Thursday, April 30, 2009

Feelings

I’m having a rough day today. I spent my hour long commute fighting off tears and now that I’m at the office I’m continuing my reign of crazy. Just to illustrate, there are window washers here and I started crying when they came in to wash the windows in my office because my desk is such a mess that they couldn’t even get to the windows to wash them. These gentlemen didn’t even speak English and couldn’t explain to them why I was upset. I suppose that even if they did speak English it would be difficult to explain the crazy to them.

If only I was showing already so folks would sort of give me a break, maybe.

I don’t even know what’s wrong, except everything. Last night I couldn’t sleep because our dog is on antibiotics and they make his stomach upset and he puked on the bed. Brett got upset and there was some stress and then I was AWAKE with the stress. I am very sensitive to the STRESS of every living being in our house. Apparently Bear now bit open his scab on his rear end wound and bled all over the other blanket that he didn’t puke on. I feel so sorry for him, and also STRESSED because I know it upsets Brett and that makes me anxious. Also, there is only so much laundry a family can tolerate.

I am crazy.

Brett called this morning and we had a chat about aforementioned dog issues and I couldn’t even tell him anything honest, so I had to email him. I had to email my own husband the truth about my STRESS and propensity to cry and not sleep. I just couldn’t do it live and in person because I was afraid that he would just get annoyed with me or exacerbated or just wouldn’t care. My husband is a very kind man, so that would probably not be the response, but this is the anxiety level I’m talking about.

I had to email my own husband with a statement of feelings. What?

Then again, we do sometimes have to write things down, even when I’m not hormonally crazy because we both have a hard time getting our words out sometimes.

I’m just feeling really raw and also swollen as my finger fat is puffing out above my wedding ring and my face is now the size of an overripe pumpkin.

This is why I like reading about babies and watching “A Baby Story” on TLC. It reminds me of why my body is doing this and why my heart is 10 sizes too big and all together too sensitive.

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

The Dictator

I know, I've been all sorts of dead to the Internet world for months, and now I'm back with a vengance. But we were keeping this whole baby thing very very quiet, and now we're allowed to talk about it, so I'm alive with the sound of my own typing.

Here's the thing, I love that I'm pregnant. Love it! I have never been more happy about anything in my whole life. However, I am physically miserable. Every day I feel like crap and, I didn't know it was possible, but I hate my body more than ever and I'm not even showing yet. Thus, it is remarkable that I'm still all sunshine and flowers. I must really want this kid.

I have taken to calling the fetus (it's a fetus now, according to "What to Expect") "The Dictator." It dictates things after all, from what I eat to the fact that I now nap on a regular basis, which is completely NOT something I would normally do.

Maybe the name will change over the course of the pregnancy, but right now it's The Dictator.

Brett has been great, though he's been sick with one thing after another himself, so he's not exactly cheerful these days. Poor guy. Also, with both of us not feeling tip-top, the house is looking like a project for that dude on Oprah that clears out clutter. It's bad. However, we did break down and contract a fence installation for the back yard. This was HUGE because Brett prefers to do things himself, but with all the projects we have going on and the fact that we're both struggling, paying for the work seemed the prudent thing to do.

BORING.

The dogs have been exciting in a very unfortunate way. Millie, the little poodle, was diagnosed with and underdeveloped vulva in the summer of 2007. Some lady dogs have this problem, and it causes incontinence when she sleeps. We had it under control with daily estrogen supplements, until we went to Texas in March and boarded the dogs at the vet. Ever since then she's had almost nightly accidents. We took her back to the vet and they did an exam and x-ray and found nothing. We've basically decided that it's like some sort of PTSD as a result of us leaving her. She is nothing if not incredibly sensitive and very very attached to her humans. Thus, we are trying to cure her of it like it's a behavioral problem and not a physical problem, because apparently that's what it is. She now has to wear this little denim diaper to bed, and when I get up to pee for the fourth time in a single night I will take her outside. So far so good, but odds are that just by writing this I am jinxing us.

Bear, our pomeranian, was not to be outdone. Last Thursday, I was at the office when Brett called to indicate that Bear had "a problem." I was about to leave early because I had come down with a cold and on top of the nausea it was just too much to take. When I got home I saw that Bear had a bloody rear end. Cue freak out and call to the vet. They couldn't get him in for a few hours, so I sat with him wrapped in a towel on the couch. Poor little guy. When the vet finally did get him in they took one look at him and said that he had an abscessed anal gland. Yummy! A week later, he's still on the mend with a very nasty looking butt wound and some high test pain killers and antibiotics.

We love them anyway. It's all good training.

Brett's got exams next week, and eyes so blood shot he looks like he's permanently stoned. I will be very happy when next Thursday comes and he is done with his last exam and we have our final doctor's appointment of the first trimester and hopefully we will hear a strong and healthy heart beat.

The Dictator needs some sort of carbohydrate now. Ta ta.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

great with child, pea in the pod, bun in the oven, pregos, what have you . . .

I am a little over 10 weeks pregnant. It’s pretty much awesome except for the parts that suck, like the nausea, HUGE hurty boobs, needing to pee all the time, and lack of ability to stay awake for more than 2 hours at a time. I’m like a text book case of first trimester symptoms. I’m not complaining at all though, it’s so exciting and I can’t believe that we’ll be parents in a few short months.

The way I found out was kind of stupid. I mean, I took a pee test on March 19th, before work. I get up really really early, like 4:30am early, so when I got a positive result I was a little befuddled. It’s hard to really understand anything at 4:30am, so wrapping my head around a positive pregnancy test was a little much. I left for work without even telling Brett, mostly because I wasn’t convinced that it truly was positive. I mean, the line was definitely there, but it seemed a little “light,” so I was skeptical.

Luckily there is a Walgreens but feet from my office, so once I got to work I bought three more tests. When all of them came up positive, I was mostly convinced and called Brett and told him that I had a positive test. I didn’t tell him I had 4 positive tests, because, you know, that would be crazy. I then called the doc and got an appointment that afternoon.

Brett met me at the doc after work and we had our first ultrasound. I know that’s not normal operating procedure, but I hadn’t had a period since October because of the Lupron treatment, so it was necessary to determine how far along I was. The ultrasound showed a little block dot in a white blob. I was definitely pregnant with something, even if it wasn’t really looking much human yet. They determined I was due on November 24th and sent me off for my blood tests.

About two weeks later I started getting nauseous and so tired. I could nap for three hours in the afternoon, and then still go to bed at 9pm and sleep a full 8 hours. Brett was sort of amazed, but I kept reminding him that I’m growing a person, and that his physical part is over, so he should let me nap.

The nausea has been by far the worst. It’s unrelenting on some days, and then gone on some other days. I thought I was out of the woods last week, as I felt no nausea for about 4 days straight. But then it came back on Saturday night and hasn’t really let up since. I’m just hoping that it goes away by week 13 so that I can enjoy the second trimester.

I haven’t gained any weight yet, thank goodness, because I’m not really supposed to as I’m pretty well padded to begin with. I have gained some girth in the boob area, which is extremely frightening because that’s already where I carry most of my weight to begin with. It’s horrifying actually. I already told Brett that after we’re done with babies, I am immediately getting a reduction. I don’t care about cost. I am so over these things.

We’ve since had two more ultrsounds. The last one actually looked like a baby, which was so awesome. I get all teary every time and we have print outs of the ultrasound pictures on our fridge. It’s so cool. Seriously.

We did watch a Nova episode about the “miracle of birth” or somesuch. I did fine until the part where the lady actually gave birth and they showed it. All I said was, “I am not doing that.” I know, I will do it, but oh my god, why does it have to be so difficult. I mean, I get that my pelvis has to be small in order for me to walk upright, but it seems like nature should have done a little better job of accommodating us womens and our childbirthin’ needs. I’m just glad I live now and live in a first world country. I salute all women who do it the “natural way,” but I will hopefully be receiving drugs and any sort of ameliorative care the hospital wants to offer. I am no hero.