My brain on hormones
Weird things about this pregnancy so far:
1. I hate food. Anyone who knows me will know how far off normal this is. But I hate all food. It’s not that it makes me directly ill. My stomach can handle it at most hours of the day. And my brain says “feed the embryo!” But in between there is a short circuit in my head that looks at just about any foodstuff and kind of goes “you want me to put WHAT in my MOUTH?” Also, “what a waste of money this is” at the grocery store and “geez these people are demanding” when it comes time to like, cook something.
I believe at this stage with Noah I was chowing down on spinach and tofu samosas and lentil pies. But with this babe it’s all I can do to choke down some toast. Toast is the least offensive food I can find, and this list includes chocolate, chips, and other non-nutritious foodstuffs.
2. Morning sickness peaks at about midnight. If I can sleep though it, it’s good. If I wake up, I end up wishing I were dead for about 2 hours.
3. I can’t quite get my head around a girl. After Emily died and I found out Noah was a boy I spent quite some time mourning that my boy would be the opposite sex from me. Now I’m like “how weird would THAT be?” On baby name picks we are definitely leaning towards the masculine, although this is probably helped by the fact that we have last pregnancy’s girl-name in our mutually agreed upon back pocket.
4. I’ve had no baby dreams. This makes me wonder a bit about the health of the baby, despite that being rather…new age of me.
5. Oh my god I realized this week this means I have to go through LABOUR again. Shit. Being me, I looked up the latest research on cord accidents and there’s interesting stuff out there - the worst, however, of which is that if you’ve had one, you are 5 times more likely to have another (and No One Knows Why). Other interesting things: Hiccups (which both my babies had) can be a bad sign. Babies also almost always tend to get nuchal cords in the same direction, suggesting that fetal movement is somehow pre-programmed to roll a particular way. None of this was especially reassuring.
6. Still pretty darn happy. However I do kind of feel like this is the last kick at the can. If this baby does not make it for whatever reason, I think I’m out, done, finito. Obviously it is not entirely my say but - I kind of really think so regardless.
Yup, Fifth - sigh
So my doctor’s confirmed that’s what Noah has. I get blood tested on Mon and then the following Mon. We’ll see. It just gives my general anxiety focus really. We did inform the school. The contageous period is over once the rash comes out - you really have to love this disease!
Luck of the - what’s the opposite of Irish?
Yesterday morning we were having a bowl of strawberries when Noah came up in a bright rash on both cheeks (more on one than the other). Being parents of the 21st century we administered Benadryl, sweated it out for a few minutes, and when the rash did not progress further and even faded a bit we made a note to get a good allergist, dropped him off for Bouncy! Castle! Day!, called 3 times to check on him (me) and cleared the house of strawberries. He was perfectly healthy otherwise and came home blissed out. Not too blissed out for a family game of T-ball.
This morning though the red-cheeked “strawberry rash” had spread to a lacy rash down the arms. I am waiting to call the doctor’s office but given that he had a mild ‘cold’ last week I am Dr. Google-diagnosing him with Fifth Disease. Which is a perfectly harmless childhood illness that starts with a mild fever (or not) and cold-like symptoms, when it is contagious, and then progresses to a slapped-cheek rash that spreads into a lacy rash down the arms.
Perfectly harmless, that is, with one exception? Any bets on what that is?
Pregnant women. Pregnant women should not get this thing because it can (not to put too fine a line on it) kill their unborn child. Before 20 weeks. Alternatively, the baby can be severely anemic and require blood transfusions (when is not clear to me).
Sigh. Now this only happens if the mother has not had it way before, and catches it. My mother thinks maybe I did. She remembers I had something anyway. The problem is in a lot of adults it’s asymptomatic. So I wouldn’t know if I got it now.
Anyways, the doctor’s office opens at 9 am, and what’s done is done. But you know that I am going to be wondering for (with grace) the next 34 weeks.
I have to admit though that I am kind of glad it’s unlikely to be a strawberry allergy. They are awfully yummy.
Still pregnant // Concert
Noah’s school concert was on Friday. He got pretty freaked out just before and no one could figure out why, but his headmistress came and got me. “He’s upset,” she whispered. “It’s fine…of course he doesn’t have to go on…but he has all the important lines.”
I held Noah next to the stage for the national anthem and for the martial arts demo he should have been in (orange belt!) It’s a hard balance. Part of me wanted to try to talk him into going on for his skits. And part of me wanted to take him home and rock him. Instead, I told him it was his decision and that I was fine with whatever he wanted to do. And that I would stand at the side of the stage and he could come to me any time. (His school, being for wee ones, is very very good about this and tears and all the rest of it. Despite the important lines bit.) His teacher told him the same, and he got a hug from her and she got his skit-mates to do a sort of group hug thing.
He went onstage, couldn’t get his first line out, and then came alive and did all the rest of his parts just fine, finishing up with a whole bunch of joyful joyful singing. Being almost-5 he then refused to come off the stage for the rest of the evening, unless running after a friend or trying to go play in the bathroom.
Being the pedantic parent, I did give him a little aphoristic “courage is being scared and doing it anyway” statement later, but I think he was too busy eying cake to learn the Life Lesson.
As it turned out, one of his best friends had spent the day at Sick Kids with a serious but not life threatening issue, and I think this took the safe feeling right out of him. Compounded, as he continued to gradually share with us, by the fact that nerves were labelled “butterflies in your tummy” by a well-meaning staff member…and which Noah interpreted as being along the lines of appendicitis.
But of course in the thick of it he couldn’t express any of that.
I’m glad I left it up to him and didn’t try to solve it for him. This, I must admit, is a rare bit of zen. But it came when it was needed. I think that’s grace.
In case anyone is interested, yes it was a little embarrassing even though it really shouldn’t be - but it was. But this is the advantage to being me at 39: I’ve embarrassed myself in so many ways that I’m kind of used to it.
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Still pregnant. Very pregnant — the 5 week beta last week was 8859, and this week’s joys include throwing up in the car and that really gross baby-growing TIRED ALL THE TIME feeling. I hope it eases up in the second trimester, as far away as that seems right now. I do not quite have dreams & hopes that involve a *baby* per se yet. But I am starting to mentally rearrange furniture and decide what is required to buy (dresser for new baby, and I refuse, REFUSE to have a newborn without a soft recliner rocker thing and not the dread wooden one I so Calvanistically purchased last time. Give me soft comfort. I am old.)
I also found myself thinking about all the TIME I will have on mat leave to do HOUSE PROJECTS. Hahahahahahahahahahaha, memory is a short thing is it not? I did laugh at myself.
I am worried about my job, but I’m sort of at the “oh well” point with it. We’ll sort it out.
And so it begins again
Positive
Struggling at work
I’m still really struggling at work. I can’t quite figure out where the deeper issue is - whether it’s me or the structure around me. I end up spinning my wheels sometimes because I’m the decision maker and I can’t decide. It’s also just plain hard to be indoors right now.
But I end up feeling a lot like “you suck.” That internal script is strong. Not to get all Oprah-esque about it but sometimes I am my own worst enemy.
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The novel is going slow and the deadline looms. Sometimes I wonder if I really do want to be a writer. Sometimes I think I would do better in a more reactive sort of job - like in medicine, where patients show up and you deal with them, as opposed to where you need to be a self-starter. But at 39, it seems like the wrong time to be asking myself this question.
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And yes I’m so glad David Besmozgis made it to the top 40 authors under 40 list in the New Yorker but I’m also a bit envious. Not that I have written anything like he has. Just sheer silly envy.
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However I was at a gala award thing last night and I have to shallowly admit that these things are a bit more fun (in the short term; this will wear off) while hovering between a size 8-10 as opposed to a solid 14. Mostly because I put a belt on with a skirt and fancy top and the effect was slimming. I wish I’d gotten pics but I was shooting others and forgot to ask anyone to point the camera my way. Next time!
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Today is clean-up day as we are having a visitor from out of town next week of the picky sort, and so there are a few areas to tackle. But I don’t want to.