Week 32, day 5

Awwwwwwwwwwww.

One of my colleagues called yesterday sounding very serious about a meeting we needed to have at 9am this morning. I said OK and recorded it in my calendar. This morning, Peg came by trailed by six or seven other co-workers, and carrying a huge gift bag. I called Barry, who came over from his office, and we opened the bag together. It contained a hand-knited afghan in bright colors that they made for us. Well, for the baby, but for now I’ll use it to keep myself warm in the evening. The card was signed by each of the givers in the color of the squares that they created. It’s really beautiful. Photographs were taken, so I’ll try to post one here as soon as I can.

Plus they brought cookies. Homemade cookies. Homemade chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. At 9 in the morning. Mmmmmm.

Week 32, day 4

Hmmmm  . . . what’s new?

We went to the midwife yesterday for our monthly (now bi-weekly) hour-long appointment. I feel so well cared for – when I went to the doctor (at the beginning before selecting a midwife) I spent an hour in the waiting room and 10 minutes in the exam room with a paper gown on – afterwards I cried from sheer frustration at feeling like a piece of livestock. What a difference.  Anyhow. Blood iron levels are good. Urine does not contain protein or glucose. Blood pressure good. Weight gain right on target (3 pounds this month). And, apparently panic attacks and night terrors are a common problem for pregnant women as hormone levels shift.  So much for my deep psychological theories, I just got a norepinephrine dump.

In other news, I’m sleeping on the couch now (I sleep better, am comfier, and don’t wake Barry up). The cute thing is that Raisin is sleeping downstairs with me. Which is odd – I’d have expected her to take advantage of my apparent move down a rung in status and try for a spot on the bed next to The Daddy. I wonder if she’s guarding me or something.

We’ve been discussing some of the bigger baby decisions that we’ll be asked about soon after birth. We’ve decided against circumcision, as neither of us want to put our infant through that kind of trauma. The videos are pretty horrific, though I do recognize that they promote an agenda. Most of the world doesn’t do it, and its getting less prevalent in the U.S. also.

We’re undecided about vaccinations, but we don’t have to decide immediately. I believe that medical science has some great stuff to offer, but I’m not sure that I agree with tying up a baby’s immune system against illnesses they will likely never come in contact with and often aren’t life threatening anyhow. Especially given the crud in the mass-produced vaccines (I am aware that mercury compounds are no longer used, though there are still some older bottles sitting on doctor’s office shelves). Some parents wait for a year or two (which allows the baby to form their own immune system more fully), or wait until the child goes into day-care or school. Others choose only to vaccinate against those diseases that are life-threatening. So it’s not an all or nothing decision and doesn’t have to be made on short notice.

I’ve been given the “Happiest Baby on the Block” video, which I think we’ll watch this weekend. Woo hoo – break out the popcorn, baby, it’s movie night!

And did I mention the adorable little outfits we’ve been collecting (mostly hand-me-downs from friends and a few little new things friends have sent)? I feel so goofy, as I am just not this kind of a woman, but: I totally can’t wait to dress my baby up in a little striped pants suit with a tiny fuzzy blue sweater and eensy weensy socks and a sweet little pointy-on-top hat.

Week 32, day 3

Gerry: Wow! Another good sleep night – 9.5 hours!

Bob: True, but remember that Ellie gets up three or four times each night. And last night she got hungry at 3am and made herself peanut butter toast with a glass of milk.

Gerry: Yes Bob, but Ellie seems well rested and ready for the day! How’s that pubic symphesis injury we’ve been hearing about?

Bob: Well, Gerry, Ellie’s coach tells us that it’s variable. Most days she feels pretty good, but sometimes it flares up. So long as she’s able to walk around, she’s ok. It’s the days when she’s stuck at home that it affects her morale a bit.

Gerry: And how is that morale, Bob? I hear that she had a couple of incidents this week, but nothing major.

Bob: That’s right, Gerry. She’s kept a good attitude most of the time, but once in awhile she has a melt-down. That’s normal for such a long game, Gerry, and now that she’s getting more sleep, her coach expects big improvements.

Gerry: That’s great, Bob! Well, we’ll keep the fans posted.

Is it me, or is baby stuff confusing? First, there’s the outfits. Adorable. And basically the same as ours. But babies grow quickly, so they need 36 versions of each thing. Then there are the various accoutrements, some of which I don’t even know the names of. The matts for the floor, the swings and bouncy chairs, the car seats and strollers and places to sit the baby that aren’t walkers but look like pre-walkers. Baby carriers that are comprised of one 56-foot length of cloth. Toys (enough said). Feeding implements. Breast pumps. And that’s just a start.

I have to keep in mind that this is a multi-billion dollar industry with a huge marketing arm. Only some of this stuff is really necessary or useful. But which stuff? And how to use it all? G’lord!  Of course there are plenty of information gathering mechanisms available to me. And I’m using them. Sort of. Mostly I’m just winging it. I figure we’ll get the basics and see what we need from there.

Week 32, day 2

I’ve spoken to two women so far who have also had panic attacks in their 3rd trimester. One of whom has had two babies at home. That’s very comforting.

In lighter news, sometimes I imagine that I have announcers narrating my day. Like, football announcers. I call them Bob and Gerry. Here’s a typical exerpt from this morning.

Bob: So, Gerry, it appears that Ellie has gotten off to a good start this morning with 10 hours of sleep!

Gerry: Yeah, Bob, that’s great! Plus, she only got up to pee three times last night!

Bob: Yup, it seems that the water before 5pm plan is working out well. Unfortunately, we’re told that the last two hours of sleep were spent dreaming about her work org chart. That can’t be restful!

Gerry:  True Bob, we’ll just have to see how it goes.

etc. I amuse myself.

Week 32, day 1

I had a nice morning. I woke up feeling good and had coffee with B, then went to the gym, then to church with a friend, then went baby shower shopping. I love baby shower shopping. I bought the cutest tiny outfits for my friend’s baby (6-month and 12-month sized sleepers, one with yellow stripes and one with green dinosaurs) and a few other little necessaries. Now Raisin and I are hanging out in the sunny study.

I can’t do what I’m used to at the gym, but I can still get some light exercise, it still feels good to move a little, and I think it’s good for me to keep up the habit. And I’ve really missed going to church. The structure of having a time just to be contemplative and in community, and to let go of the worries of the rest of the week.

So, back to wrapping up my thoughts from yesterday. I should correct something first, though. I am not afraid of dying in childbirth, but I think that every mother worries in the back of her mind about something happening to the baby. I don’t believe that I’m putting him at risk with my choices, but it’s such a huge responsibility. So of course I worry.

As to the panic attack (for lack of a better phrase) that woke me up the night before last. I don’t think it’s directly about fear of birthing a child. Though it could get in the way of doing so, and I’ll discuss it with my midwife.

My theory is that the human psyche is incredibly smart. I believe that I live with this fear all of the time, but that of course I could not function in terror. So my psyche gives me a thousand ways to distract myself from feeling it. Sometimes it’s being busy. Sometimes, due to life changes or stressors, it comes closer to the surface and the fear has to be blanketed by something more powerful, which can look like my recent dolldrums.

Why do I believe that? I don’t know. Only that it occured to me as I lay in bed trying to calm down.

So, what’s to be so afraid of? I’m not so sure. The memory that came to me upon waking the 2nd time was of being about 3 years old.

I was in a neighbor’s yard playing with some other kids on a kiddy slide. One of the tiny plastic ones. I pushed a younger child down the slide and she started to cry. I don’t remember if she fell, if I pushed her too hard, or if she was just surprised. I am pretty sure that I had no intention to hurt or scare the girl, because I remember being worried about her when she cried and wanting to comfort her.

Her dad came running, yelling. In my memory, he was huge and red-bearded. He pushed me up against a wall and yelled in my face about how did I like being pushed. I remember being too scared to talk, much less to defend myself. I don’t remember telling anybody about it.

As an adult, I don’t feel fear when I think back on this memory. I don’t feel much at all except curious about the missing parts of the memory and that I would be very angry were I to catch anybody treating my child that way. I can’t imagine that it would traumatize me for life, though it was no doubt upsetting.

That’s the memory that came back to me, but I see it as a branch, and not the root of the issue. What could be the root? It could be part of a family systemic problem – the bible speaks about the sins of the fathers, which I see as meaning that parents can pass along anxiety and shame and other trauma without a clear and direct memory of the reason. And I certainly do come from an anxious family.

It could be the human condition – that without some intervention, we all carry a terror around from birth, due to our uniquely human awareness of our own mortality.

It could be that the movie I saw had some credence, and I’m reliving my own birth trauma. Which would also explain the percolating forth of some memories of traumas of childhood and my recend childish mood.

Maybe it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that I am no longer in the dolldrums and that I need to figure out how to deal with these feelings of panic (if they even return) before attempting to give birth without narcotics.

Week 31, day 7

OK, am back.

This last month I’ve been sorta like regressed into some kind of a 6-year-old ‘nobody loves me everybody hates me might as well eat worms’ stage. Now, of course I was aware the whole time that I was being unreasonable and selfish and ungrateful and mean, but I could not seem to help myself from indulging in my own miserable murk, pushing aside any support, and basically creating an un-fun environment for myself and those in my near vicinity. Not all of the time – I have had some good times in the last month – it’s never all or nothing. But much of the time.

I’ve also been veryveryveryvery tired and, as I’ve discussed, physically less able than usual. Which is hard for me, because I am not one to sit still much. It bums me out to be worn down by doing one load of laundry and baking a batch of brownies, especially with so much to do in preparation for the little one. But still, many women have it much more difficult pregnancies than I am having.

Last night I went to bed as usual. Around 3am I had a dream that I was in labor, but the baby hadn’t turned. I was squatting with my hands on the edge of the living room easy chair, trying to give the baby room to turn. Then I woke up and I was scared. I couldn’t breathe deeply and my heart was pounding.  I felt like I could die – not as if I was having symptoms of impending death – but that I was looking at my own death.

I woke Bear up and told him I was scared and that I didn’t feel able to have a baby at home if that was how it would feel. I am not prepared for terror. He talked to me and held me for a bit and we went back to sleep. I woke up again later feeling the same way, but not as bad. The baby kicked a lot the whole time – maybe he got a jolt of my adreneline, I don’t know.

I didn’t make my decisions about this birth lightly or purely based on emotion. I’ve done a lot of research on birth. There are not all that many true emergencies in the process. Most things that can go wrong allow plenty of time for a trip to a hospital. While it is true that death rates have gone way down since the time when home births were the norm, much of that can be attributed to better nutrition and the available of medications such as antibiotics. I am not afraid that I will die giving birth. I am not afraid of the baby dying. I’m not even all that scared of pain – I know that I can go to a hospital if I can’t take it. I have a healthy respect for the process, and I will go to a hospital if there is a need. But I don’t think that fear of giving birth is what the dream was about.

Anyhow, Barry needs the computer, so I’ll tie this all together tomorrow.  Goodnight, moon.

Intermission

I’m going to take a break from writing here.

My alter ego (or one of them, anyhow) is needing a lot of attention lately, and the thing about alter egos is that they can be both very intimate and rather dreary. Just went back to look over my posts of late, and noted that they do not reveal the aspects of myself that I want to broadcast widely. Yet obviously those aspects are what need attention right now.

So, to repeat myself, I’m taking a break from posting. My writing will be done on paper until I have something more interesting to say.

Week 31, day 2

Apparently my snoring has worsened to the point where ear plugs (of the sort that are designed to protect one’s ears from the noise of firearm discharge) don’t work. Poor Bear went down and slept on the couch last night. I’ve purchased some of those nose strips to see if they help. I snored once in awhile before getting pregnant, but nothing like this.

I can’t tell if my tumor is getting bigger or if it is just more prominent because it’s being pushed out by the baby. It’s huge. And I don’t like it. I don’t care if I’m supposed to have a good attitude, I don’t like it. It’s creepy. I told Barry that if they have to do a C-section, make them take it out. After the pregnancy, I hope I can convince a doctor that it’s causing my digestive issues (which I now suspect it has in the past) so that I can have it removed (they don’t like to remove them, because they are benign and surgery can have complications, but I just want it out).

Pubic symphesis issues have calmed down the past few days. I’m having some sciatica, but no major pain in my pelvis. I just need to keep it from flaring up and I should be OK.

Week 31, day 1

Today we have birthing class again. It’s a good group of people. I made chocolate chip banana oatmeal muffins to take. I just had one for breakfast. Yum.

Some movements are very painful all the time, so I try not to do them – like driving and standing on one foot to put on pants (one leg moving out of sync, I guess). But for other stuff, like getting up from sitting and just walking around, I feel ok one day and like a cripple the next.

Yesterday I felt ok, so I did some cooking (muffins, a vat of spaghetti sauce, a huge potato/bacon/leek fritata) and housekeeping (the floors were filthy, I tell you). It feels great to have a clean(er) home and food to freeze. By the end of the day, though, I felt achey all over, especially my feet and legs. I feel quite a bit better after 8 hours of sleep (with only 3 trips to the potty, thank you).

In other news, Raisy got her cast off, which is big news for two reasons. One, it means she’s on the road to health. And two, she got a BATH yesterday, which is huge. She was a stinky puppy.

Today we have birth class. We went last night, too. It’s a great group of people and I’m excited to learn. I think that Bear is gaining confidence in providing support for my efforts.

Week 30, day 6

Last night Barry and I were both feeling a little down, and the idea of cooking dinner didn’t thrill either of us. The aches and pains in both of our bodies have taken their toll on our emotional fortitude and there’s just so much to do do do.

Barry looked at me and said “I know what the problem is. We’re operating at a severe carne asada deficit.” I took a look at our food budget and decided that we could afford Mexican food. At a sit-down restaurant, even! So we went out and had chips and salsa and hot carrots and huge platters of carne asada, cheese enchilladas, beans, rice, and corn tortillas. Barry had a margarita, of which I had a sip (mmmmmmmm).

Now, I don’t normally think that food is a healthy fix for the daily wear and tear of life, but once in awhile a good meal is just what the doctor ordered. We had both been craving red meat and I think we were both physically depleted, because after our meal we felt nourished and ready for a good sleep. Which we proceeded to get about an hour after arriving home.

On the way home, Barry looked at me and said “Well, being pregnant has its benefits. Your pelvis might hurt and you may feel bulky and tired, but you can eat like a longshoreman and not get fat!” It’s true – I appear to be putting all the extra right into this baby, who is just now kicking me for more: “Hey! How about a little service in here!”

So, I must go eat breakfast.