bye bye 2010!

I can hardly believe 2011 starts tomorrow. It’s been 5 ½ months since we lost little baby Wyatt—how did that happen? Sometimes the time just flies; sometimes it drags ass. Looking out at the cold, windy street I can hardly remember how hot the summer was it seems so long ago…but when I was sitting in the apartment in July, sweating and having hot flashes, trying to get comfortable with a big ol’ belly, it surely felt like the days and days of heated misery would never end. Then, when Wyatt died, I thought time would never pass, the new year would never come, my pain would never subside.

But looking back on it, how the hell did I make it this far without him so quickly? I’m awesome! Hubby and I can seriously do anything after this! Isn’t time funny? Not really. I still want that damn time machine for fast-forwarding purposes.

Happy new year to all angel babies and babies-in-waiting alike! (and everybody else too, of course).

Enjoy your midnight booze-fueled-Snooki-ball-dropping party while I am in my fourth hour of sleep!

Hammer Time

Apparently, in Hubby’s family, Christmas Eve is Hammer Time. I’m not talking about MCHammer and his magical pants. I am talking about BoozeFest of the year. And for Hubby’s family, that means a lot. Let’s just say I’ve seen them all mixed-taped on more than one occasion. Since we have previously split Christmas Eve and Christmas between families, spending the Eve with mine, I had only heard of said Christmas Eve debauchery; I just had no idea how intense it really was. A tradition started by the neighbors, whom Hubby’s family visits every December 24^th, involves Aquavit and pickled herring. If you can think of anything grosser, you win. This wonderful family tradition usually entails teetotaling mother-in-law driving everyone the 100 yards home and some points of blacking out by many. In the case of 2010, when our families combined, things got even better.

Combining families can be stressful, and stress can cause, well, drinking, especially in people who a) drink a lot anyway and/or b) often self-medicate with booze because of awkwardness and random bursts of enjoying extreme drunkenness. Plus, it’s the holidays (When else can people drink if not during the holidays? They just spent their year’s paycheck buying crap for otherpeople, they deserve it). If a 12 pack, four bottles of wine, free-flowing scotch and vodka, and two (or more?) rounds of Aquavit among six drinking people is not enough to make us all comfortable together, then I don’t know what would ever work. But I can tell you what happened here, from the eyes of someone who was Fetus-Friendly among boozehounds: The same two people spilled two beers and an enormous glass (aka bowl) of red wine, all on white-ish carpeting; More than two people slurred their speech during the Yankee Swap, which was not even the last event of the night; There was at least one red-faced tackle during said Yankee Swap; This tackler confessed to booting for half an hour upon arriving home, which I find magical; Father- in- law stole at least five fondue meats from my dad, who finally had to say something in order to get any of the evening’s meal (did you know fondue sets are smart and make it so you can tell whose little stick-guy is whose? Well, they do); people actually ate the pickled herring, which obviously is due to being inebriated. This is just a sampling of drunken activities I witnessed. And I have so many weeks before I can participate in this type of activity…That’s okay though, really.

Photo Sesh #1

We got to see the little nugget yesterday, his/her first onscreen appearance. We already have a repeat date for a second photo session in two weeks because it wasn’t cooperating and letting nice ol’ Doc get a good photo and measurements. Rascal! However, it cooperated enough to show a booming heart beat which, as we know, was majorly stressing me out. I’m not too keen on statistics this time around, but statistics do tell me that seeing a heartbeat is majorly good news. Needless to say it lifted a load off my shoulders, although if I’m not exactly trusting what I hear I’m not sure why it helps…

This doctor is the bomb. He already noted that I could see him more often than “normal” pregnant ladies, and it sounds as if he is even going to suggest I come in more often than “normal” without me freaking out and asking him for visits in lieu of a script for anxiety medication. Phew. His PA is also rad. She rules at finding my veins, which is usually a complete puzzle for those blood-taker types. I like watching the needle go into my arm, is that weird?

They also have a magical pee-collector set-up where I get to look at up to two other “samples” just sitting in the bathroom. What would happen if I spit it one? I asked myself this twice already and it’s only just begun!

PS. Here is a crazy Google image of a 6 week fetus. yum!

Morning sickness, anyone?

I was just checking earlier posts to see when, last time around, I complained about feeling like crap. It seems about this time last pregnancy, so I guess I’m right on schedule. I’m not sure if I find that reassuring or terrifying: I kind of hope things will be different this time around if you catch my drift. Anyway, as I noted before, it’s not so much morning sickness as really any-time sickness. For me, that usually means anywhere from 2-6pm (or later) I feel terrible. Not like I’m going to barf (which, as far as most people I know, only happens in the movies and on reality tv) just like I am death. A little sick to the stomach, a little hot or cold, a little wheezy, pretty bitchy, and a little misery. Mix together and enjoy. NOT.

Luckily Hubby lets me moan and complain on the couch without being too suspicious, and even a bit helpful. If it were reversed I swear I would probably call him a wimp and think his complaining was bs. I can’t help it I’m a naysayer. I try, but I can’t.

Here’s what is good for morning sickness: sleeping.

Here’s what is bad for morning sickness: skiing at 10,000 feet in knee deep powder. But I do it anyway. I’m in Colorado for cripes’ sake.

What is cripes anyway? I had to investigate, and I prefer this definition from UrbanDictionary.com (which is amazing): Cripes--an exclamation found somewhere in between the words 'crap' and 'Christ.'

PS. There are a lot of gross comics regarding morning sickness

Wanted: Time Travel Creator

So, I know I’ve discussed Doc Brown and the amazing DeLorean before, but really, can’t someone please invent time travel? What’s so hard about it? You can clone some random person’s dog, if they pay you enough, but you can’t help me skip ahead 30 weeks in my own simple life? That movie’s gotta be at least 25 years old too; there must be some leads we could have been following all this time. It’s a major disappointment that something so many people want just can’t be created. I mean, someone followed through on the hoverboard, right?

I know most people would go back in time to change something, to make their lives better, to save themselves from something stupid or to keep that girl, maybe to experience their senior year of college again, but me, I’d whip off my pregnancy (maybe after going back to senior year), fast-forward, skip ahead, whatever you want to call it. If I had the option to black out until I go into labor I would seriously consider it. Revving a DeLorean to 88mph would be more fun, but I would really look at any option.

If I had a science degree, or understood anything about physics, I would find a lab somewhere and get to work. I guess for now I’ll be making Christmas cards and sleeping as much as possible.

sisters in law and show and tells

I’ve been thinking about when I will tell people about this pregnancy. I suppose I could call it a baby…but I just called it a pregnancy instead so, hmm. No need to overly psychoanalyze that one. Anyway, I’m definitely closed until I see the heartbeat, and that’s not for a god forsaken 12 more days (hopefully!). Parents and brothers can find out then. Last time we told people around 11 weeks after we had seen the first pictures; it was too exciting to hold in! This time, I’m torn between sharing early so we can all be happy while it lasts and keeping it completely secret until someone just calls me out on wearing maternity pants so I don’t have to talk about it. Hubby wants to tell his boss ASAP to make him feel better about having his own baby, but I’m still going to need to be convinced on that one. I don’t see why he can’t wait a while like everybody else, and I don’t think we need to worry about making him feel any better. (Hubby’s so much nicer than I am). Boss’s already sending us ultrasound photos (no joke) and I don’t need him any more shary-shary than that.

Mostly I figure I don’t need to tell people until they’re going to find out just by looking at me. And that’s how sister-in-law (SIL) found out yesterday. Cripes, I’m not even 6 weeks “along!”I’m not sure if she was just really curious and pushed the subject or if she actually thought I was pregnant but she certainly weasled it out of me. Here’s how it went: SIL is two years older than me and dying to have a baby. Problem is, she’s in school and has to convince her husband. With graduation a mere 6 months away she’s got her eyes on the prize and literally talks about making babies all the time. Not in front of the boys, just with me. And, she admitted, with one other friend. She wants to try some crazy natural family planning method, which the

other friend uses, but I am trying to convince her to stay on birth control because there’s just no telling that one little slip won’t make a baby. I don’t think she would be too sad about an accident, but that’s not the point. The point is she started asking me about a thermometer in the bathroom and if I was using it for basal body temperature taking, which has to do with charting ovulation, etc., etc. Then she talked about missing Wyatt for Christmas, her natural-family-planning friend’s miscarriage, how she can’t wait to make a baby, and on and on about charting fertility, blah, blah, blah. I pretty much blacked out wiping the counters down so many times out of nervousness. I realized after I washed my hands the sixth time that my face felt beet red and I couldn’t turn around without telling her the truth. So I did. And I got the biggest hug ever and some tears of happiness. She claims we had a sparkle in our eyes, but it was probably gas on my part. I just hope I don’t have to tell anyone else until we get some good news from that scientific wonder we call ultrasound.

Still there, phew

So far, every morning I go pee and simultaneously check for any signs of blood. Morbid, right? But I can’t help it. Every little twingy cramp, every time I feel “off,” every time I read something scary, my first wonder is if I’m not pregnant anymore. So many pregnancies end in miscarriage, and then, as we’ve learned, so many end after that, I just can’t get in into my head that this is real yet. I want to believe, and I even made Hubby buy me some baby stuff for Christmas (although it was really just this week and I won’t be putting it under the tree), but it’s hard to be convinced of it yet. I suppose that’s normal for someone who’s been burned like me, so I guess I don’t feel badly about it, but still, it stinks. I almost chickened out of blogging my good news for fear of jinxing myself. I’m really not even superstitious*.

You know what though? It’s exciting, and I feel like people will be psyched to hear the news (although I might just wait until the birth announcement to tell people so there’s no chance I’ll have to “untell” because man did was that terrible). They want us to be happy, and they know we want a baby, so they probably assume a new baby will make us happy. Transitive property and all. I just hope they don’t forget this one is Baby #2 and we all still need extra hugs for Baby #1, that little nugget Wyatt. I hope my uterus is one sticky, nutritious bitch this time!

*In my last post I had to use a different pregnancy test image from before, just in case. So I guess I am superstitious. Whatever.

High fives, round two

Hubby has been walking around like a peacock in heat. I don’t know zoology, but I imagine that is when they get all cocky and big and fluff up their feathers and think they are amazing like some annoying high school quarterback who just won the game in a young adult-type movie. This—Hubby’s hubris, not the movie—is because I’m up the duff. I like that saying. It sounds British, but I may have heard Juno say it. Not sure. Either way, Hubby is peacocking around because he believes it is his incredibleness that has made this embryo. I tried to convince him it was partly my doing but he’s pretty convinced he has super sperm. Yeah, we’ll see if something comes out healthy in several months. At that point I will lay praise on dear old Hubs. For now, a second round of high fives to my womb please.
And lots of happy thoughts and positive energy for Wyatt's sibling to get all the way out here!