$20 Bet - The continuing story of having and raising our baby girl.

Baby Turns Two

2009-08-17T21:21:00.004-04:00

Ignoring the (sad and shocking) fact that this is the first update since February, and moving on to today.

Fiona turned two today. She is officially a toddler, a child. Not a baby anymore, although her impossibly chubby cheeks and thighs beg to differ. I remember a year ago doing something similar to what I did today, albeit with more fervor being still so close to the year prior. There were several moments of, "Two years ago right now, I was knee deep in the misery known as labor. Two years ago right now, I was realizing there was no turning back. Two years ago right now, I became a mother."

But Fiona's second birthday today seems to be much more about her than her first birthday was. Last year we had a big party with friends and family. There was a huge cake, presents galore, older (and a few younger) children galloping around the place like little fiends. And there was Fiona, who really couldn't have cared less. But for M and me, it was a serious milestone. We had survived our first year as parents. This year the party counted just the three of us, an oversize cupcake to share, the video camera, and a couple of presents. It appears as though M and I also survived our second year of parenthood, though not without some scars and long term trauma. Most importantly, Fiona survived it, too, and with not a little aplomb.

What's next on the agenda? Well, after cake and presents, a quick video chat with Nae Nae out in Arizona, a bath to deal with the remnants of cake, and one final singing of "Happy Birthday," Fiona's in bed, and I'm left to wonder what on earth really is next. It's been pretty easy up to this point. Fiona has her issues, but we've dealt with them as best we could. But she's starting to get stuff now that she's getting older, and I'm exaggerating only a little when I say I think she may be smarter than I am. How we will manage this is beyond me. But then, it's quite possible that two years ago right now, I was thinking the exact same thing.

Favorite Photo Fridays - February 13

2009-02-13T23:46:00.002-05:00

Only one this week. I think you'll be able to see why.
My child is freaking AWESOME!

Happy Valentine's Day, Everyone!!

UPDATE! CPSIA Delayed for one year!

2009-01-31T17:49:00.004-05:00

Great news!
The CPSC has granted a one-year stay on the requirements for testing certain products.

This is the result of the actions of countless people making their voices heard. What a great country we live in!

Read more about it at the CPSC Website. In short,
"The stay of enforcement provides some temporary, limited relief to the crafters, children’s garment manufacturers and toy makers who had been subject to the testing and certification required under the CPSIA. These businesses will not need to issue certificates based on testing of their products until additional decisions are issued by the Commission. However, all businesses, including, but not limited to, handmade toy and apparel makers, crafters and home-based small businesses, must still be sure that their products conform to all safety standards and similar requirements, including the lead and phthalates provisions of the CPSIA.

Handmade garment makers are cautioned to know whether the zippers, buttons and other fasteners they are using contain lead. Likewise, handmade toy manufacturers need to know whether their products, if using plastic or soft flexible vinyl, contain phthalates."

So while it's not necessarily a done deal permanently, this allows for enough time to put in additional feedback and make sure the law is written correctly.

Favorite Photo Fridays - January 30

2009-01-30T23:36:00.005-05:00

By popular request, I'm getting myself in gear with some exciting new favorite photos of young Miss Fiona. With one month of 2009 already almost in the can, perhaps it's time I start working on my New Year Resolution to post more on this blog. Because goodness knows, you people deserve it!

Enough chatter. On to the good stuff!
1) This one was taken in late December. I can't handle the awesomeness of these blue eyes.
2) Another late December shot. We were psyched that Fiona had eaten all her green beans. Of course, she loves green beans, so she always eats all of them. Maybe we were just looking for an excuse to high five.
3) Fiona makes this funny little face when she's particularly happy and running around the house like a tiny fiend. It never fails to make me laugh out loud.

Slightly OT: Like supporting small home-based business? Yeah, me too...

2009-01-22T08:08:00.006-05:00

Ever since I found out I was pregnant with Fiona, I've been addicted to the Web and all the glorious shopping opportunities it offers. There must be millions (ok, maybe just thousands) of small, home-based businesses out there that make awesome, unique, beautiful, and reasonably-priced stuff for babies and mommies. And that's pretty valuable in a world of the cookie-cutter, generic crap you'll find in Babies R Us and other such stores.

I'll be honest, I have done my fair share of shopping at BRU - heck, I even had a baby registry there. But that was more out of a sense of ease. I was able to find most of the basics of baby-rearing at BRU, and people who wanted to give gifts from a registry had it easy between the stores and the online option. But I wasn't super-psyched about it. Most mass-produced stuff for babies is garish, frilly, or just outright ugly. And that's fine if you like that kind of thing. M and I do not.

So back to the glorious shopping opportunities. When I was researching cloth diapers, I found a small affordable producer and bought a bunch of her adorable flannel all-in-ones. When I couldn't stomach the price of a sexy Hotsling or Mayawrap - especially without knowing how Fiona would respond to a sling - I went on eBay and found a woman who makes beautiful, simple slings. And Fiona and I loved it. When it came to The Great Bedding Search of 2007, I managed to track down a company that made cute, semi-affordable stuff that was made in the U.S.A. What's not to like about that? And a co-worker makes the most adorable sock monkeys you've ever seen, selling them on Etsy (incidentally, the best site EVER).

OK, so I have a point to all this. The point is early next month on February 10th, the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act goes into effect, and this spells very bad news for a huge number of these small home-based businesses. It sounds like a fine idea. After all, who among us doesn't want to strengthen the requirements for testing and ensuring the products our kids wear, play with, and use don't contain toxic chemicals?

The problem with the CPSIA is that it requires every component of every toy, article of clothing, or other item intended for use by children under the age of 12 for lead and phthalates, and this can be a very expensive process. A process only large producers of these types of goods can afford. It's a well-intended law that was clearly created without much forethought. The cost of testing will be too much of a burden on small businesses, and they will be forced out.

Which means no more adorable bibs from craft fairs (like my mother-in-law bought Fiona for Christmas). No more cool jackets, like this one that I am coveting like crazy. No more adorable and affordable cloth diapers. To that I say, "BOOOOOOOOOO!"

What can you do to help? Contact your representatives. Tell them this law is great in theory, but really screws the little guy. Check out CoolMomPicks for some excellent resources and even more information. And thanks for your consideration!

Favorite Photo Fridays - November 14

2008-11-14T12:35:00.006-05:00

As if the fact that it's Friday and the weekend starts in approximately 4 hours isn't enough! New favorite photos, coming at you in 3...2...1...

All of these were taken in the latter half of October. In the first two, you can see that Fiona had recently discovered Ollie's bed was awfully fun to hang out in - especially when he was in it. I love the first one because she just looks so damn pleased with her situation. Meanwhile, Ollie is just tolerating it. He's a pain in the ass in a lot of ways, but he's really good with Fi, and I consider us very lucky in that regard.

The other two are from an apple picking trip we took in Franklin, MA, with some dear friends and their one-year-old son, Ethan. What's cuter than two little fall babies hanging out together and eating apples straight off the tree?

Happy weekend, all!

Too tired to eat lunch

2008-11-12T12:08:00.002-05:00

In my post yesterday, I mentioned that Fiona managed to sleep through what sounded like a small army of elephants playing cricket on our roof. I guess I shouldn't have been all that surprised. I mean, she was really, REALLY tired, as evidenced in this terribly cute and amusing video. Poor little shaver!

Baby + Tired = Not waking up for ANYTHING

2008-11-11T19:58:00.002-05:00

I've always known the old adage, "babies can sleep through anything." I'd witnessed the strange ability for babies and toddlers to shut out the noisy world around them and have a nap. It's uncanny, really.

But then of course, there are the times when even the slightest hint of a noise will wake a slumbering child into an upright shrieking banshee. Seriously, how do they do that? Fiona has scared the bejebus out of me more than once when I've walked into her room late at night to check in on her - silently as a cat - only to have her suddenly rise from her prone position - also silently as a cat - staring at me with those big blue eyes of hers. Sometimes I think she must still be asleep when she does that because leaving the room has no ill effect. Other times, naturally, if you're caught sneaking into the baby's room, she will make you pay. She will make your eardrums pay. She will make your own need for sleep pay. This stock-straight standing thing she occasionally does when roused from sleep by a mere whisper of sound reminds me of movies where dead bodies in morgues suddenly sit up with their sheets still over their head. Yeah, it's that creepy.

OK, sorry, I got distracted. So, babies sleep through anything. Yes, back to that. Today Fiona amazed me most of all. I put her down for a nap a little after noon when she was so tired she fell asleep while I was feeding her. And of course, not 10 minutes later, the roofers (expected either today or tomorrow) showed up. And they immediately set up their first ladder directly in front of Fiona's window. And proceeded to clomp all over the roof of the house as they ripped it to shreds.

I cannot emphasize this next part enough: this shit was LOUD, people. LOUD! Had I not known what was going on up there, I would have been scared out of my mind. Actually, even knowing what it was I was a little scared. I think it was only 5 guys, but it sounded like 50. And it went on for nearly three hours. Pounding, pulling, banging, clomping, crashing.

And that baby didn't even so much as peep. I'll grant that she's obviously still under the weather from her cold; and it was significantly later in the day than she's used to taking her first nap (at least on the days she's home with me). I also put a small fan in her room for a bit of extra white noise. But this was the equivalent of a herd of elephants stomping across the roof! Really?? Fiona will pop to life at the sound of the teeny, tiny click her door makes when I come in her room, but will sleep like, well, a baby during the cacophony we heard today? Well. OK, then. Maybe that means I don't need to tiptoe around this joint so much at night.

Baby's First Cold

2008-11-10T20:39:00.002-05:00

It had to happen sometime. After almost 15 months of blissfully good health, Fiona finally got her first cold. It came on subtly: last Thursday she was just a little off, not too interested in food, kinda crabby. Friday morning when she woke up, she had a thoroughly crusty nose, and my mother-in-law informed me later that day that Fi was officially a sick little puppy. She was in good spirits, though, and played most of the day with her usual vigor.

Of course, when I showed up to pick her up that evening she took one look at me and remembered that she was sick and demanded some love and attention, which I gladly dispensed to my usually independent child. By Saturday evening, she was still congested but apparently feeling better. Not so on Sunday. More congestion, more crabby. Poor little shaver. As of today, she's on the mend again, but I have her humidifier on full blast to do as much as I can to alleviate the snot block going on in her wee noggin.

The dreaded toddler cold couldn't be held at bay forever. Lots of things conspired against poor Fiona. On Halloween morning, we visited a day care just to check it out, and she naturally got her little hands all over all kinds of stuff that lots of other little hands had been on. Then the day after Halloween we had a party that was overrun with other kids, much to Fi's delight; much toy-sharing and drool exchange transpired. The following Tuesday, I took her to the pediatrician fearing she had an ear infection (no ear infection; apparently, she's an ear tugger). Her immune system - no longer benefiting from the antibodies in breastmilk - just couldn't withstand those voracious germs.

Still, we weathered this first cold pretty well, I think. She has continued to sleep like a champ (14 hours a day!) and still finds great comfort in food. Especially apples, which she enjoys gnawing on while walking around the house. All in all, it could have been worse.

Favorite Photo Fridays - Halloween Edition!

2008-10-31T21:07:00.001-04:00

Happy Halloween!! Fiona is a wee pirate. Arrrr!!!!

Favorite Photo Fridays - October 24

2008-10-24T02:32:00.006-04:00

I'm just going to pretend I've been here all along, posting my little heart out...

Onward!

It's Friday. And you know what that means. Hold on to your hats, kids. Fiona is cute as hell! Unfortunately, my blogging skills are limited, so I'm not going to try and provide captions alongside these pictures. Here's the info you need:
1) Early October: Fall + Redheaded Baby + Jack-o-lantern sweater = Ridiculous Adorableness
2) Holy frickin' crap we are PSYCHED for our first swimming pool adventure! This was late August on our trip to my aunt & uncle's place in Menomonie, WI. The kid is a pollywog.
3) September at Nana & Grampa's one day. The overalls alone are cute. Put them on my baby, it's like cute overload!

That is all!

Quick Hit - No walker required!

2008-08-19T15:24:00.003-04:00

The baby can walk! The baby can walk! THE BABY CAN WALK!!!

How lucky am I that I got to see this?? And that I had a recording device at the ready?? Answer: Super-lucky!

Sorry for the lousy video quality, but you get the idea anyway.
Go, baby, go!!!

Quick Hit - First Birthday

2008-08-18T10:00:00.006-04:00

Fiona celebrated her first birthday yesterday with family, friends, and a blue-frosted cupcake just for her. I'll post more about it later, but as I myself am recovering from post birthday exhaustion, here's a quick hit for all you watchers out there. At first, Fi was tentative with the Cookie Monster cupcake. That's really her way - touch lightly and softly until she knows it's OK. Once she figured out that frosting is yummy, she dove in. Slowly and methodically to be sure; but as the second picture below reveals, also with a ferocity known only in babies on their first birthdays.

Favorite Photo Fridays - August 15

2008-08-15T08:56:00.011-04:00

Time for another long-awaited (is there any other kind?) Favorite Photo Friday installment! Please to enjoy my impossibly adorable spawn!

This one is from June. M took a picture of Fiona's reaction when I returned from work one day. Is it any wonder I can't wait to get home every day?

Back in mid-July, Fiona and I took a trip to Arizona to visit NaiNai (my mom) for a few days. We had some professional pictures taken while there by Nnamdi Solomon. Who can resist this face? No one, that's who.

That's all you get for pictures today because there will be lots more coming after the ultimate celebration of the century (aka: Fiona's first birthday) takes place this weekend. Happy Friday, all!

Kitchen remodeling is not for wussies

2008-08-14T22:09:00.006-04:00

It's been quiet in 20dollarbet world lately. And that's because it's been anything but quiet in the real world for Fiona, M, Ollie, the kitties and me. Here's what I've learned in the last 6 weeks: Remodeling a kitchen is not particularly fun. And while I've never gone through a kitchen remodel without a baby in the house, I think a baby makes it even less fun. I

started badgering M about getting a new kitchen about 3 years ago when IKEA moved into the area and it seemed like it wasn't entirely financially unfeasible. It was mostly just a fun idea (especially when M refused to entertain the idea, or even banter with me about the prospect), but I did my darndest to plant the seed.

The kitchen we inherited when we bought this house was serviceable. Old, worn, and not the most convenient layout one might hope for; but altogether OK. But when we tried to refinance our mortgage last winter and couldn't because the housing market had tanked, M and I held onto something the appraiser had said. When he asked if we'd made any changes to the house since the last appraisal, I said heck, yeah, we have a new mahogany deck and pretty new front steps! Clearly that wasn't what he was looking for because he said, hopefully, "No new kitchen? Bathroom?" Sadly, no. But it was the impetus we needed.

We demolished the old kitchen (along with a wall that used to separate the kitchen from the dining area) the last weekend of June and have been living in utter chaos, filth, and general disarray since then. This remodeling business is not for the faint of heart. Luckily for us, we have a wet bar in the basement, which meant we haven't had to do dishes in our bathroom sink (although a bar sink is hardly any easier) and actually had an additional source of running water. But going up and down the stairs just to get a dish, clean a dish, microwave something, get a dish out of the way... it gets old really fast.

But I sit here tonight and I can see the finish line. The counters were installed today and I'm starting to feel human again. We have a laundry list of to-dos left in this largely DIY project - namely plumbing (oh! to have running water again... not to mention a dishwasher!!) - but we're so close. With any luck, plumbing won't be the final straw to break our spirits and we'll be back in business within a few more weeks.

Good thing, too. I can't take another pizza, bowl of cereal, take out from Chili's (which we actually abandoned quite a while ago out of disgust), or sandwich. Fiona has been a total champ, though. She scarcely noticed the mess she was living in, and accepted being contained much of the time in her Playzone (lovingly termed "baby jail") in spite of the fact that she's becoming quite the mover and shaker these days.

Short story, we're close enough that I can just about say, "Yeah, it's been worth it." Maybe I'll call the appraiser and see what he thinks.

(PS: Pictures will come at some point in the not-so-distant future.)

Kissy

2008-07-14T15:22:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was a banner day for Fiona and me. For the most part, it was a normal Sunday. She and I went out and about to run errands (i.e., I dragged her through a couple of stores in her stroller while she came patiently along for the ride). By the time we got home in the late afternoon, she was good and mellow after being exposed to so much rampant consumerism. I understand this feeling, it has the same effect on me.

To make what would usually be a very long story with lots of background short, I'll get right to the point. I got my first baby kiss from Fiona yesterday. An honest-to-goodness kiss. I had to ask, plead, beg, and otherwise cajole it out of her. But suddenly she gave in (after approximately 8 months of me trying to convince her that it would be fun to give Mommy a smooch).

I've since learned from others that babies don't do much in the way of puckering. It's all mouth. This would explain why what I really got was less kiss and more slobber. But it was terribly, terribly sweet. When she planted her drooly little 'O' mouth on mine, my heart just melted. This is what makes the (admittedly rare) late night or midnight waking worth it (not to mention a million other things).

So far there's been no repeat smooch, but this wasn't her first (kiss #1 went to Grampa, M's dad, a few weeks ago - and while it wasn't to me, I didn't feel too badly about it because at least I got to see it), so it certainly won't be her last. Tomorrow, we fly out to Arizona to visit NaeNae (my mother). Perhaps we can convince her to shell out a few more smooches.

Favorite Photo Fridays - June 20

2008-06-20T07:00:00.006-04:00

Been a while since you got your photo fix, eh?
Please to enjoy today's "aww"-inducing shots! Happy Friday, people!

This one was taken earlier this month and, I think, shows just how pretty a little girl Fiona is becoming. I may be biased. But I'm pretty sure that's just a fundamental truth.

This one is from last month. Nothing much to say about it other than what a cute couple we make.

This one makes me laugh because it shows what happens when a baby literally passes out from being tired (why won't they just sleep when they're tired??), regardless of what they're doing at the time. Fiona had found the post of her swing super-enthralling before succumbing to sleep.

That's all for this week. Have a great weekend, everybody!

Month Nine Stats

2008-06-01T18:05:00.002-04:00

Fiona's nine month wellbaby appointment took place right smack in the middle of naptime, so she was pretty much pissed the entire time. That's okay, we've got stats to share anyway!

Weight: 20 pounds, 6.6 ounces (down 3.4 ounces from her 6-month checkup). The South Beach Baby Diet we put Fiona on has clearly worked. We were pretty concerned with her excessive girth, and felt that she was going to be unable to compete in today's cutthroat world of thin and sexy babies. How was she ever going to get ahead in life?

Of course, I'm kidding. We love our super-chub baby. The doctor wasn't particularly concerned with her weight, although we're supposed to keep an eye on it. Considering she was previously in the 97th percentile for weight (and also considering the change in her height) this change is not terribly surprising. In any case, she's now in the range of the 50th to 75th percentile in weight.

Height: 29 1/4 inches, a gain of 2 1/2 inches. So while Fiona was more or less static in terms of weight, she was busy shooting up like a chubby-thighed weed. As a result, she moved from the 55th percentile in height to the 90th, and is now officially too big for her infant carseat. We'd switched over to her convertible seat shortly after her 6-month appointment thinking she was going to surpass the 22 pound weight limit. Obviously, she hasn't done that yet, but given that the height limit is 29 inches, we can now safely pack her first seat away.

The rest of the appointment was relatively standard fare with the exception of the occasional, explosive shrieking my poor nap-deprived baby emitted. I actually had to hold her head steady while the doctor looked in her ears and eyes. No shots this time around, but she did have her finger pricked and milked for a few drops of blood, which will be tested for lead and, I think, iron levels. Naturally, she was not a fan; and just like when she gets her shots, I felt terrible holding her down just so someone else could cause her pain. Necessary, yes. But hard to bear, too.

All in all, she remains a very healthy little girl. And by the time we got to the front desk to pay the co-pay and make our 12-month appointment (12 months!!), Fiona was her usual happy little self, sucking contentedly on the sparkly, kid-bandaid on her poor priced finger. And I'm pretty sure she doesn't hold my treasonous behavior against me.

Mastitis: Enemy of the Boob

2008-05-23T20:20:00.006-04:00

I practically should have expected it. There were plenty of reasons for it to happen. There was a bleb, or milk blister, on Lefty's nipple (= susceptible to bacteria) ; I started battling a cold late last week (= depressed immunity); then M and I went out of town for a wedding last weekend, which involved lots of fun, late nights, and partying a little hard (= "run down"). Conditions - according to what I've read and been told since then - were pretty much ripe for what happened Tuesday of this week.

I went to bed feeling fine and normal Monday night, and woke up at 5:00 in the morning with excruciating pain in Lefty (a note to readers who haven't picked up on this before, but Lefty is by far the more successful sister as far as milk production). At first, I thought it was just engorgement, easily fixed by pumping since Fiona wasn't awake yet. Very quickly I realized there was a big problem. It was so painful to pump I was immediately nauseous. But I could feel the wedge-shaped clog on the top of the breast, and knew that not working it out could mean bad things. So I continued, not wanting to chance that things could get worse. Too late: they were already worse. The pain got so intense I started to feel faint, and I started to cry. Really, really hard.

I stopped, and heated up my little flax-pack, which I'd been using for the past several days before nursing to ease the pain of the bleb. It wasn't helping that morning, but I knew I had no choice. So I took it to the next level and got into a hot shower, bringing my trusty little manual pump with me, and kept trying. But it was an exercise in futility. Hardly anything was coming out, and I wanted to die the pain was so awful. Let's put it this way: I didn't cry out in pain while pushing out my nearly-9-pound daughter... but I couldn't stop crying during this.

By now, it was 6:00 and Fiona was awake. Having had a clog once before, I knew that she was the best person for the job of getting me unclogged. I figured it would be uncomfortable for sure. But I was determined to deal with this thing and get on with my day, and figured I was so used to her that maybe it would be better than the pump. I was horribly mistaken. Pain shot through me like a bullet and I wailed like a siren. This, naturally, scared the hell out of Fiona, and she, too, began to cry/nurse/cry/nurse. M says it sounded "like a torture chamber", Fiona and me both screaming and crying. She did work out the bulk of the clog, thankfully. But the pain persisted, and my plans for the day (namely, going to work) were were scrapped. There was no way I would be able to function in normal society like that.

My mother-in-law, who cares for Fiona when I'm at work anyway, was generous enough to come over as usual and allow me to be sick without having to take care of a baby at the same time. By this point, I was pretty sure the issue wasn't just a clog, but likely the more serious - and dreaded - mastitis. On my mother-in-law's (much appreciated) insistence, I called my OB's office to talk to a nurse. I didn't even make it past the receptionist: when she asked why I was calling, I said "extreme breast pain" and she said, "Well! You need to see a doctor. Come in at 1:45." Fastest appointment I ever made.

I pumped again, only because I absolutely had to, and then went to bed in the interim, miserable as hell. MIL woke me at 1:00, gave me some soup, and sent me off to the doctor. Predictably, mastitis was confirmed, and the doctor wrote me a script for antibiotics. My temperature there was only 99.2, but certainly explained why I was feeling woozy. I left the doctor's office, called my mom, and headed straight for the pharmacy to pick up the drugs. I was sitting in the parking lot, just saying goodbye to her when I heard the rushing wind and felt that all-over tingling you get right before you pass out. Before I could do that, though, I got the 15-second warning indicating that barf was imminent. So I did that instead, right out the side of my car door. Good times. I think the pharmacist must have known I was in a bad way because she gave me the briefest, most sympathetic look as she said, "Do you want to wait for it?" And I did.

The rest of the afternoon dissolves into a haze of fever, pain, and general misery. I woke up at one point with a temperature of 102 degrees, took some Tylenol, and went back to bed only to be awakened a few hours later sweating myself silly the way you do when a fever breaks. That cycle repeated itself twice more throughout the night and into the next morning.

I still felt pretty banged up by Wednesday morning, but my temperature was mostly back to normal, and I just wanted to start feeling normal again. So I went to work and sort of glazed my way through the day. By the end of the day, though, I was feeling considerably better, in spite of the fact that pumping was still pretty painful (and producing very disappointing amounts of milk). Since then, I've improved leaps and bounds, and was even able to nurse Fiona by Thursday morning. Not comfortably, but I did it. I think she's the only thing that will bring my dwindling supply back to its former glory. Lefty's nipple is still pretty touchy, but it's getting better all the time.

There are women out there who have gone through far worse episodes of mastitis than the bout I just experienced - and who have gone through it many times. I have to bow to these women, because to endure this kind of torture is nothing short of miraculous. I myself hope to never, EVER go through it again, but I know that having had it once makes me more susceptible to having it again. Still, I know what to watch for now, and with luck it won't kick my ass quite so hard if it does ever recur. Yeah, right.

Crying it Out

2008-05-16T21:54:00.003-04:00

These are tough times.

I'm sitting in our living room, listening to the heart-wrenching sound of my daughter crying herself silly. It is nearly 10:00 - about 2 hours after her usual bedtime. Of course, her bedtime has slipped considerably in the past few days as she has decided that going to sleep is not really her thing, regardless of how exhausted she is. And she is definitely exhausted today, as she was yesterday, and as she was the day before.

Fiona used to be a champion sleeper. By the time I returned to work after my maternity leave, she was frequently sleeping through the night. And the nights she did wake up, it was to be fed just once, and I was happy to bring her to the big bed with me where she'd remain for the duration. Eventually she got to a point where she wasn't waking up hungry, and she slept all the way through almost every night. I counted myself among the lucky ones.

Then disaster struck - in the form of two top teeth - about six weeks ago. She was pretty uncomfortable with the new chompers breaking through. Then she got the mysterious itchy rash that forced us to stop solids for a bit. Taking the food she had grown accustomed to out of the picture messed with her hunger levels a little, so we were back to waking up for food in the wee hours.

After a couple of particularly rough nights a few weeks back, plus the fact that M's parents would be soon be taking her for an entire weekend while he and I were off for a wedding in New Hampshire, pushed us to what I called "Baby Sleep Bootcamp." I had planned to allow for lots of crying it out, difficult nights, and one really pissed off baby. Fortunately for all of us, Fiona did pretty well. She only hollered a little bit a couple times, and the few times she woke up in the wee hours, she put herself back to sleep after a little fake crying. All was well until this week. For whatever reason, the past 3 nights have been a nightmare again. Last night, I gave in when she woke up at 1:30 - only 2 hours after we'd managed to finally get her to sleep after much cajoling, rocking, and soothing - and I brought her to bed with me. Even then, she was not to be swayed, and she buffeted against me all night. I, too, am exhausted.

And now, as I have been writing, she has finally passed out. We went in three or four times during the howl-fest to reassure her that we were still around.But in between those visits, we let her scream it out. And lo and behold, it worked. Painfully, but here we are... and it is quiet. She fell asleep while sitting up, and slouched over her own lap. We gently put her into a position that would not cut off the blood supply to her legs, and she remained asleep. I am cautiously optimistic for now.

That said, I worry about of the sanity my generous in-laws will retain after this weekend when M and I leave Fiona in their care for two full nights. Let's face it: letting your baby scream with misery and exhaustion is not for wimps. Good thing they're not wimps. I'm a wimp. But then, I'm her mother.

Favorite Photo Fridays - May 2

2008-05-02T22:18:00.005-04:00

It's time for another installment of Favorite Photo Fridays. Sorry for the delay. I know you've all been on pins and needles. Without further ado...

Does my kid have the most marble-blue eyes you've ever seen or what? This one was taken just last week as she stood in her crib. That's her new thing: standing in her crib, trying to make trouble.

This one was taken in early April at M's parents' house. Few people can make her smile and laugh as much as her Grampa can. Note the tiny pearly whites on the bottom

Thanks for joining for today's installment. More to come next week! Well, I hope so anyway.

Baby's First Doctor Visit

2008-05-01T17:04:00.003-04:00

With the exception of the day after we brought her home from the hospital, Fiona never had any reason to go to the doctor except for her wellbaby visits where she got weighed, measured, poked and stuck with vaccines. Last week, however, I made the first phone call to the doctor's office in over 8 months.

A rash that had been quite minor and small when it appeared on her upper chest under her neck just before she turned 6 months had become much larger and very itchy to my little girl. She could barely keep her hands off it. Whenever we would take her top off, her hands would immediately latch on to her chest in a scratching frenzy. And let me tell you - this kid is strong. I don't know how she does it, being so small, but it took both my hands to pry her clenched fingers off her rash. It reminds me of trying to cut the cat's nails: Xena weighs all of 8 pounds, but she'll manage to wiggle her way out of M's super-strong-and-manly grip just to release a powerful stream of cat whiz on both of us before scampering under the bed (this actually happened just the other day).

Anyway, I digress. Fiona's rash was looking more irritated every day, and she was clearly getting itchier. So off to the doctor's office she went with her Nana late last week.

The verdict: Eczema. Nothing terribly serious, and not at all uncommon in babies. We got some recommendations - lukewarm, infrequent baths; Eucerin and Aquafor; 2.5% hydrocortisone cream for really itchy times; and starting from square one with solids. Boooooo. So much for slow weaning with the help of solids. I was really hoping to eliminate my worktime pumping sessions because good GOD am I done with the pumping. Besides that, Fiona really likes food. So it's a bummer to have to start her back at the beginning and move with the pace of a glacier again. Sorry, kid, no more sweet potatoes for you for a while.

We managed to get the rash under control very quickly. Within less than two days, it was nearly gone. She didn't have solids again until yesterday when we gave her some oatmeal (so much less disgusting than rice cereal). Bad news: that may have been the culprit. As of this morning, the rash was back and in multiple spots. Sigh. I don't know what this means other than that oatmeal is off the list for now. Maybe we really do have to resort to rice cereal. Sadly, she just doesn't really like rice cereal that much (I tried it - I don't like it either).

One interesting factoid that came out of the doctor visit... Fi got weighed and came in at 2 ounces LESS than she was at her 6 month appointment. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised - she's been moving around like a maniac, standing all the time and more trouble than a monkey in a banana shop (what?). Sweet - that buys us some more time to use all her "good to 25 pounds" baby gear!

Favorite Photo Fridays - Apr. 4

2008-04-04T17:18:00.003-04:00

Here's this week's installment. Less talk, more rock.

This picture is from mid-December of last year(as if it could be from a mid-December of some other year) and really illustrates how happy Fiona typically is. She, like most babies, especially enjoys being naked, which is where I think the twinkle in her eye comes from in this shot.

I took this picture of Fiona and my father during our trip to Fargo. He was so head over heels for her and couldn't stop saying so.

This one is from Easter Sunday. Her dress, a gift from Nana (M's mom) was the cutest, least frothy outfit imaginable, and it was perfect for her.

February Flashback to Fargo

2008-03-29T00:20:00.000-04:00

As I mentioned in the January Flashback post, February was a pretty big month for little Fiona. So what if February was eight million years ago? Let's get recap-tastic!

Early in the month, I started researching a possible trip for Fiona and me to Fargo, North Dakota. My paternal grandmother's 90th birthday was looming on the horizon, and it seemed like just the kind of excuse I needed to get out there and introduce the young one to her great grandmother, grandfather, and other assorted relatives. I struck gold when I found a relatively affordable flight out of Boston going direct to Minneapolis, from where my aunt generously offered to pick us up and drive us to Fargo. I booked the hell out of it, not with a little trepidation. Flying? Alone? WITH A BABY? Oy, this was new territory.

M's parents were kind enough to drive us to the airport, and after braving parking lot-like traffic conditions on the way that convinced me we'd be taking the next flight out, we arrived with time to spare thanks to a near-empty airport. Those of you who have ever been to Logan know that the travel gods were indeed smiling upon us that the airport was so easily traversed. Before I knew it, we were past the security line and awaiting pre-boarding. Finally! It was my chance to be in that elite group of travelers: "First class passengers, passengers with small children, or passengers who require extra time for boarding." I've been traveling by plane for going on 30 years now. This was a first for me. Yes, now it was my turn to board early.

A quick aside: I learned a lot from this trip; tips, pointers, little annoyances that I could have avoided. At some point I'll post them all, too, so that you, my vast array of readers, can benefit from my newfound knowledge. More on that later.

Anyway... I met a very nice lady in the terminal before boarding who had a baby girl just a few weeks younger than Fiona. We arranged to sit together so that a smaller section of people would be put out should both of our babies go into meltdown mode. Fiona, however, never melted down. She was amazing. I couldn't believe my luck. She didn't even have a poo-related disaster, although I did end up changing her at one point... simply because it was something to do, and at least I'd be able to say I'd changed a baby in an airplane lavatory (not really anything to write home about). I nursed Fi on the ascent in the hopes that it would prevent any painful ear popping. It apparently worked. And by the time we started the descent (said to be more painful for babies), she was asleep. But the most important and interesting tidbit about this particular flight is this: Fiona cut her first tooth! Just after we'd reached cruising altitude, I stuck my knuckle into her mouth as is normal for us only to find a sharp little addition in there. Considering this was something over which my little girl had absolutely no control, I couldn't have been prouder. And Fiona didn't have a word to say about the whole thing.

We flew direct to Minneapolis. It was more expensive to do so, but looking back I'm glad I did it. My Aunt Nancy and Uncle Dale picked us up, with a borrowed car seat all ready for Fiona. We stopped to pick up one more person in Minneapolis - Great Aunt Helen (or, to Fiona, Great-Great Aunt Helen) and set off for Fargo. Did I mention it was approximately eight degrees above zero when we landed? Yeah, good times.

We arrived in Fargo later that evening and went straight to my grandmother's house. She'd had no inkling that we would be showing up, and while she doesn't show a lot of emotion, she was clearly moved. Then all there was left to do was wait for my father's arrival. I had told my step-mother the day before that we were coming because I knew there was a chance my father would resist a random trip to my grandmother's house in the dead-cold of a North Dakota winter. I was right to have done so. He put up a fight, and my step-mother dragged his stubborn ass out of the house anyway and managed to keep mum about the real reason.

Good thing, too. In all my years, I've never seen my dad react the way he did when Fiona and I came around the corner. I'd never seen my dad cry or even tear up before that moment. He was so shocked he threw his hands up over his head and shouted something I can't remember. But it was a shout of pure happiness and surprise.

The next few days flew by in a blur of family time, eating, being too warm in my grandmother's well-heated house, and trying to maintain some semblance of Fiona's normal routine. Hard to do with a family who likes to stay up into the wee hours playing the card game golf. On February 17th, Grandma hit the 90-year mark and Fiona passed six months. Milestones all around. And the next morning,which came all too quickly, it was time to head back to Minneapolis. Of course, I missed M. And I missed all the comforts of the copious baby gear back home. But leaving my dad was tough to take.

My parents divorced when I was still a baby, and by the time I was two my mom had moved us to Montana and 600 miles away from my father. Until I had Fiona, I never realized how that might have been for him. I can barely fathom being away from her overnight, let alone 50 weeks out of the year. It makes me truly sad to think that Fiona will grow up so far away from her maternal grandfather and won't have a lot of opportunities to get to know him. It makes me more sad to think he won't have a lot of opportunities to get to know her, and I know that makes him sad, too.

But back to Minneapolis we went, to find our flight quite delayed. Which was OK because it gave me time to have a little lunch and Fiona time to have a massive, near-disastrous poo blowout. It was one of those blowouts where I knew if I left her in her stroller in the seated position for even 30 more seconds to get her to a restroom, the clothes she was wearing would need to simply be tossed. So I did the unthinkable: I changed her right there in the terminal waiting area. I've become one of those people. Oh, god, the humanity.

We got home with no problems, albeit a few hours late. To make up for it, Bobby Brown was on our flight, sitting in the same row as we were at the opposite window. Fiona's first celebrity! What good fortune to finish off her first big trip.

Favorite Photo Fridays

2008-03-28T10:52:00.000-04:00

Because I have been blessed with such an adorable, photogenic child, I am implementing a new feature here called Favorite Photo Fridays. I would imagine this is pretty self-explanatory. It's Friday. There are photos. And I will share my favorites with all of you. As if Friday isn't awesome enough just by its very nature. Could it get any better? Let's commence with the further awesomeness, then, shall we?

This was taken in late February in our back yard. She's sitting in a little sled contraption that her father sat in when he was her age. It was such a ridiculous winter with all the cold and rain that this was the one time we were able to actually put her in it.

Every time I look at this picture, I have to laugh. Fiona makes the funniest little faces sometimes. If I were Photoshop-inclined, I could do all sorts of amusing things with this shot, but I'm sure someone will be doing some random image search on Google one day and come across this little gem and do that for me.

This one was taken just a week ago and really captures Fiona's usual attitude about everything. Plus, it shows off her awesome new sitting-up skills! Fi is really, truly a happy baby. In all honesty, I just don't know how we got so lucky.

This is another one of those that just makes me so happy to look at. It's the "crazy happy" look. It was an accidental picture, but I laugh every time I see it.

And that's it for this week's installment of Favorite Photo Fridays. Hope you enjoyed. Tune in next week for more photographic phun!

Month Six Stats

2008-03-23T10:57:00.001-04:00

Fiona's six-month checkup was nearly two weeks after she actually turned six months. That happened while we were in Fargo, North Dakota. And it's partly to blame for the fact that her turning seven months completely sneaked up on me. Up until a week before then, when I finally took a good look at the calendar, I was still saying she was just over six months old.

At this point, it's all a numbers game. Time continues to go faster and faster, and months are measured in minutes it seems. Her "age" at this point isn't as significant as turning age one, or age two; although, I remember distinctly as a young girl that the six-month "birthday" was highly important, and after that point I was not just "ten" but "ten and-a-half, thank you very much." With Fiona I see every month older she becomes as anchors in time that I can actually grasp, unlike normal time, which is continually getting away from me.

So with a couple (okay, three...plus) weeks under our belts, it's time to review the results of Fiona's six-month doctor visit. Get crazy with the stats!

Weight: 20 pounds, 10 ounces. Just over a four-pound gain, her largest jump in a while. Naturally, she remains in the 97th percentile. She's fat, happy, and looks like the Michelin baby with all those rolls. I'm starting to think my boobs are dispensing lard. In case you're wondering, yes, the creases of the rolls collect all sorts of things: lint, drool, spit-up, and breastmilk. They're typically a main focus of bathtime.

Length: 26 3/4 inches, a gain of an inch and a quarter. Starting to have a body shape more like Mom and Dad's every day. Our little fire hydrant baby dropped from the 90th percentile for weight into the 55th. We're pretty sure she's storing most of it in two places: her massive brain and her meaty ham-hock thighs.

All told, the doctor was pleased with her health. She had a bit of fluid in her right ear that we were told to keep an eye on. The pediatrician asked again about solids, which at the time we had not started. I really hadn't been in much of a hurry to start them for whatever reason. But when the doctor suggested we start supplementing her with vitamins since she probably wasn't getting enough Vitamin D or iron through just breast milk, I made up my mind immediately to get cracking. Fiona had her next round of vaccinations, after which she bawled like the baby she is for a few minutes, and we were on our way.

The next appointment won't be until she's nine months... which, based on how quickly time is passing, will be in approximately 20 minutes by my internal clock. In the meantime, please enjoy this picture taken in mid-February.

Adventures in Business Travel

2008-03-18T10:52:00.002-04:00

I'm sitting on the Acela Express in New York City's Penn Station, waiting to pull out and start the four-plus hour ride home. I spent the day here at a conference for work. I enjoyed myself, learned some new things, saw some former co-workers and talked shop. But it's been an all-day thing. I'm tired, I'm a little burned, and I'm pissed that the train is currently running 33 minutes behind schedule. Make that 34.

This is the first day I've really spent away from Fiona. Not like your average workday, where I leave home around 7:00 after feeding her and spending a good 30 minutes with her; when I get home around 6:30 and get a good two and-a-half more hours with her before we put her to bed. It's not even quite like the days when I actually do something after work with other adults and don't get home until late.

35 minutes late...

Today, I left the house at 4:40 to catch my 5:24 train to New York. Fiona wasn't exactly asleep, much to her father's dismay no doubt. But the four seconds I was with her as I put her back into her crib before leaving the house wasn't exactly time well spent.

37 minutes late...

Of course, I did get to spend much of the night with her. The little stinker had the audacity to NOT sleep through the night for a change and bade me collect her for a feeding at 1:00 this morning. She's a sleeping angel when it doesn't count. But somehow, she knew I would be getting far less sleep than is typically necessary for me and she opted to make it a little worse by getting me up in the wee hours. But co-sleep time is also not quality time.

39 minutes late...

Today I will have spent the entirety of her true waking hours apart from her. And my god, how I miss her. When will this cursed train start moving? As it was, I would not have arrived at the Rte 128 station in Dedham until nearly 10:30. Now, it will be after 11:00. And another 30 minutes before I reach home after that. There's a part of me that hopes she's awake when I arrive. But that's the selfish, bad-parent part who just wants to hold her and give her a kiss and tell her how much I love her.

Electrical problems? You're checking out electrical problems on the train that are delaying our departure? Screw you and your electrical problems! Don't you realize I have a baby daughter who turned seven months old today who is waiting for me? Who needs me??

43 minutes late...

It doesn't help, either, that I opted out of a late afternoon pump session thinking I'd be home in a timely enough fashion that it wasn't necessary. I think that wasn't a great decision. Yeah, definitely not. These suckers are going to need some attention pretty soon.

Oh, well.

We're moving now. 44 minutes late. This business of being away from her is seriously going to take some getting used to. I have an overnighter coming up in a few weeks. But at least for that one, transportation won't be out of my hands. I'll get to come and go as I please. And I think I just might leave early.

...

Nope, never mind. We're not moving. We went for about 5 minutes and stopped again. "Waiting for 2 westbound trains to clear the area." Well, screw you and your westbound trains. How about giving the train that's a full hour behind schedule the right of way!!! My kid will have forgotten who I am by the time I get back. And my boobs hurt. This does not bode well.

8:07. Finally moving. So help me god if we stop again for anything other than legitimate station stops...

(p.s. As I did not have Internet access while actually on my little business travel adventure last night, I am posting after-the-fact. Of course, I realize this reduces the impact. I am okay with this.)

Goodbye, Montana

2008-03-09T23:16:00.000-04:00

Most of you know I moved to Massachusetts from Billings, Montana nearly 10 years ago. At the time, I left thinking that someday I'd probably go back "home" to live there permanently. I grew up there; many of my dearest friends were there; and, most importantly, my mother was there. Through the ensuing years, a lot has changed. I've really made a home and a life for myself in Massachusetts. I got married to M, we bought a house, got a dog. And now we have Fiona. I spent my most formative growing-up years in MT, but I've really become an adult in MA. Even so, Montana has always been what I think of when someone says "hometown."

As of today, my most important link to Montana is gone. My mother, untethered by marriage, mortgage, or job, packed as many of her belongings as would fit into her sparkly red convertible Mustang and hit the road. As I write this, she's making her way to the sunnier climes of Phoenix, Arizona, where she plans to live for the duration.

I can't blame my mom. In fact, I'm really psyched for her. After all, I had my own similar adventure when I moved here, and clearly it has worked out. But I'm sad, too. Montana has always been one of the main characters in my life story, and having a home base there was a significant comfort. I always knew that if, for some reason, things didn't work out so well here, there was always Montana... there was always "home."

I'm fortunate to have my own little family, though. M and Fiona, along with the animals, our friends, and our lives here are my real home now. And I still have a few lovely friends back in Montana to be my home base (they probably won't put us all up for weeks at a time, and cook for us, and generally host us like my mom would have... although perhaps now is the time to ask). It's just going to be weird to go back to Montana as a pure visitor, not as someone who "sort of lives here" by virtue of her mother's residence.

To be sure, M, Fiona and I will all take the long trip one day so I can have the pleasure of showing my daughter where I grew up, where I went to school, where I played and had friends. All around my favorite places in Billings - the sandstone cliffs that line the northern part of the city known as the rimrocks; the downtown area; the mall where I spent countless hours of my pre-teen years. And we'll all go to my favorite places around the state, too - Beartooth Pass, Yellowstone National Park, Cooke City, Bozeman, Missoula, and Fairmont Hot Springs. I do love that state. And who knows? Maybe someday my new little family and I will go back there to stay.

January Flashback

2008-02-20T22:07:00.009-05:00

I've been quiet for a while now. Not for lack of things to write about, or for lack of moments I'd like to record and share. Strictly for lack of time and willingness to separate myself from my amazing and adorable daughter for long enough to come up with witty anecdotes and cogent points.

The aftermath of all those holiday firsts ("Baby's First Thanksgiving!" "Baby's First Christmas!" "Baby's First New Year's Eve!!") is a little like the day after your wedding. There's a bunch of planning and a bunch of anticipation. Not to mention all the family gathering madness. When you have a new baby, you're like a celebrity at these things. In our case, we were seeing a bunch of people we hadn't seen since before Fiona was born. And boy, were they psyched to meet her.

But then it was all over. Fiona will never again have a First Christmas or First Turkey Day. It was a little bit sad. But with the end of the holiday season and 2007 came the start of 2008 and a whole bunch of new possibilities.

In mid-January, we took our first road trip with the young one when we headed up to North Conway, NH for a weekend with some good friends and all the associated kids. It was chaos - all those adults and children (and adult children). The kind of chaos I never expected to tolerate and even enjoy. Fiona handled it all pretty well, even though we went through every single one of the more than enough (or so I thought) outfits we had packed. The child has a gift or... something. M was banished to the couch on the second night due to excessive snoring and the fact that Fiona refused to sleep in the pack 'n play provided for that very purpose and instead had to sleep with me in the big bed.

The weekend after that, Fiona hit the five-month mark with relatively little fanfare. It wasn't until the end of the month when she reached a small development milestone and started babbling like a maniac. For those of you with kids, you know what I'm talking about. This stuff is pure comedy. I admit, my babytalk is rusty, but I understand her perfectly well. Usually, she is just talking a blue streak and swearing like a truck driver.

February has been a pretty big month for us, but I'll get into that more in depth later. To whet your whistle, here's a preview: air travel, meeting the other grandfather, turning 1/2 year old, and ... TEETH! Stay tuned, kids!

Month Four Stats

2007-12-28T15:55:00.000-05:00

I'm a little late with this (what else is new). But better late than never, I suppose. I have to keep track of this stuff somehow anyway. Fiona's four-month wellbaby appointment was the week before Christmas. As with the last visit, the doctor declared that she is very healthy. And while last time she was moderately impressed with Fiona's strength, this time she was legitimately surprised at what a little bodybuilder we have on our hands.

Let's get Stats-tastic!

Weight: 16 pounds, 8.7 ounces. Another three pounds gained since her two-month appointment. Based on the constant ache in my lower back (seriously, I'm considering medical intervention), I was moderately surprised it wasn't more. Anyway, she remains in the 97th percentile.

Length: 25.5 inches, a gain of two whole inches since her two-month checkup! And now she's up into the 90th percentile. She's practically taller than me already.

With all the good news about how fat and tall and healthy the young one is, just like last time, there was some pain. Three more shots and the tasty (read: disgusting) rotavirus (right?) drink. Fiona was no worse off than last time - she screamed diligently. I, on the other hand, did a little better this time. While I felt like crying momentarily, I did manage to keep it in check.

We got the go-ahead to start solids (rice cereal or something similar) and will be watching for her to turn over from back to front (she's already mastered front to back). She'll also likely start raking toys toward her (another thing she's already somewhat doing, much to the doctor's amazement), babbling even more than she already does, and laughing more.

The idea of solids is a bit daunting to me for some reason. Firstly, I'm not positive she cares much about food other than what she's getting out of the boob. And secondly, I finally just stopped being jealous about the whole bottle thing. But, that's a decision for another day.

Balding

2007-12-28T15:44:00.000-05:00

In the beginning, there was so much hair. Beautiful, luxurious hair with a fine chestnut sheen. And then it started falling out. Slowly at first, but then with a vengeance. All that lovely hair, disappearing.

Sadly, I am not talking about the hair on Fiona's head. While it is true that many babies lose the thick locks with which they are born (and Fiona has lost some of hers), I am referring, regrettably, to my own hair. It is falling out at an alarming rate. I expected this, of course. I was warned by a dear friend sometime in the middle of my pregnancy. Granted, I'd never heard of such a thing before actually getting pregnant (add it to the list of "Things no one ever tells you about pregnancy and childbirth before you take the plunge and go get knocked up" - a list that seems to get longer all the time), but a couple people had mentioned it may happen.

And happen it has. Whenever I shower (every other day, since I fear if I showered every day I would go completely bald) I think to myself, "Damn, I could knit another me with all the hair I'm leaving in the drain!" I could definitely not get away with any crimes these days since I leave no fewer than 482 hairs behind everywhere I go.

Sigh. I've always had rather thin hair. But when I was pregnant, I suddenly had gorgeous, shiny, lustrous hair. All the words you hear in shampoo ads actually applied to the mop on my head, and it was good. A friend who has not seen me since shortly before Halloween (and before I started losing my locks) suggested I change nothing about my lovely hair - no color, no cut. "It's so pretty like it is!" I'll be interested to see what her reaction is when she sees me tomorrow. Not only am I scraggly-haired, but the color also appears to be changing from its previous chestnutty brown to a dull ash. Clairol Nice 'n Easy, here I come! If I weren't awash in the glow of motherhood, I'd be disgusted with myself! (just kidding)

Baby's First Christmas

2007-12-26T22:47:00.000-05:00

Christmas crept up like a stealth killer this year. We were utterly unprepared. No Christmas cards, no family picture to send out, no Advent calendar to count down the days. Thankfully, Fiona - being only four months old - won't remember our inadequacies during her first Christmas season. We will, but we're not particularly important anyway. As long as Fiona's happy, we're happy.

It was a lovely holiday in spite of our shortcomings. We spent Christmas Eve with M's extended family as is the annual tradition. Christmas morning the three of us lounged in bed together, Fiona apparently unconcerned with the significance of the day. I had a little trouble convincing her that she should wake up at all (she loves to be in the big bed with Mommy and Daddy). But convince her I did. And then I did what at least 50% of all new mothers who celebrate Christmas probably do on their baby's First Christmas: I dressed her in a ridiculous holiday outfit. Oh, but she was so cute in it that it was worth any annoyance she may feel toward me when she's older and wondering while I dressed her like a little drunken elf.

Once the kid was dressed in her holiday finery, we loaded her, Ollie, ourselves, and a boatload of wrapped presents into the family sedan and headed over to Nana and Papa's for the full celebration. More presents awaited us. It was gift-wrapped mania! And it was exactly what I would have hoped for the day. Fiona made out like a bandit. Clothes to last her until she's 2; toys to entertain her for... well, we hope at least 30 or so minutes. And books galore! As for M and me, we made out like bandits, too. We are very fortunate indeed. But our best gift, of course, is our awesome little elf baby. (Cue "awww")

One other fun thing about this Christmas was thinking about how last year at the same time, we had just learned I was pregnant, which put a whole different sheen on the holiday. We've moved beyond the "one year ago now" stage of things and are into full-time parenting in the present. What a difference a year makes!

Back to Work - The First Month

2007-12-09T23:53:00.000-05:00

It's been a month since I returned to work. Clearly, I haven't had a lot of time to write about it. I haven't had much time for anything but work (when I'm at work) and being with my kid (when I'm not). When I was pregnant, evenings after work could be spent posting my mother-to-be musings with no distractions. Then during maternity leave, I could post whenever I found a spare moment during a rare nap or what I have come to call "Daddy Time."

Now, though, the most important thing I can do with the precious little free time I have is be with Fiona. Not to mention try to do my part to keep this household running (I am largely failing at this one. But who needs clean floors anyway?). No offense to the fine people who have been keeping up with my life by reading this blog, but Fiona's really, REALLY cute and it's hard to stay away from her.

Anyway, so I'm back to work these days. In all honesty, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The first morning I left her was admittedly awful. I managed to hold back the tears until I was out of the driveway, but then was a disaster for the next 30 minutes with only a Dunkin' Donuts coffee to ease my pain. But once I got to work and back with the people I used to spend most of my time with, I was remarkably... fine. I missed Fiona terribly to be sure. But it was actually rather nice to be back in the adult world. At work, away from baby, I can have some semblance of free will. I can eat when I am hungry or during typical meal hours instead of when I just happen to have a spare 30 seconds to wolf down a granola bar. I can go to the bathroom when the urge strikes, and I don't even have to figure out where to set down the baby - who may or may not pitch a massive fit. And I can use my brains for things other than trying to remember what time it was when I last changed the baby's diaper, or when I last fed her, or how many hours she slept last night.

Of course, there's plenty I'm missing while I'm gone. But I'm starting to come around to the idea that it's really OK. I'm in no way alone in this. Lots and lots and LOTS of mothers have to leave their babies, and I'd be willing to bet the majority of them have a hard time with it. And I am fortunate to have a job I really like that is challenging and fun with co-workers I enjoy spending time with at a company that has been good to me for the past 3+ years. And Fiona is being very well taken care of in my absence by someone who loves her dearly, which is great for her. This separation thing could be a lot worse.

As a result, however, I'm even more of a homebody than ever. I've always been the type to really enjoy my time at home, due in great part to a very long commute that allows relatively few waking hours there during the workweek. So while I used to be somewhat possessive of my time at home - not keen on long phone conversations with friends or frequent weeknight forays out on the town - I'm even more so now, because my time at home means time with Fiona and M. Which means I'm a little (a lot) out of touch with anything outside the four walls of home. But for the time being, that's the way it has to be. Fiona's changing so fast these days I can barely keep up. More than that, though, I'd really rather be hanging out with her for the most part. She smiles and laughs and talks (baby babble, yes, but she's quite expressive!) all the time, and is super entertaining. And being that our little family is still so shiny and new at this point, it makes sense to really enjoy it now as much as I can. So while I must go to work in order to make ends meet and do my part to keep a roof over our heads and all of us fed, it could be worse. Of course, it is a bummer to not get to see this face every minute of every day.

One week to go

2007-11-05T11:55:00.000-05:00

For the past eleven weeks of my life, I have dreaded this one: the twelfth. At the end of this week I will be returning to work. The dread isn't because I hate my job or anything of that sort. On the contrary, I like what I do and am looking forward to getting back to it. But I do not want to leave my infant daughter for the bulk of every day's waking hours.

Oh, who am I kidding? The kid rarely goes to bed before 11:00, and that's on a good night. I'll probably have oodles of quality time with Fiona, even if it is time spent trying fruitlessly to get her tired-but-unwilling-to-go-to-sleep tiny baby butt to bed.

But I digress. My maternity leave has been amazing, and an enormous gift. I know a lot of women who have babies don't get to take nearly the same amount of time I have been able to take. I have been immensely fortunate to spend this much time with Fiona during her first few months of life. I don't know how some women go back after only six, five, or even just a couple of weeks after giving birth.

Of course, the anticipation of leaving her has already made a basketcase out of me. I have been known to start a lullaby to her only to have it choked off with sobs when I remember that our daylight, weekday hours together are numbered. Then there are the times when I just spontaneously combust with tears as I'm feeding her, knowing that I'll be cuddling a lot more with my breast pump than with her by next week.

There are two things keeping me sane at this point. The first is the knowledge that I have only a week and-a-half before the Thanksgiving break when I'll have four solid days to spend with Fiona and M. And after that is the anticipation for the holidays, plus a visit from my mother and grandmother at the end of the month. I'm hoping it all serves as a nice distraction.

The second thing keeping me sane is the biggie. Instead of having to go to daycare or a sitter, Fiona will be in the care of her grandmother, M's mother, and my amazing mother-in-law. Whatever time I am not spending mentally willing us to win the lottery so I don't have to ever work again, I am spending thanking my incredibly lucky stars that my child will be taken care of by someone who will love her almost as much as I do. And that is what will make it even remotely possible for me to keep it together one week from today, when I take that long drive to the office next Monday morning, and the even longer drive home that night to be with my baby again.

Five Years

2007-10-30T00:57:00.000-04:00

Recently, M and I celebrated the fifth anniversary of our wedding. It was a small milestone, but one nonetheless. And it's one that scarcely seems possible. In some ways, I feel like we're still those two clowns who met at UMASS. We both had a crush on each other, and while nothing came of it until years later, we both somehow knew we'd get married someday. The relationship I have with my husband has surpassed everything I ever hoped for. We're fairly different people, and anyone who knows us can attest to the fact that we're not the picture of wedded bliss. We're constant bickerers, and act more like friends than spouses. We have fun together, not necessarily connubial harmony.

But that's good for us, and underneath our bickering, sniping, and weird little inside jokes is great love. M has long been the one person in my life that I don't think I could live without. He's my best friend and the person with whom I want to share all the details of my life. And the details - mundane or otherwise - of whose life I want to know.

While I was pregnant with Fiona, I spent a lot of time thinking about how important M is to me, and how I really didn't want that to change. It was my greatest fear, in fact. He's been my other half for so long I felt the need to jealously guard our relationship from the child we were awaiting.

I've always thought that our relationship should always be the top priority, even if we were ever to bring a kid into the mix, which, truth be told, we never expected to do. For the first five years of our couplehood we eschewed the very notion of kids. Our mantra, whenever we'd see a child throwing a tantrum or hearing a story about a kid being annoying, was, "NEVER." We also used to say, "Reason No. 483 not to have kids" on a regular basis. So when we changed our minds about having kids and I got pregnant, it was imperative to me that our relationship not change. After all, you pick the person you spend your life with; you can't choose your children.

But you can't expect to bring another person into the world without changing yourself, and thus the relationships you're in - all of them. M and I are still reeling from the little interloper in our lives. I think neither of us knew just how much we'd love her when she arrived. When you throw that much more love into the mix, things automatically start to shift.

What has changed the most is that we're now a family. There were two (plus animals). Now there are three (plus animals). I guess I'm less concerned about anything getting in the way of what M and I share, because we are and always have been very simply US. There's just one more of US. Having a baby changes everything, and it's wonderful, frightening, earth-shattering, and awe-inducing. There's no denying that our marriage and our relationship have and will continue to change. Now, instead of loving just M more every day, we both love each other and another person more every day. More love is good.

Month Two Stats

2007-10-29T22:17:00.001-04:00

Fiona had her two-month appointment last week. She was amazingly good-natured through nearly the entire visit. This was likely because I smartened up from her one-month appointment and made sure the last thing I did before we left for the doctor's office was feed her so at least she wouldn't be screaming herself silly due to hunger.

As with the previous visit to the pediatrician, Fiona checks out to be very healthy. The doctor says she's right on track with everything and looks great. She was even impressed with Fiona's strength and figures she'll be early to roll over. Not two seconds after she said this Fiona rolled over on the exam table. Little show-off. I was so proud. Granted, she was probably helped out a bit by the incline at the head of the table. But still: for one, her timing couldn't have been better, and two, she really is that strong.

On to the rundown of her stats:

Weight: 13 pounds, 8.2 ounces. That's right. She gained nearly three pounds in the last month. She bumped herself into the 97th percentile for weight. This really came as no surprise to us since M and I both are having more back pain every day. Holding Fiona is fast becoming a weight-training regimen.

Length: 23.5 inches, a gain of an inch and-a-half since her one-month appointment, and reaching the 75th percentile for weight. Our little basketball player could very well outpace both her parents in stature. After all, her height at two months of age is an adequate indicator, right?

The appointment could not end without some trauma, of course. We also had to face the horror of her first round of vaccinations. This experience was nearly as bad for me as it was for Fiona - maybe worse. For her it was momentary pain from three shots. For me, it was having my heart ripped out knowing there wasn't much I could do to prevent the pain. The nurse started with the rotavirus drink, which Fiona accepted like a champ. Then she got one shot in her left thigh and two in her right. These nurses nurses really know what they're doing. She positioned herself just so that I couldn't see the actual injections taking place. All I could see was poor little Fiona's face as that first injection registered.

Thinking about it now, a full week later, and I still want to cry. A surprising amount of emotion was clear on that tiny little face of hers: confusion ("What did I do to deserve this??"), anger ("Goddammit, you bastard, that hurts!", pain ("OWIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!") and overall upset ("Mommy!!! Make it better!") All I could do was comfort her afterwards, and that was no small feat. Thankfully, I have with me at all times Fiona's two favorite things in all the world: Left Boob and Right Boob. Once she'd had a visit with each of them, she was in much better spirits.

The remainder of the day was so peaceful as Fiona slept for most of it. I wasn't surprised. I remember my last round of vaccination shots back when I was 18 and getting ready to leave for college. I slept the entire day afterwards, too. Still, I kept an eagle eye on her all day, watching for bad reactions. But she's such a trooper. She had three tiny bruises at the injection sites, but no fever, no apparent discomfort, and no illness.

Already, I dread her four-month appointment during which she'll have her second round of shots. I'll be back to work by then, but based on how traumatic the first round of shots was I think I'll have to take the day off so I can recover emotionally.

TV Sucks Bigtime

2007-10-12T00:53:00.004-04:00

During the past 8 weeks I've been home on maternity leave, I've had the opportunity to realize just how very, very much TV sucks. There is so much crap available for viewing at any hour of the day it boggles the mind. Right before it churns said mind to an oatmeal-like consistency. I'm almost looking forward to returning to work just so I can avoid looking at the idiot box for so many hours a day.

There are major turds to be found on every channel, even ones I would have considered non-sucking. For instance, HGTV, to which I am typically glued on the weekends, has a bunch of seriously lame shows where people do sub-par crafts ("After the break, we'll show you how to make this tribal drum end table!") while smiling insanely. The Food Network shows waaaay too much Rachel Ray (of course, in my book any Rachel Ray is too much). Travel Channel has the giddies for Jeff Corwin; he's alright, but a little too cool-guy-goofy-smug for my taste. TNT and TBS are my usual go-tos, but even they let me down from time to time, showing more Home Improvement and Married With Children than I choose to watch.

Of course, that's just the basic cable channels. I don't even bother with regular network television. I'm sorry, but I will never be desperate enough to watch Dr. Phil, Tyra, or whoever else is on the air these days after having sold their souls to Lucifer. Before Fiona and I discovered the magic of sleeping late together, it was all I could do to watch The Today Show. That much perky that early and you could strain something!

Soap operas have also descended beneath me at this point. Growing up I was an avid Days of Our Lives fan, but it's just not worth it anymore. I'm annoyed that there are so many new characters. By the same token, I'm annoyed that so many characters remain - and are STILL up to their same old tricks. BOOORING.

I don't even want to get into the commercials that air during the day. I've seen way more ads for ambulance chaser lawyers, credit counseling agencies, and Vehix than I ever hoped to. Seriously, who does the media buys for these companies, monkeys? Because it seems to me like forcing people to watch the same ad more than once during every commercial break of on half-hour program isn't smart media planning. But maybe it's just me.

I have a schedule I typically follow nowadays. It's not great, but it works for Fiona and me. In the super-early hours when Fiona wakes up for a feeding, I'm likely to catch an episode of Dawson's Creek, which I was never really into when it originally aired but will suffice to keep me company when the world is dark and quiet. Later on, if we make it up in time, we'll watch two episodes of Charmed (from the Shannen Doherty days) from 8:00 to 10:00. From 10:00 to 11:00 it's Frasier, and then Will & Grace (if I'm not too annoyed by it that day) until noon. Then we hit something of a dry spell for the day. Most days I'll turn off the TV and turn on classical music. But when the need for company other than a screaming baby overwhelms, I'll turn on What Not to Wear from noon to 1:00, and follow it up with Ten Years Younger until 2:00. Last month, between 2:00 and 4:00 I'd be watching Star Trek: The Next Generation, but Spike TV turned stupid and stopped airing it by October 1. Bastards. So now I just wander through TV hell, occasionally landing on something that I don't hate until 4:00 when there are two more episodes of Charmed (from the Rose McGowan era). From 6:00 to 7:00 I'll watch whatever catches my eye. By 7:00, M is home and Scrubs comes on.

Sure, my brain is rotting and I'm turning my kid stupid by watching so much TV. But with a child that opts not to be put down as a general rule, there's not a lot else for me to do. I feel bad about this. But being entertained 24/7 is extremely important to me. Plus, Fiona's not much of a conversationalist just yet. I bet when I'm back at work in less than four weeks, I'll really miss all the crappy TV I've been watching. Well, no - I'm sure TV will be the farthest thing from my mind. What I'll be missing is the entertainment I get out of Fiona. She's the best kind of TV.

Big Love

2007-10-12T00:53:00.003-04:00

Some women who have a baby and feel an overwhelming love for their child before it's even out of the womb. Some fall so deeply in love at first sight of their newborn that they are overcome. I was not one of these women.

Sure, while I was pregnant with Fiona, I was very committed to her, and I loved her in a way. But she was such a mystery at the time. A future child about which I knew nothing save that she was growing in me. And when she was born, I cried with joy and my feelings for her deepened. But still, what I felt was more a mix of relief that she had been born safely at last and a sense of wonder that she had actually come out of me. I remember being surprised somehow when M touched her head as I held her in the hospital and said, "I love her." I knew I was happy to have her, and I would be crushed to ever lose her. But she and I still had a road to travel together before the real love fireworks would begin.

I think it took a couple of weeks before I felt the kind of love that other mothers experience instantly upon laying eyes upon their children; and even then, it was a gradual thing. I don't know the exact day or moment it happened. But at some point I started saying "I love you" and I haven't been able to stop. Sometimes I say it to her over and over again. I hug her and kiss her as if my life depended on it. This is seriously big love.

I wonder if it makes me sound like a bad mother to admit I didn't feel that all-consuming, bone-crushing love for my baby when she was first born. I can promise that I'm making up for it now. And I know now that unless you've had a child - whether biologically or otherwise - it's impossible to know this love. I had no idea what I was in for when M and I decided to have a baby. I understand now why my mother - who is NOT a kid person by any stretch (although she does have a soft spot for Fiona) - could have been so loving and giving and kind to me. I understand why my father still talks about how much he regrets not having picked up and moved his life from North Dakota to Montana when my mother moved us there after their divorce. I understand how mothers lift cars with their bare hands in order to save their babies' lives. This love makes you stronger.

At the same time, though, this love can make you utterly weak. I am completely at Fiona's mercy. There is nothing I wouldn't give her. I am putty in her tiny little hands, and she melts my heart with her cries as much as with her smiles. I can't believe I used to not want this. I know I had my reasons, and they were no doubt valid. But I've never been happier about changing my mind.

Long time, no post

2007-10-12T00:39:00.000-04:00

I've been most remiss in keeping this blog up to date. I'm not lazy, I swear. I just have a rather fussy baby in my care. Fiona does not take well to being put down as a general rule. She's getting better as she gets older, but she's really a big, BIG fan of being held. This is fine, as I am a big fan of holding her. She is really cute, after all.

This situation, however, means I'm completely tied to the kid most of the time. What little free time Fiona affords me is frivolously spent showering, eating, peeing, washing my hands, and spending far too little quality time with the dog. Poor Ollie was probably so psyched to get to be out of the crate and home with one of us all day every day until he realized that Fiona and I are pretty useless to him.

Yes, I fritter my days away cuddling, feeding, changing, and generally dealing with the wee one instead of keeping my anxious readers up to date on the fascinating goings on of parenthood. But like I said, Fiona is growing more and more agreeable all the time, so I'm recommitting myself to posting on a more regular basis. In the meantime, here's what's been going on in a nutshell:

- I'm up to my elbows in baby poo.
- When I sweat, it smells like breastmilk. Thank god the heat finally broke so I don't sweat as much.
- Cloth diapers allay a LOT of potential guilt.
- Buying baby clothes and other stuff is addictive.
- I can get by on way less sleep than I used to.
- Fiona is easily the most adorable creature I've ever met.
- I am in love.

Stay tuned. More irresistible updates will be posted soon!

Month One Stats

2007-09-20T09:27:00.001-04:00

Fiona's one-month doctor visit was yesterday. It was supposed to be the day before, but somehow I managed to put the wrong time on my calendar so when I showed up at 10:15 for it, the receptionist said the appointment was long past since it was scheduled for 9:15. Yeah, as if I'd ever make an appointment for that early in the morning.

All's well in Fiona-world as far as her health goes, though. Here's a quick rundown of her stats:

Weight: 10 pounds, 12.2 ounces. Our little piggie has gained nearly two pounds from her birth weight; nearly three if you account for the pound she lost after being born. This puts her in the 90th percentile for weight. SWEET!

Length: 22 inches. Two and a quarter inches since birth. Not exactly basketball player height, but she's average, landing in the 55th percentile. Hmm... 90th percentile for weight, 55th for height. Already she's taking after her parents' body shapes. Poor thing.

In spite of a lot of congestion - totally normal for a little bean such as herself - Fiona checks out as totally healthy. Her lungs sound clear and strong (especially if you gauge by the ear-splitting screams she was emitting during much of the appointment), her heart sounds great, and everything else is on target. She's growing like a weed, which makes me so happy. After the anxiety of that first week when she lost so much weight and was so unhappy due to hunger, I couldn't be more relieved that she's doing so well now. Plus, I feel a certain sense of pride knowing that her awesome growth is due to the milk I'm making and giving to her. Sure, it's a natural process and I don't have a lot of control over it. But there's something very satisfying about the fact that my boobs have the awesome power to feed and nourish my daughter. This along with the awesome powers I already knew they possessed. Hot damn, the sisters have skills!

Fiona's next appointment next month will likely be less fun as she'll be getting her first round of vaccinations. I'm already dreading it, hating to see her in pain of any kind. Especially legitimate pain. She squawks plenty from silly stuff like being changed when she's really hungry, or being put down when she's feeling needy. But this appointment will produce serious owies, and I am already steeling myself for the trauma my poor daughter will be experiencing. I get upset when my cats and dog get shots. I think seeing my own flesh and blood get pricked will probably drive me a little batty. Sorry, battier.

The First Month: A Review

2007-09-17T11:43:00.000-04:00

Amazingly, four weeks have already passed. Four weeks. Not four days, which is what it feels like. Everyone says it, and I knew to expect the phenomenon from watching my little sister go from adorable baby to antagonizing pre-teen in about 20 minutes flat: it is so true that time flies when you have a new baby. Fiona is already a completely different child than the one who emerged from me just over four weeks ago. And I suppose it stands to reason that my husband and I are also pretty different at this point, too.

I realize that I dedicated my last several posts have been about labor and sleepless nights instead of chronicling what our daily lives have been like since Fiona's birth. This is, of course, because time has been limited and I opted to tell the story of her birth (as well as provide a detailed rant about her occasional late night feeding issues) before telling the story of her life. So I'm a little behind I guess. Here is a brief recap of each of the last four weeks of our new life with Fiona.

Week One
The first few days were, obviously, pretty chaotic. She was born midday on Friday the 17th. The next few days are a haze of visitors, being poked and prodded by a variety of medical personnel, hanging out in bed all day, and feeling utterly exhausted and overwhelmed. And when it's not visiting hours, hospital life can get pretty lonely. Especially in the wee hours of the morning when there's nothing but crappy informercials on the mere 13 channels the hospital TV offers. Being awakened every 2 hours to breastfeed a tiny, squalling person about which you know virtually nothing other than that she came out of you (at great cost to your figure and your lady bits) didn't help much either. I was happy to see her every time she was brought to me, but the need for sleep was overwhelming.

On Sunday we brought our new family member home. Our first night was no picnic. Fiona had already lost weight in the hospital since my milk hadn't come in yet. This was no surprise and nothing to be concerned about, but I should have expected that Fiona would be hungry beyond what my body was making for her to eat. So I had my first new mother meltdown at about 2:00 in the morning when my daughter, starving to death, could not be calmed. And I, more exhausted than I had ever been in my entire life, did not know what to do and was pretty much in the same boat. Thankfully, my husband and mother both woke up and talked me off my ledge. But it wasn't pretty, and it's not a fond memory.

I don't even remember Monday at all, but I know it must have been tough because we got on the phone with the pediatrician we were so concerned about Fiona. So, Tuesday found us at the pediatrician. With Fiona not seeming to get any food into her (and thus neither peeing nor pooping like we wanted her to), we were just beside ourselves. The pediatrician assured us that Fiona, in spite of having lost 20% (a full pound) of her weight, was fine. Unfortunately, she did have a bit of jaundice, so we had to go to the hospital to have blood taken and tested to see just how bad it was and what treatment was warranted. So, a day after leaving the hospital, we were back. While there, we also visited the lactation consultant who managed to restore some of the sanity I had lost two nights before when she helped me feed my poor starving kid.

Wednesday was the first time I left Fiona. The carpal tunnel that had been getting progressively worse in the final weeks of my pregnancy had worsened to the point that it was getting difficult to care for her. Everything I did with my right arm sent me through the roof with pain. I had no doubt that the amount of fluid still stuck in me had everything to do with it, but I couldn't wait anymore and went to my hand and wrist doctor for a cortisone shot. Fiona stayed with my mom while my mother-in-law drove me (since I wasn't supposed to drive for two weeks and M had returned to work as of Wednesday). Even though I fed the little piggy right before I left, Fiona demanded to be fed during the two hours I was gone, so my mom gave her the bottle I had left behind (thank you, pump!). It was not as hard to leave her as I thought it would be, which made me feel a little guilty. But I think it wasn't so difficult because 1) I left her with my mom, who had been around since Fiona had been born and knew how to calm her, and 2) it was absolutely necessary for me to get the problem of my wrist handled sooner rather than later.

Other parts of that first week are a bit hazy at this point. I know there was a lot of exhaustion and probably some more tears as Fiona and I adjusted to each other. But looking back, it's quite a blur. We did manage to leave the house a few times before the first week was over, taking our first shopping trips on Thursday the 23rd (to Target) and Friday the 24th (to Babies R Us). The BRU trip also marked our first semi-public feeding. I say "semi-public" because BRU has this awesome room called the Mothers Room that is outfitted with a few chairs and couches so mothers can breastfeed and change their children. Totally separate from the bathroom. While I'm not a huge fan of box stores such as BRU, I have to say this particular offering is pretty darn cool and I really appreciate that they have it.

Week Two
Not much more to say about this week. More exhaustion, more getting to know each other. Early in the week, Fiona lost her umbilical stump that Saturday, and got her first kisses from Ollie - who had previously been terrified of her - on Sunday. Really, it was like a switch flipped with the dog. He wanted nothing to do with her for the first week, and would run away from someone holding her. But then on Sunday, he suddenly wanted to lick her endlessly. Either he decided he loved her, or he realized she could be a tasty treat. We're still trying to determine exactly which one it is. I'm opting for love.

As for myself, the early part of the second week finally revealed the ankles that had disappeared over a month before. At last! No more cankles! Seriously, this was an extremely joyous day for me. Also, I was able to wear shoes other than flip-flops again, which I had been confined to for at least six weeks prior to giving birth. I was one swollen puppy, but finally I was returning to normal. By the 26th, only 9 days after having Fiona, I'd dropped 30 pounds of the 38 I gained overall. Pushing out a kid and feeding it from the boob? Best. Weightloss. Plan. EVER!

Week Three
My mother went home exactly 3 weeks after she had arrived. For the week leading up to her departure, I was in an utter panic, fearing I would fail utterly as a mother. Not to mention I would never again be able to find the time to pee, wash my hair, dust my living room, change my clothes, or anything else that would require putting the baby down. But I wasn't so worried about the emotional impact of her leaving until I drove her to the airport. As I watched her say goodbye to Fiona and realized she wouldn't see her again for an untold number of months, I was overcome.

Having my own daughter made the importance of my own mother much more poignant. I realized I didn't need my mother as a pair of helping hands. I wanted her around to see her granddaughter grow and change, as well as to see me grow into motherhood. So far, Fiona and I have managed to get along without her NaiNai (her grandmotherly designation), and I do find the time to pee and complete other tasks. At least to some degree. But I do miss having my mom around to help take care of me. Nobody ever takes care of you the way your mother does.

Week Four
Week four, for as recently as it happened, is the most blurry to me. I think that's because things are evening out. Fiona is starting to sleep for longer stretches, and developing more of a personality. And having her is less of a novelty and more of a reality. I'm adjusting to motherhood, M is adjusting to fatherhood, and we're all adjusting to being a family. Every day, I am more and more amazed at how beautiful this little creature is. Honestly, I think she is likely the most adorable baby ever created. I may be biased. But she's certainly the cutest member of this particular family, I assure you.

Fiona, meet the bottle. Bottle, meet Fiona

2007-09-17T11:11:00.001-04:00

We officially introduced Fiona to a bottle this weekend. She had eaten from a bottle once before when I had to leave her for more than two hours when she was only five days old and I had a doctor appointment. But it was a last resort kind of thing - we'd hoped she'd hold out and not need to eat while I was gone since it was very early in the breastfeeding process.

But once she hit four weeks last Friday, and breastfeeding has been well established (along with my milk supply), it seemed like the right time to let M participate in feeding our daughter. Not to mention give my poor nipples a break from time to time. I had pumped a good 3.5 ounces earlier in the day, so as we settled in for the evening and hoped for a peaceful night, M prepared a bottle and sat down to feed Fiona for the first time. Little piggie took right to it, caring nothing for the different nipple.

I expected to feel a kind of relief as I got a much needed break from the frequent feedings Fiona demands. I was surprised when I felt overwhelming jealousy. Not so much of my husband, since I'm eager for him to experience every part of caring for our kid. It was the bottle I resented. The bottle that was holding milk I had made. And the lowlife, incompetent nipple delivering that milk to my daughter just pissed me off. I kept wanting to snatch Fiona from her father and that horrible bottle and put her to my breast where she belonged. As it turned out, I got my chance anyway when the 3.5 ounces wasn't enough for her. Hooray!

This was clearly a reaction brought on by some hormonal imbalance due to childbirth. Either that or I'm just a major freak. I'm leaning toward the latter. I've been complaining about sore nipples and excessive responsibility for several days now. You'd think I'd be over the moon to share the task of feeding her. But when it comes down to it, feeding her is really the only thing that, up to this point, has belonged to just her and me. And for the most part it still does. After all, I'm the one home with her all day, every day. And we don't give her formula, so I'm still the one making all her food. No doubt, this too shall pass. In the meantime, however, I'll be shooting evil looks at the bottle and fake nipple. Clearly, they're trying to come between me and my daughter.

4:40 am - Marathon night sessions

2007-09-11T04:43:00.001-04:00

This is the time of night I cherish. Oh, wait, no, that's not right. This is the time of night I want to scream bloody hell, throw in the towel, and jump off a bridge. This isn't every night, but it's probably half of them. The nights when Fiona decides that only her first 30 or 40 minutes of her late night feeding session will be peaceful, and then the rest of it is going to suck righteously. And so is she. So as I hold my breath for her to stay asleep now that I've put her down after two hours of feeding, burping, attempting unsuccessfully to burp, cajoling, calming, attempting unsuccessfully to calm, and growing exceedingly frustrated with this whole breastfeeding my daughter baloney, I'm going to use this time to decompress and further scare the ever living pants off of all my readers who occasionally wonder whether having a baby is for them.

Typically these marathon sessions go like this: after a surprising 3- or 4-hour stretch of sleep (very unusual for our 2-hour-maximum sleeper), I'll go into the nursery to find Little Miss Hungry clicking for a nipple (I say "clicking" because she makes a cute vocal smacking noise when she's trying to wake herself up to eat). At this point, I am always more than happy to oblige. Some night feeding sessions are really lovely and rewarding, when she's peaceful and sleepy and looks right at me as she eats. So we settle into the glider rocker for some late night chow. Now, Fiona has been known to be a spitter - occasionally of the projectile variety - so pulling her off every five or so minutes to be burped usually figures into the equation. Sometimes this irritates her. When it does, it is a sign of pending doom as far as the amount of sleep I'm going to get for the rest of the night.

After the first 10 minutes and two good burps, if she's still hungry, we go back to it. But by now, burping will be nearly impossible. This is why when we get beyond the first 10 minutes in a nighttime feeding session, I know I'm screwed. Because if she can't burp, that means she's got gas. And like any obsessive eater, a full and gassy tummy will not stand in the way of her eating herself silly. In fact, this feeling will probably make her want to shove that much more food into her tiny little gullet. But now her eating will take on an urgency that veers toward panic. Pulling her off for a good burp results in about 15 minutes of fruitless back smacking paired with intermittent high-pitched screeching wails of protest. Right into my ear canal, usually.

After the 15 minutes of attempted burping, if she's still wailing, I'll give in and put her back to the breast, hoping she didn't already suck it dry. But because her tummy hurts, Fiona won't just nurse peacefully. Heavens no. She tosses her head about like a drunkard and flails her arms like she's in a Tool video (watch right around the 4:00 mark and you'll see what I mean). I can stick the nipple directly in her mouth, but she'll still holler like I've been denying her food for weeks, apparently not noticing that what she wants is in her mouth.

This will continue for an untold period of time. There will be countless more ineffective attempts to burp her, but there is a 98% chance I will get barfed on multiple times. Even as I write this, I am watching a particularly large patch of spit up breast milk on my pajamas dry. More screaming will ensue, as will more desperate attempts to shove the nipple in her mouth so she is quiet for at least one precious moment or two (knowing full well it will lead to me getting spit up on). There will be begging and pleading for mercy on my part. I will stick the pacifier in her mouth multiple times as well in an effort to calm her down and get her to stop using my poor beleaguered nipples as binkies with benefits. And until that random, surprising moment when she simply drops off to sleep for no apparent reason, this pattern will continue.

So far the longest marathon session lasted 3 hours. Tonight's was only 2, so perhaps I should count my blessings. The problem is that afterwards, because I'm awake for so long and don't have the luxury of being a newborn who can fall asleep anytime, anywhere at all hours of the day (that phenomenon occurs only when I really don't want it to), I'm left wide awake and not a little resentful of Fiona, my darling husband, and the dog, all of whom are getting to sleep through the night just as much as they want. In Fiona's case, of course, what she misses out on in sleep during the night hours will be made up during the following day - if I'm lucky. And if I'm extra lucky, she'll allow me to take a nap of more than 20 minutes at some point.

From the silence coming through the baby monitor, it seems as though sleepytime for Fiona has taken hold, and I can safely crawl back into bed. Having spent this time chilling out, I may even be able to fall asleep in short order - only to have to get up again in a couple hours. Let's hope the light of day brings a little more peace. And for those of you who think this kind of business is reason enough to swear of having children forever, I'd rethink it. Once I've gotten a little more sleep and the ringing in my ears from Fiona screaming directly into them has faded, I'll have a whole new perspective and I'll want nothing more than to kiss and hug her all day long because I love her so much. It's just these damn wee hours that get to me.

The Labor Story - Part Three

2007-09-07T08:14:00.002-04:00

Now that it's been three weeks since I went through all this, I suppose it's time to finish up the story. When I left off, I had taken Nubain and was getting to relax a little bit. That lasted for about an hour and-a-half, when the Nubain wore off. That was really unfortunate, I must say. More contractions, back to full force. It was getting worse before it would get better.

Things are a little fuzzy now that I look back. But then, they were a little fuzzy the morning after it happened. So I'm sure the next several events I'm going to relay are out of order, not quite right, or otherwise compromised. Whatever, you'll get the picture. But the way I remember it is like this: After the Nubain wore off, I was back in a lot of pain (naturally), but I had continued to progress. As to how much progression there had been, I can't remember. But there was talk of "bulging waters" whenever I'd have a contraction. Since my water hadn't broken yet, I thought this might be a sign that I'd break my own water rather than having it done manually by the doctor with the scary water-breaking hook thingy. Sure enough, in the midst of a particularly hard contraction sometime later, I felt an enormous gush of water. Like peeing my pants, only 1) out of an unusual area, and 2) accompanied with a LOT of pain.

Once my water had broken, the pain shifted. Up to that point, the pain had been caused by a bag of water against bone. With the bag gone, the pain was now caused by the Weeble's bony skull against my pelvic bones. I don't think it was too terribly long after that I gave in completely and asked for the epidural. This was a big step for me.

Let me back up a bit. I don't like things to do with the spine. It's just a thing with me. When it comes to the very sensitive business taking place on my back, I want everyone's hands off. Granted, epidurals are done so commonly, I had no real need to be worried about damage. And of course, I still didn't want to slow things down. But at that point, labor could have gone on for six more days and I wouldn't have cared so long as I didn't feel like my insides were being ripped out with meat hooks. So the epidural doctor or whoever came in and sent M away (apparently husbands don't get to watch this kind of thing being done - guess I'm not the only one with spinal issues). It wasn't painful at all having the catheter inserted. The only difficult part was being curled into myself while having contractions. Thankfully, the doctor was highly practiced and it took fewer than five minutes (I think) and only two contractions. When the drugs started into my system, it was cold, tingly, and uncomfortable. And then it was pure joy as my lower half disappeared. Well, not completely. I could still feel the pressure of contractions, but it was no longer painful. When M returned to the room, he found me relaxed and happy. We took advantage by both taking an hour-long nap.

After the nap, things really get fuzzy. Someone must have checked me at some point and decided it was getting time for me to push or something. Next thing I know, the nurse has got one of my legs and M has the other, and I'm being told to grab the backs of my thighs and start pushing. Now, for those of you who haven't gotten to participate in the delights of pushing out a baby, allow me to elaborate on the pushing process. In short, pushing out a baby should (and does) feel much like pushing out a monster turd. Yes, that is correct. If it feels like you're going to poop your pants, you're doing it right.

I'd read all about this and heard it from friends who had labored with their babies. So it wasn't a complete surprise. What was a surprise was that this first stage of pushing took place with only the nurse and M in the room - not the 54 odd people I'd been led to believe were in the delivery room at any given moment. I had been semi-OK with the idea that I might drop a load on the table to a large audience while pushing the kid out. I was decidedly less OK with my audience being just my husband. That's the height of vulnerability, not to mention seriously "ew".

Overall, I think I pushed for about 90 minutes or so. The nurse, god bless her, was kind and generous and didn't make me push with every contraction, allowing me to take a break. The epidural had worn off completely by this point, so every push just enhanced that earlier feeling of my insides being ripped out by meat hooks. When the doctor came in, however, it was all work and no rest. No breaks with that guy (my doctor had long since ended her shift). It was "Push, push, push! Keep going! Harder! HARDER!" GAH!

The rest of it is quite a blur. I remember one particularly nasty contraction that went on for something like five minutes (and that left me in tears). I remember telling M I wanted to stop and go home. And I remember a lot of pain and pressure. I'd describe it, but there are people with sensitive stomaches that read this blog and I like to retain as many readers as possible. Besides, nobody can really know what it felt like except for me. I assure you, this portion of labor is what warranted the comment, "Labor sucks".

Halfway through the pushing, I had to have an episiotomy; or, as the doctor referred to it, "a small nick". I didn't feel it, what with all the other stuff going on down there. But I did see it since the nurses had set up a mirror for my viewing enjoyment. I can't say I'd recommend the mirror to everyone, but I did appreciate it - particularly when the Weeble made her appearance. Before that moment, though, it was quite the experience just to watch my lady business be utterly and completely altered by the efforts of pushing out the kid. Again, I won't provide details. Besides, I'd just as soon forget what I saw anyway.

The last few moments of pushing were the most excruciating. I'd been having contractions on top of one another, no breaks to speak of. The baby's head was finally out, and on the next push, her shoulders were, too. And then the doctor made me stop pushing. He needed to position her properly, I guess. So no pushing. WORST PAIN EVER. I can't really explain the pushing urge, but it's something your body feels compelled to do. And by "compelled" I mean you'd rather poke a large stick in your eye than NOT push when the urge arises. So when the doctor said to stop pushing, that was bad enough. Add the fact that I had to stop while her shoulders were halfway out... oh, god, I get faint just thinking about it. Then I just had to wait for the next contraction. Only, suddenly, it wouldn't come. And wouldn't come. And wouldn't come. I don't know how long we waited for it, but at one point I yelled, "Where is the goddamn contraction!?!?"

In the end, the contraction finally came, and so did Fiona. She had an amazingly round head for a baby that came through the birth canal. It was so round that for the rest of our hospital stay people kept assuming she'd arrived by c-section. I got to take one good look at her before they whisked her off to the opposite side of the room to weigh her and evaluate her. Meanwhile, the doctor set about fixing up my nether regions while Fiona aced her Apgars (9 and 10). I didn't get to hold her again for about 40 minutes, which was no fun. But I guess holding her while being stitched up down there wouldn't have been so great either, since I was yelling "Ow ow ow ow!" at the doctor.

But then they put her in my arms and I was overcome. Sure, it was the flood of emotion and love that you feel when you hold your new child. But mostly I was overwhelmed by the final reward for all the work of labor. Here she was at last. I had worked so hard for her, and it hurt so badly. But she was there. And she was perfect.

The Labor Story - Part Two

2007-08-29T08:14:00.000-04:00

M, Mom and I arrived at the hospital around 2:30am on Friday, August 17th. The place was blissfully quiet and downright serene. It seemed like we were the only people there as we made our way to the labor and delivery ward. I resisted the offer of a wheelchair at first, but thankfully changed my mind. The contractions weren't super painful yet, but they definitely made walking difficult. And it seemed like the corridor was endless, as was the elevator ride, before we finally got to our destination. By this point I was pretty tired, having been up for 21 hours already.

A nurse put M and me into a room, gave me a hospital johnny (so sexy!) and hooked me up to a couple monitors to track the baby's heartbeat and my contractions. Thus began a very boring hour, where we waited in a tiny room, me on the bed, M on a chair, staring at a monitor because the only thing on TV was Hanging with Mr. Cooper or some equally boring show. Admittedly it was fun to have M tell me, "You're having a contraction... and now it's peaking... and now it's going down," based on what he could see from the monitor. Otherwise, it was just boring. Except for the part when the nurse came in to give me my first pelvic exam. Hoo. Ray. Having a contraction while being poked and prodded from the inside is totally NOT awesome. When she first did it, I was no more progressed than I had been at my last doctor appointment the previous Tuesday (1 cm. and 80% effaced, for those of you who know what I'm talking about). So I thought for sure at that point it was fake labor. But when the nurse returned and did a second exam, finding that I was 3 cm. (while contracting) and 100% effaced, it seemed like the time had come.

Sure enough, I was admitted and we got our very own room for the duration. There was a moment when we were moving over to the room where I would labor, deliver, and then recover until we went home when I panicked. I realized, all of a sudden, that this was it. By the end of this particular road, I would be a mother. Have a completely foreign life. And have a baby for which her father and I would be 100% responsible. Somewhere in the recesses of my brain, I heard, "No, no, no! I'm not ready for this yet!" But the inevitability of my body's processes quieted the panic enough so that I didn't freak out and make a me-shaped hole in the hospital wall.

Once we got settled, it was just more waiting around for not much to happen. By then, it was nearly 4:00. The admitting nurse started going through a bunch of paperwork, which was not so much fun considering the fact that every few minutes I felt like my insides were turning inside out. She kept asking me questions I couldn't answer fully, giving me information I couldn't process properly, handing me documents to sign that I could barely focus on, and overall badgering the hell out of me while I was in a lot of pain. Looking back on it, she was just doing what she needed to do paperwork-wise. But it seemed downright cruel at the time. Thankfully, she had the patience of a saint, and kept badgering to a minimum during the peaks of my contractions.

Around 6:00, my doctor showed up to check on me. Hers was a welcome familiar face, although she wasn't there too long and when she checked me (yippee, more internal prodding!) I wasn't any farther along than the last check: 3 cm, and down to 80% effaced. Sigh. If I remember correctly, she came back one more time just before getting off shift at 7:00 and checked me again, but by then I was so tired that the memory is foggy of those morning hours. I got a new nurse, Marah, at 7:00 and she was with me through delivery. I loved Marah. She was so motherly and kind. She didn't badger me, and when I had a hard contraction, she would say things like, "You're doing so well, I am really impressed." The kind of stuff she probably says to all patients, but that made me feel like I could go on.

I think it was around 7:30 or so I'd had it with the contractions and asked for Nubain (a relatively mild pain medication administered via IV and a shot to the arse) to take the edge off. I had wanted very much to remain drug-free through labor and I was extremely leery of doing anything that would slow down the process. I held off on Nubain until this point because I'd rather deal with the pain then having this labor business go on any longer than absolutely necessary. By this point, though, I'd just about had it. I was so tired that I just needed a break. Labor takes a lot out of you, especially when you've been up for over 24 hours. (And before any of my competitive mommy readers wants to point out that my labor was probably the easiest thing since slicing bread compared to their labors, I don't wanna hear it - everybody's labor sucks in its own way. Am I right? Yes, of course I'm right. It's my blog.)

Anyway, once the Nubain kicked in a bit, I could actually relax a little. I was still in pain, of course, but I managed to sleep a little between contractions. So I had about 90 minutes of 2 minute catnaps alternating with three-minute contractions. Not ideal, but it made me able to deal with things a little better.

Next installment: Water, water, everywhere; more drugs, and the big push. Come for the science, stay for the gory details!

The Labor Story - Part One

2007-08-25T18:23:00.000-04:00

For the very few of you who are interested in the long story of Fiona's birth, this post is for you. Mostly, I want to write it down for my own purposes so I don't forget any more than I already have. To me, it is interesting and fascinating. To others, eh, not so much. So don't feel bad if you want to skip this one.

But here it is, from the beginning. Thursday 8/16 at work, I started feeling weird. Not really bad, but just not good. My usual Braxton Hicks contractions were a bit more painful than usual. By 2:00 that afternoon, I started thinking that maybe I should be done with coming into the office and working from home going forward. By the end of the day, I was saying as much to co-workers. Nothing definite, of course, but I prepared for the possibility that I would not return to the office the next day.

I carpooled to work that day, and during the ride home, my contractions seemed to be getting stronger and more regular. But since I usually had most of my contractions when I was in the car, whether driving or riding, I didn't worry too much about it. Still, I said nothing about it to my friend who was driving. This ensured he did not freak out and drive off the road or drop me on a corner somewhere after dialing 911 (me going into labor in his car - or even in his presence - made him quite nervous, naturally). My last leg home, which I drove, was even more intense to the point that I called my best friend to distract me.

I got home where I was greeted by my mother who had been graciously picked up from the airport by my in-laws. We had planned the dates of her visit with some trepidation, not knowing for sure when Weeble would actually arrive. It could have been a week before my mother, it could have been two weeks after. As it turned out, of course, she arrived in the nick of time. By 8:00 that night, I was starting to suspect it was real labor and started packing my hospital bag (well, "started" isn't quite right... I had put slippers into a bag prior to that evening). By 11:00, the patterns broke down and I thought I was off the hook for one more night. Not so. 11:30 came and everything started up again. M went to bed around 12:00 or so, while my mother and I stayed up. Frankly, I was too uncomfortable (and starting to freak out) too much to sleep. But at 1:30, it seemed like it would be a good idea to at least try so I went to bed with my doctor's phone number, two telephones, and one of the waterproof crib sheets we had for Weeble underneath me (in case of water breaking). Three contractions (inside of 10 minutes) later and I decided a call to the doctor was in order. Clearly, sleep would be out of the picture tonight. Sure enough, she said to come in to the hospital to be checked. What a stroke of luck that she was on call.

M had woken up at this point, so we began making preparations to go. Being uncertain about how the night (morning) would proceed, my mom opted to come with us to the hospital to wait it out. So we all piled into the car a bit after 2:00 and headed out in the quiet and dark of the very early morning.

Next installment: The never-ending night, real labor, and just how bad it actually hurts. Stay tuned!

Introducing...

2007-08-25T17:48:00.002-04:00

Our little girl, Fiona Morgan Elizabeth.

Fiona arrived in the world on 8/17 at 12:39 in the afternoon. She weighed 8 pounds, 13 ounces and was 19 3/4 inches long. She was born after only 11 or so hours of active labor, and 1 1/2 hours of pushing. You'd never know she didn't come out by other means given her perfectly round little noggin. She had a lovely head of strawberry blonde hair and a serious set of lungs. I may be biased, but she was also incredibly cute straight out of the gate. She looks unnervingly like her daddy in nearly every way except for her mouth, which she appears to have gotten from me.

We've been calling her Weeble for so long, I thought maybe it would be a challenge for me to switch to her real name. But it is so natural to call her Fiona. The moment we saw her, we knew that of the two names we had in the tank, Fiona was the right one for her.

Each name we gave her has some significance. Well, sort of. Fiona is a name we simply landed on and both loved. It was the first name we test drove, and the name we both always wanted to go back to when other names seemed not to be right. It is a Gaelic name that means "fair and white".

Morgan is a name I've loved for over a decade. It is a variation on the name of the main character in my favorite book (The Mists of Avalon) and means "from the sea". Since I grew up in a land-locked state, I've always been fascinated by the ocean, and its relative nearness is the best thing for me about living near the coast now. Morgan was considered as a first name for her, but M (whose initials are MMM) wanted no more alliteration madness.

Elizabeth is the name of the dear friend who is the reason M and I are together. She had been friends with M before I came, to UMass Amherst for a yearlong exchange and was my accidental roommate. She introduced us, naturally, and served as a liaison for the many years he and I spent trying to figure it all out. Now, she is now more like a sister. So Fiona bears her name.

It's a long name for such a tiny little girl, I suppose. But it seems to suit her so well. Pretty name for pretty girl. And she is pretty.

The first week has been a mixture of pure joy, complete frustration, a mental breakdown or two (or four), utter exhaustion, lingering soreness, and more emotion than I generally know what to do with. But every day gets better and tends more toward the pure joy side than the complete frustration side.

As I manage to find the time, I'll be recording as much as I can about this awesome experience. Of course, there's no describing it. There's no way to really relay just how utterly awesome it is to look in Fiona's face and know that we made her, and she is ours. I'm pretty sure nobody can really anticipate how it feels - and to be honest, it's not all good. Some of it is so, so hard, for whatever reason. But it's all worth it. That's the weird part that can't be explained. The exhaustion, the pain, the mental and emotional roller coaster. It is ALL worth it.

I was right: Labor DOES suck

2007-08-24T17:45:00.001-04:00

A week later and I finally have the time to confirm what at least 95% of my readers already know or guessed: it was the real deal indeed. Last Thursday, August 16th, I went into labor. By 12:40 the next day, I had a whole new life, and Weeble had a new name. Since it's a lovely story, it deserves its own post, which I'll put up shortly.

Until then, I can confirm that labor totally sucks. So does the delivery part. It was exhausting, excruciating, and the hardest thing I've ever done. And no, the "mommy amnesia" thing that allows women to consider the remote possibility of doing it another time has not yet kicked in. But it was amazing all the same, and so is the result of all that hard work.

Now begins the fun part. Parenting.

Oh. My. God. What have we done?

Labor might just suck a little

2007-08-17T01:12:00.002-04:00

I'm still pregnant, which may seem surprising given my recent silence. But that's just a delightful side-effect of crazy work and home schedules. But as of tonight, I'm out of the office for the duration, even if I'm continuing to work from home over the next few days before Weeble deigns to make her grand entrance.

I'm not sure there will be any more working from home, though. It could be false labor, sure, but what's going on here tonight is NOT all that much fun. In fact, it kinda sucks. Every 4-6 minutes, lasting 30-60 seconds each, I've been having contractions. Actually, this has been going on since this afternoon, but it's decidedly more painful now than it was at, say, 3:00 today.

If I didn't know any better, I'd say this is the real deal right now. And I don't know better, so maybe it is. ACK, given the contraction I'm having right now, I could be persuaded to say my insides are about to fall directly out of me. ALL my insides, not just Weeble.

Well, I'm going to try and get some sleep anyway. Does this labor business get worse than this? Shit, I think it's going to. Dang, I'm starting to forget why I wanted to do this.

More to come, happy betters. I'll keep you all posted.

Getting the Gambling Bug Again

2007-08-05T16:34:00.000-04:00

We're down to the 2-week mark from my estimated due date, people. Get your bettin' shoes on. It's time to make some super-scientific predictions about Weeble's pending birth!

We have a couple of gambling options here. Date and weight. For those of you feeling extra frisky, go ahead and pick a time of day. Now, before you take off for your bookie's office (or back-alley refrigerator box), let's recap what we know so you're not just placing bets in the dark:

According to my doctor's estimate, I am due August 19th.
My first ultrasound, however, indicated a due date of August 16th.
The average online pregnancy calculator estimates my due date to be August 21st based on my last period.
I have had contractions every day for the past week or two, and some of them have even been rather uncomfortable. But they usually seem to happen most when I'm sitting in a car.
As of the last ultrasound we had (at week 32 - so 6 weeks ago), Weeble weighed in at about 6 pounds and "some odd ounces" (whatever that means). The doctor also told me during that appointment that I was measuring at 35 weeks, but that they wouldn't be changing my due date (smug bastard).
It is important to note that ultrasound weights are notoriously off by as much as a pound or more. Which means Weeble could have been way more than the 6+ pounds at 32 weeks (please, god, no) or way smaller (please, god, yes, for I am a small woman).
During the eighth month (approximately weeks 32-35), Weeble probably gained about 1/2 ounce per day

So that should give you all some food for thought to help you make the most accurate estimates possible as to Weeble's birth date and weight. Feel free to set up office pools, extensive betting charts, and whatever else will aid in your gambling extravaganza. Post your best guesses in the comments and whomever's closest will get... well, probably nothing. Let's just be honest here. Once she's born, I'll probably have bigger fish to fry. But hey, one never knows.

Happy betting, all!

PS: I finally added pictures from the baby shower for your viewing pleasure.

Feeling Loved

2007-08-04T11:52:00.000-04:00

Pregnancy as the power to bring out the stupid in the people around you. And by "stupid" I mean that some people just don't think before they speak. They say things like, "Wow, you are HUGE!" as if I don't know I'm very big. Of course I know it - I have to LIVE with this body. And my current favorites (typically heard from co-workers): "Haven't you popped that kid yet??" or "Why are you still here?" Um, where else am I supposed to be? Why wouldn't I be here? And NO, clearly, I haven't "popped the kid" yet, but thanks for reminding me that I'm still stuck hearing comments like these all the time. Sheesh!

But pregnancy also has the power to bring out the best, the kindest, and the most generous in people. Most people love a pregnant woman, and they can't help but smile. And the people who are already in my life - my friends, family, loved ones in general - are the best example of how wonderful this experience is at times. I have been told some of the most wonderful, loving things in the past nine months; been given some of the greatest gifts (tangible and otherwise); and cared for by many as lovingly as my own mother cares for me.

Today I've been making out a list of people we want to contact after the Weeble arrives and putting together their numbers so M can take care of this mighty project while I'm in the hospital. The mail arrived, and with it an unexpected and most precious gift. It got me thinking back on some of the lovely things people have said to and done for me during this process.

Every day, M proves that he is an amazing husband and father-to-be, taking incredible care of me and an endless list of work around the house as I get bigger, more uncomfortable, and more swollen with every day. One day, several months ago, I had sent him out to pick up some groceries and some O'Doul's, the pregnant beer-drinker's staple (hey, it's better than a kick in the head). He returned with warm O'Doul's off the shelf and apologized that he wasn't able to get cold that I could drink immediately. The reason? Only canned O'Doul's was in the coolers, and, as he said, "It’s enough of an insult that you have to drink this stuff, so I wasn’t going to add to it by making you drink it from cans." It's hard to describe why this is so sweet, but the people who know M will understand.

Around Mother's Day this year, a handful of people recognized the day with me, even though I wasn't yet officially a mother. One friend sent an email expressing high admiration for all the mothers she knows, saying she doesn't know how we do it, but she loves that we do. All I could think was how much it meant to me that she thought to put me in that category.

Another good friend sent an email - in response to what I don't remember. But in it she said, "“Not sure if I ever told you before, but… let me say this: you are one of the most attractive people I have ever met and now you are OFFICIALLY one hot mama. Don't forget that." Considering that there have been so very many points during this pregnancy when I have felt decidedly unattractive or hot, this is one thing I've taken with me and held onto during the rough spots.

And then there was my baby shower, put together by two of my dearest friends who went above and beyond to make it a special, relaxing, and fun event. I thanked them both, but I don't know that I could ever show them just how important they are to me and how grateful I am for all they have done for me throughout my pregnancy... not to mention the durations of our friendships.

Just this week, I had breakfast with two dear friends who are among the kindest, most supportive people I know. Later in the day, one of them sent me a note to tell me she thinks I look fantastic, and that I am an inspiration to her. And that she wasn't saying it just because it's probably what I need and want to hear right now. What made it even better was the fact that, of course, it is what I want to hear right now.

And today. The unexpected gift that arrived in the mail from a kindred spirit. I think I'd rather not try to describe it other than to say it is easily one of the most personal, touching gifts anyone could have given me and my child. It's the kind of gift that you won't get from someone who doesn't really, truly love you.

There have been so many other gestures, some big, some small. But all have made my life happier and better. I just don't know how I got so lucky to have so many good people in my life. And as I get closer to "popping the kid out," I realize that she is just as lucky. Because all these people who love and care for me will doubtless do the same for her. Now that is one fortunate little girl.

Anytime is good for me

2007-07-29T21:43:00.000-04:00

After five months of eager anticipation, last night finally came. It was the culmination of nearly 20 years of hoping, praying, wishing that it would happen... someday, somehow. Last night, I finally got to see The Police, live in concert. And oh, god, was it ever good. I've been a fan of The Police since I was 15 and rediscovered the song "Wrapped Around Your Finger." Later, during the autumn of my sophomore year of high school, my best friend and I would drive around during lunch listening to Every Breath you Take: The Singles over and over. To this day, the song "Roxanne" can conjure a rainy fall day like no other. But I was a little late to The Police party, since they'd broken up when I was still a pre-teen. And no good concerts ever came to Billings, Montana, anyway. Well, except for the extremely awesome REO Speedwagon, whom I saw in 6th grade.

Needless to say, when word came out late in 2006 that a reunion tour was in the works, M - also a longtime fan who missed out on the chance to see them in concert - and I were more than a little interested. Tickets went on sale for fan club members on February 20th (and yes, we purchased a membership specifically for this purpose). We scored 4 tickets with relative ease. Now came five months of waiting. Oh, yeah... and getting more and more pregnant with each passing month. When we bought those tickets, I was barely out of my first trimester. It seemed like no big deal - of course I'd make it to the concert! Why wouldn't I?

As time went by, I could begin to see how being extremely pregnant might be a bit of a hindrance in getting to the concert, but I was not to be deterred. A number of people expressed their doubts about my ability to make it there, but I stood firm. Of course, I would make it. I've waited too long for this! But I couldn't help but wonder at the words of my previously-pregnant friends who obviously had more experience in this department than I. Would I make it? M and I opted in when a November show was announced and tickets went on sale. Just in case. But I was still determined that unless I was in labor or had a 3-day old baby, I would be there.

Now, being nine months pregnant, something like a major rock concert - at Fenway Park, no less - was not to be undertaken lightly. Understanding that I could get very hot, very swollen, and very tired in short order dictated how M and I prepared for the concert. First, I did virtually nothing all day but sit on my fat arse with my feet up (to minimize swelling) and take naps as they came (to minimize exhaustion). And I wore the most comfortable, loose-fitting clothes I had. No small feat these days, given how big I am now. And M, bless his heart, went out early in the day to find me some sort of cushion to sit on.

I could go into all the details and funny little side-stories that made the evening just that much more flavorful: our bemused cabbie who dropped us off at and picked us up from the concert, the sourpuss in our row who was so disinclined to move her lazy fat ass out of the way to let people in and out of our row (to the point that I actually climbed over the row in front of ours in order to get into my own seat at one point), and our precipitous seat change. But they don't really get into the main point of it. We finally got to see The Police. Live. In concert. And it RULED!

Overall, I have to say it wasn't nearly as difficult or uncomfortable as other people tried to prepare me for. Sure, I was hot and had to keep drinking water to keep hydrated. And I missed parts of a few songs due to multiple bathroom trips. And climbing stairs wasn't really much of a picnic. But after all, I am just pregnant, not disabled. I'd guess my enjoyment level at the concert was actually in no way compromised by my advanced state of pregnancy. It may have been enhanced, actually: all those trips to the bathrooms brought numerous kind comments from fellow concert-goers like, "Three weeks to go? God bless you for being here, honey!" and "Good for you!" and "You look fantastic!" Not only was I having a great fricking time, but I had the support of a lot more people than just the ones I came with. Of course, I got a couple of incredulous stares - some admiring, some less so. But from what I could tell, most people were delighted to see a very pregnant woman being normal and having fun.

And of course, The Police themselves were awesome. It wasn't all "Every Breath You Take" and "Don't Stand so Close to Me;" they also did some of their lesser known songs, which suited me just fine. Sting sounds just as good as he did back in the band's heyday, as do Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland. They rocked it good and hard as I would have expected, and it was completely worth it. Best part? We can tell Weeble that we took her to an amazing rock concert just a few weeks before she was born. Granted, she was on the inside. But still, that's pretty cool. She was there. She has the onesie to prove it.

Now that The Police concert is behind us, I'm pretty much good to give birth any old time. And, in a twist of fine timing, Weeble officially reached "full term" status as of today. 37 Weeks. Which means all her parts are basically finished cooking and she'd most likely be fine on the outside. So, really, anytime is good for me. Just give me enough time to pack my hospital bag and get the car seat installed in the car, and we'll be ready to rock and roll, baby.

Showered

2007-07-17T21:22:00.001-04:00

Last weekend was my much-anticipated baby shower. Much-anticipated because I love those gatherings where all one's various worlds collide for a brief time. Work people mingling with family mingling with a whole gaggle of different friend groups. And I don't want to brag, but I know some awesome women, not the least of which is my mother who flew in from Montana for the weekend simply to attend the event. What better way to spend a Saturday afternoon?

My mom and I started out by getting a pedicure and manicure (me) and a massage (her). I forget how much I enjoy pedicures. I've always had super sensitive feet - being unnaturally ticklish and having toes too close together that don't do well with being separated. But the woman who did it Saturday was awesome and I left with happy feet, an all-too-rare occurrence these days.

By the time we got to my mother-in-law's house where the shower was hosted, things were already well underway. Several people had come early - namely the two friends who did the bulk of the planning and arranging, as well as some family members who are always inclined to help out. It felt really odd for me to not participate in the preparations. But it did give me the opportunity to greet people as they arrived. Plenty of people attended who haven't seen me at all since I got pregnant, or who hadn't seen me since I started showing, so there was lots of, "Wow! look how pregnant you are!" and other related exclamations. On any other day, that probably would have bothered me or made me paranoid. But not at the shower. I was so happy to see people and to have them all together, nothing could bother me.

Well, maybe except for the heat, made all the worse by 1) my enormous belly resting on my thighs; 2) opening gifts under the eyes of 25+ women (fun, but awkward just the same); and 3) my general inability to fit any of the gifts on my lap in order to facilitate opening them. The 3 inches remaining is wholly insufficient for gift-opening purposes (or much of anything else, for that matter).

There was only one game, per my request. As M and I have neither decided on a name for the Weeble, nor will we be sharing the final choice with anyone until after she's born, I thought it would be a good idea to have people submit their best guesses. That way, M and I get some fresh ideas (although a few options, such as "Fenway Park," are most definitely not in the running - no offense to the fine friend who clearly submitted that name as a serious suggestion). And if anyone guessed the name she ends up with, they'll get a prize of some kind. Nobody guessed any of our top picks as of now, but a few people hit on B-listers. One never knows.

Aside from getting to see all the people who were kind enough to gather for my baby shower, my favorite thing about the day was the customized puffy-paint onesies. For those of you planning a shower for a friend, I highly recommend this activity. Not only can it produce some extremely hilarious and/or inappropriate onesies (and yes, we certainly got at least a few of those), but it's so fun to see what types of slogans your friends and family members would like to see emblazoned on your kid's front.

All in all, we got a lot of great baby goodies, too. As I mentioned before, I know a lot of awesome women, all of whom are among the most generous people I've ever met. There are hardly any gaps that need to be filled at this point. Between the friends who have given me their wonderful hand-me-downs and the friends and family who showered us with new gear, we're more than set for Weeble to arrive.

I have a bunch of great pictures I'll post up here at some point in the near future. In the meantime, all I can do is thank everyone who came and made it such a great day, especially the women who made it happen at all. I don't know how I got so lucky as to have the friends I do.

Update: Here are some of the pictures from the day. Left to right for each row: me on display; my mother and me; my dear friend Becky and me.

Six Weeks to Go

2007-07-08T22:19:00.000-04:00

As of today, I completed 34 weeks of pregnancy, leaving me with only six weeks to go. Six weeks. 42 days. One and-a-half months. In other words, not really all that long. On one hand, it's an eternity from now. On the other, it's practically tomorrow. Of course there's plenty to be done before that six weeks passes, and that's if the Weeble even waits that long.

Looking back, there have been a couple other times where "six weeks" has been significant. I was six weeks pregnant around Christmastime, when we told my family in North Dakota that we were expecting. Earlier than we would have liked to make that news public, but since it was the only opportunity we'd have to share the good news in person, we took it.

Six weeks after that, I was in Germany for a business trip, and gearing up for my first ultrasound and the opportunity to start telling other people in our life about the baby. It took another six weeks to let everyone know.

So here we are, getting near the end of things. My feet and ankles aren't too swollen for the most part, but I can't wear my wedding ring anymore - something that I said from the beginning I hoped would never happen. Up until this point, my pregnancy showed almost exclusively up front. But now my butt, hips, and thighs have gotten in on the action. My glorious stretch marks (or "love branches" as I don't actually call them, but that strikes me as an amusingly sarcastic thing to say) continue their march up and around my belly. Speaking of the belly, I don't know how it can get any bigger - or how I'll stay upright when it does. Because all signs point to I am not yet as big as I will be. Which is scary, considering that when strangers ask me when I'm due and I tell them August 19th, they look shocked and make some comment that usually results in me being pissed and/or paranoid for the rest of the day. Some strangers don't bother to ask, and simply say, "Wow, you must be ready to go, huh?" Urge to kill, RISING.

But there's no way around it. I'm getting close. Weeble is big, active, and ready, as her soon-to-be father believes, "to mess stuff up" (he uses a few alternate words I'll let you fill in on your own). So let the countdown begin. It is ON.

Childbirth Learnin'

2007-07-07T22:58:00.000-04:00

We are so totally ready to have this kid. Oh, yeah. We know exactly what to expect, where to go, who will be there, why, and what comes next. All this thanks to the joy of childbirth education classes, of which we had four over the course of the last month. We just finished our last one this week, and we couldn't possibly be more prepared.

Let's recap what we learned. I know you'd all like to share in our extensive knowledge.

Week one: Getting to know you
Our educator spent a good 45 minutes blathering on about her pregnancies (some 30+ years ago) and a couple of her daughter's pregnancies. One class participant, who was serving as labor coach to her daughter, also felt the need to chime in every five minutes with details of her own experiences with her four kids. The latter half of the class was spent watching a video about what happens when sperm enters the vagina and fertilizes an egg. Holy shit, so that's what happened?? I had been wondering how I got into this condition! There was also some discussion about how to breathe in through the nose and out through the mouth, as well as how to give hand massages (as a potential relaxation technique for the laboring mother - lucky M!).

Week two: Video Mayhem
I can't tell you a damn thing about our second class beyond the instructor repeating half of what she'd said in the first class, another breathing technique (the "sniff huff"), more "insights" from annoying coach-mother. And The Video. I knew it was going to be rough going the second our instructor started it and everyone in it had that vague ugliness that everyone in the 70s had (hey, I'm not knocking it - I was an ugly child by virtue of my birth in 1974). Everyone in the class giggled their way through several parts - especially us. Then M started getting a little out of control. The laboring 70s woman, with her feathered hair and horse-like teeth, was simply too much. Her geometry teacher husband made it even worse. When he asked her if she wanted anything, she said she'd like juice. His response: "Yeah? Juice?... Yeah." M nearly passed out from trying not to laugh out loud. Then all hell broke loose when ugly 70s lady let out a big grunt and geometry-teacher man responded with, "That was a BIG ONE!" Note to self: don't try to stop yourself from laughing by simply listening to the video instead of watching it. It won't work.

Week Three: Not Your Typical Labor
M and I were quite trepidatious about returning to class, thinking perhaps we would not be able to control our amusement. This was the class where we learned about good stuff like cesarean sections and epidurals. We got another video, too, which showed a "normal" labor along with a few women having non-"normal" labors. Thankfully, M and I were far more mature than usual and hysterical laughing was kept to a minimum. There was also a repeat of just about everything our instructor had shared in the first two classes, and possibly another breathing technique. But frankly, I can't remember at this point. Hooray, annoying mother-coach was not there - presumably because her daughter was busy requiring coaching for her birth.

Week Four: Hospital Tour and Swaddling Your Hideously Ugly Baby
This was easily our most interesting class. After only 10 minutes of repeated information and anecdotes heard in the first three classes, we got to take a stroll through the labor and delivery floor to see where all the "magic" happens. At least places where babies are born have a little more personality than other parts of hospitals, which as a general rule, I dislike immensely. After the tour (during which a few anecdotes were repeated again), we returned to our usual classroom to learn how to bathe and swaddle our babies. When it came to the swaddling, each couple was given its own practice baby. Ours was the ugliest thing you've ever seen. Made out of material similar to that of a Cabbage Patch Kid, it had a pair of painted-on crossed blue eyes, a disgusting tuft of brown hair, a suspicious stain on the back of its head, body-builder shoulders, and a face about a quarter the size of its head. This is the opposite of what I hope comes out of me next month. But hey, we learned how to swaddle our little thing-baby, and what's not good about that?

So, four childbirth education classes, three breathing techniques, countless repetitions of previously discussed pieces of information and anecdotes, and one out-of-control laughing fit, and we graduated with flying colors. Oh, yeah. We're ready for what comes next. No problem.

The Name Game

2007-07-02T21:57:00.000-04:00

As any pregnant woman will tell you, the first question she always gets when someone learns she is pregnant (or the protruding belly is so obvious there's no way it's simple weight gain) is "When are you due?" The next two questions will inevitably follow, and almost always in this order:

"Do you know what the gender is?"
and, my favorite,
"Do you have a name picked out?"

In our case, we don't. We're testing out a list of four A-list names and four B-list names (ones we're not entirely sold on). We're taking each name and using it for a full week whenever we are referring to Weeble. We probably won't make our final decision on what it is until she's born and we've all been properly introduced. But it's nice to be able to try names out, even if we don't do it in public. We're one of those annoying couples who refuse to share the names, or even the potential list, with anyone else. It's our one last secret.

Thankfully, this policy didn't prevent one of my dear friends from providing a list of "suggestions." She's more or less settled on her favorite (Metallica - perfect for a girl or boy!), but I thought there were some other gems in there that are worth our consideration:

Aphrodesiac - Lovely, but this is how we got into this mess in the first place. I think no.
Bedonkadonk - Also what got us into this mess (as in, my awesome bedonkadonk that M simply couldn't resist).
Diamonique - Now this one has merit. Not only do I love diamonique jewelry, it's just so pretty as a name!
Filistina - Fine, but she'll inevitably end up with the very pedestrian "Tina."
Gayna - Isn't this the woman who sang that song, "I Will Survive"? Sure, Gloria Gayna.
Hambonia - Isn't this a region in Germany?
Iphagania - Pretty sure this is an itchy condition of the nether regions. No thanks.
Jean-Bobby - The 50s called - they want their crappy hyphenated, gender-neutral name back.
Lambycakes - I can totally see our kid going through life with this name being totally respected by men and non-strip club-oriented employers.
Rusty - I think not. I had a boyfriend in 9th grade for about 10 minutes named Rusty. His mother called the cops on me when two friends and I were breaking and entering a school. That bitch. How could she? Of course, this was on Mother's Day. Yep, I got brought home by the cops for breaking and entering on Mother's Day. This is not a memory I cherish (although I'm certain my mother does).
Shaniqua - As if every other baby girl being born these days isn't named Shaniqua already.
Tamborino - Built-in circus stage name! "The Great Tamborina will now thrill you with her daredevil antics high above the rings!!!"
Uvula - Mulva?
Xyla - Well, at least it's unique.
Yummy - No, I'd rather not tempt anyone inclined to snack on children.

OK, so they're not all winners. But I think, in the end, we'll end up with something a bit more on the traditional side. Like Thelma or Myrtle. Either way, we'll all know for sure when she's born. And that's only 7 weeks from now (give or take).

Stats - 32 Weeks

2007-06-28T22:43:00.000-04:00

I had my final 4-week appointment the other day. From here on out, I'll go in every two weeks. My doctor wasn't there (nor was she when I went in after the accident). But I did get to meet another doctor in the practice, and since there's a chance someone other than my usual doctor will deliver me when the time comes, I'm happy to meet the extra players.

Good news all around. I'd gained only three pounds since my previous appointment. My belly, while seemingly huge to everyone else (to the point that comments have begun to make me a little paranoid about my size), measures completely normally in terms of size.

We also had a bonus ultrasound to size Weeble up and make sure she was on track. Oh, she's on track alright. She's so on track she's passed the station and is cruising on up the mountain. What I mean by this complete nonsense is that, while my belly is measuring "normal," Weeble is a big girl as of right now. The ultrasound puts her at five pounds and some odd ounces. More than a pound plus a few ounces over what a 32-week baby would "normally" be. But my favorite nurse said that puts her in the 65th percentile for size, which sounds a lot less scary. Still, if she keeps on this particular track, she's going be out of newborn size clothing before she's even born.

All around, she looks good and healthy. Fluids - check; placenta - check; 2 arms, 2 legs, check. We got a lovely view of her face, too (second picture). It's fairly clear from this that she's already taking after me, what with the lips. Of course, the first thing that came to my mind was "Baby fish mouth!" No offense to her whatsoever, but those are some big lips she's got.

Looking at these ultrasound pictures compared to the previous two sets (at around 14 weeks and again at about 21 weeks) is unreal. She was scarcely a blip before. Then the "baby" in there became apparent. And now she's too big to fit on the screen. If there was ever a kick in the pants I needed to convince me that, oh, yeah, this is happening and she is real, this is it.

My stretch marks, as predicted, have in no way abated. They've all but taken over. I look at them as a hedge across my lower belly, since they do look very tree-like with all their spidery branches. People try to console me with the usual, "They'll go away eventually," clearly forgetting that stretch marks don't go away if you're not a celebrity with endless funds to get laser treatments or whatever it is the beautiful people do. They simply fade to become silvery branches instead of the angry red-purple ones they are today. But I suppose I'll embrace them eventually. I'm sure it's worth it. That's what they keep telling me anyway.

Stretch

2007-06-13T22:15:00.000-04:00

It finally happened. After 30 weeks and 3 days of flawless, gorgeous skin covering my belly, they came. A nice little crop of stretch marks have appeared just above my bikini line. This does not please me. I'm not interested in battle wounds. I'm interested in being exceedingly pretty.

OK, I'm exaggerating a bit (a lot). But still, I really don't like it. I'm already big, cumbersome, awkward, and cranky about 98.7% of the time. Now I get some purple road maps to Crazyville to boot?

I am aware there was little to nothing I could have done to prevent this particular side-effect of pregnancy. The cocoa and shea butter I've been lathering on since the 4th month I was pregnant were nice effort, but ultimately proved futile. Of course they did. Stretch marks laugh at lotions and potions. Stretch marks answer to genetics. My mom had them when she was pregnant with me, so it was pretty likely I'd get them, too. Hell, I got them during puberty when my boobal region grew faster than my poor skin could accommodate.

Still, I had maintained the small hope I'd escape this particular fate - or that I'd at least get farther along. I have the feeling it's all downhill from here. In fact, I'm pretty sure that in the time it's taken me to write this I've gotten at least 472 more stretch marks. Clearly, I need to up the ante: from now on I use TWICE as much shea butter. See if I can stop these suckers from getting any worse. Don't hold your breath, people.

Crash

2007-06-12T21:33:00.000-04:00

Monday was not a good day. I should have known the moment I woke up. In fact, i did toy with the idea of staying home. I was sore and sunburned from our yard sale on Sunday, and even more tired than I usually am on a Monday morning. Sign #1.

But I dragged myself out of bed, showered, and geared up for my 1.5-hour commute to the office, an 8-hour workday, and another 1.5-hour commute home. When I let Ollie out for his morning constitutional, I noticed he was fixated on something on the ground. I went to investigate only to find 5 naked little baby birds, along with one egg, scattered about the base of our birdhouse. Very sad. Poor little shavers. Who knows what happened to them - there was no sign of trauma. But it was definitely Sign #2 for me.

Sign #3 was the ridiculous traffic. Having left home at the much-later-than-usual time of 8:00, I thought perhaps I'd miss a good deal of morning rush hour traffic. I was wrong. It was taking forever. At 9:00 I was pulling off the highway off-ramp, and when I finally made it to the top of the off-ramp, the driver in front of me started, then stopped. Unfortunately, I had also started. And when I stopped, I was cheek-to-cheek with her rear bumper. Sigh.

Fortunately, the lady I hit was nice about it. But I was a mess. Couldn't think straight, couldn't function properly. Barely knew my own name well enough to give it to her. But finally, we finished the information exchange and I headed back to my car for the last half-hour of my ride to work. I was in tears before I even closed the door. I cried like a little girl the entire way to work. Not sniffles, not occasional sobs. Outright inconsolable weeping, torrential downpours of tears. It wasn't just that I had hit the girl and done actual damage to both our cars. It was that I've gone nearly 20 years of driving with only one other (very small) fender bender where my insurance company let me off clean, and one speeding ticket (for a mere $5 - those were the golden years in Montana, my friends). I've been pulled over two other times, but got away with written warnings. So this little fender bender was something of a legitimate accident that was my fault. Dammit - such a clean record for so long. Combine this despair with pregnancy hormones... bad news.

When I got to the parking garage, I decided it was time to call M and tell him what had happened. True to form, he was lovely about it. So long as I was OK and the Weeble was OK, then it was no big thing. We'd deal with the increase to my auto insurance premium, and we'd be just fine. This made me feel better. And when my manager showed up in the garage looking for me (after I'd left him a voice mail that indicated I'd been in a car accident, but failed to mention that I was OK) to make sure I was, in fact, all in one piece, made me feel even better.

I lost all mental and emotional stability progress I made in the first hour at my desk, however, when I called my OB's office and they told me they wanted to see me. This should have made me feel better, but it just made me nervous. If I didn't go to the doctor, nothing could possibly be wrong with Weeble. But if I did go... there was the possibility they'd find something they didn't like. I didn't want them to find any such thing. I like denial. Still, I went in. I was immediately hooked up for a "non-stress test," which just involved two monitors that were belted around my middle - one to listen to Weeble's heartbeat, and one to hear what was going on in her domain. I was hooked up for nearly an hour and-a-half while they waited for her to do what they wanted her to do: namely, maintain a baseline HR for a bit, then shoot up 10-15 BPM for a minute, and go back down. Little bugger is already stubborn, which is why it took so long.

Everything is fine, of course. My mental state has improved significantly. Weeble checked out normally. And my car, while a little worse for the wear, is still perfectly serviceable. Still, from now on, I'll be watching the signs and actually heeding them.

Best Husband Ever

2007-06-06T21:58:00.000-04:00

Last night was the first child-related education class for us. This one was about breastfeeding - how it works, how it doesn't work, and basic techniques.

When I registered for this class, the form indicated that "spouses are welcome and encouraged to attend." I took this to heart, and told M I really wanted him to join me for the class. Granted, I'm the one with the equipment, and thus the one to actually do the deed of feeding Weeble. But from what I can tell, breastfeeding can be tricky business, and women doing it can use all the support they can get - especially from a spouse or partner.

M was mostly on board with the idea of coming to the class. His primary concern was that it's not really a "dad" event, that there would be only expectant mothers attending. I assured him that this couldn't possibly be the case. After all, the registration form encouraged partner participation, and everything I'd read at the threads about this topic at BabyCenter.com indicated that breastfeeding classes were definitely equal opportunity.

As last night's class approached, M had that look about him. The look I know so very well. The look that says, "I don't wanna do this and I'm going to try and get out of it." Before he could even open his mouth, I said, "No way, you are COMING to this class with me and that's it!" Turns out, his concern was putting Ollie pup back in his crate for yet a few more hours (he's not quite trustworthy for a full day of roaming the house just yet). I agreed, this is a lousy situation. But it's a one-time deal, and we don't leave him crated any more than absolutely necessary. As a compromise, we decided to leave him out of the crate for the time we were gone to test his non-destructive inclinations. So with a few pleading moments of "don't eat the couch," we took our leave and headed to the hospital for breastfeeding class.

We walked in - just a minute or two late - and it was immediately clear. I was so very, very wrong. There were no other daddies-to-be. No supportive spouses. M was it. The lone guy in a very mother-oriented class. He (kindly) didn't say anything, but cast me a sardonic sidelong glance, to which I replied, "Not a word." This, of course, was simply my guilt for having dragged him to this class. He was willing to be supportive, but I knew going in that he had his doubts about attending this particular class.

What a guy. I don't know how I got so lucky with this one. He sat through it, and he took it all in with barely any noticeable discomfort. Even the teacher had some props for him, noting that while breastfeeding might seem like strictly a "mom" thing, dads need to be as supportive, knowledgeable, and on board as possible. I couldn't have been prouder. I couldn't help but wonder if all the other expectant moms there were thinking to themselves, "My husband is a dog! Why isn't he here supporting me??" Yep. What a guy. And he's all mine.

During a brief break, I apologized profusely for making him come. I had truly believed there would be many couples there. Why shouldn't there be? Feeding a child - whether the equipment is attached to one parent or there are bottles and formula to mix - should be a family affair. M was so good about it. I couldn't make him stay for the second half. So I sent him home to figure out dinner, entertain Ollie pup, and wait for me to be ready to picked up. He didn't miss too much in the second half - nothing he can't pick up from reading a book or being told by me. And I missed only the pleasure of his presence, and the fact that we're both of the same juvenile mentality to find the same things funny.

What I walked away with from this situation is that I have an awesome, amazing, supportive husband, and I am lucky for it. Not that I didn't already know this. But it's really wonderful to be reminded of it. He put himself out there into a place that was undoubtedly uncomfortable and weird, simply because he knew I wanted him there with me. What a guy.

Eyes up, boys

2007-05-29T22:02:00.000-04:00

As someone who's been, um, well endowed since the sixth grade, I've gotten pretty used to the up-down-up-I-swear-I'm-not-looking-at-your-boobs reaction out of plenty of people (men). Mostly, it doesn't bother me. Outright leering has been rare, and hardly any of the lookers have resorted to grabbing and playing mammary motor-boat.

Ever since I got pregnant, though, I find the focus has shifted further downward to my ever-burgeoning belly. I almost feel bad for the twins. They're usually the center of attention - not even my hypnotic eyes have ever compared to the power of the bodaciousness of the tatas.

And now, they are mere afterthought as my belly takes over and demands all the attention. It's not really surprising - Weeble's current address gets bigger every day. This belly practically hits people in the face it's so huge. I, however, know that the day of the twins will return, and not so far from now. Until then, the onlookers should enjoy the show. It's ending in less than 12 weeks.

Cute stuff

2007-05-11T22:52:00.001-04:00

OK, so while I said I want to start the Weeble off on as non-consumerist a foot as humanly possible, it is really, really difficult to not love all the incredibly cute baby stuff out there. I spent weeks - maybe months - trying to decide on the bedding alone because there were so many great options. Granted, most of the stuff I tend to be attracted to is WAY out of my league price wise. Honestly, paying upwards of $400, no matter how much I love it (and I do) strikes me as asinine. Especially considering there shouldn't really be much of anything in the crib with the baby, including baby bumpers, quilts, and sleep positioners. So unless you find a company that will sell pieces separately, you'd be paying a lot of money for a lot of stuff you couldn't really use.

As for us, we decided on a ridiculously cute and happy set called Birdhouse by Pixel Pieces, which arrived last week much to my delight.
Now, with bedding in hand, furniture awaiting delivery, and the spare bedroom being gradually cleared out to make room for the new family member, I am ready to go.

M and I aren't really baby decor types. We love animals and alphabets and bugs as much as the next person, but frilly-baby-cute isn't really our thing. So we wanted the kid's room to be pretty, fun, but most of all, cool. So after picking out the boring stuff like the carpet and paint (both will be neutral), I'm on a mission to find cool-baby-cute elements that will turn her room from a utilitarian nursery to totally sweet digs.

So far, my favorite find (after the bedding and the furniture) is Wallcandy's Dottilicious kit of 80 multi-colored dots in different sizes. These nifty little dots peel and stick so they can be moved around at will without damaging wall paint. How bright and fun are these things??

My next mission is to find a crib mobile. I remember having one over my crib (or at least, I think I remember one) as a baby, and I've heard babies think they're just the neatest thing since sliced bread. So far, I've found only one I even remotely liked. Too bad it's $90. Yikes! Needless to say, I'll be putting on my crafty-lady hat and trying to make something myself.

Beyond the dots and the homemade mobile, there's not much left to pick out for cool-baby-cute. Then it's back into utilitarian mode. Figuring out what kind of bottles to go with, which waterproof sheet to get, how many pacifiers we'll need.

Ah, but in the end, that is going to be one damn cool room our kid gets to live in. And hooray for us, the cool digs will be right across the hall from our own bedroom. Perhaps our room will absorb some of that cool just by way of proximity. Or maybe I'll just get TWO sets of dots - one for Weeble's room, one for ours.

Numbers To Date

2007-05-07T22:08:00.000-04:00

I haven't done a stats post yet, and I figure since this is comprising my entire journaling experience while pregnant, I should at least record a milestone or two.

As of right now, I'm 25 weeks pregnant. For all you civilians, that translates to around six months along. So far, I've gained about 15 pounds, and it's split evenly between my giant belly and my enormous ass. I'd rather not discuss my boobs, which have exploded out of control. No, seriously.

I've given up very little, really. I don't drink alcoholic beverages (save the negligible amount in fake beer and wine), and I generally steer clear of deli meats. Not that this was difficult since I'm not a big sandwich eater anyway. Otherwise, I still drink caffeine, although not much (today did not count - I was exhausted, I needed that second cup just to stay alive, I swear!). Soft cheeses are definitely still on my menu, and I'll be damned if I give up hot dogs.

Physically, I feel pretty good. Well, except for the sciatic nerve pain (more fun than hanging out on a fire ant mound!). And being winded by walking more than five yards. Not in love with the round ligament pain, either. Especially when it wakes me up in the middle of the night as I turn over to get in a more comfortable position. And I'm pretty awkward by now, with this large protrusion on my front, also known as "the baby". I feel like no matter which way I turn, it's always in the way. Said protrusion also itches like crazy, so it's a good thing I like to scratch like crazy.

Mentally, I'm a complete moron. I can't concentrate worth a damn, I forget stuff (literally) 2.7 seconds after it is told to me. One time I got out of my car and left it running. I fall asleep at my desk at work multiple times a day (not usually for more than a minute). I drive M thoroughly crazy with my nonsensical rambling.

But it's worth it. The stupidity, the occasional discomfort, the getting fat, and the panic at all that remains to be done before she arrives. All it takes is one little kick from her and a feeling of calm purpose takes over. This is just damn good fun.

Judged

2007-04-30T19:08:00.000-04:00

In the grand scheme of things, I have had it easy during this pregnancy in terms of other people saying or doing stupid things. Very few people - and no strangers - have put their hands on my belly without permission. Hardly anyone has said, "Wow, you look really pregnant!" or, nearly as bad, "Wow, you don't look pregnant at all!" And very few people have insulted me with some smug, amused variation on, "Haha, you have no idea what you're in for."

But last weekend, I got judged because I'm pregnant. Two friends and I were waiting for a table at a restaurant, and while we waited I ordered an O'Doul's. When we were seated, the hostess looked at me (rather, my bulging belly), looked at my bottle of (fake) beer, and said, most disapprovingly, "Is that a beer?" I said it was non-alcoholic, so not really a beer. She responded, "Oh, good, since, you know..." as she gestured between my belly and the beer.

Oh, NO SHE DID NOT. She did NOT just pass judgment on me! While the truth was I was drinking a perfectly "legal" non-alcoholic beverage, what would she have done or said to me if I'd said, "Yep, a big, fat, alcoholic BEER"? Would I have gotten a lecture from her? And if that were the case, would I have decked her? Yes, yes, I probably would have.

Anyway, the incident has lost some of its rage-inducing luster by now. But it still rankles me. I don't know why. I suppose just because the idea that it was none of her business what I was drinking. And she doesn't know me. She doesn't know what I do every day to protect this baby inside me on a day-to-day basis. She knows nothing about me. But she still thinks it's her place to even remotely suggest that she knows better than I do how to be pregnant with MY child. Until I'm pregnant with her baby, she can keep her mouth shut.

At least the dinner was good.

Decisions, decisions

2007-04-26T19:12:00.000-04:00

Living in this ultra-consumerist world should have prepared me for the sheer volume of baby crap available. From Babies 'R' Us to Target to online superstores to the countless local storefronts both tacky and quaint, there is no need that should go unfulfilled when it comes to your baby. From the looks of it, we may need a second home to hold all the stuff we apparently need for the Weeble.

Our first foray into the baby-stuff frontier was a few weeks ago when we took our first trip to the superstore that is Babies 'R' Us to get a lay of the land. I had found some furniture online that I liked and wanted to see it in real life to decide if it was as good as it seemed. No such luck: half the stuff found on their website isn't necessarily found in the store. True for most of the furniture, if not all of it.

That evening at BRU was mind-numbing at best. For starters, there must be approximately 487 different types of baby bathtub available. 209 different crib mattresses. And no fewer than 1,763 strollers, carseats, and playpens. Everything does something slightly different, and has slightly different features. And that's just the useful stuff. There are $40 shelves with painted-on bumblebees, which are cute, but anywhere else (and without the baby-decor designer's name attached) that same dinky shelf would cost $7. There are the coordinating valances, lamps, rugs, diaper stackers, curtains, sheets, quilts, wall hangings, trash bins, toy chests, and clothes hampers to ensure that nothing, but NOTHING in your baby's room isn't perfectly matched. Then there are the binkies, bibs, onesies, crib sheets, stuffed animals, and baby socks - each numbering into the millions.

How does one even begin to decide what they want? I say "want" because "need" plays very little part in all of this. I think about when I was a baby (not that I have an extensive memory of this time in my life), and it's pretty clear my mother got away with about 1/100th of what is sold as necessary objects in this day and age. Do I really need a bottle warmer? Or even better, a baby wipe warmer?? Is it absolutely necessary for me to have a matching set of pillows that can't even go into the crib (for fear of suffocation), or a crib CD player that will soothe our little Weeble to sleep?

M and I still have at least one BRU trip left in us to pick out stuff like the stroller, the carseat, and other very utilitarian items that, for all intents and purposes, we actually need. But in an effort to get Weeble started off on the path of less consumerism, we may as well lead by example.

Of course, I say this as I panic about all the projects we have yet to complete (painting, new carpeting, closet reorganization) so there's a suitable place for all the stuff we will be putting into her room. Namely, a new furniture set. Anti-consumerist my ass. Weeble gets all new. We decided at least someone in this house should get a nice, matching bedroom set, and it certainly isn't M and me. And, I have to be honest: there will be some coordinating decorative items in the baby's room. That's right, I said it. Stuff will match. Now, excuse me while I go hang my head in shame. And think gleefully about how awesome my kid's room is going to be.

What to say

2007-04-20T21:37:00.000-04:00

I tried to think of what I could possibly say about the tragedy at Virginia Tech. But once I read this, I decided my fellow first-time mother-to-be and blogger had already said it best.

Is she really?

2007-04-20T20:34:00.000-04:00

It doesn't take much to shake my "mother's instinct," I guess. Two weeks ago, an ultrasound technician declared to M and me, with full confidence, that I am pregnant with a girl. I myself had already believed it anyway. And M has never for a moment thought she was anything but a girl. Even the old wives tales signs pointed to a girl. You'd think I'd feel fairly confident in the ultrasound technician's assessment of my kid's in utero plumbing.

But after a friend of mine gave birth earlier this week to a little girl, after her own ultrasound pointed decidedly to a boy, I am suddenly not so sure. Thankfully, the surprise girl is healthy and both she and her new mother are doing great.

Now, let's get one thing straight, here. To me - and probably to most pregnant women out there - it truly does not matter if this baby is a girl or a boy, so long as it's a healthy baby. THAT is my primary concern, and I have no doubt that my friend's first thought was not, "WTF, a GIRL???" but "Thank god our baby is healthy (plus, I'm not in labor anymore!)." Even if I painted every surface in the baby's room pink (which I won't) and picked out a girl's name (which I haven't) and got everything monogrammed with said name (which I wouldn't), in the end, what I want most is a healthy child baby add to our small family.

BUT... I won't deny that this would be a major mind-screw. A happy, wonderful, joyous end to nine (ten) months of being pregnant and who knows how long of labor. But a mind-screw none the less. This is because when you learn the (probable) gender of your child in advance of its birth, you start identifying that child as such. I have this feeling there's no way to truly prepare for meeting your first child. I'm impatient, and I want to meet this kid now. But in the absence of the actual person (living outside of me, I mean), I will grasp anything that helps give me a sense of WHO SHE IS. Her gender is one piece of what will form her identity after she's born. And besides, I far prefer calling her "her" instead of "it". "Him" would be just fine, too.

One friend, when I expressed this sentiment about how the switch could be hard to take, said, "This is why you don't get invested in the gender they tell you at the ultrasound." But I don't know that it's possible not to use that information and go with it. I can say to myself (and do) that there's ALWAYS the possibility that the ultrasound technician was seeing things (or in this case, not seeing things), and all my "she"s and "her"s will make a fool of me when Weeble actually makes an official appearance in four months. But in the meantime, Weeble is my little girl. And if it comes to her being a him, I will be a little (a lot) shocked. I'll think about the little girl that was, and I'll feel sad that she's gone. But then I will get over it in about 2 seconds, count my little boy's toes, say a prayer of thanks that he's healthy, and then I will love him more than I ever thought possible.

Birthday reflection

2007-04-19T20:46:00.000-04:00

Every year for the past 25 or so years on my birthday, my dad calls me and tells me the story of my birth. As he tells it, my mother didn't even wake him up until she'd been in labor for a few hours. And at that point, he started running around like a chicken with its head cut off while my mother remained utterly calm. At about 7:30, they took off for the hospital. I was in such a hurry to be born that after only a few big pushes, I came out like a rocket. Apparently the doctor said if his hands hadn't been there, I'd have ended up on the floor. My dad cut the umbilical cord, and there I was. His first kid.

My dad's reaction to my birth has always been that it was a life changing moment for him. This year, there was a bit of a twist to the usual story. Echoing a thought that had been running through my own head all day, he talked about how today is my last birthday before becoming a parent. Obviously, it means something different for the two of us. For me, it signals the last year I can indulge in my birthday, when I can pretend to be the most important person on this day. Granted, my birthday was rendered useless for the most part after I hit 18, with the exception of some of the landmark birthdays - 21, 25, and 30 were all definite ME days. But otherwise, it's typically just another day on the calendar.

For my dad, today is something of a rite of passage. The last birthday his first daughter will be just his daughter. Next year at this time, I will be his daughter, he will be my father. But we will also be a mother and a grandfather. Two whole new identities that are both completely new to each of us. He said, "I would love to be there for your baby's birth. But it's OK if I'm not. This belongs to you and M. I have to let go, now. You're becoming the parent, now."

This is all true, of course. My dad will always be my dad, and I'll always be his daughter. But with "mother" and "grandpa" looming on the horizon, things will change. And to be honest, I think these things will change for the better. My dad hasn't always had the greatest life. But he swears that my half-sister and I are two of the best things he ever had a hand in. I'm looking forward to understanding the part of his life that has made him happy and proud consistently through the years I've known him.

Favorite things

2007-04-17T21:15:00.000-04:00

There are definitely some unglamorous aspects to being pregnant. Stuff I could maybe do without. Besides a myriad of digestion-related issues (I'd expand on this, but people I work with read this blog), there's the frequent abdominal pain as one's belly pooches out more and more every day. There's the bone-crushing exhaustion, which leads to ass-expanding laziness. The absent-mindedness that serves little purpose other than to annoy M. And the strange acne that plagues me now, even though as a teenager I was smooth-skinned as could be.

But there are some really, really great things about being pregnant. Of course, there's the one BIG THING of knowing you're growing a baby human in there. That alone makes being pregnant just about the coolest thing I've done yet (although seeing REO Speedwagon in concert in 6th grade was pretty awesome). And it's not just that people are nice and really happy for you when they find out you're going to be a mother, or that you can get away with falling asleep in meetings or at your desk because, hey, you've got a lot going on in there, what with the gestating at all.

There are a lot of subtle things that I really enjoy about this experience, some meaningful, and some shallow. All true.

I love:
-- My growing pooch. This belly business is something else. Even though I'm carrying really high and tend to look puffy more than pregnant, when I lift up my shirt and see that definition of where my body becomes the temporary home for this baby I am amazed.
-- Feeling Weeble kick me, punch me, and roll around in there. It's occasionally disconcerting, especially since she's extremely active these days and I constantly feel rather pummeled. But there's nothing like it.
-- I hardly have to shave my legs anymore. Seriously, practically no hair grows on them anymore. It's the weirdest thing ever, and not a side-effect I'd ever heard of before. But it comes in handy since it's getting annoying to bend over to shave anyway.
-- Thinking about how this little kicker is "our daughter." It's something of a thrill to use those words. Daughter. It's potent; so much so that I can't bring myself to say it out loud. It's almost like a secret thrill.
-- Imagining what she'll be like, and what we'll teach her, where we'll take her, and what music we'll expose her to. It's even fun to think about the fact that at some point, she'll be listening to music that M and I think is utter crap, and we'll wonder who this freak is we brought into the world. Yep, even that's cool. Maybe more for me than M, since I'm well aware of the sh*t music I thought was just swell back in my pre-teen years and I turned out just fine. After all, M fell in love with me because of my music collection.
-- Thinking of how my husband will be as a father. I'm pretty sure he's just as nervous about this as I am about being a mother. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like he would be. But I think he'll be so good at it. And I can't wait for him and Weeble to be introduced.
-- Thinking about how my mother will be as a grandmother - and mother to a mother. She's not really a baby sort. She likes kids, but only once they get to an age where they can hold normal conversations. Babies are not her thing. Plus, for the first 20 years of my life, it's been her and me. Boys have come and gone (with the exception of M, who obviously stayed). But for her, I've always been it. And for me, she's always been it. So me having a baby changes our relationship completely - and in ways neither of us can possibly anticipate. It's going to be a new chapter for us, and I'm looking forward to it. Plus, my mom is the one person who will always be my mommy if I need her to be.
-- Singing to Weeble. I don't do it on purpose, really. I never set out to sing to my belly. But I sing all the time anyway, and whenever I do (usually during my commute to work) I catch myself and think, "She can hear me right now." And I smile.

There are many more things about this experience that I love. I guess most of it is the forward-looking stuff. The dreams and the hopes I already have for her, for her father, and for the three of us (six of us - including the cats and dog) as a family. I know we don't know what we're in for, and it won't be all tender moments. But she's making an impact on me (and not just with her little feet and fists) already, and I just can't wait to meet her.

Things not to say to a pregnant woman

2007-04-15T20:54:00.000-04:00

For the most part, I can't complain about excessive hormonal rages. Well, I can't complain. M might have a different take on this. But by and large, I've felt pretty happy. Very few people have been killed or maimed as a result of my pregnancy.

That said, I have been compiling a list of things one should never, ever say to a pregnant woman. A woman who is pregnant is, among other things, feeling one or more of these things at any given moment:
> > Fat
> > Overwhelmed
> > In some form of pain and/or discomfort
> > Lonely
> > Irritated, annoyed, or outright pissed. At what, she likely doesn't know.

Add any of these emotions to the already toxic combination of hormone soup she's experiencing, and a poorly considered remark can result in a day's worth of 1) bitchiness, 2) weepiness, 3) silent treatment, or 4) all of the above.

For the dear husbands, friends, co-workers, family members, and random strangers, I am providing this list of remarks that should be considered off limits when speaking to any and all pregnant women. Print it out and keep it on hand at all times so you never accidentally find ourself at the hands of a toxic hormone attack.

1. "Why, you don't look pregnant at all!" - This is a bad thing to say to a pregnant woman. During the first trimester, a woman is likely nauseous, exhausted, and can't even tell anyone why she's such a disaster. When you find out she's pregnant, regardless of whether she looks pregnant or not, you say, "Congratulations! How wonderful for you! You're already glowing!"

2. "Wow, this pregnancy is hitting you really hard!" - When you're a pregnant woman's husband, and your wife has just returned from BJ's with a heavy box of groceries, in the dumping rain, having just contended with a crowd of imbeciles who wouldn't get out of her way, complaining about how her back muscles hurt from carrying said heavy box, and clearly ON THE EDGE, under no circumstances whatsoever should you comment that she is somehow weaker in the face of her pregnancy. No, no, no. This will do nothing but put her either closer to the aforementioned edge, or send her right over. This is bad because she will TAKE YOU WITH HER.

3. "You'll never sleep again." - In this scenario, "sleep" can be interchanged with "have fun," "have money," or "go out." OK, I know people who have experience with the whole kids thing have a different perspective than those of us seeing child rearing through the semi-rose tinted glasses of pre-parenthood, but come ON. It's not like us pregnant women need any additional reasons to be freaked out, overwhelmed, and wondering what in god's name ever possessed us to get ourselves into this condition. We'll find out soon enough. Leave us alone and let us enjoy our last few months of being childfree.

4. "You're naming your child WHAT???" - Unless your friend is planning to name her soon-to-be child something like Tequila or RawkStahr, which could lead to serious therapy in the child's future, just keep your mouth shut if you don't like the name. Pregnant lady feels fat and judged enough as it is. Don't add to it.

5. "Are you happy?" - Well, let's see. If I weren't happy, would I have even told you I was pregnant? Yeah, probably not. People who use this phrase will get an automatic BITE ME.

That's all for now. Not terribly comprehensive as of yet, but it's Sunday night and all this rain is starting to get to me. And I'm still sore from my trip to BJ's earlier today.

When baseball and pregnancy hormones collide

2007-04-10T19:08:00.000-04:00

I love being pregnant. The weirdest things get to you.

Baseball season started last week. This is a glorious time of year, and one that I usually start anticipating with excessive fervor starting approximately 30 seconds after the New England Patriots are out of championship running. This year I was reasonably distracted and haven't been as on the ball in terms of pre-season games, season openers, and how Baltimore, the Yankees, and the Twins are looking for the year. I have yet to see a full game. This is highly unusual. But not surprising given the circumstances. Still, I was somewhat unprepared for how my pregnancy hormones would mix with baseball.

Let me back up a bit and explain. I LOVE BASEBALL. I have since I was a little kid and my mom and step-dad would take me to American Legion games in Billings, MT. And since my father took me to Minnesota Twins games at the Metrodome during Kirby Puckett's heyday (to this day, my favorite joke my dad ever told is, "Kirby's butt is so big he's taller when he sits down." But wow, could that man run like the wind). And since I moved to Boston and my husband filled in all the blanks and made a lifelong devoted Boston Red Sox fan out of me. Bless his heart, he endures ALL my questions about the rules and regulations of baseball. There's no turning back now. Field of Dreams and Bull Durham both made my top 10 movie list in short order. I look forward to watching baseball games on TV. But when that's not possible, I actually listen to, and understand, games on the radio, along with accompanying game analysis. Baseball makes me happy.

Perhaps this deep love of baseball was why, during my morning commute to work, I found myself crying when the John Fogerty's Centerfield started playing on the radio. At first when I heard the song, I cranked it up and smiled, thinking about how today was opening day at Fenway. Within seconds, as I tried to sing along, I found myself choking up. Choked up turned into open crying. Crying turned into outright sobbing. Why? I don't know. Was it these lines?

"Got a beat-up glove, a homemade bat, and brand-new pair of shoes;
You know I think it's time to give this game a ride.
Just to hit the ball and touch 'em all - a moment in the sun;
(pop) It's gone and you can tell that one goodbye!"

All I know is it took a solid verse of a Rod Stewart song (I hate Rod Stewart) to get it out of my system. I blame Weeble-related hormones.

A slightly different situation transpired when M and I finally had the opportunity to watch more than 15 seconds of a game, and were enjoying Sunday night's Red Sox vs. Texas Rangers game on ESPN. My enjoyment lasted about as long as it took for Joe Morgan to open his damn mouth and start annoying the hell out of me. Normally the kind of rage and utter hatred I was feeling toward Joe Morgan that night is reserved for f**king Tim McCarver. Yeah, you baseball fans know what I'm talking about. But it appears that Joe Morgan gets to be on that list, too. If he says the phrase "dead red" ONE MORE TIME while I am hostage to these hormones, I cannot be held responsible for my actions. Goddamn that guy pisses me off. Thank god the Red Sox won that game or I may have really freaked out.

So the short story is it's something like day nine of the baseball season. There is WAY more baseball ahead, and way more hormones to course through my bloodstream. This doesn't really bode well for the next four months.

It's a....

2007-04-05T12:25:00.000-04:00

For all you suckers that voted BOY, hang your heads in shame. Apparently M is slightly psychic, and my mother-to-be super-senses were all correct: We're having a girl!!

The ultrasound went really well overall. The technician took all kinds of measurements while Weeble moved around like a sneaky little fish. I suppose the 5 glasses of orange juice and honey toast I had for breakfast may have had something to do with how hopped up she was. The really good news is that everything looks normal and she is healthy, weighing approximately 13 ounces (making M the closest guesser - must he get everything right?).

The whole process lasted no more than 20 minutes, and finally the technician asked if we'd like her to try and find out the baby's gender. Once she had the emphatic go-ahead, it didn't take long at all. A push here, a click there, and voila! "It looks like you have a little girl."

I know I said I would have been happy with a boy - and I truly, truly would have been. But when she said "little girl", I broke out in tears. I had known she was - I had known it when I first felt her move, when she suddenly became "she". So learning that she is, in fact, of the female persuasion confirmed for me like nothing else has so far that I know this baby, and that there is at least that much mother instinct in me.

And so now begins the big name-choosing expedition. Had it been a boy, the choice would have been pretty easy - I've known the boy name I would want to use ever since we started discussing the possibility of children. But the field of potential girl names is much, much broader. When we do pick, it'll be the one piece we keep to ourselves until she's born (just try to pry it out of us), but I have the feeling it'll take a while to decide anyway. M and I may have known she was a girl, but we still don't know her name. Maybe we won't until we meet her in person.

And just for the record, I have informed M that I will not be paying him even though he is technically the winner of the $20 bet. I'll just put an extra $20 into the little girl's college fund in his name.

The Big One

2007-04-04T19:04:00.001-04:00

We're down to only 13 hours to go before the ultrasound. The votes between boy and girl are neck-and-neck (7 to 6), and it's anyone's game at this point.

I have been waiting anxiously for tomorrow's appointment like I've waited for few other things in my life, and with an impatience that rivals that of any 5-year-old. After our first glimpse of Weeble, I couldn't wait to get more - to learn more about this little person growing in - of all places - me.

Now that tomorrow is nearly upon us, I am all nerves. This probably explains my bizarre behavior in the last hour before I left work today (unnaturally snippy and jittery) and in the car on the way home (even meaner and with more one-sided angry conversations than ever). To the people who were affected by this today, I do apologize. Chalk it up to part nerves, part excitement, part exhaustion, and utter terror for what tomorrow's glimpse will show.

I know I shouldn't worry. What would be the point? I'd just stress myself out and be miserable (read: I have stressed myself out and made myself miserable). Even if there is something wrong with the baby that comes to light tomorrow, what will worrying about it now do? (see above) But I can't help it. Like anyone who loves someone the way I love this little Weeble, I want him or her to have an easy, happy life. And a long one to boot. What if that is not what is destined for my child? How do parents face that question before they've even become parents?

All I can do for now is wait. Thankfully, I have a boatload of ironing to keep me occupied until I go to bed. Not to mention the mini-marathon of "Everybody Loves Raymond." Yeah, that'll take my mind of my worries.

Vote for the winner of the $20 Bet

2007-04-03T09:16:00.001-04:00

With only 47 hours to go until the big ultrasound (a.k.a., the much more scientific-sounding "anatomy check"), it seems like a good time for some hot polling action. As I wrote about in the first few posts of this blog - way back in ye olden days of February - M laid out a few bets. The first, for $10, that I was pregnant. The second, for double or nothing, that it was a girl. Well, we already know I lost the first bet. But I can be saved from having to shell out any cash to my money-grubbing (yet oh, so loving) husband if this baby is a boy.

So, what do you all think? Make your voice heard by voting with this handy little polling device. And, just to add even more intrigue, if you want to leave a comment with your best guess on the Weeble's weight as of Thursday's 8:30 am ultrasound, maybe I'll consider awarding a prize (to be shipped out via the series of tubes that is the Internets) to the closest guesser.

Happy voting! May the best parent-to-be win!

Change of tune

2007-04-01T00:27:00.000-04:00

Up until relatively recently, if I'd been pressed to answer the question "what do you want, a boy or girl?" and were really honest with my response, I would have had to say that I wanted a girl. I suppose that's just because, well, being a girl, I think I'd have a better idea how to raise one than a boy. I know this is ridiculous, if for no other reason that I haven't the slightest idea how to raise my dog, let alone a child whether it's a girl or a boy. But that's what I thought I wanted, deep down inside.

Recently, though, something started to shift. I can't really remember when I realized I'd changed my tune, but I've been attributing it to an incident a few weeks ago. I had taken Ollie to the dog park by myself. He was tired from the previous day at doggy day care, and not really interested in the other dogs. But, he is ALWAYS afraid of people no matter what. So when a little boy of about seven or eight started approaching him, I called out to him that my dog is fearful of people and he probably shouldn't get too close. Ollie's not aggressive, but you never know when a fearful dog turns into a mean dog. And I've always gotten the sense that kids freak him out. It's like he's thinking, "My god! It's like a person, but... so small!"

The little boy mumbled something in assent and wandered another direction. Which is fine with me. Sometimes kids make me nervous - I don't know why. Maybe for the same reason they make Ollie nervous. But a few minutes later the kid was standing near me, and he said, "What kind of dog is he?" When I responded that he's a yellow lab mix, the boy said, so thoughtfully, "Wow, that's odd! I've never heard of a shy lab before!" I don't know what exactly it was about him, but I just marveled at this little boy's fearlessness. He was so natural and comfortable, and he just felt like talking to me. So he did. And damned if I didn't admire him for it.

That's the thing about little boys. Most of the ones I've met are fearless like that. They go for what they want. And that's just cool.

A few days after the incident at the dogpark, I felt the baby move. And since then, I've been inclined to use "she" and "her". I don't know that it means anything - it just feels right. But I can honestly say that I won't be in the least disappointed if this baby turns out to be a boy; nor will I be if it's a girl. I said it once before, and it's true: all I want is a healthy baby.

Hanging out with a lifelong foe

2007-03-28T21:16:00.001-04:00

For my entire life, I've struggled with my weight - the excess of it and the self-image issues that go along with it. Now, I don't want to hear any exclamations of "Oh, stop, you're just fine!" I don't say this as some sort of "Poor, fat ME! Tell me I'm skinny, PLEASE!" I'm simply stating a fact. No matter how lovely a woman I may be, it is absolutely true that am overweight.

But this is not the point. The point is item #483 on the list of Things Nobody Really Tells You About Getting Pregnant: For those of us who have struggled through a lifetime of trying to lose weight, giving up, gaining more weight, not fitting into clothes, failing time and time again... when you get pregnant, you suddenly have to become best friends with your worst enemy.

When I got pregnant in December, I was probably a good 20-30 pounds over my ideal weight. I'm not obese, but losing that amount of weight would put me in a healthy range. Growing a baby human inside puts the brakes on any and all attempts toward, thoughts of, wishes and hopes for weight loss. Nope. Now you have the task of GAINING weight over the next 40 weeks. Oh, god, where do I begin with how contrary this is to everything - and I mean everything - I have considered to be the norm?

Given this perception of "trying to lose weight is what life is all about," it should be no surprise that gaining a huge amount of weight while pregnant is a concern for me. Granted, it's nothing compared to my concern for having a healthy baby - whatever it takes. If I were told to gain 100 pounds for the benefit of my child, you better believe I'd do it. But by most accounts, having a healthy baby in this regard takes a gain of only 25-35 pounds - a bit less if you were overweight when you got pregnant. Which I was.

Aside from all the medical reasons for keeping weight gain within that particular range is the fact that hey, guess what! One day I won't be pregnant anymore. But I'll still have the majority of the weight I gained to lose. And since losing weight has been difficult for me for, oh, say, FOREVER, yeah, I worry about it.

The thing is, I DO need to gain weight. And that is what is so incredibly difficult for me to reconcile. I know that at some point I'm going to have to just let go and let it happen. Not that I haven't already started packing on the pounds; I have (almost 10 at this point). But actually giving in to it is like hanging out with your worst enemy and telling him he smells great even though he really smells like skunk. All I know is that for the next 20 weeks, I'm going to be able to say to myself nearly every time I step on a scale, "This is the most I've ever weighed." Let's see how long it takes me to just get OVER it.

Poke: Hello!

2007-03-27T19:43:00.000-04:00

Once I hit the 18th week, I started waiting for that special feeling. That feeling that you can only get from a baby making its presence known by kicking the hell out of you from the inside (or from really bad gas). By all accounts, early kicking - which is typically felt somewhere between weeks 16 and 22 - is pretty light. It's not quite up to ninja standards at this point. A lot of women say it feels like popcorn popping, a fish swimming around, bubbles, fluttering, and being flicked - among other sensations.

Well, this is what I've been longing for. Really it's the one sign I've been missing so far. I've seen the baby (at week 13), I've grown out of most of my clothes and am starting to show, and, as previously discussed, my belly button is making a break for it. But feeling the Weeble has really been the missing piece of me really believing I'm pregnant.

By lunchtime today I was starting to feel pretty discouraged. I have no good reason for getting impatient. After all, some women don't feel the "quickening" until week 20 or even later. But waiting during pregnancy for a sign that doesn't appear right away leads to paranoia. Maybe he/she isn't moving because something is wrong.

Friday night was the first time I thought I felt something. It was brief, and over so fast I couldn't even be sure it had happened. It didn't feel like popcorn or being flicked. It felt like an arm, ending in an elbow, brushing up against me (only inside). But then it was gone, no matter how much I concentrated and willed it to come back.

Then today, the Weeble returned.

Poke: Hello!

Poke, poke: Where's daddy?

Poke: When do we eat again?

Poke, poke, poke: Where's the stinky dog?

Weeble's been pretty quiet since then, but it's clear now that he/she is in there. Most likely doing the mambo or something. Just over a week from now, we'll have the big ultrasound. With any luck, we'll be able to figure out just what part of him/her is poking me.

Milking it by accident

2007-03-24T19:07:00.000-04:00

One of the fun things about pregnancy is that the minute anyone finds out you're growing a baby human they start treating you with kid gloves. People suddenly demand that they carry things for you - like your grocery bag or a heavy box. Or your bottle of soda. Phew! Wouldn't want to put any stress on my arm!

Friends who are normally crazy drivers suddenly drive the speed limit and take corners with extreme caution; tailgating? God, no. Friends who smoke suddenly refuse to do it in front of me - even outdoors. On a windy day. People who never blinked when I swore like a sailor ask, "Are you going to still talk like that when your kid is born?" (the answer to that question is, "Probably - but not so much on purpose.") The other day at work I walked into a meeting where all the seats were taken, and without missing a beat, a co-worker stood up and said, "You can sit." I said that wasn't necessary - after all, I'm not so pregnant that standing has become a chore. But she insisted, so I accepted. I swear, I'm not milking this pregnancy thing on purpose. Even when you're not trying to milk it, people will do it FOR YOU.

Oddly enough, M is not one of these people. He will still allow me to pick up relatively weighty objects, won't think twice about handing me two (or five) grocery bags to carry, and I don't see him relinquishing his seat for me. This is not because he is thoughtless. It's just that he knows I don't need that kind of thing from him. And if I did, he'd have made up for it by getting more protective of me in ways that most people probably would never notice. He wonders aloud if I should use household cleaning products, and whether I should walk Ollie along dark streets. He never grumbled (much) when I kicked him repeatedly (and then just kicked him OUT of bed) in the first trimester for snoring too loudly and preventing me from sleeping. And he has never once made even the slightest bit of noise about how utterly lazy I have become. He takes Ollie out more than he should have to because he knows I will get unnaturally cold by going outside.

So at home, I still make plan and make all the dinners, and I still carry the heavy vacuum up from the basement, and I still do stuff that perhaps some pregnant women might milk their way out of. But I'm really lucky that, on the days when I do nothing but sit on the couch watching reruns of Friends that I've already seen 15 times, he doesn't bother me about it.

Baby's First Big Mac

2007-03-22T13:14:00.001-04:00

I wasn't kidding yesterday when I said I had plans to go to McDonald's for lunch today. And so, Weeble enjoyed the first and only Big Mac he or she will ever have for as long as I can help it.

Sure, I feel guilty about the fat and sodium intake - and how McDonald's is NOT meant to be a balanced part of the pregnant lady's diet. And I feel bad about supporting the megalomaniac that is McDonald's in any way. But I tell you what: right now, as I continue to ride on the high of delicious fatty, salty goodness that comprises a Big Mac and fries... I am very happy.

Talk to me in about 20 minutes when the high starts to wane and I descend into a pit of despair over what I have put into my body and into the body of my poor defenseless child. Until then, live it up, Baby! Because I'm lovin' it.

Red, Red Wine

2007-03-21T08:45:00.000-04:00

So far during the pregnancy, I haven't had any major or unusual cravings. Unless, of course, you count the need to place food into my mouth no fewer than every 3 hours a craving. Once, at around 12 weeks, I had a longing for green olives, and so when M brought them home, I finished off nearly half the jar in one sitting (note: I am not terribly interested in green olives anymore).

Otherwise, however, overall "cravings" have been limited to "see picture of food, want food" or "smell food, want food". This includes stuff I normally wouldn't eat - such as McDonald's. Today I caught an imaginary whiff of McDonald's (I say "imaginary" because there wasn't actually any around me) and I have since arranged to have lunch there tomorrow.

I haven't even missed beer all that much, in spite of the fact that it is a beloved beverage of choice for me. What I have truly missed, however, is red wine. OH! How I miss it! I would bathe in the stuff at this point.

A lot of people, upon hearing of this particular issue, remind me that it's probably OK for me to imbibe a little - especially now that I'm in second-trimester-land. And being of the sort who hasn't been denying herself much (yeah, that's right, I've had tuna... and I'll be damned if I'm leaving feta off my giant Russo's salad), I'm not totally opposed to the idea of having a small glass every now and again just to take the red wine edge off. But somehow I haven't done it yet. I've had opportunity. And I don't look so pregnant as to be in fear of being judged by others seeing me drink a glass (all the average onlooker would probably think is, "hey, chubby lady drinking wine"). So I'm not sure what's holding me back. Because it certainly isn't lack of wanting it. Because, yeah, I want it. I want it bad.

Shallow belly button

2007-03-12T21:28:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was a rough day for me. M took Ollie to the dog park and I ventured out to try and find some maternity bras and other clothing. This would be because my pants are tighter every day, and, let's be frank here, my boobs are out of control. I was starting to feel BIG, and that was freaking me out a little bit.

Then I made the mistake of going to JC Penney, which I knew from their website has maternity clothes. BIG MISTAKE. They're apparently remodeling the store near us, and all their maternity clothes were jammed into this one area, very small, everything very close together. Were I any more pregnant and any bigger, I probably would have gone completely ballistic and actually maimed someone.

As it was, I managed to keep most of my seething rage inside - even as I'd find something semi-cute (out of the heaps of ugly, insulting crap) and then OF COURSE it wouldn't be in my size. Along with that was the seasonal issue. I know summer's coming (let me call out, here: WE LIVE IN NEW ENGLAND! Summer - hell, spring! - could still be months away), but how about they lay off the capri pants a bit? I'm pregnant and need new pants NOW, not 2 months from now when the weather will actually allow me to wear capris! Don't pregnant women need to continue working their real corporate jobs??? According to JC Penney, it's all capris and other such bullshit once you're gestating!

Just thinking about it makes me angry. And of COURSE they didn't have any maternity lingerie - not that I could find anyway. And that's really what I need at this point. I think my current bras actually quiver with fear when I pick them up to put them on - as do my poor beleaguered boobs, which are getting all their circulation cut off by the too-small underwired cups I'm currently stuck with.

I went home utterly deflated, feeling ugly and fat, and depressed as hell at what is clearly to be my lot in life for the next several (never-ending) months. Then M kindly suggested I try Target, since they have a maternity section. I thought that seemed like a great idea - I've walked through there before and seen some cute stuff. As expected, they did have some agreeable options, but, again, I'd find a cute pair of pants and they'd be either way too big or way too small - never in my size. The 2 pairs I did try on (one a size up, another a size down - seriously, they did NOT have my size!) didn't fit. Duh.

Then I tried on a few dresses because we're going to a wedding next weekend and I'm already at a loss as to what I should wear. That's when the depression fairy actually flew UP MY BUTT and made me want to run screaming into the hills of Not-Pregnant. I'm something like 17+ weeks along - I shouldn't already look like I'm ready to pop a kid out! Granted, I can somewhat improve this appearance by standing up straighter and sucking in a bit. But goddammit, I have a GIANT GUT on me! And my ass is making every effort to catch up - and fast. And of course, pregnancy wear is ALL about the jersey knit - which looks like shit on me even when I'm NOT pregnant. Add another layer of lovely fat, aforementioned Giant Gut, bigger-than-ever ass, and you've got a recipe for disaster. I'm jiggly, I'm big, and I'm hormonal. Who thinks that jersey knit is a good idea? I would like to get my hands on any designer who uses this vile material on anything but tee shirts and wring their stupid, skinny, CLEARLY never-been-fat-and-pregnant necks!!! AAAACKCCCKCKCCCKKK!!!!!!

Anyway, another fun discovery this weekend is that I now have access to way more of my belly button than ever before. This is because it's already pooching out and on its way to being an outie. Yep. Where I used to be able to store chapstick in there due to its impressive depth, now I am busy creating the Mount Vesuvius of navels. Just one more example of how my body is changing - rapidly and beyond my control.

It's the no-control thing that has me utterly freaked out, I think. I feel like I'm on a roller coaster that's constantly going over very steep drops, and I keep shrieking to get off, but the operator (aka: the Weeble) is clearly NOT LISTENING! So over these precipitous drops I will continue to go until I give birth - and then I suppose I'm getting on an altogether different roller coaster where the operator (aka: currently unnamed progeny) will continue to ignore my pleas to stop and get off.

Oof.

OK, so it's not all as bad as I make it sound. What I need is to just vent like crazy and be told that everything is normal, everything is OK, and I will not be a fat lard-o forever. I have the very VERY good fortune of having a husband who finds my pregnant body beautiful. Every time he touches my belly, he goes a little fuzzy with delight. It never fails to make me feel a little better about myself.

Skunk

2007-03-05T21:08:00.000-05:00

Our dog was skunked at midnight a few nights ago. This is conceivably one of the worst things that has ever happened to me, my husband, or my dog. I do not doubt the two cats were also quite miserable. The Weeble, well-protected in its stench-blocking placenta, most likely noticed nothing. Lucky little bastard.

If you've never been through the particular delights of a skunk spraying, let me assure you, it is NOT like driving by a roadkill skunk. Not one little bit. Fresh skunk stink is something altogether more heinous than anything you could ever imagine. Why we're not using this stuff as a means to get terrorists to talk is beyond me, because I'd do just about anything to get away from the smell.

Thanks to a thorough rinsing, a (cold and useless) tomato juice rinse, a regular shampoo bath, and then a hydrogen/dish detergent/baking soda bath and another thorough rinsing (all this in the hour following the spraying - there have been countless baths since then), Ollie-pup is tolerable. The house is livable. This is about as much as I care to discuss, however.

Should you, few, rare readers, ever find yourself in this predicament, a few words of advice (TAKE IT and your life will be happier for it):

1. If it can be helped, do NOT bring the dog indoors to be cleaned. This would be very bad.

2. If it cannot be helped, do NOT allow him to walk on carpet, rugs, or anything that is not readily washed. This would be very bad.

3. Under no circumstances should you touch (or even look in the direction of) the dog without nuclear-grade protective gloves. If you ignore this advice, and you touch your dog, you WILL stink like skunk for weeks - maybe longer. This would be very bad.

4. Don't bother with tomato juice. It does nothing but make your dog smell like tomatoes, but only as long as it's actually on the dog. Then he just smells like faintly tomato-y skunk misery. This is very bad.

5. Use a mixture of baking soda, dish detergent, and hydrogen peroxide. If you are smart, you will have these items already available so you don't have to run out to the convenience store at 12:45 a.m. in order to acquire them.

And god help you.

Spreading the news

2007-02-28T19:42:00.000-05:00

Once we got the first ultrasound and confirmation that, indeed, there is a baby, we started telling everyone else. Besides the North Dakota family that found out early (along with my mother around that same time), only a few other people found out. This usually happened when I wasn't drinking, which is highly unusual for a booze-hound such as myself. Otherwise, we kept it generally under wraps until almost 14 weeks. But with ultrasound picture in hand, the news was too much to keep to ourselves.

I'm still amazed we managed to hold it in that long. There times when I could feel the news trying to escape me like some freaky alien pushing against the inside of my chest walls. Telling M's parents was probably the most fun, since they were so taken off guard and surprised they could barely react. After years of listening to us repeat "no kids, no kids, no kids" over and over again, they had probably all but given up on getting a grandkid out of us. So being able to give them such a happy surprise remains one of my favorite things about this pregnancy so far.

The first to know

2007-02-23T20:05:00.000-05:00

I am a big believer in getting past the primary danger zone of months 1-3 of a pregnancy before going baby crazy and telling everyone you know. Having an early miscarriage (as I did, at about 5 weeks in September 2006) will do that to you - make you a little gunshy, a little cautious, a lot nervous. Why spread the good news only to have to turn around and spread bad news - while your heart is breaking uncontrollably, no less.

And there's definitely something about that particular brand of news that's special in a way that, at first, you want to keep private. Well, at least M and I did. Besides the fact that, even though we semi-planned for getting pregnant at some point, it had always remained just that: "at some point". In the distant, unforeseeable, needn't-be-dealt-with-just-now future. So we ourselves had to spend some time getting used to the idea, figuring out how to get on board, and staring at each other in incredulity for a minimum of 2 hours daily. This is no small amount considering we're home and together for only about 5 waking hours on your average weekday. In the first 10 days, keeping this information to ourselves wasn't the most difficult thing we had ever done.

But when we drove to my second-home-state of North Dakota for Christmas to spend the holidays with my father, half-sister, and other associated family members on his side, the news became much more pressing. There's a whole story about part of the reason we needed to tell my dad about the pregnancy that's neither interesting nor relevant. The other, more interesting reason had to do with the fact that, since my mother had had custody of me growing up, my father was always the second to know everything about me. Not that I wasn't close to him - I was. But when you're a girl, and you live with your mom, she tends to be the mouth of the river. All things flowed downriver from her.

Sharing news of the pregnancy, albeit very early, seemed like a pretty decent opportunity to let my dad in on something first for a change. So we told him. And he was thrilled. When my step-mother (whom my father told, as we expected) started pressuring me to tell the rest of the family (aunts, uncles, cousins, my grandmother, and half-sister) I resisted. Sure, they'd be incredibly happy at the news. But I couldn't shake that feeling of "but how sad will they be if it goes badly?" In the end, I couldn't pass up the one opportunity I'd have inside of three years (which is about as often as I get to North Dakota) to share this news with family members I rarely see in person.

Double or nothing

2007-02-16T12:29:00.000-05:00

So the $10 bet became a $20 bet only a day or two after we found out I was pregnant. That Sunday night we found out, M had a vivid dream about a girl, which was enough to convince him that the kernel-sized embryo in me would be of the female persuasion. Upon presenting this notion to me, I responded that I simply had no feeling either way (who does at that point?), so I couldn't commit to one gender over the other. To which he responded, "Double or nothing, it's a girl." So here we are today, with a $20 bet.

I still have no feeling of certainty either way. If I'm really honest with myself, I will probably say that I hope it's a girl, even though "healthy baby" is truly the most important thing. Every mother-to-be says that, but now I know why. It's true. So part of me thinks that because deep-down I want the girl, it MUST be a boy. That's how it usually works for me, so I continue to think of boys names and what it would be like to raise a boy. But then when I imagine the child - all born, present, in this world, and growing up - I think of her as a girl.

Everyone else in our world is split - half say girl, the other half say boy. M and I alternate between "he," "she," and "it" (the worst of all unknown-gender-baby pronouns), but have dubbed it "The Weeble" for official purposes.

We got our first ultrasound pictures of Weeble. There's not much to see. A head, a spine, a brain, legs, arms... the usual stuff. But so much is lost in the translation of mere pictures from that experience. Seeing it move was by far the most wonderful, amazing part. When it kicked its little legs and waved its little bud arms, you realize - wow, it's a little person in there.

I bet you $10 you're pregnant.

2007-02-12T11:18:00.000-05:00

That's how it started. We hadn't really been trying, and I didn't have any reason to believe I was pregnant. But M was convinced, based on the fact that I was a little late (not entirely unheard of at the time) and a couple dizzy, nauseated moments. So when I declined to agree with him, he bet me $10, and I took it on.

Three days later, on Sunday December 10th, 2006, I asked him if he wanted me to ruin his life that particular night or wait a few more days. I think he nearly barfed. But in the end we decided I'd go ahead and take the test. I dutifully peed on the little stick while he put food on the grill. Clearly it was one of our tenderest moments. I turned it over so I couldn't see the results and walked out, only to send him back in to find out what it was.

"You owe me $10. And I told you so." Or something to that effect. I'm not sure we said much else for the rest of the night. You find out your entire life just changed, and somehow there's nothing to say.

And that is how it started.