humpday happiness

Things making me happy this week...

...a good doctor appointment yesterday in which I found out my baby is doing great.
...an ultrasound appointment tomorrow. Yay for new pictures!
...the cold weather only making a very temporary disappearance.
...getting packed up to move.
...spending the entire day yesterday with my husband and having a really great time not accomplishing very much.
...homemade biscuits, even if Bisquick was involved.
...getting surprise Christmas cards in the mail.
...a sister-in-law who believes in giving us treats for no real reason.
...an entire box of peppermint bark all to myself unless I choose to share it.
...triple filtered water from Starbucks.
...sparkling mineral water, especially that which comes with a twist of lime.
...blogging.
...a good bed to snuggle down into.
...random Mary Kay sales opportunities.
...good chats at a pool hall on a Monday night that also qualify as a very cheap night out.
...pizza rolls.

25 weeks and 5 days

I really love my OB.

I got my positive home pregnancy test on a Friday night so on Monday morning, I called to make an appointment with a doctor. My new insurance covered my old OB/GYN, but she doesn't deliver at the hospital I now work at. The reason that's significant is because any hospital stay is just covered by my insurance. I only have to pay doctor fees. She also couldn't see me for several weeks and I had way too many questions to wait that long! I hopped on my insurance's web site and called the first doctor that popped up and she could see me a couple of days later.

I went to that appointment and just didn't have a good feeling about the office or the doctor. They had just moved the office and hadn't updated the web site or with my insurance so it was difficult to find. Then the doctor was two hours late with no explanation. I understand things come up, but I think my time is valuable too and all I want is a brief explanation and maybe an apology. Then the exam was just kind of not as private as I would have liked it to be. I thought about it for a couple of days and realized I was in complete control of who my doctor was. I went back to the insurance web site and found another office. I liked it better immediately because it was a group of doctors and midwives and not just one practitioner. There was an after hours number and it just felt better somehow. I called and made an appointment with the first available doctor.

She's from here and moved away for awhile and had just come back. So I am one of her first from the beginning patients and I just think she's fantastic. She's very down to earth and easy to talk to and amazingly helpful. She talks to me like I'm a real person and I feel like we could go have a drink and it totally wouldn't be weird. Ki really likes her too and I think that's important.

At my last appointment she started it off by saying "Hey McNeil, do you think I could put a bunch of Georgia O'Keefe paintings in my office or is that weird or cliche since they all look like vaginas?" I personally think that would be kind of awesome because who would say anything? And if anyone is going to have a bunch of paintings in their office of flowers that kind of look like vaginas, an OB/GYN should be it I think.

Anyway, today I thought I was doing a glucose tolerance test for gestational diabetes. It's pretty common in pregnancy and as far as I know not something you can really prevent exactly. Sometimes the extra hormones in your body trick your pancreas into not working correctly and you have to make diet changes and maybe take insulin to correct it. You drink this super sweet concoction and hang out for an hour and get blood drawn. If your levels are in a certain high range, you then do another test that is three hours long. If I have gestational diabetes, I'm okay with that. It could be a good opportunity to set up some really good healthy eating habits. Mostly I just don't want to have to sit in the lobby for THREE HOURS.

My doctor likes to do this test at 26 weeks. Today I am 25 weeks and 5 days. So, no dice which is kind of hysterical. But also a bit awesome because they just gave me the drink to take home and I can drink it and then hang out at home and go to the office to get my blood drawn instead of hanging out in the lobby for an hour. Friday it is!

I gained no weight so my total for the duration of the pregnancy is 4 pounds. The baby's heart beat is super strong and in the 140s. I can use a heating pad for my achy back which is awesome and I go back in two weeks! I have an appointment with the perinatologist on Thursday for an ultrasound so I'm looking forward to finding out how much the baby weighs. Four weeks ago it was 1 lb 5 oz and now I can actually see the baby moving sometimes, so I figure it's like 10 pounds. Just kidding. But since two days can make such a huge difference in glucose tolerance, four weeks is probably a pretty big deal in the size of the baby, right?

baby kicks

Last night I was laying in bed watching tv and I had my cell phone resting on my belly. The baby kicked hard enough that the phone slid onto the bed. For the next half hour, I just laid there watching my belly move all over with little Baby C kicks and jabs. It was really weird and completely amazing all at the same time.

I had coffee (well, I had water) with a good friend yesterday and we were talking about the big things in our lives at the moment. My default random thought position is firmly set on the baby. I feel bad sometimes because I'm not sure I can help talking about it constantly and it must be such a bore to people. For all the days of puking my ever loving guts out or crying so much I figure I'm dehydrated again, I think it's worth it. My head is in a different place and I like it. It's so scary to think about being responsible for teaching someone else about EVERYTHING, but at the same time I'm really excited.

I'm really not in control of this whole being pregnant/growing a baby thing. My body is doing something amazing and I'm along for the ride. I wonder what the baby is going to look like and what characteristics s/he'll share with Ki and me and what is going to come out of nowhere. I wonder if I'm going to be a good mom. I'm so excited to see Ki as a dad because he has been so great with my nieces and nephew and he has so many things in mind to share with our kid.

I am pro-choice because I don't think I or the government has the right to make that kind of decision for anyone. I would like for women to be able to get what ever kind of medical care they need without having to do it illegally and just because I wouldn't make a particular choice for myself doesn't mean I'm qualified to do that for anyone else. Don't even get me started on the difference in insurance coverage for birth control pills which are often prescribed for a multitude of reasons not involving not having babies and erectile dysfunction pills. With that said though, it has been very apparent to me from the first ultrasound that this is very much an entirely separate human being from me. I may be providing a place to grow and the nutrition to develop but I'm not really in control of movement or sleep schedule or anything like that.

I'm beginning to understand that saying that being a mother is like wearing your heart outside of your body. Not fully, but I get it a little better than I did in June.

fog

For the past month or so, I've been meeting my parents at church and then we've gone to get something to eat afterwards. We go to the early service which I kind of like because it's a capella music and the parking lot is not a mess yet. It's a ginourmous church. I wasn't sure if I'd really like it for a long term kind of deal but I knew if I was going to start going to church again I needed to be able to meet someone there in order for me to actually get there. I have really enjoyed going though and think I'll just keep attending this particular church. God has met me in that place and brought some lessons straight to me and my life. I like feeling like I can hear God talking again.

Today, I went to leave and I was surprised by the fog that engulfed the apartment parking lot. It was misty and kind of magical but maybe not something everyone would feel comfortable driving in. I went ahead and left anyway, figuring that by the time I got gas, I would know if I was going to be comfortable driving to the church a few freeway exits away. I found something kind of startling. When I was looking ahead as far as I could normally see, things were pretty hazy. But I could see far enough to feel comfortable driving and it was like the fog dissipated as I drove. It was still foggy overall, but it seemed to clear up around my truck as I kept driving.

It feels like that's how my whole life is right now. If I try to look ahead to see as far as I can see, I can't see very far and it's a little unnerving. But I can see far enough to keep plodding along and as I take those steps the details all fill in and it's pretty okay.

God drives me crazy sometimes.

christmas memories

I have this lovely relative that I grew up thinking of as a cousin but I don't know if that's actually accurate. I get confused trying to figure out actual relationships sometimes because there were so many "aunts" and "uncles" and then of course their kids were my "cousins". We're related somehow or another but in any case, she is a really cool person. I wanted to be like her when I was a kid and as an adult, probably even more so. In any case, she's been posting Christmas memories in her blog and it has been fun to read. They of course stand on their own quite nicely but I can't ever hear someone else's memories of something like a holiday and not think of my own.

When I was a kid, we always did Christmas Eve with my mom's side of the family and Christmas Day with my dad's side.

Christmas Eve was ALWAYS a big hubub of a to do with my mom's siblings, my grandmother's siblings, great-grandparents, my mom's cousins, and a ton of kids. The tradition for the meal was to pick a theme of some sort and everyone contributed something. There is always a ridiculous amount of food when my family gets together, not necessarily for the need of having that much but to have that many choices of things. I remember Mexican food, Asian-ish food (my dad sat and made wonton until no one wanted to eat anymore), tritip and all the fixings, breakfast, and baked potatoes with every kind of topping you could ever imagine. Tons of people, tons of food, and a pretty much all day affair.

The pile of Christmas presents by the tree was more than any of us kids could bear to see without at least mentally sorting out in our heads. I never knew of an official time line for everything to happen. It seemed as if the adults knew precisely when the kids wouldn't be able to bear another minute of not being in the same room with all those glorious wrapped packages, and then it would be about another hour before any of them were opened. See, first everyone had to gather in the same room. Next was the reading and passing on of The Fish, Stella, and Santa Claus. Each of these is rotated every year to someone knew and that person must write a recap of the year and then read it Christmas Eve. The Fish is supposed to rhyme but the other two don't have to. I think The Fish is the oldest and it spans back to pages that are barely readable now. It's kind of a cool thing that everyone enjoys but everyone dreads having to write. After all three have been read and passed on to the next person, we would listen to Silent Night. It's a time to pause and reflect on the day, the past year, and the fact that you are literally surrounded by loving people. Christmas isn't supposed to be about the presents. When I was a teenager, my aunt added in the candles. Everyone gets a candle and the flame is passed around the circle until the room is lit up by candles alone. Several adults always cried and us kids tried to impress everyone by knowing every single word to every single verse of Silent Night. Then, presents! Hugs of gratitude, laughter, and just a generally loud good time. And, the first day rule. On the first day of a new present, you don't have to share with ANYONE. We have passed this rule on to many other families and still adhere to it this day.

Christmas Day varied a little more than Christmas Eve. We always spent it with my dad's parents and just depending on the year, my dad's brothers and families would be there as well. From my perspective, the relationships between my dad and his brothers and then all three of them with their parents are complicated enough that I stopped trying to understand when I was about twelve. Usually the food would be much more traditional Christmas fare like ham and green bean casserole and the like. My grandmother usually told the story about how one Christmas morning she made eggs benedict for everyone and used the scissors to mark the page and then completely forgot about them. She blamed my dad, the youngest of the three kids, for misplacing her scissors for an entire year until she went to make eggs benedict the next Christmas and found the missing scissors. We'd eat and do presents and have dessert. My grandmother made several kinds of cookies every year. I remember my favorite ones she ever made where biscotti and as I was on my third one she proclaimed she'd never make those boogers again because they were so labor intensive.

Inbetween, my parents and sister and I had our own little things we did. Santa Claus still comes for us even after the year when I was about 13 that my parents said Santa wasn't coming any more because the jig was so thoroughly up. I think it was that sometimes my sister and I would guess what we were getting from my parents but we never guessed what Santa was bringing. I think it's just kind of fun to do little presents like that too. Santa never brought us big stuff. My mom explained to me much later on that there was no way a mythical being was getting credit for the big stuff! For a few years, we had cream of wheat for breakfast which is kind of funny because my dad HATES it and I had no idea for the longest time.

One year, my sister and I had the idea to do Santa for my parents. We had gone to an evening church service that Christmas Eve and when my parents were in their room getting ready for bed, we quietly snuck back out to the living room and set up their stockings. We put fruit in their stockings the same way they always did for us and had a little pile of small gifts and candy for each of them. I think this was about 10 years ago and my mom only recently stopped talking about it. She cried when she saw their filled stockings and then cried in the morning when we woke up and cried every time she talked about it that year.

My dad's father died when I was 13 and we missed him when we went to spend the day with my grandmother. When she died several years later, I suggested we start a brand new family tradition. I thought it would be easier if it was just something completely different. That's how my parents, sister, and I started going to the movies on Christmas Day. We'd go to one of the first showings and then pretty much go home after that but it was a really fantastic way to spend part of the day.

This year is going to be great too, but in kind of a different way. Christmas Eve will be with my parents, sister and her family. Christmas Day will be with Ki's mom and his sister and her family. Ki and I decided that we want to go to the movies on Christmas Day before we go to his mom's house. We're brand new at this married thing and want to have our own little family traditions. I bet one of the grandmas will take care of Baby C next year if we decide to go to a morning movie again. :)

It's a lot of fun to think about how we're going to be creating memories like these for our kid. I would like to have some intentional things we do every year during the holiday season but I am also looking forward to hearing what Adult C remembers most of all later on.

food

I love me some food. That is why I am so overweight. Not because I have a thyroid problem, not because I don't understand the difference between healthy and non-healthy food, not because I abhor exercise, but because I like to eat. I like how things taste, I like cooking, I like sitting down with people and eating, drinking, and being merry. Food is good.

The only thing I do not like is bell peppers. It's the only thing I won't eat or just pick out of something in order to eat the rest of the dish. I think I have a good reason though, it makes me burp and gives me wicked heartburn. Since I already have acid reflux, why add to it knowingly? Quite honestly, out of all the food I've eaten and still want to try, I think it's pretty good that bell peppers are the only thing on the absolutely not list. Sashimi is on the "yum, let's get some!" list for heaven's sake!

This round of Top Chef captivated me. In the past I have watched the show before, but mostly in marathon spurts courtesy of Bravo's typical weekend schedule. This season though, I watched every episode as it aired and rooted for people and was summarily amazed by every quickfire competition. Sometimes it takes me several hours just to decide what to cook so there's really no way I could plate a complete dish and come up with whatever it was I wanted to cook within 20-30 minutes. A lot of the competitors either have their own restaurants or are the head chef at a restaurant. Two of the chefs that I decided I most wanted to actually try their food sometime made it to the final four so that was awesome. What wasn't awesome though? The way the producers clearly had a huge hand in who made it to the final four and then who actually won. I am disappointed with how un-realistic reality tv has become. Maybe reality tv never was really accurate in the first place and I'm just tired of trying to pretend I don't notice anymore.

I want to be a fantastic cook. I don't think I'll ever be Top Chef material or anything, but I would love to be asked to bring things to gatherings because everyone knows what a great cook I am. I have a few things I make really well, but I would like to get an entire meal on the table on a regular basis that was healthy and balanced but freaking delicious and the timing was right on all of the dishes. I want to eat well without breaking the bank and I would like for me and my husband to have a healthier diet just overall. Maybe I can save my kids the struggles I've had with weight and being healthy by teaching them from the get go that healthy does not mean pain in the ass.

Luckily I have gained a very small amount of weight with my pregnancy so far. I'm really glad about this because if it continues this way I should be able to go back to normal clothes pretty quickly. And then I can go ahead and undertake the enormous goal of getting down to a healthy weight. As much as I think the extra ultrasounds are cool because we get to see Baby C every four weeks, this many doctor appointments is a lot for anyone's schedule. And since my high risk pregnancy diagnosis is because of high blood pressure and being overweight, I have a really good shot at the next pregnancy not being high risk. The cardiologist I saw when I was diagnosed with high blood pressure said he highly suspected losing roughly 100 pounds would make my blood pressure go back down to normal. I'm not going to get into why that conversation was a few years ago and nothing changed because it's not going to help anyone.

I'm due at the end of March, so I figure I can go to Weight Watchers May 1 and just go balls to the wall. I have all the concepts down, but I need the weekly check in and support. I need to hear how other people are doing and get advice from them. Making suggestions of my own for things that work for me will help too and I want the 10% key chain too. I think most importantly though, I want to learn how to cook in a way that my husband will gobble up and not realize it was a healthy meal. I don't want to trick Ki, I want to prove that it's possible to eat at home, eat healthy food, and be satisfied. Also, he has really great tshirts that I want to wear.

This time next year, I will be able to borrow Ki's clothes. He said it was okay.

christmas

Christmas is my favorite holiday. The time of year is fantastic because it's typically all nice and cold outside and I kind of like it when it's gray for awhile. People are a tiny bit friendlier to each other (outside of duking it out over last minute Christmas presents at the mall) and there's lights everywhere! I heart stars and twinkle lights are like stars exploded everywhere. It just makes me happy. I wish windows and trees could be outlined in lights every day and not just for a month or so every year.

I really love getting stuff for people. I haven't really done this in the past few years because I barely have enough money to get all the bills paid and whatnot, but just know that I seriously love giving people really good gifts. Or nice surprises. I have kind of lost touch with this side of myself over the past couple of years and it's something I am looking forward to attempting to regain. Not so much the money as the actually just doing nice things for people. I need to come out from the little cave I've carved for myself.

Well, Ki and I are broke. I'd like to take a moment to say it really bugs me when someone says they don't have any money and then goes out shopping or eats out at a really nice restaurant. I realize it's none of my business and I don't know if maybe it was a gift or some other circumstances. But for the record, when I say I don't have any money I have less than $50 in my bank account and probably need two or three times that to pay bills and buy groceries.

My parents are paying our December bills as our Christmas present. We aren't doing a gift exchange at all with Ki's family this year. I told my sister to not get us a present because we can't afford to reciprocate. My local friends are not flush with funds either so we mutually agreed to skip presents this year and my not local friends and I don't really send presents. Except T, she is constantly mailing me stuff she thinks will brighten my day in some way or another but it rarely has anything do with a particular holiday or anything. Ki and I also decided to not do presents for each other this year. We're going to go out and do something special in January maybe. We'll see.

I'm not upset about not receiving presents. I feel awful about not being able to get anything for anyone though.

I saw a psychiatrist a month or so ago. My OB suggested I find someone to touch base with now in case things get worse for me mentally in a few months or I experience post partum depression because that way I wouldn't have to give the whole background story when I desperately needed intervention. It was an okay visit and the biggest piece of advice I took away from it was to think of things that I used to do before I got pregnant that made me happy. Or just made me not sad. I've been able to incorporate a few of them back into my day to day life, like reading books and writing more.

But when I think to myself "Who is Melissa?", that element of giving and doing nice things for people really used to be at my very core. That's what I was known for and I liked it because it was genuinely great to me to be able to make someone else smile. It's just an extra big bummer that I am not in a position to try to bring that back to life right now in the height of the giving season. It's not just the money. It's time and energy too.

I should definitely be packing right now and not typing and the real reason I'm avoiding it is because it makes me so darn tired. Baby C is wiggling and doing flips and roundhouse kicks the whole time I'm trying to decide if we really need to take all of our DVDs to my parent's house or not. All that physical activity burns my own energy out even though it's not really me doing all that moving.

I better knock out a couple of boxes at least before Ki gets home.

humpday happiness

Humpday is Wednesday because it's the middle of the week. I like to think of things making me happy at least once a week because I learned that song when I was a little kid called Count Your Blessings. For real it helps sometimes to just take a minute and realize everything is not the worst it could be. Anyway, don't expect a lot of context but feel free to ask if you're curious!

So this week's list of Humpday Happiness is as follows:

...my husband telling the baby for at least half an hour all the stuff he's going to do for him or her in the form of "Know who has two thumbs and is going to (fill in the blank)? This guy!"
...cold weather! I need to live in a place where this is only the beginning of the winter and not a freaky occurrence for a few weeks that has half the city's population grumpy.
...my hair finally growing! It's getting longer and it's ridiculously thick. I'm hoping that by the time the baby is born, it'll be long enough to pull it all back into a nice ponytail with no stragglers.
...having the same wedding band as my husband. It makes me smile every time I see "my" ring on his hand.
...a place to move to that will help us save money.
...text messages.
...my very wiggly little baby who clearly loves cranberry juice.
...reconnecting with people through Facebook.
...reading blogs.
...writing blogs.
...being able to find either Friends or Roseanne on tv almost every night.
...random phone conversations about nothing in particular.
...getting to see one of my first San Antonio friends again after a couple of years.
...the idea that you can build a bridge over troubled waters.
...jezebel.com
...feeling ridiculously comfortable in my own body, itchy stretch marks and all.
...making chocolate chip cookies made from scratch.
...eating chocolate chip cookies made from scratch.
...surprises in the mail.
...snuggling up in bed and reading a good book even if it's something I've read a hundred times already.
...forming a plan that gets me out of debt and a nice savings account all at the same time.
...Pepsi.

yes, it's another new blog from melissa

I started a blog to serve as a place for updates about me and Ki and also the baby, but I am having trouble finding a proper voice for it. I don't know if that makes sense outside of my own head, but what it ultimately means is I need another spot to post things and see what people think. Or maybe just post things and hopefully make someone else not feel so alone.

That's really what is at the crux of things for me these days. I'm pregnant, unemployed for all intents and purposes, have barely any energy at all for anything, and can't stop crying. Some of it is probably literal depression, some if it is lack of sleep, some of it is stress from money and some of it is me having no idea how to live up to my idea of what a wife and mother should be.

I positively KNOW I'm not the only one in the history of the world to be pregnant and it to not be very much fun. I've heard women complain about morning sickness, but I have not heard anyone talk about learning how to pee in a cup like a champ, out of control eyebrows, aching boobs, and the misery of trying to find a bra that will fit, be supportive, AND comfortable and then last for more than a month. Every time I see an ultrasound or even look at the pictures, it's all absolutely worth it. But it doesn't make it easier to find a sleeping position that both me and the baby like and also leaves room for my husband in the bed. It doesn't make the tears stop and as much as I love this little baby I would be really grateful if there was something to make my back stop hurting. It's not all awful. Feeling the baby move is pretty amazing and when I lay in bed next to Ki and he puts his hand on my belly and talks to the baby my heart feels like it's about to explode for lack of space to contain all the love I have for my family.

The whole job situation is rotten. I started working at this place at the beginning of summer. It's been kind of an interesting (not necessarily in a good way) set up from the very beginning. I basically like the job but the schedule is tough. It was all bearable until I got pregnant. This baby was a lovely surprise that promptly turned my world upside down. I know of pregnant women who work right up until the day they go into labor. This has not been my experience. Morning sickness isn't the right phrase to accurately describe throwing up every time you lift your head up from the pillow. I literally have a favorite bathroom in the work place to go to in order to throw up because it makes clean up and embarrassing accidents easy to avoid. I am so overemotional that one day I was sent home from work because I could not stop crying and also could not say why I had started or what I could do to make it stop. Since I've only worked there a matter of months, I am not covered under FMLA and absences have not been forgiven. Apparently it was either be put on leave or be fired but I'm still trying to get it all sorted out. Although I am glad to not have to go to work, we were barely making ends meet before.

So, Ki and I are moving into my parent's house. It's incredibly gracious and generous of them and I think it will be a set up that all of use finds to be just fine. They have a big house and the layout is really conducive to Ki and I keeping to ourselves if we want to. When the baby joins us, midnight feedings won't wake anyone but us because our rooms are literally on the other side of the house from my parent's bedroom. It's probably the ideal set up for the unideal situation. I don't think anyone really wants to move back in with their parents, but I'm really thankful we have the option and could take advantage of it before slipping into dire straits. We already have solid moving help confirmed and it's all going to be okay. I just feel a little like a failure as a wife and mother. I can't help but think we should be able to do this on our own.

The friends I've grown up with have done it on their own. I feel so far away from them now though. I thought getting married and having a baby would bring me back to their area, but I guess too many years have gone by. It's not a completely awful thing, but when you're in high school and you pledge to be friends forever no matter what and no matter where you are, it's kind of sad to realize that through the fault of no one in particular, it just hasn't panned out that way 11 years later.

So my plan is to finish up with the packing and get moved into my parent's house. I'll unpack our mini-household and then figure out exactly who I have to talk to in order to get everything sorted out at work. And maybe apply for unemployment if it's at all possible. Then it'll be getting things really set up for me and Ki to have a really solid amount in our savings account when we move out of my parent's house and to get us set up in good habits. We both need to eat better and generally take better care of our ourselves and I would like for us to have some things we just do as a family. Everything has happened so fast that we haven't taken the chance to think about some things we really want to be intentional about. I'm tired of floating along. Not that it's been bad, but especially with adding a kid to the mix I would like us to have certain things we just do. Like Meatless Mondays and regular trips to the library. And I would like to have a list of really kickass things I can cook. The kind of things that people taste and want the recipe but that at the same time we just eat regularly.

I need a break from the never ceasing stomping from upstairs and also from packing. I mean, outside of the break I've taken from packing to write this.

new blog

http://established091809.blogspot.com/