Weird Science

In case you were wondering, a smoke alarm that begins loudly demanding new batteries at 3 a.m. can actually wake up the fetus that you thought might have been protected by your comforter, sheets, body fat, and placenta.

In addition, I think it's delightful that other women mention the gentle intra-womb flutterings of their babies. Hortense's movements are more reminiscent of Homey the Clown, swinging a loaded sock around my uterus. Apparently, we most definitely do not play that.

To Sleep, Perchance to Freak the Hell Out

People have been asking me if I'm putting "the nursery" together for Hortense. I have to restrain myself from having some sort of panic attack, because I'm still trying to sell my immaculate, practically-brand-new, $12,000-below-tax-value townhouse, which has been stripped of all my personal pictures and objects and staged out the wazoo since March, when I first put it up for sale. So - I keep thinking about how I can't buy any baby furniture until I know whether I'll still be living in this place in January. I mean, I can - but doing so means that I have to move out the furniture that's currently in my second bedroom and figure out where to store it. And on top of that, there's the double panic of knowing that if I don't sell soon, I won't sell it for two more years, because I'll be damned if I clean and stage a house daily while toting around a newborn.

But on top of all this, there's the triple, intense, cherry-on-top panic of simply buying the accoutrements necessary to PUT THE BABY TO BED SAFELY. Have you noticed this? Am I more sensitive to this as a recovering-ish infertile, or is sleeping now the most dangerous, perilous, fraught activity a baby can participate in? I'm developing a serious rage that threatens to put me squarely in tinfoil-hat territory.

First off, I completely accept the findings and conclusions of the whole "Back to Sleep" businesses. I GET IT. I can't even buy a flipping sleep sack without that little mantra on it. Obviously, I'm going to put my child to sleep on her back, if that's what reduces the risk of SIDS. Agreed. Let's shake. However. What if she spits up in the night? What if she chokes on said spit-up? Why is this legitimate fear not addressed by the "Back to Sleep" information? All they give us is "healthy babies won't choke on vomit." Really? That's not terribly reassuring.

I don't like that the medical organizations downplay the possibility that one might feel anxiety about this proposition, and sometimes I feel like they're saying, "well, we've covered our asses with Back to Sleep. If you don't burp your kid well enough and she chokes to death in her sleep on vomit, you have no one to blame but yourself for being a crap burper." And they say that SIDS isn't caused by vomiting...I say, okay, semantics, then. Vomiting and choking would cause death by vomiting and choking. But the end result is the same, no?

So then you want to buy a sleep positioner that will incline the baby's head a bit to try and rectify that problem, but the consumer orgs are iffy on those, because if there are foamy parts, the child could end up pressed against one and suffocate, much like crib bumpers, which are apparently death traps as well. As are loose sleepers. As are tight sleepers, though, also, because the baby can't be overheated. Or rebreathe exhaled carbon dioxide into its sleeves. And you should keep a steady stream of fresh air flowing over them. And they should be sleeping in your room, but in a bare, safe crib, away from a window. There's a lot of opportunity for you to screw this up. Between the medical organizations and the consumer-products ones, some days, it seems like every baby product for sale is marketed as "Buy This Or: Death!!"And, BTW, if you really, really, really want your baby not to die of SIDS, you'll breast-feed until you're taking the training wheels off her bike.

I'm thinking I'll hire two eunuchs/vestal virgins to stand in Hortense's bedroom. One to hold her aloft in the very center of the room all night - no loose blankets, fuzzy crib positioners, or inadvertent tummy-sleeping allowed. The other will lightly fan exhaled CO2 away from her mouth and make sure she is adequately cool, yet never cold. Otherwise, I doubt I'll ever get any sleep.

But, you know, I have to remember not to stress out too much about this, because ya know - stress during pregnancy is bad for the baby. Everyone says so.

Sunrise, Sunset

So, generally my days begin as follows: wake up around 7-ish; realize that I'm on my back; freak out over the fact that I went to bed on my side, wrapped around a body pillow that's too big to fit under the covers with me; then bemoan my sore back and rise from bed. This morning, I threw in a bellow of obscenity as a calf cramp crippled me.

I put on one of a few outfits that will fit me - probably a maternity top that obscures the fact that I'm wearing a pre-preg skirt, or maybe those maternity gauchos that make me look like a big fat pirate. Every day, I cringe as I see myself from the side and wish that someone would ask if I'm pregnant, instead of just assuming that I'm sporting a full, taut, belly that grows weekly. Every day = silence. I know the rule...never ask a woman if she's pregnant unless you can literally see the child crowning. But still.

I eat a high-fiber bar around 7-8 a.m., and wonder if today will be the day that I'll poop.

I drive to campus, park the car, and haul myself up the hill to class, complete with calf/thigh/ass cramps, side stitches, etc. As I reach my first class, I'm usually embarrassingly out of breath, since I haven't yet modulated my walking speed to accommodate my new heft.

At about 10:30, I feel hungry again, and Hortense is treating me to some jarring kicking and pounding. Between my first and second classes, I inhale a granola bar, or some peanut butter crackers.

Around 12:30, I have the peanut butter and jelly sandwich that's being squished in my bag. Sometimes, I eat this during my 3-hour class, like a preschooler.

I spend 3-4 hours at work on campus, three days a week. Unfortunately, all of the stool/chairs available for me to sit on are oddly tall, which means I have to fling my bulk upwards and backwards and hope to land at the right place on the stoolairs. Usually, right after I manage to get myself settled (when I get myself on the chair, I then have to pull up my maternity pants in the back and my underpants in the front), someone needs something, and I have to slide off again.

Around 4:30, I become oddly delirious with hunger, and Hortense pummels me.

I get home at 5-6, lie on the couch, and whimper until my husband makes me dinner. I complain about the teeny hairs that are now growing on my stomach and the lack of flattering pregnancy jeans in my life. I choke on my own spit once every 2 or 3 weeks, which is terrifying.

So that's essentially the life of a big fat pregnant grad student. With any luck, it will continue this way, with minimal drama, for the next 18 weeks. Last week, I asked my OB, "Are there things I should be doing at this point in the pregnancy? Not doing?" Her response: "Don't drink, don't smoke crack, and try not to get punched in the gut."

That's all??? I am never reading another baby book AGAIN.

Anatomy 101

Me: "You know how boobs and nipples and whatnot are supposed to get bigger with pregnancy?"

Husband: "Yeah."

Me: "Well, all this time, I've been looking at the big, circular part of my nipple to see if it was getting bigger or darker and it's not."

Husband: "That's not your nipple." 

Me: "But I noticed these little sticky-out bits in the middle..."

Husband: "You mean your nipples."

Me: "Semantics.  But anyways, those parts are getting bigger, just like the books said." 

Husband: "So, essentially, you're telling me that at the age of 29, you have at last discovered your own nipples."

In Which Napoleon Becomes Hortense

Crap salad, I've been lazy.

In my defense, 

1. I've just started grad school, which involved running all over campus, trolling for part-time jobs.

2. My house has been on the market for six months, and I've been pricing kitchen overhauls to see if the investment is worthwhile.

3. I dunno. Other stuff.

No major life changes while trying to get pregnant? That's for the weak.

So the big news is that I had the 18-week ultrasound and learned that Napoleon is more of a Napoleonette. Which is a big surprise, given that I was nearly convinced it was a boy. On the other hand, my mother was convinced it was a boy, and she's always, always wrong at gender-guessing. So that should have been a clue. 

I guess the obvious thing  would be to rename Napoleon Josephine, but that's a name that I could conceivably give to a child someday (husband's grandmother's name), and so it's not nearly as amusing as Hortense. 

Other exciting ultrasound news - I seem to have developed a succenturiate placental lobe, which they claim poses no threat to Hortense (although she seems to be rather snug between those two big lumps of placenta, and I wish she had a bit more room to flail around in) but which will have to be extracted from me after delivery, so as to keep me from hemorrhaging. My mother describes the manual extraction of leftover placenta as "worse than 36 hours of labor" and "oh, God, I wanted to die." So, that's exciting. But - if this is the only complication I encounter between now and January 27th, I'll probably be a pretty lucky girl.   

Off to breakfast - my insane husband is drafting a document in which I release him from responsibility for any future gestational diabetes diagnosis, and aver that I am eating the Krispy Kreme he brought me of my own volition. 

Grandparent Names that are Currently Being Discussed

- Goose and Maverick.

- Mamie and Ike.

- Nub and Digger.

- Biggie and Puffy.

- Captain and Tenille. 

Not currently in the running: Meemaw, Peepaw, Glamma, Granny, "Big" anything, or Gogie. Or, sadly, Toot. 

Words that are Very Unsexy, but in All Fairness, Were Never Intended to Be Sexy

1. Colostrum.

There are women, on this message board that I read from time to time, who say that milky goo has, at one time or another, flown out of their boobs when sneezing, say, or squeezing a nipple. This was shocking to me. When I cough and sneeze, my boobs stay completely sealed. I even tried to squeeze a nipple, to see what would happen (not something I do every day, let's just say). Nothing. 

On one hand, it's always a relief not to inadvertently milk yourself. On the other, I don't want to fall behind developmentally. Hmm.

Good night, then. Off to scrutinize my boobs. 

To Everything There is a Season

I've taken a brief blogging hiatus, as I've been out of town attending my grandfather's funeral, an event that serves as a sobering reminder that everyone in the family tree is about to climb up a branch. The grandparents, as I knew them, are all gone, and the parents are ready to take their places. That, naturally, means that at some point very soon, I will be moving from the ranks of child (metaphorical: clearly a grown-ass married woman with a mortgage is not a child) to parent. If I step directly into my mother's footsteps, I'm looking at years of child-raising followed, possibly, by years of parent-caretaking.  Serious stuff. 

Is it scary? Yeah, a little. Do I feel like a wussbag for making this transition at 29, instead of, say, building a log cabin with my bare hands and raising six children and some cows and chopping cotton all day by age 19 or so? Again - yeah, a tad. 

So, loins must be girded and all that. I do wish my grandparents had gotten to meet the kid, though. 

Sensitive Musings

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I want a turkey sandwich.

I have told my husband that come January 27th, he needs to be prepared to run to the Subway outpost in our hospital and hook me up with a six-inch turkey sub with lettuce, tomato, cheese, pickles, and copious amounts of oil and vinegar, possibly on my way out of the delivery room. 

What Not to Wear

I have seen the enemy, and she is a pair of maternity jeans. Yesterday, I went with my mother and aunt to look for maternity clothes. Truly, the stash I came home with is not bad-looking and quite reasonably priced (big ups to JC Penney and Old Navy), but let me tell you - if this baby's a girl, I may end up naming her Polly Esther, because that is apparently the official fabric sponsor (TM) of gestation. I will be rocking polyester pants (with giant stretchy belly band) and polyester tops soon...and for many months, apparently. 

Of course, since I was with two pregnancy veterans, I got to hear ALLLLLLL about how huge I was going to be, how huge I would stay afterwards, how I should probably go ahead and buy everything in the biggest size possible because I would surely need it...you get the picture. I freely admit that prior to getting knocked up, I was size 10 on top and 12 on the bottom. So I'm not the sveltest svelte that ever svelted, but I don't think I'm quite at the level of having my own show on TLC. 

I had thought I'd get some stuff to get me from here deep into trimester 2, rather than immediately buying the roomiest stuff and waiting to grow into it. On the spectrum of pregnant clothes, though, these two women see no middle ground between "not quite being able to button my jeans" and "Welcome to Caftan City." They urged me to consider wearing stretchy black pants and a black shirt that reaches to my knees for starting school in the fall. (When I am carrying a visible lump of child in the front, I'm sure the long shirt will be handy, but right now, I look like a fool.) 

"But black is slimming!" they cry.

I can't wait to show up for my first day of class looking like a high school stagehand. 

Other excellent pieces I tried on included: a pair of embroidered Ren-Faire-ish shirts, with sleeves that would have caused a pre-teen Anne Shirley to pee her pantalettes; an Empire-cut top that already appeared to have a rounded puff sewn in, awaiting my burgeoning gut and making me look seven months along at 13 weeks; and a sleeveless top with a smocked panel across my bosom. I didn't really have too much objection to this third option - smocking is likely more flattering for my gradually broadening boobs than just allowing them to continue on their current path, drifting apart like two halves of Pangaea.

I get where my mother and aunt are coming from - they don't like the whole concept of walking around in tight midriff tops, pregnancy-innies on full display. Despite basically agreeing with them, I still got to hear lots of "When I was your age, I made do with a polka-dot muumuu and a denim jumper! For five months! As God intended!"  You'd think I was planning on hanging out in a bikini top and denim cutoffs (as I did that one time at Carowinds, summer of '97. I'm not proud, but if you're going to sport that look anywhere, that was the place.) 

I think I'm going to pull a Lohan and invest in some leggings. If I pair them with a good ol' fashioned, Mama-endorsed muumuu, I might be able to claim it's cutting-edge fashion, y'all. 

Ugh Moments of the Week

1. Boobs not getting bigger in an attractive way, but may be spreading sideways in a fat-ish, glandy way.

2. Trying not to roll eyes over story of a friend who accidentally got knocked up from one night of unprotected sex with husband (just! one! night!), because they're apparently overflowing with fertility. 

3. Small roll of fat beginning to tiptoe over waistband of underpants. Hott.

4. Being told that I'm not acting "excited" enough about my just-shy-of-13-week fetus...you know, not announcing the occasion to enough people I barely know. In fact, the person who inflicted this opinion on me told me that I was "acting like this was an unwanted pregnancy."

Yeah - I've been trying for eighteen months to get pregnant, dealing with tubal pregnancies, sperm issues, needles,  and stimulation meds because I'm COMPLETELY NONCHALANT. Maybe I'll go smoke some crack, drink some tequila, and toss myself down the stairs.

What a Difference a Year Makes.

Yesterday, I was pretty anxious over my first OB appt, especially the FFW (first f*cking weigh-in) and the DSDSS (desperately serious Down Syndrome screening). Both turned out to be pleasant surprises. 

The OB (who I've seen before, and like pretty well) did not bring up my weight or what it should or shouldn't be. We talked briefly about exercise, and about how it was okay to dial it back if I found spotting afterwards. I was also reassured that a sweaty-palmed 23-year-old med student would definitely not be delivering my child.

The ultrasound tech who did the screening was very friendly and chipper - I was expecting her to measure in silence, then tell me grimly to wait for the results, but she was chatty and encouraging, told me that things looked generally normal, and had a nice bright flat-screen on which I watched Napoleon flap around like a fish, then settle on his/her back and wave a fist, which was odd and amusing. 

In other news, I quickly consulted the pregnancy book my friend loaned me (which seems to be a recruitment piece for the Natural Childbirth Brigade) yesterday and learned that it's still TOTALLY OKAY to go skydiving at 12 weeks. Yeah. That's great news. I was really worried about not being able to skydive for nine months. Let me go book that airplane right now.

Waiting.

Life has improved somewhat since I stopped shoving unnecessary progesterone-jectiles into my business, but the cramps (or are they muscle pains?) still linger a bit. Sneezing, coughing, laughing hard, and stretching all produce a pleasant sensation akin to having nails driven into my pubic bone. I don't know what to make of it - two urinalysis tests came back clean, and when I called the "resident on call" the other night at the hospital, he informed me that "Uh, that might be, like round ligament pain. If you start bleeding a lot, you should, you know, come into the ER." Yeah, homes, I don't really need to be told to seek help for "bleeding a lot." If I can stick it out until Wednesday, I'll finally get to see the OB, who will hopefully have more answers and will hopefully verify that Napoleon continues to hang on to his small tract o'land.

Prior to discontinuing my use of progesterone, I was reflecting on the idea that using those messy suppositories reminded me of Ye Olde Dayse of Tryinge to Get Pregnante Naturallie. Remember those? When you thought that a little unprotected sex was all it took to get knocked up? 

...okay, I'm done laughing hysterically now. You?

And then, after the Deed was Done, you'd put your feet in the air for twenty minutes, clenching muscles you didn't know you had, because no one ever told you that unprotected sex was so MESSY and aside from not wanting to wash the sheets again already, you wanted to make sure that the Junior Einstein sperm didn't ooze back out, leaving you with the Wee Jeffrey Dahmer ones? 

Yeah, those days. 

Neato, part 2.

And the dumbest. I noticed last night, whilst putting yet another bullet of creamy hormonal goodness into my junk, that it HURT LIKE A MOFO to do so. This prompted my tiny reptilian brain to direct my fingers to email the RE and ask if I was supposed to have stopped using the progesterone supps at week 10? Or keep going until 12? Could this be contributing to my abdominal pains?

Her response: Yuh. You were meant to stop them at 10 weeks. How constipated are you right now?

Me: Very. 

Neato.

After a brief vacation/internet hiatus, I can report that at (allegedly) 10.5 weeks, my uterus feels like a balloon with a Rubik's cube inside. No morning sickness, no lovely clear skin and heaving bosoms, just gas pains. Lots and lots of crippling gas. I am probably the most desirable pregnant woman ever.  

Panic! in the Uterus

Ugh. A few days of distance from Sunday night's events means that I can make jokes about myself.

I woke up at midnight, Sunday night, and went to make one of my usual evening pee excursions. Only when I looked down, I found an oval of red blood, about the length and width of the top two joints in my little finger. When I dabbed at myself with toilet paper I found watery bright-red blood. Ad I just kept thinking - two miscarriages, two Father's Days in a row. This is actually going to happen. I woke up my husband, then remembered, in a blind panic, that I had fallen asleep and forgotten my progesterone dose, which I took immediately (two hours after my usual time). I called the OB on call at my clinic, which as I think I mentioned before, is at Big State Hospital, so naturally, the person who answered the phone was probably around 23. To her credit, she started to tell me that there were several non-m/c-related reasons for bleeding, but then - in a moment that encapsulates the infertile experience - she got paged by labor and delivery and had to get off the phone. 

I think it's fair to say that I sat up from midnight until about 6 a.m., visiting blogs where angels fear to tread - you know, the ones where you hear about someone's ninth or tenth miscarriage, and it just feels like inevitable disaster is staring you right in the face. I read that "bleeding can be normal, unless it's bright red, that's usually trouble" and that "progesterone can mask problems and make you hold on to a pregnancy that should be over;" all statements whose truth I could not and still cannot testify to in any way, but which were like emotional lead weights on two hours of sleep.

Fortunately, I was able to page the RE on call in the morning and ask him to work me in early before the usual round of ultrasounds, which he kindly did. And everything was fine. A fetus remains in my womb, heart still beating...a bizarre little white apparition that kind of resembled Orko from the old He-Man cartoons, but I digress.

It all brought me right back to those old feelings: you're not normal, you can't actually do this, your luck will never hold out, don't get too comfortable. Don't expect anything from your body, because it will always fail you. 

Thus, I declare now in writing what I have always thought in my mind: if I get this baby out, both of us in one piece, I swear I will never forget what it's like to be part of the Subfertile Nation. Fight the power, bitches. 

You can't see me but I have a fist in the air. 

Things My Husband Never Said to Me Before I Became Pregnant (ish)

"Please don't make me identify the discharge spots in your underwear ever again."

Woman on the Verge

OH. MY. GOD. 

If I read one more article, or comment on a website, or sentence from a stupid baby book that says "Well, we're not saying that not having morning sickness means you're going to miscarry, but if you do have morning sickness, your chances of miscarrying are less, and ten percent of you all are going to miscarry, soooo..."

I am going to kill someone. Straight up. 

Crotch Rocket

Holy moly. The progesterone suppositories arrived today, and THEY LOOK LIKE BULLETS. This is creepy.

Honestly, I believe that if men were able to get pregnant, the drug companies would have already patented a progesterone patch that would stick on the hip for ten weeks. Or, for that matter, a progesterone gel cap that tasted like Thin Mints. (Oh, wait, we're talking about dudes. I meant to say ribs.)

Once More Unto the Vadge, Dear Friends, Once More

Second trans-vag ultrasound shows that black blob continues to be black and blobby, small kernel within continues to have an active heartbeat. Pictures taken by RE continue to be difficult to decipher. 

I have decided to name this embryo Napoleon. (I can't bring myself to say something like "bean.") Possibly because of its small size, possibly because I use a large biography of Napoleon to keep all the ultrasound pictures flat, possibly because I really like the song "Waterloo," possibly because I have taken pictures of myself next to Napoleon's taxidermied horse and doggie in Paris, or possibly because I enjoy tormenting family members with the idea of naming my child Napoleon. 

Today's true trauma: getting evicted by the RE. Despite clinging to the bed and saying "please don't make me go back to the regular OB clinic. I like it here, where everyone's nice and has a sense of humor. You can't just kick me out," they did exactly that. Not in a cruel way, mind you. They gave me recommendations for three doctors over in the other clinic, said to call if I needed them between now and then, and that they wanted to be kept in the loop. Still, back to the OB clinic. Where the waits are long and at least two of the providers have tested negative for personality. Which reminds me, I still haven't discussed the meat of last summer's Ectopic Adventure, including Rage towards the OB Clinic. To come! 

Other developments: it's my last night for progesterone injections, which is good, because searching for knot-free Upper Outer Ass Quadrant Real Estate is about to drive my husband over the edge. Next up: progesterone suppositories. Vaginal suppositories, thankfully - I made sure to check that they were not butt-positories, because no thanks - I'll stick with the needles. I have IBS, I'm familiar with synthetic goods going in and coming out of my butt, but I generally don't have to put them in there myself.