this is why i hate numbers
i had my obgyn appointment friday. everything is fine. i’m fine. the baby is fine. the appointment was quite uneventful.
pee in the cup. smiley face the cup. weigh in. don’t register the number on the scale in your mind because all that’s on your mind is the ice cream that’s in your freezer (ps- i gained 2 lbs this month). meet with doctor. ask questions. measure belly. listen to heartbeat on doppler. listen to pickle kick the shit out of doppler. laugh. schedule next visit. peace out.
i came home from the appointment questioning everything about life. when you’re 24+ weeks pregnant with a husband who is 7 weeks away from deploying, the LAST thing you want to do is be questioning life and all of its components.
“so we’re still waiting on your surgical notes from your first c-section…”
“oh. sorry. is there anything i can do to get them to you faster?”
“no, we’ll resubmit the fax. but seeing that had me wondering… HOW LARGE OF A FAMILY DO YOU INTEND ON HAVING?”
“…………………..uh, i’m not sure. i’m just coming to grips with the fact that i will be a mother of 2 in a couple of months. why do you ask?”
“well, risks are higher with each subsequent c-section and with this baby being a girl, chances are she may be smaller than you first child was and we should consider a VBAC.”
(i’ll pause right there just to let you know that this in no way is a c-section vs. VBAC kind of post and if you’re looking to pick a fight about that topic, go elsewhere. there are plenty of parenting blogs and posts created to stir controversy and piss people off with regards to HOW your child enters the world. this is not one of those.)
moving on… i told my doctor that i had been researching VBACs and was aware of the risks on both sides, having a repeat c-section and having a VBAC. (hello, childbirth in itself poses risks, what else ya got?) then, i told her that my husband will be deployed when miss pickle enters the world, and that “i selfishly may not want to experience a different kind of birth, knowing he will not be a part of it, ya know? that will suck.”
and cue STINK EYE.
(it should be noted that this appointment was with the last of the 4 doctors who rotate within this practice. from my next visit on through delivery, who i see is my choice.)
the doctor rattled off a shit ton of stats and facts and VBACs to me that are all kind of fuzzy now that i think back on it. i was just stuck on the look of death she had given me, which made it difficult to grasp the words that were coming out of her mouth. something about subsequent c-sections and higher risk of stuff and “IF YOU WANT MORE PREGNANCIES BEYOND THIS ONE, THIS BABY SHOULD BE A VBAC BABY.”
::record screech::
hold the iphone. so, not only do i get to think about my husband being gone for the birth of this child, but now you want me to think about how large of a family i want to have and how that number of children will determine the way in which i should deliver this baby?
apparently that’s what she wanted. dr. dead eyes wanted me to put a number to it.
i don’t know how many children i want to have. i don’t know the amount of chaos this second child will bring to our already chaotic lives. i don’t know where we will be financially years from now and whether or not we’ll be able to support 5 hypothetical children, or 3 hypothetical children… even the 2 children we will shortly be responsible for. i don’t know if i’ll get the baby bug immediately after delivering this child.
I DON’T KNOW WHAT DAY IT IS OR IF I BRUSHED MY TEETH THIS MORNING.
what i do know is that my husband will be gone for the birth of this child. that is the only thing i know. i do not know how i am delivering miss pickle in to this world, nor do i know how many children i will one day end up with. all i know is that my husband, who so desperately wants to be here when his first daughter cries for the first time, will be on the other side of the world. and yes, i need to consider what is best for my health and the health of the baby… but i’d be a straight up asshole not to consider my partner and the current situation we are in with him being deployed.
i may be an idiot when it comes to numbers, people… but i am no asshole.
i left my appointment friday morning having felt bullied into making a decision that i am not ready or equipped to make yet. i felt judged for thinking of doing a repeat c-section. and i felt sad.
there’s a lot on our plate right now. and yeah, i’m taking things in stride as much as one crazy pregnant person possibly can. but don’t ask me questions about LIFE that cause me to doubt myself. don’t look at me with dead eyes.
and don’t ever ask me anything about numbers. i was an english major for shit’s sake. numbers upset me more than katy perry and russell brand’s divorce.
this is why i have online friends
my tolerance for dealing with folks in real life is dwindling by the day. case in point, my morning errand running that consisted of running back and forth from the pharmacy to panera and back to the pharmacy.
SCENE: our local panera, ordering lunch to bring home. (i had already dropped off a prescription to be filled for jackson’s ear infection. they told me it’d take 15 minutes to fill. i told them i would wait… across the street, ordering panera.)
PANERA CHICK: “hi. how can i help you?”
ME: “i’d like to place a to-go order please… one kid’s grilled cheese with apple juice box. one chicken salad sandwich…”
PANERA CHICK: “would you like chips, apple, or french baguette with that?”
ME: “chips is fine. and then one ‘pick two’ with chicken noodle soup and the turkey sandwich, lettuce only…”
PANERA CHICK: “would you like chips, apple, or french baguette with that?”
ME: “chips is fine for that too. then i’d like these cookies as well, and a medium drink please.”
PANERA CHICK: “ok, let me get you a bag for the cookies…”
(goes to get bag)
PANERA CHICK: “here is your bag for the cookies and your number. someone will bring your order to you shortly.”
ME: “wait. i placed my order to-go.”
PANERA CHICK: “oh! you wanted everything to go?”
ME: “yes. everything to go.”
PANERA CHICK: “oh, ok… then just move down the counter and they’ll call your name when it’s ready.”
ME: (skeptical) “ok, but can you do me a favor and read back my order. i know i gave you a lot of information.”
PANERA CHICK: “ok, i have one kids grilled cheese with apple juice box, one chicken salad sandwich with chips, one ‘pick two’ with chicken noodle soup and turkey sandwich and two cookies and a medium…”
ME: “did you get lettuce only on the turkey sandwich?”
PANERA CHICK: “yes. turkey sandwich, lettuce and tomato only.”
ME: “no, it was a turkey sandwich, LETTUCE ONLY.”
PANERA CHICK: “ok, sorry about that. turkey sandwich, no lettuce.”
ME: “NO. IT WAS A TURKEY SANDWICH, LETTUCE ONLY!”
PANERA CHICK: “ok, lettuce only. got it. sorry about that. here’s your number. someone will bring your order out…”
ME: “BUT I ORDERED IT TO-GO!”
JACKSON: “I WANT THE GINGERBREAD COOKIE MOM.”
PANERA CHICK: “oh right. i knew that. ok, then just step down there and they’ll call your name.”
END SCENE.
**********
SCENE: back at pharmacy, 25 minutes after dropping off the prescription.
PHARMACY TECH: “hi. picking up?”
ME: “yes, i dropped off a script for my son to be filled.”
PHARMACY TECH: “oh right, i saw you. let me just go mix it up.”
ME: (thinking: THIS IS WHY I WENT ACROSS THE STREET TO PANERA AND DID NOT WAIT ON YOU.)
PHARMACY TECH: “ok, i have it right here, anything else i can get for you?”
ME: “yes, i have my prenatal vitamins to get and this children’s motrin. that’s it.”
PHARMACY TECH: “ok, no problem. your first name.”
ME: “nicole.”
PHARMACY TECH: “ok nicole.”
(goes to get my prenatal vitamins and returns)
PHARMACY TECH: “here we go. looks like you won’t have much longer to go with this one (looking at my belly)… you going to have a new years baby?”
ME: “um no. i’m due in april.”
PHARMACY TECH: (eyes widen) “oh… april. do you’re…”
ME: “almost 6 months along.”
PHARMACY TECH: “so then how’s your gestational diabetes?”
ME: “um, i actually don’t have gestational diabetes. my husband and i just make big babies. this one (pointing to jackson) was 9 lb 6 oz and was born a week before his due date.”
PHARMACY TECH: “OHMYGOD THAT’S MY TWO BABIES PUT TOGETHER.”
ME: “yeah well… we’re not exactly average sized people.”
PHARMACY TECH: “I MEAN I COULD PUT MY TWO KIDS TOGETHER AT BIRTH AND THEY WOULDN’T HAVE WEIGHED WHAT HE DID.”
ME: “amazing huh?”
PHARMACY TECH: “OHMYGOD, HOW BIG IS YOUR HUSBAND?”
ME: “6 ft 6. and i’m 5 ft 9… so…”
PHARMACY TECH: “so no gestational diabetes with him?” (pointing to jackson)
ME: “nope.”
PHARMACY TECH: “WOW!”
ME: “yeah. well, just wait til you see me in here for my refills come spring time.”
END SCENE.
what’s REALLY on my mind
… the state of the world, as we know it, is freaking me out. a few weeks ago, i ate breakfast at a counter next to a man who liked the book i was reading and struck up a conversation with me. he mentioned reading a study that mentioned that last month alone, the national debt was so huge that it was as though every single family in the united states was $650 in debt. EACH FAMILY. do you know how many families are in america right now? how overpopulated we are? (asks the woman with a vagina-fetus in her belly.)
… why won’t my son take a dump in the toilet? we have tried EVERYTHING and he still prefers to shit his pants. it’s mind boggling. should he continue this shitty business in 2012, he will not be attending full-day school, AND HE MUST GO TO SCHOOL BECAUSE OMG I’LL DIE.
… really? you celebrated the official end of the iraq war yesterday? i don’t even know what to say about that except please don’t knock on my door come march when my husband is deployed… again.
… i’m kinda pissed that ‘the girl with the dragon tattoo’ is all americanized and redone. the books were FANTASTIC, in my opinion, and the original swedish films were genuine adaptations of the books. sure, not everyone enjoys subtitles in movies, but now we’ve gone and americanized this story which means EXPLOSIONS! STUNTS! CRAZY SHIT! and color me disappointed.
… really? you want to ask me why i would choose to have a baby, knowing that my husband will be deployed for the birth? stay tuned. i’ll lay it all out for you in a piece i’m working on. (hint: it has something to do with BECAUSE WE WANT ANOTHER BABY.)
… what is up with former president’s daughters being news reporters and journalists? the bush daughter is a today show correspondent, and a few nights ago, i saw chelsea clinton conducting an interview for i dunno abc/nbc one of the c’s. do they list “president’s daughter” on their resume? i just don’t understand.
… sandusky showered with kids in order to teach them basic hygiene? you expect people to believe that? how about the few of you who are justifying the actions of this man just go ahead and call it what it is… it is rape. stop insulting the survivors and making excuses for someone who is not worthy of excuses.
… we’re done with traveling for the holidays. this will be our last year of going ‘home’ to atlanta for christmas, and we couldn’t be happier about it. because really, while it’s lovely to have both sets of family in the same city, it’s a ping-pong match on crack. and as of 2012, we will officially out number our families with family members of little people. we’ve gone home to atlanta for the holidays since paul and i started dating in 1999, it’s REALLY time to be done.
… yesterday it was 81 degrees in jacksonville. 81. this morning, jackson went to school in shorts and while i love that we’re back in florida, i worry about our planet burning up. seriously? 81 degrees? even north florida has been known to get a wee bit frosty in december. does this mean that next christmas will be even hotter? because pretty soon, we’re all going to have loin cloths in our closets, and nothing else.
… really? a baby seal showed up on your couch? WHERE’S MINE?!?!
NO MORE BAIL FOR SANDUSKY
jerry sandusky posted his $250,000 bail this morning, and has been released.
he has racked up more than 50 charges to date. he spent last night in jail.
he is now out. again. which is dumb.
::standing on soapbox for a moment::
i’d like to take a moment to tackle this “child sex abuse” terminology that has been rampant in the media concerning these allegations against sandusky.
CHILD SEX = RAPE
CHILD SEX ABUSE = RAPE
SEX ABUSE SCANDAL INVOLVING CHILDREN = RAPE
::stepping off soapbox::
Under the terms of his release, Sandusky will be confined to his home, subject to electronic monitoring and forbidden from having any contact with any witnesses or victims in the attorney general investigation.
Sandusky was jailed Wednesday on 12 new charges of child sex abuse after a grand jury report released details of testimony from two new alleged victims.
Sandusky was charged last month with sexually abusing 8 other boys over a 15-year span. He maintains his innocence. -via abcnews.com
crimes aside. rape allegations aside. child sex abuse charges aside… what chaps my ass at this moment in time is that sandusky has the option of bail. he continues to make bail and will continue to do so until bail is no longer an option for him.
the man should be behind bars, period. no bail.
and here’s why: no one is being protected with sandusky making bail. NO ONE. obviously his victims are not being protected. their assailant is confined to his home. those brave individuals who came forward (and are still coming forward) are not being protected so long as sandusky is able to post bail.
also, (and i personally couldn’t care less about sandusky’s safety, for the record) the truth of the matter is that sandusky is not being protected either. he is safer behind bars than he is on house-arrest.
bail should no longer be an option for sandusky. no one is being protected by offering him bail.
ps- dear media, call it what it is… IT IS RAPE.
a couple quick things
last weekend, when my fabu-larious family was in town, we went to our favorite local breakfast joint. with 6 of us sitting at the counter, enjoying pancakes and bacon and eggs and cheese grits OHMY, a woman with video equipment approached us and asked if she could film us eating our breakfast.
UM NO. THIS BREAKFAST IS MINE. ALL MINE!
but we said “ok, no prob,” because really all she wanted was cutie pie jackson on film, dancing to the oldies with his pointer fingers in the air. we signed off on some paperwork and i really thought i’d never hear from her again… or at least not for a while.
then i checked my inbox this morning and saw that she had tracked me down to let me know when the local show that cameos local businesses is going to air (tomorrow at 11 pm, thank you DVR. OHMYGOD WE ARE OLD AND JUST WANT TO SLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!)
i’ll get another email from her when the clips have been uploaded online so i can share them with you here, but rest assured, cutie pie jackson will keep you entertained. to be continued…
in other news, my appetite is cray-cray these days and i cannot get enough food in mah belleh.
what? you don't like a gooey and delish choc chip and walnut cookie right out of the oven so hot that it burns the insides of your mouth so good?
chicken pad thai so legit that even my husband who has been to thailand LOVES IT. no? don't like that either?
baskin robbins mint choc chip ice cream (no i was not paid to say that). see how quickly that double scoop turned into an almost single?
food is gooooooooood, y’all. this baby really really likes some food. bring on thanksgiving.
jackson hit a mega milestone this week, allowing paul to CUT HIS HAIR. he’s gotten so shaggy, esp since we haven’t had his hair cut since before the move. there’s reason why we let our kid walk around looking like a hairy hobo though, y’all. if you could witness what this child does at the little haircut joint, you would weep along with him and be all “OMG, OK, WE WILL NEVER DO THAT AGAIN. I PROMISE” too.
paul, with the patience of something i will never come to understand because patience and i are not friends, sat with jackson on the floor in our living room FOR OVER AN HOUR and taught him the wonderful way of the hair clippers.
since jackson was not keen on the noise the clippers make, paul just had jackson comb his hair while holding the clippers. and then he got a baby doll of jackson’s and jackson gave her a little hair do. then we were kinda on a roll. paul tested the clippers with jackson a few hundred thousand times to get him used to how it felt and how it sounded… then they took eleventy and forty gazillion breaks… and then…
don't worry. it looks bad but jackson is giggling at the noise. NOT CRYING. i repeat, NOT CRYING.
i told paul to shave it all until jackson was as much of a fuzz head as he is so that we don’t have to do this again until 2012. so, he did.
ZOMG LOOK AT THOSE EYEBROWS.
and we surprisingly lived happily ever after. i believe this qualifies as a miracle and thus puts paul one step closer to sainthood.
phew… moving right along… over at babble this week, i posted about paul and i researching baby names via our family tree. seriously, this process is more fun than i could’ve imagined. we get to laugh at our ancestors names while trying to name a fetus who hopefully won’t hold his/her name against us for the remainder of our lives. (ps: i believe i find out the gender in the near future. more on that soon.)
since we were already sauntering down memory lane, i decided to take a gander at the beginning stages of this blog of mine. this little place of mine on the interwebz came to exist when i announced my pregnancy with jackson some 4 + years ago, and here i am now, blogging through another pregnancy. (it’s ok if you have ‘the circle of life’ playing in your head right now. i do too.)
and last, but most certainly not least, i admitted to myself and the internet world at large that i want to be a breast feeding champ this time around. i know! i know! it’s madness and i NEVER thought i would say that again after our trip through the 18,639 layers of hell we went through with jackson. but it’s true. i want to rock out with my… ok, maybe not quite like that, but i’m gearing up to give this boob thing another shot.
ok, that’s all. happy weekend! go eat some good food. read some good stuff. be sweet.
Have a Sip
