Tuesday, January 31, 2012

What's in a name?

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet." - Juliet (or Mr. Shakespeare if you want to be technical)

Sure. Whatever you say crazy lady. You also stabbed yourself in the gut over some dude you'd only known for a few days and then secretly married him. Forgive me if I find your judgment a bit askew.

I love Romeo and Juliet, but I completely disagree with Juliet's famous balcony line above. I think names do matter. I think what we call things and people directly influences how we view them. While I could give you tons of examples of crazy baby names such as Pilot Inspektor, Orangejello, or Sparkle (just look to the celebrities), the most recent name on my hit list is MISCARRIAGE.

Why do they call it that?
Think about it....how many words exist in the English language that begin with the letters mis- and don't have some negative connotation? Mistake. Misunderstanding. Misplace. Misery. The list goes on. Sure it's true that miscarriage is also a less than positive experience, but does it have to be labeled with such a negative and guilt ridden term?

While medical professionals say "spontaneous abortion", the term miscarriage is the more commonly used term by others....and it is my personal belief that it implies blame. The baby was not carried properly, ergo, mis-carriage. And who else can carry a baby but a momma? Unless you're a sea horse of course.

Another of my favorites is "lost"....as in "She lost the baby after only 16 weeks and she says her water broke, too! Can you believe that?!" This term is more comical to me because it implies that one has simply misplaced their child in a crowd, or perhaps left them in the shopping cart in the Walmart parking lot!

The sad thing is, I don't need a simple mis- to make me feel any more to blame than I already do.

I can list a ton of things that worry me and make me feel guilty as if I may have contributed to this somehow. I drank wine before I found out, had xrays on my shoulder, couldn't stomach 3 different kinds of prenatal vitamins, wasn't taking folic acid in advance, stayed sick throwing up for weeks and couldn't keep food down, ran a 5k, did crunches, rode my motorcycle.....yada yada yada. In some ways it makes me feel like I deserve the mis- in miscarriage for being such an unfitting mom-to-be. Maybe I made some mis-take and had my mom card revoked. I have since cried to my husband that I can't grow plants and I can't grow babies. Neither my thumb or uterus are green, apparently.

But the other side of my brain knows better. The logical side of me knows that miscarriage is very common, especially with first pregnancies. The reasonable person in me knows that I did the very best I could to be a healthy mothership once I learned I was not alone in my carnal universe. That's the side of me that ignores insensitive comments following news of the miscarriage like "What's wrong with you?" That's the side that talks me off the ledge and reminds me that lesser people with wayyyyy worse behaviors and health conditions have delivered healthy babies before me, and my case was simply God's plan for something better, maybe something healthier later on.

Or not. Either way, I'm going to leave it up to Him.

I'd still be interested in talking to someone about this misnomer though.....the term miscarriage has got to go. The blame game...or in this case, the blame name does nothing to help the situation.

Monday, January 30, 2012

No one ever tells you this stuff...

I learned 2 weeks ago that I miscarried and was shocked by the events that followed. I was completely unprepared for what was to come.

The entire 16 weeks that I spent pregnant were rocky. If I wasn't sick, I was constantly worried about the viability of the fetus (we didn't exactly have the fairy tale beginning....see previous blog on roller coaster ride).

And sadly, the pregnancy ended much the same way it began. Not one single day of this journey did I feel prepared to handle the unknowns that lay ahead. Nor did I feel like I was getting answers from the folks who should know, but then again, every pregnancy is different....or so I hear.

My family of 4 met our dear friends for dinner out one evening. During a restroom break I noticed the first sign that trouble lay ahead - a faint pink tinge to the toilet water and something dark quickly flushing away. I had no idea what it was and didn't have time to look before it disappeared. I quickly dismissed it. But during a second restroom break (I was drinking water and preggo so frequent pee breaks are to be expected), I passed something else that terrified me. It was approximately the size of a silver dollar and flesh toned (I have since learned that it was a mucus plug - a protective barrier just outside the cervix meant to protect the fetus from the passage of bacteria. Ps. It would have been helpful to know that ahead of time, as I was seriously concerned that I had unknowingly been host to an alien.). I walked back to our table giving myself a pep talk the whole way. I didn't want to say or do anything that would give reason to worry. Unfortunately, I'm a crappy actress and my face blew my plan out of the water. Despite sputtering reassurances, my husband knew better and frankly told me in front of everyone that I was a "sorry liar". Diversionary tactics were my only resource after that.

I continued to pass fleshy bits and lightly spot the remainder of the evening and the next day. I eventually filled my husband in on what was going on. Being the nurse/science-minded dude that he is, he immediately went to researching. Digging through his undergrad maternal care textbooks and simultaneously typing madly into Google, he offered a quick assessment: Spotting is normal and not always indicative of problems, but should be monitored closely and if worsens or continues for more than a few days should be discussed with the physician. He and I both breathed a little more deeply for a moment.....but that breath wouldn't last us long.

The bleeding began the next day. And our positivity disappeared down the drain with those undeniable signs of blood.

My husband called the doctor and they immediately squeezed me into an ultrasound appointment, which visibly confirmed what the blood had already declared. This pregnancy was not viable. I only made it 16 weeks.

What happened from there is a series of events and feelings that neither of us were prepared one iota for. Though I'd been warned by a friend that miscarriage was painful, NOTHING could prepare me for what was to come.

No one tells you this stuff - not even the people who have experienced it themselves. Why is that? Is miscarriage really that taboo? Why isn't this discussed more freely when you first learn of a pregnancy? After all, the statistics on miscarriage are pretty high...something like 20% of women experience at least one in their child-bearing years. So why wouldn't the positive pregnancy test come with a pamphlet/disclaimer providing information about the possibilities...ALL of them, good or bad? I mean McDonald's has to put "Contents are HOT!" on their coffee cups and blow dryers have to have tags on them not only warning of the danger in blow drying your hair while taking a bubble bath, but also illustrating it for you! Why in the world, can't preggos get a disclaimer, too, for crying out loud??? Something that warns "This may not work out and here's what you can expect...." All I got was a supply of prenatal vitamins, a booklet on healthy eating while preggo, and some coupons for diapers. Some insider information would have been preferred.

Putting together scant info from the doctor and research online, I've learned this much:

According to the ultrasound, I suffered a spontaneous abortion. And it more than likely occurred around week 9, unbeknownst to me (and my doctor at my 12 week appointment, I might add). This is what I've since learned qualifies as a "missed miscarriage" - the end of a pregnancy that goes completely unnoticed because signs or symptoms are significantly delayed. My symptoms were nearly 2 months delayed. What is even more perplexing is the fact that I spent those 2 months still throwing up in the mornings and any time I went more than 4 hours without eating. Or when I brushed my teeth. Or when I smelled something foul. You get the idea. In addition to the barfing, I was growing (even bigger) boobs, seeing bright blue veins pop up throughout my torso, growing fur in places that were previously (and thankfully) bald (my husband and I both now have goatees), crying at any commercial that involved an animal, and the list goes on. For someone who has never been pregnant before, you would've been hardpressed to convince me that I wasn't with child up to the point of bleeding. The only sign of pregnancy which eluded me at that time was weight gain. Though my figure was shifting greatly, the numbers on the scale were not. I might have gained 1-2 pounds, but I could gain that just looking at a chocolate cheesecake! Big whoop.

Strangely enough in my case, despite that the fetus abruptly stopped developing, the gestational sac, placenta, yolk sac, etc. kept right on track preparing for a baby, which is probably the cause for the continued hormonal flow and pregnancy symptoms which deceived me.

After the negative ultrasound, we met with the doctor to discuss options. He said that I could pass things naturally or I could schedule a D&C suction (dilation and curettage named for the 2 steps in the procedure....first they dilate the cervix, then they scrape its' contents with a tool called a curette...something else I learned after the fact). The word "suction" alone scared the bejeezus out of me, but I was also too ignorant to fully understand the details of option A or option B, and too overwhelmed to ask for clarification. The entire conversation lasted no more than 5 minutes. I opted to go home and sleep on it/pray on it. Two days later, I called to schedule the D&C, but it would have to wait until the following week, when I could fit it into my work schedule and my husband would be off work to hold my nervous hand.

For 5 days following the ultrasound I cramped severely and bled just the same. In my naivete, I thought this was nothing more than the natural (and entire) process of miscarriage.

Boy, was I wrong.

On the 6th day, as I sat on the couch watching movies with my husband, the cramping intensified. He was the first to notice that the pain followed a pattern and began timing me. Sure enough, my cramps were 2 minutes apart. After 4 hours of timing them with little to no change in severity, we opted to go lie down and try to get some rest. That plan worked for all of 15 minutes. We had both just gotten comfortable enough in bed to stop tossing and turning when I bolted upright and jumped out of bed.

My water had broken. And even though I knew nothing "bout birthin' babies", I recognized this sensation instantly. I've pee'd on myself before in fits of laughter, and trust me, it's not the same. For once, my pea-sized bladder was totally innocent.

No one told me that miscarriage would be much like childbirth...not even my doctor. And why or how would I know any better? I've never done this before. Why on earth would you expect to have that happen at only 16 weeks? And for there to be so much amniotic fluid already? My husband and I both were in disbelief.

And the pain! Oh dear heavens.....my hat's off to any/every mother out there who labored with no pain meds. My poor mom delivered all 8 lbs. 8 oz. of me as I arrived in this world butt first and doubled over! With no pain meds. Nada. Zilch. The woman deserves a Nobel Peace Prize for not killing everyone near her in those moments.

Water broken and bed sheets soaked, I quickly ran to the shower with a husband on my heels. What followed was frightening, emotional and much bloodier than I would have imagined. Suffice it to say that I sat in the tub for another 2 hours bleeding, contracting, and pushing what I could out of me. And he never left my side.

The look in my husband's eyes was absolutely painful. It was the look of a helpless person, which was a new look for him. He's a phenomenal nurse and can multitask like no other, so he certainly isn't unaccustomed to blood and gore. If you're in a crisis, he's the man you want beside you because he maintains his cool and his focus the whole while. Years of working as an ER nurse, medevac flight nurse, and hospital supervisor can do that to a person.

That evening...or early morning, I should say, he ran circles around me running warm water over my back, rubbing my shoulders, holding my hair, changing out the trash can that I kept vomiting into, getting cool cloths for my forehead. At one point, he even lit a candle and put it on the tub beside me! I guess he thought it an appropriate time for mood lighting?! But in actuality, it was nothing more than the effort of a partner to do something - ANYthing - that might help. And his support in that moment has only made me love him infinitely more than I did before.

What I was most pleasantly surprised to learn during this time was that we both maintained our sense of humor. Not once did we "lose it" and snap on each other. Instead, we cracked a couple jokes. Sounds crazy, I know, but the saying that "laughter is the best medicine" couldn't be more truthful. And laughter would be the only medicine I got in those 8 hours of contracting.

Despite the fact that I'd managed to evacuate the majority of the contents of my uterus on my own, the bleeding didn't stop and the vomiting only worsened, so my 24/7 nurse carted me off to the ER. Once there (after driving through ridiculous fog), I was met with several probes "down there", more contractions, lots of needle sticks (they couldn't get an IV started on me because my veins kept blowing, more than likely due to the loss of blood and dehydration) and thankfully some pain medication. Luckily, the OBGYN doc on call was fantastic and squeezed me into the OR for a D&C only a few hours later. Every professional that I came into contact with that day was kind, understanding of our circumstances, and informative - I learned more on this occasion than I did during the 16 weeks of pregnancy before.

And then it was over. I got to come home that afternoon. My husband and I laid down together after being awake for 36 hours and stared at the ceiling. Neither of us had ever been through something like this. Neither of us knew what to do or what to say. What I couldn't understand was how something that was initially so difficult to grasp could simultaneously be so difficult to let go. But as we both laid there exhausted in every sense of the word, I knew one thing was certain: I wouldn't want to go through something like this with anyone else.

I have always prayed. I have always had daily conversations with God. But my prayer time has steadily increased during pregnancy. My repeated prayer from the moment I first learned I was expecting was for this pregnancy to enhance my family, rather than take away from it, and to also have a healthy child. So, if strengthening my marriage is the purpose that this brief pregnancy served, and a difficult life was spared, then I consider it an answered prayer. And I'm okay with that.

Or at least I will be. One day.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Toddler training courtesy of Miss Oink

When I first learned that I was pregnant I was terrified - well, to be honest, I still am, but I've got a better grip on it now. Not only was I certain that I have NO idea how to care for an infant, but I was sure that the discomforts of pregnancy and challenges of infancy wouldn't initially go over well with a whiner and control freak like myself.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no baby hater. I love the way they smell (with a clean diaper mind you), but they seem so complicated when shouldn't it be the exact opposite? There's no teenage crush to talk them out of, allowance to negotiate, chores to remind of, or arguments about the importance of hygiene. It's feed them, burp them, rock them, lay them down to sleep, change them aaaaand repeat. Seems simple enough, though surely exhausting. But the difficulty comes in the communication gap. They can't tell you what's wrong with them when they're screaming their heads off, which is exactly why they terrify me so. It's a guessing game filled with trial and error efforts to find the magic formula/motion/outfit/pacifier/lullaby/back rub/clean diaper that fits the bill and shuts the pie hole. Or that's how I imagine it to be anyway. I've never done this before and acknowledge that I am no expert on the subject.

The silver lining that has guided me through these last few months has been the reminder that pregnancy and infancy are temporary. I get very enthusiastic thinking of the fun to be had with a walking, talking toddler and beyond (minus the teenager part). I want desperately to teach my kid how to "potty" and wash their own hair, tie their shoes, read, write their name in cursive, ride a bike, throw a ball, be a friend, show compassion to people and animals, never give up, etc. I have catalogued ideas for fun activities for a boy or girl for years and stashed them in the corner of my brain for later reference like many women buy baby outfits and hide in a hope chest.

But that silver lining I've relied on got a serious reality check this past weekend when my family and I fostered a miniature pot bellied pig. Oy! Or, Oink, I should say!

That little pig hand delivered a wake up call regarding the challenges that lie ahead for me as a parent at any stage...not just infancy!

Miss Oink, previously known as "Respusha", was a gag birthday gift bought for a friend, by another friend. My husband and I were let in on the gag and being the animal lover that I am, I said that I'd be glad to take the pig off their hands if the gag lost its' luster over time.  I may sound crazy....I'll give you that, but come on, who could deny this sweet, pudgy oink?



I have begged my husband since we bought our house and accompanying 4.5 acres to let me have some farm critters. I thought a pig was a fitting start to my collection.

Wrong, wrong, and WRONG!

Miss Oink was approximately 10 pounds of screaming, snorting, running, misbehaving, demanding furry beast. A friend made the comparison between Miss Oink and a toddler, and after further thought, I couldn't agree with her more.

Like a toddler, Miss Oink could walk on her own. And doggone it if she couldn't run, too - and FAST! Those four stubby little legs beat my arse and my husband's as we chased her through our front yard on the first night that she arrived and then escaped her leash. The only way we were able to catch her is because we got her cornered on the front porch and attacked quickly. We threw a towel over her and snatched her up, squeezing and holding on to her as she kicked and screamed bloody murder all the while.

Incidentally, I drew inspiration for Miss Oink's capture after I saw a mom do the same thing to her lollipop-fueled 2 year old in Winn Dixie. He was throwing his shoes at the produce and before he even realized what was going on, his mom had acted. I watched that mom very carefully as she wrapped her son up in a pro wrestling move/chicken wing and secured his tail in the front seat of the shopping cart. She was smooth. She didn't lose her cool once. She simply swooped in and handled business, or "bidness" as I like to say. I made a point to look down at my belly and issue a verbal warning to my own nugget: "Throw tantrums if you like, little one, but trust me, your mother here can out do you."

After her first stint as a free agent, Miss Oink backed out of her leash once again (shouldn't I have learned by now?) when out for a potty break. What ensued was a 2 hour marathon of chasing her through the yard, cornering her in brush, trying to lure her with food, and chasing her some more. Somehow, our two dogs also joined the party and began chasing her through the yard. It was chaos. Eventually Miss Oink was cornered in the crawl space beneath an old house on our property. Though I initally refused to go spelunking to retrieve the critter, my conscience got the better of me.  So I adapted Miss Winn Dixie's strategy of shock-and-awe....only this time, I brought tools.




And it worked! Me + headlamp + mask + safety glasses + gloves + shock and awe technique = One caught pig.



Also true with toddlers - sometimes the only advantage you have is size and resource. Those 2 things are the only reason we were able to capture that pig. Pigs are ranked the 4th smartest animal behind primates, whales and dolphins. With those smarts and some more meat on her bones, Miss Oink could dominate. It became very clear to my husband and I as we slowly approached her ready for capture that if she were another 100 lbs, we'd be in serious trouble. She assumed her charging stance and snorting glare and dared us to come closer. Thankfully, we won that struggle, but it can't be said that Miss Oink didn't put up a valiant fight - much like that Winn Dixie 2 year old. They both protested adamantly, but eventually tired from the screaming.

Like most toddlers, Miss Oink could feed herself. She just made a mess.....which I cleaned up....repeatedly. She would root through her box with her nose and intentionally knock her water bowl over so that I had to clean and refill, clean and refill, yada yada yada. It was a game that she thoroughly enjoyed, and a cycle I couldn't seem to shake. I felt like I had to clean up after her no matter how many times I was rewinding myself and telling myself that I was only reinforcing her negative behavior....I kept doing it....and so did she.

And the last comparison I could find between Miss Oink and toddlers is their demanding nature. I made the grave error of introducing this pesky piglet to raisins in hopes of training her to sit and rewarding her for "pottying" in the appropriate spot outside. That plan backfired - big time. Not only did she not grasp the fact that the raisin came each time she did something positive, but she just shut down and refused to do anything until she got a raisin. Then she refused to eat anything other than raisins. No pig feed. No carrots or cabbage, despite gobbling them down the night before. Only raisins. And like many parents of toddlers (and swine) before me, I caved from pure exhaustion. I kept raisins in my pockets and issued them at the first squeal.



So, my newly revised silver lining is simply this: There will be tough times when I have no clue what I'm doing, but it will also be an adventure and an opportunity to learn, both of which I love.

And it's a good thing I enjoy learning, because I'm going to have to learn A LOT. I seriously doubt the family who adopted Miss Oink from us will be interested in taking on a miniature pot-bellied human, too.

Monday, January 16, 2012

To sex, or not to sex?

Shame on you! Get your mind out of the gutter.

That's not what I mean by that question. I'm simply wondering whether or not we should find out the gender of this baby.

In the past, I always thought I'd prefer to be surprised at childbirth. But I also said I'd never ride a motorcycle, date a man who wore jewelry, or live in Alabama. Never say never, right?!

Take a look at me now!



It's hard to tell, but my husband (fiance at the time of this photo) is wearing a silver chain around his neck that he still wears and refuses to take off for any occasion. He's actually sitting on the same bike that we rode on our first date. We've since added two more Harleys to the collection - one of which was a wedding gift for me. And we now are proud homeowners in the sticks of Alabama! In my defense, it's hard to argue with lower property taxes and plenty of land.

Here's the house:


Not bad for 'bama, huh?

And here's me riding the wedding gift:



So, my point is this: The only constant in life is change and that's true for preferences as well. 

What makes this gender debate a more difficult dilemma for me is that this will be my only child.

 "Sure!" and "Yeah right. You say that now." Is what I hear a lot of people tell me, but rest assured, this is it. One time. Done. Finito. No mas.

Because my husband was previously married and already had two children (who were 3 and 9 years old when I first met them), asking to double his brood was a bit much. And considering that I spend all day every day with children, my previous dream of having 3 - 4 kids was quickly readjusting itself. Those buggers are a lot of work and ridiculously expensive! Add to this the fact that there is a 12 year age gap between my husband and myself. He's no spring chicken (despite acting like one) and understandably doesn't want to be a grandfather before he fathers his last child. So, we made a compromise that we both could live with: We'd only have 1 child of our own and blend our family of 5 as best we could. 

So this is my one shot and I'm left with this question.

To sex, or not to sex? To be surprised? Or not? On the one hand, a surprise could be pretty cool (unless it's a boy, in which case my bonus daughter will be devastated and probably suggest sending it back from whence it came). On the other, knowing the gender would lend itself for better shopping and name selection. What to do?

I recall having to sex fruit flies (aka Drosophila melanogaster....don't be too impressed - it's the ONLY thing I remember from that dang class) in freshman year genetics at Furman. I found the task not only quite tedious, but very boring. Though admittedly, how excited can you be when you have to wake up at the butt crack of dawn every morning, including weekends, and schlep yourself all the way across campus simply to check out some fly crotches? Not very, as I learned. I hated doing it, but understood it was a requirement for class, so there I was in the lab each morning at 6:30. The purpose was to isolate males from females so as to selectively mate them for certain traits and watch the passage of genes from parent to offspring....blah blah blah. But sexing those little bugs left me feeling like I was violating them somehow. You wouldn't just pick up a human, or really any other animal unless you're a veterinarian, and spread their legs apart so that you could identify them by their nether-parts would you?? It's just rude. Not only that, but I had to sedate them before I could put them on the slide and then zoom in on their junk with the microscope. Not cool. That'd be considered lewd and lascivious in the human world - that or a really bad first date. 

So I made a point to at least knock on the glass jar that held them as a warning that an invasion was ahead. It was the least I could do.

I should probably find some way to warn this kid, too.   

Saturday, January 14, 2012

What just crawled in my mouth and died?!

If you're a fan of fishing (especially catfish) then perhaps you've heard of Catfish Charlie. It's a type of bait used for catfish that comes in little red, doughy balls. And it smells like death! My husband bought two packages years ago and brought them home before a fishing trip. One of those packages - though opened - didn't get used, got tossed into the back of our pantry, and forgotten about. Trouble is, we have a 110 lb. bloodhound named Moonshine who didn't forget about the Catfish Charlie. Elephants never forget....and we've since learned that Moo's don't either.

Poor Moo's nose kept luring her near our pantry for weeks. We'd find her pawing at the bi-fold pantry doors with her neck craned and head glued to the floor trying to catch the scent of deliciousness wafting from beneath. I assumed her goal was peanut butter - a global weakness for pups, but especially a pup with a pro sniffer like her. So I moved it to a higher shelf. Why was this necessary, you may ask? That's because we had come home months before to find the pantry doors cracked open and a JIF jar with lid and peanut butter MIA. We still haven't figured out how something with non-opposable thumbs managed to get the lid off the jar, let alone get the bi-fold doors open, locate her desired snack and remove it from the shelf. My husband thinks she secretly knows how to use his tools. I personally think she's a Houdini. Either way somehow she figured it out and the evidence was all over her paws and face. Check out Moo in action with peanut butter:



I promise I'm getting to my point.......I came home from work one afternoon, opened the door and was slapped in the face with some serious foulness. The pantry was open again, this time with the Catfish Charlie bag in shreds, and red giblets of smelly dough smashed into the kitchen tiles. It was wretched, with an emphasis on wretch. Our whole house smelled like Catfish Charlie. It took 2 hours of cleaning and mopping, plus a whole can of Febreze to get things to a tolerable level, not to mention the time I spent trying to scrub the stuff out of Moo's fur and brushing her teeth. No amount of shampoo and toothpaste could eliminate that rotting flesh smell. Her breath smelled like death for DAYS.

Meet the culprits!

Suspect #1 - Moonshine



Suspect #2 - Catfish Charlie


And here's how years later, this all ties to the growing lump in my uterus........since week 6, I have been left with a horrible taste in my mouth all the time. It tastes like something crawled in my mouth and died! It tastes like Catfish Charlie - or at least what I imagine it would taste like. My husband insists that my breath doesn't smell like Moonshine's did, which is a great relief. I'm glad to know I'm not single-handedly burning the nose hairs of everyone around me. But this reassurance does nothing to kill the taste.

The only time it backs off is the first 10 minutes or so after brushing my teeth, which I do - A LOT. And for some unknown reason, pregnant women all over will tell you that brushing their teeth is risky business. It doesn't matter if you're delicately brushing your canines in that prescribed circular motion or scrubbing the back of your tongue like you mean business, YOU ARE GOING TO GAG! So it's a delightful vicious cycle of barfing and brushing.

And Charlie still comes back.

At least I won't get scurvy

They say you can't compare apples to oranges. That may be true, but it hasn't much concerned me for the last 3 months as I've not been in a discriminating mood with either. I just want to eat them. All of them.

These little flavorful fruits have proven themselves full of many benefits such as:

-easy to conceal up to 6 in your purse for when your stomach opens up like the continental divide
-not as smelly as warming up some frozen entree at work, and smells can be quite bothersome at this stage
-you can sneak quick bites of them in a bar (when you're playing DD of course) without anyone noticing and looking at you strangely
-craving salt? stick some peanut butter on that apple! craving sweet? stick some caramel dip on it!
-no one ever looks like a pig eating an apple or orange
-think of all the vitamins!
-great snack between meals to keep nausea at bay
-crunching on that apple burns calories, though I'm concerned about TMJ lately - my jaws are getting sore from all the chewing
- you can eat apples and oranges in places that don't allow food much more easily than pulling out a hamburger with fries
-you can throw the trash out your car window without threat of littering fines
-no one ever says to you, "I think you've had enough apples and oranges for one day." - you're never cut off from the fruit bar so to speak
-think of the immunity boost from all the vitamin c! lord knows you need it, because you dang sure can't take any medicine to treat ANYTHING while preggo

I have become so reliant on apples and oranges that I make sure to have them handy any time I visit a grocery store (pray that I don't get mistakenly arrested for shoplifting fruit). A recent walk past the meat counter of Fresh Market left my senses assaulted - and seriously questioning the freshness of said market. The only thing that kept me from losing it in the store was to stick a fresh peeled orange in my face and carry it with me through the store as if I was wearing a mask to ward off the bird flu.

I may have looked like a crazy lady, but I'm sure it won't be the last time in the next 6 months that people think that of me. Crazy or not, at least I won't get scurvy....or bird flu.

Friday, January 13, 2012

Would you rather ________ or ________?

As a teenager growing up in an average size southern town, with less than average excitement, my friends and I found ourselves creating our own entertainment. We did a fair amount of building bonfires in open pastures, fishing, shooting aluminum cans with .22's, playing hide-and-go-seek in the woods on mules (the motorized kind), dressing up in random outfits and driving around town pretending to be foreigners....you get the idea. When topics of conversation and gossip ran dry we'd sometimes turn to a game of "Would you rather?"

The concept is very simple and there's no real winner (kinda like truth or dare)...provide two scenarios for the interviewee and they must choose one or the other - no in-betweens allowed. For example, "Would you rather drink urine or eat cow poo?" Some questions were more benign, such as "Would you rather swim in gummy bears or Skittles?" Easy enough.

Three weeks into what I consider to be profound morning sickness (though admittedly, I have no base of comparison), I found myself lying in bed playing this game all alone. Only this time it centered on which items I would rather vomit. Gross, I know, but true. Here are a few that crossed my mind:

-Would I rather vomit rice? Or oranges?

Tough call, but I'm going with oranges. True, they're more acidic, but they're much easier to blow out of your nose once you've vomited through it. Rice just gets stuck and leaves you feeling like you inhaled a bug. Trust me.

-Would I rather barf milk? Or red jello?

Hmmmmm.......milk, I think. Though milk tastes particularly foul coming up, jello is a giant pain-in-the-arse to clean up. I had no idea just how tenacious red gelatin could be until I had to scrub it from the walls, floor, and toilet of the faculty bathroom at work lest anyone should enter it and fear a dead body had just been dragged from a murder scene. That stuff stains something fierce.

-Would I rather yak spaghetti? Or granola?

Hands down granola! Though it can get stuck in your throat, granola doesn't come up looking much like it did when it went down. Spaghetti does, which is gross enough to make you even more sick. Take my word on this one.

I could keep going with questions considering I've spent weeks 5 to present (which is 15) sick and sampled anything that didn't sample me first in effort to find the magic/pallatable combo, but I'm growing nauseous as I type.

Perhaps the toughest "Would you rather?" is inherent to morning sickness itself: Would you rather feel sick all the time, but never barf? Or feel sick at random and get some relief after puking?

I most certainly can't answer that one. Both are miserable. I pray that this game disappears entirely from my list of activities very soon.

Heeeere's your sign!




If you're a fan of comedy, then surely you've heard of Bill Engvall. If you're a southerner, then you can probably relate to his sketch on identifying idiots called "Here's your sign". Being from Georgia and now living in Alabama, I run into specimens I would swear were his inspiration on a daily basis.
But I must admit, I found myself deserving a sign of my own after learning I was pregnant.

I first found out when I was almost 5 weeks along and quite sincerely had no idea, which is a little bit better than those chicks on the Discovery channel claiming they didn't know they were pregnant 'til the kid called them by name. After the urine and blood tests told me as much though, my hindsight kicked it up a notch and I recalled a number of symptoms that should have tipped me off sooner:

Here's your sign #1 - I threw up randomly while driving down the street one day. And I mean random - without the mouth-watering notice that typically affords you enough time to run for the bathroom or find something to barf in. I attributed it to the fact that I had started exercising and had changed my diet drastically, not realizing that this was the first clue that I my eggo was preggo.

#2 - My hands and feet itched like crazy - maybe ka-razzzzy is a better descriptor because they felt like they were on fire and no amount of scratching or running them under cold water quelled it. Turns out this is a side effect of pregnancy that my older sister also experienced. I attributed it to the fact that I had started jogging and training for a 5k and my hands and feet were simply swelling after exercise. Here's me at my first 5k and unknowingly about 2 weeks preggo:



#3 - I got raging heartburn a couple of times after eating meat, which was completely foreign to a carnivore like me. There again, I blamed it on the change in diet and the fact that I'd cut down on my meat consumption significantly.

#4 - I woke up three nights in a row at 2:00 am from a dead sleep feeling like there was a bottomless pit in my stomach that had to be filled. I wasn't ambitious enough to get out of bed and fill said hole, so I just drank some water from the bedside and went back to sleep. Though it was puzzling, I assumed that my training and diet had just increased my metabolism (I'd lost 15 pounds in one month!). I resolved to start eating breakfast earlier in the day and that seemed to make the late night growling disappear.

#5 - My period, which traditionally arrived every 22nd day was a no show on its' ETA. My deluded self thought this simply meant that diet and exercise were the missing ingredients to a routine 28-30 day cycle. I even saw my skin improve with the new regimen, which was previously giving me routine breakouts.

What an idiot!
Heeeere's your sign!

Are you sure admission isn't required for this ride?

I love roller coasters - the loops and quick turns, even changing directions is exhilirating. Odd for a person prone to motion sickness, but true nonetheless. This ride I've been on lately is something altogether different though and leaves me feeling like I should've paid admission ahead of time.

What should have been a routine appointment with my OBGYN turned into something else. First, I was scolded for not having visited in the last 2 1/2 years, but then the discussion took a turn I wasn't prepared for. I reported having irregular cycles - every 21 days and lasting 7-9 days to be exact - and severe cramping. This inconvenience had just become the norm for me, but when I reported it to my doctor, he acted like it was more than just a nuisance. He asked about birth control. Nope. Hadn't used it in a couple years. He asked about pregnancies. Nope. Hadn't had that happen either.  He asked a series of other questions I can't recall and then mentioned "infertility". That was the first loop on the ride.

All I could think was "WTH??!! I'm only 29! How in the world could my eggs be rotten already?" I had always planned to be a mom someday, I just didn't know when. Did I totally miss the bus?

I went home from that visit with a tiny appointment card for further testing and a big feeling of failure. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I had always worried that I wouldn't be able to conceive children, though I have no idea where or why this thought originated. I'd never really given my uterus the chance to prove its worth because I'd taken birth control for so long in the past.

That evening I went for a run and made the decision that I wasn't going to punish myself or anyone else if having a biological child wasn't in my cards. I'd do the testing, but I wasn't interested in going to any heroic lengths to conceive. I was a bonus mom to two great kids already. And I had the pleasure of watching 500 kids grow each year- I swear I'm not a stalker or pedophile.....just a school counselor. A mom isn't necessarily someone who gives birth, right? I was reminded of a quote that I keep on my desk: "The mark of a true family is not one of blood, but of joy and respect in each other's lives." And it comforted me knowing that regardless of what my ovaries were producing, I was still capable of leaving people, children in particular, feeling welcome, safe and loved whenever they left my presence - and that's what being a mom is all about in my opinion. My own mother perfected the craft. And father. I won the parent lottery.

Fast forward two weeks and I'm going for testing. (Here comes loop #2) Through blood and urine screenings that were apparently of different design than those I did previously, I learn that I'm pregnant. No kidding? Me? The gal with the faulty reproductive system and wonky periods? Me? Are you sure???

Yep. She was sure all right. Apparently the plus sign is all knowing. Turns out, I was almost 5 weeks along and didn't even know. After crying my eyes out due to the impending embarassment I was sure to face from losing a bet and having to call my husband "Super Sperm", the nurse congratulated me with a hug, another tiny appointment card for an ultrasound in two more weeks (that seems to be the magic number doesn't it?), and a big bag of baby paraphernalia.  But my favorite souvenir from that visit is a note that she wrote for my husband. Check it out!


Loop #3 came (true to form) two weeks later at my first ultrasound. Having just wrapped my head around the fact that my pipes and his boys were actually compatible, it was a bit of a blow to see that there was no heartbeat. And there should have been. The embryo was measuring nearly 7 weeks in size, and heartbeats are detectible from 5-6 weeks. The poor ultrasound tech didn't want to tell us. She printed off the picture with a forced smile on her face and asked us to wait in the lobby. Then she asked us to follow her downstairs to my OB's office. The whole while - even pre-picture printing - I knew something was wrong and kept insisting as much, but my husband refused to believe. He is typically the cynic among us, so to see his assured positivity could be considered loop #4 - but a good one, of course. He insisted that the tech wouldn't print a picture for us if the pregnancy were not viable. Downstairs, he was proven incorrect. My OB explained that there wasn't a heartbeat, which was not a great sign, and I could expect bleeding and more than likely the need for a D&C. Though he wasn't optimistic, he wasn't giving up 100% on the pregnancy and insisted that another ultrasound be done before the procedure to make sure.

I dreaded that follow up appointment. I was thoroughly convinced that I needed to be braced for bad news - no heartbeat and being shipped off for a painful procedure. Then the little bugger threw me for loop #5 and proved himself to be a member of the family he is entering. This human apparently does things only when he gets darn well good and ready.Within seconds of appearing on the screen, the flutter of a heartbeat was as plain as day. We could even see the spine!

It's a good thing, too. He (or she) is going to need a steady beat and solid backbone to survive the four of us.

Thursday, January 12, 2012

"Here I come to save the day!"

Mighty Mouse sang those words, didn't he? He wore a cape, too, right? That caped vermin is the image that popped into my head when I saw a faint plus sign appear on the pee stick. Strange association to make at such a crucial moment, which probably leaves you asking "Why are you thinking of outdated cartoon characters?" That would be because my 40-something-going-on-19-year-old husband (who is a nurse by trade and clown by habit) had reassured me time and time again that his "boys" could do the job. He thoroughly believed (and still does incidentally) that his sperm were super hero strength, even suggesting at one point that they carried side arms to blast anything that obstructed their path to victory.

Though we weren't trying to conceive, we weren't diligently trying not to either. And we hadn't been for quite some time - at least 2 years. The fact that this modus operandi hadn't resulted in any screaming, crying, smelly humans left me a little concerned that my plumbing was not up to snuff, especially since he was so confident that his was. He had such faith in his "boys", in fact, that we made a bet....and I'm not one to wager. The terms were simple: If I got pregnant I had to refer to him on all occasions, in all places as "Super Sperm". If I didn't get knocked up then he had to say those four dreaded words - "You are right, dear." Seemed fair enough. I risked the possibility of embarassment from saying the word "sperm" in public, and he had to eat crow. Given our history, I knew I'd win.

That darn plus sign blew it for me though. Guess I better find him a cape.