Will Write for Babysitting

Random postpartum thoughts

2009-09-24T16:18:00.000-07:00

My daughter is 3 1/2 weeks old and I am just now sitting down to write anything. Surprising? No, not at all.

Life with three kids has not been nearly as bad as I'd feared. The transition from one to two when G was born was harder and my memories of that time are not all good ones. I was an emotional mess, D had more difficult time adjusting and things were pretty overwhelming for a while. I expected a replay of all that, only possibly worse because now I have three, not two.

What has happened has been much smoother, and boy am I grateful. D is older, and although he'll always be sensitive, he's mellowed out some as he's gotten older. He's also not used to being the only recipient of my attention. G has never had me all to himself all the time, so for both of them, adding another little person to the household hasn't been too traumatic. Plus, they have each other and that has made a world of difference. They've bonded over the summer in a way that makes me so happy. G's language skills have improved dramatically and I think that's made it easier for he and D to play together. They have fun, they fight and do what brothers do - but keeping each other company has been a big part of what's made life easier for me now that there are three of them.

And it helps that Little Miss is quite the easy baby. She's mellow most of the time, sleeps a TON, nurses well and doesn't cry a whole lot. Sure, there are times when she won't settle enough for me to put her down for long periods of time, making it tough to get anything done. And my expectations are much lower than they would be without a newborn; its a win if I get a shower, and we're all dressed and fed regularly throughout the day :). And I do look forward to getting more than a couple of hours of sleep at a time. But all in all, I either hit the jackpot with my daughter or she's going to make me pay for this when she's a teenager.

I'm taking things one day at a time and trying very hard not to dwell on the fact that I feel fat and out of shape, or that none of my clothes fit, or I can't find a decent nursing bra that is both comfortable and supportive enough. It isn't always easy having a newborn to care for, let alone a newborn, a 2 year old and a 4 year old. But I know how quickly they grow, how fast things change, and I'm trying to enjoy things for how they are now, even though it can be a little crazy.

More than anything though, I'm so amazed at God's graciousness. I look at my beautiful children and almost can't believe I would be blessed so tremendously. I couldn't possibly have asked for a better scenario - my two kick ass boys and my beautiful little girl. She's like the icing on the cake - and not just any cake, the best, most delicious cake you've ever had.

What a day

2009-08-23T21:21:00.001-07:00

Late last night (or perhaps more accurately, early this morning), I woke up to a strong contraction. The clock read 2:45 am. About 5 minutes later, I had another one. Very uncomfortable. I stayed in bed a while, but after one or two more contractions, I realized I wasn't going to be able to sleep, and I got up. I had a feeling it might be the start of labor.

I knew I wasn't ready to go to the hospital just yet, but it felt like that point might be a few hours away. I got up, messed around online a bit, and played a lot of solitaire. I used this handy-dandy online contraction timing tool, and they were averaging about 5 minutes apart. They hurt. Not baby-is-imminent pain, but I figured this was the beginning.

After a while I went downstairs, had a glass of milk, and watched part of Napoleon Dynamite. I was sleepy, but the contractions were still too strong to sleep through. In between each one I wondered if it was going to continue, but as each one came I kept thinking... of course this is it. Now its just a matter of time until they pick up in intensity, and I'll start making phone calls.

By 6am I was really tired, and decided to go back to bed. I knew I needed DH to get up with the boys, even if I was up too. I didn't want to be dealing with diaper changes and breakfast if I was in labor. So I headed back to bed with the sneaking suspicion that the last few contractions had been further apart than before. My husband woke up shortly after I came back to bed and I told him I thought it would be today. When the boys got up a little while later, he told me to stay in bed and rest and he got up with them.

By that point I was so tired, but wishing I had my laptop handy to time the contractions again for a while. They didn't feel like they were coming as fast. Could it be possible that labor wasn't starting? That all these strong, 5-minutes apart contractions were not going to intensify, that I'd fall asleep and wake up later to nothing? A couple hours ago, that had seemed impossible. I was starting to wonder.

Unfortunately, I was right. I fell asleep for about an hour and a half. It was 9:00 am by that point and I had been sleeping... meaning either not having contractions, or they were mild enough that I was once again sleeping through them. I waited a bit. Nothing. No more contractions.

To say I was discouraged would be putting it mildly. I had thought things were getting started, that by that time of morning we'd be at least heading to the hospital, if not there already. I was feeling calm, ready to face the challenge. My anxiousness over labor was gone, resolve in its place. And then everything stopped.

I've spent the day tired, quite uncomfortable and trying very hard to keep a good attitude about the whole mess. Baby will come when she's ready, I know this. I can hang in there as long as necessary; I'm not one to go to my doctor begging for an induction (hardly, pitocin and I don't exactly play nice together, as I discovered with my first). But that was really hard to deal with. I was ready, just waiting it out until it felt like the right time to go - and I'm sure had this been my first baby, I would have gone to the hospital and been sent home. But here I am, wondering if I'll get any sleep tonight, wondering if things will pick up again, wondering how much time I have left before labor really starts and we can get this show on the road. And wondering how long I'm going to have to wait through regular contractions before I can be sure. Part of me feels like it must be soon - how could my body do all that and then stay pregnant for much longer? But part of me knows you just can't predict these things.

Thankfully I have the greatest husband ever. He took care of the boys all day long so I could rest, not complaining at all about the fact that he was tired too (and he was - he expected to be sleeping in this morning, since that's usually the plan on Sundays, and I'm sure he was up late). But he handled things without complaint and let me do what I needed to do, whether it was get out of the house for a while or take a long nap this afternoon. I'm a lucky woman, that's for sure.

So now we keep waiting. I just hope I either get a good nights sleep tonight, or go into labor for real so I don't have to deal with another night of contractions that don't do anything.

Keeping it in perspective.

2009-08-19T20:15:00.000-07:00

There was a time when I had to face the possiblity that I wouldn't be able to have children. Not to the extent that some women do, but it took 2 1/2 years before we conceived our first son. That gave us ample time to contemplate - what if the next step doesn't work?... how far are we willing to go?... how much are we willing to spend?... what about adoption?... can we imagine life without kids at all?

Ultimately, we were able to get pregnant without medical intervention (the medical interventions hadn't worked), and then get pregnant two more times very easily. I consider myself extraordinarily lucky, not only to have been able to get pregnant once, but three times. That's a feat many women in my position are never able to accomplish, and many more are only able to do so with a lot of expensive medical help.

I'm keeping that in mind as I look forward to the birth of my third child. I've found myself dreading the labor process, nervous about going through the pain and hard work again. And I've found myself similarly dreading the newborn phase, with the fussiness, the lack of sleep, the early days of nursing, and dealing with all of that along with two other children.

But wait - I get to deal with all of that with two other children?

There is a moment, or perhaps a series of similar moments that blend into one, that keep popping into my head lately. It was around 6 1/2 years ago and I was driving to work in the morning. I wasn't happy at my job and was contemplating whether or not I should start looking for a new one. We'd also recently undergone a series of infertility treatments that hadn't worked and decided to stop because of the expense and emotional toll. I remember looking in my backseat and wishing so hard that there was a carseat there; and that I wasn't going to work, but going to some baby class or a check up at the doctor or to visit my mom. And I prayed, as I did so often then, that God would bless us with a baby soon, and if it couldn't be soon that He would bless us with a baby someday so we would know the joys of raising a family.

He certainly has answered.

Six or 7 years ago I would have given almost anything to be where I am today. Not just pregnant, but pregnant with my third child. So many nights I spent wondering if it would ever happen, and wishing I could at least know the answer to "if", even if I didn't know "when". Here I am, about to actually cross the finish line on that journey. Our little family almost complete.

I need to keep that in mind in the days and weeks ahead. I am so grateful for this gift. No, parenting is not easy and there will be times when I am tired, overwhelmed and frustrated. But instead of thinking with dread on how much work it is to have an infant, I need to keep in mind the woman who wanted this so badly she could taste it, but still had to wait. And all those other women out there who tearfully offer up their prayers that they may be similiarly blessed. I add mine to theirs, a soft plea to the Lord that He may grant their wish and bless them with a child. And may He bless me with the stamina, patience, humility and gratitude that I need to be a good mother to these children, and to get through the harder moments.

Contractions and me

2009-08-16T23:02:00.001-07:00

I wish I was one of those women who only got contractions when they are actually in labor - or just about to go into labor. Recently I was talking to a friend of mine about how things went down with her second son. She remembers having one contraction as they were watching something on TV, and it made her wonder. Then nothing for an hour or so, then she had another one. By contraction three, she knew it would be that night and they called me to come (I was going to watch their then-two-year-old). When I got there, she was having regular ones, they went to the hospital, and four or five hours later, her son was born.

I'm the polar opposite. I have daily contractions for the last several months of my pregnancies. And when you get to this point (I'm 37 1/2 weeks at the moment), I get nice, strong, uncomfortable ones some of the time. Not strong enough to make me head to the hospital, or even call my doctor's office. But strong enough to be a pain in the ass. Or more accurately, pain in the uterus.

Yesterday I had contractions about 10 minutes apart for 12 hours. TWELVE HOURS. The problem is, every time my husband and I get busy, I pay for it for the next half a day. And making it slightly more anxiety producing is the fact that my labor with G started in just that way. An afternoon quickie, followed by 12 hours of regular, but not too intense contractions, led up to my contrax picking up in intensity and a few hours later we were headed for the hospital. So you can imagine last night around 10pm, when my contrax had been going since noon, I was starting to wonder if I'd be getting any sleep last night.

Clearly, I wasn't ready to go into labor just yet. Part of me is glad for that. I'd like this baby to bake a little bit longer. Not that 37-ish weeks would be a bad thing, if things started naturally. But a little more time to put on some weight, make sure her lungs are completely ready, and a tiny less time in the extra fussy newborn zone would be great. I'm with Weissbluth on the theory that fussiness peaks at 6 weeks old, then gets better - except it can be 6 weeks from the due date, not necessarily 6 weeks from the date of birth. G was textbook in that department - he was 10 days early and right around 7 1/2 weeks his disposition improved a lot. So, to me, the earlier the baby is born, the longer you get in the extra fussy phase.

But I digress...

I've had a bunch of contractions today too, especially tonight. Nothing regular, nothing too intense. Just enough to make me uncomfortable and remind me of what I'm about to go up against.

Last night I was pretty stressed and upset (hormonally driven in large part, I'm sure). My husband was remarkably understanding. He said it reminds him of wrestling. You're at this tournament and you know you're about to go up against a guy who is really good. He's bigger than you and he's probably going to throw you around pretty good, although you know you can beat him if you work really hard. The time leading up to the match leaves you with butterflies in your stomach and you really don't want to be there. You almost want to quit and walk away, but you stay, and you face it. You wrestle the guy and its really hard, you're exhausted by the end, but you won and it was worth it. I told him its a pretty good analogy, especially from a guy's perspective. But you have to add one thing - in this case, you have to show up to this ongoing tournament day after day and you don't know when your match is going to come up until right before you have to wrestle. So you sit there on the bleachers, trying to be ready, but not too ready; trying not to think too hard about what you have to do or whether the guy is going to be hard to beat. You sit there day after day, until finally, the coach calls your name. But until then, you wait.

The waiting is tedious. Will it be tonight? Next week? September 1st? No real way to know, and in the meantime I have all these damn contractions to keep me company.

Spoke too soon

2009-08-14T15:02:00.001-07:00

Apparently I was wrong on two counts about having my mom with me during labor/delivery. My husband doesn't mind if she comes, and unbeknownst to me, she's already been preparing.

I told my husband last night that I wasn't sure if I would have her come, and that part of the reason is because he didn't seem to want her there. He assured me that he doesn't mind at all, and if I want her here, it's more than fine with him. I still maintain that part of him wasn't kidding, and he feels as if I'm saying he isn't good enough - but he swears that isn't the case.

As for my reservations about how committed my mom really is to being there - she called me this afternoon to tell me she's been reading up on labor coaching and such online. I haven't even talked to her about any of it in months, so obviously she not only remembered that I'd asked, she's been preparing. That made me feel quite a bit better. I was so worried that if/when I brought it up, her reaction would be lukewarm. Like if I said, "So, do you want me to call you day or night so you can come down?" she might have hesitated, or acted as if she didn't really want to come at all hours, but would if I wanted her to. I guess I was wrong.

So I think my mom will be coming down to help me through labor and delivery - and knowing that she's fully on board and my husband is too makes it feel like the right thing.

Now onto my next problem - I can't seem to get my wedding ring off my finger...

The mom dilemma (as in, my mom)

2009-08-12T12:08:00.000-07:00

Early on this pregnancy, I was contemplating if I want to do anything different while I'm in labor. I've tossed around the idea of a doula, since I think the concept is wonderful and I'm sure it would help. The cost, however, is definitely an issue. Then I got to thinking - maybe my mom could fill that role.

My husband means well and to his credit, both times he's been more than willing to do/get anything I ask for. But the problem is, I have to ask. When I'm in the midst of high pain, I'd kind of like someone to suggest things - here, try sitting on the ball for a while. Do you want to sit in the tub? Does rubbing your lower back help? That kind of thing. My husband gets a little overwhelmed and doesn't really know what to try. He's great if I ask for ice, or cold water, or help with something. But I think it might be helpful to have someone there who has been there, done that and can take things a step further to help keep me relaxed and comfortable as much as possible during the worst of it.

I asked my husband early on if he'd mind if I asked my mom to be there to help. He said something along the lines of, "Of course not - whatever you need is fine with me." That was early on. More recently his attitude has taken the sound of, "I guess I'm not good enough to help you birth our baby and you need your mom here since I suck." He's half kidding - but only half.

While I realize I'm the one giving birth, therefore what I need is the most important thing and he can live with it - I'm also sensitive to his feelings on the subject. If at the getgo he had said he didn't like the idea of my mom being there, I probably would have said ok and not worried about it. But this gets trickier because months ago, I asked my mom if she'd be willing to come and help me through my labor. So it's already out there.

Last night he brought it up and asked if my mom would be coming. I haven't talked to her about it in a long time, but I'm sure she remembers that I asked. He still feels a little put out that I would have her there. And to be fair to him, it's more than just his ego. He wants it to be more intimate, the moment we meet our child for the first time. He doesn't like the idea of anyone else being there (except the doctor and nurses of course - he has no interest in doing things himself, LOL). And I do understand where he's coming from.

But now I have to decide if I want to ask my mom again if she can be there, or if I should just let it go and not call her right away when the time comes. I do know that I'm blessed with a mother who won't take it personally, make me feel guilty, or make a big deal out of it. Whatever I want will be fine with her, whether I have her come or not. Well, she might be a little disappointed if I don't have her there, but it won't be a big deal.

The other thing I have to consider is how willing my mom really is to come, day or night. She's very busy with her job and although she has the flexibility to leave at a moments notice, I don't know if she really wants to - or maybe it's whether she feels like she can. It's a part of my relationship with my mom that sometimes troubles me, but I feel like it's the selfish child left inside me that gets rubbed wrong. If you asked me if my mom would be willing to drop everything for me - the answer would be yes, and no. Yes, she would in a heartbeat if I told her I really needed her. But it isn't always her first instinct. She has a busy life of her own and she's grown quite accustomed to her children being self sufficient adults. It's not that she isn't willing to help or doesn't want to - but she doesn't always think of doing that above other things. I mean, she does - but at the same time, she doesn't. Don't get me wrong, my mom is wonderful and I have a fabulous relationship with her. But I wonder, if I talk to her about coming and ask if she wants me to have her come day or night, I have a feeling she'll hesitate.

So it makes me wonder if I should go ahead and ask her to be there or not. I guess the bottom line is how badly do I want her there, and I'm torn on that count as well. While I think she would be helpful, right now I'm not feeling sure that she'd be helpful enough to overcome my husband's reservations about having her there. And I know he'd feel put aside and probably end up sitting and watching, feeling useless, and I don't like that.

I have some more time to consider it, so for now I think I'll leave it up in the air. But it has my tendency to overthink things going into overdrive. And let's be honest - if I wasn't overthinking this, I'd be overthinking something else...

The weird things about Sunday

2009-08-11T19:57:00.000-07:00

Sunday was my baby shower. It wasn't a regular shower, really. We met at one of those places where you can paint your own pottery and then went out to dinner. It was nice, we had a good time - but I was pretty surprised at how few people actually showed up. I invited 33 people and 5 showed up. Five. I have to admit, that was pretty disappointing. It wasn't about the presents at all - in that sense, it wasn't a traditional help the mom stock up on stuff shower. I just wanted to celebrate the fact that I'm having this baby by getting together with family and friends. But apparently any sort of celebration for a third baby isn't too high on people's priority lists.

The really crazy thing is that the one and only member of my family to show up was my aunt who lives 2 hours away! This when the venue was 5 minutes from another aunt, and maybe 20 minutes from 2 others. I'm quite appreciative of my aunt who did come - it means a lot to me that she would drive all that way, especially when no one else felt compelled to come.

In any case, the other weird thing about Sunday was that I had contractions starting at about 2 until probably 10:00 that night. They weren't the type to make me think I was in labor, and I'm certainly prone to bouts of contractions in the weeks leading up to the baby's arrival. That much is normal for me. What wasn't so normal was how long these lasted. They were probably 10 minutes apart or so, but whereas typically I would expect them to taper off after an hour or maybe two, these just kept coming. I was starting to wonder not if I was in labor then, but if I would be headed that direction overnight or possibly on Monday. As it turns out, my uterus was probably just irritable from all the activity that day and had I the opportunity to lie down, they would have stopped. But I didn't, so they kept coming. It was annoying and uncomfortable and did motivate me to pack my hospital bag, just in case.

I'll be 37 weeks tomorrow, considered full term. I'm hanging in there, but definitely at the point where if this baby is ready to come, she can make her appearance any time now. I'm a bit apprehensive about labor, and bringing a newborn home, but man am I uncomfortable. And tired. I don't remember the last weeks being this grueling with my boys. I think I'm carrying her low and its probably putting more pressure on my pelvis and bladder. I never want to be one of those "get this kid out of me now!" women, I can hang in there for the long haul if I have to - but if she wants to come a little earlier, that would be great by me.

The boys' room

2009-08-05T22:35:00.001-07:00

We have four bedrooms in our house, but a while back we decided that our two boys would share a room and the baby would get the room G is in now. The boys' room, as it would become, started out as D's room and it is HUGE. G's room is probably half the size. In any case, it seemed to fit well that the boys could share the big bedroom and our baby girl could have the small bedroom. One of the other bedrooms is obviously ours, and the final one is currently occupied by my sister-in-law, and once she moves out (someday, but not anytime soon) it will be a guest room/office (which is what it was before she lived here).

So... the plan originally was to wait until G was ready for a big boy bed to move him out of his room. He has a crib in his room and this crib will definitely not survive being taken apart and moved again. It's in good condition and perfectly safe, but it doesn't fit through the doorway unless you take it partially apart, and I remember when we moved it from D's room to G's, we decided we would not be taking it apart again - it would have to live in that room for the duration of its useful life or we'd risk stripping the screw holes.

Lately I've been thinking about whether we should get a second crib and move G into D's room sooner rather than later - and not make it about the big boy bed (there's a set of bunk beds in there now). We were just on vacation and the room we were in had a queen for us and a twin with a trundle bed. The first night DH was all about the idea of trying G out on the twin trundle, thinking if he slept fine there all week, we could transition him to the big boy bed at home. His sleep on that bed was anything but fine. The poor guy was so restless and didn't sleep well at all. The next night we put him in the pack-n-play we brought with us and he slept like a rock the rest of the week - naps and at night. Clearly he still needs the security of a crib.

This led me to the idea of getting the second crib, although I definitely didn't want to invest much money, since he won't be in a crib *that* much longer. So I got a really basic one from Ikea and my best friend still had her crib mattress, which kept the cost very reasonable. I picked it up today and we (and by we, I mean mostly my friend) but the crib together and G is sleeping in it as I type.

On one hand, I'm relieved we did it this way. Now there is no pressure to move G to a big boy bed or to free up his room. He'll be plenty used to sleeping in his new digs by the time baby arrives, so the change won't go hand-in-hand with new baby sister. I can start moving stuff out of his room and start organizing the new baby's stuff, something I've been dying to do lately. We can do bedtime with the boys together much more easily, in turn making it easier for one person to put both boys to bed, something that will come in handy when we have a newborn to care for soon. And we'll be able to put the baby in her room whenever we want. Both boys slept in our room for a while, so we didn't *have* to move G yet. But now we have the flexibility to use that room for the baby at any point, rather than it being a big hassle to move G out and all that.

On the other hand... its been an emotional night for me. This makes it feel about 1000 times more real that we are bringing home a third child soon. We've talked for months about how the boys will eventually share a room, and now here we are. And I have this touch of guilt that the room now looks like D's room with a random crib on one wall - not like THEIR room. Obviously that's completely my issue, as my 2-year old couldn't care less. Luckily DH was with me on this (the concept, if not the guilt), and we're going to do a few things to rearrange and decorate that will incorporate some of what is now in G's room into the new space, making it more their room.

A lot of changes going on in my house lately. And more to come...

Nesting, foiled

2009-08-01T21:17:00.001-07:00

I thought I read somewhere that the nesting urge is usually accompanied by a burst of energy - in other words, you get real motivated to clean and organize and you find yourself with the energy to do so. My body apparently didn't get that memo.

Right now I would give just about anything for an organized pantry. We have this amazing pantry that is literally a small room. But we're not using the space well; only one wall has shelves on it and the rest tends to get piled with random crap. It's a mess right now and has been for months. Also for months I've been talking about putting in more shelves, but I guess I keep finding reasons to not spend the money. As of right now, I don't give a crap how much it costs, I just want more shelves in there so I can clean it up and organize things. Seriously, this urge is so strong it's killing me that I can't do anything about it.

The problem is, I get tired so quickly the very thought of going to Home Depot to get the shelves is exhausting - let alone putting them up and doing all the work to reorganize. I asked my husband this afternoon if he'd go get the shelves with me and install them. He wasn't particularly interested in indulging my nesting urge. If I had pressed the issue, he probably would have given in eventually, but he'd have been grumpy about it, so I left it alone.

Tonight I tried, rather unsuccessfully, to explain to him why this whole thing is so distressing to me. I don't think he understands at all. Not that I blame him, really - it doesn't make a whole lot of sense that the unorganized pantry would be the cause of my tearful breakdown after we'd put the boys to bed. The problem is, my anxiety right now isn't about the pantry, or the mess of toys in the family room, or the once again dirty kitchen that I just cleaned up, or even the fact that I could vacuum the damn floor eight times a day and it would always be dirty.

I feel out of control, unorganized and helpless to do much of anything about it. The pantry is my glaring example and the current focus of my distress. It's a mess, there's stuff in there that needs to be thrown out, other stuff that needs a place, and so much potential to be a great storage area. I was feeling super motivated to fix the problem, but I'm not physically able to do it. I can't lift heavy stuff, and probably more importantly, I don't have the stamina. I get winded walking up the stairs, I had to sit down for 10 minutes after I did the dishes this afternoon and if I'm not careful I'll either give myself a fit of braxton hicks contractions or a serious backache, or both.

And as willing as my husband is to help, he doesn't get it. He keeps asking me what he can do, what I need, how he can fix it. Um, put up shelves in the pantry? But besides that, I do need him to help me more. Part of my anxiety is the fact that I physically can't keep up with everything right now without overdoing it, yet I have a hard time delegating tasks to him. Part of it is definitely my issue, but I have to say, part of it is him. He tends to forget to do things I've asked him to do, which makes me feel like I have to ask and remind 20 times, and then I really feel like a nagging wife. I also hate the inevitable sob story about how he so didn't want to do the dishes last night, but he made himself get it done because he knew he needed to, blah, blah, blah. I end up feeling guilty for asking him to help around the house - again, partly my issue, I know.

The bottom line is, my house is a disorganized mess and I don't have the energy to do everything that needs to be done. And I hate that. My desire to fix the pantry is so strong, but I can't do it, and lacking a house boy who will do my bidding without complaint, I'm sort of stuck. I hate the idea of sitting around issuing orders along the lines of put this here, put that there, this needs to be done, now that needs to be done... But to get things the way I would have them right now, had I the energy, that's exactly what I would have to do, and it isn't going to happen. Once I start listing things I need my husband to do, I have until about item three before his eyes glaze over and I know I've lost him.

He keeps reminding me this is only temporary, and probably the last time I'll be pregnant, so on and so forth. Of course, he's right. But it doesn't change the fact that I'm a raging mess of hormones who can't breathe deeply and wants a clean and organized house more than he could possibly imagine.

I hate feeling helpless.

A little worry - but probably not

2009-08-01T08:42:00.000-07:00

I have this little worry in the back of my head that I'm on the verge of unexpected pregnancy complications and it's going to result in needing to try to deliver this baby early. Why? Probably mostly because I'm hormonal and achey. But my blood pressure was a little higher than it usually is at my last appointment - not high, per se. But it has been very consistent at every appointment, and last week it was a little higher. Neither the nurse nor my OB even mentioned it, but the number stuck in my head and made me wonder. I did have high BP with my first, and it got pretty bad at the end. All was well, but I did have my labor augmented with pitocin, and let me tell you, me and pit do not get along so well. I'm very motivated to keep that from happening again, if I can.

There was also a bit of sugar in my urine, so she tested my blood sugar and it was 120. That isn't high per se, and both the nurse and my OB seemed to dismiss it as an issue. But all I'd eaten that morning was a bowl of cereal and a glass of milk and I was getting hungry again - so to me, I can't help but wonder if under those circumstances 120 was higher than it ought to be. Then again, maybe I run higher than one would expect for a bit before my blood sugar drops off again. I did fail the 1 hour GTT, and that is probably why - at one hour, it was higher than they'd like it to be, but when I took the 3 hour, my 2 and 3 hour readings especially were great.

I'm overthinking things, I'm sure. I'm just hoping that things continue to go smoothly and I'm not blindsided by a random complication like high BP or (God forbid), preecclampsia - especially if that means we have to try to induce early and I end up with a baby who wasn't quite ready to come out, or a c-section, or both.

Truthfully, I'm hoping that if I write this down I will somehow bend the tides of fate and by predicting that something is about to go wrong, I will prove myself wrong and everything will go fine. Like if I predict it, it therefore cannot happen. Nice logic, huh?

Caffeine detox.. aka my head hurts

2009-07-30T21:56:00.000-07:00

I think I have a caffeine headache - as in, lack of caffeine. I don't drink a ton of it - I'm not a regular coffee drinker or anything. But I probably have a diet coke most days, so when I go a few days without, I do get a headache.

My husband is a huge diet coke addict, but when he drinks too much of it, he gets really bad acid reflux. I wish he could just learn something about moderation and keep it to a level that doesn't hurt his stomach. But what always happens is he quits drinking it for a while because his symptoms get so bad, and eventually he'll start drinking it again but only at restaurants. Then he'll get some once in a while elsewhere, but we won't keep it around the house. Pretty soon he'll be drinking several cans/bottles a day again and it will escalate to the point that he's up half the night with horrible heartburn. Then he decides to lay off it again... rinse, repeat.

In any case, when we have it around the house, I tend to drink it too, although rarely more than once a day. But it's enough that when I stop, as I said, my head hurts. It usually doesn't bother me until about day three, and that was today I think. Last week we were on vacation and my husband did some serious damage to himself with all the diet coke he was sucking down; I think he figured it was his last hurrah before he had to cut back again. So I figured this would be as good at time as any to detox myself from caffeine as well. I couldn't drink any caffeine when I was nursing D, so I want to be prepared to cut out caffeine with this baby too, just in case. And I figure now is probably a better time to go through the withdrawl headache than when I'm sleep deprived, hormonal and caring for a newborn 24/7.

Of course, its making an already uncomfortable time all the more uncomfortable, but I'm hoping that by tomorrow or the next day my head will feel fine and all I'll have left is the back pain, the sore pelvis, the shortness of breath and fatigue. Oh, and the heartburn - can't forget the heartburn.

I'm turning into such a complainer.

Random thoughts at 35-ish weeks

2009-07-28T19:43:00.001-07:00

I'll be 35 weeks tomorrow. We're hitting the point where it could be two more weeks (although I doubt it will be that soon), or it could be 6 more weeks (again, sort of doubt it will be quite that long, but you never know). Like I've said a million times now, my boys were 5 days and 10 days early (or 8 and 10 depending on which due date I use for D), so it is very easy to assume she'll be born about a week early. But you just never know and I want to be prepared to be pregnant longer, so I'm not too disappointed if she comes later.

However, I have to admit, it is going to feel awfully good to not be pregnant anymore. And for the record, my prediction is August 24th. Which I'm sure means it won't be that day.

Today hasn't been bad contraction-wise, but I still get a lot of them. I already feel like I've been flirting with early labor for weeks, and I have weeks left to go. You'd think this would give me a little jump start on dilation, but if this pregnancy is anything like my last two, I'll be closed up tight until the last minute despite my uterus's love affair with a certain braxton hicks.

If it weren't for my house being air conditioned, I think I would die. It was darn near 100 today, if not slightly above. That is seriously hot, especially when you don't have a lake to jump in like we did in Chelan last week. It was this hot there, but there's something about being on vacation and having a pool and a nice clear lake to swim in that makes such high heat a lot more bearable - fun, even.

I'm down to weekly doctor appointments now. I have the next 5 scheduled, but I'm hoping I only make it to the next four. Either tomorrow or next week he'll be doing a quick ultrasound to check to make sure she's head down and growing like she should be. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous about it - I'm fully entrenched in the daughter mentality, if there's actually a penis it's going to seriously freak me out. I guess I'm still feeling like it's too good to be true. I've been brave enough to start putting clothes away, but I haven't taken any tags off, nor washed anything, and the receipts are all still there. I do hope we get another good look so maybe I can let go of that last little bit of "what if" anxiety. I tell ya, I'm going to laugh at myself about this later.

I'd also be lying if I said I wasn't getting nervous about having a newborn again. Getting? Maybe I have been all along, to some degree.

Counting down the weeks and they're flying by....

Random thoughts

2009-07-13T13:39:00.000-07:00

I'll be 33 weeks in a couple of days. As far as stuff goes, I'm feeling pretty prepared. I got a great set of hand-me-downs from a friend - seriously some of the best hand-me-down baby stuff I've ever seen! I always had a lot of stuff for the boys from another friend, but by the time it got to me it had been through her two boys and their cousin, so a lot of it was really worn. This stuff is all practically brand new, and most of it Gymboree. Can't complain about that! So even though I'm starting from scratch in the clothes department, between the handful of things I've picked up and the stuff my friend gave me, I'm more or less set.

As far as having the baby goes, I suppose I'm as prepared as I'll ever be. I know it's going to be challenging having a newborn again, especially with the boys. D will be helpful for the most part, and he's largely self-sufficient (four is a great age), but G is still firmly entrenched in the terrible twos and I don't expect him to emerge anytime soon. It's going to be busy, tiring and sometimes downright overwhelming, I'm sure. But I know the newborn stage won't last forever and we'll all come out ok on the other side. I'm going to need reminding of that now and then...

I saw my grandmother yesterday, which was nice. Like most people, she asked about names, and although we actually think we know what we're naming her (not 100% sure), we're not telling and I've been deflecting the question lately by saying we simply haven't decided and then changing the subject. Partly I want it to be something of a surprise and partly I just don't feel like discussing our name choices. In any case, she brought it up and I could tell she did so because she'd heard one of the names we're considering and felt she needed to tell me that her neice, my dad's cousin, has a daughter with that name. And she phrased it with, "But there's already one in the family." So? I honestly don't know if I've ever met my dad's cousin in my entire life. Maybe once - I remember meeting her sister, but I'm not sure if she was there at the time. I know who she is, I know her parents fairly well, but she's not what I would consider close family by any stretch. Anyway, I just thought it was weird that my grandma figured we'd throw out a name just because some obscure family member who we never see used it. I seriously couldn't care less what my dad's cousin's kids are named, but I didn't want to sound too harsh about it. See, this is why I don't want to discuss names with others - I so don't want all the opinions and "I knew someone with that name and they were such a bitch..." and "But so and so's cousin's sister's former roommate named her kid that..." Blah, blah, blah. Like I care.

Horomonal much? Sorry.

With just over 7 weeks to go, I'm wondering more and more what this baby looks like, and I have to be honest, I'm still wondering if she's really a girl. The little nugget of doubt in my mind is so annoying, but I don't know if I'll relax about it until she's here. Maybe if we get a good look at our next ultrasound in a few weeks (my doc will do a quick one to check her position), but I know I'm going to be nervous that we'll see a penis. I am so excited at the prospect of actually having a daughter, I don't want it to be taken away from me. But I think about other things too - will she look like her brothers? Will she be darker skinned like Daddy and D, or lighter skinned like me and G? Will she also have brown eyes, like her brothers do or will she be the one to confirm hubby has a recessive gene? (He theoretically could, since both his parents are dominant/recessive, but he might be dominant/dominant, in which case any child he ever had would be brown eyed). Will she be active or mellow? Will she sleep? Oh please oh please let this one be a good sleeper....

Not much time left and with so much going on from week to week, I have a feeling the next month and a half is going to fly by as quickly as the last several months have. I'm going to be having this baby before I know it!

Difficult conversation, difficult decisions

2009-06-29T21:58:00.000-07:00

My husband and I had a conversation tonight about the guardianship of our children should something happen to us. It's a subject I hate to even ponder (especially with my raging hormones) because the very thought... I can't bear it. But I also know that we've been terribly remiss in not making sure we have things ironed out legally, so if the unthinkable did happen, the transition would be as smooth as it could be.

For a long time we assumed that our best friends would take our kids. In many ways, they are still a great option. We're all very close, our boys adore their two boys, adore them, they live literally right next door... Lots of reasons to choose them. But we both have to admit there are a few concerns making us question whether that would be the best place for our kids - particularly concerns about the wife, L. L is certainly one of my closest friends, but in a strange sort of "you're basically my sister, so I'm stuck with you rather than having chosen you" way. I love her dearly, but there are things about her that drive me crazy and things that make me wonder what kind of a mother figure she'd be to my kids. My husband and I are both worried that our kids would grow up feeling like a burden. I don't question whether the husband, A, loves my kids - I do question whether L does. Sometimes I catch something in her tone or in her eyes that makes me feel like she thinks my boys are, I don't know... annoying, maybe. I'm worried that, if I'm not imaginging it, my kids would pick up on it and never feel truly loved, truly at home.

I'm also concerned because L has never made any attempt to hide the fact that she does not want a girl. Part of the reason they stopped at two kids was because of her reluctance to chance having a girl. I'm sure that wasn't the only reason, and probably not even the most important. But she thinks little girls are all annoying drama queens. I also happen to believe that there's a big part of her that doesn't want the pressure of being the primary role model for a same-sex child. She likes the idea of having the option of sending the kids to daddy when questions get awkward as they grow up. Being a mom has been a great growing experience for her, especially because she stays home full time, but there's still a part of her that doesn't like being the one in charge, being the place where the buck stops. If she has boys, I think she feels that more of the responsibility for how they turn out can fall on her husband's shoulders; with a girl, she'd have to take more of that responsibility on herself and that scares her.

So here I am, about to have a girl (I think), and I have to ask - if something happened to us, is the best place for my daughter with a woman who doesn't want a daughter at all? I really don't know. Perhaps she'd let go of that piece of herself and embrace my daughter whole-heartedly. She's a good person; it isn't like she's a complete selfish bitch. But still, it's a worry.

Our other obvious option is my mom and stepdad, but it's telling that when we talk about it we only refer to my mom. My stepdad is a good guy, but he's not the best at being a father. He's an awesome grandpa, but it's a lot easier to be an awesome grandpa than an active father. I think if my mom had custody of them, she would do 99% of the parenting stuff; he'd be around a little for that, but not much. Our daughter certainly wouldn't have a strong father figure in her life, whereas with our friends she would. But there's no question in my mind that all our kids would be loved and taken care of well. There are things about that possibility that aren't ideal either (their age, the length of time its been since they had kids of their own at home, the amount of time they both have to travel for work, etc.). But I also think that if we were gone, and they had our kids, they'd do everything to make it work and always make the best interests of our kids their priority.

I also need to bring up to my husband the possiblity of my brother. I'm not sure we should discount him, although he's not the obvious choice. He's single, for one thing. He won't necessarily always be single, and certainly his choice of wife could change our decision. It would be a major adjustment for him to make, going from being on his own to raising three kids. It might be too much, really. But he loves them so much and he'd be a great father to his own kids (and I hope he'll get to be someday). I'm not sure, but the thought occurred to me that he might be an option, so I'll have to see how my husband feels about it.

The hardest part is knowing that there aren't any great scenarios. None of these options are US. No one else would ever do as good of a job raising our kids as we will, because no one are us. No one else would do things exactly the way we do, or would love them they way we do. I'm literally in tears as I write this, but I'm making myself finish because I know it's something we need to figure out, something we need to face in order to do right by our kids. Obviously my greatest hope is that these decisions never, ever matter. But it would be worse to leave our kids without a firm direction if we were gone, leave it to become a potential fight between the people who think they should have them. It needs to be clear cut and in writing so we don't have to worry about what would happen if we're not there to protect them.

Thirty-something weeks

2009-06-28T19:27:00.000-07:00

Last Wednesday, I hit 30 weeks. Just 10 short weeks until my due date, and possibly a bit less until this little one actually makes her arrival. The boys were both born before their due dates, which leads me to believe she'll probably be about a week early. Like I've been telling people though, I've said that so many times she'll probably decide she needs to prove me wrong and come in September after all. Only time will tell on that one.

I alternate between feeling a lot of excitement and anticipation at her impending arrival, and a sense of fear at what it will be like to have a newborn to care for once again. My husband and I aren't crazy about the newborn phase. The constant care, the crying, the not sleeping... breasts hurting and what is probably an inevitable bout of mastitis... not sleeping... Newborns are amazingly wonderful in their smallness, sweetness and softness. They're so helpless and so compelling. And so much work. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried that caring for a newborn while simultaneously caring for my two boys (particularly G who is such a handful) is going to do me in. But at the same time, I'm growing more curious by the day as to what she'll look like, how big she'll be, what pieces of her personality will show. And, yes, waiting anxiously for that ultimate confirmation that I am truly having a daughter and the small, but growing pile of pink and lavendar clothes won't all need to be returned to the store.

I'm doing my best to enjoy the last couple months of what should be my last pregnancy. I'm uncomfortable a lot - I don't remember my pelvis aching so much before. But in spite of that, there are so many amazing things about being pregnant. Feeling the baby move is absolutely one of the most incredible sensations - and this little one gives me plenty of opportunities to enjoy it. She's so active, there are times that I am amazed by her strength. And I often find myself wondering what her belly-antics mean about who she is.

I am, however, more than at peace with this being my last foray into motherhood. I have so many feelings swirling around - happy that this experience is nearing the end, nervous about the next chapter, nostalgic for the enjoyable parts of pregnancy knowing this is the last time, and above all, so grateful and amazed at how blessed we are.

Writing again

2009-06-14T19:40:00.000-07:00

In my spare time (ha ha, right?), I am attempting to write a book. I started it years ago, before I was pg with my first son. Back when I started, I had all these grandiose ideas of how it would go down. I'd get so caught up in writing, I'd be up late at night and struggle through the workday the following day. I even started trying to convince my husband that if we weren't pregnant by the end of the year (this was early 2004), then I would either take a leave of absence or quit my job so I could write full time for a while.

Then I got pregnant and my writing came to a grinding halt. My fiction writing, that is. For a while I had started to fear I wasn't actually getting anywhere, writing scenes that excited my imagination, but not much to link them together. Parts of it flowed well, but I had so many ideas and so many things I wanted to have happen, and much of it came to be with thoughts of "wouldn't it be cool if..." and I'd write the chapter. And then my pregnancy seemed to suck me dry of any creative energy I had. I'd sit at my computer and get nowhere. It was like I'd run out of gas.

At first, I didn't worry too much about it because I figured after I had the baby, I'd get my brain back and start up again. That was well over five years ago and save for the last several weeks, I quite literally hadn't even opened most of my files.

Something woke up in me recently, and I find it a little ironic that I happen to be pregnant again. I blamed my lack of focus and creativity on my first pregnancy, then later on my lack of time. But somehow I'm back to thinking about this story, daydreaming about the characters, and finding little bits of time to squeeze in writing. I'm not sure what has changed, but I'm happy about it. I'd made such a big deal about my grand ambitions to be a novelist, I've spent the last five years feeling a little bit like a failure. Not that I didn't think I could, and would, pick it up again. But I'd been feeling like "someday" was taking a lot longer to reach than I'd originally thought.

And with that, I'm going to go park myself on the couch and instead of mindlessly flipping channels, I'm going to do some writing. That, and covet a new, lightweight laptop...

Feeling better

2009-06-10T19:02:00.000-07:00

Thankfully, yesterday was a low. I feel a lot better today. I went to the gym, had to stop by the hubby's office, came home for lunch and a non-nap for Grayson (darnit), went to Target in the afternoon AND made dinner which kept me on my feet for quite a while - and I'm ok. I'm tired, for sure, but not exhausted and my back feels a bit tired, but not horribly achey. Thank goodness! Yesterday I was beginning to feel like I was going to be begging to get this baby out by late August. Today I'm feeling more like myself and more like I'll be able to get through the next 12-give-or-take weeks.

In other, slightly crappier, news, I have to take the 3-hour GTT tomorrow. Apparently my blood glucose level was "slightly elevated", as the nurse put it, when I took the 1-hour test, so I have to go in for the 3-hour. I am very much NOT looking forward to that experience, given that the glucose stuff makes me feel sick until I can eat something else, and this is going to be not a one hour ordeal, but a three. Lovely. I wish I would have thought to check my blood sugar a few times this week to see what seems to be going on, but I kept forgetting. In any case, my hope is that I can make it the whole three hours without needing to lie down, but we'll see how that goes. If only they'd let me leave the doctor's office in between, but they don't, so I get to sit in a waiting room for three hours. Fun, fun. I'm just hoping I pass this one and am not developing GD.

But I'm not going to worry too much about that tonight. For now, I once again feel like I'm going to survive this pregnancy without turning into a total shrew.

Can I have some cheese...

2009-06-09T19:42:00.000-07:00

...with my whine?

I feel fat. Not just pregnant, I feel FAT. I go to my workout class and I feel like a giant whale trying to move on land. I think the baby is making up for the fact that my fundal height was a little on the low side at my last appointment and growing exponentially the last few days. I'm in a constant state of discomfort, between my belly feeling so stretched and my back aching. And I feel like I'm hitting the point where I'm packing on FAT, not just weight, and I'm going to blow up like a freaking balloon.

And I still have 12 weeks (give or take) to go. Ugh.

Coming up for air

2009-05-27T13:50:00.000-07:00

Over the holiday weekend I quite literally lost myself in the Twilight series. The books were far better than I'd imagined. I was completely sucked in finished all four books in four days. Although my house is still recovering, my husband was a great sport and helped out a lot so I could disappear into the expanse of my imagination for a while.

I haven't let myself go into a book like that in quite some time - probably since before I had kids. The allure of a good story, of feeling like I'm half living in that world, is almost like a drug to me. I love the sensation of letting my imagination run free, of living in a world that isn't my own. Its why I've always loved reading fantasy novels - I love being caught up in a world where anything is possible.

It isn't just the story in the book that gets me though. Reading something that sucks me in so completely triggers so much in my own mind - ideas, characters, plotlines, possibilities. Its why I started attempting to write fiction in the first place. I can get just as lost writing my own stories as I can reading the works of others.

I haven't written much of anything fictional in a long time now. When I was pregnant with my first son I found that my creativity ground to a halt, like my creative energy was being used up and I didn't have anything left when I sat down at my keyboard. And so things have sat, untouched, for a long time. But I feel like losing myself in a story once again has reopened the door to my creativity. I remember the reason I love to write, the reason I want to write an honest to goodness novel someday. Its what I'm passionate about. I can write to make money, as I do, and it's fine. But there's no passion behind it. Creating a story, one that allows me to live in my imagination for a while, is what really gets me going. And for the first time in a long time, I'm feeling like it might be possible to get to that place again. Maybe I'll actually finish...

In the meantime, I feel like I'm coming up for air after a long submersion. I'm blinking in the sunlight of reality. Although it's a great reality, it's been a little harder than I remember to get back into the swing of my real life. But I think I can manage.

Choosing to have a good day

2009-05-13T21:49:00.000-07:00

The other day my husband told me I've been grumpy all the time lately. Ouch. I didn't think I'd been *that* grumpy, but maybe from his perspective I have. Five days a week he comes home when I'm at my most tired, and probably most likely to be grumpy, even if I've been cheery all day. It got me thinking.

I am tired a lot. Being pregnant with my two boys isn't easy. G is such a handful, there are days when I wonder if I'm going to survive that kid. Trying to get through everything in a day is exhausting and it makes me more than a little nervous to think about going through each day not pregnant, but with an infant. If I think I'm tired now, we ain't seen nothing yet.

I realized that part of the problem is that I let my attitude go downhill, especially on days when I haven't had a good night's sleep. Goodness knows there are a million reasons a pregnant mother of two might not get enough sleep, so this seems to be happening a lot lately. But I find myself dwelling all day on the things I don't feel energetic enough to get done, or how I can't sit down for five seconds without D needing something or G getting into something he shouldn't. My life as it is right now is going to wear me out physically, there's no getting around that. Having a 31lb toddler that I can't help but lift numerous times a day will do that to you, pregnant or not. But mentally, that's another story. I have some choice in the matter of my attitude and how I approach life with two, soon to be three, young children.

I'm making a conscious effort to be happy. I firmly believe happiness is largely a choice, and how I deal with the day to day messes of life is something entirely within my control. If G once again empties the contents of the craft drawer onto the floor during the 90 seconds I'm in the bathroom or D pitches a fit because G won't stop knocking over his block tower, I am faced with a choice: let myself be exasperated, mentally remind myself how tired and annoyed I am, yell at my kids and carry the tension around with me until the next incident occurs and builds on the previous until I feel like I'm going to snap. Or.... take a deep breath and deal with each thing as it comes with an attitude that is lighter, more cheerful and rooted in the reality that I want to like my life each day and have the ability to make that happen.

Yes, my boys are going to do things that make me crazy. But over the last few days I've tried really hard to remain cheerful and happy even when those things happen, and you know what... it works. No, I'm not suddenly a Stepford Wife, walking around in a 50's era house dress, perfectly curled hair and a creepy smile plastered on my face. But taking that breath and reminding myself that I want to have a good day, even in the face of yet another roll of toilet paper mired in the toilet, or another morning of maddening indecision about the perfect show and tell item, has really made a difference in how I feel.

I'm conscious of this because I know that in a few short months, life IS actually going to get crazier. I was unhappy a lot of the time after G was born, feeling exhausted and overwhelmed and like I couldn't possibly meet the needs of these two little people simultaneously. I don't want to go through that again, at least not to that degree. I know I'm going to be tired, I know I'm going to be overwhelmed. I also hope that if I practice now, when things are just crazy times two, when things get crazy times three I might have a shot at having more good days than bad.

I just have to remember to choose to have a good day.

I don't understand

2009-05-06T20:47:00.000-07:00

I have this friend who has been married to a man who abuses her for eight years. The manipulation, control and probably some verbal abuse started early, before they were even married. I don't think she fully realized what his behavior meant, but looking back she says she saw signs. About a year into their marriage, it got physical. I don't know even a fraction of what he's done to her, but I know enough. This guy is dangerous.

Several times she's talked about leaving. She usually ended up pregnant soon after thinking such things. They had three kids in just over three years, and there was a miscarriage in between the second and third. Each time she was pregnant she claims he treated her well and I think she allowed herself to believe that he would change; he would see the great mom she'd be and he'd treat her well. It never lasted.

Now things are bad again. Her youngest is 16 months, long enough that the pregnancy honeymoon period has clearly worn off. I don't know any details (although I suspect he may have started in on the kids - at least the older ones), but she took the step of telling her pastor at church. They're very involved in their church and this was a HUGE deal for her to confide in him. She's resisted the idea of telling her church for years, because she was afraid it would "make her husband look bad." For whatever reason, she's mustered the courage to reach out in this way and her pastor will be confronting her husband next Monday.

What I'm confounded over is her seeming obsession with keeping her marriage together. She emailed me today and said this may mean they have to be legally separated and that isn't what she wants - "not at all" were her words. WHY THE HELL NOT?

She told me recently that she's praying for the restoration of her marriage. I wanted to ask her "restoration to what?" When in their entire relationship has there been a time that is worth restoring to? He's always been a controlling, manipulative prick and honestly believes that there is nothing wrong with the way he treats her. Why does she want to stay married to this guy so badly?

I just don't understand. I've tried so hard to stick by her, be her friend regardless of whether I thought she was crazy, or wrong, or stupid. I've thought all those things, and now, in the face of giving him an ultamatum she's never dared before (the church will be telling him that she will have their blessing and help to leave if he won't get help and change his behavior), she's upset that they might be separated. I have no frame of reference for understanding her sentiment. Is it fear? Is it some misguided notion that she loves him? Does she simply believe all the horrible things he's said to her and doesn't think she deserves any better? Does she actually believe he'll change? Because I'm telling you, this is not the guy who feels bad about how he treats her. He believes from the core of his being that he has every right to treat her this way. He's said so on many occassions. So has his father.

I've tried hard not to be too judgmental. She's already lost friends over the years, people who couldn't understand why she'd stay and got sick of watching the horror show. I don't understand any more than they do, but I've stayed her friend - and I plan to still. But I just don't get it. I can't fathom why she is so desperate to hang on to this sham of a marriage. I wouldn't want to be a divorced, single mother any more than she does, but isn't that better than living under the thumb of someone who tries to control your every move, belittles you at every opportunity, and dosen't find anything wrong with slapping you around when there are dirty dishes left in the sink?

And how she can stand by and let this happen in front of her children downright infuriates me. She's never admitted that he's hurt them, but I suspect that he has. And even if he never turns a hand to them (which he will), he's doing these things to their mother right in front of them. He's teaching his sons how to treat women and teaching his daughter how men should treat her. I don't know how she can let that happen.

I just don't get it.

T-ball, etc.

2009-05-02T14:58:00.000-07:00

Today was D's very first t-ball game! Watching a bunch of 4 year olds try to play t-ball is definitely one of the cutest things ever. They all looked so adorable in their purple shirts and black baseball hats - none of which fit any of them properly. The most they try to get them to do is have someone catch the ball when the other team hits, then throw it to first base. Even that was a stretch. The ball would roll past the first player then the rest of the team would run after it and nearly tackle each other trying to get to it. Then the chorus of "throw to first!" coming from the coaches and parents as the kid with the ball would look around wondering what to do.

On David's first hit he did great, running to first like they told him. But he apparently wasn't so sure where second base was because after the next hit, he went running off away from the baseline entirely. I think he saw a spot in the grass that looked like something was there, and he thought it was second base. It was seriously cute.

I'm completely exhausted from the day and G is sitting in his crib talking instead of napping, which means this afternoon is going to be rough. It does also mean that he'll go to bed early, which I can definitely live with. Gotta look on the bright side!

DH is currently on the road to California to pick up his dream car - we're buying him a 1968 Camaro, the car he has literally wanted since before I met him. And I've known him for 17 years. To say this is a dream come true is an understatement. But in the short term, it means I'm on my own with the boys this weekend, my house is already a complete disaster, G isn't napping, and I'm exhausted. The rest of the day is going to be interesting. Ordinarily I'd be thinking about where to take them to kill some time and get out of the house, but I don't think I can handle another outing. Between helping DH get ready for his road trip, getting us ready, packed up and to the t-ball game, and running around taking pictures at the game itself, I'm beat.

Being pregnant with two kids is tiring!

Sinking in

2009-04-26T19:32:00.000-07:00

It's beginning to sink in that this baby is a girl. I still have that little worry in the back (and sometimes the front) of my mind that the ultrasound will prove to be wrong and we'll be surprised with a boy in about 4 months. But the chances of that aren't really *that* great, so I'm slowly but surely allowing myself to believe that we're having a daughter.

It chokes me up a little bit.

I've started buying a few things here and there - clothes, mostly. I have a good set of hand-me-downs coming from a friend, but of course I have to take advantage of having a girl for the first time and indulge in some pink. It took a lot to buy that first pink onesie. Again, there's that fear that I'm going to get all excited and into the idea of having a girl and be really disappointed if we were wrong. I think I'm probably going to carry that anxiety with me, at least a little bit, until she's born.

In any case, I went to the mall today and ended up buying several really cute things. I'm glad I've had babies before and know how I tend to like dressing a newborn/infant. There are so many outfits that are impractical and I know what types of things would end up hanging in the closet, looking darn cute on a hanger, but rarely get worn. But I did indulge in a couple of dresses that I think could be paired with some cotton pants if needed (which I also bought, in colors to match) and some onesies that say cute stuff like "Daddy's Girl." I doubt I'll bring myself to actually take any of the items out of their bags and risk losing receipts, just in case... but I have allowed myself to relax enough to enjoy some girlie shopping.

It's like a whole new world!

Too perfect?

2009-04-14T14:03:00.000-07:00

From the moment I took that HPT right before Christmas, this pregnancy has seemed perfect. We got pregnant the instant we decided to stop birth control. We found out right at Christmas, which gave us such a great opportunity to share our news with family. I didn't need supplemental progesterone (did with the boys), all my tests have come back perfect and (at the risk of jinxing it) I'm not gaining weight as quickly. Timing wise, it's perfect because I'll get through most of the summer before baby is born, giving us lots of outside time without me having to worry about when the baby needs to sleep, nurse, be changed, etc. I'll be highly pregnant during our big family vacation this summer, but as long as things are going well, I will be able to go.

Could things get better?

We had an ultrasound yesterday. Baby looks great, measuring right on schedule with no indications of any problems whatsoever. She looks perfect. Yes, I said she.

Not only did we fail to see a penis, after a long wait while she had her legs both crossed and close together, we saw the telltale signs of girl parts. I kept thinking I was seeing girl, but the tech kept saying she couldn't see it yet, so I wasn't sure. Then we saw a great shot of her profile and my husband said, "That looks really feminine to me - not like the boys." Apparently he was right. I know ultrasounds are never 100% accurate at gender prediction, but when my dad asked the tech "are you sure?" she said, "Well, ultrasounds are never 100%, but this is a girl."

OMG!

I have to admit, I really wanted it to be a girl. I would have been really happy to have another boy, but a girl - well, it just makes everything so perfect. I'm almost afraid to believe it, not wanting to get my hopes so high and then find out the tech was wrong. I doubt it, but it certainly can happen. But as things stand, it looks like we're going to have a daughter.

This pregnancy has been so much more than I ever could have asked for. Could it really be this perfect? The perfect end to our fertility journey, the perfect addition to our family?

Apparently sometimes we do get THAT lucky.

The hazards of having a big boy

2009-04-09T19:15:00.001-07:00

I've lamented more than once about the difficulties of having a baby/toddler who is big. G is a big boy. Not freakishly huge, but he's been above the 90th percentiles for height and weight since he was about 6 weeks old. He outgrew the baby bjorn so quickly I was glad I'd decided to buy a sling; it was the only way I could carry him around without killing my back and shoulders. And as he got older, he kept getting bigger! There are 2 1/2 years between my boys, yet for about the last year there has only been 4-5lbs between them. Yes, D is still the heavier one, but G keeps trying to close the gap.

Now I'm pregnant and G still wants to be picked up and carried, often up the stairs. I still have to lift him into his carseat. He weighs somewhere between 30-31lbs, which is certainly not the heaviest almost-2 year old, but he's heavy enough to make my back ache. Over the last few days I've been wondering why my back is starting to hurt and today made me realize exactly why - I still have to lift this brick of a kid.

Today was particularly tiring on my pregnant body. I'm not sure what it was; perhaps that every time I tried to sit down, one of them needed something. Perhaps it was the number of times we went up and down the stairs. Perhaps it was our trip to McDonald's for dinner (since Daddy is working late) and the amount of that time I had to spend on my feet, chasing after G in particular. But my back is so tired and I'm looking at a long night at the computer since I have work to catch up on. Ouch.

I need to keep doing yoga. And convince G to walk up the stairs on his own more often.

I love spring

2009-04-07T14:35:00.000-07:00

On April 1st it snowed. It doesn't snow here every winter, let alone in April, so that was a surprise. There wasn't much, but it was super cold. At the gym a bunch of us were joking that our April Fool's Day joke was that spring had arrived - not so much!

By Saturday, spring decided to show.

We've had such great weather for the last several days and I was DYING for it. I expect March to be yucky around here, but even so, I've been craving sunshine and at least a little warmth. The last several days have been great. We've been outside in the backyard in t-shirts, the boys running around and getting nice and dirty. Last week I was feeling such cabin fever, so this burst of spring has been good for my soul.

Good times.

Feeling cold

2009-03-31T22:08:00.000-07:00

I think the biggest difference between this pregnancy and my previous two is that, not only am I not roasting hot all the time, I'm actually cold.

With D, I was a furnace - especially my feet. My feet were so hot I quite literally wore flip flops and sandals until after he was born... and he was born in December. I remember the people I worked with thinking I was crazy for coming to work in my sandals, but my feet were so hot, I couldn't stand to wear full shoes, let alone socks.

With G it wasn't nearly as intense, but I was still warmer most of the time. I bought one maternity sweater because I thought it was too cute to pass up (he was born in May, so I was pg through the winter), but I think I only wore it a couple of times because I was always too warm for it.

This time, I'm actually cold sometimes. I've been wearing socks at home all the time because my feet feel chilly. It's particularly strange because since having my boys, I've felt like my body stayed hotter, even once my pregnancies were over. I have this stack of old sweaters I used to wear to work in the winter and I haven't touched them - and not because I don't have to dress up for work now, but because I couldn't fathom wearing a sweater without dying of heat stroke! But here I am, pregnant and expecting to feel warmer still, and I'm curling up in blankets on the couch and wearing socks with slippers over the top! It isn't as if the temperature in my house has changed - for whatever reason, I'm just feeling cooler this time.

Other than that, I can't point to anything that is starkly new or different with this pregnancy, at least at this point. My first two pregnancies felt like polar opposites (which is ironic, because my boys personalities are completely opposite). If I had a symptom with D, I probably didn't with G; if I didn't have a symptom with D, I probably did with G. Not entirely true, but in many ways that's how it felt. I was totally convinced I was not pregnant with G because I figured I'd feel the same way I felt in early pregnancy the first time - and I sure didn't. But this time, some of it is familiar, some not as much (like being cold), but it doesn't feel so dramatically different from my other two experiences.

I had a doctor appointment this morning (I'll be 18 weeks tomorrow) and so far all is well. My blood pressure was almost low (but still fine), our results from the quad screen came back normal, baby's heart rate was 154. I also haven't gained too much weight at this point, which is nice. I'm up 10lbs or so, which is great for this point in my pregnancy. I think I gained more than that during the first 12 weeks with both my previous pregnancies, so I hope that's a good sign. I'd love to gain a more reasonable amount of weight this time around. But I am proud to say I haven't been stressing about it - just trying to keep from overeating. I've realized that I don't have to eat every single time I get a little hungry - it's ok to be a bit hungry between meals/snacks because I know I'll eat again soon and I know I'm eating plenty.

In any case, so far so good, and that makes me happy!

Freaky

2009-03-22T22:27:00.001-07:00

There is a person growing inside me right this second. That still freaks me out.

I'm a bit over 16 weeks... noticing occassional pokes from the stinker, feeling good overall, getting bigger everyday with tons of time left to grow. Time is flying by; March is almost over already and it seems as if it just began. If it's possible, I think this pregnancy is going by faster than my last one did, and that one seemed to fly. In some ways it feels as if September is a long way off, but in other ways I feel like I can't believe I'm closing in on 17 weeks in a few days.

Its kind of freaking me out.

Maternity swimsuits

2009-03-17T22:09:00.000-07:00

Why is it that so many maternity clothes manufacturers seem to forget the fact that the belly is not the only thing that grows during pregnancy? And that us busty women might want to wear clothes that fit too?

Maternity swimsuits are the WORST.

I have a maternity swimsuit that I bought last time I was pregnant. I suffered with it because I'd bought it and couldn't justify buying another one. Why I didn't send it back the instant I tried it on, I have no idea - maybe I figured it wasn't that bad or I could make it work and didn't want the hassle of returning something I'd bought online. Whatever my reasoning at the time, I have a swimsuit from Old Navy that absolutely does not fit my chest - AT ALL. I don't think this thing would fit anyone with a cup size larger than a B. And believe me, I'm nowhere near a B. Finding a good fit is tough because I'm not big all over, but I have big boobs and when I'm pregnant I have really big boobs. So this halter thingy is a disaster. It's a tankini, and the bottoms fit fine, but the top has this seam that is supposed to go under the bust line. Laughable. If I put it on the way it is intended to be worn my boobs fall out of it as soon as I move a little. Obviously not great for taking the kids to swim lessons at the YMCA.

I love to swim and I really love to swim when I'm pregnant, so I definitely need a swimsuit. Today I tried on the crazy small-boobed halter thing and it was worse than I remembered. When I was pregnant with G, I wore it, but pulled it up so it covered better. But it was so uncomfortable I often wore a bra underneath just so I didn't feel like I was going to fall completely out of the thing - and that's attractive. And when you're underwater it tends to float up (or did until my belly was really big) so I always felt like it was floating up around my neck and my boobs were hanging out the bottom.

So now I'm on a quest to find a decent fitting maternity swimsuit to get me through this pregnancy. Quest is really an appropriate term, because this ain't easy.

There are tons of suits out there, but many (most?) of them are ridiculously expensive. I've looked at some really cute suits online, but there's no way I'm paying over $100 for a swimsuit that I'm going to wear this year, and this year only. If I was pregnant for the first time and knew I'd be having a couple more kids after this, it might make sense to invest in a high quality swimsuit. But I wasn't a swimmer when I was pregnant the first time, so I didn't get a suit. And the second time I cheaped out with the Old Navy one and should have at least found one that fit better, even if I didn't spend more money. So here I am.

And judging from the pictures online, fit is going to be a problem. I can see how women with small boobs would be loving their newfound voluptuousness and be happy to show it off a little. But showing off a nice chest and flashing the world enough boob to make Jennifer Lopez blush are two different things. So many of the swimsuits I've seen are similar to the one I have - a halter top that ties in the back, has no support whatsoever and doesn't have enough fabric in the front to cover one of my boobs, let alone both of them.

And you'd think more maternity stores might actually carry one or two swimsuits in stock, even though it isn't summer, right? I mean, we have indoor pools and I certainly see plenty of pregnant women at the Y who bring their kids to swim lessons. That can happen in winter, right? But I haven't seen any in stores. Granted, I live in smaller community so the shopping options are limited, and I do need to call a couple stores that aren't too far but farther than I'd want to go without knowing if they have anything... but the point is, I'm afraid I'm going to have to buy online and given my experience with that last time, I really want to be able to try these things on.

Dressing yourself when you're pregnant can be frustrating in general and I hate every dollar I have to spend on maternity clothes, since I know how temporary this is and I know I'm not planning to do it again. I don't want to invest much in clothes I'm going to be out of come fall. But I also have to wear something every day, and I know I need a new swimsuit. I want to get back in the pool for some laps, I want to be able to take G to swimming if it works with our schedule, and we're going on vacation this summer where it will be warm. I just wish I could find one that wasn't ugly (although color and pattern at this point are secondary concerns), didn't cost a fortune, and miracle of miracles, actually fits my chest.

Is that really too much to ask?

Running a race

2009-03-15T19:56:00.001-07:00

I ran the St. Patrick's Day Dash today. This year it was a 3.7 mile course through the city. And when I say "ran" I mean "participated" - I ran some, but probably walked more. Hey, I am over 15 weeks pregnant, after all :).

The weather was almost as bad as it could be. Not quite, because it wasn't too windy, but it was snowing/slushing when we got there and that turned to heavy rain by the time our wave started. It was cooooooold and we were soaking wet. But despite that, it was still really fun. I've done this race before and it's a blast. People get all dressed up in crazy hats and costumes - very festive event.

The amazing thing is that my husband did it with me. That is something else because my husband does not run. I've tried to get him to run with me for ages, even just as a workout and he always professes to HATE running. He bases this off his memories of high school football workouts and the time he ran 5 miles around the track for some fundraiser thing. Yeah, running lines in football practice and running around a track for a million years are exactly like running in a cool St. Patrick's Day race. Sure.

He's mentioned things about running in the last couple of months and I had a feeling I might be getting to him. A few weeks ago we were talking about this race and I told him my goal was to have him do it with me next year - I could use it to get back into running shape after the baby and he could use it to get into running shape period. He said, hey, I'll do it this year! So I assumed he was serious and signed him up :).

After a lot of "what was I thinking?" talk this past week, we actually drove up there and went for it - horrible weather and all. I'm not in a position to run that distance anymore - my belly is big for 15 weeks and there's way too much pressure on my bladder (and I started the race needing to pee, which of course made it worse). And he hasn't run any distance since, well, those high school football practices. He has been working out regularly for quite some time now and has lost over 30lbs (woo hoo honey!), but he's not in running shape so he wasn't sure what to expect. We stuck together and ran for a while in the beginning and then walked most of the middle - most of the distance, really. We ran again at the end to finish strong. Through it all we had a good time chatting as we went, talking about things like running shoes, shin splints, our kids, our summer plans and how much fun it would be to do a race together if we were both in a position to run the whole thing.

The fact that the two of us pinned on race numbers together today is stunning. So many things have happened in the last few months that I never would have thought possible, but wanted so badly, and this was one of them. I love doing races and I love the idea of us doing them together sometimes - bringing the kids along when it works, having them join us when they're older. I love the idea of being that active family that looks forward to these kinds of events and is in the kind of shape to do them. For the first time, I can actually see the possibility of that idea being a reality for us. And that rocks.

My SIL came along and ran it too and she was a total rockstar. She ran the whole thing, hills and all, and made pretty good time too. She's never run that far before and was pretty nervous, but I think she learned something valuable about herself today - the same thing I learned when I started doing races. She learned what's possible, what she can accomplish if she pushes herself a little. That's a great lesson to learn and I was so thrilled to hear her say on the way home, "Gotta find out when the next one is!"

I'm so glad we went today, despite being wet and freezing. It was a cool moment for me and my husband and I'm still so amazed at how many of those we've been having lately.

Good times.

Chinese gender prediction

2009-03-09T14:37:00.001-07:00

Has anyone else noticed that the Chinese gender prediction chart is a lot more complicated that it seems? Not that I put any stock in such things, but they're fun anyway. While I should be putting away laundry right now, I've been trying to see if the Chinese chart was accurate for my boys, and see what it says about this baby. You'd think that would be easy, right? Match my age at conception with month of conception and there you go. Not quite.

One site I found says you're supposed to use your lunar age and the lunar month of conception - basically using the Chinese calendar. Ok, makes sense since one would assume that the chart is probably based on the calendar they actually used, so I went about finding a site to calculate those things (they had a link, but it didn't work). But other sites don't mention the need to convert your age or the month to lunar, so is it necessary or not? I really have no idea.

Using my real age at conception and the real month of conception (not converting either to the Chinese calendar), the chart is actually accurate - it predicted boy for both D and G, and predicts a boy this time. I'll buy that for a dollar ;). But aren't you supposed to use lunar dates, hence using the actual Chinese calendar?

If you use my lunar age and the Chinese month, it predicts boy for D, girl for G and girl for this baby. Hmmmm. 50/50 for my boys, and obviously the result remains to be seen for this baby.

And, just for fun, if you use my lunar age but the real month, it gives girl for D, girl for G and boy for this baby. I doubt that one was right ;).

So based on my very scientific calculations and a 700 year old chart found with a dead guy in China, I'm either having a boy, or a girl. Gotta love gender prediction!

Strange conversation and random thoughts

2009-03-08T20:51:00.001-07:00

I found myself having such a strange conversation with my husband today. He was completely kidding, but he said something about "what if we decide to have four kids," and "hey, if this is another boy, maybe we should try one more time." I knew he must be kidding, and he was, but it was so strange what those comments did to my state of mind. I'm already struggling with the concept of being done having kids - not because I think I'll want more or because I'll miss having a baby around or because we would actually try again for a girl. I think it's because we'll be closing a chapter of our lives for good (assuming we do something permanent about it, which we're discussing). I'm going to be ready for that chapter to end - ready to have my body back for good, not just for a couple of years; ready to lose the weight, get in shape and stay that way. I'll be ready for our family to start growing up, moving out of diapers and naps and nursing.

I already worry a bit about how I'm going to juggle the needs and schedules of an active four-almost-five-year-old, a two year old and a newborn baby. D will have preschool 3 mornings a week and at some point we'll want to go back to having some other activities for both boys like gymnastics, toddler gym and swimming (not all at once, but those are the usual classes they like). I'll want to get back to my regular workout schedule, but suddenly I'm not only juggling two kids, but three - and this one is going to need a zillion naps, nursing sessions and who knows what else. The thought of going back to having a tiny baby again after this one - yikes.

But when he said that, it still made me pause. Hmm, what if? It took mere seconds before reality came flooding back and we both laughed - noooooooooo, we don't want four! But for a split second, I wondered if he'd been serious, could he talk me into it? Probably not, but it surprised me that there was this part of me deep down inside that didn't shout "NO!" Most of me did, but that tiny part...

Not that I'm saying I want to have another after this baby. When I was pg with G there were times that I wondered if it would be my last pregnancy. We hadn't fully decided on whether to have two or three and I spent some time exploring my feelings about whether it should be the last time. There were moments when I felt it would be ok if we only had two, if that had been my last pregnancy experience. But more often I felt that I wanted to do it again. This time not so much. I'm so grateful to be pregnant, and don't have anything to complain about, but at the same time, I'm happy that this is my last. It feels great to know that things are in motion and when this baby is here, we can move on from our trying-and-having-baby years.

It also makes me want to enjoy this experience as much as possible. I already feel like its flying by and I'm afraid I'll be too busy to notice. I'm going to wake up one day and realize I'm as big as a house and really ought to pack my hospital bag. Hopefully I can slow down enough to enjoy the ride till then.

Feeling pregnant

2009-03-06T22:17:00.000-08:00

I'm genuinely feeling pregnant these days, and not just from nausea and fatigue. My belly isn't "big" yet at all - but it has reached the point of being big enough that I'm noticing it. I'm sure the casual observer wouldn't realize I'm pregnant, or might wonder a bit but not dare ask for fear of being wrong. But I feel like I grew outward about an inch today. Nothing really fits - maternity clothes are too big, but my regular clothes don't fit either. It's a fun stage - sarcasm intended ;).

I may be feeling the slightest bits of movement. Hard to say, since it is quite early for that (just over 14 weeks), but I did feel D distinctly at about 16 weeks and G probably at that time or a touch earlier. So it isn't impossible. I certainly know what it feels like. But it also might still just be little intestinal twitches or air bubbles. What makes me think it could be baby is that I feel these little flutters particularly when I squish my belly in some way - like bending over or if I press on my lower abdomen with my hands. I think I might be feeling baby push back.

We heard the heartbeat for the first time last Tuesday. Wow, that's a great sound. Hearing that brought it home in a whole new way that yes, I'm actually pregnant. We're doing this again! My doctor found the heartbeat instantly - literally, doppler hit belly and sound emerged. It took him a little bit to get a good reading on the actual rate, which turned out to be 152bpm, since we were hearing my heartbeat some and he said the baby seemed to be moving around a lot.

I can't help but wonder what this baby is going to be like and I find myself thinking about the traits we saw in the boys while I was pg with each of them that seemed to carry foward into their time outside the womb. D was a kicker and a firecracker from the start. He was always moving and heck, he still is. I remember the tech at our 20 week ultrasound had trouble getting measurements because he was so active. G, on the other hand, was mellow-yellow. He did move plenty, but at our ultrasound he seemed so chill, almost like he was lying there with his head cuddled up against the placenta. He's a monster toddler right now, but he still has this underlying mellowness to his personality that I swear I could see before he was even born.

I keep telling my husband that this is going to be our "Ta da!" baby. More than once I've said I feel like this baby was knocking on our door for months before we conceived. The subject of when to try kept coming up over and over and then we finally did decide to go off birth control, and BAM! we were pregnant. It happened so fast, it feels like this baby was waiting and saying, "Come on guys, I'm ready to come into the world, let's get this started!" I knew I was pregnant so much earlier than I knew with my boys, I tested earlier than I did with them, we found the heartbeat instantly the very first try, and things seem to be moving so quickly. I'm showing earlier (which is of course because its my third, but still), and baby seems determined to keep his or herself top of mind for me.

It makes me wonder if I'm going to need to rush to the hospital because baby's trying to make a grand entrance, LOL!

We'll see how the next six-ish months go. For now, I'm feeling pretty good, trying very hard not to stress over the gender (I'm geniunely having boy feelings, for the record) and trying to decide what I need to add to my maternity wardrobe, if anything. I'll need a few things, since I'll be so pregnant during the summer, but I'm not motivated to spend a whole lot of money since I'm not planning to do this again.

In any case, time is flying and in no time I'll be out of the dreaded "looking fat, not pregnant" stage :).

Hard on a Friday night

2009-03-06T19:46:00.000-08:00

Man it's hard to work on a Friday night. In order to reasonably keep up with the projects I have, I should really work 4 or 5 nights a week - these days 5 or 6, really. I've been quite busy, which is good because goodness knows we need the money. Having this baby isn't going to be cheap. In any case, right now I have stuff going on Monday and Thursday nights, so I really can't afford to take tonight "off", yet I'm having an extraordinarily difficult time simply changing over to my work computer. It just feels wrong somehow to have to work at 8:00 at night on a Friday. I guess I spent enough years with an 8-5, M-F schedule I just want to be DONE with responsibilities on Friday nights - even if for just a short while.

Things I do not need to hear again today.

2009-02-20T18:57:00.001-08:00

"I can totally tell I'm still fighting off that cold," said by my husband with an air of "feel sorry for me, I'm so sick."

I've been so sick this week I can barely function. I've had a horrible cold that turned into a raging sinus infection. I feel like I've been hit in the face with a 2x4 and each and every day this week he's complained that he's "fighting something".

"I'm about to pass out, I'm so tired I can't stay awake," said by my husband when it was time for the boys to go to bed - possibly implying he didn't want to help with bedtime? Not sure on that one.

I haven't had a good night sleep in two weeks, between both boys being sick last week and me being sick all this week. It's pretty hard to sleep when you can't breathe out of your nose, your throat hurts from being dry and your head is so stuffed and painful that it hurts to the touch.

I get that he didn't get a good night sleep last night and of course that sucks. But as sick as he is of hearing me complain about how bad I feel, I'm doubly sick of hearing him talk about how he ALMOST has the cold I have. Good for you buddy, you can pump your nonpregnant body with all the vitamin C and airborne you want, sleep all night because you can BREATHE, and IF you do get sick, you can take any medicine you want, plus take time off work, stay home and shut out the world for two days while you sleep it off and get better. I CAN'T FREAKING GET BETTER.

I'm sick of complaining about it too, but seriously I haven't been in this much pain in a long time; probably since the last time I had a sinus infection a couple of years ago. This HURTS and it's all I can do to survive the day because I CAN'T CALL IN SICK. My husband and sister in law have been doing what they can to help me, and I appreciate it very, very much. But the bottom line is, these kids are still my responsiblity and if I'm sick, I just have to tough it out most of the time. Yes, my SIL took the boys for a couple of hours yesterday which was AWESOME. But I'm still sick as hell and if the antibiotics don't kick in soon, I'm going to lose it.

Being sick while you're pregnant is a special kind of torture. There was a time I didn't think there was anything much worse than that. But being sick while pregnant AND chasing around two very active, very energetic little boys is actually worse.

I'm sick of complaining.

Sick kids are the WORST

2009-02-11T18:55:00.000-08:00

Saturday G had a tummy bug that had him throwing up about every hour from around 5pm until 3am. Sunday he acted like nothing had happened, except he didn't really eat anything all day. That same day, D started mysteriously running a fever and was rather unhappy about it. Some motrin perked him right up and by Monday, they both seemed healthy and fine.

Fast forward to last night and G was the one with the fever. At first I had wondered if they both had the same virus over the weekend, just reacted to it differently - G with vomiting, D with a fever. Now I'm thinking that G had a tummy bug, D had a fever bug (for lack of a better term, since he didn't have other symptoms) and now G has the fever bug.

Unfortunately, G with a fever means he won't sleep. At all. I was up most of the night with him, trying to get him to stay asleep for more than half an hour. I rocked him, cuddled him, tried to just sleep in the chair with him, but even that didn't keep him asleep for long. I tried taking him to our bed, but that didn't work any better. He just tossed and turned and cried and wanted to be "all done" - with trying to sleep or being in our bed, I'm not sure. I think we both slept for a solid couple of hours in the wee hours of the morning, but that was about it.

He was a complete zombie today. He's normally so active, today was bizarre. He barely moved most of the day, wanting to sit in my lap and do nothing. He drank plenty of fluids, but didn't eat more than a few bites. And true to form, in that he seems to be the polar opposite of his brother, he HATES taking medicine of any kind (D would take any medicine every day if I let him). Come nap time I figured he'd crash completely and hoped he'd sleep at least a solid couple of hours. Not so. Although he was so tired, he was falling asleep on the couch in my arms, he only slept for about 30 minutes in his crib. I rocked him back to sleep and just held him, hoping I could get him to stay asleep for a decent amount of time if I held him - with no luck. About 35 minutes later, he was awake again, squirming and tossing and miserable - and unable to sleep more.

I put him to bed ridiculously early because he was falling asleep on me again. He slept 45 minutes, and was up again. This does not bode well for the rest of the night. I guess I should be happy he's sleeping now, specifically sleeping without being ON me, but I have a feeling I'm going to spend an awful lot of time in that damn chair tonight.

As if I needed more to make me jittery, D threw up all over the back of the couch after dinner. I *think* at this point it was a fluke - he was coughing a lot and might have gagged himself. But that's exactly how G's tummy bug started; a random vomit with no warning. So far he hasn't done it again and insists his tummy feels fine. We'll see. He is for sure getting the cold my SIL has had for about a week and a half (hence the coughing), so unfortunately, he IS getting sick. But I'll take the cold over vomit.

I'm desperate for a decent night's sleep, but G is far more desperate than I am. I seriously don't know what I'm going to do if he won't sleep tonight - and I don't really think he will...

11 weeks - and feeling a bit better

2009-02-10T20:22:00.001-08:00

I guess I'm not 11 weeks exactly until tomorrow, but close enough :).

I think I'm finally passing through mild nausea and fatigue land. My tummy feels normal most of the time (although there are still a lot of foods that don't sound good and smells can be an issue), and I'm not so lethargic. I actually got all the laundry washed, dried and... drum roll please... put away! That is a feat, considering we've been living out of laundry baskets full of clean laundry for weeks now. It's nice to know we have a floor in our bedroom - and nice to know I'll be able to find socks in the morning. That's the worst when your clothes aren't put away; socks are impossible to find, particularly matching ones.

A few weeks ago, in one of my hormonal fits of "I'm upset but have no reason to be", I asked my husband (perhaps a little tearfully, although no drama was intended), what things he cared about more in terms of the state of our house. I knew I couldn't keep up with everything, so did he give a crap that the clothes were on the floor? Or was that bugging him every day as he got dressed? What mattered to him? I should have guessed his reply - food. He said keep him fed, and he's fine. The rest of the house can resemble a hurricane zone and he doesn't particularly care. So grocery shopping and cooking have remained at the top of my list - the rest gets done as I can.

In any case, I think I've turned the corner and hopefully the worst of the first trimester stuff is behind me.

I'm still having a little trouble wrapping my brain around the fact that there is actually a baby growing inside me again. The signs are there - my pants won't button (thank goodness for sweats and my belly band!), the whole nausea and fatigue thing, and you know, those two pesky little pregnancy tests that are still sitting on my bathroom counter as if I need the daily reminder of those two beautiful lines. I guess I still do. I have to admit, I've never thrown away the two tests I took when I found out I was pregnant with G. And I think the only reason my HPT from D's pregnancy is gone is because we moved and it seemed silly to keep it. What can I say - pee soaked test strips are hard to let go of, specifically when they say what you'd so hoped they would say.

I'm trying very hard, and succeeding for the most part, not to think about the baby's gender. I have a hard time believing it could be anything but another boy - which, for the record, would be great. But there is still that part of me that would love to have a daughter and I know this is my last shot. So I have a little anxiety over the whole thing. I hate the idea that I'd be "disappointed" if the baby is a boy, but there will be a little sadness at what I'll never have. Mostly happiness, because my goodness, I got this child without any trouble and the goal is a healthy baby. We all know that. But there's still the lingering knowledge that if this baby isn't a girl, I have to let go of my little dreams of Cabbage Patch dolls, pink tutus and tea parties. And in the grand scheme of things, that's perfectly ok. In fact, a baby boy would fit in so easily into our family, it almost feels like it would simply make sense to have another boy. I love having boys. And... well, we'll just have to wait and see, I guess.

I do need to report, for the record, that so far D thinks the baby is a girl and wants to name her Holly. How cute is that? I have no idea where he came up with that name. All of his other name suggestions are ridiculous, not even names at all. Today we heard "Nosey", "Poop-bottom", "Cry-pants", and "Gravy" (the last one being G's nickname). He's also suggests "Baby" pretty often. He's such a funny kid!

I suppose that's all there is to report at this stage of the game. I'm left feeling, once again, that pregnancy sure is long. But I'm grateful for that, really. I'm not ready to have a newborn just yet! I can see glimmers of hope that G will be somewhat easier to manage in the near future, so I'm setting my hopes on that. I'm glad we didn't get lazy with BC or decide to try way sooner; if I had a newborn right now I think I'd be in a looney bin somewhere. And I've probably said that already. Pregnancy brain, anyone?

Whine

2009-01-28T13:22:00.000-08:00

Maybe I should have some cheese with this.

I'm tired. Not so tired that I can't stay awake, really. That's how I felt with my first pregnancy. It's more like lethargic; I don't particularly want to get up and do anything most of the day. Obviously, that is impossible with two small children running around. But my house is a mess and I'm behind on everything. Every day I tell myself I'm going to make some progress, only to end up feeling like doing one more little thing is simply impossible.

I have a feeling this is a little bit like what depression feels like. Not that I think I'm depressed; I'm not even sad or upset, most of the time. I have my hormonal moments, but that's to be expected. I'm just having such a hard time getting up and doing things. I have to force myself to get out of the house in the morning, even when I have scheduled things to get to - preschool, for example. And although the days I go to the gym are considerably better as far as my energy level, I really have to force myself to go work out. It's pretty much the opposite of what I want to be doing. But the difference in how I feel on days I work out versus days I don't is so striking, I HAVE to keep doing it.

Still, I'm feeling whiney. Every day I feel like I'm drowning - in laundry, dishes, kids, you name it. I can't keep up and although I'm one of three adults in this house, no one else is exactly stepping up to the plate. Granted, I have learned by now that I cannot expect anything for which I do not explicitly ask - but sometimes I wish I could. I wish my husband or my SIL would pitch in a little more without me feeling like I have to ask 70 times. I asked my husband to put the laundry in the dryer last night and he rolled his eyes at me. I almost lost it on him and told him if he didn't do it, I'd be waking him up in the morning by pouring ice water on his balls. And I meant it.

I'm doing my best to keep juggling, but it isn't easy when my motivation is so freakishly low.

Oh, and my food aversions are becoming worse. I can't eat much in the way of protein and it's making it so hard to plan and cook dinners. Nothing sounds good, but if I don't eat enough I feel sick. It's a mess. Chicken is so my enemy.

I think that's all the whining I need to do now. I'll be fine, things could be worse, yadda, yadda. I know that. But for now, I'm tired of not feeling like myself.

A step in the right direction

2009-01-24T18:23:00.000-08:00

My husband and I both consider ourselves vaguely as Christians. I say vaguely, because although we have the basics down - we believe in God and Jesus and all that - when it comes to living it out in our lives, we're still figuring out what that means. And a large part of that is finding a church.

I grew up Catholic, he grew up nothing specific, but believing in God at an early age and scared of being in the wrong camp; in other words, scared of the ideas of hell, or oblivion, or eternal damnation. He was drawn to different religions and actually looked extensively into one that almost meant the demise of our relationship (it was before we were married, and was a religion I disagree heavily with and could not be married to someone who is a member for a multitude of reasons).

I have always been drawn to the Catholic church, even though I haven't been an active participant as an adult. It isn't that I believe they are "right" and other denominations are "wrong". I've probably said this in a previous post, but I agree with C.S. Lewis's idea of the "hall with many rooms." It's like being in a hall, with all these doors to rooms on either side. Some rooms seem more fitting than others, and the key is to find the room that works best for you. Because at the end of the day, we're all in the same building.

But the idea that I may have to forever give up being Catholic has been difficult for me. I've prayed about it endlessly, asking God to open my heart to understanding where He wants us as a family in terms of a church community. Because that's the other piece of it for me - we need to be on the same page and going to the same church. This is for us as a family, not just what makes me feel good on Sundays. That isn't the point.

I've been itching to find a church, Catholic or otherwise, for a long time now. I think it has taken some time for my husband to be in the same place, and the waiting has been difficult for me. But I also know how far I get with him when I push, so I've largely left it alone, asking questions and suggesting options from time to time, but waiting for him to take the lead, or at least be willing to take a step.

Last Thursday night, we finally took that step.

A long time ago he agreed to attend RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults) classes at our local Catholic Church. We both agreed that it would be fair to take an in depth look at Catholicism to see if it might be right for us. We both have some things we like about the church, and some things we're not so sure about; although I think his list of "not so sure" is probably longer than mine. But I feel at home there, and he has no major objections, and a lot of questions, so going to this group seemed like a logical step. A couple of years ago, I don't think it would have been a good idea; he was much more skeptical and I doubt he would have gone in with an open heart. But he's told me recently that he's excited to learn more and wants to move on from this church-limbo we've kept ourselves in.

We went, as "inquirers", which means we were there to ask questions about the church, the community, and the RCIA process. The whole thing is quite informal, believe it or not since Catholicism is certainly known for it's formality. You attend the "inquirer" group a few times, which is highly conversational and question oriented. Then, if you're interested in learning more, you can become a "candidate", which simply means you're on the path to learning more, and might someday become a Catholic, but there's no pressure to decide anything for sure. That process usually takes about a year, give or take, and it's not a matter of covering all the topics, or taking tests, or proving you can say the rosary. It's just the time it takes to go over the important things about the church and the church's role in your relationship with God - and to decide if this church is the best place to enhance that relationship, which is what it's really all about.

The people were very nice, and helpful. There were several other "inquirers" there, with varying stories about what brought them. We talked about the process, a bit about the church, and the RCIA process. I felt the entire time that this was a good thing, but I was so nervous about my husband's reaction. I worried that we'd leave and he'd immediately say "no way" or be reluctant to give it a chance and come back.

Boy was I wrong.

We got to the car and he said he felt great about it, we should go to church there on Sunday and get D enrolled in their Sunday school as soon as possible. He said he can't say for sure at this point if this means we'll land here forever, or if he'll want to actually become Catholic. But he had a great feeling about the church and the community and feels like it might be a great place for our family - offering us the kind of support we're looking for on our journey to Christ.

I couldn't be happier! I never imagined in a million years he would be so gung ho. He said several times on Friday that he felt so good about the class, and he's looking forward to going again this coming week. I thought for sure he'd be skeptical, but try to tough it out for my sake. I feel like the pull I've felt towards the church hasn't been in my head, but might actually be God calling us in a certain direction. Again, not because I think they're "right", but because it might be the place that will allow our family to grow in our faith and give us the foundation we need to raise our children believing in and loving the Lord.

For the first time probably ever, I feel the tension between my husband and I regarding religion to be fading. When he was looking into that other religion back when we were in college, it created this wall between us, making it difficult for us to even discuss religion without getting defensive and argumentative. I've always hated that and wanted to badly to be on the same page. More than ever before, I feel like we're almost there. And I'm so excited to attend church on Sunday. Granted, in reality I'll probably spend most of my time trying to get G to stay in the nursery without freaking out, but that's ok. We're on the road, taking steps together, our feet in synch and hands embraced. And we're moving in the right direction.

Too much

2009-01-21T13:50:00.000-08:00

Sometimes there is just too much going on at once.

I'm tired, obviously. I'm 8 weeks pregnant today, and as I said to my husband last night when he asked to be reminded how far along I was, it's still frickin' early. Let's be honest, in a lot of ways, the first trimester kinda sucks. The days before the telltale belly begins to show, before you feel the bliss of your baby moving inside you, you're stuck with queasiness, bloating that makes you just look fat, and utter exhaustion. That's the first trimester for me, anyway.

I'm not in terrible shape, so I feel bad complaining about it. I could be puking my guts out everyday. When it comes down to it, I'll take the random queasiness and food issues I'm having (I can barely eat anything with protein in it, especially meat) over horrible morning sickness. But still. I'm lethargic, tired and unmotivated and it's hard to keep up with everything. I'm ready to start feeling like myself again.

My house is a disaster. I feel like I'm behind on everything, but I'm having a hard time getting up and doing anything about it. Case in point, I had plenty of time to clean up the kitchen last night, but never got around to doing it. So it's still gross. I hate that, and yet it seems so hard to just get it done.

I'm so busy with work right now, and I knew the timing on this project was going to be rough. But not only do I need the money, I want the flow of work to continue, so the last thing I'm going to do is start complaining about being too tired to get things done. I'm supposed to write up this huge plan, and originally I was going to have another month in which to do it. But the meeting that was supposed to happen to kick off the process was snowed out back in December, and didn't get rescheduled until this past Monday. So I only just now have the information I need to get started - but the deadline is still the same. I'm so exhausted by the end of the day, it's very hard to focus, but I have 10 days to do a project that should probably take a month and a half.

Adding to my stress level, we're attempting to refinance our house to get a better interest rate, but things keep going wonky. I know it's the state of lending right now, but we just had one lender back out at the last second because they decided the appraisal of our house was $10,000 too high. How they made that determination from a desk in goodness knows what city, I have no idea, especially when the appraiser was actually here. But whatever. Rates went down again, and we have the chance to lock in a really low rate on a 30 year fixed loan. It would be so nice to make this happen, but we seem to run into glitch after glitch. We were just told today that we have to pay an additional half a point at closing because the bank is considering our previous loan a cash-out loan rather than a rate-term. I don't even know what that means, really, but what it means to us is suddenly this refi might not make sense anymore. And our broker is taking his sweet time getting us all the numbers we need to make a real decision.

I think what really stresses me out about the refi thing is that I'm the one in contact with the mortgage broker all the time, and so when I deliver news like this to my husband, I feel like he's somehow blaming me. He's not, and logically I know that. But he's upset about it (understandably so) and asking me all these questions that I don't have answers to because at the end of the day, I don't understand all these details. And I think what I'm afraid of is that my lack of understanding will lead to us making a bad decision - or perhaps was the reason our current loan is somehow being mislabeled by this new lender (because according to our broker, the old loan was supposed to be considered rate term, since we didn't take out any cash). Was it because I didn't ask the right questions? I've known our broker for a long time, and I know he's not the best communicator sometimes. He tends to leave out those pesky little details that usually don't matter, but sometimes they do. And I think this time they do, and it's hard not to feel like I need to take responsiblity for this not going the way we'd planned.

I'll get through everything, obviously. I'm just tired and wish I had a maid. A clean house would do me a lot of good, but I don't know how it's going to happen today. I still haven't even showered.

Now that would be ironic

2009-01-07T19:34:00.000-08:00

So the wedding I'm not too excited about? It's this Saturday, but we may not be going. Not because of any drama, real or perceived, not because we don't genuinely want to be there. Because it's raining enough that I'm considering building an ark and the major freeway that would get us there is supposed to close tonight. It might not open for four days.

There are a number of major rivers between us and the city where the wedding is supposed to take place (about 2 1/2 hours south of us) and basically every river in this half of the state is flooding today. Luckily our house is fine; we don't live near enough to a river that our property is in danger, but mere miles from us everyone is being evacuated. And it's the same everywhere. I haven't seen flooding this bad in, well, maybe ever. We're getting record setting rainfall just after an early winter storm that dumped snow everywhere. The mountain passes are closed, and other freeways are closing down as well.

As weird and awkward as things have gotten for me with my BIL and future SIL, I don't actually want to miss their wedding. And if we're unable to get there, that essentially means that NONE of my husband's family will be able to get there, since they all live north of the point on the freeway that is closing.

They've said before that their wedding will happen regardless of weather and regardless of people not being able to make it. But when they (and by they, I mean her) said that, I'm sure they were thinking of snow and ice, not major freeways being washed out by flood waters. Literally all the groomsmen wouldn't be there, and neither would three of the five bridesmaids. But how do you reschedule a wedding you've been planning for almost a year and a half when it's three days away?

I hope it all works out ok. It's possible there are other routes to take, although they'd take at least twice as long. And there's the problem of the mountain passes; one other route down there that comes to mind would involve crossing a pass, and that isn't happening either. So I just don't know.

If it turns out no one from up here can get there, I seriously hope they postpone it. As heartbreaking as it would be, I think it would be far worse to go ahead with the wedding with over half the people not there. Part of me can't imagine that happening, but part of me wonders if A (BIL's fiance) would say screw it and make him do it anyway. Of course, her sister is among those who wouldn't be able to get there, so that makes it less likely... But I don't know...

I guess we'll see what happens in the next day or so. But is sure would be ironic if we couldn't get there.

Pregnant brain and other randomness

2009-01-03T12:55:00.001-08:00

I'm already feeling loopy and out of it, like I can't quite make a complete sentence half the time. I remember feeling this way during my previous pregnancies and I'm hopeful that I'll regain the full use of my brain sometime in the next couple of years. But who knows, baby 3 may just do me in.

It has struck me lately how different this pregnancy is through the eyes of D. He was less than 2 when I got pregnant with his brother, and only 2 1/2 when he was born. He had some understanding of what was going on, that there was a baby in my tummy, etc. And certainly when we brought that little bundle home and his life turned upsidedown, he had more of a clue.

This time, he really understands and it is so fun. He's explained to me several times, demonstrating not only his understanding of the process but his obvious genius (wink), how the baby is in my tummy and is "super tiny" (his words), but will grow bigger and get too big for my tummy, at which time we'll go to the hospital and "get it out" (again, his words), and then we'll have a baby at home. The baby will then grow, and soon will be as big as G, and then will get bigger still and turn into a "kid" and he can play with it. He's also told me how he's going to teach the baby to talk and teach him how to play with toys. How cute is that?

But the kicker so far was when I came downstairs one morning and he curled up in my lap and asked me, "Mommy, how's your baby doing?"

He's such a sweet boy.

I'll be six weeks tomorrow and I'm exhausted. I told my SIL today that if I seem out of it, or if the house starts to fall apart, not to be alarmed. My body is simply going through the equivalent of running a marathon every day. Growing that placenta is hard work, I tell ya.

I'm feeling glad that this should be the last time I have to do this :).

The wedding I'm not excited for

2008-12-30T18:55:00.000-08:00

My BIL's wedding is coming up on the 10th. Way back when they got engaged, I'd thought I'd be really excited for this wedding when it finally came around. But frankly, I'm not. I wouldn't even consider not going - but there's a part of me that sort of wishes I could just skip it. I'm feeling less and less like the bride would even give a crap if I were there anyway.

Bitter, much? Perhaps. Hormonal? Most certainly.

My BIL finally decided to ask my husband to be a groomsman in the wedding. This is after months of NOT asking, and us hearing twice that he'd asked someone who for one reason or another couldn't do it. So what, his big brother is the last resort? Apparently it has more to do with his fiance. He told my husband, and I quote, "I wanted to ask you from the beginning, but A said I could only have a select few in the wedding." Select few? A select few that apparently included his younger brother and loser drinking buddies, but not his older brother. Why A would not want him in the wedding, I can't fathom. Unless she's secretly mad at us from a conversation we had with her OVER A YEAR AGO where we talked her down from declaring she'll never go to my IL's again, especially for the holidays. That's the only thing I can think of that she'd be holding a grudge over. Of course, every time we've seen her or hung out with her since then, she's been fine. We've hung out, they've stayed weekends at our house, we've played games, watched movies, stayed up all hours of the night talking. But clearly there is something there that we're unaware of, because she clearly didn't want my husband in her wedding. That fact alone is sending my mama-bear instinct into overdrive.

This weekend is the bachelor and bachelorette parties. Apparently they are both in the town where my ILs live (and why my BIL and his fiance's social life is all centered around a little, podunk and rather redneck town where neither of them actually live, I don't know - but that's another story); the girls are doing their thing on Friday, the boys on Saturday. My husband is going down for the bachelor party. Guess who is not invited to the bachelorette party? That would be me. Apparently the future sister-in-law isn't cool enough for an invite. My SIL (my husband and BIL's sister) IS invited, of course - and that's partially how I know I am in fact not invited. She has all the details, and has for a couple of weeks. I've heard nothing, even though I have talked to A at least twice since they set up the party. I even asked her about it last time I saw her, and admittedly I was fishing to see if she was going to invite me. I asked her what she was planning and she said something about hanging out and having a girls night. But that's the last I've heard of it, except through my SIL.

Think that rubs me wrong? You bet it does.

So my future SIL didn't (or perhaps still doesn't) want my husband in her wedding and she didn't bother to invite me, her future SIL, to her bachelorette party. Of course I was cool enough to be invited to her bridal shower, but that meant I was bringing a gift.

I realize I'm hormonal right now. I got cut off in a parking lot the other day and went from gripping the steering wheel so as not to fly out of my car and launch myself at the person, to almost balling my eyes out in the space of about 15 seconds. But still. I'm really insulted by everything. She doesn't seem to give a crap whether she's a part of this family or not. For a time, I'd assumed that she and I had become friends; that despite the fact that she's 9 years younger and in a very different stage of her life, that we could be friends. Heck, even sisterly. But this feels like a slap in the face.

I will admit that even were I invited to the party, i couldn't go. But that's not the point. A courtesy invite would have been appropriate, I think. So much for being family.

Tired already

2008-12-28T21:50:00.000-08:00

I suffered from pretty extreme fatigue in my first pregnancy. I got a really bad cold at about 5 1/2 weeks and from then until about 11 or 12 weeks, I was barely functional. I'd get up late, drag myself to work, do my best not to fall asleep at my desk, leave early, come home and fall asleep on the couch, wake up to eat dinner, then go to bed.

Second pregnancy was much better. I attribute it to an easier pregnancy overall, as well as not being put on a mega-dose of progesterone supplements. I needed progesterone both times, but with my second pregnancy the dose was about 1/3 of what my old doctor had put me on, and I think it made a big difference in the severity of the side effects.

I'm approximately 4 1/2 weeks right now, and I'm feeling extra tired already. I really hope that doesn't mean I'm in for a rough couple of months (although I'll take fatigue over morning sickness any day!). G is at such a tough age right now and I don't know how I'll keep up with him if I get too fatigued, not to mention my slightly high-maintenance 4 year old. Obviously, I'll manage, but I'm hoping the fact that the first trimester tiredness is setting in early (for me) isn't a bad sign.

I think I'm in for a couple months of extra early bedtimes! Or at least I will if I'm smart. Sometimes getting to bed early is so much easier said than done.

I'm not crazy.

2008-12-26T19:43:00.001-08:00

Nope, not crazy. I'm pregnant.

After several days of living in crazy-land, wondering if the mild cramping, the achiness, the full sensation was all in my head, I caved under the pressure and took an HPT. My husband and I had talked about waiting until Christmas morning (and that certainly would have been cool), but Tuesday night we agreed that Christmas Eve morning would do, given how anxious I was getting. However, just minutes after having that conversation, I ran to the bathroom and ripped into the box of First Response. I felt like I'd never be able to sleep, waiting to test in the morning and although I might regret testing at 11:00 at night (since I wasn't using trusty FMU), I couldn't take the suspense any longer.

As I sat there waiting for the results, I felt more and more like I was about to be disappointed. Maybe it was my defense mechanism against the sadness I knew I'd feel if there had been just one line. I'd been trying to protect myself from it, telling myself there was no way it could turn out this perfect - to get pregnant the first cycle trying (again!) AND find out at Christmas... No one is that lucky, right?

Apparently we are.

The two lines were dark pink, leaving no room to wonder if I was seeing things, if I was crazy. Not crazy - pregnant! Well, perhaps pregnant and crazy go hand in hand, but it was such a vindicating feeling to know that all the things I'd been feeling were real; not only real, but indications that I am in fact pregnant. For days I'd been wanting to say, "I feel pregnant," but fear of being wrong kept me from saying it out loud and fear of disappointment kept me from saying it even to myself.

So I'm pregnant! I'm over the moon. Something about this feels so right. I never thought I'd have three kids quite this close together; three years always seemed like a nice age gap, whereas D and G are 2 1/2 years apart and G and this baby will be closer still. Even so, this feels perfect. We've wanted three, we're certain we're done after this and it feels good to have things in motion. I can stop wondering, stop worrying and just enjoy what should be my last pregnancy.

I feel so blessed. I know how lucky we are and I'm SO grateful.

She would have known

2008-12-22T22:09:00.000-08:00

As I sat down at the computer just now, it occurred to me for apparently no rational reason, that my mother-in-law Marilyn would have known if I was pregnant. Marilyn isn't with us anymore; she died right after Thanksgiving in 1997. But she was one of those people with a really big personality; the mark she left on those around her was pretty intense. More time than I have on this earth would have to pass before I could forget her.

She had one of those crazy radars that seemed to pick up on everything; especially things you want to keep secret. For example, she was impossible to surprise at Christmas. Every year my poor husband would try, and every year she somehow knew what he'd gotten her. One year he got her a bottle of Chanel #5, wrapped the little box, then placed that box in a much larger box filled with several old books for added weight. He tried to let slip hints that he'd gotten her something that would explain the size and weight of the box (I can't remember what he was trying to convince her it was, but he had a plan). Still, she knew exactly what was in there.

I will never forget the first time we saw her after we had slept together for the first time. He wasn't living with her then (he'd moved out at about age 16), but for some reason we'd gone to her house. She instantly knew. She got this huge smile on her face, the one we always knew meant trouble, and she said something to the affect of, "You guys had sex, didn't you!" She wasn't mad, and maybe not even surprised. We'd been dating for over two years at that point and amongst most of the people we knew then, we seemed like long time hold outs in the virginity department. How she knew, I have no idea. Maybe she saw something in her son; maybe she saw it in me. Maybe both. But she had a tendency to know those kinds of things, especially when you didn't want her to.

I think that if she were alive today, we'd have a hard time putting anything past her. If I was pregnant, she'd take one look at me and know. And she wouldn't hesitate to ask, probably in front of other people. And it would be impossible to lie to her; she'd know that too.

Two week wait, take one

2008-12-21T19:01:00.000-08:00

And here we are, the dreaded two-week-wait.

This is certainly not my favorite part of TTC. I've done well this time to stay calm, keep from obsessing too much, let thoughts of "am I pregnant?" dominate my mind. Mostly. I'm not even 100% sure that I ovulated at all, yet as the days go by, the anxiety mounts and I start to wonder - did we strike gold again?

I can't shake the notion that I feel *something* going on in there. What that something is, could be a variety of things. It could be that after spending the last several years either pregnant or on birth control for the most part, I'm simply feeling the sensations of having an actual cycle (which in and of itself would be a good thing, pregnant or not). It could be that I'm a little constipated and it's leaving me a bit bloated and uncomfortable. Or it could be that it's all in my head and my mind is making me believe that I'm feeling a fullness in my pelvic region, a little bit of cramping, and an overall awareness of my uterine area that I just can't explain. And of course I can't forget how constipation was the first symptom I had when I was pregnant with G.

But then logic kicks in and I feel sort of sheepish. How could I feel something so early? Even if I ovulated on CD14, I'm days from when I'd even be able to test with any reasonable accuracy, and I'm not certain of if/when I ovulated. And I've been down this road many, many times; thinking the little cramps and twinges I convince myself I'm feeling might be the first signs of pregnancy. And many, many times, I've been wrong.

In fact, the two times I've been pregnant, I had no idea until the day I actually tested. With D, we hadn't been actively trying for many months and didn't really think we'd get pregnant without medical intervention; I tested on a whim, thinking my period should have shown up by then. With G, I was totally convinced that I wasn't pregnant that month, since I felt too "normal" (except for the constipation, but I brushed that off as being unrelated) and only tested when I knew my period should have started, and hadn't. How could I know so early this time, when my pregnancy radar is so clearly unreliable?

And come later this week if my period shows, or if I break down and take a test that comes up negative, I'll sure feel silly for thinking what I'm thinking right now. There you go again, convincing yourself of something that wasn't there. It seems so impossible that we'd get pregnant on the first try yet again. That just isn't fair, really. How could one couple hit the jackpot twice? And when we decided to start trying this month, it certainly didn't escape me that we'd likely be finding out one way or another right around Christmas. That would just be too much, to find out at Christmas that our third baby is coming. How could that be possible? We couldn't be THAT lucky.

Could we?

I don't know. Right now, I don't know if it's all in my head, if I'm feeling something genuine that isn't pregnancy, or if we're just plain lucky. Really lucky.

Understanding Santa

2008-12-18T13:14:00.000-08:00

I love that D really "gets" Santa this year. He knows the stories and the songs; he gets the naughty/nice idea and loves the idea that this mysterious, magical man will be bringing presents to our house on Christmas. Last year he sort of got it, and definitely understood the Christmas = presents connection. But this year there is so much more magic to it - it's fun!

All on his own he decided we need to make cookies to leave out for Santa on Christmas Eve, and asks daily if we can make them. He very willingly sat on Santa's lap, which is a HUGE first. And he's been rather concerned, since he asked Santa for a big Hulk toy and he got one for his birthday shortly after we saw Santa; so now he's worried that Santa won't know what to bring him. I've assured him that Santa is a pretty smart guy and he probably has a good idea of what he wants for Christmas.

He also asked if it's ok for him to come in our room and let us know if he hears a "clatter" or a "racket" on the roof Christmas Eve. He likes using those words and I think he assumes they're only associated with the noise of Santa landing on the roof.

However, some of his questions about Santa have been a little harder to answer. He's asked several times how Santa will get in, since we don't have a regular fireplace and big chimney. We do have a gas fireplace, but as he insightfully pointed out, it has a glass door on the front. We've told him Santa is magic and can get around those kinds of things really easily. He's only partially convinced.

I can't wait for his eyes to light up Christmas morning when he comes down and sees all the presents under the tree! We usually don't put all the presents under there until late Christmas Eve, so when the boys get up it looks really magical. And he'll see some bites taken out of the cookies we'll make and the carrots we leave out for the reigndeer will be gone too. He's going to freak!

I love Christmas and it takes on a whole new dimension of fun when you have kids!

Held hostage by the gift exchange

2008-12-11T19:14:00.000-08:00

I love Christmas. LOVE it. It's my favorite time of year, and I actually really like all the shopping and wrapping and such. I love buying presents for everyone; the only bummer every year is that we don't have more money. Back when we were DINKs (double income, no kids) we'd go to each family gathering with armloads of presents and it was AWESOME.

Anyway, even though we can't get loads of gifts these days, it's still fun to pick things out for people and see their faces when they open them. I love that part. I think that's part of why the "plan" with my in-laws this year is bugging me so much.

They decided, and by "they" I mean my step-MIL Maria and her daughter Amy, that instead of everyone buying gifts for everyone else, we'd do a gift exchange. Each adult is supposed to bring a gift that is, "something you'd want," whatever that means. We draw numbers, and pick gifts in order. Each person can either pick a gift from under the tree or "steal" a gift from someone who has already picked. We've played this type of game before and it can be really fun - and granted, it might be really fun when we do it this year.

The problem is, this means that we're not "supposed" to buy gifts for my in-laws, nor my SIL who lives with us, my BIL or his fiance. So instead of taking the time to pick something we think they'd really like, we just buy two random gifts and we don't even know who will end up with them. No strolling the aisles thinking, "Sam would love this!" And speaking of Sam, my SIL really gets the shaft. She's a single college student. Usually it's her parents, my ILs, who buy her a bunch of Christmas presents - you know, how parents do. She doesn't have a boyfriend, fiance or husband to spoil her on Christmas. This year, because of this gift exchange, instead of getting a bunch of cool stuff from her parents, all she's getting is some generic, random gift that she ends up with at the end of the game. Now, it isn't all about the gifts and she's the least selfish person I know in the whole world, seriously. But even she is really bummed.

The purpose, I'm sure, is to allow everyone to save money, and that is totally fine with me. Our budget is tight this year too and I can totally appreciate that. But it's annoying that we weren't even consulted on this decision. In fact, we were only told as an afterthought. During Thanksgiving dinner, Sam asked Amy about it and asked if Amy had told us yet. It was obvious from the look on her face that it hadn't even occurred to Amy that we should know about it. Gee, thanks, glad to feel a part of the family.

The real kicker is, instead of saving us money, this is going to cost us more. My husband said screw it to the not buying other gifts part, so we're still buying something for my ILs, my SIL, and my BIL and fiance - which we would have done already - plus the two gifts for the gift exchange. So that kind of sucks. Obviously we don't have to, but he's adamant about it. So instead of saving us money, it really means we have to buy two extra gifts.

Not only that, but because Sam isn't getting any "real" presents from her parents, we're trying to squeeze the budget a bit more and buy her some extra stuff so she has more presents to open. I'm happy to do it; goodness knows I love her dearly and she deserves it. But ouch. I'm trying to keep track of the Christmas spending and I want to throw my hands in the air, pull out the credit card and say screw it.

So I guess the bottom line is, I'm annoyed that two people got to dictate what the rest of us do for Christmas without consulting any of us, I feel bad for my SIL because she's pretty disappointed about it all, and I'm frustrated that this is going to actually end up costing us more money, not less.

And I have no clue what to do for the gifts... Sigh.

Happy birthday to my little man

2008-12-08T21:06:00.000-08:00

You are four today. How it has come to be four years since you were born, I almost can't imagine. And yet so much has changed in that time, it feels like so long ago.

You are such a fun, smart, silly, rambunctious boy. You love school and the teachers tell me you are friends with everybody. That doesn't surprise me much; you don't have a shy bone in your body. You recently discovered you have some pretty sweet dance moves and you love to sing. Right now your favorite things are skeletons, dinosaurs, and superhero action figures. You love to build things, play with playdough and do art projects. You're learning and growing so much, it's amazing to watch. You recently wrote your name by yourself and you're right on the cusp of learning to read a little.

You take my breath away with your sensitivity and love. You tell me and your dad how much you love us at least twenty times a day. Today you called me beautiful. It was hard not to cry. You love your brother and insist on giving him about thirty hugs before bedtime every night. He loves you back and tries to do everything just like you. I don't think you appreciate that much right now, but someday you'll look back and realize how cool it is to have a little brother who looks up to you.

You make the silliest faces and your stories are wonderful. You tell me stories about skeleton monsters fighting fires in big houses, of superheros fighting bad guys and sending them to "big giant time outs". Your imagination is limitless. The living room floor is often hot lava, or the ocean. We chase each other around pretending to be sharks and your brother follows along behind, laughing.

It is such an honor to be your mommy. I love you so much it almost hurts. There was such a long time when we didn't know if we'd ever have you and I have to say, you were worth the wait. Ten times over, you were worth it. Every day that you have been with us has been an enormous blessing from God. I'm thankful for every moment we have with you, even the hard ones. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Hard as it is to believe you are four, it's a wonder and a blessing to watch you grow up. Parenting is such a bittersweet endeavor; we have this short period of time when our children are ours, when they are here in our home, dependent on us. And we love them so much, we can't stand the thought of them leaving. Yet every day, that is what we are preparing them to do. The goal is to have to let them go, release them into the world and hope we did a good enough job.

I pray to our Father in Heaven that I have the strength, courage, wisdom, patience and understanding to be a good mother to you. I pray for your health, safety and well being as you grow. And I pray that He will give us many more years of laughter, fun, games, and love.

I'm so proud of you and I love you so much. Happy birthday my sweet little man.

I guess this is it

2008-12-01T19:24:00.000-08:00

I'm officially not taking birth control. Yikes!

I think I'm over the "am I crazy?" worry. Obviously the answer is yes; however, that isn't deterring either of us from going down this road again. It is what it is - we both believe we're meant to have three. Yes, I'll have to get fat, and yes, I'll have to give up my freedom, my body, my boobs, my time, my schedule, my sleep.

Ah, sleep. I remember sleep.

But I digress... I'm sick of thinking and worrying and talking about my weight - the relevance here being whether or not I'll even be able to get pregnant at this weight, which might be a no. And the fact that I'm still holding onto half of the weight I gained with G and am going to try to get pregnant again and gain more weight... well, ick. But like I said, I'm sick of talking about it. I feel like all year I've been worrying about my weight almost to the point of obsession, yet I haven't actually done anything constructive about it for long enough to make a difference. So I'm over it. I'm doing what I have to do about it now and I guess better late than never. But I don't want to prattle on about it endlessly here; I already cringe looking back at some of my posts this year on the subject. So that's that. I'm heavier than I should be but I'm hopefully going to take care of some of that - in other words, I'm going to diet like crazy until I actually get pregnant and hope that will be good enough for my f'ed up hormones. (and when I say diet like crazy, I don't mean crash diet or something unhealthy - I don't do "diets". But I am keeping my food intake to a target number of calories, reducing my carbs and food logging everything I put in my mouth - basically what worked for me before and what I should have done months ago...).

So here we go again, hopping on the TTC train for what should be the last time. I hope it isn't a long ride; I don't know that I have it in me to go through the infertility nightmare again. But I don't really know what to expect from my body right now. Time will tell, I suppose. I'll try not to obsess and worry a whole lot, but let's be honest, that probably isn't going to happen.

Wish me luck, I guess!

Nothing like a little aversion therapy

2008-11-13T19:00:00.000-08:00

Since my husband and I are thinking about trying for another baby not too long from now, I decided to go ahead and go back on metformin (and if there is anyone other than my cyster friends who ever see this, I'm going on metformin because I have PCOS and it helps - short answer). I've been on met twice before, both times when we were trying to get pregnant.

Met is famous for wrecking havoc with your tummy. Lovely side effects, but they usually go away once your body is more or less used to it. Usually, they have you start on a small dose for a week, then add to it each week until you get to your full dose. The first time I started it, I was essentially nauseous for a month as I ramped up to my full dose. The second time, it gave me low blood sugars, especially in the middle of the night (so not pleasant). This time, I'm having my share of tummy troubles, some of the bathroom variety.

You'd think, having been on it twice before, I'd have no trouble remembering what is and isn't ok to eat. You'd think. But apparently I needed some reminding. The first day I felt rotten, but I expected that. Then a day or two later, I ate a candy bar. A whole one. Never mind that I have no business eating a whole candy bar anyway, on met, especially the first week of met, that's just bad. I felt AWFUL. It took me a bit to figure out what was going on and then it hit me - sugar. Sugar + met = BAD. At least for me.

So you'd think after that I'd be good to go, but NOOOOO. Apparently I needed to learn this the hard way. Two more times. DH brought home stuff to make root beer floats. I LOVE root beer floats and I can't remember the last time I had one. I paid dearly for it, but I don't know, that one might have been worth it. It was good. But then a day or two later I had a mocha. Apparently those are off the menu as well.

You know what's funny though - right now I don't have the slightest craving for anything sugary. Chocolate, ice cream, eclairs, donuts, milkshakes, even mochas - all sound horrid. All I can think about is the tummy dramatics that ensued when I ate anything with too much sugar and I have no desire to go there.

See, a little aversion therapy can't be too bad of a thing, right? Maybe that's why some people lose weight on metformin - it isn't that it does anything for their metabolism, it's that they have such rotten side effects whenever they eat bad, they quit eating bad real quick!

Saying goodbye to October

2008-11-05T22:58:00.000-08:00

D went on his first field trip with his preschool to the pumpkin patch a couple of weeks ago. At the end, they all got to pick out a pumpkin to take home and he was beyond excited. He was mildly amused by the animals and other things at the farm, but what he really cared about were the pumpkins. And when they told him he could pick one to keep, that really made his day.

He walked amongst the rows of small pumpkins that were set aside for school groups while most of the other kids ran around and played. This was serious business, the choosing of a special pumpkin. He picked up several and eyed them before finally finding what he was looking for. What it was he saw in this particular pumpkin, I can't be sure, but it was most definitely the one.

On the way home, he decided to name it and after kicking around several names, including "Tree-monster," "Pumpkin-monster" and simply "Pumpkin" he settled on "October." "It's because this is October and October is for Halloween, Mom," he explained to me as we drove. I'm still tickled that he not only decided to name his pumpkin, but he came up with such a creative and appropriate one.

Thereafter, "October" was part of the family. We referred to the pumpkin by name, as if it were a new pet. He took it with him in the car when we ran errands and proudly showed it off to anyone around, interested or not. He'd excitedly ask anyone he saw if they had seen his pumpkin yet, and if not, happily make the introductions.

On Halloween we carved a couple of pumpkins to put out on our porch and he insisted that October be carved as well. We explained to him that this would mean October wouldn't last much longer and when he started to rot and get mushy, we'd have to throw him away. He asked "why?" a lot, but he asks that about everything, so we just explained it to him as best as we could. He was adamant - he wanted October to be a honest to goodness jack-o-lantern. And not just any jack-o-lantern - one with a "spooky-scary-mad face".

My husband obliged, after D did the honors of scooping out the "guts". D was very happy with the results and proudly displayed October on the porch for all trick-or-treaters to see.

Saturday morning he asked to bring October inside and we went ahead and lit his candle again so D could enjoy seeing his face glow a while longer. Since then, he'd been sitting on our kitchen island, right next to where D normally sits to eat his breakfast.

Today it became apparent that October's brief life would soon come to and end. The top around his stem was mushy and he was getting little black speckles inside and around the carved eyes and mouth. I was worried about how D would take it, but I also didn't want to throw him out without D knowing about it. So I showed him the spots, explaining to him again that pumpkins don't last forever and we'd need to throw him away. He thought about it for a few seconds, then declared, "Ok, I'll do it." I told him we'd need to throw him in the garbage in the garage, so he carried his pumpkin out and tossed him in the garbage can while I held the lid open.

No tears, no protests. He accepted what would happen, but he was adamant about doing it himself. There was something about his resolve that struck me today. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it was so sweet and yet a little sad.

As we came back inside from the garage I tried to dwell on the good things about October's brief stay in our family. I said, "It was fun having a cool pumpkin like October, wasn't it?" "Yeah," he replied quietly. "And remember, we have some pictures of October, so if you ever want to look at him, just let me know." "We do? We have pictures?" "Yep, do you want to go look at them?" "Yeah, Mommy. Let's go look at them...."

Bye, bye October.

The time change sucks

2008-11-03T18:22:00.000-08:00

Both boys were up before 5am this morning. Obviously their little bodies haven't gotten the memo that it isn't 6am, it's 5... And why D woke at 4:45, I have no idea, but it's been an interesting day nonetheless. I'm seriously tired. When I put G down for bed I whispered to him to stay asleep until at least 6. You know it's bad when you'll be happy if you can "sleep in" until 6am.

D has gone to bed without getting up for two nights in a row. My husband is putting him to bed right now, so we'll see if it continues. It seems like we've turned the corner, but you never know with him. Hopefully by Thursday when I'll have to put him to bed (DH will be working late), he'll be solid enough that it won't matter whether it's Daddy or Mommy doing bedtime - he'll just plain stay in bed.

I know one day I'll look back on this time and laugh - when I'm trying to drag my teenage boys out of bed for school and they won't budge, LOL!

Huh.

2008-11-02T12:35:00.000-08:00

Last night the door remained unlocked.

Several things could have been a factor. One, my husband was the one to put him to bed. D absolutely pushes at me harder than my husband, so that could have been part of it. I sort of hope not, because I have to put him to bed some nights and so we have to get him to go to bed for me as well.

Two, and perhaps most importantly, D was uber exhausted. Friday was Halloween of course and he was a trick or treating maniac. He was out late, as we expected (although that night he still got up and threw a fit, although a short lived one, behind his locked door) and also as expected, didn't sleep in AT ALL on Saturday. Then we spent the entire day at my ILs on Saturday, getting home late again. He was super, duper tired. He'd slept some in the car, but woke up about 1/2 hour before we got home, so it wasn't like he was sleeping still and we just transfered him from the car to his bed.

Today he finally got a sticker on his sticker chart, he got to choose one toy to get out of time out, and he will get to read books again at bedtime. If he does another good bedtime, we'll start putting some of his things back in his room. I'll probably start with the lightbulbs from his overhead light. It's pain not having those in there, LOL.

And another...

2008-10-29T19:41:00.001-07:00

Blah, blah, blah... locked door. Blah, blah blah.. tantrum... Blah, blah, blah, about 30 minutes from door closing to silence... Blah, blah, blah...

Can you tell I'm sick of talking about bedtime?

Another day, another bedtime post

2008-10-28T20:59:00.001-07:00

Last night didn't ultimately go quite as smoothly as I'd originally thought. He woke up at about 10:45 and came out of his room; I'd unlocked the door before then, thinking I'd leave it unlocked for the night. I'm not sure why he woke up, although he did hear my husband leave - but normally, that kind of thing wouldn't wake him. At least, it never has before. In any case, he got up, and I tried to get him settled back into bed, but once I tried to leave, he decided he didn't want to stay in bed. Again. So I locked the door again. He had another fit, kicked the door quite a bit, but ultimately went back to bed. How G sleeps through all this is beyond me, but I'll take it; I'm super grateful that he's as easy as he is when it comes to bedtime right now!

He woke again around 2:30 because he fell out of bed. I think when he got himself back in bed after the second tantrum episode he was probably too close to the edge, so rolled off in his sleep. I got him settled again and he stayed in bed this time, so the door stayed unlocked until morning. He slept until about 7, which is actually pretty decent for him.

In any case, tonight rolled around and once again, he got up as I was leaving his room, so I locked the door. He kicked it half a dozen times, cried for a little while, then got himself into bed. He cried softly a little longer, but in the end, he was asleep before 7, which is earlier than he's been asleep in WEEKS! He SO needs this. I hope he sleeps all night, but I'm expecting him to wake and be mad that his door is locked at least once. We'll see.

Progress? I suppose so. After how things have gone so far, I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.

The next step

2008-10-27T19:53:00.001-07:00

Tonight went better than I thought it would.

Ultimately, we locked his door. We told him that we were going to put a lock on his door and if he stayed in bed, we wouldn't lock it. But if he got up, we would simply lock the door. We took him to the store and showed him what we were buying and he watched my husband install it (it's a new doorknob with a lock and we installed it backwards - so the locking part faces out). We explained it to him several times to make sure he understood, emphasizing that it was his choice - if he chose to stay in bed, we wouldn't lock the door; if he chose to get up, the door would be locked.

I also decided to try one last thing, in addition to the lock. At bedtime, I told him that if he stayed in bed, I would come back and check on him in three minutes and give him a hug and a kiss. I didn't really think that would work, but I was willing to give it a try, in the interest of trying everything to avoid actually locking his door.

Unfortunately, I was right and it didn't work. I told him several times that if he stayed in bed I would come back and check on him, but if he got up I'd lock the door. He was out of bed before I could even get to the door - and the distance is only a few feet. So I locked it.

I was literally sick to my stomach while I was putting him to bed, worrying about what he would do if I had to lock the door. I imagined him screaming and kicking the door for hours on end, finally collapsing in a heap on the floor from total exhaustion. What happened was not nearly as bad as I'd feared. He did scream and kick his door, but not for very long - less than 10 minutes. I don't know exactly what he was doing in there, but I did hear him moving around his room, crying loudly and yelling things for a bit after that. But then, it got quiet. Not completely quiet, I could still hear him crying, but it was softly. I think he'd crawled in bed and laid there crying for about another 15 minutes. And then all was quiet.

It took me a while before I would say it out loud to my husband - "I think he's actually asleep..."

Honestly, he was asleep earlier tonight than he has been in a long time. I hope he sleeps fine all night and gets some good rest; goodness knows he needs it.

I'm relieved that it wasn't the horrific disaster I'd feared, but still pretty amazed that it had to come to this. I really, really thought that the "silent return to sleep" was going to work. Isn't that supposed to work for every kid? This has been a good reminder that there isn't any one thing that works for every kid. Some kids need to be put back in bed over and over to set that clear boundary - mine needed to be shown in no uncertain terms that he would not be seeing us again after bedtime, so there's no point in getting up.

I don't know what to expect tomorrow and the following nights. Nothing would surprise me at this point. Tomorrow might go great; we might not even have to lock the door. But I wouldn't be surprised if he threw a mega fit tomorrow, just to see if we're still serious. I have no idea. I wouldn't have predicted anything about the last month, so we'll just have to wait and see. For tonight, I'm just thankful he's getting some much needed rest and I have the slightest bit of hope that maybe we can see a faint bit of light at the end of a very long, dark tunnel.

The battle rages on

2008-10-26T19:48:00.001-07:00

I'm sick of blogging about this.

I think I've decided that the so-called "silent return to sleep" isn't going to work. I actually thought it would. I figured we'd have two or three bad nights, then progressively better ones as he realized his antics weren't going to work. I was ready to do it night after night, but I think my resolve hinged on the strategy doing some good and showing some progress. But that certainly isn't what has happened. Last night showed me that he'd keep this up forever, if there were no other consequences. He doesn't really care that I just put him back to bed anymore; he gets away with getting up over and over and so what if I put him back - it's more fun than going to bed, apparently. At least he gets to see me every minute or so.

Today I emptied his room of just about everything - toys, books, etc. I left him his pumpkin nightlight, his kitty, elephant and shark (the animals he sleeps with), his two extra blankets (superman blanket and monkey blanket), his monitor, fan, his lamp and his regular nightlight (that we don't use while the pumpkin one is on). Everything else is in the playroom.

I told him that if he got up once, he would not get books at bedtime tomorrow; twice, his pumpkin nightlight would go away; three times, his kitty; four, his shark; five, his elephant; six, his monkey blanket; seven, his superman blanket. After that, I said I would no longer tuck him in and he would have to pull up his covers by himself. I thought maybe, just maybe, when he was down to just one animal, he might actually stay in bed just so he could keep the elephant and have something to sleep with. What on earth was I thinking?

In the end, he lost his bedtime stories for tomorrow, his nightlight, his kitty, his shark, elephant, monkey blanket, and superman blanket - as well as his lamp, since he kept turning it on, and the light bulbs out of his overhead light, since he kept turning that on too. And still, he got up; he was just getting started.

After about 40 minutes, and one big throw up on his floor, I made an executive decision. In some extreme situations, we've put him in a time out in our van, in the garage. It's been reserved for those times when he's done something really bad, or escalated a situation so far we feel we have to do something pretty dramatic. I have to be honest, we've been discussing whether or not to spank him at this point, and generally, I'm not a fan of spanking. But this has gone on so long and to such an extreme level, we're actually talking about whether to try it. Anyway, I was thinking about that, and thinking about whether a time out in the van is any worse than a spanking, and decided to try a time out in the van again. My husband did that a few times when this whole mess first started, but it was the kind of thing he did out of anger. After D threw up all over himself in the van once, and I had to clean up the subsequent mess (and let me tell you, cleaning up puke off of a carseat is not easy at all), we decided not to use it as a consequence anymore. It left a bad taste in our mouths, not to mention the cleanup was awful (part of my problem with it was that my husband was leaving him out there for much longer than I felt he should). However, I know how much he hates it, and when used sparingly, it's been effective in the past (emphasis on used sparingly, and we went through a period where my husband got too van happy and would escalate to that almost immediately - it was the cause for some heated discussions between the two of us, but that was a while back).

In any case, since I'd taken away everything that I could, barring his covers (and if I did that, he'd get cold in the night and wake me up, which I don't need any more of that), his nightlight, which just seemed too mean, and his fan, which also seemed too mean since I know he can't sleep without it (I can't sleep without mine either, so I get how that feels), and I didn't want to start taking away things only to give them back if he promised to stay in bed ("Ok, I'll turn your nightlight back on if you stay in bed), because what do I do if he doesn't... Anyway, all that to say, i decided to put him in a time out in the van. I warned him that I would, that if he got up again, he would go sit in the van for two minutes. Of course, he got up, so we headed downstairs to the garage.

He had three van time outs tonight, before he finally decided to stay in bed. THAT is how stubborn this child is.

Right now, we're considering whether to put a lock on his door so he simply can't get out. I am running out of ideas and nothing seems to be making an impact on him. It's insanity, seriously. I don't really want to do it, but we're discussing it. I don't want to spank him either, but we're discussing it. I don't know what else to do. He's so overtired, he wakes up in the night every night now and it's hard to get him back to bed; and he wakes up ridiculously early in the morning, both signs that he's not getting enough sleep. I'm utterly exhausted, not to mention behind on work and pretty sick of the whole thing. I just do not understand.

It may sound like my calm is out the window, but I'm not angry. Yeah, I'm frustrated (who wouldn't be), and pretty perplexed at why this has gone on so long and why no consequence seems to be enough. But I'm staying calm about it and not letting it make me miserable all day long. At least I'm trying.

Consistency? Or Insanity?

2008-10-25T20:35:00.000-07:00

The bedtime battle wages on. At this point, I'm not clear on who is winning. I thought by today (day 5 of me doing the "silent return to bed") it would definitely be me, although I expected it to continue for at least several more days, if not more. But tonight made me wonder at what point consistency becomes insanity, the definition of which is to do the same thing repeatedly expecting a different result.

Maybe D and I are both insane?

Tonight took 1 hour and 45 minutes. But the crazy thing is that it wasn't full of tantrums, crying, spitting, throwing up, spilling water, hitting, dropping to the floor, yelling and begging for a million different things. The first 10 minutes were the crying, asking for things phase; but even then, he didn't get nearly as upset as he did the first two nights. He calmed down so quickly I was silly enough to think tonight might only take 20 or 30 minutes. Boy, how wrong I was.

The rest of the night was spent with him quietly getting up and doing things like turning on his lamp, turning off his fan, turning on his overhead light, and then coming to open the door. Then he'd immediately go set things right again - turn his fan on and turn his light and lamp off, get into bed and wait for me to cover him up. Sometimes I'd hear him get up or see his lamp go on and then it would be quiet for a minute or more. I'd been waiting for him to open the door before doing anything, but once out of sheer curiosity I opened the door to see what he was up to. That time, he was playing with the Halloween window clings on his window. I promptly and silently took them out of the room.

Honestly, tonight was almost as maddening, if not more, than the two hours of screaming, crying and other obnoxious behavior was. This quiet getting up, doing something or other, and coming to the door for me went on for so long I seriously felt like I was going to lose my mind. Over and over and over he did it; it was just a game to him. And it wasn't as if he was stopping to play for long periods of time. He'd do something or other in his room (most of the time I don't know what he was doing), come to the door, open it, and get back in bed. Half the time he'd just lie down in front of the door and pound his legs on the floor. I wonder if those times he was trying to see if I'd come in.

Eventually, I did start going in before he'd open the door. I'd listen for his feet to hit the floor and then open the door and point him back to his bed. I don't know if that was the right call or not. On the one hand, he might have discovered "Cool, if I keep doing this, Mom comes in my room!" I'm hoping it was more that he realized he couldn't get up and play around anymore. I did it as much because I was sick of waiting for him every time he'd get up as anything. I knew he was up, I wanted him to realize I wasn't going to allow it.

Still, even with that, he kept it up and showed absolutely no signs of slowing. At one point he'd seemed like he was winding down, but after that it was like he got more and more energy. He'd run to his bed, jumping up and rolling around, getting his animals in place before I'd put the cover over him. I could tell he wasn't going to stop anytime soon.

Finally, I broke my silence and informed him that I would no longer be putting his covers over him; if he wanted to keep getting up, he could put his covers on himself. Once again, I'm not sure if it was a good call or not, at least in the long run. Maybe the whole time I should have kept to my silence, but I was so beyond done with it, I felt like I had to do something different or he'd be at it for another hour or more. I knew that kind of escalation would make him mad, and it definitely did. He got upset and started getting up quicker, pounding on the door and crying for me to put his covers on. I let him do that about a dozen times, not even going into his room, just standing in the doorway pointing to his bed, waiting for him to get back in, and closing the door. Finally I went in, told him calmly (although at this point, calm was the last thing I was feeling) that I would put his covers on one more time, but if he got out of bed again, he could do it himself and I would not be putting his covers on him again tonight. That was the last time he got up.

I think I'm going to have to add something to what I'm already doing. Tonight he was playing a game and more or less getting away with it. I think he honestly would rather do this than go to bed, so even if all that happens is I put him back to bed over and over, he figures it's more fun than actually going to bed. I'm going to have to impose some sort of consequences. However, I want to keep things fairly simple and all related to bedtime and his room.

Tomorrow during the day I'm going to clean out his room of just about everything - toys, books, animals, everything. He can keep his regular nightlight, the Halloween pumpkin nightlight he is currently using (the other one is in there, but not on), his shark, elephant and kitty that he sleeps with and I think that's it. That way there at least won't be anything to play or mess around with in there.

Then, tomorrow night I'm going to tell him that if he gets up out of bed, even once, he will not be getting stories at bedtime the next night. The hard thing about bedtime consequences is they're so hard to make immediate. I can't take away books right then and there because we read books before the shenanigans begin. So hopefully this will still have an impact; and I do know he's perfectly capable of understanding the connection between a consequence that is delayed and the behavior that caused it. I fully expect him to call me on it and I have no illusions that this will magically make him stay in bed tomorrow night. But the next night he will not get books. Maybe that will start to get his attention.

After that, I'll be taking away his Halloween nightlight and switching him back to his regular one. I'm reluctant to take away the nightlight entirely, although I'm well aware that I have a very limited number of bedtime things to take away. Once the Halloween nightlight and books are gone, I'm sort of out of options unless I take the nightlight and the animals he sleeps with. I'm not sure if I'll do that or not; at this point I don't want to, but I wonder if I'll have to. I have a couple of days to think about it, so we'll see.

And I'll have to think about the covers thing too. I might have to decide at some point to stop putting his covers back on him at all and just fight that one out with him. Maybe that will have an impact, I don't know. At this point, I honestly don't know what will ultimately get the message across.

In the meantime I'm exhausted because he's also getting up in the night at least once most nights. I'm hoping against hope that once he's going to bed well and starts getting more sleep again the night wakings will stop. That's what Weissbluth would have me believe, but we'll see. D apparently hasn't read the same books as I have so he doesn't know what is supposed to happen. I also ordered a book on "strong willed" children. I'm sure D hasn't read that book either (lol), but I'm hoping it might have some ideas, for bedtime and other issues. Another we'll see.

I feel like I say that a lot these days.

A little more progress and counting pills

2008-10-25T13:00:00.000-07:00

We had a slightly better night last night, so I'm hoping that's a good sign. We went from 50 minutes of getting up to 40, so at least we're heading in the right direction. He did throw water on me from his little cup of water he gets at bedtime - he immediately insisted he didn't mean to get it on me, LOL. I just tossed the empty cup into the hall and left it at that. I guess if we go down by about 10 minutes a night, I have what, 4 or 5 nights left of this? I bet it will be more. I know my kid.

On another topic, my husband took my BCPs out of the medicine cabinet the other day to count them. The conversation went something like this:

DH: "Ok sweetie, just nine more pills!"
Me: "Nine more pills? Until what? Did you count my pills?"
DH: "Yeah. Nine more until we start trying again!"
Me: "Um, weird that you're counting my pills and no, I thought we said at least two more months."
DH: "Naw, let's just go for it now."
Me: "Hey, I have a good idea, how about two more months!"
DH: "What's the difference anyway? We both know we won't get pregnant right away. D took us 2 1/2 years!"
Me: "I realize that Mr. Selective Memory, but you do recall that G took only one month, right?"
DH: "Sure, but what are the chances that would happen again?"
Me: "Why are you in such a hurry that you can't wait until December?"
DH: "I just want to get it over with!"

He's driving me nuts. Our almost-four year old won't go to bed, gets me up in the middle of the night most nights and he wants me to get pregnant? Now? Just to get it over with? What is he thinking?

Have I mentioned that patience isn't one of his strongest virtues?

A small step forward

2008-10-23T19:33:00.000-07:00

Tonight was better. It took about 50 minutes to get him to bed. That's certainly progress over 2 hours. Thank goodness! I've steeled myself to do what it takes to ride this out, but I certainly did not want a repeat of last night.

This time he added turning on his lamp to the drill. He was actually quite calm for about the last 10 minutes or so, just getting up, turning on his light and opening his door. Then he'd immediately turn around, climb back in bed and wait for me to pull up his covers. He probably did that a dozen times. It really begs the question, WHY? Why does he keep going when he KNOWS all I'm going to do is turn off the light and put him back in bed. He wasn't even trying to do anything else, just got back into bed without me so much as pointing. It makes me worry that he'd rather do this than go to bed and I'm in for a long, long run of this bedtime mess. Or maybe he really is THAT stubborn. Anyone know any good books about parenting strong-willed children?

At least I didn't have to clean up any puke tonight. That's always a bonus.

Two hours is a long time...

2008-10-22T21:05:00.000-07:00

... when you're putting your preschooler back in bed over and over.

Tonight was one for the record books. It literally took me two hours to get him to bed. He pulled out all the stops tonight, doing anything and everything he could think of to get me to, well... I don't know. To let him out of bed? To let him out of his room? To give into whatever inane demand he'd thought of that moment? Or just to do something, because I think it was pissing him off that I wasn't talking to him as much as anything.

He hit, kicked, spit a lot (sometimes aiming for me, but mostly in his hands or on the floor), made himself puke three times, tried to run out the door as it would open, dropped to the floor to be dead weight, cried, screamed, kicked the door, threw things at me and basically behaved the way you see kids do on those nanny shows. I thought I felt like I was on the Supernanny before - that was nothing.

But, in an effort to see this play out as a comedy, rather than a horror movie with a subliminal theme designed to keep teenagers from having unprotected sex, here are a few of my favorite lines from this evening's festivities.

"Mom, I'm so angry at you!"
Oh kid, if you only knew...

"This is NOT good manners!"
I'm not sure what manners has to do with it, at least on my part, but ok.

"I'm not tired!"
Oh I know baby, you're not the least bit tired as you practically pass out while standing up.

"Mom, look it's morning!"
Right, because you're going to trick me into thinking it's time to get up.

"I want NOTHING!"
Then why do you keep getting up? I'll give you a whole lot of nothing while you're sleeping.

And my favorite of the night, "Mom, go away and go to bed!" and then he'd point to my room the way I've been pointing to his bed to make him get back in it.

Ah, good times with a three year old.

Calm.

2008-10-21T21:08:00.000-07:00

Bedtime is not better. Yet.

Last night I was upset and frustrated. I was exhausted and had a ridiculously hard time falling asleep. I was tense and agitated and felt like a big, fat failure.

I started thinking about the whole thing and was able to step backwards a little bit to gain some perspective. This parenting thing isn't easy. Rewarding, yes, but easy - no. There are always, always, always going to be things like this - whether it's sleep issues, problems at school, fights with friends, nightmares, tantrums, the list goes on and on. If I chose to, I could look at it like a trip from one crap situation to the next, always fighting my way through, always facing something stressful or waiting to face the next stressful thing.

OR. I could recognize that the reality of the situation is parenting is hard and there are always going to be situations like this that I have to handle. And I can choose to either be stressed and miserable, or I can suck it up, deal with the situation and let the stress go (as much as humanly possible). Yes, these things are frustrating, but indulging myself in that frustration and choosing to carry it around with me all day long certainly isn't helping the situation resolve more quickly. And it's making me miserable in the process.

So tonight, I was calm. I was a snow capped mountain, standing tall and firm. Resolute, unshakable, unemotional. I dispensed with the punishments, the negotiations, the threats. His Halloween costume sits, untouched, in his closet. I simply put him back in bed, each and every time. For over an hour, he'd get up, sometimes crying, sometimes asking for this or that, and I would point to his bed, he'd get in and I'd put the covers on him. I was gentle, calm and silent. Even when he again made himself throw up, I cleaned him up silently, taking off his bottom sheet, putting on fresh jammies, all without saying anything, without giving him a single crack to grip. And strangely enough, my calm was not an outward show. I wasn't mad, I wasn't upset. I didn't let myself go there. Even after the vomit, so clearly intentional, I didn't get angry.

I am annoyed that I wasted an hour of my evening. Goodness knows I have too much to do to spend that kind of time on his shenanigans. But it is what it is and I am feeling hopeful that if I stay the course, remain completely consistent and unshakable, this will end and he'll return to his former good bedtime self.

Ask me again if I'm so calm and confident a week or so from now if this is still going on. We shall see.

Almost four year old boy for sale

2008-10-20T19:27:00.000-07:00

What do you do when you're at your wits end and you feel like you've tried everything? And nothing is working?

D is still not going to bed without a fight. At this point, whatever may have started it, it has simply become a battle of wills. He doesn't want to go to bed and he's going to fight me at every turn. He's totally fine through the whole bedtime routine, until I tell him it's time for his drink and hugs and kisses. Then he gets all wimpery and starts telling me he hates bedtime and doesn't want to go to bed, ever. He doesn't like to sleep and he doesn't like being in his bed. He wants me to stay in his room all night.

Sorry kid, not going to happen.

So every night we go through the same crap. He claims he's going to do a good bedtime, but when the time comes, tantrum city. We've tried putting him back in bed over and over, taking away various toys and privledges, and threatening to make him throw away his Halloween costume. After he keeps escalating the situation, we usually end up grabbing his beloved Halloween costume and handing it to him, telling him to go downstairs and throw it away if he's going to get up out of bed. He flips out more, begs to keep it, and usually that's more or less the end of it. Tonight he still threw up in bed, but only a tiny bit on one blanket. And he didn't get up, just started yelling "I threw up!"

Making my mood so much better is the fact that I've been awake since 2:30am this morning. D woke up then and was basically up and down until about 5:00, when again I had to hand him his Halloween costume and tell him we might as well just go downstairs and throw it away. He stayed in bed after that, but I never went back to sleep and G woke up bizarrely early this morning. So here I am, running on less than 4 hours of sleep and really pissed off about it.

I'm SICK OF THIS. I'm sick of every bedtime being a huge battle. This is so stupid and ridiculous and I have no idea how to make it stop. I'm sick of this being the only thing I feel like blogging about, sick of it making the rest of my day miserable. And I'm sick of not knowing what to do to end it.

Angry.

2008-10-16T20:15:00.000-07:00

I'm angry tonight.

I'm angry that my son won't go to bed without a fight. We did the fighting, when he was younger, to get him to sleep well and I can't help but feel like we did things right, he shouldn't do this now. Yes, I know how silly that is. It isn't like you fix something once and it's forever fixed. They are always growing and changing and adding new challenges. But damnit, this has gone so far into the realm of ridiculous, I feel like I hardly remember what normal looks like. Unfortunately, I think he feels the same way.

I'm angry that my husband had to resort to telling D that if he got up one more time tonight, we'd be throwing away his Halloween costume and he would not go trick or treating. I'm a bit angry that he did it, although much less so for the fact that it actually worked. He was in full tantrum, freak out, almost making himself puke mode, and when DH laid that one on him, he was done. He didn't get up again. But my freaking goodness, why do we have to take it out to the furthest possible extreme of consequences? He is OBSESSED with Halloween this year (he's always liked it, but he's already beyond excited), so clearly this was the button to push. But I'm going to be utterly heartbroken if tomorrow night he flips out at bedtime and we actually have to throw the costume away. Because we will. And that's going to suck beyond belief.

I'm angry that my husband isn't sticking to our new financial strategy. We've not been doing a good job of budgeting, or rather actually sticking to said budget. This has gone on for years, and although we're not experiencing financial hardship, we need to do better because we don't have a lot of leeway with just one income. So we decided to go all cash except for bills, which I either pay online or write checks for; gas, which we don't go over on anyway and it's so much easier to pay at the pump with a card; and groceries, since I do the shopping and I don't want to have to worry about whether I have enough cash on me (and we don't tend to go over on groceries anyway). But everything else - lunches, coffee, eating out, random trips to the store, anything, has to be from the stash of cash that I take out when I deposit his check. I've been sticking to it like glue, hoarding my last $2 so I could by myself a tea when I went to Bible study yesterday. Him, not so much. We were out of money this weekend and he knew it and he has since put $50 worth of purchases on the debit card. I'm furious about it, especially because the cash thing was HIS suggestion. But after the night we had with D, I don't know if bringing it up tonight will be very productive. I'm super edgy and I know he is too.

Pretty much I'm pissed off and this is a lot of complaining. Life is like that sometimes. Now I have to go attempt to write an article about something I don't give two shits about so I can make a little extra money and perhaps not charge half of what we spend on Christmas to our credit card.

Sorry for the bitterness. It's been one of those days. Weeks. More than that.

Just go to bed D, damnit.

I feel like I'm on the Supernanny

2008-10-11T19:32:00.000-07:00

D is having another fabulous bedtime. Since this is typed and you can't hear my vocal inflection, I'll tell you that comment is dripping with sarcasm.

Once again, he was upset when I started to leave the room because he wanted another hug and to go potty. That would be no, and no. He absolutely does not need to go potty less than 10 minutes after he already went; it's just a stall tactic. The kid goes hours upon hours during the day and does not have accidents anymore - we're not buying it. And, as we've been doing the last several nights, we gave him a "warning" if you will - two more hugs and two more kisses and then bedtime is done. He knows what is coming, and decides to totally flip out.

It's been about half an hour so far and my husband (who is definitely getting some later, by the way) is handling it, Supernanny style. D gets up, hubby puts him back in bed. D gets up again, hubby puts him in bed. Rinse, repeat.

He's yelling that he wants his elephant (which is in his bed), that he wants his monitor light on (he still has a monitor in his room and it has a stupid nightlight on a timer - it's since gone off, but he knows perfectly well how to turn it on himself), he wants his covers fixed and he wants more hugs and kisses. Crying, crying, crying, yelling, banging on his door. How my husband is keeping his cool out there, I do not know. Patience and calmness are not usually his strongest virtues. But after talking about it, and after the last really bad night we had that resulted in a lot of vomit, we decided to change our tactics a little - he gets up, we put him back in bed. Tomorrow we'll talk to him about the consequences (as in, what he's losing for the next 24 hours) but for now, he's being put back in bed over and over. It's rather insane.

I wish I knew why this was happening. I don't know that we've ever had such a rough time with him at bedtime, well, ever. Or like I've said before, maybe I've just blocked out the details of the worst times. This is bad, though.

We had three decent nights - two where he cried when we left, but didn't bother getting up, and one where he got up once but my husband gently guided him back to bed and he went silent after that. Of course, he's also added waking up in the middle of the night and coming to our room to his antics. Last night was only once, at about 4:15, but the two previous nights he was up numerous times equalling both he and myself being awake for 2-3 hours in the night. I've been one cranky mommy.

I hope my husband can hold it together, because I think he's doing the best thing. If he loses it on D and starts yelling or goes back to a time out, the plan fails. He needs to realize bedtime is for bedtime and we're just not going to play his game anymore.

Wish us luck...

A tough week

2008-10-09T11:50:00.000-07:00

We've had a tough week with D's bedtimes. The last two nights have improved, but the few nights before that were a nightmare. He's fine until we try to leave the room, then all hell breaks loose. He wants a drink, another hug, another kiss, fix my pillow, fix my covers.... etc. etc. etc. We've reached the point where we've had to say enough is enough and stop with all the extra requests, because he's so out of control. And we all know how much preschoolers like being told no, especially when you're raining on their bedtime stalling parade. I've been feeling like a demon has taken over my child at night.

D has such a strong will. It helps to know that will serve him well later in life, but it sure makes life hard on us sometimes. I'm determined to keep his boundaries in tact; this is a child who has the potential to be a total monster if we let him. As it is, he's pretty well behaved for an almost-four year old. But there are times, like now, when he decides to push back as hard as he can to see if those boundaries are still there and if they're going to stick. He wants to push down that wall, so he beats his head against it for a while to see what happens.

Kid, meet your parents - you've met your match.

The only people in this house more stubborn than D - probably the two of us, with my husband taking a slight lead. I think it's a good thing in this situation - he's not going to get his way and learn that he can throw mega-fits and get out of going to bed. But it's been exhausting, frustrating and downright maddening getting through this phase.

A few nights ago he was put in a time out and promptly threw up all over himself. On purpose. So the next night, my husband told him he was getting a time out and if he threw up, we'd take his jammies off and he could sleep naked. Yeah, he slept naked that night. My sweet darling boy gags himself so hard he vomits all over. See, strong willed. But he did learn that puking no longer gets him a free pass out of a time out. He sat in the puke until the time out was over before we stripped him.

That night we were both left feeling awful. It reminded me a lot of when he was younger and we let him cry it out in his crib to go to sleep. That same questioning, the same worry - did we do the right thing? Will this work? Are we horrible parents and somehow causing this mayhem?

Ultimately, I know we aren't really causing it and I don't think we're peramanently screwing him up. But these are the times that really test our abilities to handle stress. I'm grateful right now for my husband; he's assured me over and over that we're in this together and we will get through it in one piece. It's nice having that reassurance and acknowledgement that I'm not the only parent in the house.

The last two nights have been better and I'm optimistic we've turned the corner. Two nights ago he only got up once (in a fit of rage because he wanted his lion, which 5 minutes before he said he didn't want, and the freaking thing was on the end of his bed anyway), and last night he cried for us for about 10 minutes, insisting he needed a kiss on the hair, but gave up eventually and went to sleep. Since he didn't get up, we're calling it a victory. Hopefully some night soon he'll just go to bed and not flip out at all. One can hope.

The verdict

2008-10-04T22:44:00.000-07:00

I went to the pharmacy today.

I figured out that if I went off BCPs now, had a reasonably normal cycle in that I ovulated somewhere around day 14 and actually got pregnant, despite the "not trying, not preventing" status we would have given ourselves, I'd be due in early July. If I'm going to stop birth control, I have to be prepared for that possibility, even with PCOS. After all, I have a 16 month old that did not take ages to conceive and there have been many times I've told people, "You really need to wait to try until you're truly ready, because you just never know!" Although I don't know what to expect when I hop on the TTC train yet again, I do know that I have to be prepared for one of three possibilities: one, that it will happen right away; two, that it will take a bit of time but not long enough to worry over; and three, that it will take forever and we'll be faced with a lot of big questions as to what to do. But it's the first possibility that concerns me right now.

In any case, I thought about the idea of having a baby next July. I wasn't so crazy about that idea. Right smack in the middle of the summer, when things are a little chaotic and our routine is flimsy; right about the time my family is planning a big vacation. I'm not ready for that, so to throw caution to the wind would end up being more of a stress for me than anything else.

It seems sort of silly that the difference of two or three months seems so significant to me, but it really does. The thought of having a baby in September versus July is a whole different thing. September, I can handle. It's about as soon as I can imagine it being ok, about the soonest I can imagine being prepared. Anything sooner feels well... too soon. Even the difference between being due in August and being due in September seems like a big deal. I don't know if I can even explain why, at least not in a way that anyone else might understand. It just doesn't feel right.

So there you have it. I picked up two more packs of BCPs and I guess the plan is to take those, then punch my ticket and board the train. Now, my feelings on opening that can of worms... that's another post entirely. For now I'm just praying that the roller coaster is small and short and I'm able to handle it with a bit of grace.

I feel better now that I have a plan. Of course, I've said it before - how do you make God laugh? Tell him your plans.

Here we go again.

2008-10-03T12:05:00.000-07:00

I thought my husband and I had a plan in place with regards to trying for another baby. He thought we had a plan too. It turns out, however, that our plans aren't exactly the same. And forgive me, but this is going to be LONG.

Originally, he wanted to start trying in September. He had this thing about wanting all our kids to be two years apart in school. D and G will be, but due to the fact that G is a spring baby, our third kid would have to be two years younger or less in order to be only two years behind G in school. I guess if we had a summer baby it would be debatable, but I think most people these days are waiting until their kid is six for kindergarten if their bday is in the summer, rather than having them be really young for their grade.

In any case, that felt too soon for me, and we had a big conversation about it a few months ago, and I thought we worked it all out. I had a list of reasons that I wanted to wait longer and in the end, he actually agreed with me. We decided (I think) that we'd wait until after the new year to start trying, which would mean the earliest we'd be having baby #3 would be in the fall (if we get lucky enough to conceive easily again - that's always the wild card with my f'd up hormones).

Then we had another converstation. I think that's where things got screwy. He came away from the conversation thinking I was going to finish this month's cycle of BCPs, then go off of them; and while we wouldn't be actively trying until January, we wouldn't prevent either. I came away from the very same conversation thinking I would keep taking my BCPs for a few more months, but stop them one month early and have one cycle where we weren't really trying, but not preventing, so we could get the artificial hormones out of my system and see what my body does in terms of a cycle.

Over the last couple of weeks he's asked me more than once where I'm at in my cycle of pills. Last night he asked me again how many I have left, so I asked him why he kept asking me about it. That is when it came out that he thought I was going to stop taking them now. We were both sort of dumbfounded, because we thought we were on the same page, when he was actually about five pages ahead of me. He had no idea I wasn't thinking the same thing he was; and I felt the same.

So now I'm in the predicament of what to do. He'd like me to stop taking them now, throw caution to the wind for a few months, and then really start trying in January. He thinks it would be good to get the hormones out of my system, give my body a chance to rev up and start working, and lose a few more pounds which will hopefully make conception easier, and certainly make a pregnancy more comfortable.

Here's where my overthinking kicks in. And if anyone is actually still reading, I'll say for the record that I'm writing this more for my own good than because I think it will make an interesting post - many times writing all my thoughts out helps me make sense of it all.

Originally, I thought it would make sense to start trying in January. If we did get pg right away (and I know I need to plan things that way, despite my past issues with infertility - we got pg right away the second time), the baby would be born in the fall at the earliest. That would give me all summer with just the boys, and they'll both be at great ages to play outside more independently. Last summer was hectic with a newborn, and this summer was spent with G mostly crawling, so hanging out outside a lot wasn't as fun or relaxing. My time was spent chasing G around as he crawled through anything and everything, getting filthy in the process and trying to eat lots of rocks. I love the idea of a summer where the boys can run around in the backyard and I can do more watching, rather than fishing rocks out of the mouth. If I have a newborn next summer, it's yet another summer where I feel like I can't relax as much.

If the baby is born in the fall or later, D will be in school and have more of a routine. Plus, I'll have time three times a week with just G and the baby. Granted, I'll have to juggle dropping D off and picking him up with G's schedule, as well as the non-schedule of a newborn, but that's basically inevitable.

We don't have 100% coverage of maternity care on our insurance, so we'll have a fairly large bill to pay. Waiting a bit longer will give me that many more months that I'm working, therefore that much longer to save up.

My family is planning a big vacation for July and I'd like to be able to go. Pregnant, I can go - with a newborn or too close to my due date, not so much.

As much as we might say we'd avoid my fertile times if we're not using BCPs, that's a little ridiculous. We don't usually go more than a day or two without having sex. And sperm lives for like 5 days, right? And I know we wouldn't use anything else. We just wouldn't.

When I first went off of BCPs to try for D, I gained a bunch of weight right off the bat. Of course, I didn't know I had PCOS, didn't know about the whole carb/blood sugar/insulin/hormone thing, so I'm sure I wasn't eating right. And I didn't have the same experience when I went off BCPs to try for G. But I worry that it's because I'd already lost enough weight that my hormones were good and not in weight gain spiral mode. This time, I'm not as overweight as I was when we were trying for D, but I'm not at the weight I was when we got pg with G either - so I just don't know what to expect from my body. And I'm trying to lose weight to make conception easier - not looking to jump up another 20.

However...

I don't know how long this is really going to take, and the thought process starts down the "if we start trying sooner, it might happen sooner" path. I'd hate for a year to go by and we wish we would have just started trying sooner. Of course, I don't know that when you start has any bearing on how long it will take. Like, if we had started trying for D sooner, would we have actually gotten pg sooner, or would we have gotten pg at the same time and the amount of time we were trying simply have been longer? Or if we had started trying for G in say, July instead of September, would we have gotten pg in July instead, or would it have then just taken a few extra months and been in September anyway. Impossible questions, obviously, but still...

Maybe my body will do better with a longer break from BCPs and a chance to start having cycles. And it would give me some time to judge when I'm ovulating (assuming that does happen) so we can more effectively try when the time comes to really make the effort.

This is sort of hard for me to admit, but I have a hard time saying no to my husband. If he really, really wants me to go off of BCPs now, it will be hard for me to say no. If I was adamantly not ready, I would tell him no and that would be that - I'm the one potentially getting pregnant here. But obviously I'm considering it, so it isn't an out and out no - which means I'm feeling the pressure to say yes, even though he's made it clear to me that he's ok with whatever I decide to do.

This is harder for me to admit, but we've talked about doing some things to "try" for a girl - mostly timing of sex in relation to ovulation. We'd both like a girl (although I'll say again that we'll both be more than happy with another boy) and kind of figured, why the heck not? Why not do things a little differently in order to possibly increase the odds of having a girl next time. Neither of us think it's foolproof, nor would we be putting a lot of faith in it - just a "why not give it a shot" kind of thing. But if we are in "not trying, not preventing" mode, I wonder if we'll just end up having sex whenever, and not give ourselves the chance to try to throw the odds in favor of a girl. And if we do start timing sex that way, aren't we actually trying - not "not preventing"? Where is that line between "not trying, but not preventing" and "trying" anyway?

There's also the feeling of excitement over the possibility of getting pregnant again. Sort of like being on the verge of the Christmas season, but not quite there yet. Wouldn't it be fun to just jump the gun, break out the Christmas tree and enjoy the holiday season a little early? There's a tingling of excitement I get when I think about just going for it and going off the pill now and I think that has a lot to do with why I'm considering it.

Then I have this (probably irrational) fear that I'm messing with fate somehow, or with God's plan for me. That the reason my husband has pushed for this is because we're supposed to get pregnant sooner - that the baby we're meant to have is just on the cusp of coming into being and if I don't go ahead and go off of birth control, I'll be missing my chance. But on the other hand, maybe my original plan was right and if I go off of BCPs too soon, I'll be messing things up that way. (did I mention I'm a little bit insane?)

Complicating matters is that I'm out of pills and if I'm going to keep taking them, I have to decide by tomorrow so I can get a refill from the pharmacy. I need to start a new pack on Sunday if I'm going to start.

Today I've been thinking about it a lot and jumping positions faster than the most fickle politician. One minute I'm feeling confident that my original plan was the best thing and I'll take a couple more months of BCPs. Then the next minute I feel like it's only a couple extra months, it'll save me the copay on another round of pills and I probably won't get pregnant right away, anyway, so what's the harm.

I'm hoping that writing all this out will help me figure it all out. It usually does.

Bedtime

2008-10-01T19:36:00.000-07:00

We seem to go back and forth lately with D on bedtimes. Generally, he does fine - goes to bed without a lot of drama, sleeps all night, etc. But once in a while we start to go through an "I'm going to make bedtime really hard" phase. Apparently we're entering another one of those.

He's the king of stall tactics - wanting to get up and go potty even though he just went 5 minutes ago, one more book, one more hug, one more kiss, fix my covers, I need a drink.... On and on and on. And he is a child who epitomizes the whole "give them an inch and they take a mile" thing. If you start giving in on anything, he pushes HARD to see how much more he can get. There was a time when his naptime routine (back when he napped) had grown to include so many steps it would take 45 minutes just to get through all of it. It's like, if you do something he requests, even if it seems like a one time, no big deal thing, eventually it becomes a big deal.

Part of the problem lately is totally our fault. We haven't been great about getting him to bed on time. Realistically, he needs to be in bed by 7; we've been pushing it to 7:30 or later way too often. Once in a while is fine, but he's always been very sensitive to keeping his sleep schedule. Although he's become more flexible as he's gotten older, the fact still remains that when we don't do a good job getting him into bed on time, bedtime starts to get ugly.

Tonight... well, tonight isn't going so great. My husband is doing a good job handling it, but it is so frustrating. I keep telling myself he's going to bed early tonight, and like tonight, something comes up and it doesn't happen. He seriously needs like a week of early bedtimes to catch up so he'll quit acting like a monster when we try to put him to bed.

And I swear, if either of them wake up before 6am again tomorrow, I'm going to scream. But that's another story.

Sick.

2008-09-27T19:18:00.000-07:00

I hate being sick.

That's pretty much it. I have a ton of work to do, feel behind on everything and I have no energy. And I hate that all I want to do is whine about it.

I am so getting a flu shot this year.

What is up with my boobs?

2008-09-18T12:47:00.000-07:00

My boobs get enormous when I breastfeed. Pre-pregnancy I was a solid C cup. During breastfeeding I went up a whopping 4 cup sizes to a G. A few years ago I didn't even know you could be a G. I thought D, DD, and DDD were the end all, be all of bra sizes. I guess I didn't think too much about women with mega-boobs and what size they might be - DDD? Um, yeah.

So here I am, a couple months since I last nursed and mine are still a lot bigger than I thought they'd be. The bras I have now are a DD and they definitely fit right. I guess if I lost this last 20lbs, maybe a lot of it would be boob, but good greif! I thought for sure I'd be at least a small D post-breastfeeding.

The reason I'm thinking of it at the moment is that my husband took a picture of me a couple days ago and it really shows how big the girls are. When I looked at the picture I was like, WOAH! They are still big!

My husband's response? A sly smile, and a "yeah, baby!" nod of his head with a thumbs up sign. He's such a man.

This isn't about me, but...

2008-09-11T12:15:00.000-07:00

I know this is not about me. At least, not the worst of it.

My husband hurt his back, probably late last week. It's bad. He talked to a doctor about it, who described the injury as the equivalent of having a knife slice down the muscle fibers of the lower back. The muscle fibers are trying to heal, but every time he bends over, picks up something heavy, or just moves wrong, he tears it open again. She said these injuries are very painful and slow healing. He's doing what he can, but it isn't much - we just have to wait for it to heal.

This means he can't do much. He can go to work, because sitting is ok, although he's in a lot of pain by the time he gets home. And, of course, he winds up doing things he shouldn't when he's working; lifting something he shouldn't, being on his feet too long, whatever. He gets home and is in pain, exhausted and can't stand up for more than a few minutes at a time.

This leaves me without the small repreive I normally get when he gets home. He's trying so hard to still hang out with the boys, but he can't do much with them other than sit and read books and such. He can't help with much around the house either. Granted, he doesn't do a whole lot normally, but he can't even take out the garbage.

I know this isn't about me. I know he has it worse than I do, considering he's in pain all day. That's exhausting and I really feel for him. But here's where I need to complain about how it's affecting me. This is hard! I'm worn out by the end of the day too, and I still have to get dinner on, feed everyone, get G to bed, then get D to clean up his toys, then get him to bed. Usually I have some help with some of that, but my husband just can't do much. After that, I have to deal with the dishes and any other stuff around the house, plus fit in work. Maybe it's the fact that I can't ask him to help, but the last few days I've found myself really wishing I could ask him to take out the garbage, or to help me pick up or vacuum for me real quick.

Plus, I'm super worried about him and the toll this injury is going to take on him, both physically and emotionally. He's been so stable emotionally for a long time now, but he doesn't handle things like this well. Something messes up his routine and his motivation, and he has a tough time recovering. He can't workout (obviously) and that's not good. Working out is a lot of what keeps him on an even keel emotionally. And when he can't workout, he gets angry and eats. And then he puts on weight, feels worse, eats more, gets mad, eats more... etc. etc.

We've been down a dark road in the past with his depression, anxiety attacks, and unhealthy escapism into food and computer games. I do not want to go there again! We've been talking about that the last few days, and he knows he needs to keep his head above water even in the midst of an injury, but he said it's already hard. Every fiber of his being wants to say, "F-it" and go eat french fries.

I really hope this thing heals - mostly for his sake, but for mine too. I'm doing my best not to let the stress of the situation get to me, but at the end of the day I'm tired and frustrated. I've spent a lot of time being his lifeboat, and I don't know if I have the energy to do it again. I'm pretty well spent by the time the boys are in bed (and then I have to go sit at my desk and work). And it's stressful to see him in pain and know there isn't anything I can do about it, other than go get him a fresh ice pack.

Nerves

2008-09-10T11:51:00.000-07:00

I signed myself up for a new class at the gym. This first fall session they have a whole bunch of new classes, mostly for the kids, but a few new adult classes too. The one I'm going to try is called "Stroke and turn conditioning" and no, I'm not making a dirty joke, so get your minds out of the gutter ;).

It's a swim class, designed for people who already know how to swim, but want some coaching to get better at it. Yeah, that would be me.

So why nerves? I'm very intimidated and have managed to overthink my way into worrying about how I'm going to do in this class. I hesitated to even sign up for it, because I'm nervous about it. Why? I guess I'm afraid I'll look like an idiot and the coach will wonder how on earth I manage to swim at all. I know, that's being silly - but still. I know I'm a slow swimmer and I'm afraid the coach is going to be frustrated and assume I'm not trying hard because I don't move faster.

I'm always a little nervous when it comes to physical stuff. I've turned myself into something of an athlete, but that label is still hard for me to wrap my head around. I'm a bookworm and was much more into academics and clubs in school than sports. I'm not the most uncoordinated person ever, but I'm not a natural either and I have to admit, I've tended to shy away from things that don't come naturally to me. That's why this whole triathlon thing has been so great for me. It's helped me to redefine who I am and what I can do - what my body can do.

But I still have those lingering picked-last-in-gym insecurities. And I'm not confident in my swimming - which is precisely why I need the class, and precisely why it makes me nervous. However, I'm going to suck it up and go and see what happens. I'm positive it won't be nearly as bad as I'm afraid of.

Right?

Damn skinny bitches

2008-08-26T20:19:00.001-07:00

That's a mean title. The woman I'm thinking of is actually a very nice gal.

But she just had a baby, like a month ago, and I saw her today clearly wearing her prepregnancy jeans, with a cute little t-shirt tucked in. TUCKED IN. And she looked fabulous.

Here's where I get whiney. Why do some women look like THAT after having a baby, and fifteen months later I'm still carrying around at least 20lbs that I shouldn't have gained in the first place? COME ON. I tried so hard not to gain too much weight while I was pg last time, but apparently that's impossible for me. I gained over 50lbs both times, despite doing much better the second time of staying active and eating well. WTF? Seriously, what do I have to do to not gain a gazillion pounds when I'm pregnant?

And although I gained a lot of weight, for a long time I didn't worry too much about it. After all, I had great success losing weight before my last pregnancy. I was down in the low 130s, which is a pretty good range for me. I looked damn good, if I do say so myself. So I figured, I know how to lose weight, I can do it again.

Apparently I'm doing something wrong.

I actually weigh about 10lbs more than I did at the beginning of the year. Stupid blog posts. I wrote down my weight in an early post this year, and yep - I weighed 148.8 I think, and now I'm rocking about 156-157. And I have been for MONTHS. I keep trying to do what I did when I lost weight before, but apparently I'm not getting it right.

No, I'm not logging every bite of food that goes in my mouth, which I did before. I'd hoped that keeping rough track of my calories per meal would suffice. If I'm aiming for 1600 calories per day and I spread it out over my three meals and couple snacks, that should work out right? I guess not. Either that or I'm going over too often and not really realizing it. The whole, oh this one day won't hurt, or this one treat isn't a big deal. The food log takes care of that, if I do it accurately, so maybe that's where I'm missing the boat.

I'm frustrated that I have to be nothing less than perfect to lose even an ounce of weight. Thank you PCOS for that one. It's hard to be perfect when you're busy with two small children and have a husband who is notorious for bringing home little treats, desserts and pizza for dinner. And I rarely do anything but give in.

I'm feeling a weight loss time crunch. We want to try for another baby next year; and if I know my husband, he'll be chomping at the bit about the time the New Year's Eve ball drops. But I don't really want to get pregnant at this weight. I don't even know if I could, given the love affair my hormones have with my fat cells. I wasn't this heavy when I got pg with David, although in all fairness, my body composition must be better because I looked heavier then. But still. If I get pg at this weight and gain what is apparently my requisite 50lbs, I'm going to be huge. And it will be that much harder, and more depressing, when I go to lose weight again.

Yet I'm in this constant mental battle with myself over whether I should go balls to the wall and really cinch up my diet in order to drop the pounds, knowing I have just enough time to lose the weight I need before I go and get knocked up and gain it all back; or just live with it, try to lose a little, be a fatty preggo and deal with it all at once when all is said and done and my babymaking days are over.

I guess my biggest problem is just committing to it. It's hard and takes such mental discipline to do what I have to do to lose weight. I don't care what any diet book says - I have to be hungry most of the time in order to drop a pound. High protein, low protein, high carb, low carb, paleolithic, prehistoric, liquid, solid, whatever - there isn't a diet out there that would simultaneously keep me full and drop the fat. And that means I have to be committed to it day in and day out, and right now, that's harder than I thought it would be.

It's so hard to be motivated to lose weight when I feel like I'm just going to gain it all back again as soon as I hit my goal.

Oh, but this is assuming I can actually get pregnant in a reasonable amount of time again, and here's where I have to chuckle to myself. I'm one for two in the infertility department (one took 2 1/2 years, the other took one month), so I'm not too sure what to expect there. But I know I can't take anything for granted, and the logical part of me realizes losing weight now is an important step to insuring that I don't have to ride the infertility roller coaster again. Weight loss played an important role both times, so I know it's a big deal.

So why can't I just do what I need to do?

And why do I have to be around cute women who look freakishly good after having a baby?

Ok, evil green jealousy monster, you can leave now.

Wedding weirdness

2008-08-23T11:40:00.000-07:00

My brother-in-law is getting married this coming January. He is my husband's younger half brother on his dad's side. Siblings get a little complicated in my husband's family, with all the half, step and former-step kids running around. In any case, he's also the brother of my sister-in-law who lives with us now (versus my husband's other sister, who is his half-sister on his mom's side... but I digress).

I'm completely weirded out right now because my BIL is not having my husband as a groomsman in his wedding. BIL's other brother (BIL's half brother on his mom's side - my husband and BIL share a dad, but different moms...) is in it, as well as a cousin from his mom's side, two of his old high school friends and his current "best friend" (I guess, aka drinking buddy) is his best man. His fiance has her sister, my SIL and three of her friends.

And, our son D is a ring bearer.

How do you have one brother in your wedding and not have the other? It isn't as if he's closer to his younger brother than he is to my husband; arguably he's closer to DH. Granted, my husband is quite a bit older (his younger brother is only about 4 years younger than my BIL), but still - my BIL and his fiance come up to hang out pretty often and he and my husband have both enjoyed creating a closer relationship as BIL has become an adult. I thought for sure my husband would be in the wedding. I seriously can't fathom why he wouldn't be.

Oh, and my BIL was a groomsman at our wedding when he was like 14.

Now, I don't think that you are required to reciprocate if you're in someone's wedding. But these guys are BROTHERS. Come on! I honestly do not understand. At first I thought maybe it's because he thought you're supposed to have single people in your wedding party, but two of his groomsmen (his high school friends) are married, so that can't be it. Then I thought maybe they already felt like they had too many people, but they only have five on each side - adding one more groomsman shouldn't be that big of a deal and I'm sure they could come up with another bridesmaid - a cousin, another friend, somebody. And besides, who is more important, the dude you like to throw back beers with, or your older brother? He has three friends in this wedding, and the cousin is more of a friend too.

And BIL's younger brother is in it!

I'm sorry, I've gotten to the point where I'm pretty upset. For a while I thought it was an oversight - that BIL assumed my husband knew he was in the wedding, so hadn't talked to him about it. But I asked his fiance who was in the wedding party and she listed everybody - five people on each side, and definitely didn't mention my husband.

Seriously, WTF?

And what do you say? My husband is fishing with him today (along with my FIL and D), but I have no idea if he's going to try to bring it up. I know he doesn't want to make his brother feel bad, but he's pretty hurt that he's being left out of such an important occassion.

I really, really hope it doesn't have anything to do with the big talk we had with him and his fiance last fall. She went through a big drama-fest where she got mad at FIL's wife and declared she wasn't going to go to their house anymore, even during the holidays. We tried to help her realize that if she's going to be a part of this family, she can't take a stance like that - the only person she's hurting is her fiance. It was a good discussion, I thought. We listened to her side, and told her how we feel (honestly, I probably did most of the talking); it was very nonconfrontational, I thought. But maybe she was just putting on a happy face for us and actually harbors a grudge about it. I wouldn't put it past her - but it seems like there would be more tension and weirdness since then if that were the case. I don't know. I just hope she didn't decide after that, that she didn't want my husband in her wedding anymore and convince BIL not to ask him. If she were mad enough, I wouldn't put something like that past her.

However, the more I think about it... she gets upset easily and blows things out of proportion, but she gets over it quickly too. The aforementioned incident with FIL's wife blew over and there weren't any issues when the holidays rolled around. She was there with the rest of us. So if she had harbored any resentment about the talk we had, it seems like it would have faded by now.

I'm at a loss. I wish there was a way I could find out why - did he just forget? Did he think my husband wouldn't want to? Does he have resentment or anger towards my husband that we don't know about? It's put a very sour taste in my mouth and at the very least, I just wish I knew why.

My baby is walking

2008-08-21T11:30:00.000-07:00

Step... step... step... wobble... step... step... wobble... step... step... wobble... uh oh.... boom!

G started geniunely walking yesterday. He'd walked a step or three for the last couple of days, but only a few times. Yesterday he made it across the room. As luck would have it, I wasn't home for the amazing feat :(. I was at my Bible study group and my sister-in-law was watching the boys. She said he was simply standing up, saw something a few feet away, and walked to it; she got all excited and he seemed to have no idea why she was clapping. My husband got home soon after and they had lots of fun getting him to walk to them - especially once he realized how cool it was and that they were clapping and cheering for him.

D doesn't always know how to handle it when he isn't the center of attention, plus he has a cold, so he spent a lot of time rolling around on the floor and babytalking. Stinker.

My husband called me and as soon as I answered he said, "Your baby can walk!" OMG! I almost cried. When I got home, he obliged and walked right to me on the first try, sticking out his tounge and smiling like he'd just conqured the world.

My life is about to get a whole new level of complicated.

A crazy thing happened to me

2008-08-19T22:15:00.000-07:00

After the triathlon I had to go back to my mom's house (I had stayed the night there since she lives a lot closer) to pick up my stuff. They've recently done a huge lanscaping project and it included buying a new grill; ours recently died, so I offered to take the old one off their hands. Since I was there and had our truck with me, my stepdad loaded it up so I could haul it home.

I left shortly thereafter, exhausted and in need of a shower (lake water + sweat = gross). They live just a few miles from the freeway and all seemed fine until I took the left turn onto the freeway onramp. You can see where this is going...

The weird thing is, right before I got to that spot I had this very strong feeling that something bad was going to happen. It made me think about my fear of dying and leaving my kids without a mother. I suddenly had this horrible flash in my head of what it would be like if I got in an accident on the way home and died. I hate thinking like that, and usually I try to push those thoughts out of my head. I'm sure it's a common fear in mothers. But I felt nervous about the drive home suddenly and I prayed about it. I asked God to please not take me today; to guide me home to my family and keep me safe. That I love and miss them to please let me get home safely.

And then the grill fell out of the back of my truck.

I was stopped at the stoplight, so it wasn't as if I'd taken the turn too fast. The light turned green, I went and as I finished the corner, the top-heavy grill toppled over the side of the truck and landed with a sickening crunch on the ground - in the middle of the road. Thankfully it didn't hit someone, just the road - upsidedown and most certainly destroyed.

I panicked. Well, panic is probably a bit too dramatic, but I was instantly mortified and completely unsure of what on earth to do. I couldn't pull over where I was and there were people behind me trying to get on the freeway. So I kept going and called my husband. He didn't know what to tell me, and ended up unintentionally making it worse by asking me over and over, "Why did you keep going?!" like I'd left the scene of an accident. Finally I told him I'd call him back, pulled over and called my parents. My mom answered and when I told her (sobbing, I have to admit) that the grill fell out of the truck I think she about dropped the phone. She told my stepdad, and after explaining exactly where it had happened, he said he'd meet me there.

I had to go to the next exit and turn around, which took some time. By the time I got back to the scene of the grill debacle, someone had moved it out of the road. My stepdad called me back and told me to meet him at the Lowes parking lot, which was just past the freeway onramp.

He apologized up and down for not tying the grill down better. He never in a million years thought it would tip over like that. I felt like a kid again, crying into the arms of my stepdad. I think I was just too damned tired to handle the situation like a mature adult. So I regressed into scared child running to her parents to save her.

The kicker of the whole thing though, is that when I got to Lowes (and dried my tears finally), my stepdad said, "Ok, let's go shopping." He bought me a new freaking grill. And he must have felt really, really bad because it's a nice one too! I told him over and over that he didn't have to do that, but he insisted. When I called my husband back and told him what I was bringing home he couldn't believe it. When our grill went kaput it felt like one more thing added to the list of expenses - we really didn't know how or when we'd be able to afford a new one. And now suddenly, there's one on our back patio.

Maybe this is the part where I read too much into the situation, but I can't get over the feeling that something bad was going to happen to me on that drive home, but knocking that grill out of the truck kept me from being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Who knows; maybe my feeling of dread was tied to a little premonition that the grill was going to do a header out the back. But maybe, just maybe, that was God's way of keeping me out of harms way. Obviously I'll never know, but I appreciate it just the same. I could have lived without the whole mess and I'm still nervous that someone wrote down my license plate or something and I'll get in trouble for driving away. But I did get a new grill out of the deal, so it couldn't have been *that* bad, right? LOL.

My stepdad sent me an email asking if I'd gotten the grill home ok. Then he said, "You came up to do a triathlon and went home with a new grill - all you had to do was swim 800 yards, bike 12 miles, run 3 miles and then ditch a grill out of the back of your truck on a freeway onramp. Not too bad for one day's work!"

A great day for a triathlon

2008-08-18T11:34:00.001-07:00

Yesterday's triathlon went beautifully. My time wasn't anything to write home about, but it was right about where I thought I'd be, given my lack of any serious training. In fact, as I was thinking about it this morning, it's rather remarkable I did as well as I did. Two years ago when I was training for the same event I was working out 6 times a week at least. I was running twice a week, doing speedwork and long runs. I was swimming twice a week as well, going for long bike rides on the weekends and in the weeks prior to the race, hitting it hard with brick workouts (biking about 10 miles, followed by a 1.5-2 mile run). This time, not so much. I've been running a couple times a week, most weeks, but no speedwork and my longest runs have been 4 miles, not 5 or 6. I literally hadn't been back on my bike since the last race I did 6 weeks ago, I've been in the pool only a handful of times, and I haven't done a single brick. Granted, my fitness level is obviously still pretty good, and I do classes at the gym once or twice a week. But still. I don't feel like I specifically "trained" this year and yet I was still able to complete this race, and only about 9 minutes slower than last time. Not too shabby, I have to say.

The race started off on a great note with the swim, if you can believe it. In the last event, I HATED the open water swim. I was miserable the entire 400 yards and just wanted it to be over. This one was twice the distance - 800 yards which is about half a mile. It looks like an eternity from in the water, let me tell you. But I've done it before, and I've concentrated my swimming workouts not on getting faster or improving technique, but in preparing myself to be in open water. I've been swimming with my eyes closed to simulate the lack of visibility and did a practice open water swim to help get my confidence back. It worked! I had a great time out there. My time was abysmal - it took me over 30 minutes, when I'm fully capable of doing that distance in 20 - but that's ok. I took it easy, took breaks on my back when I needed to, and just swam it on in. I didn't get freaked about being in the lake, I was able to get to it and actually swim, rather than that crappy half-assed kicking/side stroke thing I tried to do at my last race. So although it took me forever and a day to get through it (LOL), I didn't hate it and that was my number one goal for this race.

The bike leg was the most fun. The course is awesome - it goes along the lake and then over a floating bridge (it's a freeway, but they close the express lanes for us to ride on). The view is awesome, the weather was great and it was a really enjoyable ride. It seemed a lot easier than I remembered it, somehow. I think the bike I have now is a big part of that. I'm riding an actual road bike instead of my modified mountain bike. What a difference skinny tires make! I had an awesome bike ride, and my time was great too - helped offset that slow swim ;).

Coming in from the bike, I realized I had to pee - badly. There were porta-potties near the run start, so I decided to take the time to stop and pee. Boy am I glad I did. Remember that scene in Austin Powers when he pees for like 5 minutes? That's what it felt like. I swear, I don't swallow water when I'm swimming, but it must soak in my skin through osmosis. I always have to pee like a racehorse when I'm done swimming. After that I felt much better - well worth the extra minute or two it added to my transition time.

My run was good - not very fast, but I felt strong and I ran the whole thing minus the big hill. The run course is nice, winding along the lake and it's largely flat. There is one hill that is quite steep. Almost everyone around me was walking up it. I walked it (I walked it last time too). The cool thing is there's always a group of dudes playing drums at the bottom. Very cool motivation. I thanked them for being there as I passed.

There's this one spot on the run course that is probably my favorite. You have a view out over the lake and can see the I-90 bridge going across, which is what we'd biked over. It looks really far away and makes you feel like you did something pretty spectacular, to know that just a little while ago you were way over there, and now you're here, about to finish this huge event.

The weather turned out great too. Saturday it was in the mid-90s. That would have been utterly miserable. Sunday it cooled down, and although it could have been cooler and was a bit humid, it was nothing compared to the day before and ended up being pretty nice weather for a race. A woman on the run leg kept yelling out, "It's a great day for a triathlon, ladies!"

Overall, that was probably the most enjoyable race I've done so far. I had fun the entire time, not wondering what I'd gotten myself into or focusing so much on where the heck is that finish line, LOL. My last race was tough and left me feeling like the best reason to do it is for the afterglow. This one made me glow at every turn. I was almost teary several times throughout the race, thinking of where I was, what I was doing. How many people out there will never feel that thrill, because they can't, or because they don't think they could.

I am glad it's over though; I've been feeling a little raced out, even with just three events under my belt this year. But that was a good amount for me, at this time in my life. But I am SO glad I went ahead and did it. Over the last week I'd been wondering if doing this race was really worth it. It's huge, and the logistics can get complicated. But as I was out there, I remembered why I love it. There's something pretty special about being a part of an event that big, where everyone is cheering everyone else on. The energy is spectacular.

The finishers medal that I got says, "The woman who starts the TRI is not the same woman who finishes the TRI." It's very true. You can't come out on the other side of an event like that without changing, at least a little. It teaches you something about yourself, about what you're capable of.

If I wasn't hoping to be pregnant this time next year, I'd be planning on doing this race again. I'll have to shoot for it in 2010.

Another TRI a'coming

2008-08-14T19:55:00.000-07:00

I have a race on Sunday, probably my last this year. I'm really, really ready for it to be over. I'm not stressing about the race per se; but I haven't trained for it as hard as I probably should have, and so each day I'm plagued with a small amount of self-guilt for what I should have done. "Definitely should bike this weekened.... Ok didn't bike, but I'll bike next weekend... Ok, didn't again, but someday I'll bike..." I'm worn out by constantly feeling like I should be doing more than I am, even though I know I'm in good enough shape to finish the race and that's all I'm trying to do. But still... the "I should be doing more" feeling is one I'll be happy to put away for a while.

It's a high maintenance race though, because it's so big. I believe there are about 5500 participants - that's a lot of chicks in spandex. We have to pick up our race packet and rack our bikes at the park on Saturday; and of course, those two things happen at totally different places. Different cities in fact, and neither particularly close to where I live. Anyway, bottom line is that after I put G down for his nap on Saturday, I'll be heading to my mom's house (she lives closer) and won't be back until Sunday after the race, officially making this the first time I've left G overnight. Granted, it's with Daddy, but still - a milestone of sorts. Except for the fact that I'll have to get up early to get to the race site, I just may get a pretty good night's sleep!

I'll be breathing a sigh of relief on Sunday when it's done. I feel like I can relax a bit - try some new classes at the gym, not worry about whether I'm running or swimming enough, and stop feeling guilty for almost never touching my bike.

In the meantime, I'm visualizing having a good open water swim. It's 800 yards, which is almost 1/2 a mile - that's a long freaking swim in a huge ass lake.

Think good thoughts for me on Sunday! I'd like to have a good swim (regardless of my time) and finish strong - and most of all have fun (and not melt in the heat - it might be a scorcher).

Buying a new dress

2008-08-07T11:22:00.000-07:00

I have a wedding to go to on Sunday and I really needed a new dress to wear. I have a great dress I bought a couple of years ago for just such an occassion, but said dress was purchased just a few months before I got pregnant with G - in other words, when I was 20lbs lighter than I am right now. Cute as it is, it isn't going to work these days. I have another dress in my closet that does fit right now, but it's not really wedding appropriate. It's more of a night out for a great dinner and tickets to the symphony kind of dress.

As an aside, am I the only one who's closet is filled with clothing of varying sizes categorized by such labels as "Too small, but likely to fit again soon," and "Too big, but saving for after the next kid is born," and "Too small and saving in the hopes that I'll squeeze back into it someday, by which time it will probably be too outdated to actually wear." Just wondering.

Anyway, I went out yesterday to find a new dress. Now, first off, it was simply heavenly to be at the mall, walking around, browsing through clothes... all with NO KIDS! No bulky stroller, no one whining for a snack, or that they're bored, or throwing fish crackers onto the floor causing me to run over them, or grabbing at everything within reach and pulling it off the hangers. Ahh, the sweet relief of solo shopping!

It was, however, far more difficult than I imagined to find a dress. Seems like a simple enough thing, to find a nice dress appropriate for an early evening wedding. Lots of stores carry dresses, right? Not really. Granted, I live in a small city, so the mall isn't much to get excited about. But there are a few big department stores and a range of other shops, some of which carry women's clothing, so I thought I'd have a decent selection to choose from. Not so much.

I started at Macy's, and really should have just stayed there. But of course, being the weirdo shopper that I am, I have to see EVERYTHING before I can make a decision. Overthink, much? So I found some cute options at Macy's, but had to venture further to see what the competition might be. I was amazed at how few stores carry dresses. Skirts, sure, but dresses were hard to find. Some stores had one or two, but nothing to get excited about. And the mall here seems to have a huge abundance of stores that I'm just too old for anymore. Not that said stores carry dresses anyway, but I felt like a huge dork wandering through stores that basically carry juniors stuff. I'm not 19 anymore, and I don't want to be one of those women trying to dress like I am. Granted, I don't want to go the other direction either and end up in frump-land. I tell you, shopping in your 30s can be hard - you're faced with stuff that is either too young (and would make you look trashy or just lame) or clothes that would look very nice on my mom, but too old on me. And my mom is a nice dresser, but I don't really want to dress like I'm in my 50s, thank you very much.

After wandering the mall a bit, I wound up back at Macy's and finally found a winner. It's brown with a cream paisley design on it; sleeveless and fitted at the top, with plenty of room for my still-too-large boobs (come on, aren't they supposed to get smaller again?), fitted at the waist right around the rib cage, and flowing down from there. See, I watch my "What Not To Wear" - thank you Stacy and Clinton for some good style tips! I wasn't really looking for brown, but the fit was good and I think the shape is really flattering on me. Hides my baby-flab tummy pretty well. Plus, it isn't black, which is a good thing - I tend to end up with black a lot.

So there you have it - a new dress. I also found some cute, and quite cheap, shoes at Payless. The dress wasn't exactly cheap, despite being on sale, so spendy shoes were out of the question. Now I think I need to find a necklace to go with it - something with blue in it, I think, to add some color to this outfit.

Choosing a church

2008-07-31T19:32:00.001-07:00

How does one go about chosing a church? I don't mean, how do you find a church that you like going to. I mean, if you're starting from scratch and you and your significant other aren't sure what type of church to go to, where on earth do you start?

I grew up Catholic. As an adult, there are some things I really like about the Catholic Church and some things I'm not sure about. I don't have the mindset that any one demonination within Christianity has everything 100% correct, so we better pick the right one or we're in trouble. I like how C.S. Lewis described it - a hall with many rooms. You have to find the room that makes the most sense to you, but really, we're all in the same building. Anyway, my point is, if left to my own devices (as in, if my husband didn't care either way), I'd probably happily go on attending Catholic church and raise my children that way, as long as we did it as a family.

My husband, however, does care. He grew up with some random influences when it came to religion, but wasn't raised in a church-going home. He's not so sure about the whole Catholic thing. He doesn't think there's anything wrong with the Church, necessarily, just not sure that it would be the right place for him. I get that, and I know it isn't all about me, but it puts us at sort of an impasse. Especially because he doesn't have any better alternatives. It isn't like he grew up Presbyterian and I grew up Catholic, so we'll go his way and call it good. He doesn't know what he "is" in terms of a Christian label. He knows he's a believer, which is a good start. But we've been sort of drifting along for what feels like forever, not sure where we belong.

The problem with that is we have kids now and we need to teach them something. Sure, we pray with them and talk about God and read them kid-versions of Bible stories. But I think we're really doing them a disservice by not attending church regularly. Granted, attending church with our boys is really hard and it's actually hard to imagine trying to contain G for an hour or so while a church service of any kind goes on. I think one of us would spend more of our time chasing after him (he's only crawling, but man is he fast) than listening to anything that was going on. But still. I have a strong compulsion right now to figure this thing out once and for all and finally commit to a church that will work for both of us.

The thing is though, I don't know anything about church shopping. When you're Catholic, you generally just go to the closest Catholic Church. You might try out two, if there are a couple in your area, and decide which one "feels" right, but it's not something that requires a whole lot of research. Catholic churches are what they are. You can walk into any Catholic church in the entire world and they'll be doing basically the same thing as every other Catholic church. That freaks some people out; it's a great comfort to others. It also means that, if we decide not to be Catholic as a family, I have no idea where to start.

I've been researching a bit about other Christian denominations, just to get an idea of what the differences are, both from each other and from Catholicism. It's utterly overwhelming. You have various Protestant branches, evangelicals, non-denominational churches and everything in between. Some groups have more structure, in that there is an established doctrine and if not a heirarchy as complex as the Catholic church, at least something in place that holds together what the church teaches. Others are much more fly by the seat; they sort of make up their own thing and it can vary from church to church.

I'm trying to sort through it all to get at least an idea of what the different branches teach/believe. There are differences in the teachings on salvation, on what practices are important/not important/bad/good/etc., on the use of decor, of sacraments, of music... I guess when I started looking, I thought I'd read about a church and think, "Ok, this one sounds reasonable, I can see myself going to a church like this." But with so much variation and lack of structure amongst many churches, it's hard to figure it all out. Short of visiting pastors at all my local area churches and asking, "So what do you believe at this church?" I'm not sure how to make sense of it all.

I guess it's the Catholic in me that wants to know, "What does this church teach?" Because, well, that information exists for the Catholic Church. I'm not used to the idea that an individual church could have such free reign to interpret scripture as they see fit, but some churches do just that. When I walk into any given church, I'm just not sure what I'm going to get. How do you know if the pastor of the church has any credibility; how do you figure out if it's a really fundamentalist group, or a more progressive one?

In our search for answers, my husband and I are planning to attend RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults) "classes" (and I put that in quotes because the word class is too formal, but I'm not sure what else to call it) through the local Catholic Church. He's skeptical. I don't have a strong enough background in the church of my upbringing to answer his questions, nor give him compelling enough reasons for why our family should attend church there. Quite honestly, I'm not sure if my desire to remain Catholic will hold up under real scrutiny. And that's fine. The good thing about this whole process is that it's making me take a hard look at what I really believe in and learn about the church that our family will eventually be a part of, whatever church that may be. I certainly won't be going into it blindly, or simply because I was brought up that way. But this isn't an easy thing to tackle, especially when my husband is a bit defensive about the whole topic (and that's a completely different post in it's own right); it's made having rational discussions a little hard, but we're working on it.

In the meantime, I'm left feeling a little like I'm in a rowboat with no oars. There's certainly the part of me that wishes he didn't care so much and we could just go to church somewhere and call it good. But nothing is ever that easy with my husband, especially large issues like this. And we are talking about matters of the soul here - that's kind of a biggie.

My advice to anyone who might happen across this post who is single - figure out the church thing before you get married. If you're of the same religious denomination, awesome. If not, decide where you'll go. Don't let it sit for almost a decade.

Weird dream

2008-07-29T12:05:00.000-07:00

I had such a weird dream the other night. It was the other morning, actually. G woke up around 5:30, which is just way too early. I turned the sound on the monitor way down so he wouldn't wake my husband (why I do that, I have no idea - he never wakes up when our kids do) and decided to wait a bit and see if he'd go back to sleep. Obviously he did, because I did too, but I had a strange dream after that.

I dreamt that I woke up and looked at the clock and it was 10:00, and I realized I'd turned the monitor completely off and G had been awake and crying for 4 1/2 hours. I flew out of bed into his room and found him in his crib, sobbing. His voice was hoarse from crying for so long and he'd thrown up everywhere. I picked him up and I can still remember how sad his little voice sounded. I felt like throwing myself off a bridge, I couldn't believe I'd done that.

I woke up right about then and quickly looked at the clock, then the monitor. I was horrified that I might have really left him crying all morning. But the monitor was still on, and quiet, and it was only a bit after 6. Phew! I was so relieved, but the feeling of that dream wouldn't go away for quite some time.

Friends and girls

2008-07-28T18:27:00.001-07:00

The other day when I picked up the boys from the gym childcare, D told me he'd been playing with his friend. I was intrigued, so I asked some questions:

Me: "Is your friend a boy or a girl?"
D: "Boy."
Me: "Do you remember his name?"
D: "No. His name might be Jennifer, I think."
Me: "Well, Jennifer is a girl's name. Is your friend a girl?"
D: "No, he's a boy." (very emphatically)
Me: "Ok, so he's a boy. Maybe his name is something else."
D: "Yeah, maybe I just don't know right now."
Me: "Ok, well, do you know how old he is?"
D: "Yes! He's 3 just like me!" (he was really excited about that part)
Me: "Cool! He sounds like a good friend."
D: "Yeah, he likes robots." (well there you go - what's not to like)

A couple of days later we went to the gym and when I picked him up, he very happily told me he'd been playing with his friend Jackson. So we solved the friend's name mystery (Jackson, Jennifer... who knows, they both begin with J), and I think it is utterly adorable that he made a friend completely independent of my influence. So far, his friends are all either our friend's kids or kids of moms I've met at the Y in one class or another who have a kid roughly his age - not kids he's picked out as friends. It's so cute! With him about to start preschool in September, I have a feeling we're in for a lot more of this kind of thing.

How on earth is he old enough for this?

Anyway, today, when I came to pick him up from the gym childcare, I could see him through the big windows. He was sitting at a picnic-style table with about 5 other kids and they were playing with a bunch of play food in the middle. How adorable is that! I think the kids on either side of D were both girls, and there was at least one boy across from him (and I was wondering if that was Jackson, but apparently not).

On the way home I asked him about what he'd been doing at the table. He said he was playing with the food. I asked who he'd been playing with and he just said, "kids." When prompted further he told me, "There were girls, but I don't like girls."

Already?

I had to try really hard not to laugh at him, because he was so serious. I asked him why he didn't like girls and for a while he didn't really give me an answer. Then he said something about, "That girl didn't give me the food," so I'm guessing one of the girls had something he wanted and wouldn't give it to him. Which apparently demonizes the rest of the female gender in his eyes forever - or at least until puberty.

I asked him if he liked me, and he said yes. I'm apparently exempt, even though I am a girl, but his aunt isn't (my SIL who lives with us), because he said he doesn't like her. Nor does he like his little friend Ellie (a 3-year old we sometimes get together with for playdates), or our friend's kid Olivia, nor any of the other girl examples I threw at him.

"No Mom, girls are borning," he says. ("borning" being his pronounciation of "boring")

Well, there you have it. A friend named Jackson, and he doesn't like girls because they're boring.

He did say that he wants my friend's daughter Emily to come over and play, however - just so she can be the bad guy transformer and they can fight. Kid, you have a lot to learn about girls.

It must be genetic

2008-07-26T11:36:00.000-07:00

My 3 1/2 year old son has recently developed a fascination with Transformers. He's never seen the cartoon, nor the movie. His introduction to them has probably come in the form of my husband, who has an old-school Optimus Prime (and from a kid perspective it's one of those inexplicable toys that isn't available for playing, and just sits on a shelf for people to look at; seriously, when I was a kid I could not fathom why grown ups would have toys that no one was allowed to play with. But I digress), and from our friends' boys, who are a bit older and into that sort of stuff.

In any case, my husband bought him his own Optimus Prime toy and he's barely put the thing down to go pee since he got it; it even sat on his nightstand last night when he went to bed. He's crazy about it.

Earlier, he was playing with it and had a few other toys on the couch who were apparently playing the role of "bad guys", including Megatron. I'm telling you, the most violent and grown up movie he's ever seen is the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie that came out a few years ago, so I seriously don't know where he gets some of this stuff. He usually watches Disney flicks or Playhouse Disney cartoons.

Using his "good guy voice": Megatron, you need to stop that right now!
"Bad guy voice": No, I'm not.
Good guy: That's it, I have to destroy you.
Bad guy: No way. I'll get you first.

Proceed with toys banging into each other simulating an epic battle of good and evil.

Bad guy: Say goodbye to your planet!
Good guy: I will crush you!
Bad guy: Ahhhhhhhh!

Good guy smacks into bad guy and bad guy goes flying across the room.

In regular D voice: "Mom, Optimus Prime just saved the world."
That's great, baby. I'm glad he's on our side.

"Say goodbye to your planet"? Where on earth did he hear that? Seriously, it has to be genetic. He will play these crazy games where toys fight each other and he can make a gun out of anything. It blows me away. I think if I gave him a baby doll, he'd dub it a good guy and make it fight his Shredder action figure.

Boys...

Money... or rather a slight lack thereof.

2008-07-21T21:27:00.000-07:00

We do fine financially, generally speaking. We pay our bills, we own our home, have decent cars to drive. Nothing fancy-schmancy, but we're comfortable enough. I often feel like we don't manage our money as well as we should though, and looking back on our years as DINKS (double income no kids) makes me absolutely cringe.

In any case, I'm the financial planner/record keeper/money manager of the family. My husband would stink at it and I wouldn't be able to handle not knowing what's going on in the checking account, so it's a job I'm glad I have. But I am rather sick of being the one to say, "We're X dollars away from being over budget, so if you could just spend $5 for the next two weeks, that'd be great. Thanks."

I'm trying so hard to get us caught up and not overspending, but it's freaking hard. I hate that half my paychecks keep going to catch up our checking account for the overspending of the month before. We actually have plans for the money I make (like paying off our stupid credit card and saving for the inevitable hospital bills we're going to incur because we're insane enough to want another baby), but my budget spreadsheet keeps changing every month as more of the money I make goes back into the checking account.

Unfortunately, my husband has no concept of managing our money. The last thing he thinks about when he whips out his debit card is, "Do we have the money for this?" That question, if it comes up at all, is a far cry from what he does think, which is something along the lines of, "I want that," and "Where's my wallet?" Even when I tell him explicitly how much money we have left for things like eating out (like, none), and gas (not enough with these damn gas prices), he'll still find a way to "need" something at the store, or grab dinner on the way home from work.

But I don't mean to complain about my husband. At least not entirely. I'm not innocent in this either. I bought a new purse today that I certainly didn't need, and although it was half off (and wasn't expensive in the first place - I'm not a designer purse kinda gal), it's still one of those things that brings us further from hitting our financial target this month.

I just wish we could do well financially for the first half of the month so I didn't spend the second half cringing whenever my husband comes home with a plastic bag in his hand or suggests we grab dinner. I hate feeling like the old stingy crumudgeon - the one who's always reminding him that we don't have the money for that. I feel like I've always done that, even when we had a lot more money than we do now (aka, when I worked full time). Even back then I was always trying to get us to stick to a budget and failing pretty miserably at it. Now, our budget is much more realistic, in that it's something we honestly could stick to without too much trouble, but also much more necessary, in that I don't make nearly as much money as I used to and we're a family of four now. Which puts me in the perennial position of the money police.

Yes, we go over the budget together. Yes, I update him regularly about where we are relative to our goals. I try to keep us on the same page. Maybe I need do get better at that part and it wouldn't be as much of an issue. Either that or he'd do his guy-listening thing - you know, when they totally act like they're paying attention, even ask relevant questions, and then claim to have no memory of the conversation. "You never told me we only had $x in the checking account!" Right.

I realize things could be much worse. We don't stress (much) about paying our bills, or our mortgage. We have things like health insurance (man, that's expensive) and reliable transportation. I'm just tired of always being behind. We're hardly saving anything for our retirement, and someday that's really going to bite us in the ass.

Maybe I'll start buying lottery tickets.

The end of an era

2008-07-14T19:03:00.000-07:00

I haven't nursed G since last Tuesday.

It is a little bittersweet to be done nursing, but a lot more sweet than bitter. I do have a little bit of that "my baby is growing up too fast" feeling, but at the same time, things went so well, I can't really complain.

For a little while we were down to just one nursing, first thing in the morning. It was probably my favorite nursing time. He wakes up early, so I could roll out of bed, stumble to his room, pick him up and sit down in the rocking chair to nurse without having to truly wake up. It was a nice way to start the day.

I didn't have a cutoff or a plan of when I wanted to stop completely. But last week I started to feel ready to finally pull the trigger and be done. He'd gone from nursing all the time to only once a day with no trouble at all; almost made me wish he'd fought a little harder for it. But not really. Like I've said before, I felt like he was giving me a window of opportunity, so I decided to take it. So last Wednesday when I got him up, I decided I'd not nurse, but instead take him downstairs and get him his sippy of milk, and see what happened. And he was totally fine.

The next day was the same. He's never acted like he's missing something, never given me any indication that he was anything but ready. And that has made the weaning process so easy. If he'd given me any grief about it, shown any sign that he was feeling deprived, I would have kept going. But it's like if he could talk, he'd have told me, "I'm good, Mama. We can move on."

Physically, I'm utterly amazed at how easy this was. When D quit nursing it was abrupt, followed by a month of pumping, followed by a week or so of trying to wean myself off of the pump. That kind of abrupt end to nursing equals plugged ducts, mastitis and over a week of horrific engorgement. I'm talking rock solid boobs for DAYS. It was awful. I was doing everything I could think of to get my milk to dry up - putting crushed cabbage leaves in my bra, taking antihistimines, drinking sage tea. It was a mess.

This time, I didn't get even a tiny bit engorged at all. For the first few days I kept waking up expecting it to happen, expecting that horrible discomfort of those playboy looking boobs. But nope - they felt slightly full for about two days, just a little heavier than normal. And then, nothing. They've gotten a little smaller (although not near my pre-pregnancy C-cup yet, but I'm not spilling out of the DD bras I have anymore) and unfortunately look about as deflated as I remember they used to. But that's it - no pain, no discomfort, just a nice smooth transition.

This time nursing started out rough (two months of cracked nipples and awful pain), but ended perfectly. He nursed for almost 14 months and weaning went better than I could have hoped for. I certainly can't ask for anything better.

But my baby is growing up. Sniff, sniff.

Adventures in nose piercing

2008-07-13T11:31:00.001-07:00

I pierced my nose.

Friday I decided to just get it done. My SIL was home to watch the boys (after bedtime), so my husband and I went out in search of some mild self-mutilation ;).

It turned into a total wild goose chase. The first place we went to was cash only. Cash only? Who is cash only these days? Neither of us carry much cash around, so we figured we'd try someplace else that takes debit cards. The second place did take debit cards, but their piercing person was already gone for the day. The third place was closed, the fourth place also cash only.

At this point, it was almost 9pm and I was feeling pretty defeated. I'd gotten myself all psyched up to get it done and I didn't think it was going to happen. I told my husband I had piercing blue balls.

We decided to try one more place that we knew of (who knew there were so many tattoo shops in our town). When we pulled up we saw what is apparently a common sign in these places - cash only. But this time we figured we'd go in, see if the piercing person was there (and if they'd be there for a while) and then hit a cash machine. Of course, we could have done this earlier, but we didn't realize how common it would be for tattoo shops to take only cash. We figured we'd find one easily that took debit cards. In any case, the girl inside was the one who does piercings and they'd be open until midnight.

We came back with the cash and she had me sign my life away, then come into the back. Their setup looked like a doctors office from a Quentin Terrantino movie. She had all this sterile equipment in that big, bulky packaging you see needles and stuff come in, but the walls were black with multi-colored paint splatter and big pieces of crazy, demonic art all over the walls (probably from one or some of the resident tattoo artists). I sat up on what looked like a bed from a doctor's exam room.

She cleaned my nose, then put a dot where the stud would go to determine placement. It looked good to us, so she prepared the needle. It was enormous - not so much in length, but in width. Up until that point, I'd purposefully kept the actual process of getting a piercing out of my head, and as a result I was surprisingly calm. She put a clamp in my nostril and I closed my eyes. She had me take a deep breath, then let it out - and she shoved the needle through.

It definitely hurt, but not horribly so. It made my left eye water a lot, but not because I was crying - it just watered. And pain wasn't the only sensation - there was this bizarre sensation of pressure with the needle sitting in there. It felt like she drove an inch thick stake through my nose; she must have created an enormous gaping hole. It wasn't really that big, of course, but the pressure made it feel like it was huge.

I was afraid to open my eyes at first, but once I did it was ok. I did lie down at that point, since I felt the mild beginnings of whoosy-ness. I'm all too familiar with the sensation, and I know how to counteract it before it turns into me falling on the floor unconscious - so rather than try to tough it out, I just laid down and felt fine. After she had the stud all ready, she removed the needle and put it in, then dabbed the blood for a while. It bled more than I thought it would.

So there you go - I now have a pierced nose. I've been suprised so far at how little it hurts. It was very sore in the first hour after I had it done, but some ibuprofen took care of that easily. Since then, it's been a bit sore, but nothing too terrible. And I'm quickly getting used to the feeling of having it in - I do have the constant sensation that there's something in my nose, but I'm told that goes away in a few days. It already seems to be.

We'll see if I can post a picture... if it works. I might take it down after a bit :). I don't think pic quite does it justice. It is small, but it sparkles a little and it actually light blue.

Oh, and I LOVE IT!!!!!!!

Where is my damn hover car?

2008-07-09T20:51:00.001-07:00

Remember when we were kids and we talked about what the 2000's would be like? There would be all these crazy cool gadgets, like robots to do your housework, voice activated houses ("Lights!") and hover cars.

I seriously think we should have hover cars by now. I'm just sayin'.

Watch out nose

2008-07-06T18:33:00.000-07:00

I just may pierce my nose.

For the record - I am not a piercing kind of gal. People who know me IRL would probably be pretty surprised to know I'm contemplating a nose ring. I have my ears pierced, and once upon a time I had three holes in the left and two in the right; but I haven't worn more than one set of earrings in a long time, so the extra holes are pretty well closed up. But other than that, I don't have anything - no piercings, no tattoos, nothing.

I got to thinking - I sort of wish I'd have done a few more funky things with my appearance when I was younger. Why didn't I dye my hair crazy colors or pierce my belly button or something? I don't know... And while I don't think I could pull off pink streaks in my hair now, I think a little stud in my nose could be cute. I'd hate to go another 10 years and look back and wonder why I didn't - and really feel like I was too old to get it done at that point.

My husband doesn't have a problem with it. I thought for sure he'd look at me like I was nuts when I brought it up. But he doesn't care either way, really. If I want one, he's fine with it; if I never did, that would be fine too. That fact actually made me even more inclined to go for it; I half expected him to try to talk me out of it and when he didn't, I thought, what the heck!

However, I don't want to look like I'm trying to be something I'm not. I'm not edgy or hip. But I don't want to completely fade into suburban soccer-momminess either. I'm something of a rocker chick at heart and I think it would be fun to do something a little crazy - at least crazy for me.

So look out nose, you just might be getting a needle jammed through you soon. Yes, it's probably going to hurt like hell, but my sister-in-law swears getting her ears pierced hurt worse. Of course, she might just be telling me that to convince me to do it. I'm not all that worried about the pain though. I've birthed two babies, one without any drugs - I think I can handle a needle through my nose.

Apparently we're weaning

2008-07-03T20:03:00.000-07:00

Well, I think we're weaning, LOL! I laugh because after all my stress and wondering how, when, etc. things are just happening more or less naturally.

Writing my recent post about breastfeeding actually helped me to sort things out in my head quite a bit. I like it when that happens - I write it all out and suddenly instead of this quagmire of churning thoughts burning a hole in my head, I get some clarity. I realized I'm starting to feel ready to be done and I'm ok with that - no guilt that it's "my thing," no worries about how long it will take. I just figured I'd try a few things, see how he does, and go from there.

So anyway, I decided to try limiting his nursings to just four a day - first thing in the morning, before nap, mid-afternoon and bedtime. Those were the most regular, with a couple other random ones thrown in here and there. He's basically sleeping through the night now, so the night nursings are out too (and I say "basically" because when he does wake up, it's usually in the early morning and he's at the point where he wouldn't go back to sleep even if I did try to nurse him back down). That went fine - there were a few times the first day or two when he was fussy or clingy and I probably would have nursed him, but I just gave him a sippy or a snack or both and he was totally fine. No biggie.

Then there were a few days in a row where, simply because we were out and about and busy, we missed the mid-afternoon nursing. He was fine without it, so I went with it and stopped offering. The first day he probably wanted to nurse, but I gave him his sippy and he was fine - drank some milk and went about his business playing. Easy cheesey.

He's been less and less interested in nursing at all this last week. Case in point, he's only nursed once in the last 24 hours (or more?). He refused at bedtime last night, nursed this morning for a while, refused at naptime and refused again at bedtime. I can't be making much milk at all anymore (which is probably part of why he's not interested) because I don't feel the least bit full. Crazy, huh. So I'm going with it. I'll offer in the morning, but I might not at nap and bedtime from now on. We'll see though - I might try at naptime tomorrow and see what happens.

Anyway, it's going really smoothly for both of us. Sure, it's bittersweet, but I'm surprisingly ok with it. A lot of that has to do with how he's doing - he's totally fine, which makes it so much easier. I feel like he's giving me this window of opportunity where he's pretty uninterested in nursing, so I'm going to take it. It will be sad when it's over, but not so sad that I feel the need to keep going. I'm ready, he seems pretty ready and so there you go.

OMG, I might actually get my body back for a while? What a concept!

A belated race report

2008-07-02T21:34:00.000-07:00

Saturday marked my second triathlon of the year - this one quite a bit longer than the first. My mom and my good friend both did it as well, which made it a heck of a lot more fun than the last one. In fact, Mom and I stuck together throughout and I think we both decided that's totally the way to go.

The swim... ah, what can I say about the swim? I hate open water swimming. Hate it. I suck at it, plain and simple. I have such a hard time getting my face in the water and just freaking swimming. I get disoriented so quickly. And my wetsuit being so tight did not help matters. As soon as I started breathing harder I felt like my lungs were being crushed. I ended up pulling the zipper open partway through so I could breathe better. Overall, it was awful. You could barely say I swam the thing - more like I clumsily propelled myself through the water in a roughly forward direction until I got to the shore. I was the last person out of the water, and that sucked. Of course, everyone there were all so nice and cheered me on, but I felt like it was a pity cheer. Oh look at the poor girl who can't swim - isn't she couragous for getting out there and really sucking. The thing is - I can swim. I can swim pretty well, even if I'm slow at it. I can swim for a good long time without stopping and my form isn't too bad. But out there I must have looked like I'd never tried to swim a distance in my life. Bleh.

So not the greatest start to the race, but it turns out my swim time wasn't as bad as I thought. I was 2 full minutes behind my mom, but as I headed to the transition area I was sure she'd been waiting for me for at least 5. It's a distance I should be able to do in about 10 minutes, but it took me 14 - but considering it felt like about half an hour, I was a little relieved at the 14...

(and never mind that my friend did it in just over 5 - that woman is a freaking fish)

In any case, wet suit came off, shoes went on and the bike began. It was a 14 mile, 2 lap course, which means the whole first half was spent knowing we had to do it all again. Yikes! The course wasn't too bad - a bit hilly, but nothing I couldn't handle. I've biked worse. The problem with 2 lap courses though is you go through the whole thing dreading having to do it all again - and feeling like you must have already gone the whole 14 miles about the time you pass the starting line again, so you're really only halfway done. But that's ok. Mom and I hung together and we even passed a few people. Pace-wise she and I are a good match, although she's in better shape than I am this year (no worries there - her last baby was born 21 years ago, LOL!). We actually had fun most of the ride - although my hiney was seriously ready to be off of that sucker by the end. I haven't done many long rides and I'm definitely not conditioned to be on the bike that long.

The only problem I ran into, really, was forgetting to take my energy gel before I started the bike. Thanks to PCOS, I have blood sugar issues and my blood sugar tanked on me about halfway through the bike leg. I felt pretty nauseaus, and unfortunately that lasted the rest of the race. I did take the energy gel (which is just a packet of super sweet, supposedly complex carbs that you sort of half drink, half try to choke down because eating while you're working that hard just plain sucks - at least for me) between the bike and run, so it helped some. But I did have to stop and walk three or four times on the run because I felt pukey. Luckily my tummy did hold and the run wasn't too bad.

Mom and I weren't trying to break any records, our own or anyone else's, so we didn't kill ourselves. We pushed hard, but like I said, there was some walking and it was all good. We had a really good time together. I hope she wants to do the same when we do the Danskin next month. It took the pressure off big time. I wasn't very nervous at all the night before or the morning of; it truly felt like something we were just doing to have fun together and to keep ourselves in shape - which is exactly the point.

All in all, a fun race. I'm trying very, very hard not to be depressed at how I look in the pictures, being that I'm 20lbs heavier than I was when I did the Danksin in 06. I know, I know, I did the damn triathlon, that's a lot to be proud of, screw how fat my thighs are... I know. But still. It's hard.

I also really need to do a couple practice open water swims between now and the Danskin. I know I can do better and I'd like to have a better swim experience. I was hating it out there; next time I'd like to at least be comfortable enough to do some real swimming, not this stupid half side stroke BS I ended up doing. Lame.

But I don't want to end this on a negative note, because overall it rocked. I'm really glad I did it, really glad I did it with my mom and really glad we're doing one or maybe two more this year. I felt awesome afterward - tired, obviously, but awesome.

Go me! LOL!

Nine years

2008-06-26T11:44:00.000-07:00

Nine years ago today (well, yesterday - I meant to finish this last night but didn't have time) I wore the big white dress, walked down the aisle on the arm of my father and pledged my life to another person.

Our wedding was fantastic. Our friends and family literally talked about it for years. The ceremony was a little long for some (it was in a Catholic Church, but not the full mass, which is even longer), but the reception was a great party. Everything about it was perfect. Sure, there may have been some details gone awry (my dress got dirty during picture taking prior to the ceremony), but those details didn't matter even the tiniest bit when we stood up there and said our vows. The dress, the decorations, the flowers, the tux - all of it melted away and there we were, standing before our loved ones and before God and pledging to be true until death.

We've been through a lot these past nine years. So much has changed, it almost feels as if 9 years isn't enough to hold all that has happened. We started out living in my dad's spare bedroom after returning from our honeymoon, what few posessions we had stacked in a storage unit. Now, we own our second home, complete with four bedrooms that are quite full. We've been through jobs, moves, family dramas, therapy (for him, LOL), the birth of two kids and so much more. Our life is so utterly different today from what it was 9 years ago when we said those vows.

I think if you had asked us that day what we'd like our life to be like 9 years in the future, this would pretty much be it - a good career, a nice house, a couple of kids. It feels good to be where we're supposed to be.

Scheduling

2008-06-24T11:18:00.001-07:00

Scheduling the lives of the four of us can be pretty complicated sometimes. We have to consider feeding, pooping, napping, bedtime, etc. Not to mention the adults have needs as well. I try not to let my needs fall by the wayside, at least not too much. I live my life around their schedules, but I do my best to incorporate my stuff in there too. But it isn't always easy.

My current quandary revolves around fitting in my workouts on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I thought I had a good plan when I signed them up for the current session of classes at the Y. The class schedule for summer is reduced, so there aren't as many options. I had to put D in gymnastics on Saturday, since the only weekday classes were right at G's naptime. G gets to do swimming on Saturdays as well, but that left us with nothing scheduled on the weekdays. I like having something at least a couple of days a week; it gives us some structure, and something to get us out of the house and look forward to. The solution - toddler gym! D has always loved gym class, G is now old enough, and since the class runs from 10m - 4 years, they can be in the same class together. I just have to juggle chasing after G with watching to make sure D doesn't jump off of something too high.

The problem is for some reason I thought it would be a good idea to put them in the 8:45 class. My thinking was that I could take them to gym class, then come home and take them out for a run afterwards. And if the weather is really bad, we could just stay at the Y and I could workout there. The problem with that plan is we don't get home until about 9:45, which means starting a run at about 10. And that means G will very likely fall asleep in the stroller, since it's close to his naptime. Granted, he might not, but he definitely could, and probably would often. Considering he'll only sleep about half as long, not to mention I get zero break when that happens, I don't particularly want him napping in the stroller.

I asked this morning about switching to the later class, but both classes are totally full. So we're pretty much stuck.

The thing that sucks is none of my options are that great. I could try working out early, before we have to go - but considering I have to get them both fed and dressed, my husband fed and his lunch made, and myself more or less presentable, all by 8:20... not likely that I can squeeze in a workout, especially considering my husband is busy getting ready for work and can't exactly watch the boys while I'm gone. And in order to take them out in the stroller with me, we'd have to leave at like 7 - that just isn't going to happen, even on days when they both wake up early.

Option two, is of course, my original plan - workout after class. I could stay at the Y and run there, which alleviates my napping in the stroller problem. But of course, the childcare isn't free, so I'll be tacking on an additional $11 per week (it's $5.50 for an hour for both of them, times two extra days) to what I already spend. Ouch. The childcare cost adds up fast and I don't know if I can afford to pay more.

Option three is to workout after naptime. But that would have me running in the heat of the day (and I think we might actually get some summer weather finally, after a very dreary spring). Plus, I'd have to shower with both boys up, and that's just a PITA. My normal routine of working out in the morning and showering with G is napping has worked really well.

Option four is workout after they're in bed, but that doesn't do me much good either because evenings are when I work. I can't lose two work nights a week, especially right now when I'm so busy.

I know, I know, there are many worse dilemmas to have. And I also know this is probably the most boring blog post ever. I'm writing it down more to work out the details than because I think anyone will find it terribly interesting. It's just some of the juggling I go through, trying to schedule our lives around each other.

And to think we want to add another person to this zoo? I shake my head at myself often over that one.

Future memories of Papa's house

2008-06-21T21:13:00.000-07:00

Today we spent the day at my in-laws. It's almost a two-hour drive, which for us on the verge of being too far to go just for the day, but that's usually how we do it. Occassionally my husband will take D and those two will spend the night down there, leaving me in the strange world of having just one kid to take care of; but today the whole fam decided to head down.

My in-laws live near a river that empties into a bay; they're also Native American, and things like clam digging, fishing and hunting are a normal part of life. A lot of members of that part of our family make their living harvesting shellfish and fishing. My college student brother-in-law spends most of his summer alternating between digging clams with the tide and long lining for black cod and halibut off the coast with his dad. Since they're Indian, they get certain privleges with regards to fishing and shellfish and the like - so for a lot of people, it's a decent way to make extra money.

In any case, it's clam digging season and my BIL was off digging clams this morning. After we arrived, it was decreed that we should meet him down at the docks and go for a boat ride. The area that was open for digging today is only accessable by boat, so after he'd brought in and sold his buckets of clams (he dug over 300lbs, which is an enormous amount of clams when you see it all piled up) we piled in the boat and rode around the bay for a bit.

There's this tiny little town on the edge of the bay where we rode; it isn't the town where my in-laws actually live, but it's a place my husband (and myself, actually, thanks to the number of years I've been with my husband) has spent a lot of time in. My FIL grew up there, and his father grew up there; it's actually the ancestral home of the Indian tribe my husband descends from. Anyway, it's this tiny little place where people don't lock their doors, there are two churches, one tavern and a little convenience store that still sells penny candy to the kids. The rules of the modern world don't seem to apply there, like it's a place suspended in time. Sure, the buildings look older and more worn than they did a decade ago, but you can do things there that you don't often see people doing in other places these days.

Like let your three year old sit on your lap and drive.

I had this great moment while we were driving around this little town today, after our boat ride. We'd made a quick stop at the beach and D had jumped into my FIL's car with him. I watched as my FIL sat D in his lap, turned the car on and lightly gripped the wheel to guide the car as D enjoyed the thrill of "driving". What was so great about that moment? I happen to know that's one of my husband's fond memories of his dad, and of that place - sitting on someone's lap and driving around, and even as an older child, being given the keys to the car and driving himself (long before the legal age to drive). I'm sure people do that kind of thing still - up and down their street, or in a parking lot. But something about seeing my son, in that place, on the lap of his grandpa with his hands on the steering wheel - it made my heart happy.

There is nothing like watching someone else enjoy your child to endear them to you all the more. If you love my kids, I'm pretty much going to love you - simple as that. And my FIL adores my boys. It becomes all the more apparent as D gets older; he likes babies ok, but he's great with kids. He's the kind of grandpa who loves to play, to entertain, to invent games and indulge their ideas for pretend. He'll drink endless cups of "coffee", push him for what seems like forever on their swing, exclaim in delight at a relentless slough of silly faces or peekaboos, and snuggle in the chair at the end of the day when even the vast trough of three-year-old energy runs dry.

I feel more a part of their family than I ever have in the past. I've known them a long time and enjoyed their love and acceptance. But being the mother of their grandsons makes me feel like they truly are my family. They are my sons' family. Their house is the place my boys will remember going to. They'll remember the boat rides, digging clams on the beach, fishing for crawdads in a bucket with a strip of bacon on a string, swinging in the yard and driving on Papa's lap through Bay Center.

Good times.

Giving it another go

2008-06-20T11:24:00.000-07:00

I'm back with another weight loss attempt. I've been working out, training for my races and all that. But I've managed to put on 7lbs that I'd lost, which SUCKS. I want to give this a strong, honest attempt, diet wise in particular, to see what my body is willing to give up now. I'm not nursing as much as I was and I'm hoping that the decreased demands on my body will free up some of the "just in case" fat that it seems to want to hang on to. We shall see.

I've been eating on plan for two and a half days now, which isn't much, but I feel fine - and that's huge. I'm decreasing my calories by more than I have so far (since G's birth, anyway) and yeah, I'm hungry a lot, but it isn't I'm-going-to-pass-out hungry; hopefully it's just burning-the-fat hungry. I felt like this a lot of the time when I was dropping pounds before I was pregnant with G, so hopefully that's a good sign.

So we'll see. If I can't lose weight with what I'm doing now, I really am stuck until nursing is over. But I think I'll be able to lose a little. Slowly is fine, as long as I can start moving in the right direction.

As an aside, I have a race a week from tomorrow and it's an open water swim. My wetsuit BARELY fits. Actually, I don't know if I can even make that claim, since I have yet to get it completely on and zipped up. I also discovered one of the seams popped open, but I don't know if that happened a while ago or if that stems from my attempts to squeeze the thing on. I'd hate to think I've ripped it open because I'm too big for it, but that's a real possibility. After all, I am a good 20lbs heavier than when I wore it last. Ugh, that sucks. In any case, I hope I'll be able to get the thing zipped. It's going to be really embarassing to have my mom and my friend both tugging on the strap trying to get me into it. But I do not want to do an open water swim without it - water temperature aside, that thing helps me float!

Breastfeeding.

2008-06-11T19:03:00.001-07:00

With G's first birthday in the past, and the boobs still on the loose, the inevitable question has come up - when will I stop breastfeeding?

I have remarkably mixed feelings about the whole business. I think I need to post this largely to help me sort things out. Sometimes writing down my thoughts helps me to make sense of what I'm thinking. Sometimes not, but we'll hope for the best here.

I don't think I'm game for the whole "child-led weaning" scenario, in the sense that I'd be happy to keep breastfeeding G for as long as he wants and let him control when we wean. I don't think that would happen soon enough for me. I don't exactly have a cut off of when I'd like to be finished, but I also know I don't want it to go on for a lot longer. Does that make any sense? Like I don't particularly want to be nursing when he's 2, but what about 14 months? 15 months? 18 months? I don't know.

Having said that, there is that tiny bit of guilt at the thought of me leading the weaning process because I want to be done, not because he seems ready to be done. I know, I know - breastfeeding is great as long as it's working for BOTH mom and baby. When it applies to other people, I totally believe that. But there's this little part of me that can't quite get over the notion that I should let him nurse as long as he wants - because, you know, so many health organizations throughout the world advocate breastfeeding until at least age 2, yadda, yadda.

The thing is, I'd really like to have my body back for a little while before I go and get knocked up again. I don't even know if I could get pregnant at the weight I'm at right now, and I don't know if it's going to be possible to lose a lick of weight until I'm done nursing. I'd hoped that when he cut down some it might get easier, but I'm still not losing. In fact, I've gained back about 5lbs (which sucks royally, but is entirely my own fault) and I'm fighting just to get back to where I was a few months ago. It would be really nice to have some time to focus on getting my body in the best shape possible to have another successful, and hopefuly fairly comfortable, pregnancy.

My other thought regarding weight is that I can't help but wonder if the birth control I'm on (as in, the mini-pill) is contributing to my lack of weight loss. Is my weight being so stubborn because of nursing, or because of the birth control I have to take while nursing? Does it really matter? I can't take any other type of BCP while nursing, it would be ridiculous to get something like an IUD since we'll be trying again sooner rather than later, I don't want to leave it up to chance (or barrier methods, since I KNOW we'd be super lazy about using anything else), so I'm pretty much stuck. As long as I'm nursing and preventing, the weight thing sort of is what it is.

And the more I think about it, the more I realize that a lot of my desire to wean is stemming from how I feel about my body. I'm not loving how I look right now. Yes, it could be (and has been) worse. But as summer approaches, warm weather brings out things like capris, tank tops and (gasp!) shorts. At least when the weather sucks I can layer and wear long sleeves. It isn't that I hide under huge, baggy clothes all the time, but you know how much less forgiving summer clothing can be.

I caught a glimpse of my reflection this afternoon in our sliding glass door and I wasn't exactly thrilled. I'm 20lbs too heavy, my tummy still looks like it did when I was about 15 weeks pregnant (at least) and my boobs are too big and saggy. It's hard not to think about how, if I weaned soon, my breasts would (hopefully) go back to a semi-normal size, I could ditch the nursing bras and go back to wearing good bras that actually put the girls up to where they need to be, and I might have a shot at losing the rest of this weight and feeling better about how I look.

But then, what on earth will weaning actually be like? I nursed my first, but he solved the problem for me by abruptly stopping nursing at 10 months. That wasn't at all how I'd wanted things to go, but it's how it happened, so I never had to actively wean. This time around I'm so unsure of what to do, how to proceed, and perhaps most importantly, when to start doing something about it.

I want it to be as smooth and painless for both of us as possible. I'd like to slowly decrease the number of regular nursings until we just stop altogether and it's no big deal. I'd love to be able to tell people later that it was easy and he seemed ready - no trauma at all.

However, right now I feel completely incapable of making any moves towards doing that. He is nursing less than he used to, but that's all him. I nurse him whenever he seems to want it. It's usually only 4, maybe 5 times a day, but still. There are certainly days (like today) when it's more and the thought of even just keeping him to the 4 or 5 is hard. When I pick him up and he's fussing and tugging on my shirt and I've tried everything else - he clearly wants to nurse. I'm not ready to deny him that, to limit nursings - let alone try to cut any of the regular ones out.

But if it's going to take a while to accomplish, I have to start sometime, right? I just don't have any idea of when that will be.

I'm a planner. I like having things at least loosely planned out. I'm flexible enough to change my plans when necessary - but that just means having a new plan. With nursing, I have no plan. I don't have a time in mind when I feel like I should start limiting nursings, then start cutting down on them. I couldn't tell you if that will start happening next month, or the month after or six months from now. And that makes me uncomfortable. I wish I could just be content with how things are now; be happy that he nursed this long and be comfortable to just go with the flow. But I'm too much of an overthinking planner to be content with that. I want to be able to tell myself that in X months I'll cut down to three nursings, then in X months down to 2, etc. But that would require an end date, and I don't have that. It would require admitting that I want to actively wean, and committing to a course of action that will make it happen - and risking that I'll feel guilty and sad when it's over.

I'm just not sure what to do. So often I wish I could just temporarily shut down the part of my brain that insists on having things planned out; that I could enjoy today for what it is and stop focusing so much on the future. The times I'm really able to do that are when I have a plan. Because once I have an idea of how things will go, I can (somewhat) let it go and wait for said plan to take place.

It's a good thing my husband doesn't read my blog; he'd really realize how insane I am.

(who am I kidding - he knows.)

Supermom

2008-06-03T19:34:00.000-07:00

Last week I was chatting with a couple of my friends from my Bible study group. They're both a bit younger than I am, and are married but no kids yet. They seem to like to talk to me about what my life is like with kids - I think because they're both contemplating having kids but aren't sure if they're ready yet. I'm like a living museum display; they get to peek in and see what it's like from a distance.

In any case, I was talking about my work situation - in that, I work about 10 hours a week, all at home, and squeeze it in when I can, usually in the evenings after the boys are in bed. One of them called me a "total supermom".

I don't think I really want to be a supermom.

I appreciate her compliment, I really do. She's told me before that she thinks my kids are really well behaved, and coming from an outsider, that is nice to hear. D is a sweetheart, and he's also a very energetic 3 1/2 year old boy - and as parents, we're biased. We simultaneously think our kids are the best kids on the planet, and also are hardest on them as far as their behavior. If he acts up a little bit in public, most people would say, "Oh, he's fine!", while I'm ready to haul him to the van for a time out.

In any case, I was thinking - I'd rather not be supermom. If I could drop the work entirely and it not affect our financial situation, I would. Honestly, I don't do it to "stay in the game" or stay connected with some semblance of a career. I do it because we need the money; this makes our lifestyle a lot easier, has helped us pay off some debt and allows us to save more and have some extras. Those are good, necessary things and I'm willing to put in my hours to have them. But if I didn't have to, I wouldn't be working, even just the 10 or so hours a week I do.

The thing is, I'm mommy from the second I get up in the morning until we get them both to bed in the evening. During that time I have to manage to get things done around the house, do a thing or two for myself (like workout), run errands, cook dinner - everything that taking care of my family entails. Once D is in bed for the night, usually between 7-7:30 these days, I have to put in a couple hours working. That doesn't leave me much time at the end of the day when I'm not busy. It's a lot to pack into a day.

I don't mean to complain too much. I'm very grateful for my situation. I'd much rather do this than work full or even part time outside the home and have to juggle childcare and all that. For what it is, this situation is darn near perfect and I'm very glad to have the opportunity to earn money in this way. But, given the choice, I probably wouldn't do it. Someone else can be supermom - I'll settle for just mom anyday.

For those who pray

2008-05-29T19:37:00.000-07:00

If you are the praying type, I'd like you to take a moment to say one for Henry Reitzug.

My husband works for an IT company, and their parent company is owned/run by Henry. He's a former pediatrician who has done mission work abroad in numerous countries. He volunteers for Medical Teams International and has been to places like Afghanistan, several African countries, Cambodia and others. He goes and treats children, free of charge, for several weeks at a time. He feels strongly that it is something God is calling him to do and he faithfully answers that call.

He is one of the most amazing people I have ever met. His faith in God and his integrity in everything he does are so admirable. He puts his money where his mouth is in every way. He is a devout Christian who embodies so much of what those who follow Christ would aspire to be. Not to put him on too high of a pedestal (after all, he's human like you and me), but he's a special person and he does a lot of good both here at home and abroad. He's become like a grandpa to my boys and is a mentor to my husband.

A few days ago, he left for Darfur. It's arguably one of the more dangerous places in the world right now, but he felt that God was calling him to go. If it's like many of his past missions, he'll be treating anywhere from 50-100 children each day while he's gone - and I think he'll be there for about a month. He goes knowing he may not have enough to eat and he's putting his life in danger.

I'm worried for him, so putting this out there and asking all who do to pray for him. Please pray that the Lord will see to his safety while he is gone and bring him home to his family. Please pray that he brings healing to a people who suffer each and every day and that his work might show some of them that there is love in this world; there is still good here.

This isn't the first time he has gone where the Lord has asked him to go, and I pray this won't be the last. Please Lord, keep him safe.

Thank you.