Thankful to Feel Thankful

I’m a little late for a thankful Thanksgiving post, but I was rather occupied over the holiday overeating and chasing after the now vigorously crawling Rex (“no, not the fireplace, Boo Boo!”).  And, I had a hard time summoning the blogging mojo after all was said and done.  But, I wanted to share with all of you lovelies who still indulge me.

I have so much to be thankful for, but you know what I am most thankful for?  I am most thankful that I can feel thankful.

Via Creative Commons by Kyle Steed

Because, there was a time not so long ago when thankful was the last thing I would have felt.  Overwhelmed, sad, tired, tired, trapped, anxious – these were all things I felt.  I was so afraid that I had made the biggest mistake of my life becoming a mother.  I didn’t recognize my life anymore and I longed for earlier days when life was boring and predictable and, yes even infertile, because at least then I wouldn’t have to deal with such constant uncertainty and upheaval.  Yeah, really.

I had no perspective on my life, no measure to determine if I was really foundering as much as I felt.  I thought I was a terrible mother to Rex.  Sure, I met his needs, but I wasn’t as much fun as daddy or as loving as his grandmother.  I was pretty certain that he didn’t like me very much and I realized that I agreed with him. I didn’t like me very much either. I could not see how Rex could love me since I didn’t see anything really worth loving.

I made a decision – I could continue down this road of being my own worst enemy or I could slowly begin to love me for me.  I took baby steps in the beginning – no more nasty thoughts about myself, no more worries about what other people thought about me.  In the end, I don’t have to live with them for the rest of my life, but I sure as shit have to live with myself, so why not get along with me?

And I began to feel such peace.  Peace with me, peace with my life.  I accept my life now, all of it.  I embrace it, warts and all.  I see the joy in it and I also see the mundane.  And both are ok.  And, I’m becoming friends with me.  I like myself more.  I put that nasty little voice in a box and sit on the lid. And at the end of each day, I sit back and go over my day thinking about the highlights – good hair day, wonderful moment with Rex, good conversation with Mr. X, delicious glass of wine, and savor those moments.  I congratulate myself on successfully navigating situations that would have earlier brought me nothing but angst.

And, I feel thankful. Thankful for my wonderful family, for this beautiful boy who I grew and nurtured and now get to watch every day interacting with the world. Thankful that I persevered through the dark times to get to this light.  Thankful that I made the conscious decision to be present.

Do I Know You?

In those first few years after Mr. X and I were married, there were times when I would find myself looking at him thinking, “Who is this guy and how did we get here?”  For as much as I knew him, physically, emotionally, intellectually, he was still sometimes this strange person in my house who I didn’t recognize from my former life.

Peek A Boo

If I had those moments with a man who I knew for three years before I married him, then you can only imagine how many of those moments I am having with Rex.  Let’s just say lots.  Part of the difficulty is that I have a hard time seeing me in him.  He is the spitting image of his father at this age.  I knew even on the 18-week ultrasound who he took after in the looks department.  Seriously.  The chin, the profile, it was Mr. X, which of course prompted a little IVF humor – at least we know they didn’t use the wrong sperm!

Even now, at almost 8 months, Rex is a bit of a mystery to me.  I’m still having a hard time reconciling the baby I knew for 9 months on the ultrasound screen, and then later through the belly Olympics to the one who is starting to crawl and wants to eat the dog’s tail.  He is his own little person who is slowly, but surely, developing his own personality.  The good news is that it looks like it’s a wonderful personality that is a joy to see emerging each day a little more.  And, he is starting to have a sense of humor, playing peek-a-boo or giggling while being tickled (his baby love handles are a particularly fertile spot for giggle induction).  I’m also starting to see me in him, particularly the eyes.

While this getting-to-know-you phase still sometimes makes me panic – oh my God! I’m sharing my home with this little strange alien creature who shrieks and emits foul smells and it feels like it’s going to be this way for the next 17 1/2 years! – I’m making a concerted effort to take a more positive spin on the situation:  he’s like a gift that we are slowly unwrapping; a flower blooming; a volcano erupting (er, or maybe not).   Each day, we find something new.

We are getting to know each other as people do.  I have to remind myself that he is getting to know us (and all of human kind at the same time), too.  So far, he’s doing a pretty darn good job of it.  I know that sooner rather than later, it will seem as if we have known each other forever and that was the way it was always meant to be.

Tempus Fugit and Forget It

Rex turned seven months old on Sunday.  In response to a picture of Rex I posted on my Facebook page that evening, one friend said, “didn’t he just turn six months?! Time flies it seems for everyone.

Except us.

These last seven months have been some of the longest of my life, no doubt in part due to the fact that I’ve been awake far more during their waking and non-waking hours than I would care to think about.  Even after we all started sleeping for longer periods, though, the time alternately dragged or flew.  I think this is because our lives are still in a state of flux as Rex grows and changes almost literally before our eyes.  Time seems to fly when things are routine, but when things are constantly changing, you don’t have time to get used to the new normal, let alone get into a groove that lets the time fly by.

But, why would you want time to fly, you ask?  I read so often new mothers with babies of Rex’s age and even younger wanting to keep their babies this age for all eternity.  And, I frankly have to admit, I don’t get it.  I really don’t.  I can’t wait until my child can feed himself and begin to communicate with us even if it’s sign language for “give me food, bitch!”  He has already started being able to give himself a bottle and it’s been this side of heaven for me. Look Ma, no hands! I can put him in the boppy with a bottle and gaze lovingly upon him as he stretches out like a fat cat nonchalantly sucking down his Similac Crack.

Still, there’s that little voice in my head that says, “remember this time. It will be gone before you know it and the kid will be 5 and no longer suffer your hugs and kisses.”  Right now, the overwhelming part of me says, “please, let’s get to 5. At least then he can wipe his own behind.”

Part of my antsy-ness to get him out of babyhood has to do with the fact that even though I’ve been taking care of an infant for seven months now, I still feel like I don’t know what the hell I’m doing.  Sure, I can diaper him up in 15 seconds while lecturing him on proper changing table etiquette (twisting one’s body to get to the baby lotion is not acceptable while mommy is trying to cover your boy parts) and I can feed him a jar of pureed chicken and rice without getting too much on him or me.  But, I still don’t feel competent, in charge, in control of the situation.  And boy does that bug me.  Still.

Part of me thinks that once he reaches that age that I can talk with him, I can at least try to have a conversation with him in which we can discuss such serious topics as poop, pee and other topics of inherent interest to the below 3 set.  For now, he is full of grunts, screeches, screams, and singing notes going over several octaves.  He’s right where’s supposed to be developmentally. I’m just the one with the itchy finger on the fast-forward button because there’s still not a whole lot that we can do together.

Remind me of this, will you, when I’m lamenting that he’s 5 and I can’t believe how the time has flown?

image: Monceau

Little Do I Know

A few years ago, when we were well into the infertility and miscarriage slog, but Rex was no where in sight, I happened to look out my window at home and see a touching family portrait: mom walking her little girl in a stroller while sporting an obvious baby bump.  As usual, my blood boiled and I mentally cursed the universe for subjecting me to this scene at such a low point in our lives.  I didn’t know the neighbor, they had moved in a few months before. All I knew was that they had one kid and were on the way to having another and that was more than I had or could even imagine having.

That second child was born in October of that year, right around the time of both of my prior due dates.  Mr. X and I happened to be taking a walk one afternoon, shortly after the new baby came home and we met him, being borne around in the arms of his proud papa.  I made all of the right congratulatory noises even though I was still just as pissed inside.

If I had known then what I know now:

That their first child was the product of IVF.  That the second child was an oops only 8 months after the first one since they didn’t think they had a chance of conceiving naturally.

I found this out from their next door neighbors (really, in our neighborhood, there is no such thing as a secret, depending upon who you talk to).  Their daughter also dealt with infertility and just had a baby through a surrogate, using IVF.

I could have learned this information much sooner if I had been more outgoing during our struggles.  But, I didn’t want to talk to anyone, least of all mothers of small children.  They would be just like all the rest of the fertile population – blissfully unaware of the difficulties of life and telling me that having kids has been the greatest thing they could have ever done with their life, blah, blah, blah.

Oh, how we are own greatest enemies.  I could have found additional support from these ladies (well, maybe not the lady with the grown daughter.  She was a bit …. much).  I could have seen that the world isn’t nearly as black and white as I had made it out to be – and me being a lawyer, too, for shame!

But, that time is gone and I’m glad that I do know, even if it’s a little late.  I was able to share with this neighbor our struggle to have Rex and how we too benefited from IVF.  She got it, even though we both have the families that we wanted, she still got it.

And I learned that it’s never too late to reach out.

image: Steve Took It

Individual Results May Vary

I have been wanting to write about motherhood, as it is after being finally gloriously obtained after so many trials and tribulations.  Seriously wanting. And, I’ve had the time. Rex is in daycare (thankyou, thankyou, thankyou) and I am back at work part-time.  Partial sanity has been regained. While, I’m still oozing with bloggy feelings, something has continued to stop me, specifically my former infertile and childless self.  I would not have wanted to read what I want to write about. In fact, I would have un-subscribed from my blog tout suite after reading a few paragraphs and wouldn’t have come back for a while.

You see, I’m still struggling with this whole motherhood thing.  I’m not feeling those thunderbolts of instant love that feature so prominently on A Baby Story.  I don’t want to spend every waking moment with my baby and I certainly don’t want to keep him awake to play with him.  In fact, I think he is most attractive when he’s sleeping.  He is so peaceful … and so quiet.  When he’s awake, I am still a little on edge, waiting for him to get fussy either because he’s hungry or bored (or, worse, both).

About this time, the guilt starts setting in.  My Inner Infertile points out how much we wanted this child and how monumentally ungrateful I am being for having these thoughts in the first place.  Then I think about those who read my blog who are still trying to have a child and how I would have felt when I was there reading this (not particularly thrilled).  And, so I just couldn’t write anything.

The thing is, I remember so vividly when we were in the deepest darkest corners of infertility how much I would give up to have a baby and I feel just wretched that now I am so damn ambivalent about the whole thing.  I feel like I have let down myself and all of the other girls who have struggled with infertility. I always thought that once I had a baby, it would be so much better and to now have that baby – who is by all measures an absolutely wonderful baby – and not feel as if I am the happiest woman in the world is an incredible shock.

In a way, I set myself up for this.  I put so much emphasis on being ‘fixed’ once we had a child, that the baby would magically fill that gaping hole in my heart.  And he has filled it somewhat, but not the level that I thought he would.  Not yet, at least. So, I am left with a hole still, and what’s even worse is the sense that it should be full but I’m just too ungrateful, selfish, and plain awful to let Rex fill it.

It is getting better, though. Today, at lunch, he was smiling that whole mouth smile that just makes you smile too.  It’s contagious, like a yawn.  He’s started squealing, which we think is a prelude to laughing.  He’s even had his first walk facing outward in the Bjorn because he can hold his head up.  All of these are amazing milestones that seemed so distant not just a few weeks ago.  The good thing about an infant is that they change so rapidly so fast that the status quo, if you don’t like it, will change and pretty quickly (although, you may still not like what it changes too).

Today, I also felt, for the first time since he was born, like I was happy.  I was walking G with Rex in the Bjorn wearing this adorable hat and it just hit me.  I’m happy. In this moment, I am happy. Perhaps there’s hope for me yet.

image: paterjt

It’s Time

As we’ve gotten closer to term, I gave some thought to induction but figured that it would only be an option once we get past a due date with no progress.  What I didn’t factor in was the possibility of a not-so-overdue, but rather gargantuan baby.

The estimate from yesterday’s ultrasound was a whopping 8lbs 12 oz.  The doctor did tell me that there is a 20% swing in either direction meaning he could either be on the heavy side of 7lbs or on the really heavy side of 9lbs.  Either way, I say oof.  I may have child-bearing hips, but I don’t know if they are up for the challenge of passing a possibly almost 10 lb bowling ball.  So, we decided to pull the trigger right at 40 weeks before he got any bigger and my chances of a c-section increase.  As it is, my chances are at about 20-30% because of my cervix, which is neither favorable nor unfavorable.

So, tomorrow at 5am, we present ourselves at the hospital for induction.

It’s time.

In Due Time

Normally, I’m a planner.  I love to plan.  It gives me a feeling of control where maybe I don’t really have that much control.  But, when it comes to planning for Little B, I panic with a capital P.

This is not a new phenomenon with this pregnancy.  It started right out of the gate when I was debating whether or not to pee on a stick.  As beta day grew closer, I would ask myself, do I want to?  For a few days, the answer was ‘no’.  Then, about three days before beta, I was working and all of a sudden, I wanted to pee on a stick.  As a benefit of working from home, I was able to do it right then and there.  Next was when I would take another test.  Again, I listened to myself and trusted that I would at some point reach a point that I was comfortable to take that next step.

I’ve been listening to myself about these kinds of decisions regarding pregnancy ever since.  I waited until our 15 week check up to shop for maternity clothes – and then only at Target where I would not be completely immersed in pregnancy.  I didn’t hit the big time (Destination Maternity) until around the 20 week mark because I knew that I could not handle it – and even then, it was still overwhelming.

The thing is, as the pregnancy progresses, the bigger decisions are beginning to loom larger.  We’ve been asked multiple times recently if we have begun to think about names (we’re waiting for now).  Closer to home, Mr. X has been gently prodding me to start making some decisions about the nursery.  Not only do I love to plan, I love to decorate and the thought of being able to transform a room that frankly I have really not liked ever since we moved in is intoxicating, except for one small detail.

It’s the nursery.

Most pregnant ladies, especially the first timers, would probably think that I am crazy or mentally ill, or both to be wary.  I prefer cautious.  I’ve already told him that we aren’t buying anything until the baby arrives safe and sound.  He countered with at least picking out things to which I relented.  The thing is, of all of the steps that we have taken so far, creating a nursery is by far the biggest and most permanent.  All I can think is, what if I decorate this room and make it adorable and something happens and I will be forever reminded?  Paint is a lot more permanent than a pair of stretchy maternity pants.

I told Mr. X that I’m just not ready yet to committing to decorating and he understands.  I just hope that I can find a middle ground between my anxiety and need to go cautiously and my growing desire to begin transforming that space into the future.

image: mumchancegaloot

Happy Blo-go-ver-sary to Meee!

Yowza – I’ve been doing this blog thing for two years. Not too shabby for a girl who picks up hobbies like men in bars and discards them pretty soon thereafter.  Although, this has always been more of a hobby.  It’s been therapy, a chance to meet new friends, and good writing practice.   I’ve reaped all three of those benefits and that alone has made it all worth it.

Happy birthday, little blog.

Damn, that cake looks good.

image: Jessica N. Diamond

This Must Be the Place

Not only is this the title to one my of all-time favorite ever songs, this should be my new mantra in getting used to the idea that I am now a patient in an obstetrics office.  Not an infertility doctor.  Not even the gyno.  A doctor for pregnant ladies.  Whoa, momma.

We had our first OB appointment today, and it went very well.  Our OB is just adorable and super nice (in fact, I think she might very well be known here as Dr. Sweet).  Dr. Salsa hooked me up.  She took our (sordid) history and I got the impression very quickly that she understood that we were not her typical patients and that she was more than up to the task of dealing with our unique challenges.  The practice itself seems like a pretty low-key.  There was just one other person in the waiting room when we arrived and during our whole visit, we weren’t hurried at all.  What was really amazing was that there was not a single poster showing a baby in the whole place. for which I am truly grateful.  Even now, those are a bit much for me.  I was weighed and then I had to give a urine sample – which for a moment I thought was so that they could confirm what we’ve known for the last 10 weeks – but was really so that they could look for proteins, etc.  Then it was essentially a well-woman visit complete with the breast exam! and pap smear!  But, she was super gentle and it was fine.

Then she whipped out the portable doppler.  I had been eying it ever since we got in the room with a mixture of curiosity and anxiety.  Then, I was slathered with gel and all we could hear was …. my heartbeat.  But, I did not allow myself to panic.  I got dressed and headed over to the sono room where I had my first belly ultrasound, with even more gel.  And, of course, there was the little bugger looking a little groggy but perking up once he knew he was on TV.  We even got a little wave.  Heartbeat was 167 and measurement was on target at 12w1d.

We are set up to schedule the nuchal translucency test next week.  This must be the place.

No Pomp, No Circumstance, No Problem

I have been in no less than three graduation ceremonies in my illustrious educative career.  And, through all three I never got tired of the ceremony, the playing of Pomp and Circumstance as we paraded solemnly down the aisles, subtley craning our necks to see our relatives.  Of course, with my maiden name, I was toward the end of the alphabet so I usually got the tail end of the song, but it still had the cache.  I loved the feeling that I had earned this pageant and I was finally participating in something that everyone got to do. 

Today, I had my fourth graduation: we have officially been released to the OB.  This time, there was no ceremony, no cap or gown, just a brief check that Little Bugger was still in there and doing his disco thing (he was with a heartbeat of 175).  It was surreal and ordinary at the same time. 

I have thought (and agonized) about this moment a lot in the past.  I tried to imagine the feeling of knowing that I had finally made it to the next step.  I envisioned the nice parting hug from the doctor and the nurses and then being carried out on a litter leaving the office without looking back and moving onto the next grade: Big Time Pregnancy.  Reality was a wee bit different than fantasy.  The appointment was lightening fast – I don’t think I am particularly interesting now since I am no longer a problem to be solved.  I was given the name of the OB that Dr. Salsa handpicked for me on a post-it note.  We paid our final fee and like that, we were gone.

I realize though, that an uneventful graduation was exactly what I wanted and needed.  I didn’t want to be fawned over or exalted (although, being carried out on a litter would have been pretty awesome).  I just wanted to be patted on the back and sent on my merry way.  And that’s exactly what happened.

We already have set up the appointment with the new OB.  Not only have I graduated to the next level of pregnancy monitoring, I have graduated to the infertile gal’s version of the ninth ring of hell – an OB waiting room with lots of beaming pregnant ladies.  That might take a lot more to get used to.

image: wiccked