manually turn my baby. It hurt, and I feel bad for doing it to her. But I needed to be sure I tried it all. And this was my final hurrah. The medical attempt, the if all else fails move.

And that's what I've done. I've sat and cried uncontrollably, I've had a relaxing facial, I had a glass of wine and I've talked this out with friends and family, all trying to let go of whatever is holding her back.

Yet, here I sit, with a content, butt down baby who seems ready to stay content for quite some time, and deny us the opportunity to have a natural birth experience together. And I am trying to learn to let that go.

She didn't flip over, so I'm flipping out...

2010-03-08T21:32:00.000-08:00

So the version was horrible, painful and didn't work. They laid me out on a bed, after having me to the hospital 1.5 hours earlier than I needed. The nurse was fantastic, and I was really happy with my care. Too bad that didn't eliminate the pain of the procedure. I knew it wasn't going to be good, and to be honest, it was no worse than I thought. But at the end of the day, it was awful.

I laid on a bed in a small room, and after being monitored for an hour, the doctor (who is awesome) arrived and jumped right in. After a failed IV attempt, where it popped out of my hand vein, and a re-insertion into my arm, we were under way. She was reconfirmed breech for the 47th time, and the doctor talked his resident through the procedure. They flipped the bed, so I was once again upside down (which I have been ALL weekend in the pool, doing handstands in hopes I could help her flip). Then they made a fluid pocket by pressing with enough pressure to make a diamond, directly above my pelvic bone and he began.

At first, we went right, She's been getting herself transverse this entire weekend so I thought it might be a good option. They pushed, the midwife and the hubs rubbed my legs and feet to distract me, and I felt immense pain and pressure in my abdomen. I tried to breathe through it. Closed my eyes and envisioned being on a warm Hawaiian beach with my baby. They told me to relax, and I really thought I was but apparently I was tensing up all my muscles, including the leg ones. I tried to stop, but it wasn't me doing it, it was my body.

Right didn't work. We took a break, they put something in my IV to relax my muscles. I began to feel like a jello version of my former self, and we tried to go left. Left wasn't working. One more shot to the right, because 3rd time is always the charm. Except, it wasn't.

I tried to stay calm. I tried to stay quiet. I tried not to let the tears welling up in my eyes stream down my cheeks, but I failed on all accounts. The doctor simply said "I don't think this is going to work, and I don't think we should keep trying". Fair enough, he is the expert. He is the man who has been called "the breech guru", he is the person I'm putting all my faith and trust into right now. And to be honest, the feeling that my stomach cavity was going to snap off in my body, or that they were going to break my poor sweet child's neck was far too much to bare. I conceded. I gave in. I gave up.

Up I went, back into a flat position, so I could lay for an hour while they monitored contractions and fetal heart rate to make sure they didn't do anything to either of us. Luckily, we are both fine. Her more so than I am. We talked to the midwives, we talked to the nurses, I laid there and waited and then it was time to go. My lovely nurse came back in to let me go, and gave me a rose she'd been given for International Women's Day. She said I was strong and that any decision I made would be the right one. She told me to listen to the baby, and not to feel guilty.

Now I'm at home. Resting. Sitting here pouring over statistics about cord compression and baby brain damage in vaginal breech delivery, and feeling an insane amount of guilt about potentially choosing the c-section route. I am also insanely petrified of the c-section.

I could rationalize being told I didn't have the option for vaginal breech, I could feel ok saying I had a 'medically required C-section', but having to CHOOSE to go this route is killing me.

I don't even know for sure what my hang up is entirely. I don't know WHY I am so adverse to the C/S but I can't feel good about choosing it. And it's making this all too hard.

I feel like I'm not going to be able to bond with her if she comes up via an incision. I feel like I am not going to be able to take care of her or my family after it's over, because I am going to be recovering from 'major abdominal surgery' and that makes me so angry. I take care of everyone here - the husband, the dog, the house and to have to let HIM do everything for my new baby will just drive me insane. Even now, they told me to rest following the version, and as I sit here, him taking care of everything, I want to cry. It's not at all that he's incapable, or disinterested in helping. Quite the opposite. He is keen to take it on (though I'm not sure he gets how much work it'll be, since I don't). But that's my job. I take care of people, I take care of my family and I am certainly the one who should be taking care of my new baby. Me, that's my job. I am the mama and I am supposed to be strong and fix it all.....and if I've been cut open, I really can't.

I'm afraid to be cut open. I am afraid to be awake, while they not only cut me open but remove a human from my body. I am afraid that my body will never be the same. I am a million times more afraid of a C-section than any form of vaginal birth.

But at the same time, there are some parts of this I cannot deny. There are risks of cord prolapse, which could result in my child suffering short-term brain damage, or worse, something permanent like cerebral palsy. And yes, the risks are low, but you know what? So were the chances she'd be breech at this stage, let alone TURN breech at 36 weeks. Odds are not in our favour apparently, and when your child's mental ability and quality of life is at stake, screwing around with probability is not acceptable.

I also need to think about my husband. He's willing and able to support me 100% in what I want to do. However, that's not to say he doesn't have a preference or fear. I know that for him, the pain and stress of watching me go through today was a lot. And that was a short couple of hours, and a relatively innocuous procedure. For him to participate in the birth of his child, when things are so uncertain and he's so nervous will eliminate any joy or gleeful anticipation. What was going to be a journey we took together to bring our daughter into the world, will now be fraught with fear, anxiety and probably terror.

At the end of the day, the birth I wanted, the birth we wanted, is no longer on the table. Of course no matter what, we always faced the chance that our plan would go sideways and things wouldn't end up the way we hoped in terms of our delivery. The difference there is the blissful ignorance going into the labour, which would have allowed us to believe it was possible. We know now that it's not. We cannot labour in the comfort of our home, with the support of the doula, until we're ready to go to the hospital. We cannot use the birth pool to tame the discomfort of the contractions, and I can not opt for minimal internal checks and limited or no monitoring. No, a vaginal breech delivery means heading to the hospital much earlier, and turning the birth into the medical intervention I was so heart set on avoiding. And if I'm going to do that, then perhaps I should just go all the way over to the other side, and consider this a procedure. A means to an end. And then, just maybe I won't feel so traumatized over the thought of what I'm losing, and finally be able to focus on the important part, what I'm gaining - a daughter.

I'm sitting on the fence, not knowing what to do, dying to simply fall off and have the decision made for me. But it's not going to happen. It's time I put on my big girl panties and did what is right, for me and for my family. At the end of the day, the only thing that's important here is the 3 of us. Everyone else's opinions and theory's about what we do to bring her into the world are irrelevant. We need to make a choice, we need to feel good about it, and we need to be prepared to face the consequences, good or bad.

I think when I settle on a decision, I am going to be in a much better head space. I don't tend to do well with uncertainty, and this is not the time to be so confused. The right choice is coming, I just need a little more time to process this all.

When right side up is upside down...

2010-03-04T14:44:00.000-08:00

36.6 weeks into this pregnancy, the hubs and I headed to our midwife appointment...blissfully unaware that things had changed with our baby girl. We sat, we talked, we covered the basics. How am I feeling, were we ready, and hey did you want to have a vaginal swab (GBS test)? Sure, what girl doesn't want a 6 inch swab up her vajay at 9:45am?!?!?!

All that was normal, and then the midwife did the heartbeat and position check, and my heart sort of sunk. Luckily her heart beat was clomping along like a little horsey at 130 bmp, so I knew she was ok. But the midwife was having a hard time verifying position. But hey, she's the student midwife so no problemo, let's get one of the pro's. Problem is, the pro couldn't tell baby girls head from her butt either. Egads!

Now we KNOW for a fact she's been head down for a long time. At 33.6 weeks, we confirmed she was head down. The midwife felt her "nestled perfectly in the pelvis. Head down ready to go". So I am not worried. No baby in their right mind would flip the wrong way this close to their birthday, that would be crazy, and stubborn and just plain difficult. Then again, this is my kid, who is already demonstrating just how much like me she is.

So I go for my "emergency ultrasound" at the most hilarious little clinic. It's in the heart of our Chinatown, on the 2nd floor of perhaps the most confused mall ever. Chinese food, herbs and cell phone providers all in one place... conveniently located next to the medical clinics of Wong and Wong. Whatever I'll take it, they had an appointment for me 2 short hours after the visit with the midwife. My darling friend G joined me, as the hubs was not able to, and waited patiently for me in the waiting room...

I was 100% sure the tiny little woman performing my scan would tell me that lump under my ribs was my kids bony butt and away we'd go. That was right up until she put the doppler on my lump and said "and that's her head".

"Excuse me, pardon, fuk the what, how stupid are you, did your degree come from a Fruit Loops box, you've gotta be wrong you insane women my kid would not flip like that" was sorta what went through my mind. There may have been a few more expletives involved.

As I lay there, choking back tears, sure this woman would not "get' why I was upset, I tried to wrap my head around this thought. My child is heads up, which is actually upside down in fetus world.

We left the appointment, I called the hubs and we stopped to get Chinese food, because really, when in Rome...

Back to the office me and my friend go, and I sit in my office the rest of the day, choking back the tears, whining incessantly on Twitter (but getting AMAZING support) and wondering what went wrong.

I also remembered back to the previous Thursday, when in retrospect is when the baby flipped. At 36 weeks 1 day, in the evening at my BFFs house, my baby flipped out. Literally. I had felt funny all afternoon. I'd been crampy, and feeling a tad on the nauseated side. I was starving by the time we put her daughter to bed and ate our dinner, and I knew something was going on. My belly had jetted out so far for a moment, on the opposite side that she'd ever been, that my bestie even commented. I felt crampy in my legs and even had a hard time walking back to my car when I left. It was certainly strange and I actually thought for a minute or 200 I might be going into labour. But it all went away and I thought nothing more of it. Now I know, that was her pulling a gymnastics move.

I spent the better part of Tuesday night crying uncontrollably. This is equal parts fear and confusion, and 9 month pregnant hormones. It is cruel and unusual punishment that your 10 months of sobriety has to end with a shit show of excess hormones. If a girl ever needed to slam back the better part of a bottle of wine, now is the time. I was just gearing up to get all excited about the arrival of my baby, and she threw me a curve ball. And I've never been a good catch.

I am ashamed to admit I felt a little anger towards her. Not really at her, but I just had this sense of "why NOW?" And I felt slightly less excited about her arrival. Not less excited to have her. I'm still just as excited to hold her in my arms, but I am now not looking forward to potentially going into labour. I am not looking forward to it because I don't want it to come unless she flips. Now there is a whole new sense of fear surrounding her arrival. Not the hopeful curious fear that comes with having no sweet clue what to expect, but a raw fear that exposed a nerve which is now perfectly poised to be struck repeatedly.

I've heard from everyone that no matter what, she will get here and I will love her. And I have no doubt about this. As long as she arrives happy and healthy, I will be ecstatic. I know it could be a lot worse, of course I am SO lucky that she's healthy in there, that she's made it to term and that my pregnancy has been complication free up until now. I know a c-section is not the end of the world, and that my life will not be ruined if I have to go that route. I know that bottom line, the most important thing is that soon, we will be a family of 3. But knowing all of this does not make me any less sad. My rational side is fully aware and happy, but my emotional side feels like I lost something.

There are 2 types of people - the ones who get how I feel and the ones who really don't. And I don't blame the ones who don't, because frankly, what is the big deal? And maybe somewhere the old me, the one that existed before my baby ate my rationality (thanks Mae for letting me know what happened!) agrees with them. It's not a big deal, who cares. I sometimes miss that girl. But let's face it, she was drunk a lot so probably shouldn't be trusted. This me, the one who has poured 9 months of heart and soul into researching birth stories, reading really motivating and empowering books about birth, and meeting with her midwives and doula with the excitement of a little girl getting her first dolly on Christmas, is crushed. I'm crushed because I'm not getting what I wanted, and maybe that is a lesson I should learn here. I think my times of living for me are over sooner than I thought. It's time to start living for my baby. This is not to say I appreciate her position right now, or am willing to concede to it. Just that there is probably a lesson in there somewhere.

All hope is not lost yet though, and this is how I stopped the tears. We've looking into all our options. I spent the better part of Tuesday and Wednesday evening inverted in some fashion or another. I've been trying to convince her that it will be better for HER if she flips. I know she's just a stubborn brat like me, and that is why she is going against the grain. So I need to appeal to her in the right way, in that this decision to flip has nothing to do with me and everything to do with making her life easier. And I've been trying to tell her that. But she's also a fetus, so I've promised her multiple pony's (and neglected to mention I mean of the "my little" kind). I've visited a chiropractor and started the Webster technique with her (2 more next week). This morning, I did an hour's worth of acupuncture and moxibustion. I will repeat this on Tuesday. Tonight I am going to go do handstands in my BFF's pool. I am going to try to keep calm and relaxed and hope that she chooses to flip back. And I'm about to go visit an OBGYN who specializes in both version techniques AND vaginal breech deliveries.If she doesn't flip back, then she wasn't meant to. And I will just have to accept that my kid is that darn special, even from -1 month old.

If it comes down to a C-section being the best and most safe way to bring her into this world, I will opt for it in a heart beat. But I will continue to seek out alternative this, and hope she flips naturally right up until the last milisecond before they cut me open.

Labour's no problem, I've got tattoos...

2010-02-25T11:17:00.000-08:00

No not REALLY? Are you insane? Clearly I don't believe this for one moment, but the thought did cross my mind this week.

We had our doula come for a visit last week, and it was absolutely amazing. We talked about our birth plan, our hopes and fears, our hesitations, and we ended with a relaxation technique that had us both ready to go to bed before she even left. It was really awesome. And as it turns out, I am more of a control freak than once assumed (which is a bit of a scary revelation, because I already KNEW I was a freak in many ways).

When talking about our individual fears, mine all stemmed from losing control. Am I afraid my vag is going to tear from butt hole to clitoris? Sure am I, but that didn't come up once. What did come up is how I'm afraid to pee on my floor, poop in front of the hubs and be totally naked in front of a room full of people, while trying to push a watermelon out a lemon hole (as an aside, when I compare my baby to a watermelon, all I can picture is Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing, with that HUGE melon "uh uh I carried a watermelon". Now, I don't want my baby to be the size of that melon....but I'd take if it Patrick Swayze would come back to life as dear Johnny and teach me how to dance like that...just saying). I'm afraid of being able to let go and make the noises I need to effectively ease this babe from my loins, and I'm afraid that someone will judge me for any of it. I'm not a prude, or uptight in general, but there are a few things I'm less than comfortable with, and naked, sweating, grunting primal activities are tops on that list. I mean, obviously I am 36 weeks pregnant, so things like that have happened before, but this is different. I've said it before, getting this baby in there was a lot more fun than I anticipate getting her out will be.

I am also afraid of being able to ask for help, or relying on other people. Not afraid TO ask for help, afraid of not ALLOWING myself to ask for help. And I'm afraid I won't be able to turn off my mind long enough to realize certain things, like that the beard hairs around the bathroom sink just do not matter. Or that the baby won't notice if I haven't quite figured out which drawer I want her tiny baby socks to go in.

Mostly in labour, I envision myself trying to put the dirty dishes away or getting the doula a drink of water, while having a contraction. I anticipate stressing over the dust bunnies on the floor that the midwife might see, instead of reaching deep down inside and finding the strength to stay focused and breathe my way through the contractions. I suspect I will be seriously needing something, but be too afraid to ask for it, and will try to get it myself. I also suspect that my need to control will lead me right down the path to peeing on my living room floor as I try to make my way to bathroom without asking for help. And then? And then I will have to helplessly watch as some person I met only 8 short months ago wipes my urine from my 100 year old hardwood. And that's how control is going to make me her bitch, and slap me silly.

The good news about all these fears and worries is that the doula assures me, I won't have them. She gave me a lot of insight into the labour process, and how it works. She told me about the chemical changes in your brain that happen, which make you ditch your over thinking parts and access your more primal instincts. And I hope she is right. I will believe she is right, because I can't possibly control everything (I am coming to terms with this, I swear) and if there is one thing I should probably realize, it's that controlling control can only lead to bad things. That's like trying to microwave a microwave, it just won't work.

So what does this all have to do with my tattoos and labour? Absolutely nothing at all. However, all this talking with the doula led to something else, which was her asking me 2 questions:

Have you ever experienced what you would consider a long period of pain or discomfort?
What has been your greatest emotional challenge in life, and how did you deal with it?

Tough.

The first one is pretty simple, and relates to the tattoo comparison. I've never broken a bone or had major surgery (knock on wood) so the ONLY thing I could come up with here, was the tattoo. The doula said this is good, since labour is nothing like a breaking a femur (which by the way, rates right up there with my top fears, after zombie apocalypse and biological warfare). It's not like getting a tattoo either, however, at least with a tattoo it's what you can consider "positive pain" in that, you put yourself in the situation and are looking forward to the end results. Much like labour. Only, last time I checked I didn't get to orgasm before my tattoos so making a baby scores one there.

Of course, with my tattoos (ok let's clarify, I have 1 on my upper back/neck that took about 15 minutes to do, so this does not count. I have one on my lower back, which I got when I was 19 and which took probably 2 hours, so almost counts. And I have 1 in the centre of my back, which took 2 sessions at 3 hours each, so this is the ONLY one I think is relevant in the pain department...and even that's questionable) I knew exactly what I was getting into, how long it would take and what I could expect. And this, I have NO idea. At least with this, the only man involved will be the hubs, and he won't be trying to shave any parts of my back, so that's a bonus.

The second question, well, I'm still trying to answer that one. Funny how it's taken my birth planning to have me realize exactly how great life has been. Not that I've ever taken that for granted. I've always know I was lucky to grow up in a beautiful place, with a wonderful supportive family and only a handful of douchebag "friends" over the years. However, until someone asked me to point out my biggest emotional challenge, I've never considered that I don't really have one. I mean sure, I've had my heartbroken by a parade of fuktards over the years, I've lost grandparents and felt the sadness that comes from watching my parents deal with the loss of their parent. But what's happened to ME that I would consider my greatest emotional challenge is hard to pinpoint. I know that she is asking me this so I can draw strength for it, because the next part of this question was, how did you deal with that. Unfortunately the short answer is drugs (no not cocaine or something, just wine, vodka and marijuana), and that is NOT how I want to deal with this challenge.

So I need to do some more thinking. Uncover something from my past that I believe challenged me, and think about how it was dealt with. Something more substantial then a couple of tattoos. Maybe that time when my pregnancy craving took me to the store for the Vanilla Carmel Latter Hagen Daz, and the store didn't have any....because that my friends, was VERY challenging ;)

**********************************************************************************

Would you BELIEVE they reset our counters on Top Baby Blogs and that it actually HELPED me get onto page 1? I never thought I'd see the top 10 pages, let alone page 1. I've been there all week, and I know I can't hold on forever. But if you like me, even a little bit, or even if you just want to pretend to, or if you realize I've clicked the hell out of all those in the top 1-12 spots and want to thank me, then click below. I don't normally do this sort of shameless plug business, but everyone's doing it, and I would so jump off a bridge if they told me to (again, no not really). Anyway, just click this, that's how you vote. It would be swell. You can even do it twice, if you're that nice!

I'd really love to blog tonight...

2010-02-22T17:11:00.000-08:00

But I will be ass deep in cardboard and vaguely descriptive pictorial Swedish instructions. Also know as assembling IKEA furniture.

As mentioned on Twitter, I expect bloodshed, tears and epic bruising, with a side of curse words, confused facial expressions and screams of frustration.

Hopefully this time, we will only be missing non crucial parts. As opposed to that one time, when we put the dresser together, only to find out our box lacked the actual bottoms to the drawers. In case you are wondering, bottomless drawers are not as fantastic as they sound.

Unless I'm in jail for stabbing someone with a phillips head, I shall return tomorrow. Down a finger nail or two, and somewhat defeated by particle board furniture. However, I will at least be able to hide some of my nursery mess behind overpriced red cupboard doors, and store all the wine I can't drink on our new kitchen cart for the non-kitchen.

Wish me luck. Or at least sanity.

This one time, I was 33.5 weeks preggo, and I let some girl take pictures of me...

2010-02-19T20:04:00.000-08:00

And they turned out like this!!

Tomorrow I am 35 weeks, say WHAT NOW?

2010-02-16T18:07:00.000-08:00

Yes, exactly. How in the hell did that happen? I remember those excruciating first 12 weeks like they were yesterday. And really, it was only 7 weeks since I was 5 weeks 1 day when I peed on the stick that told me we had finally made a baby. And yet NOW, I'm almost 35 weeks?!?!?!?!? That's a mere 5 weeks from due date, and an entire 1 week PAST when my niece arrived. Translation? This baby could technically choose to vacate the ute at ANY TIME NOW.

Ok so I suppose that's always a possibility, but let's think about this for a minute. Some people are keeners. You know, those early rising types who say things like "I just love running at 530 in the morning, it's so calm and peaceful". Yes, of course it is you nutbar, you're the ONLY PERSON ON THE PLANET who willingly got out of bed at that time. Everyone else who is outside, it pretending to be awake, on their way somewhere they don't want to go, frantically looking for coffee. These are the kinds of people who consider "sleeping in" when their internal alarm clock (because these are also the people who don't need an alarm clock because they just "wake up naturally with the sun") has them sleeping past 8:00am on a Sunday. These are the people the hubs hates, and I don't wish to be.

Don't get me wrong. I will cease the day with the best of you, when there is something to be ceased. But I also enjoy those days where my internal clock can wake up, think "fuk fuk fuk I am late for work", then realize it's Saturday and I can roll over for another few hours. I still get up before noon, and generally in the single digit hours. The hubs on the other hand, he's the other end of the spectrum. He get's up in the single digit hours too, but they are not the ones that happen before noon.

Anyway, I digress as always. My point IS, my daughter may well be a keener, and think it's as good a time as any to be born. Carpe Diem and all that jazz. I mean, why not right? I am a go go go type. A never stop moving type. A "I can do it all and a bag of chips" type, who is always 10 seconds away from a completely overwhelmed breakdown, but who generally gets through things flawlessly and in good time. If she's got that streak, that part of her, that raging A-type side, there is nothing to say she won't channel it into a keener mentality, and decide to rocket out of my body ahead of schedule.

I am keenly aware of how not on a schedule a baby is, even from conception. And I realize that this "due date" is an arbitrary timeline put on me, so I have something concrete to obsess over. Obviously due dates are about norms and statistics, but of course, there are standard deviations in everything, and pregnancy is anything by normal. So I know that I am entering the grey area. That period of time where, fewer first time moms go into labour, but many second time and beyond moms do. The time where that pesky back ache or more intense Braxton Hicks may be something a little more serious. The time in which, my baby could decide she wants out. And there would be no reason to try to stop her.

In general, I am not scared of the prospect of having her in my arms. Petrified is probably a better word. Just kidding. While I am nervous about the first few moments of motherhood, I do strongly believe I possess the instincts that will allow me to keep her happy and healthy. And that's really all I can hope for at this point. Well adjusted and highly intelligent I will work out later. But just because I am not afraid does not mean I am prepared.

First of all, I am not DONE with pregnancy. Sure, I had a day last week where my feet swelled up to the size of tree trunks and I thought I may never walk normally again (I am now convinced the pregnancy waddle is not a result of widening hips, but of stumpy feet). Sleeping has started to become hit or miss. I have great sleeps still a lot of the time, but I also have nights where night sweats, bizarro dreams and burning excruciating hip pain join forces with needing to pee bi-hourly, to ensure I get a taste of newborn life in advance of her arrival. And sure, I am getting more and more comments about how huge I am, and the boys at work are starting to feel sorry for me for "carrying all that extra weight around". If only they knew HOW much. And maybe, between 33 weeks and 34 weeks, I gained an astonishing 4.5 POUNDS and almost passed OUT at the number, and have an insane amount of fear about what that scale will say tomorrow.And just perhaps I would enjoy a cold beer with my dinner, or a glass of wine before bed. However, with all these things going on, I am not done with being pregnant. I am still loving every moment of it. Even when she's got, from what I can tell, her big toe pushing out a rib and causing me pain, or she's practicing tai bo on my cervix, I enjoy it. Maybe I enjoy it less at that moment, but I still have not hit that wall of "I AM SO OVER BEING PREGNANT" yet. I attribute this in a large part to the fact I am not 8 months preggo in the summer. Those with summer babies, you've got an entirely different experience on your hands.

Second of all, I am still working. I did this on purpose after friend upon friend shared with me their experience of being 8 days past due, and so insanely bored and frustrated. Taking off from work too early just means that if you DO go passed the illusive due date, you will go fuking bananas. Leaving work at say, 35 weeks, would leave me with a possible 7 weeks off, and no baby to care for, so I've chosen to leave at 37.5. This is great for saving me from that long stretch of anticipation and waiting, but not great for me feeling ready and prepared for her to come. I need to finish training my replacements. Yes, there is an S there because, we have hired 2 people to fill 1 pair of my worky shoes. The same shoes I could have used last week when my stump feet had me calling the hubs to bring me some runners. And I need to mentally separate work me from mom me before she comes. I had NO idea I identified with my job so much before I contemplated leaving it for an ENTIRE YEAR (yes I am SOOOOOOOO lucky to live in Canada!!!), nor did I realize how hard it would be to walk away from all the hard work I've put in, and leave it up to someone else to carry on. So, I need to get to that point, that date I set of March 12, to put my career on hold and enter the world of mom. I need it mentally more than anything. It's a milestone in my mind, and I think it's the only way I can get through this transition with any semblance of sanity.

And finally, I need a little ME time before she comes, so I can be the best mom to her from the moment she arrives. I need to have a little time and space between shelving work me, and becoming mom me, where I can sleep in, wash her clothes, do prenatal yoga and take in my life as I currently know it. It might sound selfish, and maybe it is, but I don't care. I just want to have a breather between the insanity that is my daily work life, and the complete unknown that will become my mom life. I need to take a little time to centre myself, before embarking on a new adventure. I need to clean the floors and prep the foods, and sip a decaf latte at the speed in which it was intended to be enjoyed. I need to hover in that free space, where I almost don't belong anymore.

So no, I am not ready. And hitting 35 weeks is causing me some angst and discomfort in the chest region. And not just from these giant C-cups I'm suddenly sporting (uh ya, when you fake a B cup your entire life, a C cup IS a huge deal...just saying). I am sure if we fast forward to the post that will come in 3 weeks, it will be "GET THIS BABY OUT OF ME WHY WON'T SHE JUST BE BORN I AM SO DONE WITH PREGNANCY" and I will revisit this and think, 34.6 week me, what WERE you THINKING?!?!

But for now, I'm enjoying my pregnancy and I just want her to hold on, for 5 more weeks (but not 7, ok?).

Birth Stories - The Arrival of OMyFamily's OBaby

2010-02-13T08:00:00.000-08:00

As we know, I'm scouring birth stories on the internet like a fiend. I am reading them, I am watching the videos, and I am borrowing books from the midwife, all to help me learn from other people's experience. I am trying to empower myself to believe that I am capable of doing this without drugs, and without fear. I am trying to surround myself with the positive stories, because as women we're forever told of the horror stories of labour.

I think it's partly because misery loves company. People who have had crazy stories like to share them with anyone on the street. And don't get me wrong, I've had plenty of friends who have had plenty of different kinds of births. Hearing their stories is always welcome. I want to share in their lives, and hear about their experiences. I want to know how they brought their cute little bundles into this world, and whether it was short, long, natural or cesarean, I want all the details.

The details I don't want, are from the woman at the dollar store, whose cousin's best friends hair dresser tried to have a natural child birth, and ended up tearing so bad she had to have 15 stitches and 3 re-constructive surgeries. Or the waitress at the lunch place, asking me with a wince on her face when I'm due, and when I tell her, responding with "the good news is, once the baby is out, you have something to be thankful for, because labour is HELL and you want to die".

These stories are not helpful, and they aren't productive. And some of my friends have had some pretty intense labour experiences, and not one of them has ever told me labour was hell or that they wanted to die.

So when I read stories like the one from Allison at OMyFamily, I just melt. It's exactly the story I hope to be telling you all when we welcome our daughter into the world.

Allison starts her 2-part story pretty much how I feel about this whole attempt at a natural child birth. You see, there is, for SOME REASON certain women who think those looking for a natural experience are either REALLY crunchy, or just plain smug. And neither has to be true. Sure either CAN be true, but let's face it, there is a huge grey area in there, where women like me and Allison (and a million others) sit. This is the area where we just want to try to let our bodies do what they were built for. And the area where we're afraid of big scary needles in our spines, temporarily paralyzing us from the waist down.

In order to ensure you don't find her smug, Allison even prefaces her story with "If in the following story you perceive a twinge of smugness or any symptoms of i’msoholy-ididn’thaveanepidural-itis, please know that it was by no means intended"

She then goes on to say something you almost never hear, something so welcoming and unexpected, I've actually read it several times. Something I will be thinking about when I am in the dredges of labour and doubting myself. She said "You must believe me when I tell you that OBABY’S BIRTH WAS AMAZING. I want to shout it because I think that every sister, aunt, grandma, stranger, and otherwise well-intentioned woman who has ever intentionally or inadvertently scared the buh-geezus out of a first time mom regarding labor and delivery NEEDS TO HEAR THIS:

BIRTH CAN BE WONDERFUL"

The rest of her story is a beautiful, heartfelt account of how birth can be a wonderful experience. I am 100% sure she experienced some level of pain, but she never even mentions it. The pain did not define the experience for her, and it is not the overall theme of her fairly long labour. She even manages to have a smile on her face in all the photos she's shared. From this story, I believe she truly enjoyed the process of bringing OBaby into this world, and I can only hope my experience is the same. Heck, I'd settle for almost as good.

This is one of my favourite birth stories so far. So go, read it. Empower yourself to enjoy your birth, and get over the fear that's come from years of TLC programming, movie births and crazy people behind counters in retail locations.

OMyBaby's Birth Story

I'm not taking this pregnancy thing too seriously....

2010-02-12T13:18:00.000-08:00

Ok before anyone reads the title, freaks out and tell me how I should cherish the life I am carrying and that pregnancy is very serious business, I just want to let you know I know that. And I am taking the serious parts very seriously. I have been taking prenatals since long before I got pregnant. I have been drinking my water, getting my exercise and trying to get enough sleep. I've put down the bong, stopped socially smoking and stopped proving that I am in fact, the skinny bitch who can out tequila shot any dude. I've upped my vegetable intake (which was hard, since I eat A LOT of veggies), I've begrudgingly given up negitoro rolls and salmon sashimi, steered clear of ham sandwiches and torn through piles of cheese, looking for the pasteurized brie. I have taken 1 tylenol, because I fell down the stairs and almost broke my ankle, and though I've been sick 3 times, I've only used my netipot to quell the symptoms. I've done all the things I can to make sure baby girl grows happy, healthy and strong and is not underdeveloped or ill when she is born.

At the same time, I'm having fun, enjoying life and reveling in my last few months as a wife, but not a mother. Well, I am a mother but for now, this baby is a breeze to care for. She does exactly what I want her to do at all times, never cries (well at least, I can't hear her) and allows me to sleep for extended periods of time with no disruption.

And I'd be lying if I told you all, that I've been a model pregnant lady, avoiding everything on that 17 page list of pregnancy don'ts. Sometimes a girl wants to cross her legs, or sit on her back or eat a hot dog. Sometimes she wants to stay up until 3am and eat a half a pizza before bed, or sit down to a tub of cream and refined sugar in the form of vanilla caramel latte hagen daz. And sometimes, just sometimes, she needs to clean the mothereffing bathroom, and the only products around have bleach in them.

I'd also be lying if I said I've had absolutely no alcohol since this baby was conceived. First of all, let's face the fact that I was off birth control for 14 months (and strangely on them for 14 years before) before we made this human. I was getting convinced making her was going to take more than a little bit of bumping uglies. So I went to my friends wedding the week before I peed on that 30th stick and had a few drinks. It was THE hottest day ever and I MC'd and we had my mom DD'ing us so....I partook in the frosty cold, free flowing MGDs. And I don't feel guilty. I know enough about this baby growing business to know that she suffered no harm from that evening. I also had no concept we might be pregnant. I may have been off the pill for 14 months, but as part of my Babe_Chilla style, I was being chill about the whole TTC thing. And that meant, we didn't save sex only during a window of 7 days per month, where I relentlessly stalked the Hubs around, thermometer in hand, yelling at him to impregnate me. No, that was the last thing I wanted. We just went off all forms of birth control, and let nature take it's course. And though 14 months SEEMED long at the time, it was actually perfect. It allowed us to buy and move into a house that could accommodate another person in this family, and really prepare ourselves to be parents (I mean, as prepared as one can be).

So there was that. And I didn't sweat it. I didn't do the thing many women do, which is panic, and Google like a fiend to ensure I hadn't caused FAS. Partly because I wrote a paper on FAS in school and I KNOW what causes it, and partly because I'd Googled that for friends already and knew the answer. And partly because I knew, there was nothing I could do about it anyway.

Let's also realize I got pregnant smack dab in the centre of summer. The first summer, in our new house, in which we have a FABULOUS deck. Many a cold, sweaty, limey corona were drank by my friends on that deck. Not to mention my favourite apricot beers and other fruit flavoured summer sensations. I made mojitos and sangria for guesst, and watched as they sipped them in relaxation. I lived through the Bud Lite lime phase (and side note: blech), when everyone was focused on finding some. I fake drank through a series of parties, when we hadn't told anyone yet. I did all that, and it would be a lie to say I wasn't dying to participate. And it's SO not about being drunk. It was just about being social. But I had my sparkling water, with a slice of lime, and 99.99% of the time, it did not phase me. But you know what? I've had a few sips. I've taken that newly cracked beer from the hubs, and taken a small swig. I've tasted a really great bottle of wine, and had a sip of champagne on new years. And quite frankly, I don't see the problem with that either.

And I'm not only lackadaisical about sipping (and I hope none of you are calling the local authorities on me, I haven't had more than a sip or two here or there). I've also had a few cups of REAL coffee. And this was a big one for me, because I like me some coffee. I'm not someone who will cease to exist without her morning Joe, but I do like it. And I've been having some pretty regular decafs. But I've also had the odd cup of real coffee, with caffeine and all. Because sometimes I wake up at my mommy's house on Christmas day, and she makes coffee and I want some.

And can we just talk about the birthing classes? Because honestly, what's with all the seriousness? I pride myself on being sarcastic, and sometimes even witty. I like to make light of every situation, and joke at inappropriate times (like when I made the joke to the ultrasound tech who told me to 'shake the baby into position', and I replied "Ha I guess this is the only time in my life it will be considered ok to shake my baby hey?". Apparently, that was not funny. Could of fooled me). So when it comes to sitting in a room for an ENTIRE weekend, talking about the journey my daughter will take to exit my body, via a hole which, by my calculations is never going to be as big as she is even now, one needs to make a few jokes. As we sat, watching videos made circa 1985, of scary mullet women with big bushy beavers screaming as they pushed a pruney little purple thing out (another side note: they sure don't look like cute little pudgy humans on the way out!!), holding our fake babies, one can't help but crack a few one liners. And half the class was right there with me, while the other half? Not so much.

As we split into our day 2 groups, to do some infant care stuff, with our fake babies, my group proceeded to laugh hysterically throughout the entire practice. We dropped our fake babies, mixed them up with each others and made them cry. We took the "wrap them like a burrito" comment literally, and rolled the baby up until she couldn't be seen. We joked about wearing ear plugs when they cry too much, and saving money on diapers by only changing them one time per day. We joked and my sides hurt I was laughing so hard. My sides hurt, my eyes were watering and I was getting dirty looks from the other side of the room. Apparently people, this is serious business and should not be taken lightly.

And I agree wholeheartedly but COME ON. If we can't have fun with our fake babies, as we all sit petrified of never having a working vag again, and scared we'll be that person who puts the baby down and drives away, then what's the point in living?

All in all, I've been enjoying my pregnancy, but I've been approaching it in the same way I approach life - not too seriously. And I am actually proud that part of this journey has been me really trying to let go of the stressypants parts of myself, and go with the flow more. I think this will only help me as a new mother. Because being wound up, up tight and overly stressed seems like the worst thing you can do to keep your child chillaxed. I want to have one of those babies who is seemingly un-phased by the world around them. Who just coo and smile and cry so seldom it's a complete non-issue. Many of my friends have these babies, and I want to so much. And the thing all the parents of these wonder babies have in common? The ability to just let it go. Sure, no two couples are exactly the same, but they all have a quality about them that exudes confidence and makes you feel relaxed about parenting. And I can't help but assume this is the reason their kids are not stressed out.

I just hope I can remember all that, after no sleep, when she's crying and I don't know what to do.

And then we were showered with gifts....

2010-02-10T20:31:00.000-08:00

Sunday was the big day - the Baby Babe_Chilla Baby shower! And some of you have been asking for photos.

Let me start with saying that there were probably close to 40 women in my living room. They descended on my house like aunts to a pile of sticky watermelon juice. As the hubs tried to sneak out, he was caught on the stairs as lady after lady stopped to ask him if he was excited, while they rushed by with bags of cute things wrapped in sparkley tissue paper. My once giant living room, that we barely ever use, turned into a hot box of pre-baby excitement. Between the smell of cheese plates, sushi platters, and bruschetta in the oven, and the heat rising off the bodies of 4 pregnant ladies, 2 great-grandma's to be, 1 grandma to be and about 25 other people who might as well be family, the air was intoxicating everyone. There were a thousand laughs, a million smiles and a couple of cries from my poor niece who is currently face to butt with everyone over 4 feet tall. Here she is in her Patutu; why? Because she epitomizes awesome:

We played the game where you can't cross your legs, or someone steals your pin. As an aside, pregnant ladies are dangerously good at such games, because they actually cannot (and probably should not) cross their legs. We played the one where you guess the baby food in the mysteriously unlabeled jars, in which TOO many people guessed a purple gelatinous substance to be beef (1, why are we feeding babies jarred beef? And 2, what kind of beef are you people eating that it's purple?).

And we had cake. Boy did we have cake. The MOST beautiful cake EVER, made by my even more beautiful (and painfully talented, to the point I am SO jealous) friend Christina. See exhibit A through C:

Yes, these are RED fondant shoes I'm keeping till baby's 1st birthday!

And then there were gifts galore. We were, WAY more spoiled than anyone deserves. I cannot begin to describe how overwhelmed I was by all the love I felt. Everyone seems genuinely happy for us, and I was so grateful to be surrounded by people who cherish and respect us for who we are. Having a baby teaches you one of those life lessons, like getting married or buying a house does, where you get to learn who your real friends and family are. And you also get to learn how selfish and two faced others are, but hey that's another story. I was just so happy to stand back, and look around the room, and know this baby will grow up loved to her very soul, by the people who have been such an important part of my entire life.

I will spare you 150 photos of me and my onsies, but I will share a select few. Mind my second chin. I told her she was not invited to the party, but that bitch is nosy and will not stay out of anything. She's totally the type would would show up uninvited and stick her fat self into places she does not belong. I digress...

Frilly BUM!:

Keep sake sweater from Great Grandma:

I LOVE it - I'm Kind Of New Around Here

Uh hello, red and aqua like her room? OK!

Me? Imma have the coolest kid on the block!

For ME, perrineal wash, 9 month tea, arnica and rescue remedy :D I HEART my bestie!

Our Mobile (and a RED bumbo!!)!!

So I kind of have a thing for peacocks...and this is a 2 handed peacock puppet...it took me awhile to figure it out.

And then? They made the preganese lady open the champagne for them:

And there you have it. 4 hours of estrogen filled joy, crammed briefly into this blog post :D

Thanks to everyone who came out! I can't wait to go through all the gifts while I'm filling in my thank-you cards (which are SO cute by the way....I'll have to show you later though!) and relive the entire day.

Beautiful Blogger

2010-02-08T17:47:00.000-08:00

I know, I know, I should be doing a post regaling you with tales from my baby shower yesterday. Complete with how many women we crammed into my living room, and how absolutely freaktastically adorable my cake was (and sooooooooo yummy). And I will. I WILL do it. But I want to get some photos loaded and I've just plain run out of time and energy for some of these things lately. My shower deserves time. It was awesome, and a lot of fun. So it deserves the photos and anecdotes to make you all feel like you were there. And I'm at work, sans photos, with a cake hangover and 27 people asking me to do things so....I will save that for tomorrow.

And I will move on to something else TOTALLY exciting.

On Saturday night I laid in bed, iPhone in hand, wishing I had the energy to boot my laptop and catch up on all the bloggy goodness I've been missing out on the last week. I knew I needed to get some sleep because there was a lot to do before my shower the next morning, but I was a little on the excited side, so I was checking in on Twitter. And one of my FAVOURITE "friends who I've never actually met, but who I want to be my BFF because she seems SO cool online" bloggers put up a link to her most recent blog post....actually, that's a lie. Another equally cool person, who also falls into the above category (KristiMaristi) posted a reply to her blog, and I just had to go check out what it meant. Cause I'm an internet stalked like that ok?

Emmie B of This is the First day of My Life (an AWESOME Bright Eyes song...and if you don't know who Bright Eyes is then, well I feel sorry for you), got an award from another bloggy friend of hers...and that award meant she had to give it out to 7 more people (I'm getting to that soon), and ZOMG she gave one to ME! And not ONLY did she give MY BLOG one (she reads it, she really reads it!), she did mine FIRST! Like as in, #1, like, I am the FIRST one all her bloggy friends will see. It was exciting!

To those of you who read and don't blog, you might thing this is silly. But, it's really not. The thing is, no one blogs for validation (ok, I shouldn't say no one, there are some people who truly do blog for that reason alone) but it's always nice to know that not only is someone reading, someone is enjoying. I mean, I enjoy it, and that's enough for me, but it's always fun for someone to recognize.

So now onto the real stuff. Here it is, the Beautiful Blogger Award:

And now, the rules (we aren't all unstructured out here in the world of blogging you know. There are rules and shit):

1. thank the person who nominated me for this award
2. copy the award & place it on my blog
3. link to the person who nominated me for this award
4. share 7 interesting things about myself
5. nominate 7 other beautiful bloggers

1 - THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU! I was seriously excited, and if my hubs cared at all about blogging, I'd of jumped out of bed to tell him I got an award in the #1 spot but, you know, he doesn't. He'd just look at my like I was insane, tell me it was nice and go back to his video games. But hey, I don't get the appeal of hours of time spent on a game that seems to infuriate you so, we're even.

2 - Done that!

3 - In case you missed it the first time, you can find Emmie Bee's adorable blog, about her son Hudson and soon to be TWINS (another boy AND a girl), who are arriving on March 3rd (keep them in there Em!!) here: This is the First Day of My Life . I love this blog. She's honest, open and heartfelt. Even with all the things going on in her life (and there is A LOT - hello, cholestasis), she manages to post something worth reading on a very regular basis. I can't remember how I found her to be honest, but I'm so glad I did. Visit her. Do it. But not until we get to the end of this :D

4 - 7 Interesting things about ME? I'm so not that interesting but let me try:

I hate soggy foods, like HATE them. And not just in that way where I think it's gross when things sit too long, but in that way that makes me like a crazy person. I eat cereal faster than anyone should, and I am not someone who can take a sandwich made in the morning, and eat it in the afternoon. I DO NOT dip my garlic bread in my pasta sauce, I hate the whole concept of croutons or crackers in soup, and I don't put gravy on anything but meat. And this has transformed into a full on hatred for my foods touching. When I put ketchup on my KD, I individually dip each forkful into it, and I NEVER cover my fries in ketchup either (the only time I break this rule is for poutine...don't ask). My idea gift would be a plate with several compartments for my foods, so they never had to touch.
I was allergic to chocolate until I was like, 14. I used to cry a lot when I was a kid, and get hives. So they did an allergy test and found out it was chocolate. I didn't eat any for something like 9 or 10 long years. I went to a lot of birthday parties where I couldn't eat the cake, and the Easter Bunny always brought me jelly beans and white chocolate. I discovered sometime in my teenage years I could eat it again, but I attribute this hiatus to my lack of a chocolate obsession. Sure I like it, it's tasty, but I'm not one of those people who would die to have some. I'm also so over white chocolate, probably forever.
I met my husband when he first moved to Vancouver from his home town. I think I was about 19-20 years old (which would make him 23). I was dating this guy (as in, for 4 years, we owned a house), and I was close friends with said guys brother. Said guys brother was roommates with the hubs. We used to hang out, and I knew the hubs had a little crush on me then, because said guys brother told me so. But it wasn't until 5 or so years later, that we ran into each other after I'd just broken up with another guy (and he was dating someone, ehm), that we got anywhere close to romantic. Technically, I've known him for almost 10 years now I think. If you asked 20 year old me if 28 year old me would marry the hubs, I would have laughed. Not because he's not awesome, but because how that scenario would ever play itself out would be impossible to imagine. But I am so glad it did!
I've only eaten 1 Big Mac in my entire life. I was 27 years old, it was 4:30am and we were in Winnipeg with the hubs family after our wedding social (if you don't know what that is, it's ok. I didn't either until I had one). I was so proud of myself for never having eaten one, but I caved. I don't remember it being any good, and I'll probably never have one again.
I barely ever use the microwave. I lived in an apartment for 7 years in which, using the microwave would cause the fuse to blow. If we wanted microwave popcorn, we use to turn off EVERYTHING in the ENTIRE apartment, including lights, and hang out in the dark while it popped. And sometimes even then the fuse would blow. Now we have a perfectly capable microwave in our house. I use it to store frying pans in.
I dig vacuuming but HATE emptying the dishwasher. I don't know what it is. I will vacuum all afternoon, and feel like I've accomplished something, but trying to get me to empty out the dishwasher requires a major mental kick in the ass. It's tedious. The dishes are sometimes wet, and it just seems so futile. That said, after spending the last 7 years with NO dishwasher, I'll take emptying it over hand washing any time any day.
I'm a faker. Not in a super bad way or anything. I just like to pretend a lot of things don't get to me, when they really do. People's insensitivities, callous behaviour and bad talking non-sense make me cry alone in the shower, even when it's not directed at me. I don't like to show that to other people. It's not because I think I need to be strong, but because I think mostly, crying over someone else's stupidity is an epic waste of time. I just need to let it out, and then I'm over it. Show me an SPCA commercial, or a movie in which an animal is mistreated however, and I will cry out loud over it for hours. Seriously, at the end of Kong, I could not hold myself together. I was a sobbing mess for an hour...because Kong really DIDN'T KNOW why they were being so mean!

Ok, that's 7. I told you, I am not that interesting.

Now for 7 bloggers that I am nominating. This is hard. I haven't been at this too long, and I sometimes think the ones I nominate for these things don't need my support. I follow a lot of blogs with a bazillion other followers, and I'm just one little Canadian. My 35 followers (hello I love you all) probably already follow these others, because they have upwards of 500 followers, and I've mostly found people by stalking their sites. So let me try to do this in a different sort of way. And I can't really nominate Emmie Bee again, or else she'll be back trying to find 7 more and it'll never end. So, ya, just know you'd be on this list if it wasn't for the whole circular awarding thing :D

1 - The Mommyologist - I nominate her for two reasons. Firstly, she is hilarious. I laugh out loud every time I read her posts. So much so, I've stopped reading them at work. Secondly, she's always there to support a fellow blogger. I've received 2 awards from her, and never had one I can give back. I am SO happy to be able to give her one in return, because she so deserves it. She cracks me up, and I do so love her approach to life with her son, and her husband. Thanks to her, I will never think of Q-tips the same way again.

2 - The Pursuit of Mommyness - This lady spends a lot of time coming up with great idea about how you can improve your blog world. I love the MondayMEME , and her tips and tricks for helping newbies like me. It's also very full of resources AND she just found out she is pregnant with her first. so I bet things are going to get a lot more interesting :D

3 - Maybe If You Just Relax - Jen is SO SO funny. I wish I could be half that funny in a blog, let alone in real life. I love reading her posts because I KNOW I will giggle all the way through. Even when her poor little baybee Olivia was experiencing feberal seizures due to fever, she managed to make me smile. Not a light hearted subject, but she handled it SO well.

4 - Parenting in Progress - I stalk Mae because she guest posted on another blog I love, and it was hilarious. I also stalk her because she has some pee in your pants hilarious tweets going on, and I love to watch her pop up in my feed. Her daughter Piper is oh so adorable, and her website is full of more than just parenting. From the things she's made, to the things she's going to do more of, Mae is out there, telling it how it is. And I love it.

5 - smonk you - The dudes a daddy blogger and I have the utmost respect for him. He hangs out in a world of mommy bloggers, and keeps up. He's hilarious, supportive and totally speaking from the often forgotten side of this parenting equation. I sadly didn't find him until very shortly before his son Miloh was born, but the play by play Tweets of the labour were all I needed to want to read more. He's super hilarious, and I LOVE to hear things from the daddy perspective. It just does not happen often enough.

6 - The Wifey Blog - Ok Gabrielle is the kind of girl you sort of want to be, but are afraid to. This woman holds nothing back. She tells it like it is, from her marriage, to her friends to her annoying party animal neighbours. She has her weekend irks, which are always a good read. She seems like she'd be an excellent person to have on your side, and kind of a scary on to have against you. I love that she changes her blog look on a weekly basis, and I'm sad to see she's been discovered by those "IRL" and is considering censoring herself, because her blog is awesomeness.

7 - Things I Can't Say - Shell is another one of those hilarious, say it how it is ladies. Are you sensing my pattern? Make me laugh, make me want to be you, make me jealous that you're so free with your words and so uncensored, and I will apparently follow you like a lost puppy. Except, chances are high I won't hump your leg (certainly not when I'm giaganto like I am right now). She's defined "Motherbitch" and it's probably one of my favourite phrases. I like this lady, a lot.

So there you have it. 7 not-that-interesting facts about me, and 7 blogs I like to read. You should visit them all, and follow them, and tell them where you heard of them so they know I have some pull in this bloggy world. Even if it's only a small force.

Thanks again Emmie!

"Remember, you're not a martyr"

2010-02-02T22:05:00.000-08:00

Martyr:

a person who is put to death or endures great suffering on behalf of any belief, principle, or cause; a person who undergoes severe or constant suffering; a person who seeks sympathy or attention by feigning or exaggerating pain, deprivation, etc

We went to our Child Birth preparation class this weekend, and I took a lot away from it. Of course I learned the process of labour - first stage, second stage, third stage. I learned some tactics for dealing with pain, some relaxation techniques and some detailed information about why women poop when they birth. The hubs learned to not take it personally when I tell him I hate him or smack his hand away from my body. He learned how to best help me, and what he should do if I start to vomit (the answer is, keep my hair out of my face, provide mouth wash and tell me I'm pretty). I learned 3 uses for a can of coke (or your chosen canned beverage) that do not include drinking, I learned how to massage my perineum (not sure I can go there) and why sex can induce labour (it's not just because it rocks your world, it's because of the prostaglandin) .

It was all very useful information...very useful information that we will promptly forget at the first sign of a contraction. And that's ok, because at least we did it. And even knowing what we know now will make us that much more confident, especially in these last 7-9 weeks.

The most important things I took away were a little less technical. I'm going to start with her reminding us that if we choose to try for a natural childbirth, we are not martyrs (and end with how labour is like an erection....see now you have to read on, because you want to know that one).

I found this martyr comment very interesting. As I continue down the path of preparing myself for the birth of our daughter, I can't believe how often I'm made to feel this way. Actually, that's wrong. No one can make me feel anything, but I can't believe how many times I'm faced with someone's snide remarks or backhanded comments about my choices. And frankly, it's pathetic.

I get it. Everyone's reactions of WHY would you CHOOSE to put yourself through all that pain and suffering for no good reason makes sense. Because to them, there is no good reason. And to them, it is pain and suffering.

Don't get me wrong. I am pretty damn sure this whole thing is going to hurt. I've read a lot of stories about women who claim they had pain free childbirth, and I only DREAM I could be one of them. But that takes a certain level of confidence, self trust and focus that I'm not sure I've got in me. But what I'm not so convinced of is the suffering part. I believe that feeling and experiencing this is something I should do to bring my daughter into the world. I believe the birth of your child should be dramatic. It should be memorable, and it should be intense. And granted I am in the 80% of people who have a "normal" child birth, without any major medical interventions or emergencies, I should be able to tolerate it. And if I'm in the other 20%, then I'll deal with that as it comes.

Sure, I know there are a lot of drugs I can take to make the experience less painful. And I may choose to go that route, I'm leaving myself open to that possibility. But just because I KNOW it could be less painful, does not make me a martyr for choosing to try it without the drugs. And frankly, I am sick of the attitudes about people who choose to birth the way they do.

There are a lot of things that aren't necessarily my style. I don't think a home birth is right for us, because I think I would be too worried about the "what ifs" to let go and surrender to the experience. I don't think a lotus birth is right for us, because, well ick. I am sure there are reasons for this, and good ones, but it's just not for me, sorry. I also don't think a scheduled, non-medically required c-section is the way to go for us. But what I DO think, is any woman choosing these things, should be given the opportunity to do so without ridicule from the people around her. Unfortunately, in my experience, this is not always the way.

I do get a lot of support from other people who have managed a natural experience and lived to tell about it. I also get a lot of support from people who went the medicated route, but understand it's an individual choice. However, it's the negative, snide underhanded remarks, to myself and those around me, that start to get to a person. And by get to me, I mean, make me want to scratch some eyes out (what, I never said I wasn't petty).

What makes me a martyr exactly? What's wrong with trying to do it without drugs? Who cares if I read a hypnobirthing book? I just don't understand. Why are my choices up for ridicule and debate? Is it jealousy? Is it anger? Or is it just plain ignorance? I am not pretentious, I don't think I am better than anyone, and I certainly don't think that getting medicated means you're any less of a person. I just know what I want for my personal experience, and I think I've gained the right to focus on that goal.

I'm ranting and not getting anywhere, but this is one of those things that's been irking me for weeks. People have opinions on everything, and they are entitled to them. And I have more than anyone out there. But they are not entitled to tell me about them negatively, and they are not entitled to put their assumptions onto me either.

At the end of the day I'm very thankful for that comment by the instructor. I am happy she put it out there because it means I am not alone. I certainly knew I wasn't the only one contemplating a natural birth, and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who hears the comments. But at least I know it's not something exclusively about ME that prompts people to talk so poorly about the choices I'm making for my body, and our birth experience. The fact that she said that means there are a lot of us there, feeling excited about the arrival of our babies, while simultaneously feeling stupid or guilty or ridiculed for the choices we're making.

I wish I was a stronger person. One who didn't care what other people thought, and could just let it roll off her back. And I'm getting better at it. But sometimes, someone shocks you with their true feelings about your birth choices, and well, it shakes you up a little.

But that's enough of that. I am not a martyr, and I am not going to let anyone make me feel like I am from now on. Screw it, I've only got somewhere between 5 and 9 weeks until this baby arrives, and it's time to build my confidence.

So what else did I learn?

Well, I learned that I can do anything for a minute, and that piece of advice I'm going to take to the grave. She did an exercise with an ice cube to simulate the differences between focusing on the pain, using distraction and working with your breathing, and you really could tell. I learned that I like to focus on the countdown, and breathe through it, and that if the Hubs was in labour, he'd choose to simply embrace the feeling and know it would end soon. I'm pretty sure contractions will be harder to tolerate than an ice cube tightly gripped in my palm, but it demonstrated that I can in fact, do anything for a minute.

I learned that the 2 steps forward, 1 step back of baby's exit routine is not some cruel joke designed to punish me for Eve's mistakes (AHAHAHAHA). No, instead it's a favour she is doing for me, so that her dad may in fact get joy out of my body again at some point in life. Nothing like your daughter giving you the gift of an intact vag, and not a tear from hole to hole.

I learned that some people like contractions more than pushing, but that most women find relief in the pushing process (UH YAY! Something to focus on and work towards!).

I learned what a fully grown woman of around 50 years old sounds like when she simulates the different types of contractions, and what that simulation will do to a room full of men.

And finally, I learned that my vaginal opening was designed to stretch to exactly the size of a babies head, and that the stretching itself does not hurt. In fact, it stretches the same percentage as a mans flaccid self (yup, I said flaccid, twice!) stretches when he get's an erection. And since that does not hurt, neither does this. I also learned that I think that comparison is a bit of a stretch.

At the end of the day, I am really glad we did the class. Sure, lots of people told us we didn't need it, and I am sure we would have coped if we hadn't. Like my sister who was in labour during the time her birth class was occurring. However, I think confidence is a big part of this, for both me and the hubs. And I think anything we can do to help us build that confidence, is worth a few hours on a weekend.

Now, I'm off to find something else to be a martyr for........

Birth Stories: Starting with Baby Rabies

2010-01-29T23:15:00.000-08:00

In an attempt to get my vajay to unclamp itself and allow my darling daughter to exit without a spaghetti head (as an aside, the hubs has often said, since long before we were even married let alone pregnant, that we were going to have spaghetti children...I'll let that gem sit with you while you continue to read...or while you quickly run to the "unfollow" button and close this browser), I have decided to collect, read and record birth stories.

The fact of the matter is, most of the labour stuff I know is coming from you people anyways. From women (and 1 man so far) who I know only since starting to blog, whose lives I've learned about 140 characters at a time, and in some cases, whose real names I don't actually know. This is not to say I don't have friends with children, I do. But for some reason, sitting down and trying to talk to them about their experiences rarely gets us anywhere.

There are a lot of reasons for this. Often, they don't want to talk so intimately about the time they pooped on their husbands. We get easily distracted. I feel awkward asking them to detail the exit of their children from their bodies. And their kids are here, and are a lot of fun, so I'd rather play with those babes than discuss their arrivals. Also, of the people I know who have had babies, some have had medical interventions based on necessity, some have had early arrivals and some have spent the majority of their labour in a car, praying to make it to the hospital. And my goal here is to surround myself with as many natural, positive birth stories as possible, so I can, as mentioned above, convince my vajay it should unclamp. And finally, most if not all my mama friends don't remember their labour in the amount of detail I feel like I need. They never wrote it down, and it's been 4 years, or 1 year or 10 months or even 6 months, and they just can't recall.

So I put the word out to the Twitter world, and got a little help from my friends. Before I knew it, I had offers for birth stories coming from people I'd never spoken to. I had offers for natural birth stories, planned and emergency c-sections, hypnobirths and water births and almost every kind of birth I can imagine (I also learned about something called a Lotus Birth from Mandy at Harpers Happenings, and well, ick). . So I decided, I'm going to read and post them all (or as many as I can before I go into labour, because birth stories will end with the arrival of my daughter). I feel like everyones story can contribute equally well to my experience. And at the end of the day, I have no idea what kind of experience I am going to have just yet, so I might as well be open minded and get prepared.

I start my "birth story recap to get my vajay ready" reporting business with Jill from Baby Rabies. I start here for 2 reasons. 1 being that she is single handedly responsible for about 75% of the stories I received. She has a HUGE following (and for good reason, she's downright hysterical) and she put it out on her twitter and in they came (when Jill tells you to do something, you do it). The second reason is that anyone who has the guts to put the word "Baby" and the word "Rabies" in the same sentence, let alone build their internet persona around it, is a person I want to be best friends with.

Jill's story is perfect. She thinks it's long winded, but as you can tell from my ever loquacious nature, you can never use too many words for me. In her usual style, she combines the right amount of hilarious anecdotes ("These are definitely NOT Braxton Hicks. I’m now noticing my mucus plug. Yay! My vagina finally sneezed!"), and hopefulness ("The car is packed by 6:30. I’m imagining we will be in it by the time lunch rolls around"). Her incremental reporting, her brutal honesty and her unintentional words of advice ( “How can I do this again?” but I stop that train as soon as possible and promise myself to only think about each contraction as they come. That frame of mind helps immensely.") give me a lot of hope for my ability to do this.

One of the things I love about Jill and her story, is that it really resonates with me. Because I know that even if I DO manage to get through this without any drugs, and come out the other end alive and with working lady parts, I won't do it quietly. I'm not going to be one of those women who avoids using the word "fuk", who doesn't tell her husband he's a bastard for doing this to her, and who doesn't shoot bodily fluids at her midwife. No, like Jill I will do all those things. I will worry that the women in the other rooms are getting scared because I'm screaming my bloody head off. Like Jill, I'm going to yell "NO" emphatically when they ask me if I want to see the head emerge with a mirror.

If you've come this far, then good for you. I should probably apologize to Jill for posting her story first, and prefacing it with a novel of my own opinions. But that's the point. To take these stories to heart, and get out of them what I will. To gain an ounce of strength and power, when the pain I feel is getting to be too much and I'm screaming for an epidural. To take something from every story, to remember as I experience that "ring of fire" everyone talks so much about.

So before I talk anymore, here is the link to Jill's story. Go there, read it. Then spend the next several days pouring through the rest of her posts, and learn to love her like I do, and like so many other mommy bloggers out there do. It's one of the few things you can read on the internet, which isn't a waste of your time.

Baby Rabies Birth Story

**Because I can't ever just shut up, I have to add, in Twitter-chatting about this post with Miss Baby Rabies herself (and OMyFamily) I got even MORE gems of wisdom out of Jill, and there are seriously things I will take with me into that delivery room and beyond. So here, I share some more:

babyrabies @Babe_Chilla When I ran my marathon I saw an awesome sign that said "Pain is temporary, pride lasts forever." Use that for inspiration :)

OMyFamily @babyrabies @babe_chilla My favorite motivational phrase was "You can do ANYTHING for 5 minutes." It's SO true. One contraction at a time.

babyrabies @OMyFamily @babe_chilla Yes! That's the way you have to think of it - small increments of hell followed by relief :)

OMyFamily Amen. RT @babyrabies: @Babe_Chilla I have to admit, I owe a lot to wanting to prove people wrong.

Belly Shot Preview

2010-01-27T16:08:00.000-08:00

I've just seen a few on Facebook from my photographer. I loooooooove this one:

Almost 32 weeks and a little freak out....

2010-01-26T21:38:00.000-08:00

Well this is the end of week 31. Tomorrow I'll wake up, 32 weeks pregnant, 2 lbs. heavier and that much closer to meeting our daughter. That seems scary to me. To say things like "8 weeks to go" or "56 days", or to realize that my baby shower is coming up soon all makes this very real. Not that it hasn't been real, but I'm rapidly running out of time and all I can think is "have I done enough?"...to which the answer is always an emphatic NO!

I have not saved enough money, and this is stressing me out. The hubs and I are equal in our income, and we have a nice little system set out where we pay the bills together, and enjoy liberty with our spending money. I don't complain about the 4th video game he's bought this month, and he does not complain about my 68th pair of shoes. I shop for food out of convenience sometimes, which only means it's more expensive, and I am ALL too familiar with the old take out regime.But I'm about to go to 45% of my income for an ENTIRE year, and add another life to care for. EEECK! The power is going to shift, and I'm not sure I like it.

Now, it's not like the hubs is going to hoard his money and laugh manically at me as I shuffle around in my holey shoes. Obviously we're going to be working it out, but my issue is that I'm not going to be contributing my equal share, and that makes me feel, awkward. I am sure we'll find a balance, and I know it won't be held against me in any fashion. I've just worked for 15 years, and always taken care of myself. I'm an independent, self sufficient lady who has trouble asking for help for even the simplest things - what's it going to be like to have someone else caring for me? I've never relied on anyone else for much, and while I've had help from the parentals along my life path, I've otherwise been sufficient.

Whoa this baby business is changing more than just my silhouette! Tone down the seriousness would you? Who knew all these things would come to play when we decided to have a family."When we decided" makes it sound like we sat down, weighed the pro's and con's and developed a plan. Instead it's more like, we got married and that somehow kicked my clock into gear (previously, I thought I had been born devoid of a clock) and we threw caution to the wind (and birth control pills out the window) to see what would happen. I'd like to tell you all that I was patient and completely zen throughout the following 14 months but, it's a lie. I temped, I charted, I checked my "fertile signs" (I'm leaving it at that...those of you who KNOW what EWCM is get it, and those who don't, probably don't need to). I slyly seduced the hubs when it suited the timing, and impatiently suffered the excruciating 2WW to see if I got a visit from good old AF. And FINALLY one time, she didn't show up...and finally, when I peed on that $16 STICK I saw 2 lines.......

And 32 weeks later (well 27 I guess) here we are. And I'm getting a little sweaty thinking about all the things I know I don't know. Well, if I knew that I guess I'd know them, so I am thinking about all the things I can imagine I don't know, and am going to have to learn. I really hope this whole mommy thing as intuitive as people keep saying, because I was sure not a good puppy mommy at the beginning (it's the only frame of reference ok?). And nothing else has ever come that natural to me either. I'm not a natural anything. I'm not good at singing or playing instruments, I'm not good at drawing or doing art. I'm not very crafty and aside from a little bit of a flare for cooking I'm pretty much useless. I'm not patient enough to be a good baker. I can't play sports. I can barely walk without falling over and my house is never all put together and sparkling clean. Nope, not this girl.

So you can imagine my fears about being a mom. Because really, why would THAT come naturally when nothing else does? One can hope. Maybe this is my calling. Maybe, I'll be so good at it that I'll go all Michelle Duggar on you (see, no pregnancy and/or mommy blog can be complete, without the Michelle Duggar reference, so I'm now officially in the club) and pop out a few dozen. No, that'll never happen, I'm too selfish for that many children. But maybe I'll surprise myself. Or maybe, I really will be the naked panicked woman, crying and swinging from the street lamps, wondering where my youth went.

On to my point, what's happened in pregnancy week 31, that's new and exciting:

1 - Night sweats. Last week I noticed the peri-menopausal state of my body temperatures, and this week has been no better. My temps have continued to increase and I'm now waking up soaked, on a nightly basis. I think it's training for all the laundry I'm going to have to do with baby, washing these pajama's so often.

2 - My friends Braxton and Hicks. They aren't new, but the frequency of their visits is. And to tell you the truth, I think they are both assholes.

3 - Pressure in my head. I think this is a combination of increased blood volume, and the internal human compressing some of my vital organs. I'll be checking with the midwife on that one tomorrow.

4 - Waking up screaming in pain. This has happened 3 times this week. Only once did I actually scream, and feared the hubs would wake up and fly out of bed in a panic. The other two times have been mild whimpering that I've kept to myself. The first time came after I rolled over, and pulled something in my abdomen. It felt like I tore a muscle clean in half, and I thought for sure I was never going to stand up again. The other 2 times have related to this burning pain in my left hip, that is the result of who knows what. I stretch and move and pull until it goes away. It hurts. And as an aside, my ass is still broken.

5 - Two Words. SAUSAGE. FINGERS. This is NOT funny. Thursday I was fine, but Friday I could not get my wedding rings off, and after 5 soapy panicked minutes, where visions of having my rings cut off flashed before my eyes, my sausage fingers were finally free. I've tried a few times over the last few days, and depending on when it is, I can get them off and on. But now I'm afraid of them. So I will probably go the next 6-10 weeks, with the naked fingers of an unwed mother. I've got a jade ring the hubs bought me once long ago, for $5 at a farmers market, and it fits. So for now, it'll have to do.

6 - It's a FOOT? Like seriously, I think I can discern a baby foot above my belly button. It feels about the right size, the right shape, and in the right area of my belly. I know she's head down, because I can feel her hiccuping into my vagina, and knocking on my cervix....

7 - Yes, she's knocking on my cervix. I think it's like the bladder, it's there so why not play with it? She keeps knocking, but I am not answering and she is not coming out. Consider this your first grounding young lady. You're going to stay in your room for another 6-10 more weeks, and I don't care how small it gets in there.

8 - Breathlessness. Some how, I've become a 450 lbs. smoker walking up a San Fransisco hill at all times. Talking takes a lot more energy than is appropriate. My maternity leave replacement must think I'm crazy, lazy or just completely out of control because every question she has results in me huffing and puffing like I've just run a marathon. And I talk A LOT. My face is red all the time, and whether I'm partaking in mild conversation or walking to my car, I'm elevating my heart rate. Let's hope I'm burning the other 500 calories I'm taking in, above the 300 recommended....

Anyway, those are the major pregnancy things for week 31. She continues to move and roll and stretch herself out. She's sticking feet in ribs and using my bladder as a stress ball. I love her a little more every minute that goes by, and I am starting to envision myself actually holding her in my arms, instead of in my body.

I wouldn't say I'm ready, but then, does anyone ever (remind me of this in 5 or so weeks, when I'm waddling around, crying about my cankles and wondering where my neck has gone)? But I'm in the home stretch, and things are getting a little more exciting around here! Not to mention the nursery has now been painted!

The Cloth Diaper Edition

2010-01-21T17:15:00.000-08:00

The hubs and I are considering cloth diapering. I'd like to go on about all the statistics that relate to how that will positively impact the earth, but I don't know them. I know they exist, and I know they are important, but what's good enough for me is knowing that I will not be contributing (at least on a massive scale) to the diapers plaguing our landfills. I did learn the other day that on average, you'll use 7200 cloth diapers in your child's life time. And I don't need math to tell me that's an awful lot of fecal filled plastic sacks to add to an already epic waste management problem.

I also don't need to do the math to understand what that will cost us. A fuk lot. Math doesn't give you ballparks like that, but who needs them. For those of you who are into math and junk, I did a rough calculation and we're looking at about $2000. This is assuming your kid is an average crapper, that you don't have more than 1 child, and that you are shopping around for discount diapers. Converesly, you can get cloth ones for around $500, with all sorts of selling your old ones, buying used ones, borrowing from people or looking for sales.

Not to mention, when I think about buying the "cheapest disposable diaper" I envision myself, my hubs and my daughter covered in crap. Literally. I mean, I'm no expert, but I've had the lovely experience of lifting up a baby and finding urine, or worse turds, on my leg or arm. And as it turns out, I'm having a baby which means I will be covered in both those things (and more, because we all know no matter what kind of diaper you have, it does not protect against projectile breast milk in reverse) often as it stands. So to limit the leakage, I doubt I'd be bargain basement diaper shopping. No, I'd totally coupon clip my way to saving on the ones that are the best defense, but I suspect those ones start at a heftier price.

And then of course, there is the fact that this is my child and her BRAND NEW skin I'm swaddling up in plastic and whatever else they make a diaper out of (I don't know, but I'm somehow sure it didn't start out that fluffy white colour). One of the best things I read when researching cloth diapers was "I don't wear plastic panties, why should my kids?". And I think maybe, that's true. I mean sure, I've never TRIED plastic panties, at least, not in my adult years (oh come on, we ALL had those little training pants), but I assume they aren't as comfortable and breathable as Pampers would have you think. And frankly, I half expect to find out diapers aren't BPA free sometime soon, or that they are laced with some other sort of life sucking chemical. Not because I'm a pessimist, but because last time I checked, everything we do is being put on the "this is going to kill you dead" list.

For these reasons, and the simple fact that this WHOLE thing is so new and foreign to me, so I figure why the hell not try it out, we're looking into cloth diapering. No promises though. If I find out they are, in fact, the worst things ever in life, I will consider going back to disposables. And I am SO not against disposables on certain occasions. Like when you've got a baby sitter coming by or, you know, you haven't done laundry because it was laundry or sleeping and sleeping of course wins (yup, naps already win over my daughters butt. Mother of the year award coming my way!). My approach to this whole pregnancy/delivery/motherhood thing is attempted flexibility. Talk to me in 5 months and ask me how that's going, ok? I'll probably be the crazy naked lady hanging upside down from the street lamp, crying about my youth and when things were easy. But maybe not.

So anyway, we went to Cloth Diapers 101, put on by New & Green Baby Co.I thought the 101 was indicative of the level of diapering knowledge we were going to cover, you know, the basics. And it sort of was. But mostly I think the 101 refers to how many types of cloth diapers (and I'm talking types here, not brands. That would be Cloth Diapers 5698) we would be covering in the evening. And that is in no was a negative towards New & Green. I don't think they were trying to overwhelm us, in fact I know they weren't. They were just doing their diaper due diligence. And they did a fine job.

We did the whole gamut of diapers. We talked about All-in-Ones, Prefolds, Pockets, One Size, Fitted, and G Diapers. We saw how to stuff extra material in for increased leakage protection, and felt the difference between hemp, cotton, bamboo and synthetic materials. We touched diapers to our cheeks (not THOSE cheeks geeze) to see how soft they really were, and we snapped, unsnapped and velcroed up and down like nobody's business. We also sweat a lot, but that's really got nothing to do with diapers and everything to do with stuffing a bunch of pregnant ladies in an over heated community centre meeting room.

We looked at bumGenius, Fuzzi Bunz and AMP, we looked at plastic covers and wool covers, and learned what a Snappi is. We sat, and after an hour and a half, had a pretty good grasp on what this whole diapering thing was about. I think. I mean, how will we really KNOW until she's here and I'm up to my elbows in diaper changes. We won't.

The fact is, after the class I was less intimidated by all the things out there and more excited to get started. Visa in hand I was ready to buy, but I refrained. We haven't settled on a type yet, or really even made a plan. But at least NOW I feel as though we've got something to go on. We're far too good at making decisions based on assumptions, and since we're becoming adults now (sure whatever) I figure it's high time we thought things through a little better (a little better then "hey let's buy a 100 year old house with lots of wood in a SUPER rainy climate" or "this fridge will fit in there, NOOOOO problem).

As an added bonus, my BFF has always used cloth diapers, and her daughter is almost 1. And that means, she's got a nice set of infant sized all-in-ones she is just DYING to lend us (that, her Ergo, her Peg Perago car seat and I am SURE other things are coming...we are SOOOOO lucky). So it means we can try it out on her pretty much right away (the baby, not my BFF) and see how we like it.

I think my family is laughing at me, with my hopes for natural child birth, my attempt at cloth diapering and my plan to make my own baby food. And not because they think any of that is stupid. Just because it doesn't seem like a me thing to do. Not that I make a habit of raping the earth, poisoning small creatures or being careless with my things. But because at the core of it all, I'm still a city girl with a couple tattoos, who enjoys the simplicity of having things done for me. If I could afford it, I'd have a house cleaner, and a gardener. There I said it, and I'm not ashamed. When given the option to go the easy way, I'll generally take that path. And natural child birth, cloth diapers and homemade baby food scream complicated. But for some reason, this seems like the way to go.

I know I'm in for a lot of hard work ahead. I'm thinking I'm in for an unfathomable amount of confusion and stress, exacerbated by a lack of sleep and the dependence of a whole new life. It's going to be bumpy and surely I'll falter and fall. I can't even begin to image what life will be like, because I have no experience, no frame of reference and no knowledge of my daughters personality. She could sleep like an angle but never want to eat, like my niece. She could be colicky and refuse to nap. She could be a HUGE combination of traits, and until I know what those are, I can hardly plan a course of action.

I can however prepare myself for the kind of family life I want to have. I can arm myself with knowledge and do what I think is best for us. The rest will just have to fall into place, however that shall be.

Apparently the proximity I'm getting to her arrival is increasing my loquacious nature......

My 30th Week of Pregnancy...sweat and tears....

2010-01-19T23:54:00.000-08:00

Well with 31 weeks a mere hour and 40 mins away, I thought what a better time to start posting about the last week in pregnancy. Up until now, mostly, this preggoness has been uneventful. And that's GOOD, the last thing you want are events in your pregnancy. Those never end well (unless it's one of those orgasmic dream type events but that's not where I'm going with this).

The best case scenario has so far been my life .No morning sickness, no extreme fatigue, no high blood pressure and no proteins in my urine (I swear the midwives have me do that JUST to satisfy this never ending urge I still have to pee on sticks). I don't have gestational diabetes, I can still see my toes, and so far I've had no nasty exit or non-exit, issues if you know what I mean (and if you don't, you've clearly never been pregnant and you probably don't need to know the details yet). But this week, things are changing. None of the above have happened, I have not regressed to morning sickness, and my toes are still all there, but I DO suddenly notice that I am 7something months pregnant (who the hell KNOWS how pregnant they are, with all the weeks and days and that 2 week "you're not pregnant but we count you as pregnant even though you haven't even had SEX yet" part of pregnancy that fuk's everything mathy up...not to mention that this whole thing is in fact 10 months long, and not 9...thanks to whatever male OBGYN genius who tried to pull the wool over our eyes on that one).

So anyway, let's see, what's new this week:

1 - My sore ass. We already know all about that, but it's still new. I hadn't really noticed anything ass related until now, but this last week, my tail bone is aching and my sciatic nerve is wound up tighter than the buns you see on ballet dancers (and I'm so not talking about THEIR asses). I learned today from my chiropractor that this is a result of my widening ass (oh yippee), which is due to my daughters growth (good girl). And this is causing the sexy preggo-waddle (finally, this is definitely been on the "can't wait" list pfft) which makes my legs turn out, which tightens the sciatic nerve. Phew. That's my medical lesson for the day, so you can skip your daily dose of WebMD. All this ends in her telling me that the solution is a combination of stretches (check, I can stretch), regular visits to her (already done thanks), massages of the area (any excuse to get the hubs to massage sounds good to me) ANNNNNNNND lunges and squats...FTW? Lunges and SQUATS? Hello I know my ass is getting bigger but is this really necessary? Apparently it is, because it will strengthen my legs, which will stop said above issues. This baby better be cute because I do NOT squat or lunge for just anyone.

This week, I also learned how fun it was to type the word "ass".

2 - Hot flashes. Another lovely symptom this week. Many of my previous pregnant lady friends have told me about this. All of them in fact. Most of them have experienced the increased body temperature throughout their entire pregnancy, and many of them were jealous that I got to experience most of my journey in the winter. 2 issues with that. 1, it's Vancouver and winter we do not have (go Summer Olympics..err wait). It's 11 degrees out right now, at 10:45pm (that's 52 for my friends south of the border). Now this is unseasonably high, but that's beside the point because it's affecting ME and I said so. And 2, it does not freaking matter because the stores and offices still think it's freezing outside so they jack their heat anyway.

I wake up wet, with crunchy hair and a pool between my breasts. I walk the 2 blocks to work, tearing off my jacket before I've even locked the car, and wishing I could sit naked at my desk and have it be appropriate. I feel menopausal...well I mean, I feel like my mother looks when she has a hot flash. Maybe I should try sticking my head in the freezer...too bad it's on the bottom of the fridge and getting down on all 4's is probably just going to make me HOTTER. Being hot is new for me in general, and this is not one of those signs I even understand? Bigger ass sure, but more sweaty? Why?

3 - Tears. I've cried a total of 7 times already this week, which is 1 time per day if you're counting. Granted I did skip a day, but I made up for it by crying twice the next. And sometimes, it's about absolutely nothing at ALL. I cried uncontrollably for a good 10 minutes when I came home to the dogs bodily fluid trifecta (vomit, pee AND poo...he's having some anxiety issues which is it's OWN post) for the 5th time this week. Frustrating as fuk for very sure, but cry worthy, I think not. The other times have been about things that, well, I suppose could be cry worthy, but really, there were an unnecessary amount of tears involved.

4 - Frustration. Remember back up at the top of this post, where I said I'd had it pretty easy so far? Well the goddess of pregnancy karma has listened to me go on and on and on about how much I enjoy being pregnant and has delivered me her own special gift. And that's the gift of everything I thought was supposed to happen before now, happening now. I don't know how many things I've thrown at the wall this week, but even 1 is too many. At least I only threw the dog one time (no I DIDN'T geeze....but it crossed my mind as I was on hands and knees, scrubbing pee out of my grout). This frustration is usually what leads to the crying as mentioned above.

5 - Alien belly. I've totally seen her move before, and I love every minute of it. But this week I'm totally channeling Sigorne Weaver, and I keep expecting my offspring to tear out of my gut and onto the table. She's a busy bee in there, pushing and stretching and making it her personal mission to see to it my belly button never feels, nor looks, the same again. That thin little layer of skin between her and the outside world must look like a light at the end of the tunnel for her. And I sing a lot in the car, badly, so she's probably trying to plot her way out of there stat. And currently, it seems she considers the belly button her best bet. This is one of the best things to happen this week. I enjoy her moving around SO much, even when it's technically bedtime (I sense foreshadowing). Her favourite time to party is 4am, and her favourite guests are my bladder and my rib cage. At least she's making friends.

6 - Is it a bum? Is it a head? Is it a cheek? Who knows. But this week has marked a very clear progression towards discerning body parts through my belly. It started happening a few weeks back, but it was few and far between and there was NO way to know if I was touching a foot or a face. But NOW, I can definitely feel some rounded bits, and while I'm not sure if this is her bum or her head (never tell her this), I do know it's something more significant than an elbow. This is fun. It's fun because I am connecting with my daughter AND because I'm freaking out my husband. Double bonus.

That's it for brand new occurrences over the last 7 days. A lot of things remain the same - my lack of balance, the dance party on my bladder and my incessant hunger for all things apple and pancakes (oooooh I should TOTALLY make apple pancakes).

Stay tuned for next week, when we're SURE to cover more exciting pregnancy progressions....I bet you can't wait!

How YouTube helped solidify my choice to go for a natural childbirth!

2010-01-16T12:09:00.000-08:00

Well I've been watching the home birth videos on YouTube all morning, and I have to say, I'm less traumatized than I thought. I'm also shocked by the sheer volume of videos on there, and the selfless women who put themselves out there, so I have something to do in the early parts of a Saturday morning. It would never have occurred to me to look on YouTube for birthing videos, but who was I kidding? You can find anything on there, and I mean ANYTHING. Want to knit a suit for your cat? There's a video of someone doing that. Need to learn to play Baby Got Back on the acoustic guitar? There's a video for that too. Like the App store for your life and not your iPhone, if you need it the YouTube's got it. And sometimes it's disturbing, what people will do or post (I don't want to watch some girl demonstrate putting her clit ring in, I just don't...but I bet her mama's proud). I don't spend a lot of time on YouTube, but this is one instance where, it's helped me. So I'll put a check in the pro-YouTube column for this one.

Back to my point (why am I ALWAYS getting back to my point? Oh ya, because I write like I talk, too freaking much). I hesitated doing this for the last few weeks. I was afraid that watching other women go through labour and delivery would somehow scare me off the path towards natural child birth. I was afraid that I would see something graphic and frightening, that caused my cervix to fuse itself shut and demand I rethink this whole baby thing. I was worried that it would shake out the little bit of courage I've managed to muster thus far, and send me back to a puddle of self-doubt. I was worried that it would cause me to regress to the tender age of anytime before now, when I thought the best possible scenario was to be highly medicated, so you didn't even know what happened.

Because before I was ever the pregnant one, I didn't understand why you'd ever even START to consider a natural child birth. WHY would you do that to yourself when there are perfectly good drugs out there to be had? I'm a fan of getting a buzz (or let's just be honest, getting full on drunk) and I'm a fan of partaking in the BC bud that is in rampant supply around here, so why would I not hop on the drug train? I've sedated myself to get over one particularly bad break-up, I've sedated myself to handle the stress of a bad job, and I've sedated myself when things just got too hard to face. When the going get's tough, I tend to get all Ramones on life, and "I wanna be sedated". So why would labour be any different?

And let's get really honest here. I don't have ANY idea where this notion of natural birth came from in me. It's as unexpected to me as it is to those around me. ME, LABOUR? UNMEDICATED? You cannot be serious. Most people are still getting over the shock of me having a baby, let alone being able to handle the thought I want to do it all granola. But something has been telling me it's the right way to go. It's the approach I am meant to take. It's the way this baby wants to come into the world.

My hubs will tell you he doesn't believe in some sort of cosmic connection between a mother and her unborn baby, and I don't totally disagree. I mean, we both realize I'm bonding with this baby every moment she lives inside my body, and that her presence has had a profound effect on my life. But she's has an effect on his as well, and he's the one sitting on the outside. What he's getting at is the thought that her and I can actually communicate with each other in the way that us post-birth humans can. And he's right. My daughter did not send me a message, tell me she wants to go it au naturale and sway my thoughts. But something about being pregnant has lead me down that path, so I'm going to giver her some credit for it.

So how did YouTube help me start to believe this really is the path for me? Well, it showed me regular, everyday women, labouring and delivering with no medical intervention, and surviving through it. Not just cosmically connected hippy couples, channeling the power of the moon goddess while making plans to eat the placenta with a side of couscous. Just regular, everyday women, who wanted to try something against the norm in today's society.

There was the one woman who sang through all her contractions, and you could barely tell she was in pain (don't worry world, this is not a technique I will employ. We all know that me and singing are an ugly and lethal combination. Although, my daughter would probably opt for a quick entry into the world, if it meant stopping me). There was the other woman who, although in clear pain you could read on her face and in her body language, managed to smile between contractions. And not the fake "my crazy husband is taping me so I better put on a show" way, but in a way that indicated she was coping like a champ. There was the couple who joked and laughed the entire time, and went from 3-9 cm's without anyone noticing. And there were countless other women, who were just normal people, coping in various ways and making it through without any major catastrophes.

Of course there is pain, and you can see it. There is discomfort, and there are moments when they claim they cannot do it anymore. There a husbands with compassion and helplessness on their faces, and midwives and doula's standing strong, encouraging both partners equally throughout the process. But what there isn't is the sheer terror and fear you learn to expect from watching shows on TLC. There isn't a lot of screaming and profanities (not that it's silent in any way, it's just more productive noise). There aren't any doctors, with their hands up your vag, telling you you aren't progressing fast enough and making you feel like a failure. There were no beeping noises, fluorescent lights and gaudy hospital gowns to suck you so far out of your element you don't know who you are. There is none of that.

There are just strong, powerful women with the support of other strong powerful women, and empowered husbands with an understood purpose, bringing a life into the world. And they all did it, without any trouble.

Now a few things. I realize I hand selected the happy, non-complicated home births to watch, and there are a lot of things that can go awry and derail a plan. But I'm trying to empower myself, not scare myself, and that was a conscious choice. I also know that we will go to the hospital to deliver, even if we're labouring at home. At least at the Women's Hospital they have a hands off approach to women delivering with midwives, and only if we NEED assistance from a nurse or OBGYN, will we get it. So none of these sweet home births will be the same as ours. But the hospital videos are all medical ones, with epidural and pitocin drips, and that's not what we're going for either (this is a plea for more Canadian home labour/hospital delivery moms to post videos! Even if I'm too modest to do it). So I'm sticking with the home births. And they don't look that bad. They don't look easy, but I'm less frightened than I thought.

And that's how YouTube gave me just a little more confidence in my decision to go for a natural childbirth.

Bump Watch 2010...

2010-01-14T22:54:00.000-08:00

Ok technically, the bump watch started in 2009, but Bump Watch 2009-2010 just didn't have the same ring to it. I've been taking belly shots for the last 25 weeks and I have to say, things have changed. I'll spare you 25 photos, but I'll give you a brief look at the bump...and at what was once a nice flat tummy and is now a super lovely round and bumpy! I heart it. It contains my daughter. I'm sure it'll never go back to the summer of 09, but that's cool. I'll have something much better in the summer of 2010 (ugh I just can't get my head wrapped around calling it 0-10):

First Shot - Week 5:

We can skip Weeks 6-10, since there wasn't much a happening. But here we are, Week 11:

Somewhere around week 19, there appeared a bigger bloat:

And then from 19-22, she went bananas!:

And at Week 26, someone else actually NOTICED it was a baby (and not just a food baby!):

And here we are, at 30 weeks my friends! 10 more weeks of growing to go, OH MY!

If you look close, you can see the jumbo belly button...the one you could land planes on!

I think my ass is broken...

2010-01-13T19:23:00.000-08:00

No, not literally, it just feels that way. And no, this is not yet ANOTHER one of those posts where I delight you with a long story about falling down or otherwise hurting myself. It's not even one where I talk about the lack of exiting occurring from that region as a result of being pregnant, no, no it's not. It's a post where I talk about my first annoying pregnancy symptom. And that symptom is my broken ass.

I sit for a living. Well, that's not exactly true. No one is paying me for all the sitting, despite being insanely good at it, but what they are paying me for requires me to be in front of my computer all day. And that requires sitting. Over the last few weeks, I've noticed a mild amount of butt discomfort at various times. I assumed it was pregnancy related, but it was hardly bothersome so whateves. Well today, that's changed.

My tail bone is officially throbbing. And I mean, I've fallen on my ass WAY more times than I wish to remind it, so it's not a total shock nor is it a new feeling. I know what it means to damage your tail bone. What's different this time is the lack of falling. Sure when I slipped down the steps, landed square on my ass and ruined my jeans it sucked, but at least I knew why my ass hurt. Or when I thought roller blading would be a fun pass time (it's not) and almost killed myself and 2 ladies with strollers on the sea wall, and used my ass to stop myself, I knew then too. Or maybe the time I went snowboarding when it wasn't snowy (and I am a TERRIBLE snowboarder) and again, used my ass to stop...are you sensing a pattern here? I am a klutz, without an ounce of athleticism nor balance in my body. So a stranger to the pavement my butt is not. But today, even before lunch time, with my throbbing tail bone I couldn't help but wonder, have I started to sleep fall down? Cause I assume that is coming sometime in my life, but I thought it would at least wait until my dementia years.

But no, the hubs assured me I didn't get out of bed last night and use my ass to walk down the stairs, so it has to be pregnancy related. I assume with an extra 15 lbs. weighing heavily on it, and a life predominantly spent sitting on it, she was bound to break. That, or my ass is protesting the thought of pooping during labour, which is something both me and my ass have just started trying to come to grips with (and don't even get me started on the peeing).

So I sit her with my throbbing butt bone (notice I'm still sitting on it, cause not sitting on it, well, that would be like letting it win or something) and blame the pregnancy books and baby centre. In all the things they've told me, all the scare tactics and ass references, not one has related to a throbbing tail bone.

They've told me my ass would get bigger (it hasn't) or that I would get constipated (I haven't). They told me to expect hemorrhoids (I've got none) and to be aware of pregnancy farts (don't got those either). They told me all those things, but never once did they tell me about my tail bone pain. And so I blame them. I blame them for coming up with, at last count, 67,983 things to expect when I'm expecting and never once discussing the feeling of a broken ass.

I can't complain much, and world you can consider this my superstitious knock on wood that none of those things I've thus far avoided come flooding over me in these last 10 weeks. But regardless, my butt throbs and, short of creating some sort of hunch back, leaning over my desk to stand up and type all day, I've yet to come up with a solution. I could try the yoga ball in my office, but I see 2 problems with this. 1, these balls are used in labour and, I don't want to give my body any crazy ideas like this child is ready to come into the world (she's not ready and I am SO not ready). And 2, that I am a klutzy, unbalanced moron (see above) and the result will SURELY be that of me sliding forward and knocking my teeth out on the desk. And I anticipate labour being ugly as it is, with my sweaty frizz hair and a face which I'm sure will be even uglier than my cry face. I certainly don't need to add toothlessness to that situation.

So, I will either go out and buy a hemorrhoid pillow, and carry it around like on old lady (or someone whose just given birth because I've seen this happen before. But again with the not wanting to mislead my body), or I'll just suffer and whine about it.

I think I'll opt for option 2, seeing as I've been ridiculously lucky throughout this pregnancy and have had almost NO sympathy inducing moments to speak of. Sad as it may seem, I may milk this broken ass feeling to get some preggo sympathy. That and hope it simply goes away.

And for the record, this topic falls into WTH Wednesday.....

Misadventures in babysitting.....

2010-01-11T22:09:00.000-08:00

So I am at my BFF's, and after watching her dear little 10 month old daughter for about an hour and 30 mins, and putting her to bed, I felt the need to talk about how useless I've just realized I am. First of all, I don't know how to entertain a 10 month old for longer than 30 seconds. But, that isn't exactly my biggest problem. My biggest problem is something that should be beyond simple, and that's changing the poor girl!

Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to change a 10 months old's clothes and diapers? Of course you do, you people aren't daft, but me, apparently I've got a LOT to learn.

She's just a baby. A cute, pudgy darling little baby, with a great big smile and thighs you just want to bite. You wouldn't think a 10 month old could shake my confidence to the core with a simple diaper and PJ change, but she did it. And she certainly didn't mean to. I brought her to her room and laid her on her change table. And then I looked at her and thought, ok now you just need to pull the t-shirt over her head. After what probably seemed to her like 300 hours of me trying to figure out if the button on the back of the shirt needed to come undone (it didn't. It's false. You know, decorative, cause that's not at all confusing) I finally pulled it over her head. Step 1 complete, and she's unscathed. Annoyed, but unscathed.

Next I have to remove her pants. Simple, right? Sure it is, if you're not a spazz but me, I had issues. I pulled and tried to get them off, one side down the other side still firmly under her butt. She's squirming and I'm trying to simultaneously hold her down so she doesn't squirm off the change table onto the floor, while lifting her butt. I am sure she looked at me and I saw her roll her eyes. She's a smart monkey, it wouldn't surprise me. But ok, pants off. Victory is mine! But she's wearing a onesie...oh dear not a onesie.

Unsnap the crotch, check. Did I mention she's got bitable thighs? Ya so she chooses NOW to faux-thigh master, clenching her thighs of steel together stronger than I could pull even if I wanted to (which I don't, I'm too afraid to hurt her). We struggle, she squirms, I feel stupider by the minute, I mean HONESTLY, her mother does this 5 times per day. Finally unsnapped, I've got to now pull said onesie over her head AND free her arms from it's long sleeves. I need a manual. Which do I do first? Arms? Head? No matter what I do, it's not going to end well. I am sure she could do this on her own by now, but poor kid, she's stuck with me.

Finally, I FINALLY free her from her clothes. Now we're down to the diaper. I can do this She's mad at me, but it's ok. I know I can soon soothe her with a bottle and a book, and really, she's not been hurt, just suffered the stupidity of her aunt. I'm sure that's why she is mad. She can't believe that I could have this much trouble. And I know she was secretly sending baby messages through my womb to her soon to be BFF, telling her to STAY IN THERE, cause this woman is hopeless and she's at least naked in utero.

Removing the diaper was fairly uneventful. By now she's been on the table for what seems to both of us like an eternity, and she's done. She's flipping and squirming and yelling at me. And now, I have to put the clothes back on. I HAVE TO PUT THEM BACK ON. I think I should buy her something pretty for enduring the epic bedtime change with me. Honestly. And I guess since normally, her dad bathes her in the middle of the process, by virtue of me skipping that (I'm honestly petrified of putting her in the water...I'm just not comfortable with bathing a baby so I got a free pass), it was extra torture.

As she lay there, I realize the PJ's are all snaps, which is awesome since it means no pulling anything over her head or feeding her appendages through any holes. What's not awesome is, she's on the table, and I've got to get this thing under her. Why don't I have 3 arms? I need 3 arms, how is any of this possible without 3 arms? Why weren't we born with 3 arms?

I scoop her up, fling the PJs down and put her on top. And now, well now it's me against 37 snaps and a squirmy babe.

I won't even go into detail about how many times I mis-snapped them but, by this time she's given up on getting to bed and has started to just yell and suck her blanket, I am sure she assumed she'd be sleeping on that change table, since I was clearly going to take an eternity to do up a few snaps. She gave up, and mental noted to herself to talk to her mother when she learns words, and tell her mama not to leave her with this crazy lady who doesn't know how a shirt works. Finally, we are done. I should have started her bedtime routine much earlier because I am sure that in the entire course of time, it's never taken anyone that long to get a baby ready for bed.

When it's bottle and story time and the rest of the night goes fairly smoothly. I guess one thing we can say is that, if you want a baby to just roll over and go to sleep, give them a reason to want to get as far away from you as possible. Just call me, I have a knack.

This does not bode well for my baby girl. And this is not the first time this has happened. I had a very similar experience with my niece when she was new, only my sister couldn't take it and jumped in 30 seconds into the disastrous scene I was making. I am hoping this is again, one of those things that you learn when you have your own child.

I seem to be hoping for a lot of that these days. Like as if, shortly after cutting the cord your body is filled with all this maternal instinct and motherly know how. As if I will suddenly stop being a spazz, a klutz and a moron, and clearly and calmly know exactly how to approach these situations. As if becoming a mom is so easy.

Every time I watch someone else's child, I leave that experience envious of my friends. They are all so with it. They KNOW what they are doing, their kids are behaving, entertained, clothed and fed, and none of them seem to have arms out of the socket in order to accomplish that. And me, I'm a mess.

So dear baby, I hope that there really is some sort of "on" button the midwives will push for me, that will suddenly have me knowing what to do with you, and not floundering around like an idiot. Because although there was no harm to my little friend today, she was only exposed to me for 1.5 hours. And you my darling, well you've got your entire LIFE to deal with this.....

Only on the hospital tour did I realize, I'm having a baby!

2010-01-10T15:31:00.000-08:00

Ok so it's been a week since I've been on here, and my last post was full of whiny nonsense. So I promise not to do that again for at least another week...who wants to read my whining, really? I've had some ideas for posting over the last few days, but a series of incidents have left me unable to oblige. Some of these things are personal and also, not that interesting so I won't make you endure hearing about things I don't think deserve my time. Most of these things are work and socializing related. The work part makes me angry, how dare it get in my way. The social part? Well that's ok. I have some great friends and spending time with them is something I not only crave, but truly enjoy.

As usual, I am making no sense and have no point.

On to what I did want to talk about, and that's the hospital tour I went on yesterday. Now, I know this tour is hardly a baby delivering necessity, and I really hadn't planned on having one at all. However, my doula is a relatively new doula, and having not delivered at that hospital before, her mentor (also know as her backup doula) wanted to give her the doulas eye view of how it works. And since I wanted to meet the backup doula, and help my doula out, I decided to go and be her first client tour. Plus, this woman is about to get quite intimate with all my lady parts, and watch me do things I can't yet imagine so, any extra time with her is considered a benefit. So ya, I get that you can have a baby without touring the hospital, but I thought, what the heck?

Now, the first thing we did was enter through admissions, view the assessment rooms, meet some nurses blah blah blah. I think this would be interesting and informative for MOST people, however, just a short 16 months ago, my mother and I camped out in that very area of that very hospital for oh, somewhere around 27 hours. You see, my niece came early, but not TOO early. Early enough that my sister was "high risk" and they would not let us into the regular delivery rooms, but not early enough that they would stop her labour. Early enough that they wouldn't let her get up and walk around in case she encouraged labour, and early enough that after 38 hours they were unwilling to give her anything to help her along. So we sat, and we waited, in the assessment area, for 27+ hours. Until they moved her into the high risk delivery area, because they were finally convinced she was in labour. Apparently she doesn't do labour like most, so they weren't sure....we didn't realize there was a preferred protocol, but that's another story.

And you might wonder why my mother and I found it necessary to stay there for the entire time, but that's probably because you don't really know me. That's just how my family works, well my mom, sister and I anyway. No way was I letting my baby sister sit there alone, scared or bored for one moment, and neither was my mother. That is not how we operate. So we hung out, let her husband have some much needed time off (to go home and feed the dog, take care of his diabetes, have a mental break so when the real work came he'd be ready). We played cards, ate crappy $12 sandwiches and learned how to watch the monitors and unhook them so my sister could pee. We sat on the concrete floor (ok I let my mama have the labour ball, and I sat on the floor) and I'm pretty sure my ass still has a flat spot. But we stayed, as long as we could (with a 1 nights break to gorge on pizza and get 3 hours sleep) and we waited. Waited until it was actual go time, then opted out of that part. That's not something she wanted us there for, and I thank her. I think labour is one thing, but delivery is something else. And it should be personal, and private.

All in all, it was a 38 hour hospital stint, but only 2.5 hours of active labour and a happy, healthy 6 week early baby girl.

So ya, to say I am familiar with that hospital is probably an understatement, but this time it's different. This time it's ME coming through those doors, panic stricken with a human trying to spring forth from my body and a dizzy husband running in circles. And this time, when I leave, I will not have a flat ass but I WILL have a small helpless life form who relies on me. So I figured a refresher can't hurt.

What I DIDN'T see before, were the actual birthing suits in the "you're having a pretty average labour" department upstairs. And of the 5 people I've known to have babies recently, 3 were born there but none were classic text book style, so I'm not sure anyone get into those rooms. And if they did, the rest of their labour was so complex that I've yet to ask them about their surroundings at the time. Instead I've just been forever grateful that all their daughters left that place in excellent condition...even if my friends left a little beat up. But hey, no one said labour was easy.

Back to the suites, they are quite luxe. With HUGE deep bathtubs, the kind that, if I had one in my house I might consider using, and showers, CD players, beds for me AND the hubs. If it wasn't for the beige colours and all the tubes and medicinal looking things around, it would almost feel like a sweet hotel room. There is a bassinet for the babe, and even a skylight. I could see being comfortable there. I mean, it's really not what I expected. I expected 4 walls, a bed and a toilet, and there is much more. And with the midwife and the doula, we can actually make it even BETTER, by adding some chosen music and turning down the lights.

Now, I said, I can see being comfortable there, and that's true. It's true in the "I anticipate this won't be the worst place ever" type way. And not in the, I can actually SEE myself there kind of way. I realized yesterday, I cannot see myself doing this at all.

I mean, she's got to come out. And I'd much prefer to deliver her as nature intended, rather than to have a c-section - chosen or emergency. But to actually envision ME in that room, her making her way out, is just unfathomable at this point. I assume (pray, hope, beg) that this will change, and that as things near I will be able to visualize it happening, so I can prepare myself. But for right now, I can't do it. Like I said, I've had many a friend do it. quite a few of which have done it in the last year or so, and they've all survived. And while they've given me infinite details about it, none of them have indicated it was not manageable or that they were in a great panic. And if they can do it (not to mention a bazillion other women over the course of the world), I must be able to.

I am not even that SCARED per se. I mean that's a lie, the anticipation is killing me and if I let myself think too much about the process itself, it causes a certain level of anxiety. But I am not scared that I will fail or that it will be too much, it's just such an unknown. And standing in that room yesterday, looking at the bed and listening to the doula go over all the things in the room, and what we can use them for, I realized that soon, like within 3 months soon, I'm going to actual have to be in there for real. And I about pooped my pants.

No, not literally, but we can add that to the list of things I've heard that can happen in labour, that are already freaking me out.

I just, it's becoming more real to me now. I am so much closer to delivery than I am to conception, so much closer to holding my daughter in my arms than in my womb, and so much closer to having to go through the entire labour process, than just through the pregnancy.

And I LOVE being pregnant. I know, I am still only just shy of being 7 months along and the last 4-6 weeks are supposed to be the hardest, but so far, it's been great. I love feeling her and knowing she's in there (and HATE when she get's all like her dad and lazes out for a day, causing me to poke at her incessantly until she hits me back). And I am a little sad about this ending. More so I'm excited to meet her, but there is this entire labour thing that stands in the way. And I just cannot visualize myself doing it.

The plan (loose, very loose, very very loose) plan is to try to do this naturally as well. And for the one person I know out there, who is reading this and thinking "well aren't you special, you think you're so tough" you can stuff it. This is not me sitting on my high horse (sorry to the rest of you peeps for my digression but you know, blogging gets you in hot water sometimes, mostly for no reason), this is me thinking why not give it a go. If it doesn't work, if it's worse than I can imagine, if the pain is unbearable and I want to be medicated, you better believe I'll do it. But after looking at the epidural information out there and learning about that, I've developed an unhealthy fear of epidurals. And I don't need anything else to be afraid of right now. I don't like the idea of a giant needle in my spine, and I don't like the idea of being paralyzed from the waist down, catheter in my pee hole, strapped to my bed. Everything I've read leads me away from using one, but hey this is now, and 4 contractions in I could be singing a WHOLE other tune...probably a loud one, riddled with the word fuk and noises best reserved for wildlife, but we'll see.

And I guess I shouldn't say I want it to be natural, because I think that's misleading. I don't want to go the epidural route if I can avoid it, but I suspect I'll be sucking down the laughing gas like it's oxygen. I mean, sure I'll avoid that TOO if I can, but let's not get crazy here and give it all up right away.

I still have a lot of learning to do. I have child birth classes to attend, DVDs to watch and my doula and midwives to talk to. I have to go through the plan with the hubs and make sure he's on board. I have to wrap my head around the physical power this is going to take, and start to really believe my body can do it. Because if I can't do that, I might as well give up right now.

But in all this thinking about it, the scary part is I STILL can't see myself doing it. And maybe this is one of those things, because I have absolutely no frame of reference, I can't envision. Maybe I won't ever be able to, and I'll just have to live it and experience it. Which is probably the case. Too bad I'm so A-Type that this in and of itself stresses me out. I want to plan, I want to prep, I want to know what I'm headed for. I want to imagine myself in labour, so I know what to expect. I want all these things but, I think I'm just going to have to suck it up. Because in all honesty, it might not be possible.

And maybe, just maybe, that's for the better...?

My K9 has no canines, and other whiny pregnant ladyness...

2010-01-05T18:41:00.000-08:00

I have had one of those days that just makes you want to give up. You know, pack your shit, check yourself into somewhere with padded walls, and resign yourself to eating tasteless broth and applesauce for the rest of your life, taking comfort in that fact that at the very least, you will be strongly medicated until you die. But this is the easy way out, and if I was going to take the easy way with anything you think I would have started by now.

It's not that today was particularly catastrophic. In fact, compared to a lot of other days I have, this one was a piece of cake. But something about being almost 7 months pregnant, and slowly losing my ability to do it all no matter what, is wearing heavy on my last nerve. And my eyelids. I swear I'm aging by the minute, and it pisses me off, because quite frankly I was convinced for a long time that I would remain that fresh faced 20 year old forever. I've seen old people, lots of them, and thought to myself "I bet she was pretty", followed by "I'm never going to look like that". I always KNEW I would, but when you're still all shiny and new, with a vacant uterus that's never seen more than the odd cyst, and no concept of the graphic nature of child birth, these things are easy to say. And then you get pregnant, and well, it's all down hill from there.

No not REALLY. I am sure I am going to LOVE being a mother, and will wear proudly the battle scars from becoming one. But right now, today, I'm exhausted and cranky, not to mention hormonal, so I'm allowed to whine about the havoc that's being wreaked on my body. Even if it's not the reason I've had such a day from all hell.

First off, it's the Hubs birthday today. And this does not make my day suck. In fact, it should be a great day full of love and gift showering and all the things I want and expect on my birthday. However, I did not get my post-Christmas self together fast enough to do any of that, and took a selfish pass on the whole thing. We will go out for dinner here shortly, and we are getting together with close friends on Friday to celebrate. But gift I do not have. For several reasons, the least of which is the fact that I have $23.97 in my bank until Friday, and he does not need any flashlight key chains from the dollar store. The other reason being, he wants a new laptop and I've given him the green light to use some of the joint savings to cover some of that cost. So I figure in a roundabout way, I'm contributing. And the biggest and most important reason is, of course, the small child currently jamming her foot into some organ I didn't know I had. I'm giving him the gift of life, see, so what if it'll be 3 months later than his birthday? I started creating this gift a whopping 6.5 months ago, so there. A soon to be crying, pooping, helpless little girl who will turn his hair grey and probably grow up to be just as sassy to him as I am. And I don't think there is a better gift around.

The second suckatacular reason for today's whinefest (and the Hubs lack of a gift) is that, my dog had dental surgery today. I don't know if you saw my post about the Top 10 Things that make me happy but, he's #1. So today, I took him to the vet, where they sedated him heavily and removed, not 1, not 2 but 6 teeth from his tiny little head. That's right, my crazy little monkey is SO hard on his teeth, what with hanging from tree branches and carrying driftwood larger than his mother around, that he's cracked, broken or otherwise damaged his teeth to epic proportions. He is no longer a dog as far as I can tell, because my K9 has no more canine teeth left. Yup, they took all 4, and a molar, and 2 incisors just for fun. Oh joy. This has relieved me both of guilt free puppy mamahood, and approximately $1200. I took him in this morning, hugged his happy little face so close, gave him a big kiss and bawled. I bawled because one time I read of another Boston Terrier, who was over sedated and died on the operating table, and it's all I can think about. Damn internets. I bawled like a crazy person and the little dude at the front desk must have thought I was insane. Too bad my winter coat covers up the bump, or maybe I could have passed it off as that? The good news is, he's awake and well, so despite putting me in the poor house, he's perfectly fine and I am VERY relieved.

Suckfest # 3 (and I am listing these in the order in which they occurred, and not which suckniess sucked more than the other suckinesses), is that we had to resume the epic office move from hell today. Shortly before Christmas (Dec 21 to be exact) we tried to move from one too small office to another slightly less than too small office. Packed we were, ready to go on the preceeding Friday, only to get a phone call that the new office had flooded. FLOODED, with POO water. Everywhere. POO WATER. Ugh. The saving grace being that we had no possessions to be ruined, the kick you in the shins shitfest being, we also had no office, no server and no ability to get mail or function. We also happen to have work for 57 people and 12 bodies to do it all, so no ability to simply throw our hands up and say "oh well it's the Holidays". So, we crammed an entire office into 1 room of this new office, and after 9 treacherous hours of moving crap, we were only part way done. You can imagine my joy when they told me we could move full in today, because that meant MORE office moving. Super duper. The entire thing has been fraught with insanity, from a lack of connections and phones (and if I cannot tweet from my desk about how annoying my movers smell, then how will I survive?) to the flood, to the bitchy other pregnant lady who works in the office next door, and is subletting this space to us. So ya, moving offices sucks. Period. The end.

So to top today off, I had to attend my grandmothers funeral. And while it may seem trite to put her at the end of this list of things that made today a tough one, it's simply because that was the last thing to happen today and because I have no bitching to do about her or her funeral. It did not ruin my day, and I do not resent having to go. I only resent not having more time, patience and energy to give her the me she deserved today. She died on Christmas day, after a short (well long if you count the fact this was her coming out of remission after 25 years) battle with lung cancer (thumbs up to the fuktards smoking outside at her wake, way to go geniuses). And because of the holidays, we have not buried her until now. My ragingly dysfunctional family (to give you some insight, she's my stepdad's step mother, and his two step brothers were there with their step children, so none of us are really technically related to anyone else), were out in fine form. And not even for one day, could they all suck it up, stop being so selfish and let her be buried in peace. We weren't always that close, grandma and I, but she took me in when I was 3 years old, her stepsons girlfriends daughter, and treated me like I was her own flesh and blood. And caring like that cannot go unrecognized. And today, she was laid to rest beside my grandfather, who passed 6 years ago. And I think, she's probably the happiest she's been in those 6 years to be with him again.

And that is the day I had today. I realize this is not exactly uplifting or too pregnancy specific, but I had to let it out somewhere. I promise to get back to my regularly scheduled insanity first thing tomorrow, when we hit 29 weeks and I try to see if I can put on my pre-preggo pants...you know, for shits and giggles :D I anticipate a lot of shits, and not so many giggles but, we shall see.

Pushing the Pretty Pushers

2010-01-04T15:48:00.000-08:00

Ok, so awhile back I posted about these awesome things, Pretty Pushers, which I learned about on Dear Baby.

So I ordered 3 sets. Only 1 is for me, 2 are for friends. Though, that's not to say it didn't cross my mind to have a wardrobe change once or twice throughout the process. I mean, people tell me it might take like, 24+ hours, so why not keep myself fresh? But I decided against it. Both because I don't have the money for such things, and because I'm sure mid-labour I'll be lucky to be wearing any clothes, let alone changing (but I WILL be thinking about it...especially when photographs are involved!). So anyway. they came awhile ago, but since I've been sick, busy, moving offices and gestating a human, I haven't had a chance to post about them.

But here I am, posting them.

Now, my photography skills are more than lacking. The hubs bought me an awesome camera last year, and if I had the patience of even an 8 year old, I'd of figured out the tricks by now. But instead, I just go on "Auto" and let it tell me what it needs to do. I don't always agree, but who the hell am I to question my Canon?

Anyway, here is it, in not as much glory as it should be.

They arrived in a giant box, and inside that box there were 3 other awesome boxes. Exhibit A:

I bought a purple, a blue and a stripes, so I found the stripes one (and these boxes were nice and labeled so the other 2 are still completely in tact. I LOVE places that pay attention to the importance of packaging). And inside, I found my Pretty Pusher gift set. And again, loving the presentation!! Exhibit B:

And then I looked closer. You'll notice a lip gloss WITH mirror, some warming massage oil (hello back rub from the hubs, or the doula if he's passed out), and the refreshing lemon scented wipes. Exhibit C:

And then I tore the box open as fast as I could And then I carefully opened the beautiful package to find my Pretty Pusher inside. Notice the matching headband, because hello, who needs to worry about her bangs during labour? OR her headband not matching exactly. As if. Exhibit D:

So then it was time to try it on. Um, after 15 mins or so of me trying to figure out where my head goes (for your future reference, it goes through the head hole. You know, the one at the top with the halter? But see, there are all these ties and things and I confuse easily at the best of time, let alone when I'm excited!), I was in! These photos are horrible. They are of me, so strike 1, in poor lighting, so strike 2, in my sorry excuse for a full length mirror, strike 3. So don't hold it against the Pretty Pusher. The dress is what they are referring to, not the wearer HA. Exhibit E:

Openings for monitors and other medical type things that are used (and a giant belly button, where planes could land):

The back (and the hardest photo to get), which is low, so you can get your epidural in there (if you're having one) and not have to give up your fashionista style! Mind my bra, I'm one of those people with small tata's who is afraid to go braless, like it would matter:

And last but not least, my super svelte side profile:

So, that is that. So far my review is that this thing is AWESOME. It's nicer than I expected even. The material is thicker and softer than I expected for the price I paid, and the packaging and presentation were seriously above and beyond what I expected.

I highly recommend this as a gift for any fashionista in mommy training. I think they are a lot of fun. And while certainly not a labour necessity, they are one of those special little somethings that will help make the frantic insanity of delivery day that much more enjoyable. Pretty Pushers get a 10 from me....stay tuned for my post labour follow-up, when I test them out, in action!

Pretty Pushers website it here!

*as an aside, I bought and paid for all 3 sets of Pretty Pushers, at no special deal. This review was done solely for personal reasons, because when I love something I want to share it. I was in no way compensated for said warm fuzziness.

Happy 101 - I got an award!!!

2010-01-02T13:41:00.000-08:00

I did I did I did!!!! The Mommyologist has to be like, one of the sweetest blogger ladies I've met so far! This is the second time she's bestowed upon me a lovely little award, and I could not appreciate it more. No really. When I saw her in my inbox this morning I was SO excited. And I hope she's well aware of just how much it means to me. Someone recognized me, for serious. And I couldn't be more overjoyed. It feels so special to know someone out there thinks highly enough of this little old blog to share awards. It makes me feel that there is a purpose to this, other than to hear myself talk (or I guess that's type?), and of course to keep me out of the loony bin.

So here it is, in all it's shiny glory:

So, here is the deal with this award, once received you are charged with the task of listing out 10 things that make you happy. It's easy peasy, and a GREAT way to start the New Year. It is also a great way for me to stay on track with my resolutions, which simply relate to me enjoying my life more.

So here it goes, and in no particular order. I'm not very orderly and if you asked me to rank these, I would shrivel up an die. So they are coming out of my head, in random spastic order, like everything else I post :D

1 - My dog. I know, a strange place to start, but of course he's laying here beside me on the couch, snoring and snuggling under the blanket and I cannot deny how much I love him. He's my fur baby and the first animal I've ever loved in such an unhealthy manner. I got him almost 6 years ago when he was just a brand new baby bean. His name is Tuker (like Tucker and NO I didn't spell it WRONG, I chose to spell it that way). He is a Boston Terrorist, I mean Terrier and he's 100% insane. He's a lot like me. He cannot focus, he gets separation anxiety and on occasion, I catch him sniffing his fingernails. He's my first bundle of joy, and no matter how totally crazy he is (and he IS completely bonkers) I love him more everyday. Even on the days where I come home to a giant pile of puppy puke and eaten up baseboards....I may get annoyed but deep down, I know it's only because he missed his mommy so much. I am SO glad he cannot talk because this dog knows more of my deep dark secrets than anyone should. He's always there for me, he loves me unconditionally and he never ever makes me feel bad about myself. Even when I forget to feed him. He's my monkey, my baby, my snugglebunny, my Tuker Tuxeedo:

2 - My niece. I know, seems weird that she follows the dog, but like I said, I am random. Also, she's younger than him and thus has been part of the love in my heart for a shorter period of time. She was born on September 14, 2008 an entire 6 weeks before she was due. She was fine, she just knew my mom and I could throw a kick ass party and she did not want to miss her baby shower. She is probably the cutest and most hilarious child ever to be born, and I'm totally not biased. She's so cuddly and so happy, and I just want to eat her up. If it was acceptable to squeeze a baby until their eyes popped, it would have been done several times already. She is the reason I got hard core on the baby train, and she really gassed up my biological clock. I hope my daughter is as happy and carefree as my Teegan Alexis, because this kid is truly amazing:

3 - My new house. Again, these are totally random, so while I do love the house less than my dog and my niece, I don't love it more than whatever follows (and I am totally doing this list on the fly so who knows what those will be anyway?). It's a 100 year old, 4 story house with a bit of a chip on it's shoulder. We had to put on a new roof a few short months after moving it. We also painted the flesh coloured walls a series of fun colours, and my main floor is now predominantly a rich, bright purple, a deep sexy grey and a bright grassy green. And I'm talking a lot of purple. The second floor is full or red, blue and teal, with some grey to calm it down. When I was younger my first apartment looked like Rainbow Bright threw up, but we've done it in a more sophisticated manner this time. Since moving in, we've also had to replace the furnace AND hot water tank, and have had to deal with being landlords for the first time. It's not perfect yet, and it may never be. But we're not perfect either, so what can you do? It is the home we're making, it's where my daughter will spend the first part of her life, and where we will become a family. One day I hope to be as with it as my mother or sister, and have a nice clean house all the time but, let's be realistic, it won't happen. I'll just continue to spot clean and make people think I've got it all together. Here she is, pre new shiny black roof:

4 - Friends. Nothing makes me happier than friends. I've got some from high school that I miss everyday. Even though we only live 40 mins apart, this life is so busy and we definitely do not see each other enough. However, 2 of them have children already and 2 are pregnant and due just after me, so 2010 promises to be a year I get to see them more. And then there is my BFF, who I met in university and who I could not live without. I'd of never married my husband, got pregnant or bought a house if I didn't know her. That might seem stupid but it's true. She's the support and love I've relied on in my formative adulty years, and without her sense of reason, our Thursday night dates (6 years strong) and her way of making me see things from a different perspective, I'd of never made it this far and remained as almost sane as I am. And then I've got some friends I just met last year (actually, we're coming up on our friend-a-versary very shortly here!!!) who've made a huge difference in my life. They are the type of people who you meet and who instantly treat you like they've known you your whole life. Without them, this last year would have been infinitely harder. Then there are a handful of others, who positively impact my life every day. I could go on for pages and pages about my friends but the bottom line is this, finally at almost 30 years old, I've managed to weed out the people who suck time and energy but don't provide anything in return, and surround myself with only the people who truly love and appreciate me. It's been a great year in friendship. A lot of them are missing from this photo, but we had a pajamarama in adult sized onsies this year (with FEET), and any excuse I can use to talk about it I'm all over:

5 - My mother. My mother is and will always be my best friend. At the age of something just slightly over 50, she has more fun than a lot of 30 somethings out there. She exercises more than a reasonable person should (seriously she's got like, 4 gym memberships), keeps an impeccable house, cooks like a maven and does it all with a smile. She makes me laugh more than anyone I've even known, and inspires me to just relax and enjoy life. I can tell her anything, and I want to tell her everything. I don't think we've had more than 2 fights, even in my formative years. She's been the best mother a person could hope for. She never judges you, she never second guesses you, and she'll drop any and everything in an instant if you need her. I can't wait to give her another granddaughter, to teach and love and hang out with. I hope my daughter can learn from her as much as I have. I love my mom and just thinking about her makes me smile, no matter what!

6 - Vacations with my hubs, those make me insanely happy. We love road trips, and seeing new places. And though he hates to fly and it creates an insane amount of pre-vacay anxiety, we've had some amazing times in the last 5 years. We've been twice to Hawaii, we've driven down the entire coast to San Fransisco, then flew back there just this last year. We've visited the island on numerous occasions, to just enjoy the simplicity of the cabin. Everything from day trips to full on, pack your bag vacations, taking time out of our lives to travel and spend time together truly makes me happy. Something about the vacation us is so refreshing. We don't stress, we don't argue and we don't worry about small things like leaky faucets or stupid jobs. We just laugh at our mishaps, and carry on our merry way. Vacations with my husband, be them for a day or 2 weeks, are one of the best things in life!!

7 - My little sister. Granted I tried to give her away to the milkman when she was first born (I'd gone 6 whole years as an only child, then spent 3 months with my mom, eating peanut buster parfaits and laying in the sun...then along she came and ruined it all...so sue me for sticking her outside on the door step and hoping the milk man would take her). We didn't always love each other as much as we do now. Well, that's a lie, When I was 13 and she was 7, she adored me but I thought she was annoying. Of course, the tables turned when I hit 21 and she was only 15 and she told me I was passed my prime. After working out all the silliness (and all in all, it was VERY minimal. We've always been great friends) she's one of the most important people to me. I never thought I wanted more than 1 child, but I cannot deny how wonderful and important my sister is to me, and I would hate to deny my daughter that same experience. My sister is so much like me and so different from me it's confusing. I love her, and I am so proud of the woman, wife and mother she has become. I look up to her, even if she is 6 years younger:

7 - The hubs. I can't do a top 10 things that make me happy without talking about the hubs. Now, he also infuriates me to no end and I spend many a moment shaking my head at him. But fundamentally the things that make me shake my head are the things that make me love him. We're so different it's hard to imagine we could be together. I'm so A-type, go go go and he's so B-type take it slow. It's good for me since I can talk anyone in circles, but bad for him since he gets almost no word in ever. He's patient with my insanity, and he takes care of me in silly little ways. He goofs off, he plays music, he makes video games and above anything else, he love me. He really, truly loves me more than I could even hope to be loved by anyone. It makes me happy to think someone could appreciate the bizarre insanity that is me, and still continue to love it. I'm not going to go on some sappy tangent of "he's my heart, my soul mate, my love" because that's not us. But he is all those things, just in a less sappy way :D

8 - The bump. She makes me happy. I know that in 3 short months, my bump will be a baby (well, I assume the bump will remain for awhile after that, but it will no longer contain my daughter). I love the way I feel her hiccups (even in strange places), I love to feel her move from the inside, and feel her move from the outside. I love that I can be connected to someone I've never seen or met, and be so in love with someone that's only been introduced to me through the wonders of medical technology. It get's a little bigger every day, and people are actually starting to notice her!! I love my bump, and I'll miss it when it's gone. Being pregnant has been a wonderful, exciting and amazing experience, something I never knew I'd enjoy so much. My bump, the Hubs calls her Sarah Jessica Barker, my BFF calls her Herm. I call her lots of things, but mostly I call her my heart:

9 - Ok, I'm done with the sappiness and onto some not too personal things that make me happy. So let's call number 9 shoes. And not just shoes, but shoes, sandals, boots, pumps, flats, whatever they are, they make me happy. One of the biggest challenges ever was finding the right ME shoe for our wedding. They make me smile, they make me feel sexy and fashionable, they are part of my everyday life. I heard somewhere that your feet can grow an entire size during pregnancy, and never go back. And THAT is so much more scary than the idea of a stretch mark. On last count I had close to 40 pairs, but if you include flipflops, and add the ones I bought since we moved, I'd guess we've crossed the 50 mark. But don't tell the hubs. The wedding shoes:

10 - hmn, last but not least, what can I choose? Somewhere between all things teal and aqua coloured, and things I can cram in my face. I love teal and blue, and anything that colour makes me happy. I am insanely obsessed with peacock feathers, and will buy anything made of them. But let's not make that #10. Let's make food and wine #10. And not just the physical consuming of said things, but the entire social aspect that relates to food. I love shopping for food, preparing food and consuming it. I love having parties, where I've put out a great spread and everyone enjoys eating and drinking. I take photos of food when the hubs and I go on vacation, or when we're at a birthday party. I almost enjoy prepping and serving food more than I enjoy eating it, but that's irrelevant. And I can't deny that I also love the wine and beer we can pair with food. I am no Coors Light girl. I drink fancy, fruity micro-brews, and taste test anything different that I can (thanks to the hubs). Obviously, the drinking has taken a back seat to my eating lately, but I love them both equally. So maybe it makes this 10 & 11, but I figure we'll call it all consumables, and leave it at that.

So there are 10 things that make me infinitely happy. Thank you to The Mommyologist, for giving me this award, and this opportunity to reflect on 10 things that make me happy!

Happy New Year!!!!

We've crossed a decade and it's only just begun....

2010-01-01T13:08:00.000-08:00

I feel the urge to ring in the New Year with one of those posts that talks about the year before, and what we're going to do differently in the upcoming days. Apparently I don't dance to the beat of my own drum quite as much as I thought, because I'm totally following. But that's ok, because the reason I want to do a post like this is because I've enjoyed reading everyone else's over the last few days.

I guess I will start with my reflections on 2009, before I get into the changes I plan to make for 2010.

In 2009, the Hubs and I celebrated our first year of marriage. We moved from a small 700 sq. ft apartment on the beach in downtown Vancouver, to a large, 3000 sq. ft house in East Van...aka "the ghetto". It's not technically the ghetto, it's actually a very cool area of town, and one of the only area's where normal people can buy houses. And even that's a stretch, we've got tenants so we can afford it here. But it isn't the fancy side of town, and if there was a residential ghetto, it would be in East Van. The house is 100 years old, and very cool. Lots to do around here still, but it's becoming us and I do so love all the charm about it. There are no closets, which is a serious issue when one has the shopping obsession I do, but whatevers.

I watched my little sister get married to her high school sweetheart (ok I planned the entire wedding), and one of my best friends get married as well.

I pee on a stick at 4am one morning in July (it was July 16th to be exact) and expected to, once again, find 1 pathetic line staring me in the face and to return to bed with a thick tear bubble in my throat and an ache in my chest I couldn't explain. I psyched myself up with all the "it will happen when the time is right" thoughts and the "maybe our timing wasn't as good after all" and of course the "14 months is really THAT long" and "we're not really ready anyway". I expected to not have any pee stories to tell the Hubs, and let him go on blissfully unaware of how long this was taking and how sad I was every month. But OMG OMG OMG, as I peed on that stick (you know the one I've still got, in the bathroom cupboard, with it's 4 sisters...which, when you think about it, is pretty gross. But I know I'm not alone here.) and that line came up, I just about fell off the toilet (after having SO many "false hopes" I waited an obscene amount of time after I should have got my period to POAS. So when I peed on it, the line came up before I was done). I had this BIG plan all the previous months, to tell the Hubs in some completely story worthy way. It was going to be one for the books. I was going to come up with such a fun idea, and make the moment extra special. Instead, I ran upstairs, climbed into bed, shook the Hubs until he was awake (ok pseudo-awake) and blurted out, at 4something am on a Thursday "I"m pregnant". To which he lovingly replied "what?!? how did THAT happen". Oh the joy and romance of that moment. But hey, that's SO us! I'm the one who replied "Are you fuking serious" when he proposed so, classy we are not.

We took a trip to San Fransisco, and thoroughly enjoyed touring the city. Even at 14 weeks pregnant, and totally exhausted, I trooped around on foot for 5 days and even sat while my husband had a few beers at the Rogue Pub - his favourite brewery.

I started a baby blog in October, mostly for my own personal reasons. I like to write (which is handy since, it's also my job), and to me it's like therapy. At first I didn't do it to get followers or even care if anyone read me, but that's started to change. I've grown increasingly interested in becoming part of this community, and there are some of you out there who are part of every day of my life.. I've done a lot of work to become part of the blogger community, and have met a lot of other mommy bloggers I love and adore. They may not know how much I love them, but I do. One of the best parts of my day is looking at the list of blogs I follow, or seeing a new post pop up that I can go read. If it were socially acceptable to tell some of these women that I love them, even though I've never met them, I would. I'd be sending them roses and chocolates, and trying to woo them into loving me back. Actually, that's a lie. I think roses and chocolates are lame attempts at romance, and if someone wanted to effectively woo me, they'd do it with stylish foot wear and feathery hair accessories, so I'd probably start there.

We had a house warming party, a Halloween party, a Christmas party, Christmas dinner for 22 people and a New Years Eve party all in the new house.

And now, we're planning for the baby (who is so never going to have a name), who will actually join us in the first quarter of this year.

In this year, I will become a mom, a mother, a mommy. And not just in the technical sense, because technically, in the technical sense, I think I am one now. But a real, full on mom. I hope I can be half the mother my mom is, but I think that's another post.

In this year, the Hubs and I will celebrate 2 years of marriage, and while it hasn't always been easy, it has always been right.

In this year, I will turn 30! I always said I wanted to be a mom before 30, and even if this baby girl is a full 2 weeks late, she'll get her 8 days before my 30th birthday, so I call that a success. Nothing like cutting it down to the wire, but hey, I'm an avid procrastinator and I'm REALLY good at it. I will try not to let the big 3-0 get me down, because it's just a number. I will ignore the fact I can find pimples AND grey hairs in the same day, and just be happy I am healthy. And that I am still younger than 95% of my friends (not that I did that on purpose or anything...no really).

In this year, I will grow up and learn to appreciate the world around me. I will say no more often, do the things I want, and stop being so guilty over the things I cannot control. I will realize that being 20 mins. late for family dinner has no overall detrimental effect on anyone (except my cell phone bill from my dad's incessant calling), and that it's more important to arrive safely and happily, then hastily and on time.

I will rest more (and yes, I appreciate the irony in trying to rest more in the year I will become a mom however, I intend to take the next 12 weeks to calm down). I will take better care of myself, and stop putting everyone else's needs and wants ahead of my own. I will enjoy life more, and stress about it less. I will try to remember not to sweat the small things, because fundamentally I have a great life and I need to appreciate every moment of it.

I will plan less, and go with the flow more. And I will do this both because I need to stop spreading myself so thin, and because I want more time to enjoy the things I am choosing to do, instead of constantly stressing about what's next on my list.

I will learn the patience I need to bake. I can cook like no-ones business, but my baking always fails, and I'm convinced this is a patience issue. If I can bake, I can do anything.

I will put more time into the people who reciprocate their love for me, and waste less time feeling sad, angry or left out of those who don't have time to be part of my life. I will stop trying to make these people happy, because it's not getting me anywhere, and I've got more important things to do.

I will stop feeling guilty over things that I cannot control. Guilt should be reserved for things I've done wrong, and not for the false or unrealistic expectations I've put on myself and failed to attain.

I will give myself more credit, and spend less time criticizing my dust bunnies and more time watching the dog chase them around. And I will laugh at the hairy bathroom sink, instead of being disgusted and getting frustrated at the Hubs.

I will remember what it was like to love unconditionally in the beginning, and appreciate the Hubs and what he does for me more. I will try not to be so frustrated and impatient with him, because we are not the same person and his views on the world and his priorities are not always the same as mine. And this doesn't make him wrong, it makes him awesome.

I will do all these things, because I want to teach my daughter how to enjoy life, to be happy and caring, and to love herself. I want her to grow up in world full of love and joy. And I don't want to miss any of those little moments with her, because I'm so busy trying to get my hair to look right so I can get to the 8th thing on my To Do list on time. I will do this because life isn't about me anymore, it's about us, and it's the perfect time to make a change. I will do this because I truly believe the most important thing in life, is happiness, and that you have the power to make yourself happy in any situation.

That is what I expect for 2010. I hope you're all here to enjoy it with me. And to remind me when I start to fall off the wagon.

As IF you could live without one of these for very much longer...for serious!

2009-12-29T23:43:00.000-08:00

Once and awhile, I come across something on the internets that is certainly not a necessity but which you simply cannot live without. This happened a few weeks ago, when I came across the Pretty Pushers . I've received them, but I'm bad and I've neglected to even open the box yet, let alone take photos and post them like I promised. But I WILL. This week, promise, nnnkay. Sometimes a girl just gets overwhelmed by Christmas and nasal mucus and can't focus on any more things....and let me just say, you know I'm fa-rigging exhausted when a package can arrive at my door and survive my mad tearing for more than 30 seconds, let alone days.

Anyway, I think the sheer amount of grandma's butter tarts I've consumed in the last 7 days is starting to melt my brain. I again started by digressing.....why do I do that?

My point TODAY is I found something ELSE we simply cannot live without. Ok, well maybe if you have only male children, and no nieces or other small females around, you could resist but, you know what? I doubt it. You know why? Cause there is boys stuff on here TOO.

But back to all things for little girls....what did I find? Oh I don't know, just a freaking TUTU! For babies and little girls. Did you hear me? A frilly, fancy, beautiful TUTU for your child. And I'm not talking about that Tinkerbell knockoff they gouge you for at Toys R US, with the shoddy elastic and sparkles that barf all over your house and choke your dog. No ladies, I'm talking about a beautifully hand crafted, colourful little tutu...FOR YOUR BABY......

To be EXACT, it's a Cutie PaTutu. And not A tutu, but several, in many sizes and colours, for every occasion. And you know what else? They are affordable.

I know you're not listening anymore...you're off on the site, daydreaming about your daughter rockin her birthday party in this sassy little number - The Meghan or your sister's baby showing up to the next family soiree decked out in her very own Princess Courtney.

The bottom line is this - these Tutus are the cutest thing this side of a newborns butt, and if I don't get one now I think I'll freak out. The Hubs will be beyond mortified (as will the brother in law, because let's face it, I've got to get one for my 15 month old niece too), but who cares. If this child was a boy, we'd be covering him in robots and lego.

When I get them, I'll snap a photo of my niece in hers (and eventually my in utero babe but, let's face it, it could be awhile before I manage to get her in her tutu). But until then, stock this site, fall in love with them...and then love me for finding such awesomeness for you. Because honestly, where would you find the time?

I tried to hide my stupidity, but the bleeding gave it away....

2009-12-28T20:18:00.000-08:00

I did something stupid earlier today, and tried to hide it. Unfortunately my bleeding foot later gave it away.

You see, I, like many women, are sure that I am 100% competent at accomplishing every task, whether I've done it before or not. I also refuse to believe that just because I am pregnant I should avoid doing certain things. Finally, I believe that I am right and the Hubs is wrong, in almost any situation where our opinions differ - which is about 98% of the time.

So this morning, while he slept, I got the bright idea to show him how talented and capable I truly am. You know, so I could rub it in his face be an awesome wife and revel in his shame excitement when he woke up.

We bought a lamp shade at IKEA yesterday (back to me being a glutton for punishment, we went to IKEA the day after Boxing Day) for Baby Girls room. Just a simple, red lamp shade. I got the BRILLIANT idea to hang this upside down, from the ceiling, in lieu of the circa 1985 wanna be WalMart special light fixture that currently hangs in that room. The hubs wasn't sure my plan would work but, uh ya, of COURSE it would. I'd only seen it 500 times and I'm now pregnant which makes me both handy AND crafty, no?

So instead of even beginning to give him the option to sort it out (in my defense, handy he is not) I thought "I'll just pop up there, change the shade, flick the light on and nananabooboo I'm right VOILA, it works." Of COURSE it'll work, why wouldn't it? It's my plan after all.

So at 9am, after being rudely awaken the SECOND time on my last day of vacay, I decided since I couldn't sleep, I'd accomplish something. I grabbed the computer room chair, put it under said light (I'm very tall, so it's not too much of a stretch) and went to work. Now let's forget the fact that at 6 months pregnant, 13 lbs. heavier and not an OUNCE more graceful than before, I was up on a chair, trying to change a light over my head. I see no problem with that, and I refuse to acknowledge if there is one.

Step 1, remove the old fixture, hanging by what appears to be the same chain my grandmother uses to ensure she doesn't lose the pesky plug in her tub. That was a no brainer. Step 2, remove old lightbulb. Pfft, this is easy peasy. I was eating a little dust, but it was all in the name of decor so who cares. Step 3, hold new lamp shade over existing electrical light bulb holding thingamajig, and line it up.No problem! Step 4, screw new energy efficient light bulb in to the hole and glorious step 5? Flick the swich and revel in my astounding accomplishment.

This is where the plan fails. No light. Switch it on but no light is coming out. What the eff? Hmmm in my infinite electrician and handygal abilities, I am able to quickly deduce it's because the bulb isn't screwed in far enough for the metal part to touch the other metal part and make bright shiny light come out. No problem, this is easily solved by screwing the bulb in farther. Back up on the chair I go, a few more turns and, it's TOTALLY going to work, right? Right?

Clearly not. What the deuce? I must not have screwed it in enough. Back up on the chair I go. Holding the bulb I give it one final twist and.....

The fancy ass twisty energy efficient bulb breaks off and shatters, in my hand. Raining down on me (and the Hubs computer chair) a shower of fine glass mist. Clearly I do not know my own strength.

Fuk fuk fuk. I hop down. I MUST quickly hide all evidence of said misadventure and pretend such things never occurred. I simply cannot let Hubs know I failed, and give him that ammo. Lightening fast, I run the chair into the bathroom, and tip the glass bits into the tub. Once I've cleaned it (effectively with a wad of toilet paper) I return to the room to hide the evidence of the broken bulb. Lucky for me, these new energy efficient ones have quite a base, and I was able to twist it out WITHOUT using a potato, a la my 8th grade shop teacher.

Cleaned up, evidence hidden, new bulb in place I pretend none of this mornings events take place. I tell the Hubs I tried, but it doesn't work, and we need a new solution. But it WILL work. He rolls his eyes in the "I told you so way", I envision stabbing him in the eye socket with my spoon, and all is well. We hit Home Depot for like, the 5789th time since moving into this house, and try to sort it out.

After 18 minutes and at least 5 "let's buy and try this, and if it doesn't work, return it" moments (side note: I have a cupboard of things that did not work, which should have been returned, but will now die a dusty, half utilized death in my house, only to be resurrected during some cleaning spree, where I file it under "find something to do with this". It will never ever get used. Unless I open an odds and ends store, where we just carry 1 of everything for a myriad of problems). Finally, I asked the geriatric HD associate I'd been following around the store which solution would work best:

"So I've got this like, lampshade thingy, and I'm trying to hang it from a thing sort of like this, but without that part, and I don't want to use a cord thingy or rewire anything, so I'm hoping either this will work? Or this? The problem is, the light bulb thing, the metal part, doesn't screw in all the way in, it's just a bit too shallow, and I've already asked in light bulbs, and there aren't any with longer metal connector parts. Anyway, which of these thingy's works better for hanging a $6 lamp shade from my ceiling in a way it was never intended to be used, but which I saw once in a magazine full of talented people with brains and tools? I just need like, this much more space (showing him with my finger nails).

Oh, and while you're at it, can you please make sure to mention to the Hubs here that I'm the smartest girl ever for coming up with this idea (not to mention a VERY sexy pregnant lady, even if this hoodie hasn't seen the washer in 6 weeks), and that it will work no problem and will not require any Googling on his part? K thanks!"

I don't envy those HD guys. Their ability to decipher my thingy from my whatchamacallit has been quite impressive over the years, and they've barely steered me wrong. His response?

"Well dear, it's just a connectivity issue, and I'd say your old light has just pushed down the copper part here (demonstrates on 1 of the 15 things I'm holding). You could probably just use a screw driver to bend this prong out ever so slightly, and use your existiing fixture...but make sure YOU TURN THE POWER OFF before you put a screw driver in there".

Check. Right. Thanks. Got it. No need to invest in heavy artillery, just fix what you've got. At least the Hubs never thought of this either.

So home we go. We haven't tried it since it's dark and I've rendered the only light in there completely useless (if not insanely cute), but that's what tomorrow is for.

So how did I get caught?

Welllllll, remember my glass shower? Right so, as it turns out, I didn't do such a great job on my clean up and wound up with a shard of glass in the pad of my foot. I didn't notice all day, wearing my Uggs is like wearing pillows on my feets, But then we came home, and it hurt like HELL. I was limping around, whining about my sore foot. I went to look and wouldn't ya know it? Glass, in MA FOOT!

Sigh. So up on the counter goes said foot, and I attempt to reach for the tweezers to remove it (bending back in a way I could only have accomplished at age 6), while the Hubs stands curiously in the bathroom door. I push it, it HURTS, I bleed, I need toilet paper (and balance) STAT. So the Hubs assists...and then of course asks the question "so how did you get GLASS in your foot anyway".

Busted.

I am also no good at lying or keeping secrets from the Hubs, so as soon as he asked me, the verbal diarrhea kicked in and it was all out on the table. My other trick is to try to dazzle him with my Gilmour Girlease and speak so quickly and with so many cute quips, he gets confused and walks away without addressing the real issue...that being me, up on a chair, with electricity, at 9am and 6 months pregnant, while he sleeps a floor away.

But I survived....and tomorrow we shall make that lamp work. I just need to remember to turn off the electricity first.

Vagina hiccups, who knew?

2009-12-28T12:52:00.000-08:00

So I put Google Analytics on my blog the other day, because I am the curious type and wanted to know what things brought people to my blog, and how much. I'm into myself, I'll admit it, and all I want is for someone to read my little blog and enjoy it. I also liked stats in school and so, seeing things in numbers makes me happy.

I've pretty much learned that I am not that highly read. Which is honestly no surprise. I mean, I'm new and I'm not even that good at promoting myself. I don't know what else I need to do, but I'm working on it. I read and comment on other blogs, I tweet and follow peeps and I have joined SITS, which is where a majority of my traffic comes from.

I also got to see where some of my search traffic comes from. Mind you, it's practically nil. There were a few pregnancy blog related searches that have delivered me a reader or two. Well, I don't know if you can call them a reader when the bounce rate is that high, but I'll take it. Whatever gets me out there.

The most interesting search that has drawn someone to my site (someone who hung out for over 1:57 minutes!!!) was "Vagina Hiccups".

Now, this in and of itself is neither surprising nor strange. I did write an entire post about my vagina having the hiccups. But what IS strange is that somewhere, someone out there, is Googling "Vagina Hiccups". Someone other than me, is experiencing vaginal hiccups, and there is no way to know if said person is even pregnant.

Clearly, we can assume it was a woman (or let me assume this, the prospect of it being a MALE is far to creeparrific to allow myself to consider this an option), because of the word vagina. But the hiccups, Really? Someone else is experiencing this? And not only are they having the experience, it appears that it's not gestationally related. Honestly, while it FEELS like my vagina is experiencing the rhythmic 'up up up' that are in utero hiccups, I am WELL aware that it's simply the position of my daughter in the womb, and nothing more. It never would have promoted me to Google such things, or to be unsure about it. The whole "my vagina has the hiccups" was more a clever title designed to get you people reading me! I've known full well what's going on the entire time.

The fact that someone Googled it means, they are unsure as to what is happening in their body. It means that they, in fact, are concerned that their vag actually HAS the hiccups, and that this is abnormal. It means that something is happening to this searcher, that replicates a hiccuping vagina, and is not related to a baby.

I'm worried for this person. Honestly, what could that be? How could this happen to anyone else? I'm tempted to log into my AdWords account from work and see what stats I can find out about vaginal hiccups. I mean, is this a widely experiences phenomenon that no one is discussing but many are experiencing? Can this actually HAPPEN to people? I somehow doubt it.

I suspect this is some rogue search from a confused pre-teen experiencing something strange after a hot and heavy petting session with the boy from the coffee shop. Or perhaps it's some college girl with a throbbing sensation she doesn't want to admit she "caught" somewhere. Or maybe, it's another one of those "I didn't know I was Pregnant" women, whose vagina actually feels like it's hiccuping.

Either way, I can't help but find this strange. But I'll take it. Whatever gets me a reader ;)

Oh blog, how I've neglected you!

2009-12-28T11:29:00.000-08:00

The fact of the matter is, I'm exhausted. The problem with being the hostess with the mostess, while also being 6 months pregnant and suffering a recurrence of exhaustion induced pregnancy rhinitis is, you get run the hell down at the site of overwhelming, and stay there for days. Buried under a pile of down comforter and tissue with lotion, only to emerge at the tail end of your blissful holidays, slightly less exhausted but still full of snot.

So here I am today. I've got a lot of blogness to catch up on. I've got feeds to read and comment on, a WHOLE list on the SITS site to peruse, and a few new bloggy commenters to stock read up on. It's a tall order, ESPECIALLY when the hubs is still on holidays and I'm required to participate in daily outings and entertain him. Not that I mind, I'm just not used to this. Lucky for me, he likes to sleep much later than I do (and I go to bed much earlier than he does so, it's a fair trade) so I can sit here this AM and entertain you all (nice of me to assume I'm at all entertaining) with my ramblings and whinings.

I'm a little bummed that the holidays are over, and I feel like I missed them in some stress induced amnesic fugue. We had 20 people, 2 babies and 2 dogs over for Christmas dinner (ok well, one was the resident dog and if you count children in utero, there were 3 babies). Christmas Eve was spent with me cleaning like a mad person, and making 2 types of potatoes, fresh cranberry sauce and 2 other types of vegetables. Then the hubs and I ran out to my mothers for the Christmas Eve festivities, which was AWESOME. Awesome because, I got to lay on the couch the entire time while my mother doted on me, and then went to bed at 10pm. It was fantastic, I so needed it. But then, up at 830am (not that that's EARLY but I'm sick yo!) and it was pandemonium after that. Present opening with my mom, step dad, sister, BIL and niece, brunch with them and my BILs parents then a mad dash home, to get ready for the guests.

And not that I mind but upon home arrival, I found my father and step mom hanging out and manning the turkey. I thought they were dropping it off and coming back later, but no. They were here, ready to get thier Christmas on. So mad dash some more. I threw on some make-up (it wasn't pretty, and I'm generally good at this make up biznas), and spot cleaned the bathrooms (so I left 1 chore for Christmas day, sue me) and then the hubs and I had to open our gifts...since we'd had NO time to do such things yet. Then it was right on into party time. Setting up tables, organizing food, trying to figure out how to get 10 dishes into the oven...the whole shebang.

Before I knew it, there were 20 people here (mom and step dad, sister and BIL, grandparents x 4 aunts, cousins, friends) and the house was PACKED. And it was stressful. Everyone else seemed to enjoy themselves but somehow, I feel like I missed all the fun.Did I mention everyone missed my BYOB memo and since I'm PREGNANT and can't partake in the delicious alcoholic festivities, I'd forgotten to pick up ANYTHING. This quickly became my problem, even though I could in no way solve it. My parentals all came stocked and I had a mishmash of things we could drink, but there was a serious drought on CHRISTMAS DAY! And nothing was open. Hostess MEGA FAIL. And before I knew it, dinner was over, and people were heading home. As happy as I was at the prospect of bed, I was bummed that I was too sick, tired and overwhelmed to enjoy the holiday season.

I am not complaining. I did have a wonderful holiday. I just feel like it was over too fast, and that I didn't take the time I should have to stop and appreciate it. I should have been less concerned about the Hubs random beard hairs around my bathroom sink, and more concerned about the smile on my nieces face when she opened her gifts. I should have focused less on arranging the tables just so, and more on it being Christmas. But I didn't.

The thing is, I'm an overachieving, A-type personality who thinks she is wonder woman. I'm no good at asking for help, or admitting defeat, and I am certainly not going to let someone witness a beard hair gone awry in my sink.I take care of everyone, including the dog and I do it with a smile and a "no, I'm not tired at all". And I am starting to regret it.

I'm not looking to do a retrospective post about the last year, but if there is one thing I've learned, and which I am going to continue to focus on, is that I am only one person. That, and no one else cares about a beard hair. I need to SLOW down, and focus a little more on myself and a little less on the orientation of the towels in the bathroom. I need to take care of me, so that I am able to take care of my daughter. I need to grow up and relax.

I don't know if it's the impending motherhood speaking, or simply the proximity I am sitting to age 30, but I do know that my one and only new years resolution is to learn to say NO, and stick to it.

Step one, keep sitting on this couch...all freaking day!

Sometimes, you come across a blog...

2009-12-22T17:36:00.000-08:00

...and it's just pee your pants funny. And when this happens, I think it's REALLY important to give props to the hilarity by drawing attention to it.

Being very very new to this whole blogging thing, I've not yet listed out any sort of "top" anything blogs. I feel like that's best reserved for women (I saw women because I am currently following all mommy and baby blogs, and they are all written, at least predominantly, by women) who have put in their time. And who have established more than 13 followers (to my wonderful followers, this is not to say I don't cherish each and every one of you. I do. In fact, you are the reason I keep posting. I just mean to say, someone with 230 followers certainly outranks me in the world of blogging, and thus, has more authority). But I am starting to think I should so more with these blogs I heart, than list them on the side of my blog, so I'm starting here.

Anyway, I digress. Or well, can I call it a digression when I never even really got to my point? Whatever.

The point is, I found a new blog today. I found her because the FIRST ever baby (now a mommy) blog I found (which is still my favourite) blogger Blair, from The Heir to Blair was a guest poster. And anyone who loves Blair enough to get her as a guest poster, is clearly someone I want to "know" on the internet. So I went to peruse the site, and spent the next little while sitting alone, in my living room, laughing my ass off.

Not literally, don't worry, my ass is still in place. But I laughed a lot, and I thought this woman deserves some props. Even if it IS on my brand new, shiny, barely out there blog, it's still props. And all of YOU have lots of followers, who have followers who...well you know how this works, so this could help her permeate more mommy minds. And fill us with laugh out loud moments, at work, or on your iPhone at the doctors office, wherever you do your inappropriate blog stalking.

Her name is Jen, and her blog is "Maybe If You Just Relax".

Take a read, but do it on an empty bladder. Trust me, this site is Depends worthy.

"Oh I thought it was a food baby"

2009-12-22T15:45:00.000-08:00

So yesterday we moved offices. And this whole office move has been a clusterfuk of epic proportions. It started last week when our ISP turned off our internets and phone service 2 entire DAYS ahead of schedule. Yup, Thursday morning is the same thing as Monday right? Not quite. After hours of phone calls and frustration, we got the service back up and running. We're a consulting business so, lacking access to email and internet is not an option.

We were all set to move on Monday and then, our new office flooded on Friday. It's been empty for a YEAR and 3 days before we move in, it FLOODS. Too bad we had the movers all set and ready to move us, and all of our stuff packed before we knew. Not to mention that we had to get out of the old office, so, we set off to move into the dry portions of the office, and deal with the rest later. Our 10 people office is crammed into a board room and a kitchen. It's been overwhelmingly stressful, and I am glossing over about 100 moments that made me want to cry yesterday but, that's not what is important.

What is important is that the movers thought I just had a spare tire, and not a baby.

A spare tire. AND NOT A BABY. Are you hearing me?

It went something like this:

After hours of chatting mindlessly with the movers, and one of my close friends who also happens to work with me, and making countless mentions that I am in fact, with child, we had this conversation:

G: Oye what a day, we need some beer...or a lot of wine
Me: Well in 13 weeks, I'll take you up on that...often and A LOT
G: Yes, get that baby out of you and we'll get drinking wine!
Me: Sometime before my birthday we will drink again!
G: Ya I only got to know you for like, 5 months before you got knocked up
Me: Soon, I will be carrying around an external human, instead of an internal one, and I can have some drinks
Mover: Wait? You're really pregnant? Huh. I thought it was a food baby, not a real baby
Me: Um no, she's real, been in there 6 months now
Mover: Ha

So ya that's how it went down. And I guess I am not as big as I thought. In fact, I guess I am small enough that instead of looking 6 months pregnant, despite wearing form fitting pants and a cute, bump accentuating t shirt, I just look like I've been doing too many keg stands. Just when I thought I was starting to actually appear preggo to the masses, I am reminded I instead look like all those trips through the Wendy's Drive Thru have finally caught up.

I should however, take solace in the fact that this comment came from a less-than-25 year old, meatheadariffic dude, who makes his living with brute force. Did I mention he didn't appear to be the brightest bulb in the light bright? So perhaps I shouldn't take what he says to heart. I have to assume that the 3 movers, sharing their 25 brain cells and talking like douchebags gone wild may not be the best judge of exactly how pregnant or not pregnant a girl may be. If the fact that I look like a perfect size 4 from the back still didn't give it away. the protruding belly button should have. Or at the very least, the repeated comments about "my baby" and the fact that I kept saying I wasn't going to lift anything heavy, since I was 6 months pregnant.

Apparently, he thought all of this was just in reference to a food baby I'd been carefully and lovingly growing since early summer. A food baby I was worried about harming with the lifting of boxes, and the consuming of alcoholic beverages. A food baby I continued to rub, and call her.

Boys.

Even if he thought it was possible that I carried an extra 10 lbs. in the shape of a half basketball off my front, any smart man would have kept his mouth shut when he learned that, in fact, I was not. A smart man would have giggled silently to himself, and thought "phew dodged that bullet" after realizing he'd save himself the embarrassment (and potential kick in the balls) of accidentally calling a chubby girl pregnant. Or, worse (at least in my opinion) calling a pregnant lady fat. Yes, a smart man would have kept that tidbit to himself, and filed it under "I'm an idiot".

But not my mover. Nope. He called my darling little baby bump a FOOD BABY...and yet, he lived to bring down the general intelligence of the world another day.

Boys.

My internal human is growing....

2009-12-20T23:44:00.000-08:00

I looked down this morning and thought to myself "I can't get any bigger than this, can I?".

And the scary thing is, I'm not that big.

The problem is, I am bigger than I've ever been in my entire life. And it's not the size, I realize I'm pregnant and I honestly feel beautiful and am thoroughly enjoying watching my little one grow. It's amazing. I am not however enjoying my inability to bend at the waist or remove my boots on my own. Honestly, I've almost called my girlfriend on 2 seperate occasions - once it took me 20 mins to get my shoes ON, before our Christmas party, and once as I sat, hot and sweaty, trying to remove slippery wet gumboots from my feet, and having a hell of a time (he hubs was not home to assist of course). The only negative to being pregnant in the winter is that flip flops aren't exactly the footwear of choice for the weather. Too bad, because they would be so much easier, especially considering your feet get suspiciously farther from your arms every day.

Doing seemingly easy things (see removing boots above) or bending over to pick up another piece of #&$&ing! tinsel which is plaguing my home (we had a party last weekend, and there was an ugly sweater, complete with tinsel. A friend of ours decided to wear it, and spread tinsel EVERYWHERE, in every crevice of my home. I've vacuumed 5 times, and picked up 100 pieces...it's procreating. I swear), has become increasingly difficult.

First of all, it hurts. I'd assume this is the result of round ligament pain and my internal human pressing into my organs. The ligament pain is a strange thing, because 98% of the time, I do not notice it. But when I do, it's like my muscles are rubber bands and I'm snapping them. It's electric. Electric pain in my uterus.

Second of all, it's hard to breathe when I'm bent over (or walking up the stairs for that matter). This is the result of a few things - my increased blood volume, my lowered iron stores, and, you guessed it, my internal human and her living room creeping into my breathing space.

Last of all, my balance. We've discussed this before, and it's not getting any better (obviously), so bending over or standing on one foot, not a good idea. Every time I bend forward to pick something up, blood rushes to my head and for a split second, I realize how dangerously close said head is to the floor. And the next second consists of me contemplating a head contusion, and hoping this isn't how it ends.

I realize that in the grand scheme of all thing pregnant lady, I'm whining about almost nothing. And I do honestly appreciate how lucky I've been. I barely felt any morning sickness, I didn't get the crippling fatigue I read so much about, and so far, I've escaped any midnight pickle and ice cream sandwich cravings. I'm peeing a little on the frequent side of the spectrum, but that's not all that new for me, and I haven't been starving all night. Mostly, I've just had awesome sex dreams, and that's not much to complain about.

All in all, I'm almost a little bummed by the lack of attention I'm able to garner from the hubs and others, because other than the hand free of a glass of wine, I've been exactly the same these last 6 months. My weight gain has (thank WHOEVER is responsible for these things...I don't believe in god per se, but there is a higher power out there looking out for me) been pretty manageable, I've had no cravings, low fatigue and, other than my balance issues, I've been pretty much the same (and let's face it, I wasn't so good with the balance before either).

However, this isn't to say it's not coming. Everyone I talk to and everything I read tells me that as of Wednesday, I exit the glory trimester and head into the third, final and apparently most difficult trimester there is. And so, as I look at my belly I think, it can't get any bigger than this? I mean, really, if my shoes are this hard to get on and off now, and if staying upright is this much of a challenge, then surely I'm doomed. But I know it's coming. I mean, my darling is growing by the moment in there, I can feel it. And no one has ever had a healthy baby after 3 months of non-growth. So it is inevitable (not only that, but it's anticipated and highly requested that she continue to grow her little heart out in there..I'd never pick fashionable footwear or grace over my baby girl). I will continue to grow, and apparently, more so than before. And I'm sure that I'll have some new and exciting symptoms as a courtesy of my internal human....

But at least it's great blog fodder :D

"I'm never going to be like that"

2009-12-19T17:29:00.000-08:00

I had one of those moments today. The one I'm sure every first time mother to be has, where she is standing in some store, watching a poor mother struggle with her purse, the diaper bag and a stroller, while her child has a magnitude 10 breakdown. And just when it seems like she's almost done and free from the store, she drops her wallet, and cards and money go spiraling everywhere. The one where you think to yourself "OMG, is that what I'm in for?" and that follows.

I went to Toys R Us today, because I am a glutton for punishment and felt the need to punish myself hard. It's 6 days before Christmas and I live downtown, so you can imagine how pleasant it was in there. I think there have been natural disasters that were better organized (and somewhat cleaner) than that place was today. I only went because I needed 1 thing, and I knew what it was. I figured I could be in and out in a few minutes, and blissfully tick SOMETHING off my ever growing to do list. And you know, from my perspective, it wasn't that bad. I didn't have to walk mindlessly up and down the aisle, trying to figure out what a 4 year old would like (why are there not lists for this in the toy stores, honestly?), or if my sister would hate me for buying her child a drum set (side note, the answer to that question is always YES!). I just needed to grab one small thing for my niece, and be on my way.

I must have been in there for 30 mins, because as a 6 month pregnant lady, I can't resist the urge to peruse the baby stuff, and in the time I was in there, I witnessed a few things I wish I hadn't. I guess Toys R Us at Christmas is where you go, when you want to study parenting, and what not to do (as an aside, this part of my story has nothing to do with the aforementioned poor woman above...I'll get back to her later).

First, I was in the infant/toddler toy area, grabbing what I needed, and I saw a cute little girl, daydreaming, walking up the aisle, fingering the shiny pink plastic toys that are all at her level. I smiled at her, and she shyly looked away. I try not to creep other people's kids in the toy store, so I moved away from her a little bit. I didn't see her parents around, but surely they were close by, because she couldn't have been much past the age of 3. She didn't seem overly concerned by the lack of parents either so I didn't think much of it. A few moments later, as I stood trying to decide between 2 seemingly the same toys, a woman comes up, frazzled and sweating, and yells in a shrill and unnecessary voice "Arianna, what the hell are you doing? I told you we were going to the check-out. We're leaving. Stop daydreaming and GET OVER HERE".

I'm one of those people who has a hard time biting my tongue and I really wanted to snap back at her "you expected your 3 year old to know what the check out was? And did you seriously just say HELL to your child? And you want her to stop daydreaming? STOP? That's the best part of being a little girl you troll". But I didn't. I just gave her one of those dirty looks, that indicated I was less than impressed, and watched her drag her poor child away by the arm, walking faster than her daughter possibly could, practically ripping her arm from the socket. At this moment, I took a breath and made a mental note. I filed this under "remember how that looked and felt" and thought to myself, "I'm never going to be like that".

Now I'm not on a high horse. I clearly don't have a child yet, and I don't know what the background was here. I don't know the pressures of shopping with a daydreaming toddler, 6 days before Christmas, with the heat cranked up to scorching, and the noise level at a steady 11. But I do know that asking my 3 year old "what the hell" is never appropriate. Ever. And I have mega potty mouth. There are so many things wrong with the scenario, that I could go on about. But let me just say, that was the first (but not last) time in Toys R Us, I thought "I'm never going to be like that".

There was a series of other events that happened over the next few minutes. I watched a lot of angry parents give their children grief about being distracted and not paying attention. I mean, it's not like you brought them to a giant toy store 6 days before Christmas with 1500 other children, so I can imagine why you'd expect them to be focused. I heard a lot of people use "if you don't smarten up, I'm going to call Santa and tell him not to bring you anything!" in an attempt to negotiate with their kids on a fear based level. And we know this will never happen, because at no point ever in history, has a parent cancelled Christmas for their child because they asked for a package of Pop Rocks 17 times. And I saw a lot of tantrums, but those are unavoidable. And while I watched the pandemonium, I thought to myself several times "I'm never going to be like that". Except, in these instances, I am not so sure I can guarantee this. I know things happen, and again, I've haven't yet been there, so I'm sure I'll be one of these parents at some point, that someone else looks at and says "I'm never going to be like that".

I think the most painful thing I saw was a woman, with her sheepish and clearly doormat like husband, timidly carrying packages while she ran off at the mouth about how bad the food was at the neighbours party last night. She had with her 2 sons, I'd guess around 6 and 9. And one of them yawned, clearly bored of her trash talking story, and of being in the pretty princess section of the store. She stopped, looked right at him, and without missing a beat, said loudly and clearly "I told you to cover your mouth when you yawn. That's DISGUSTING. None of these people want to see your disgusting mouth. Grow up". And then continued on, bashing her neighbours meatballs.

Now, I don't know about any of you, but I guess I missed this part of etiquette school. Are we actually supposed to cover our mouths when we yawn? I mean, sometimes I do, but a lot of times I definitely do not. And other than perhaps not wanting to show the world my fillings, I don't really see the issue. And is it that disgusting? The yawning and his mouth? I mean, really, his yawn did not affect me in any way shape or form. Her bitching did. I was embarrassed for her children, and her husband, and I felt a little sorry for them. Not just for her outburst, but for the simple fact that she was such a hag. And I again thought to myself, and this time I KNEW, I'm never going to be like that. I'm not. I can't imagine talking to my family in that tone, in that manner. I cannot imagine telling my son he's disgusting, and I certainly can't imagine embarrassing my family that much. If it was really that much of an issue for her, she could have quietly said something constructive, and saved us all the awkwardness. Me and another family in the aisle shared a look or pity and anger, and quietly walked away. Again, in my mind I was telling her she should grow up and stop being such a bitch but, I was trying to stay in the Christmas spirit.

Now, for my last poor mother. This was a situation where, I didn't think "I'm never going to be like that". It was a situation where I thought to myself, "I hope that never happens to me". As I mentioned, she was alone and struggling through the store, stroller, diaper bag and purse in hand, carrying a basket full of toys and trying to console her hysterical child. There she stood, in the long long line, probably so close to being done her shopping she could taste is, and just trying to survive the next 10 mins. Overwhelmed and frustrated, she stood, sweating in her coat, trying to figure out how to manage all the stuff she had with her, while getting a bottle of of the diaper bag. And no one was helping. No, in true Christmas spirit, instead of the guy in front of her clearing his 1 item off the counter so should could use it, or the person behind her backing up so she had a bit more space to maneuver, people just stood there. They stood there with asshole face, looking down their nose at her and whispering to each other about the state of her son.

Now I have no idea what prompted the child's outbreak, but I'm sure there was some toy negotiation gone wrong, and he was now just sulking. Well, not sulking, screaming bloody murder at the top of his lungs. And she was at a loss. Missing that ever needed 3rd arm, she struggled to find a way to soothe him, and hoping the woman at the check out would just STOP pontificating and buy the damn Barbie (why do people do this, ever, but specifically at Christmas? Stand at the check out, contemplating the pros and cons of 2 items? Do that in the aisle people, do it IN THE AISLE), so she could move ahead 1 space and get this over with. The look on her face was one that screamed "I'm sorry" to those around her. She knew her son was causing some headaches, but at some point, what can she do?

I stood there for a moment, wondering what I could do to help. Unfortunately, I was 3 aisles over, suffering my own pregnant lady hot flash and wishing the stinky dirty man behind me would STOP COUGHING in my hair. I shot her a sympathetic look, and watched in pain as she finally reached the counter, only to drop her wallet as she fumbled to get it from her purse, sending the contents flying everywhere. Coins bounced and rolled, cards skidded across the floor and receipts fluttered to the ground. And she looked like she was going to cry. And once again, no one helped her. Her son screamed louder, and I thought for sure she was going to lose it. If anyone deserved to, it was her.

But you know, she surprised me. She actually laughed. She threw up her hands, and laughed. Now, perhaps that was the incident that pushed her over the edge, and she has just completely gone bananas, but, I don't know. She picked up a card from the floor, handed it to the cashier, and let her process the payment as she proceeded to pick up the contents of her life. Her hands free, she handed her son a MumMum, giving him something to focus on that actually turned his screams into hiccupy sobs, and she composed herself. Some kids helped her get the remaining AWOL change, she pushed her flattened, frazzled hair from her shiny red forehead, grabbed her bags, and fairly calmly pushed her son out of the store.

And for the first time that day, I thought to myself "I hope I can be exactly like that".

Dear Gluocodex...I did not know you were akin to magic mushrooms...

2009-12-17T16:00:00.000-08:00

What a strange and unusual thing you are Gluocodex. A sickly sweet and painfully potent cocktail of sugar, water and orange flavoured sugar.....did I mention the sugar?

This morning I drank you. I drank 500 ml's of you, and sat, and waited for the longest hour of my entire life, I waited. I am not sure what I was waiting for, but the nice ladies in the blue scrubs and dangerously comfortable shoes assured me I needed to wait. I had an hour to pass, so I thought to myself, I shall read my book. I should have known better.

My book is close to 600 pages long. In tiny font. I'm reading Wicked for the book club and I've only a month left to get through the remaining 460 pages...with Christmas and New Years peppered in there for distraction. So I thought 1 hour of uninterrupted reading time - PRIME. Even better that it was occurring during the day, when I was supposed to be at work.

But I neglected to realize the psychedelic effect that much sugar would have on my body. I'm not a sugar person by nature. Sure here and there I indulge, and over Christmas there have been many an opportunity to do just that. But overall, I am not a sugar eater. And regardless, that is more sugar than any human has ever ingested willingly, in one sitting. And this includes the time my sister stole a box of Pot of Gold chocolates from under the grandparents Christmas tree, and ate the evidence in an hour, before anyone could find out. Too bad for her, she neglected to also eat the box and wrappers.

As usual, I digress. Whatever is in that cavity inducing beverage (at least they chill it for you, but no vodka) made my head spin. And not in a "I'm feeling a little dizzy" type way, but in such a bad way, I felt the need to reach up and make sure it wasn't literally spinning like a top. It wasn't, but it felt like it. The lights got brighter and dimmer, and I started to see things I'm pretty sure weren't there. Between the sparkly lights of the clinic waiting room, and the medicinal smell, I started to wonder if I'd passed into another realm.

So I sat, pretending to read my book, praying that this would not be the first time in my pregnancy I needed to uncontrollably vomit. Something about that orange syrup mixed with this morning Cheerios, spewed all over the shiny white floors seemed uncivilized.

Lucky for me, I manages to avoid projectile vomit, but that hour was no more tolerable for it. I spun, got dizzy and of course became increasing hungry. I wanted to lie down, or at the very least curl up on the chair, but I couldn't. I couldn't because those chairs are plastic and uncomfortable, and lets face it, a lot of sick people sit in them. The uncomfortable nature of this mornings events were further compounded by my inability to cross my legs. Well I mean it's certainly not that I CAN'T cross them, but I'm trying my hardest not to. These road map spider veins aren't going to get any better on their own, and I'm doing my best not to further anger them. But have you ever tried to not cross your legs? As a woman I find it easier to stop blinking or breathing that to avoid the natural tendency to cross my legs. I hate it, I just want to cross them, but I also want to wear skirts again one day, so I have to suffer a little longer without it. I'm hoping I break the habit all together by then, but so far it's not looking good.

The only one of us who seemed to enjoy this mornings adventure was the little one. She sucked that sugar back like the drug it truly is, and spent the better part of the hour getting her groove on. I'm not sure where she learned her dance moves, but it unfortunately feels like she learned them from Elaine on Seinfeld. Here's to hoping she gets some of her fathers musical aptitude after all. She is now resting, after such a high, and so she should. I'm just jealous I have no where to curl up and sleep. I feel like I'm doing all the work in this relationship, but I suppose in her defense, she IS working on becoming a fully functional whole person, so I'll cut her some slack.

In any event, there I sat, baby girl kicking me fiendishly from the inside, my head swimming, my heart racing. I sat - dizzy, tired, hungry and uncomfortable, watching the seconds tick by. I swear at least twice I saw them stop ticking all together. When it was all said and done, the nice lady took my blood and sent me on my way. And that was it. An hour of time spent, and a 30 second test.

I've got to wait to find out the results, but I'm crossing all my crossables (with the exception of my legs, those are virtually crossed) that I don't have to go back for the dreaded 3 hour test. Because if I have to see spots like that for 3 hours, I'm surely going to puke. And I haven't puked since I was a kid.

One more WTH?

2009-12-16T23:12:00.001-08:00

My blog is back to small type and giant spaces?!?!?!? I changed NOTHING!! WTH?

WTH Wednesday - spider veins, fashion and trying to sell my washer and dryer...

2009-12-16T23:09:00.000-08:00

Even though it's 6:43pm on Wednesday, I am going to WTH Wednesday anyway...it's before midnight so I get points for that.

We've been trying to sell a brand new washer and dryer on Craigslist for about a week now, and while I've had an obscene amount of emails, I've had no buyers. Lots of people ask me if they are still available, and when I reply with my phone number, that is where the correspondence ends. I had one guy, make a 2.5 hour drive in the snow, to take one look at it and say "it's too small".The thing is, the specs are ALL on the posting. Every one. The width, depth, height, and ALL the manufacturers details about how many pairs of jeans it'll fit, the whole shebang. They are brand new, never even hooked up, and in perfect condition. I talked to his wife not once, not twice but FIVE times on the before she sent her husband all the way out here to look at it, AND the ad clearly states the set it stackable. So WTH? 2.5 hours IN THE SNOW, to look at it for 2 seconds and leave without it. WTH? I had another woman tell me she was very interested and ask me not to sell them without calling her, and then disappear. WTH? I'm not putting shit on layaway over here.

That boring tidbit aside, some of my other WTH moments pertain to this strange body I now carry around and pretend is mine. Since I clearly have no control over it, with a protruding belly button and a hiccuping vagina, I've decided it belongs to my daughter. I am nothing but a host for this being, and this becomes increasingly apparent as I notice strange and unusual things happening.

One of these such things relates to fluids which have been exiting my body. Now, I promised I wouldn't blog about this, because I'm pretty sure no one wants to hear it but, honestly, I don't get it. And so, this WTH moment will start and end with just that. WTH fluids, what....the.....HECK?

The next thing I don't understand is why it looks like I've fallen down a flight of stairs. I've got bruises on my arms, bruises on my hips, bruises on areas of my body I am sure has never touched anything else? My legs are the worst. And I mean, we know I'm a total klutz, so these ones are less of a surprise. But to have one bruise melt into the other in such a way, that there is an area the size of a big mac (ok I've only had one big mac in my life, at 4am, after a lot of drinks, at the age of 27 but, I've seen them on TV) that shows no skin tone, is disconcerting to say the least. I considered making a doctors appointment to look into this, but then I'll just get swine flu in the waiting room and have him look at me in that "is this chick for real" way, so I'm opting out. A simple solution would be to stop falling down and walking into things, but, let's face it, if that was an option I would have exercised it long ago. So, I will just go on looking like I fell down the steps, or like DH is beating me, discretely below the knee, until this baby is born. And then I'll likely go back to my regularly scheduled bruising. Even though I've accepted it, I'm still going to say WTH bruises? WTH?

And while we're on the topic of strangely coloured, blood related things making my body look strange, can we look at my spider veins? What am I 97? Who gets a road map of spider veins on their legs so ugly and convoluted it looks like a never ending tour through some backwoods mountains? I mean, I know these are common in pregnancy, but I've never had one before, and I honestly didn't anticipate them taking over my legs. Especially since they are all roads that lead to bruises? WTH?

I could what the heck my bulging belly and widening arse but, let's face it, that isn't interesting at all. However, I will WTH my skirts, which are all now riding up in front and making it difficult to wear them. I've been trapped between maternity clothes and my regular attire for what seems like an entire lifetime (when in reality it has been about 10 weeks) and I'm not sure when I'll be able to comfortably fit into either end of the spectrum. My regular clothes, while a great way to show off the bump, also do nasty things like flash midriff at the office (gasp, midriff. Not since I was 16 was this acceptable, and even then, it was questionable) or stretch into bizarre shapes which look so much more awkward than flattering. My pants provide the unwelcome combination of being tight around the thighs (that's water retention right, RIGHT?) and the full frontal wedgie...I'll let you think about that one for awhile. My regular wardrobe also does it's best to accentuate my protruding belly button, and the fact that the tights or legging I am wearing are cutting across my belly like a too small rubber band trying to contain a pillow. WTH.

Now my maternity clothes, they are often a better option - comfort wise. Not so much in terms of fashion and appearance. I've complained about this before, but this isn't even about the ugly patterns and cheap scratchy fabric. This is about my body and it's usual issue, nothing fitting it properly. I've always struggled with pants that are too short and gape in the back, or shirts that are either too short or too big. So why I thought this would change, I don't know. So here I am, in maternity pants, trying to put on a belt. Yes, a belt in my maternity jeans. You see, that panel, while comfortable and oh so sexy, does nothing to help keep my pants on. So in an attempt to conceal my ever widening butt crack, I am forever pulling them up. So maternity pants, WTH? What am I supposed to do? Shoving myself into my old pants is like trying to get my sleeping bag back into the bag in which it came, it ain't happening with any ease. WTH? And shirts, well shirts, I'd like to know how my boobs can be too big, and my belly be to small to satisfy your weird shape. Honestly clothes, WTH? The only thing still cooperating with me are my shoes. Which is good, because I love my shoes in a slightly unhealthy way and I don't know what I'd do if they betrayed me.

So that's my WTH for today.

And now for something completely un-pregnancy related...

2009-12-15T17:03:00.000-08:00

I present to you our TREE! It's the very first one we've ever had together, being that we lived in a 700 sq ft. apartment until this summer. And it's the first Christmas in our house.

Behold the tree in all it's glory!:

My belly button - a beacon for aircraft, a 3rd nipple, a new appendage?

2009-12-15T16:44:00.000-08:00

So I'm not sure WHY this happened so early, but somewhere around 22 Weeks my belly button decided it wanted some more attention. I don't know if it was feeling left out, seeing as my belly was suddenly the focal point for all my social encounters, or if it was simply angry at me for removing the navel ring I'd had in since the tender age of 14, but it decided to take a stand. And it's been becoming increasingly demanding of time and attention ever since.

At this point, it's almost downright embarrassing. I'm pretty sure small, personal aircraft pilots could use it as a beacon, to navigate their way to my city and safely land their planes. If I just lift my shirt and lie flat on my back, I think the Russian space centre could pick it up, and use it as a GPS location point (ok I have no idea how GPS works, but I'm guessing some satellite somewhere finds reference points, so I'm going with that for now). And the thing is, I don't see it getting smaller anytime soon. Why would it?

I've read this is a result of my uterus pushing from behind, more so than the size of my daughter to be. So I take comfort in that at least. Enlarged uterus I can handle, it's not like I ever have to look that thing in the eye. But I'd really love to know how much farther out my button wants to protrude. Not that I could control it, I just want to know if I need to make preparations. You know, sending out warnings to the space stations, and ensuring I'm not mistaken for a runway at any point.

My friends seem to find this whole thing completely hilarious, with a side of alarming. The button has been called my "3rd nipple" on a number of occasions, which only has me wondering, what do these people think my nipples look like anyway? And honestly, "Jumbo Button" or "Aircraft Beacon" or "Weird Squishy Protruding Mass" all sound a little better to me than 3rd nipple, but what can you do?

Most times, the "3rd nipple" comment is followed either by "eww it's so weird" or "ick, you think it'll ever go back to normal?". And on particularly lucky occasions, I get both. And honestly, I know it's weird. I touch it all the time and think it's strange, and squishy. I get a little bit freaked out by how it feels, but I'm also morbidly curious and obsessed with touching it. And I also wonder every day whether it will go back to normal or not. But asking me if it will is like asking me if I think I'll avoid getting stretch marks or gaining a lot of weight. The answer's the same "I have no idea, but DEAR GAWD I HOPE SO!!".

Obviously I have no control over these things, and if I DID, clearly I would choose to go back to my EXACT pre-pregnancy body, without 1 inch of skin out of place and not 1 ounce more fat. And I'd choose to go back to that body before I ever left the hospital. But as with so many things pregnancy and labour related, you're severely limited in how much control you have.

You truly are gestating an alien form, that's going to do to you exactly what she wants, no matter the consequences. And the best part is, you tried hard to put her in there. You'll do everything you can to keep her there for the requisite 38-40 weeks, and love every minuscule piece of her, no matter what she puts your body through. It's a special kind of love, the kind that will allow someone to mess with your body and have you not put them on your hit list. It's a love you can only ever have for your child.

But back to my belly button. I have to say, I BARELY got over how offensive I found it sans navel barbell (ok honestly, I never got over how offensive I found it) before it started to stick itself out, beg to be touched and ridiculed, not even pretending to hide under my shirts anymore. But here I am, and she sticks out. And I've had people tell me "you know you can buy thinks to cover that" and, yes I do know. But I feel like that's accepting defeat, like I'm allowing the button to kick my self esteems ass, and I just can't give THAT much control to a part of my body I've never really understood in the first place. And besides, as strange and awkward as it looks to the outside world, it's a badge of honour I wear with pride. It's one of the first things my daughter has ever given me, and I can't deny the importance of that.

Even if it is just a stupid, protruding belly button..............

My vagina has the hiccups..no seriously...

2009-12-11T11:42:00.000-08:00

Ok so I know I know, it's not my vagina, it's my daughter, but for the last few days she's been positioned in such a way that it really feels like my vagina is hiccuping. And it's awkward.

It's awkward because, well, last time I check, vagina's didn't hiccup and so to have yours doing just that, can be distracting to say the least. It took me awhile to figure out what was going on the first time it happened. But as with everything strange going on near my vag these days, I figured it must be pregnancy related. It was only later when she had the hiccups again, in a much more acceptable spot like my mid-abdomen, did I figure out what had been happening earlier in the day. And I was happy to realize that was in fact all it was.Not that a hiccuping vagina couldn't be some sort of circus freak trick that might make me money some day, just that I'm not exactly prepared to share myself with the world in that capacity....talk to me after I've delivered this baby!

It is also awkward because there are people who are DYING to feel said hiccups, and it's not exactly appropriate to let them do this when the hiccups are coming out via my intimate parts. The issue is, I generally have said aloud "the baby is hiccuping" before thinking to myself it could end in an awkward moment. And then, someone always asks "can I feel it from the outside", hopeful, with a hand flat out poised to cop a feel. A normal person would say "No sorry you can't", but me, well I'm getting used to saying vagina a lot these days, so I tend to blurt out something along the lines of "sorry, only my doctor or my husband are allowed to touch my vagina" or something else equally inappropriate. Which, as you can imagine, leads to another awkward moment - the moment in which they can't figure out how we went from talking about cute little in utero hiccups, to my vagina. This inevitably leads to me needing to explain to the person WHY I said that, and by the time I'm done, I'm no longer the cute pregnant lady whose baby has hiccups. No, I'm the strange beach ball on twigs, who has just made them feel dirty for not particular reason.

Regardless, the hiccups are quite fun to experience, and I assume that means she's getting this whole swallowing thing down pat in there. And I have to admit, I enjoy the hiccups far more than her daily game of jump and poke the bladder. They are just more comfortable for me. Even if they are coming out of my vagina......

What the Heck Wednesday?

2009-12-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

Is it seriously Wednesday again? WTH? Awesome. That's what 4 days out of town will do to a person.

So, as The Mommyologist has started, we're doing another round of WTH Wednesday :D

There is a snow storm coming. Not of course to Vancouver that would be insane, but to other parts of the world. One of those parts happens to be Montreal, where my dad is away on business, and may be TRAPPED until some undetermined later date.Generally, this doesn't matter too much to me. I don't live with him so him being out of town one more day has no effect on my life overall. Except THIS week, we're going to do the 3D Ultrasound, and he was supposed to come with me. And now, he may not be in town. WTH?

I went away for 4 days with the husband to relax and enjoy some time alone in advance of me being as big as a whale, and the baby girls arrival. I came home, and after having missed only 2 work days, noticed that my inbox had swelled to 127 emails - WTH? Nothing like relaxing and coming home to THAT!

There are only 16 days left until Christmas. And I for one believe that that, deserves it's own WTH moment!

My eyebrows, they have been drastically neglected for the last while, I've been too busy to deal with them. I need to get over to my little place and get them threaded, about immediately. But until such time, I say to you eyebrows - WTH are you doing? Really? Where did all these extra brows come from? The usual suspects are one thing, but these are new hairs, and not ones I am happy to see. I'm used to the increased hair growth sprouting up on my body now, but on my face? Come on! WTH?

Actually, my next WTH is hair related as well. Since when does a relatively attractive 29 year old get a treasure trail? Yes. There are hairs growing ON MY BELLY. And not 1 or 2 you might not notice, but a collection. I feel like a teenage boy, but instead of this being some right of passage into manhood, it's just a gross display of exactly how out of whack my hormones are. And on my BELLY? Like cause no one is looking there these days. Hairs, to you, I scream and plead - WTH?

That's probably enough for now, because the next WTH is going to relate to my body fluids and, well, I'm not sure anyone wants to hear about those :D

We're still playing the name game...

2009-12-09T08:00:00.000-08:00

After having spent 4 glorious days with the hubs at a resort akin to heaven (if I believed in such a place), and conversing casually over our daughters name, I am feeling no closer to a finally decision.

We've got 2 we're pretty set on. Which is better than none, but which does pose a problem when I'm only carrying one child. Not that I was hoping for twins, just that having 2 names and one child doesn't an easy decision make.

And many people have said things to the effect of "well just use one for the middle name and one for the first" or "use one and save the other for your next child" but, neither of these things works for me. First of all, we like both the names (the issue being really, that the one I prefer is not the one hubs prefers, and vice versa), and we don't feel either of them work as middle names. Not to mention we both want our choice as the first name. The next issue of course being, that I have NO idea if we'll ever have another child, and if we do, if that child will be a girl. So saving a name for this "maybe baby" isn't an option.

So here we are. We've got somewhere around 15 weeks (or 3.5 months which seems WAY too close) to figure this out. And like I've said, we'll enter the delivery room with both and come out with one. But I worry that one of us is always going to feel that we gave in, and that we didn't get to use the name we wanted most. I don't think it will plague either of us for life, but what if she comes out, looks at us, we look at each other, smile in that endorphine fueled love, and both say a different name. We'll be starting her off with an identity crisis, and what's worse, starting our first disagreement as parents with a freshly birthed child of only 7 minutes old.

Hopefully, it will just come to us. We'll just know. And hopefully we don't come up with any more names before then, to add fuel to this confusion fire. Hopefully.

I am starting this mommy thing off with a lot of hope, and not the dreamy "I hope my daughter will marry her prince charming" kind of hope but, that "holy ass I hope I can figure ANY of this out" kind of hope. The hope you have when your car starts sliding on the ice, barreling towards a busy intersection, and you're frantically searching your brain for the time your dad told you what to do in this event, HOPING you can remember it in time to save your life, or at least your car. So, I hope.

I also hope it doesn't come down to, what I've so often heard called Mommy Rank. Where I use the fact that I've just birthed this child, grown her 9 months, sacrificed my figure, my grace and my shame for the love of her, to get my way. I don't believe women have more say in the name or child bearing, simply because they are the ones designed to carry and birth the children. And it really bothers me when people assume this is fact. I want mutual agreement. I want to feel like WE, as a team, we who created this child, have chosen to give her the name that will suit and carry her to greatness. We. Not me. Not I. Not because I am the mama. We. Because she is not mine, she is ours. She is only 50% me, and the other 50% deserves the opportunity to have her father love her the way he will.

So for now, I hope. We talk, and I hope. And in a few short months. we will know how this all plays out.

I'm pretty sure, I not only want this...

2009-12-08T22:10:00.000-08:00

But I NEED it.

Does it seriously provide me with a HEADBAND, that will not only help keep these horrible bangs I thought were such a good idea and am now running out of time to grow out, out of my face, but that will also MATCH my outfit? Seriously?

I love that there are people in the world who would think this up. I love it. I'm seriously having a moment over here at the thought of this. Who are these people and can they be my best friends? Pregnancy and labour does not have to equal dressing in moo-moos. I want one. NOW!

And lip gloss? Shut UP!

Pretty Pushers

What goes in, must come out....

2009-12-08T21:54:00.000-08:00

It turns out this baby has to come out of my body...likely through a very small opening once reserved solely for those private moments with my husband, and a yearly not so private moment with my doctor. She has to come out of my body, through a hole which is, at best, 1/16th her size, and I'm supposed to just deal with that.

This has occurred to me many times throughout my pregnancy, and long before that. In fact, when I was younger and the biological clock still seemed like a myth, I often anticipated this being the reason I opted out of procreation. The idea of all that pain was simply overwhelming. And at the tender age of somewhere less than 25, I didn't know if it was worth it. But somewhere along the way I lost site of that, and the desire to get the baby in there took over the fears of trying to get it out.

As the clock ticks down (and we've still got a long way to go) this point becomes more and more apparent. And things have changed a little. Every time I leave the midwife, the doula or my prenatal yoga class (as an aside, if I've gone 4 times and then not again for weeks and weeks, due to the ragingly inconvenient time it's at, can I still say I DO prenatal yoga?), I am convinced I can do this without meds. I say things like "how bad an it be?" and "how much pain can one really feel", I think to myself "my sister did it med free" and neglect to remember that my niece was 6 weeks early, 5 lbs. and out in less than 2 hours. And also that my sister didn't have a choice.

And I want to believe myself and try to do that. I want to be that strong powerful type, who flawlessly pushes out a baby, barely sweating, and is up making eggs 4 hours later with a baby on my breast. I want to do this with grace, with love in my heart and without a lot of F bombs. I want a lot of things, but the reality is, I am who I am and I don't know if that kind of labour is in the cards for me.

And people will tell you, if you believe it's going to be hard, it will be.And I believe them. And I don't want this to be hard, and I don't want to lack faith in myself. And this is where I am stuck.

It's funny, I started this post about a week ago, but haven't had time to finish it. But I just spent the weekend away with my hubs at an amazing spot, and spent a lot of quiet time thinking about this, only to come home to read a blog which, after The Heir to Blair, is fast and furious becoming my favourite - Dear Baby. One of her most recent posts - Why I'm choosing a natural child birth, talks specifically about why she's decided to go au naturale, and what it has taken her to get there. And it's once again inspired me to think this through a little harder.

I have a lot of friends who have had babies recently, and who did not have good experiences. Still somewhat cynical about the process, or at the very least, afraid of that experience again, they will tell me not to bother trying. I've heard a lot about how it's not possible from various sources, how you get too tired, how it's just too hard. And I've been asked by people (my dear husband foremost) why I would want to put myself through that unnecessary pain. And the answer to that is, I'm not sure it has to BE unnecessary pain.

First of all, I am a strong believer that the reason labour is so dramatic is simply because it should be. Bringing a child into this world is nothing less than a miracle, and I am not someone who believes in miracles in the traditional sense. But every single part of making this child is so unfathomable. I know the science behind it, and I "get" it. But when I REALLY stop to think that one night of drunken joy, last Canada Day, when the hubs and I created this little girl, could actually result in a human being springing forth from my body, my mind is blown. Our DNA combined, and cell after cell divided, and now, 25 weeks later, we're over half way to meeting our daughter. We're created a human being, a life, an entire person with fingers and toes and complex thought processes and, well, that's pretty insane to think about.

Love, sex and the transfer of some fluids (graphic but true, face it) had led to the creation of another human being. And that is no small feat. Procreation is an amazing journey, and I think it should culminate dramatically, in an unforgettable experience. And this is why birthing a child has never been considered easy, or a small task.

As usual I digress....

My point is, millions upon millions of babies have been born to mothers, without the use of drugs. And only in Western Culture do we put so much emphasis on the fear and pain of child birth that we lose trust and faith in our bodies. Without fear, anxiety and preconceived notions, women all over the world deliver babies, with minimal pain and without fear, and I would venture to guess they have better experiences than those of us who are medicated beyond the point of spousal recognition.

So on my high horse I'm sitting. Thinking, I can do this. I can bring this child into the world, with a clear mind and even clearer veins, and we, as a family can experience the joy and drama of creating and delivering a life.

(I suppose this is the point where, I have to put the caveat about not thinking women who choose medicated births, or those who, for medically pertinent reasons end up or choose to have a c-section are anything but amazing. I just, I'd like to try, for as long as I can, to go without meds. And if I wind up screaming for the epidural or begging my darling to knock me unconscious, then I'll know I was wrong about this whole thing. I just don't think I am. Not this once.)

I have a lot more research to do on the matter, as I am FAR from prepared for any sort of childbirth - be it natural or not.

And with 15 weeks to go, I suppose I should get on it. I think I've started, with the choosing of a great team of midwives, and a great doula with experience in childbirth accupressure and massage. I plan to labour at home for as long as I can, using my bathtub, my stairs, gravity, breathing, jumping and whatever else to get through as much of the labour as I can, without heading to the hospital to be "treated" as though something is wrong with me.

And I've started thinking, and planning and believing that this could be done. So for now, I'm happy with that, and with myself.

Now if I can only get the hubs to believe in me too, we'll be good to go :D

What the Heck Wednesday?

2009-12-02T20:36:00.000-08:00

The Mommyologist started it...instead of Wordless Wednesday (and phew, cause let's face it, when was the last time I was wordless? Probably in utero), she's started What the Heck Wednesday, and I for one am here to participate....

Let's begin with my sore throat. It started on Sunday night, and has plagued me all week. I wake up with that sticky, hurts in my ears, puffy sore throat that I am sure will soon morph into a full fledged case of tonsillitis, ruining my upcoming relaxing and romantic weekend. I suffer through walking the dog, trying to swallow and not being able to. I come home, gargle with salt water and by the time I'm out of the shower, the throat is feeling better. All day long, it's only a mild scratch, and by bedtime, I barely notice it. Until I wake up the next morning and it happens again....what the heck?

My butt. That's the next what the heck. And not the size of it, nor the cellulite now forming. Not even the way it jiggles when I walk in sweat pants. No, my what the heck butt moment relates to how much my tail bone hurts. I realize I've gained almost 10 lbs. now, which means the weight pushing down on said butt while I sit has increased. But to the point that I'm in physical PAIN from sitting at my desk all day, and in the salon chair? To you I say what the butt...I mean what the heck.

And finally, I want to say what the heck to the people at my local Honda service center. I took my car in for the second time in 2 weeks. I needed to fix a lose bolt in the drivers seat which was, apparently a safety hazard. and replace a piece of rubber around the window, that has my car making this OBNOXIOUS whooshing sound, like the window is a bit open (and which has recently begin letting water in, eww). So I go and pick it up, and it comes to $407! What the heck? For a piece of rubber and a bolt? $407? Seriously? What the heck?!?!?!? The bolt better be made of diamonds and platinum and that rubber piece better exponentially increase the resale value of my 10 year old car or else, I really got screwed. Either way Honday - what the heck?

I have had a lot more of these moments today, but the husband is home and he's serving me supper...so I'm going to go. Because food and husbands rule over blogs.

So, really, what's in a name anyway?

2009-11-26T17:08:00.000-08:00

Oh you know, only everything.

I don't know why I am finding this so challenging, or why I am letting it stress me out...but we just cannot find a name that we both love the same way. My dear husband has his picks, and I have mine, and never the two shall meet. We've settled on 1 name so far, but the fear is that we really are settling on it, so while it remains on this ever growing list, the shine has worn off. It's just not as sparkly as it was last week. Sigh.

I want something beautiful, interesting and fitting of our first child. My names tend to be a little more off the charts. And while I'm not into making names up like Rainshine Moonwalk, or completely massacring the spelling, like Jaxxsoun, just so it's unique, I am also not prepared for my daughter Sarah and her 3 BFF's Sara, Sera and Sarra to be playing in my house. It needs to be as unique as I know this little one is going to be. It needs to speak to me, and to her, and I guess since we're married and all, to my husband.

Husband on the other hand, has a slightly different view. We've discovered that 98% of the names he likes sit comfortably within the Top 50. Not so close to the Top 10 that we know any yet, but close enough to the Top that our daughter surely would have a few friends with the same name. And really, it's not that bad, and it could be worse. He likes popular names, he just does. And so what, I suppose you could say SO WHAT?

And you know, I don't really KNOW what. I just know that's not what I want. And so we're stumped. It's not that we hate every name the other likes, but we just aren't loving or feeling the other person's top picks. And I'm really in love with some, and I'm not truly sure if he feels the same about his. And so, I obsess and he gets hounded with list after list of potential names. And we, we get no closer to picking anything.

What's worse, We're not even trying to pick THE name, we're just trying to pick a FEW names, that we both agree on, that we can take into the delivery room with us, so she doesn't leave the hospital simply named Baby Girl X. Or worse, named something we picked during an oxytocit/exhaustion cocktail high, like Roxanol or Kadian, which are brand names for morphine.

I should probably let it go. But for some reason I feel like this is some huge, overwhelming responsibility on my part. Her name will help define her, and as much as I want to believe that the person makes the name, I just don't think that's true. I strongly feel my life and path would have been markedly different had my name been something else, something less unique, something boring that I didn't have to explain time and time again. If I hadn't spelled my name 1000000 times, and had to endure a number of ongoing jokes about it, I would be someone else. If I was just another Katie or Christine, things would have been different. And so I stress.

And I suppose this is the root of me and husbands issue. He's got a name like everyone else. A Matt or Paul or Joe kind of name. The kind the everyone's heard and no one's ever commented on. And this is where he stands in this name thing. Well not exactly there, but he isn't deviating far.

We'll find some middle ground, but for some reason, right now, at 23 weeks, it's torturing me. And I just need to let it go.

Maybe I'll go and find some ice cream or something.........

The only thing I hate more than blowdrying and flossing? Doing my kegels!

2009-11-24T17:18:00.000-08:00

You might be tempted to wonder how I could combine blow drying, flossing and kegel exercises into 1 blog post, but don't. This is the mind of a pregnant lady and there is no rhyme, reason or rational. And in fact, I'm sure that by the end of this post, you'll know why I'm targeting all 3 at once.

Let me start with the least offensive, and most necessary evil on my list - flossing. The thing is, us humans are hardly confused as to why our dentists continue to beat us over the head for not doing this enough. We understand the importance of it, but we hate it so much we'll actually risk losing teeth over it. Teeth people, you need those (unless you're my dog but that's another story) to eat, and not look like a freak. You also need them to ensure you don't whistle and spit while you talk, and to help keep your tongue in your mouth..... or so the vet told me about my dog.

Anyway, it's not that it's hard or painful, and it's not even that it's that time consuming, it just sucks. It adds another step to your daily routine, and frankly you don't see the immediate benefits. The only thing that ever prompts me to floss on a regular basis, is the idea of having to listen to my Hygienist AGAIN detail how and why I should floss. So quite frankly, I'm good at it for approximately 4 months per year - 1 month before each cleaning, and 1 month after when I'm all jacked up on fluoride and free toothbrushes, and I truly believe I have the power to have a positive impact on my smile for my senior years. Then I start to realize I don't even know if I CARE about my seniors smile. Even though I'll be getting cheap McDonald's soft server and eating the $8.99 early bird lobster special at 4pm, so I'll have a lot to smile about, am I really going to care if those smiles are full of teeth? I suspect not.

And really, my grandparent's wear dentures and I've got to say, there are appealing parts of that scenario.Regardless, I hate flossing and I only do it periodically out of bare necessity. And now that I am pregnant, with all this excess blood volume and puffy bleedy gums, I'm even less interested. Why floss when I could use those precious moments for sleeping...or better yet eating? And that's my rant on flossing. If I could pay someone to do it for me, I might consider taking it back up.

This of course brings me to my next problem, the loathsome task of blow drying. Now some of you are saying "oh it's not that bad" while others are thinking "well if you hate it so much, why do it?". And to you I answer this: It IS THAT bad, but I'll get into that in a second. But why do I do it? Because I don't enjoy looking like a poorly washed poodle or an overzealous Q-Tip, and the only way for my head to look any form of put together is for me to engage in excessive heat styling. This requires the blow dryer AND the straight iron, but I heart my straight iron and wouldn't DARE ridicule her publicly. She might retaliate and break, and then I'd have to lose my shit.

My hair is curly, or at least it thinks it might want to be. It's not curly in that "wow that girl has got gorgeous curls" way, nor in that "hot I just came in from surfing" sort of way. No, it's curly in that "it's kind of big on this side, with a front load of frizz and a whole lotta wrong". So I must tame it. At least in part. On ugly stupid Sundays, I can get away with just a crown and bang dry, but on a daily basis, it requires an entire blowout.This process takes me on average 25 mins. 25 hot, sweaty and unbearably obnoxious minutes, where I stand in the humid bathroom, and blow hot air at my head with a gun shaped device. Having just got out of the shower, I generally find the profuse sweating which accompanies the blow drying down right offensive. Add to that the fact that my goddamn bangs will never ever EVER do the same thing twice in a row, and it's a recipe for a pregnant lady meltdown. I've only cried during blow drying once since I got pregnant, but I've thought about it a lot. That, and the irony of the fact that the gun shaped device I'm holding up to my head, is making my want to hold a gun to my head.

And I'm pregnant, so I'm hot. I'm hot, and not so much nimble anymore. Maneuvering around between the shower and the sink, praying for a bit of bounce or shine, and cursing the Pantene Pro-V girls is not a great way to start the day. But prancing around with stringy, limp curls with a side of "was she electrocuted?" is also not a great way to spend the day, so I chalk it up to the lesser of 2 evils.And that is why it is THAT bad.

Which brings me to my kegels (if for some reason you don't know what these are, you're probably a man and may want to stop reading). The reason I started thinking about the three of these things together in the first place was, I started trying to do my kegels, while blow drying, after flossing. My theory was, if I am going to be in hell ANYWAY, I might as well get it all out of the way at once. Like a bandaid, rip.

The flossing thing, well I gave that up before I started, but the kegel/blow dry combo I'm still working on. It doesn't make blow drying any less trying, but it kills two squawking birds with one stone. And of all of these evils, I think kegels might top the list in terms of necessity. I can live without teeth, I can live with a poodle-do, but what I can't live with is peeing in my pants with every sneeze or laugh from here on out.

That's right ladies and gents, having a baby spring forth from your body, existing out your vagine doesn't only hurt like hell (ok I ASSUME this one), but it wreaks havoc on your internal workings. One of those workings holds your pee. And I for one am quite happy with the amount of control I've got over my pee, and am not prepared to give that up just yet.

Actually, that's a lie, even at this stage in the pregnancy, sometimes I fear the worst, so it ain't going to get any better.I'd love to sneeze, laugh and even walk to the bathroom on particularly urgent days without leakage, but with a human on my bladder, that's not always the case. And what I don't want is to end up wearing Depends at the tender age of 30. That's right, I'll forgo my teeth but not my big girl panties. So I do my kegels.

I sit, and concentrate, and clench in and out, and do them. I do as many as I can before I have to stop, I take a rest, and do some more. I curse each one, but then silently thank it for keeping the pee on the inside, until I tell it to come out. Holding my pee is no longer something I'm going to take for granted.

And I've talked with enough of my mommy friends to know that the pee issue, is not the only one. Men fart in yoga because they are men and men are gross. Postpartum women fart in yoga and it's not a result of last nights broccoli if you know what I mean (and if you don't, then you're better off not thinking too much about this one).

And so, I kegel. I hate them, they suck. But Imma gonna do em. Every day. Until I once again control my pee.

Blogging about falling down wins me an award!

2009-11-24T13:17:00.000-08:00

Finally, my equilibrium does something for me OTHER than cause me bruises. The Mommyologist sent me an award today, this cute little lemonade stand!! And honoured me with a link on her blog page. Awesome! So fun!

I heart lemonade, and presents, and drinks at the end of the day. So to all the other mommy's and mommy's to be out there, I share with you my fun gift!

Thanks Mommyologist!

Dear equilibrium...you, me and gravity need to have a serious talk....

2009-11-22T22:51:00.000-08:00

Alright, I was not deluded enough to believe that adding an additional 20odd pounds to the front of my body over the course of 40 short weeks wouldn't have side effects. In fact I was quite sure that at some point, the whole balance thing would become a problem. Balance and I have never been friends, so I didn't think we were about to start having slumber parties. However I did believe it would take longer for balance to mess with my baby.

Of course, my first experience with this issue happened at only around 17 weeks, when I fell from grace with the loudest thud yet, and sprained my ankle. But that is old news, and something I got over. I've never been graceful, so what did I expect? Well I expected to be able to put my shoes on, I'll tell you that.

Throughout my entire life, I've been prone to fall down. When I was younger, I fell so many times that I permanently killed the pigment in my knee, and still have a scar. My legs moved so much faster than my feet or body, that I knocked not one but BOTH of my two front teeth out, on separate occasions. Once was a bloody mess at the ferry terminal where I ran to meet my dad and fell flat on my face. A normal kid puts her hands out and at least TRIES not to mangle her face. I did not. People say "well at least you didn't break your wrists". Sure I didn't, just my tooth.

The second time was a slow and simple walk on the pier with my grandparents, where I tripped on my own feet and flew forward, landing again flat on my face. Only this time, I added a new level, and sunk my tooth into the wood of the pier (I should say teeth, I'm pretty sure I didn't yet have a replacement tooth for the one lost at the ferry). I stood up and left my tooth behind. It's a wonder I'm not hideously scarred on my face.

But I digress.

The point is, I've spent my entire life falling down. And to be honest, I come by it honestly because my mother and sister aren't a whole lot better at staying upright.

I've often blamed the fact that I stand 5' 11" with only size 7.5 feet, but I'm not sure that's the issue. When I was a teenager, all tall and thin, with knobby knees and gangly limbs, I simply assumed the falling was just another part of the torture which is your teens, but then I never grew out of it. At the end of the day, I think me and my equilibrium have just had issues my entire life, which we've never managed to settled. I'm the girl who trips on the sidewalk when there is nothing there, the one who has rolled her right ankle not 1 but 4 major times in her life, and the person who can be knocked over with the slightest of nudges. Did I mention I've had crutches only once in my life, and the first thing I did was fall flat on my face in the hospital parking lot and need further medical attention?

Fast forward to my Relaxin hormone filled pregnant body, and cleary we have a problem.

So back to my point. At 22 weeks along, I've started noticing an alarming new trend in my daily routine - I fall down. I fall down doing the simple things even I'd learned to take for granted. From crouching down to pick something off the floor, to leaning over in an attempt to pull my shoe on without bending at the waist, I fall over.

The good news is, these aren't the loud, painful, disastrous falls of my past, but little gentle thumps to the ground. The bad news is, I fear this is only the beginning. I did not realize the getting pregnant meant losing your ability to perform the most basic tasks - and so early. I can't image convincing my husband that he is now responsible for the on's and off's of my shoes. Not to mention we're not always together. Additionally, there are sometimes just things on the floor which I need to pick up. Socks, dog toys, my sanity, and if I can't bend down to get them without joining them on the floor, what's the point? I'm going to need to get one of those things people use to pick up garbage so I can stay upright.

All I can say is that I hope I regain my sense of balance, and even gain a little extra after Baby Girl get's here. Because honestly, my arms are not safe for a small, fragile and dependent person. I'm sure I've dropped the dog on a number of occasions, but at least he's built like 12 lbs. of bricks.

What I REALLY hope, is that this Baby Girl gets my nose and ears, but her fathers ability to walk and stand up. Unfortunately, this klutzy thing seems a pretty dominant trait for the women in my family, so it's already not looking good.

Not to mention hat her most prominent in utero memory is going to be a strange falling sensation, culminating with a loud thud and her mama yelling FAWK!

Catastrophic Underwear Affair

2009-11-21T11:05:00.000-08:00

So this was something I didn't expect, but pregnancy makes your ass and hips grow, which also means, your underwear gets smaller. I tried to convince myself that all my old underwear just miraculously shrunk, but, I think it's more likely that ye olde arse is getting bigger.

So what to do. I don't want to go all jumbo granny panty and lose what little sex appeal I have left, but having a perma-wedgie is hardly an option either. So obviously something had to be done. So where does one go for sexy, but better fitting underwear? WalMart.

This was a mistake of epic proportions.

I can easily be dazzled by cute patterns and bright colours, so add that to my need to get in and out of WalMart as quickly as humanly possible, and a poor decision was inevitable. Something about WalMart, with it's rows of cheap plastic goods, low priced jumbo everything and crowds of bargain hunters who have forgotten that in fact, they are not the only person on earth, and I just get itchy. My throat closes up, and even though I know I'm saving $0.03 on that box of 5000 Q-Tips, I most times can't be bothered to put myself through it. But on this particular day, husband also needed underpants and undershirts, and those are best bought at some sort of "Mart".

So there I stood, row upon row of underpants designed for suburban housewives who haven't seen the inside of a Victoria Secret ever in life, confused. Bikini, low cut, boy cut, hipster...all the normal words I associate with panties, not the normal look. Never have I bought a pack of 12 pairs of underwear, without the actual ability to look at them or touch them. I mean, these are going to be jammed up against my delicate lady parts, shouldn't I be able to assess the feel of the material? Apparently not.

So I pick 2 sets, up one size from my norm - 1 in hipster and 1 in bikini, in the cutest patters available, and off I go.

Home, I'm eager to unwedge my cute silky, but too small, panties from my ass crack I tear into the bags and promptly throw the lot into the washer (they may have been in plastic, but they did still come from WalMart) and wait. And there I have it, 2 dozen pairs of underpants that will hopefully not spend most of their time residing in my butt crack.

Sigh. But when I put them on the next day, I realize I've made a horrible mistake. Well, not with the hipsters, they are actually ok, sit low, cover my bum, look cute enough and don't feel like sandpaper. I wish I could say the same for the bikini option.

I don't know what part of "bikini" Fruit of the Loom failed to understand, but what I got was hardly something akin to a bikini brief. The tops came up my back and front, covering half of both my belly button and my tattoo. Now, I don't own ANY pants that come within 2 inches of my belly button so why the HELL would I want underwear that did that? Wide at the bottom, these underpants surely won't give me the dreaded wedgie, because how could they, they are wrapped around my thighs? What a mess.

So I cried. I cried for a moment, realizing that I was in fact a pregnant lady, and I did in fact need to consider larger, less sexy underpants And then I realized, no matter how pregnant I get, I never ever need to don underwear that my grandmother wouldn't be caught dead in. So I packed the lot into the back of my underwear drawer, (hiding them from the others as I don't want them to get fearful of what they might become), and accepted that they were a waste of a hard earned $8.99. And there they will stay, until after the baby is born and I need cheap ugly underpants to ruin in the hospital. That, or until was have a natural disaster and the Red Cross needs something to fashion a giant tent out of.

The new, the old, the never ending incidents.....

2009-11-20T17:29:00.000-08:00

It's Friday again. It's Friday and my original evening plans fell through which means I have a glorious night of Wendy's drive-thru and TV shows I would otherwise not watch, due to the presence of my husband. He's out tonight. Out at a thing called Hopscotch, which is a Scotch festival. I anticipate one of those evenings where I wake up, alone, around 4:44am, carefully walk down the stairs (as to avoid another fall), and find him asleep with the Xbox remote in his hand, glasses on his face, and the dog sleeping in one of his body crevices. I cherish those moments, in my groggy state. Something about my boys snuggling gives my heart warm fuzzy's. Warm fuzzy's until I realize I need to pee so bad it hurts.

Anyways, the last week has been a week like any other - a little bit totally normal, a lot of new things and of course, some unfortunate incidents. I don't know if we have ever gotten through an entire week without some sort of incident since we met, but I suppose that which doesn't kill you (or force you to kill each other) only makes you stronger. More on this weeks incidents later. For now, I want to talk about the same.

It's nice to have the sameness. I am learning to appreciate the sameness, because I know it will soon come to an abrupt end, and the same will never be the same again. As the weeks pass by, marked every Wednesday by a new and exciting fruit, this whole baby thing becomes increasingly more apparent. More real. So for now I'm going to enjoy the things which are the same. Because when this chapter of our life together is over, I know I'll miss it. Long for it even, on certain days.

So for now, I enjoy that every Thursday night I go to O's house, which I've been doing for about 5 years or more. And even that has changed as we've grown. She's moved, I've moved. The TV shows have changed (but let's face it, are the same) and we've gone from cheap wine and cigarettes, to less cheap wine and cigarettes, to a year and a half of sobriety. It's not because we gave up on wine and menthols, it's because we went from her being pregnant, to me following shortly after her daughter was born. So sober we are, but we're counting the days until the wine come back (but we're not bringing back the cigarettes).

I enjoy the nights on the couch with my husband, complaining about the lack of entertaining TV, eating our dinner at the coffee table (despite it now being on another floor than the kitchen) and completely vegging out. Whether we're watching one of the few BluRay's available to rent, or some made for TV movie, we're together, alone, and we're enjoying it. The time is drawing near where, we may never be alone again. And we certainly won't be having nights like this, where we come home from work together, make dinner and waste several hours on the couch. It just won't happen.

And again, I'm not complaining. In fact, I'm doing the opposite (rejoicing?). I'm truly learning to enjoy the life we've built, so that I can prepare for it to all change. The closer it get's, the better prepared I am for a major life change. Profound hey? Hardly, I bet there is some hormone in my body doing this.But I'll take them. I have to admit this week feels a bit clearer. I'm more excited at the thought of baby, she seems more real to me now, and I'm getting ready to enjoy mommyness. I know it'll be hard, but for some reason I think I can do it. But that's this week, check in with me at Week 37, when labour is pending and I'm in full on panic.

Now for the new things this week. Our daughter (I'm finally getting use to saying this!) has taken to staying up all night and practicing her tap routine. And not that I don't enjoy her eagerness, it just sometimes wakes me up. But even that I enjoy. I love waking up to the feeling of her, tap dancing on one of my vital organs, because any reminder that she's alive and well in there is certainly welcome. Even if it means my spleen will never be the same.

She's also trying to get me fat. I have been the most hungry person on the planet this week, and there is just nothing I can do to satisfy it. I'm hungry from breakfast until snack time, and then until lunch. After lunch I'm hungry again, and snack, until I stuff myself with a dinner which cannot satisfy my hunger. I've had cereal at midnight, then tried to immediately go to bed, so I could sleep without being hungry. But then I just dream in bagels and lasagna. Mmmmmm lasagna....anyway.....

We've also finally booked a meeting with our first doula. I've been having a hell of a time finding one. I had a few referrals but wasn't getting any calls back. And frankly sister, if you can't answer my inquiry about your services, I'm not trusting you to help deliver our first child.However, at the appointment with the midwife this week, they offered up some suggestions. I found one I loved, but she was booked. But she referred me to someone else, so here's to hoping.

How does one go about interviewing a doula exactly anyway? I mean, this person is going to see me, buck naked, bodily fluids leaking from various orifices, moaning like cattle and praying to a god I don't believe in that the pain ends soon. Talk about pressure. The relationship between a doula (or midwife) and their client goes from new to ragingly intimate in a short period of time. I wonder how we'll all look each other in the face after?

In other news, the belly is definitely growing. It seems to get bigger by the day this week and I'm starting to feel like someone might actually guess I was pregnant. The one downside (the only I can think of, except the inability to wear flipflops without looking insane) to being pregnant in the winter is, it just looks like you've already been overindulging in the Christmas spirit. Layering up with a sweater and a jacket does not accentuate the belly in the right way. It just screams "this chicks almost 30 and now has a beer gut". The irony of it all, I get a beer gut when I have not had any beer in 5 months time.

And finally, husband and I found our nursery set for much less than we'd see it originally, and quickly jumped at the chance to purchase it. That and the stroller, but these topics are for a later thread.

That's probably it for news. So now we're onto the weekly incident.

To recap, LAST weeks incident came in the form of my 5 year old Boston Terrier Tuker, and his ability to cry me out of $500 worth of emergency doggy leg Xrays. $500 xrays on a leg which, is apparently completely fine. But that was last week. The week before, it was a "routine oil change" which turned into a timing belt and $1100 other things we had to do to maintain our 9 year old car. We only have one, and we have no money, so we best be good to it.

This week it was the house. If it's not the dog or the car getting us, it's the house. We did the roof in the summer, that was expected. Then a few weeks (and $5000) ago, we had to replace our furnace. Last night, the call from the tenant (because it's ALWAYS the poor tenant who notices these things) was "so um, the hot water tank is leaking". The effing what is effing WHAT? The HOT WATER TANK is LEAKING. Goddamnit!

Down my husband goes (because these things ONLY occur when he's home alone) to assess. Yup. It's leaking alright. We 911 call our plumber friend and wake him up. He tells husband what to do, and husbanc complies. We're left with no hot water in an instant. No prep time, no time for a shower. Just OFF. Fawk. Too bad it was all for not. Because the hot water shut off was broken, and the damn thing leaked all night anyway. It leaked all night so I COULD have just showered but no. Instead I interviewed a girl for my maternity leave, smelling like yesterday. Good thing I don't drink right now.

Another quick job by our new best friends at Reid Brothers plumbing, and by 5pm today, we've got a new bad ass water tank, with 15 extra gallons. Hopefully this will reduce the amount of obscenity filled, cold shower mornings for me. For $1800 it better. Now I'll just swear about the bank account, but I'll do it from the warmth of the shower.

So our baby booty is painfully depleted, and we're reeling from all the stuff that's gone on. We're warm and soon to be clean, but reeling none the less. Damn houses, who ever said they were such a great ideal. I think the renters have it better.

But it's our home. The home we bought to start a family, and start it we did. I think we lived here all of 24 days before they count me as pregnant (even though that was 2 weeks before I even OVULATED), so we clearly didn't waste anytime. Shocked the shit out of my husband but, I think he's getting used to the idea now.

And hey, unless they let me stay pregnant until 43 weeks, our daughter will be born before my 30th birthday. So as far as I'm concerned, we couldn't have timed it any better :)

Moving, shaking, and busting out of my pants…..did I mention it’s a GIRL?

2009-11-13T13:16:00.000-08:00

As the pregnancy progresses, my brain power regresses and, I have to admit I’ve slacked on the blog a little (which is sad since I’ve just started it). The result? A power packed post, full of everything worth mentioning over the last 3 weeks. So sue me, I’m long winded.

Anyway, it’s official, maternity pants are the shit. I no longer even try to go for the jeans without the elastic waist band because let’s face it; they weren’t that comfortable when I was still a perfect size 27. And if I knew you could find stylish, sexy butt jeans that had swapped their buttons and zippers for soft stretchy lycra, I’d of made the switch sooner. In fact, I don’t even promise to go back to normal pants after the baby. Frankly, undoing buttons is a time waster, and I suspect post baby, I won’t have the luxury of wasting any moments. I’ve become obsessed with buying maternity jeans and 4 pairs in, I still feel like I could use more. I should give it up, really, but I was a shopper and a fashionista-wanna-be long before I was knocked up, and some habits are hard to break.

Regardless, the joys of expanding waist bands are becoming increasingly apparent, and with the pending holiday season, I can’t see them getting any less joyous.

I have to admit, 21 weeks and 2 days (because us pregnant ladies count everything by the DAY) into this pregnancy, and I haven’t seen too much change in my body. I know somewhere, there is a pregnancy god, preparing to strike me down for playing with fire, but I swear I’m not being cocky. I just honestly didn’t know what to expect, and anticipated blowing up like a balloon before the pee dried on my stick. I mean, isn’t that the thing, you get pregnant and you get fat? Not that I want to get fat, I just want to be prepared for when it starts to happen. So far, I’ve got a little protruding belly, which is bigger in the night than in the day, and wonderfully C-sized breasts. I have to giggle at the belly changes from morning to night, it’s crazy. Surprisingly, you have to feed the baby too.

Now onto the baby, as you can see from the headline, it’s a girl! Shocked the hell out of me when the midwife told me that. I was SO sure this bean was a boy; I’d already picked out a name. And of course, living in BC where sick and twisted people do horrible things, there are rules here about finding out the sex before 20-24 weeks. So even though I laid pants down on the table, and had the technician write in the report what Baby Barker was, I wasn’t able to find out until I called my midwife. She was not going to tell me, even though I was a short 34 hours away from being at the chosen 20 weeks.

I thought I saw the telltale 3 lines, but my husband did not, so we left no closer to knowing. And the thing is, I know there are a lot of people out there who don’t find out until delivery, and I know that back in the day this wasn’t even an option. But it is an option now and damnit I wanted to KNOW. And the fact that some stranger KNEW and wouldn’t tell me was irking me. It was written down for all medical professionals to review, but not the mama.

My friend O would tell me to be patient, tell me that the baby would be the same sex Tuesday as it was on Thursday, and that I should just wait to find out in a few days. I don’t know if she has forgotten the last 7 years of our friendship or is holding out hopeful that motherhood will change me, but I am far from being a patient person.

So I called the next day. I called under the guise that I was looking for my triple screen results, when in fact I knew they were all fine since they were taking so long to come back. I was just hoping to not bug the Clinic Coordinator with my call so fast, so I figured this was a good way to get around that. To my surprise, the midwife had the results. I was surprised because the technician at the hospital said they wouldn’t have the results until Thursday, and it was only Tuesday. However the midwife had told me they would know on the Tuesday, so I held out hope that she was right. I suspect telling me to wait until Thursday was both the technician’s punishment for my shaken baby remark (more on that later), and because she knew that on Tuesday, I would only be 19 weeks and 6 days, and not 20 weeks. And no way should I know 1 day in advance, in case I made a rash decision to abort the fetus and try again for something better. You know, cause this whole getting pregnant and holding your breath for 12 weeks, praying every time you pee that your wipe will be clean, is fun and easy stuff.

Anyway, I called, and Penny the Clinic Coordinator said “oh I just got your results, hold on” and came back to tell me. She said “it’s a little Girl” and I heard boy and thought for a split second, d’uh. Then I had to ask her, what was that? And she said “It’s a GIRL” and I said “aww thank-you” and hung up. I then tortured my mom and sister a little by telling them I knew, but my husband didn’t yet, so I couldn’t tell them. I finally got a hold of him and he was ecstatic. He’s wanted a girl this whole time.

He was ecstatic and a rush of guilt covered over me like a cheap itchy blanket. Not guilt because I was disappointed or something, just guilt that I was so sure it was a boy, and it wasn’t. I don’t even know how to explain this feeling. My friend Jill put it best, she said that when they found out they were having a girl, after expecting a boy, they were so excited about the girl, but a little sad not to be having a boy. It’s weird. Very weird. I’m not at all unhappy about having a girl; I think it will be awesome. It’s supposed to be every mothers dream right? So how dare I falter if even for a moment? I had just imagined a little boy in my mind so many times; I’d even caught myself calling my belly “my little man”. So not now only was I surprised by the gender of my little one, I had also already given her a complex. HER I’d given HER a complex.

It took a few days to really wrap my head around the girl thing. I’m excited, I am. But I was also sure I was going to save the human race with my lone male offspring, since everyone I know (save two high school friends) has had baby girls. And so, here I am, with my little girl belly and my itchy guilt blanket, hoping this is not the first of many mothering disappointments to come. That is, me being a disappointing mother.

Back to my shaken baby comment. This is a good story. I was laying on the table, pants around my knees, belly lubed up like a Christmas turkey basting in butter, and the technician was having a hard time getting Baby Girls brain shot. She assured me nothing was wrong, but that the doctor would want to see the brain from a very specific angle and she couldn’t get it. I was asked to pee (OH THANK YOU BABY FOR GIVING ME THE CHANCE TO PEE TWICE DURING AN ULTRASOUND!!!!!!) and to shake my butt and skip my way there and back. I was then asked to continue jumping around like an idiot in the room, until the tech came back, to see if I couldn’t force baby to try a new position. So there I stood, hopping around, listening to my husband self diagnose the baby because the photo he saw of her brain was not the same as the one on the wall, and waiting on the technician. When she came back she said “shake that baby into position yet?” and I said “I guess this is the only time it will be ok for me to shake my baby, hey?” and I smiled. Apparently, this kind of joke is never appropriate, regardless of the preceding circumstances. Who knew? Mothering fail #1 (the gender thing is Mother fail #2, as it occurred AFTER this incident).

Oh well. She finished the exam, wrote down the gender and sent us on our way. We still haven’t yet seen the midwife but, I’m assuming since we’ve also had no emergency “your baby is actually a Boston Terrier” (because believe me, I’ve had that dream and birthing Tuker is no joy) phone calls, everything is going along well in there. Which is good, because being pregnant is like sitting on the edge of your seat for 10 (nope not 9) months, optimistic but prepared.

So for now, we continue to count the days, the weeks, the months until her arrival, and try not to kill each other creating the perfect, yet highly underutilized nursery in our computer room. And I should mention Baby Girl has been having a party in my womb for about 3 straight weeks now. And while I appreciate her ability to shake her booty like her mama, adhering to her father’s sleep pattern of staying up till 3am and sleeping past noon is going to have to stop.

But that is probably better saved for a post-birth post :)