Another age since I've written. I'm now nineteen weeks (as the title may have unsubtly given away) and my bump is no longer a slight protrusion of the waist, leading onlookers to assume I am a little bit porky and perhaps should lay off the pasties.
It is growing rapidly, ensuring my centre of gravity is forever in turmoil and my legs just have to make it up as they go along with regards to keeping me vertical and to aid avoidance in the general falling over or crashing into things that would otherwise be my daily life.
They are doing quite well, however Newf isn't helping matters. The other day, frolicking with a new found friend up the woods, she collided with my legs so badly I fell crashing to the floor, luckily with my knee taking the impact. I then hobbled, tearily, onwards (luckily the dog seemed to not have an owner nearby) until Newf decided, in another frenzy of play with a Springer, that the top of my thigh was not going to stop her onward attack of said Springer.
Needless to say I was rather in the wars after that point, and nursed my bleeding knee in the bath with no one to offer a word of sympathy. I am really looking forward to when we can have Disney plasters in the house. Somehow they make everything better.
So Newf and I are going back to training classes. In the house, on a walk without other furry friends, she is the picture of innocence and incredibly easy to control (despite being, as my sister described, somewhat dyspraxic, often forgetting that various limbs or her tail are actually attached to her when negotiating gaps between myself and someone else/an inanimate object/another part of myself). When another dog is added to the fragile equation she becomes deaf to my commands and entirely disobedient.
We did try puppy training, where she largely performed like an angel and would respond to treats and calls, if a little slowly (as is the Newf way). Out of the 'classroom' however, and into a real world scenario, nothing, not her mother's love, not her father's bellowing, not even a bloody treat, will tempt her away from terrorising (in her mind 'playing') with other dogs. For, due to her sheer size, and due to a curious stalking-then-bunny-hop approach she seems to have adopted in greeting new dogs, she largely terrifies them to the point they run (giving her the impression they are inviting her to play), bark (for which she also takes as a sure-fire sign that its playtime), whimper (for which she tends to stare blankly at them for a moment, then continues to bunny-hop regardless) and snarl (for which she appears to adopt a near identical approach to that of the whimper).
This play, which is a joy to watch when well matched with another fearless or large dog, is also impossible to interject without suffering bruising or running in the opposite direction praying that she'll find you more entertaining than the dog she was playing with (a tactic that should only be attempted if you're feeling particularly blessed). Calling works perhaps every one in five occasions. Odds and skills which work fine for J, who is strong, fearless and fast, but which aren't entirely helpful or practical for a near-five-month pregnant woman who is only increasing in her size and lack of agility. And also has a baby strapped to the front of her stomach (thank God Newf is the supposed runt of the litter, any taller and my unimpressed thighs would become my terrified womb).
So, as treat training is about as effective as a really un-effective thing when another dog is added into the equation, back to training class it is.
In other news, I am (whispers) not feeling sick.
Well, that isn't entirely true, but I let it have a paragraph to itself anyway just to bathe in those glorious words.
I am getting a life back. I only feel sick now when I am tired or stressed (this morning I am both, which is why I am cowering from an increasing, daunting, hideous workload in the comfort of the Blogger window). The nasty taste in my mouth, that my wonderful acupuncturist attributes to my liver, has now subsided to the degree it again only rears its ugly head when I am exhausted, hungry or stressed. Headaches have evaporated, and last week I even managed four decaff coffees and half a glass of white wine.
Looking back on these last months, it is quite terrifying to the degree that I became such a shadow of myself. I don't spend my days coping with just functioning anymore. I went through a rather unsavoury stage of eating white bread for pretty much any meal. But now I can be tempted with a variety of foods, and some of them even a little spicy (dependent on certain variables, of course). As I become heftier (I now own an extra half a stone onto my once trim stature, which has negotiated its way around the baby and my swollen and rather unattractive breasts harnessed into their ever tightening maternity bra, as well as settling in an unsightly manner on my hips and legs for which I didn't request and could frankly do without, if they wish to deposit themselves elsewhere or, even better, on someone else).
I eat. A lot.
I am not 'eating for two'. But I'm definitely eating for Webstress+. At least, and I should be thankful of my stomach's ever raging complaints, I am only eating low fat products. Although the amount of carbohydrates that march, sometimes in a fanfare of delight, sometimes unnoticed, into my mouth throughout the day would make a dietitian wince.
I can't help it. I am driven to the kitchen by a force deep within me, the foetus demanding consumption of an ever expanding list of foods. There is no way of controlling the internal desires of my inner growth. J has taken to calling me 'The Host' for which I have not taken to too kindly but is terrifyingly accurate. Although I would like to highlight at this point I am hoping that my birth doesn't replicate John Hurt's in Alien (especially as he, as the host, then snuffs it, unsurprisingly). I am not in control. And I have, finally, given up trying to be.
My exercise regime is no longer a regime, more of a whistful, lustful dream, where I am burning calories and fat cells are disintigrating and evaporating effortlessly, my figure evolving into that of a Catalogue Bump, a Model Preggers who's bump blossoms beautifully on the front of her slender figure without any impact on the rest of her perfect, petite curves.
I get up, walk the dog, work, walk the dog, work, walk the dog, eat dinner, work, sleep.
I do not: entertain Smug Pregnant Exercising Women on a DVD that still remains unwrapped, dance energetically around the room to another DVD that still remains untouched, swim (despite my purchase of a swimsuit with expanding panels from Mothercare that makes me look like an oompa loompa), or attend any sort of Yay I'm Pregnant Let's Get Fit classes that I am constantly reminded to go to by various sources.
I am desperate to. But my exhaustion and my continuing wave of nauseating deadlines mean that I don't ever have the time. And I really don't. I work from 7:30am to anything between 6 and 11 at night. Muscle in three dog walks a day, time to bath, time to eat and the day's pretty much maxed to capacity.
Get up earlier you say? Considering I spend half my designated sleeping time being prodded awake by a baby snuggling into my bladder, and wandering blindly to the toilet (up to seven times a night of late) getting up earlier would mean crowbaring a grumpy pregnant tired lady out of bed in the hour of six. I tried it. I even packed my swimming bag. I cancelled the alarm.
Cut down on your workload, you say? Don't. Even. Go. There.
So I am resigned to another week of lethargy but next week I am on holiday with J and Newf in Cornwall and am intent on at least taking the labels off my swimming costume and shaving my legs for the possibility that I might want to plunge my rotund frame into the water (sickness dependent).
In other news: I have felt movement. Baby movement.
Throughout the last week I have felt a number of movements that, even for me and my poor digestion, could not be attributed to wind or stomach complaints. I felt it. I felt my baby.
It wasn't the momentous occasion I ideally hoped for because I spent a good deal time after each movement pondering whether it was actually the baby or maybe a figment of my over active and highly volatile imagination (if you were to bear witness to my dreams at present you might be a little terrified and think about having me sectioned).
But I felt the baby turn as I was walking the other day. It was an incredible feeling and send me completely off balance to the point that I nearly fell over. This baby is definitely taking after J. And paving the way for how it assumes the next few years of its life will be. Which generally involve a great deal of sleep deprivation from its mum.
And now, with thirty minutes killed and a stomach aching for yet more consumption, I'd better face my workload that I have been hiding from. Its like an eternal episode of Doctor Who and I am the Webstress of my youth, sheltering my eyes and cushioning them through slits in my hands. Blogger is my much neglected but always comforting sofa and I have enjoyed hiding behind it for forty minutes and not thinking about my Things To Do.
Monday 21 April 2008
Thursday 3 April 2008
Mourning the loss of the tea-making process
I miss tea.
I thought it'd be alcohol I missed, out of everything.
My liquid consumption consists of: orange or apple juice, orange squash, hot or cold water and the occasional fizzy pop.
The idea of drinking a cup of tea or coffee makes me feel rather uncomfortable. Queasy, unsettled. It isn't even so much that I'm disinterested, if I was then I'd still 'endure' the drink. But I just really, really don't want one.
But it isn't so much the lack of tea that affects me so.
It is the actual process of making a cup of tea.
I used to adore that kitchen time. Making a cup of tea for me represented a fresh approach - I could sit down at my computer again and start over. I would get up, defiantly, make a cup of tea, and sit down again, that tiny interlude of normality, of a treat, still not losing its novelty of being able to drink cups of tea at my desk after 10 years since I left school. I relished that moment.
Now any person who comes to the house is bombarded with numerous hot beverages, just to allow myself a glimmer of my previous normality. My glass of squash lies eclipsed on the side behind a line of proud, self assured tea mugs. Someone is going to love that tea.
It just won't be me.
People have adorned me with numerous fruit and herb alternatives, but even then don't rest well on my tormented inners. So right now I have a hot water. At least I have the kettle boiling process to relish, briefly, in that.
Even if the aftermath is so unbelievably rubbish.
I thought it'd be alcohol I missed, out of everything.
My liquid consumption consists of: orange or apple juice, orange squash, hot or cold water and the occasional fizzy pop.
The idea of drinking a cup of tea or coffee makes me feel rather uncomfortable. Queasy, unsettled. It isn't even so much that I'm disinterested, if I was then I'd still 'endure' the drink. But I just really, really don't want one.
But it isn't so much the lack of tea that affects me so.
It is the actual process of making a cup of tea.
I used to adore that kitchen time. Making a cup of tea for me represented a fresh approach - I could sit down at my computer again and start over. I would get up, defiantly, make a cup of tea, and sit down again, that tiny interlude of normality, of a treat, still not losing its novelty of being able to drink cups of tea at my desk after 10 years since I left school. I relished that moment.
Now any person who comes to the house is bombarded with numerous hot beverages, just to allow myself a glimmer of my previous normality. My glass of squash lies eclipsed on the side behind a line of proud, self assured tea mugs. Someone is going to love that tea.
It just won't be me.
People have adorned me with numerous fruit and herb alternatives, but even then don't rest well on my tormented inners. So right now I have a hot water. At least I have the kettle boiling process to relish, briefly, in that.
Even if the aftermath is so unbelievably rubbish.
Four months in
16+3 weeks today. Yup, I'm still sick.
I am, however, making progress.
After what I can only describe as a mild breakdown on Sunday which involved my return home after a mammoth weekend on the road which began on Friday with a 6 hour drive into central London and concluded with a return journey from the Midlands after spending the night in an unmemorable hotel due to a weekend of trawling round his various friends and relatives scattered around his hometown feeling permanently queasy.
Anyway, I digress. I returned home to discover my parents had cleaned my much neglected house.
The floodgates unceremoniously opened without warning. They took me back to their home. I was not coping well.
That was probably the lowest I have been in recent weeks. Another sad, hard goodbye to J, this time with a 3.5 hour journey ahead of me, emotionally and physically exhausted, stocked up with crackers and prepared for the Archers omnibus (which I was actually a bit excited about) and knowing it'd be yet another 5 nights until I saw him again.
My good friend Yorkshire Lass said to me yesterday that she didn't know how we were doing it but we must know what we're doing.
But sometimes I don't. I want to beg him to come home so badly, I want to call him, to ask him, to demand him.
I have been here before, without the bump. When he was in New Zealand training, I would ache, I would hurt so much, but I never asked. Eventually, he called me and told me he was on the next flight home. I stood by him through the most painful of times, through hearing his hell out there, through missing him beyond belief.
And this time, at least, I have him on weekends. I don't know how service wives do it.
But I have these constant goodbyes, these constant feelings of loneliness, of endurance, of constant trial. It is so hard being on my own.
And now he won't be home until two weeks before the baby is due.
He has been away just two months now. And I have five to go. Even as I write this I have tears stinging my eyes, but I can never beg him. He is doing this for us, for our baby. He wants to be home just as badly as I want him. If he came home we would not be able to cope financially. And he has a commitment which he would never break.
But it hurts so god damned much. I am so lonely in a way that only he can ease. My family and close friends have got me through each day, but I miss him beyond all comprehension. I miss his cuddles at night, I miss hearing him breathe beside me in bed, I miss just talking to him, I miss just being with him, being in the same house, the same environment, together, how it should be. And now I can't stop these bitter tears which to me are just flooded with weakness and guilt and the inability to cope.
Thanks to my wonderful, wonderful sister, I visited the acupuncturist on Tuesday. A midwife as well, I didn't realise how much hope I had pinned on this visit until I was there. My voice was shakey, she must have known how I fought back these all too regular tears, as I told her how I felt. About the continual bitter taste in my mouth that plagues me and increases in intensity until I cannot cope in the evening, the rising of the sickness as the hours go by (its a good job I'm a morning person otherwise I'd not get anything done), the pressure headaches that feel like I am crumbling beneath the weight of sandbags balanced delicately, invisibly, on my head.
So she stuck pins in me. This midwife-come-acupuncturist treated me with such gentleness, promising me that she'd help me get better, listening to me, helping me, soothing me. She asked me such questions that I knew she knew.
I lay there, on the table, some gentle music playing, pins in my feet, my wrists, my chest, my head. I lay there and gradually, after my anxiety started to reside, after my giant gasps of air to surpress my tears has died, after my body began to accept to relax, after my mind slowly, slowly, with great effort, began to drop its crowded thoughts until I lay there just thinking about names.
I now have ball bearings in my ears and on my chest. I have an appointment next week and the week after. I am not sure whether anything is helping yet, it is too early to tell. My massive, unrelenting, unforgiving workload plagues me into exhaustion and tiredness that I know is a hindrance to my recovery.
But she gave me such hope. She listened and, I do believe, she understood. Where modern medicine fails with morning sickness, I have been offered a lifeline. Thanks to my sister and this woman, I feel like I have been given the opportunity to fight, to try again.
It made me realise how low I had fallen, and how far down I still am. I am still a shadow of myself, I still look at myself in the mirror and see a face riddled with the scars of pregnancy - dark shadows, spots, pale and tired skin. My body is unfamiliar to me. I have put on an incomprehensible half a stone. I have no tone, no definition. A mass of fat cells accumulating around my back and hips along with my bump, I feel like I am within a shell that isn't my own. I feel like I am within borrowed skin.
On Saturday morning, though, J and I saw our baby. J for the first time. I will never forget that moment. This time it had such long legs, such beautiful fingers and toes. It turned and stretched and rolled over and was just so incredibly beautiful for a few moments I forgot everything and there was nothing in this world other than J and our baby.
I am, however, making progress.
After what I can only describe as a mild breakdown on Sunday which involved my return home after a mammoth weekend on the road which began on Friday with a 6 hour drive into central London and concluded with a return journey from the Midlands after spending the night in an unmemorable hotel due to a weekend of trawling round his various friends and relatives scattered around his hometown feeling permanently queasy.
Anyway, I digress. I returned home to discover my parents had cleaned my much neglected house.
The floodgates unceremoniously opened without warning. They took me back to their home. I was not coping well.
That was probably the lowest I have been in recent weeks. Another sad, hard goodbye to J, this time with a 3.5 hour journey ahead of me, emotionally and physically exhausted, stocked up with crackers and prepared for the Archers omnibus (which I was actually a bit excited about) and knowing it'd be yet another 5 nights until I saw him again.
My good friend Yorkshire Lass said to me yesterday that she didn't know how we were doing it but we must know what we're doing.
But sometimes I don't. I want to beg him to come home so badly, I want to call him, to ask him, to demand him.
I have been here before, without the bump. When he was in New Zealand training, I would ache, I would hurt so much, but I never asked. Eventually, he called me and told me he was on the next flight home. I stood by him through the most painful of times, through hearing his hell out there, through missing him beyond belief.
And this time, at least, I have him on weekends. I don't know how service wives do it.
But I have these constant goodbyes, these constant feelings of loneliness, of endurance, of constant trial. It is so hard being on my own.
And now he won't be home until two weeks before the baby is due.
He has been away just two months now. And I have five to go. Even as I write this I have tears stinging my eyes, but I can never beg him. He is doing this for us, for our baby. He wants to be home just as badly as I want him. If he came home we would not be able to cope financially. And he has a commitment which he would never break.
But it hurts so god damned much. I am so lonely in a way that only he can ease. My family and close friends have got me through each day, but I miss him beyond all comprehension. I miss his cuddles at night, I miss hearing him breathe beside me in bed, I miss just talking to him, I miss just being with him, being in the same house, the same environment, together, how it should be. And now I can't stop these bitter tears which to me are just flooded with weakness and guilt and the inability to cope.
Thanks to my wonderful, wonderful sister, I visited the acupuncturist on Tuesday. A midwife as well, I didn't realise how much hope I had pinned on this visit until I was there. My voice was shakey, she must have known how I fought back these all too regular tears, as I told her how I felt. About the continual bitter taste in my mouth that plagues me and increases in intensity until I cannot cope in the evening, the rising of the sickness as the hours go by (its a good job I'm a morning person otherwise I'd not get anything done), the pressure headaches that feel like I am crumbling beneath the weight of sandbags balanced delicately, invisibly, on my head.
So she stuck pins in me. This midwife-come-acupuncturist treated me with such gentleness, promising me that she'd help me get better, listening to me, helping me, soothing me. She asked me such questions that I knew she knew.
I lay there, on the table, some gentle music playing, pins in my feet, my wrists, my chest, my head. I lay there and gradually, after my anxiety started to reside, after my giant gasps of air to surpress my tears has died, after my body began to accept to relax, after my mind slowly, slowly, with great effort, began to drop its crowded thoughts until I lay there just thinking about names.
I now have ball bearings in my ears and on my chest. I have an appointment next week and the week after. I am not sure whether anything is helping yet, it is too early to tell. My massive, unrelenting, unforgiving workload plagues me into exhaustion and tiredness that I know is a hindrance to my recovery.
But she gave me such hope. She listened and, I do believe, she understood. Where modern medicine fails with morning sickness, I have been offered a lifeline. Thanks to my sister and this woman, I feel like I have been given the opportunity to fight, to try again.
It made me realise how low I had fallen, and how far down I still am. I am still a shadow of myself, I still look at myself in the mirror and see a face riddled with the scars of pregnancy - dark shadows, spots, pale and tired skin. My body is unfamiliar to me. I have put on an incomprehensible half a stone. I have no tone, no definition. A mass of fat cells accumulating around my back and hips along with my bump, I feel like I am within a shell that isn't my own. I feel like I am within borrowed skin.
On Saturday morning, though, J and I saw our baby. J for the first time. I will never forget that moment. This time it had such long legs, such beautiful fingers and toes. It turned and stretched and rolled over and was just so incredibly beautiful for a few moments I forgot everything and there was nothing in this world other than J and our baby.
Friday 14 March 2008
12 Week Scan II: The Return of the Sonographer
Monday saw a significant event: The purchase of 1 x pair of size 8 maternity jeans (feels slightly like an oxymoron to me...) from New Look's impressive range of maternity wear and 1 x maternity bra (who needs under wire when you can have a tee-shirt bra eh?) that made me realise how my breasts had been stuffed unattractively into a confined space for a little too long and had actually made me suffer severe discomfort. I felt truly pregnant.
Tuesday and I had yet another significant event: My second twelve week scan.
This time my oldest friend accompanied me. We have known each other all our lives, quite literally, having been christened together (the sharing of font water, while not something I can of course recall is something of a bond).
So, jelly smeared over my enlarged stomach, baby appeared again. This time: bigger, better, with more exciting features! We saw hands and feet and it bounced up and down, using my womb as a trampoline. Then it began to drink, opening and closing its lips repeatedly (I can't imagine amniotic fluid is all that tasty, but I guess baby doesn't know any different) and the sonographer explained romantically how it would then pee. Into my womb. Nice. This time she conducted fuller tests on the thickness of its neck fluid and took a good look at its enormous brain. This one definitely takes after J.
So now I wait for the blood test results (I nearly fainted, however my friend came to my aid with fizzy pop which managed to restore some sort of normality in my frazzled veins). For the baby and me. I am terrified. Not that I think I do have syphilis but the list that it checked me for really was quite disturbing and, as I am a born worrier, I am obviously riddled with notions that something with ill intentions may be lurking in my veins.
With my bump ever expanding, I proceeded through the rest of the week. Last night, however, I had a bit of a shock. Preparing for bed at J's aunt's house, I noticed how truly enormous I was. It isn't a pretty little belly. My belly starts to extend outwards at a dramatic exponential rate just after my breasts conclude. I am enormous. And I'm only 13.5 weeks. That isn't all baby - that's belly. I'm not even supposed to be showing yet according to the biblical reference books that I would love to discard but am addicted to like a sinner hovering continually in a confessional booth waiting for a sign to say that I'm really doing okay and I really am normal.
Blood test results awaiting. I'm wondering if the answer machine at home is flashing with messages I don't want to get.
Tuesday and I had yet another significant event: My second twelve week scan.
This time my oldest friend accompanied me. We have known each other all our lives, quite literally, having been christened together (the sharing of font water, while not something I can of course recall is something of a bond).
So, jelly smeared over my enlarged stomach, baby appeared again. This time: bigger, better, with more exciting features! We saw hands and feet and it bounced up and down, using my womb as a trampoline. Then it began to drink, opening and closing its lips repeatedly (I can't imagine amniotic fluid is all that tasty, but I guess baby doesn't know any different) and the sonographer explained romantically how it would then pee. Into my womb. Nice. This time she conducted fuller tests on the thickness of its neck fluid and took a good look at its enormous brain. This one definitely takes after J.
So now I wait for the blood test results (I nearly fainted, however my friend came to my aid with fizzy pop which managed to restore some sort of normality in my frazzled veins). For the baby and me. I am terrified. Not that I think I do have syphilis but the list that it checked me for really was quite disturbing and, as I am a born worrier, I am obviously riddled with notions that something with ill intentions may be lurking in my veins.
With my bump ever expanding, I proceeded through the rest of the week. Last night, however, I had a bit of a shock. Preparing for bed at J's aunt's house, I noticed how truly enormous I was. It isn't a pretty little belly. My belly starts to extend outwards at a dramatic exponential rate just after my breasts conclude. I am enormous. And I'm only 13.5 weeks. That isn't all baby - that's belly. I'm not even supposed to be showing yet according to the biblical reference books that I would love to discard but am addicted to like a sinner hovering continually in a confessional booth waiting for a sign to say that I'm really doing okay and I really am normal.
Blood test results awaiting. I'm wondering if the answer machine at home is flashing with messages I don't want to get.
13 weeks. The 'honeymoon' trimester. Apparently.
"Are your long-lost energy and sex drive making a comeback? If so, you may soon find out why many women call this the honeymoon trimester."*
13.5 weeks. Still sick as a dog. Starting to worry that narcolepsy might be setting in for good. Can't bear the thought of a reassuring, breast crushing, space-invading hug of any description, let alone anything slightly more engaged. And feeling like an eighty year old trapped in the exhausted body of an ungainly, overweight, adolescent teenager with growing pains, awkward growths and distinctly ill fitting clothes, exhuding all the personal eroticism of a pubic louse. Everyone else saying they began to bloom at 13 weeks. Still with no life, an ever decreasing lack of social interaction and interpersonal skills, while an increasing waistline due to continuous grazing to abait the beast of all things regurgitating, I reacted somewhat badly to my update email from BabyCentre yesterday.
The honeymoon trimester you say? I reacted about as well as I did to J crawling into bed intoxicated and having over indulged on Saturday night, whispering through alcoholic tinged breath that he understood how I'd been feeling because he'd eaten and drunk too much. Oh how truly touched and understood I felt.
*BabyCentre email, 13 weeks pregnant
13.5 weeks. Still sick as a dog. Starting to worry that narcolepsy might be setting in for good. Can't bear the thought of a reassuring, breast crushing, space-invading hug of any description, let alone anything slightly more engaged. And feeling like an eighty year old trapped in the exhausted body of an ungainly, overweight, adolescent teenager with growing pains, awkward growths and distinctly ill fitting clothes, exhuding all the personal eroticism of a pubic louse. Everyone else saying they began to bloom at 13 weeks. Still with no life, an ever decreasing lack of social interaction and interpersonal skills, while an increasing waistline due to continuous grazing to abait the beast of all things regurgitating, I reacted somewhat badly to my update email from BabyCentre yesterday.
The honeymoon trimester you say? I reacted about as well as I did to J crawling into bed intoxicated and having over indulged on Saturday night, whispering through alcoholic tinged breath that he understood how I'd been feeling because he'd eaten and drunk too much. Oh how truly touched and understood I felt.
*BabyCentre email, 13 weeks pregnant
Sunday 9 March 2008
Friday 7 March 2008
Baby Bump
I have, as the title so effortlessly gave away, a baby bump.
However, according to the books, those creatures that dictate my baby's growth, my hormonal changes, my physical contortions, state that it isn't a baby bump at all, but fluid retention because of my enlarged uterus.
Gee. Doesn't that make an already spiralling to all new lows of unattractiveness pregnant lady just feel so warm inside?
My mum proudly pointed out my protrusion yesterday and I immediately reeled at her comments, worried because I shouldn't even be showing yet, according to the naked body chart of yet another smug mum-to-be with its little evil description beneath.
My SP's sister had an unfortunate incident with one of these books, in the end throwing it in the bin triumphantly after attempting, and failing, to live by its dictatorial regime. There's one thing my mum's continually told me is that the baby hasn't read the book. So when she told me, and also told me to take all knowledge, anecdotes, stories, advice and suggestions that people will willingly lay on with trowels as soon as you are pregnant and, to an even greater degree, once the baby has been born, I was determined to take on board their knowledge, file it efficiently and then continue to follow mine and J's own parenting strategy.
It worked with Newf (to a point: who needs a dog who can come to recall and doesn't slobber over babies and young children's faces - to their excitement/horror/abject terror - anyway).
The problem being: I am a born worrier. I am also constantly concerned, and absorbing, of other people's opinions.
Those two things combined offer an often soul destroying, depressing, uncontrolled set of emotions. Add that to the pregnancy hormones and we're cooking up something worthy of a Roald Dahl name that does strange things to grannies.
I have made a pact with myself that I need to control this before the baby is born. I knew it was coming, the opinions, the idealistic routines, the exceedingly high expectations I set myself, and will not achieve because it takes two to tango and the baby will not be particularly inclined to appease my own personal concerns and worries.
Luckily J, on the other hand, is confident, self assured, calm, practical, pragmatic and generally the Alka Seltzer to my emotional burnings. Otherwise this poor baby would be lumbered with absorbing it's mother's numerous unattractive personality nuances and neurosis. With J, it has a chance of some balance at least.
But I wasn't really prepared for the rules and regulations dictated by pregnancy within these books that I was gearing up to challenge once the baby was here. This week you will, the baby will. Some of the charts are a little more forgiving, with some mays and probablys sprinkled in to ease the worry of a concerned pregnant lady.
I have been absorbing pregnancy anecdotes, questioning friends insistently and, occasionally, strangers on their trimesters, my most recent question, tinged with desperation, aching with worry, 'when did you start to show?'
So, this baby bump. My mum looked at me, her eyes sparkling, telling me that it was perfectly normal. Those that love me, that are close to me, that have seen this new extrusion of my flesh that has appeared within this last week and see the baby within.
However, those that don't know I implant, mostly I imagine unnecessarily, the opinion that I'm letting myself go a little, the thickening of the waist attributed to too many pies. I don't really have that many sympathetic clothes and those that do make me look either like a chav or a hippy (thank god for the empire line being in fashion this year, I was slightly concerned we might all be adorned with lyrca hotpants for the summer, with unpredictable trends and my complete lack of fashion awareness).
And myself, what do I see? I see flesh-covered liquid and gas. That's it.
I know what it is. My belly is a fraud for my poor digestive system, something that has never been on my side when it comes to appearance, my dinner sitting nicely in the large round bowl of my stomach after a meal while it debates the act of digestion for several hours.
The baby is there, deep within me, protected by my inefficient inner workings, hiding behind an ever swelling mass of liquid and gas.
However, according to the books, those creatures that dictate my baby's growth, my hormonal changes, my physical contortions, state that it isn't a baby bump at all, but fluid retention because of my enlarged uterus.
Gee. Doesn't that make an already spiralling to all new lows of unattractiveness pregnant lady just feel so warm inside?
My mum proudly pointed out my protrusion yesterday and I immediately reeled at her comments, worried because I shouldn't even be showing yet, according to the naked body chart of yet another smug mum-to-be with its little evil description beneath.
My SP's sister had an unfortunate incident with one of these books, in the end throwing it in the bin triumphantly after attempting, and failing, to live by its dictatorial regime. There's one thing my mum's continually told me is that the baby hasn't read the book. So when she told me, and also told me to take all knowledge, anecdotes, stories, advice and suggestions that people will willingly lay on with trowels as soon as you are pregnant and, to an even greater degree, once the baby has been born, I was determined to take on board their knowledge, file it efficiently and then continue to follow mine and J's own parenting strategy.
It worked with Newf (to a point: who needs a dog who can come to recall and doesn't slobber over babies and young children's faces - to their excitement/horror/abject terror - anyway).
The problem being: I am a born worrier. I am also constantly concerned, and absorbing, of other people's opinions.
Those two things combined offer an often soul destroying, depressing, uncontrolled set of emotions. Add that to the pregnancy hormones and we're cooking up something worthy of a Roald Dahl name that does strange things to grannies.
I have made a pact with myself that I need to control this before the baby is born. I knew it was coming, the opinions, the idealistic routines, the exceedingly high expectations I set myself, and will not achieve because it takes two to tango and the baby will not be particularly inclined to appease my own personal concerns and worries.
Luckily J, on the other hand, is confident, self assured, calm, practical, pragmatic and generally the Alka Seltzer to my emotional burnings. Otherwise this poor baby would be lumbered with absorbing it's mother's numerous unattractive personality nuances and neurosis. With J, it has a chance of some balance at least.
But I wasn't really prepared for the rules and regulations dictated by pregnancy within these books that I was gearing up to challenge once the baby was here. This week you will, the baby will. Some of the charts are a little more forgiving, with some mays and probablys sprinkled in to ease the worry of a concerned pregnant lady.
I have been absorbing pregnancy anecdotes, questioning friends insistently and, occasionally, strangers on their trimesters, my most recent question, tinged with desperation, aching with worry, 'when did you start to show?'
So, this baby bump. My mum looked at me, her eyes sparkling, telling me that it was perfectly normal. Those that love me, that are close to me, that have seen this new extrusion of my flesh that has appeared within this last week and see the baby within.
However, those that don't know I implant, mostly I imagine unnecessarily, the opinion that I'm letting myself go a little, the thickening of the waist attributed to too many pies. I don't really have that many sympathetic clothes and those that do make me look either like a chav or a hippy (thank god for the empire line being in fashion this year, I was slightly concerned we might all be adorned with lyrca hotpants for the summer, with unpredictable trends and my complete lack of fashion awareness).
And myself, what do I see? I see flesh-covered liquid and gas. That's it.
I know what it is. My belly is a fraud for my poor digestive system, something that has never been on my side when it comes to appearance, my dinner sitting nicely in the large round bowl of my stomach after a meal while it debates the act of digestion for several hours.
The baby is there, deep within me, protected by my inefficient inner workings, hiding behind an ever swelling mass of liquid and gas.
Encounters that need a blog (and other stories)
So from my break from achieving a fairly minimal amount of productivity relative to the hours I have been sat in front of the computer, I decided to take a break with Newf and take her for a walk up the river, despite her being in the physical and metaphorical dog house after vomiting up whole strands of seaweed and a great deal of saltwater over the carpet just as I'd sat down with my jacket-and-beans for dinner last night (the house still smells like a trawler), and waking me at 3am to tell me that she'd finally realised that oh yes she really did need the toilet after all after drinking seven gallons of water to rehydrate herself before slinking off to bed.
The walk was beautiful, the sun was shining, my phone had decided to work again, albeit erratically and not wonderfully effectively after dropping it down the toilet last night (don't ask) and spending the night in pieces on the radiator to think about what it had done, so I was able to at least stumble blindly over twigs and roots, trip over nothing-at-all at extreme regularity and narrowly avoid various piles of misc dog related elements.
Then Newf met a friend. And I met the friend's owner.
We'd briefly encountered each other on the weekend, so I knew Newf was in with a good chance of not bullying it into submission, terrorising it, angering it or terrifying its owner. So off they went, Newf and friend, Newf submissively and kindly let her new friend try to hump her at various different angles (none of which were entirely correct, but thankfully her lady op meant I had little to concern myself with) and generally played various games involving driving her hefty 8 stone soaking frame into my legs at every opportunity as they bounded about together.
So I chatted to her friend's owner, a woman I'm guessing of her fifties, about various dog related things (all paving the way for playground talk of later years, I'm hoping this is an investment in small talk and How To Look Interested In Other People's Dogs/Children* *delete as applicable).
Then she told me she hadn't had a very good February. I'm not sure if I asked her quite why, but she proceeded to tell me anyway.
She launched immediately into telling me her ex husband had been found dead. This I managed to swiftly put an understanding but not too sympathetic (noticing the 'ex') look onto my confused face while she told me more, as the dogs crashed into each other and myself and tried to make ineffective puppy love.
Then she proceeded to tell me that he'd been pronounced dead on the Thursday when in fact he'd died on the Wednesday night. She knew this because, as she put it, she'd 'seen a fair amount of dead bodies in her time'.
Right. I didn't ask her about that.
She then went into not insignificant detail about exactly how bodies appeared as they were decomposing (including a rather traumatic tale about her daughter being summoned home from her holiday and not being able to look at the body for a week, by which point it was in a severe state of decay).
This story, embellished with a great deal of detail, then led on to another relative's hospitalisation, by which point my back had begun to drip with sweat, my legs had begun to sway, a prickling sensation had startled my skin and then, suddenly, my hearing went and I could only decipher words through what appeared to be a large volume of water or a rather effective pair of earmuffs. All the while the dogs were continuing to bounce wildly around us in gay abandon.
So I made my excuses and carried on walking soaked, happy and completely disobedient Newf as I tried to compose myself.
The baby had clearly decided it was time for beans and less talk about rigor mortis.
The walk was beautiful, the sun was shining, my phone had decided to work again, albeit erratically and not wonderfully effectively after dropping it down the toilet last night (don't ask) and spending the night in pieces on the radiator to think about what it had done, so I was able to at least stumble blindly over twigs and roots, trip over nothing-at-all at extreme regularity and narrowly avoid various piles of misc dog related elements.
Then Newf met a friend. And I met the friend's owner.
We'd briefly encountered each other on the weekend, so I knew Newf was in with a good chance of not bullying it into submission, terrorising it, angering it or terrifying its owner. So off they went, Newf and friend, Newf submissively and kindly let her new friend try to hump her at various different angles (none of which were entirely correct, but thankfully her lady op meant I had little to concern myself with) and generally played various games involving driving her hefty 8 stone soaking frame into my legs at every opportunity as they bounded about together.
So I chatted to her friend's owner, a woman I'm guessing of her fifties, about various dog related things (all paving the way for playground talk of later years, I'm hoping this is an investment in small talk and How To Look Interested In Other People's Dogs/Children* *delete as applicable).
Then she told me she hadn't had a very good February. I'm not sure if I asked her quite why, but she proceeded to tell me anyway.
She launched immediately into telling me her ex husband had been found dead. This I managed to swiftly put an understanding but not too sympathetic (noticing the 'ex') look onto my confused face while she told me more, as the dogs crashed into each other and myself and tried to make ineffective puppy love.
Then she proceeded to tell me that he'd been pronounced dead on the Thursday when in fact he'd died on the Wednesday night. She knew this because, as she put it, she'd 'seen a fair amount of dead bodies in her time'.
Right. I didn't ask her about that.
She then went into not insignificant detail about exactly how bodies appeared as they were decomposing (including a rather traumatic tale about her daughter being summoned home from her holiday and not being able to look at the body for a week, by which point it was in a severe state of decay).
This story, embellished with a great deal of detail, then led on to another relative's hospitalisation, by which point my back had begun to drip with sweat, my legs had begun to sway, a prickling sensation had startled my skin and then, suddenly, my hearing went and I could only decipher words through what appeared to be a large volume of water or a rather effective pair of earmuffs. All the while the dogs were continuing to bounce wildly around us in gay abandon.
So I made my excuses and carried on walking soaked, happy and completely disobedient Newf as I tried to compose myself.
The baby had clearly decided it was time for beans and less talk about rigor mortis.
Thursday 6 March 2008
Twelve Weeks
Last Monday I had my first twelve week scan.
I say first twelve week scan for a reason.
There I was, on the table, jelly smeared over the lower part of my stomach, my mum sat next to me, the sonographer waving her scanner thing over me.
And then I saw it. My baby.
Even as I write it, tingles shoot through me, a wave of pride, of emotion, of overwhelming protection, of realisation.
There it was, arms and legs wriggling like mad (clearly taking after J*).
I grabbed my mum's hand, overwhelmed, tears prickling my eyes. It was so clear, so alive.
The sonographer's words blurred with the image as I tried to focus - that she couldn't do any of the other tests now at this early stage.
Alarm bells drilled through my skull. Early stage?
She measured the baby - and again - 10.5 days old. My heart sank. My tears turned sour, but I smiled uncomfortably and thanked her, disappointment consuming me.
Looking back on it, having hit finally my twelfth week yesterday, the way I felt following my scan seems petty. But that would be betraying myself. If I'd have written back then (such a long time since my last post, absorbed with terrible morning sickness, a cold that floored me and then a mounting workload that ensured it invaded every waking minute for the past 10 days) then I would have seen the legacy the news left. Another 1.5 weeks of all-consuming sickness. Another 1.5 weeks of secrecy, of, basically with trying not to sound hideously melodramatic but failing dismally, misery.
Now my sickness has started to calm during the day, eased by the constant grazing of a variety of crackers, cereal, bread, beans and potatoes (yup, that pretty much summarises my diet for the past week). In the evening the tide comes in, every wave that little bit stronger, until I go to bed often gipping, often sickness (and potato) rising to the top of my throat, acid-burning. I lie awake, still, trying not to move, trying to lay the beast to rest, to calm it. Even when I wake in the night I feel it still, stirring.
And I do wake in the night. Often. Probably about every 1 - 2 hours. I raise automatically, gone are the days where I would try and ignore my insistent bladder, now I just obey its commands, mechanically, without any unwillingness.
Looking back over these twelve weeks - or I guess really two months - I have not enjoyed any aspect of my first trimester. I have been lonely, a recluse, a shadow of myself. I have not recognised myself, my actions, my conversation. I have felt so low I couldn't imagine being pulled out of this state of self pity, and sometimes couldn't even let myself. To put it lightly, I have not been happy.
I have been consumed by sickness, my body has seen its muscles tumble undone, my work, my control dissolving as I stand powerless. My changing shape, my back fat, my hips, my stomach, my breasts, all without my control, my years of work, of effort, of watching what I eat, of exercising, riddled with self consciousness. All undone.
I haven't been out on a social activity for weeks. When J is home at a weekend, we are reluctant to do anything but indulge in spending time together with Newf (in between my cat-naps, and as anyone who's ever had a cat knows, a cat nap is never quite as delicate and short as it implies). During the week, I am exhausted by the time I have finished work, with my stomach beginning to churn like a vicious wash cycle (these last days, between 8pm and 10pm anyway).
And my dance. I miss my poleing so terribly I dream through sequences, I run through those first classes when I'll return, awkward, with an enormous baby belly and no strength in my neglected limbs, unable to achieve the moves I worked so hard for. I couldn't bear to enter the class like that. I don't think I could cope. And I can't imagine J or the poor baby wanting to endure my collapsed figure's routines around the pole in the house either.
I watched my beloved Amy's routine on Friday, overwhelmed and so incredibly proud, a beautiful, intense, continuously, fluid, seemingly effortless routine (I say seemingly because I know how she felt the next day!), but it infected my sleep with dreams of dancing, continuously, sometimes back before I knew I was pregnant, one last memorable time with my sister on Christmas Eve, hours and hours of dance, and then some taunting me, mocking me, returning to a class where I don't know anyone, where I am unable to perform moves my body used to map out so well. I was never graceful nor a particularly talented dancer, but I danced for strength, for control, for a love that I had no idea the full intensity of until it was taken away from me. Until I took it away from me.
Would I have it any other way? Would I have done things differently if I'd have known the selfishness of my want, my need would make me bitter and resentful? I am ashamed of myself. I am ashamed of my selfishness and my resentment. I am ashamed of my lack of perspective and my understanding that this won't be forever.
I am ashamed of my seeming lack of respect for my baby - no longer a foetus, not now, not now, not now I've seen you, oh but I do adore you so much, please forgive me for this, because I need to be forgiven, I've only seen the briefest of glimpses of you yet, you've made no appearance on my figure, you are still such a secret, such a thing I have trouble to comprehend.
I desperately wanted this baby. I do desperately want this baby. After seeing it, it became so real. I have the picture by my desk, I take it to bed. The meaning has faded out of the picture now, it isn't the wonderful realisation it was before, I am used to looking at the outline of my baby, of tracing its head, its tiny arms, its body. We used to discuss that if something had turned up through the blood tests that I am yet to have then we would discuss whether to keep it. Back then, before I thought we had a choice, before the baby became real, before the baby was just an idea, connected in some way to my sickness and my exhaustion but with no real link, no physical cord, no dots joined together. Now there is no choice. Now it is just the fierce protection of my baby, and the hating myself for not giving myself up in the way I would desperately want to, in the way I assumed I would, to pregnancy, to growing our baby.
Last night I lay awake day dreaming of romantic meals with a glass of champagne, a beautiful dress, a lovely hotel, J and me, together. All such a world away from my life at the moment. Alcohol is an abhorrent thought, a meal beyond anything with basically the complete genetic makeup of a potato makes me feel a little queasy just considering it. A hotel room, where we might drink, and sit up, and talk, I might feel pretty, not a mass of ever multiplying fat cells.
Last weekend J and I picked up a Mothercare and Boots Baby catalogue. It was bliss - we indulged in planning a nursery, choosing items, discussing 'travel systems' (something I'm definitely leaving to him to research), chatting about our baby. I had focus then, in talking, I could lose myself in the realisation of our baby. But only with him. Only when he's beside me, I realise that we're doing this together, that we're apart because we're going to have the most wonderful life when our baby comes. Together. Not being apart any more. The months stretch out before me, and I lose myself in a mess of week days.
So, twelve weeks. On Tuesday I have my second twelve week scan. Then I should be able to finally begin to tell those close to me who I haven't yet been able to tell. Then I will enter my second trimester fully, sincerely, finally. Finally.
*As my partner does play a fairly hefty role in many of my posts, I've decided after years of blogging to raise him from partner status to his initial. I haven't told him, but I imagine he'll be fairly uninterested in his increased status. Either that or he might be a little bit perturbed to why its only happened now.
I say first twelve week scan for a reason.
There I was, on the table, jelly smeared over the lower part of my stomach, my mum sat next to me, the sonographer waving her scanner thing over me.
And then I saw it. My baby.
Even as I write it, tingles shoot through me, a wave of pride, of emotion, of overwhelming protection, of realisation.
There it was, arms and legs wriggling like mad (clearly taking after J*).
I grabbed my mum's hand, overwhelmed, tears prickling my eyes. It was so clear, so alive.
The sonographer's words blurred with the image as I tried to focus - that she couldn't do any of the other tests now at this early stage.
Alarm bells drilled through my skull. Early stage?
She measured the baby - and again - 10.5 days old. My heart sank. My tears turned sour, but I smiled uncomfortably and thanked her, disappointment consuming me.
Looking back on it, having hit finally my twelfth week yesterday, the way I felt following my scan seems petty. But that would be betraying myself. If I'd have written back then (such a long time since my last post, absorbed with terrible morning sickness, a cold that floored me and then a mounting workload that ensured it invaded every waking minute for the past 10 days) then I would have seen the legacy the news left. Another 1.5 weeks of all-consuming sickness. Another 1.5 weeks of secrecy, of, basically with trying not to sound hideously melodramatic but failing dismally, misery.
Now my sickness has started to calm during the day, eased by the constant grazing of a variety of crackers, cereal, bread, beans and potatoes (yup, that pretty much summarises my diet for the past week). In the evening the tide comes in, every wave that little bit stronger, until I go to bed often gipping, often sickness (and potato) rising to the top of my throat, acid-burning. I lie awake, still, trying not to move, trying to lay the beast to rest, to calm it. Even when I wake in the night I feel it still, stirring.
And I do wake in the night. Often. Probably about every 1 - 2 hours. I raise automatically, gone are the days where I would try and ignore my insistent bladder, now I just obey its commands, mechanically, without any unwillingness.
Looking back over these twelve weeks - or I guess really two months - I have not enjoyed any aspect of my first trimester. I have been lonely, a recluse, a shadow of myself. I have not recognised myself, my actions, my conversation. I have felt so low I couldn't imagine being pulled out of this state of self pity, and sometimes couldn't even let myself. To put it lightly, I have not been happy.
I have been consumed by sickness, my body has seen its muscles tumble undone, my work, my control dissolving as I stand powerless. My changing shape, my back fat, my hips, my stomach, my breasts, all without my control, my years of work, of effort, of watching what I eat, of exercising, riddled with self consciousness. All undone.
I haven't been out on a social activity for weeks. When J is home at a weekend, we are reluctant to do anything but indulge in spending time together with Newf (in between my cat-naps, and as anyone who's ever had a cat knows, a cat nap is never quite as delicate and short as it implies). During the week, I am exhausted by the time I have finished work, with my stomach beginning to churn like a vicious wash cycle (these last days, between 8pm and 10pm anyway).
And my dance. I miss my poleing so terribly I dream through sequences, I run through those first classes when I'll return, awkward, with an enormous baby belly and no strength in my neglected limbs, unable to achieve the moves I worked so hard for. I couldn't bear to enter the class like that. I don't think I could cope. And I can't imagine J or the poor baby wanting to endure my collapsed figure's routines around the pole in the house either.
I watched my beloved Amy's routine on Friday, overwhelmed and so incredibly proud, a beautiful, intense, continuously, fluid, seemingly effortless routine (I say seemingly because I know how she felt the next day!), but it infected my sleep with dreams of dancing, continuously, sometimes back before I knew I was pregnant, one last memorable time with my sister on Christmas Eve, hours and hours of dance, and then some taunting me, mocking me, returning to a class where I don't know anyone, where I am unable to perform moves my body used to map out so well. I was never graceful nor a particularly talented dancer, but I danced for strength, for control, for a love that I had no idea the full intensity of until it was taken away from me. Until I took it away from me.
Would I have it any other way? Would I have done things differently if I'd have known the selfishness of my want, my need would make me bitter and resentful? I am ashamed of myself. I am ashamed of my selfishness and my resentment. I am ashamed of my lack of perspective and my understanding that this won't be forever.
I am ashamed of my seeming lack of respect for my baby - no longer a foetus, not now, not now, not now I've seen you, oh but I do adore you so much, please forgive me for this, because I need to be forgiven, I've only seen the briefest of glimpses of you yet, you've made no appearance on my figure, you are still such a secret, such a thing I have trouble to comprehend.
I desperately wanted this baby. I do desperately want this baby. After seeing it, it became so real. I have the picture by my desk, I take it to bed. The meaning has faded out of the picture now, it isn't the wonderful realisation it was before, I am used to looking at the outline of my baby, of tracing its head, its tiny arms, its body. We used to discuss that if something had turned up through the blood tests that I am yet to have then we would discuss whether to keep it. Back then, before I thought we had a choice, before the baby became real, before the baby was just an idea, connected in some way to my sickness and my exhaustion but with no real link, no physical cord, no dots joined together. Now there is no choice. Now it is just the fierce protection of my baby, and the hating myself for not giving myself up in the way I would desperately want to, in the way I assumed I would, to pregnancy, to growing our baby.
Last night I lay awake day dreaming of romantic meals with a glass of champagne, a beautiful dress, a lovely hotel, J and me, together. All such a world away from my life at the moment. Alcohol is an abhorrent thought, a meal beyond anything with basically the complete genetic makeup of a potato makes me feel a little queasy just considering it. A hotel room, where we might drink, and sit up, and talk, I might feel pretty, not a mass of ever multiplying fat cells.
Last weekend J and I picked up a Mothercare and Boots Baby catalogue. It was bliss - we indulged in planning a nursery, choosing items, discussing 'travel systems' (something I'm definitely leaving to him to research), chatting about our baby. I had focus then, in talking, I could lose myself in the realisation of our baby. But only with him. Only when he's beside me, I realise that we're doing this together, that we're apart because we're going to have the most wonderful life when our baby comes. Together. Not being apart any more. The months stretch out before me, and I lose myself in a mess of week days.
So, twelve weeks. On Tuesday I have my second twelve week scan. Then I should be able to finally begin to tell those close to me who I haven't yet been able to tell. Then I will enter my second trimester fully, sincerely, finally. Finally.
*As my partner does play a fairly hefty role in many of my posts, I've decided after years of blogging to raise him from partner status to his initial. I haven't told him, but I imagine he'll be fairly uninterested in his increased status. Either that or he might be a little bit perturbed to why its only happened now.
Tuesday 12 February 2008
Thoughts to my unborn
Let me get something straight. I don't believe you're really in there.
At least, perhaps I can't let myself.
There have been numerous times over the past 10 weeks that I have wondered if I am, in fact, pregnant. Despite having symptoms showering themselves upon me in gay abandon - sore, aching and rapidly expanding breasts, constant sickness, a 'thickening' of the waist (as so many articles and books delicately put it), exhaustion, and an emotional instability like a 30ft high badly constructed giant Jenga. There has always been that wondering, that doubt.
Now, I am fairly convinced I am. Finally. But trying to equate pregnancy to the growth of a foetus, you, is just something I am struggling to join up the wayward dots to (they'd rather conclude with a badly constructed image of just a hormonal, irrational, bloated and poorly WebStress - end of).
This week, you are the size of a lipstick case, with the ability to kick, swallow and move. I have been reading about your growth constantly, but I am struggling to equate it to my own rapid changes.
I have been thinking about writing to you for some time. I don't think about you much, which is a funny thing to say. But I don't. I think about being pregnant. I think about the sickness, the exhaustion, the inability to multitask, or even singletask, effectively.
It is strange that I should feel so lonely, with another whole person growing within me. Someone experiencing everything I think, say, feel or do. Someone who was there in the night when I couldn't sleep, someone who has felt my tears, who has already met some of my dearest loved ones. You have already been with me across the country. You have already had Newf nuzzling up to you (and slobbering on the material just inches away from where you are stretching your cells and multiplying your size).
My sister told me that one of her friends became incredibly introspective, in a joyous way. She rose above issues and problems, everything passing under her without consequence. The only thing that mattered was her growing child within her.
I am two weeks away from the end of my first trimester. You will double in size over the next few weeks.
I am protecting myself, I know. I am terrified that I will lose you, this tiny thing that I don't even believe I have. It is like belief, I have no other proof, I have not seen or felt your physical existence, apart from your repercussions on my body. But, unlike a normal belief, I am terrified of believing too much. Just in case.
I have my scan, hopefully, in two weeks. Then I should see you - then belief may become a solid, tangible thing. I desperately want to believe in you, to indulge in you.
I protect you, fiercely. You would have thought it funny to see me the other day out walking with your father, and I turned away from a group of lads playing football, just in case a ball were to hit me, you. You are so fragile, so delicate, yet seemingly so impossible to please and so all-consuming.
Your father is working for you in London at the moment. Father is a word for books, for literature really, dad sounding somewhat childish oddly in a novel.
Your dad I should say, for I can't imagine you ever calling him father unless you absorb some sort of misplaced public school education throughout your early childhood. He adores you. He has visions of you, a genderless image, but his, all his, holding his hand so tightly, splashing in the sea, in the bath, you will be a water baby in every sense of the word (and at your birth, perhaps...?). You will adore him, I know. And he will adore you more than he has ever loved anything, even me.
I understand that, I understand he will be consumed by you. That is a strange feeling. Maybe if I didn't know I was to be too, it would be different. But I have no choice, he has no choice, we will become your slaves.
He told me yesterday he can stay in London until the summer, so that we have enough money for when you arrive, so that I don't have to work. I didn't have the heart to tell him I wouldn't be able to work, but I knew what he meant. I felt a pang of selfishness, as if already you were demanding his love, his time, his attention more than me. As if you were more important, your birth and the time after more important than me, now.
He would be absent for most of my pregnancy. I know that importance does not feature and he is so homesick and aching for me, for our life, but my emotions spike me angrily, a surge of sharp, cutting, isolated attacks that I loathe but that I allow myself to indulge, to weak to rationalise. I face a long six months.
We have not agreed to anything yet, but how can we not. He left his job in November, for us to start a business. We chose to conceive, we had discussed it for such a long time. Were we terribly naive in the assumption that we wouldn't need such a vast injection of cash, that we weren't going to be in the financial stability we would have longed to be in, that both of us working freelance together, your dad himself starting a totally new career, was a gamble that jars icily with your conception, your birth? Or were we presented with an option that would make everything easier, in that holy grail, that distant reward, of The Long Term?
I am not sure it is the long term. He will continue his work, then return, perhaps not until August. Then he will be back in his old career, too dangerous, too unstable to immerse himself in a new one, in the business. And I, I am alone again, freelancing on my own. But we can only choose one path to take. We will both work so hard, we can only both do so much.
Your dad is my rock. He is everything to me. I adore him with my whole heart. I adore him and I will adore you. We will be such a loving family, I promise you.
I hope you consider my outpouring this morning to be something of a good thing, and to not scare you off, not to terrify you of an emotional, unstable, selfish mum who aches for your protection and your health and your happiness more than you will ever know, throughout the rest of your life, and asks only for your love in return.
At least, perhaps I can't let myself.
There have been numerous times over the past 10 weeks that I have wondered if I am, in fact, pregnant. Despite having symptoms showering themselves upon me in gay abandon - sore, aching and rapidly expanding breasts, constant sickness, a 'thickening' of the waist (as so many articles and books delicately put it), exhaustion, and an emotional instability like a 30ft high badly constructed giant Jenga. There has always been that wondering, that doubt.
Now, I am fairly convinced I am. Finally. But trying to equate pregnancy to the growth of a foetus, you, is just something I am struggling to join up the wayward dots to (they'd rather conclude with a badly constructed image of just a hormonal, irrational, bloated and poorly WebStress - end of).
This week, you are the size of a lipstick case, with the ability to kick, swallow and move. I have been reading about your growth constantly, but I am struggling to equate it to my own rapid changes.
I have been thinking about writing to you for some time. I don't think about you much, which is a funny thing to say. But I don't. I think about being pregnant. I think about the sickness, the exhaustion, the inability to multitask, or even singletask, effectively.
It is strange that I should feel so lonely, with another whole person growing within me. Someone experiencing everything I think, say, feel or do. Someone who was there in the night when I couldn't sleep, someone who has felt my tears, who has already met some of my dearest loved ones. You have already been with me across the country. You have already had Newf nuzzling up to you (and slobbering on the material just inches away from where you are stretching your cells and multiplying your size).
My sister told me that one of her friends became incredibly introspective, in a joyous way. She rose above issues and problems, everything passing under her without consequence. The only thing that mattered was her growing child within her.
I am two weeks away from the end of my first trimester. You will double in size over the next few weeks.
I am protecting myself, I know. I am terrified that I will lose you, this tiny thing that I don't even believe I have. It is like belief, I have no other proof, I have not seen or felt your physical existence, apart from your repercussions on my body. But, unlike a normal belief, I am terrified of believing too much. Just in case.
I have my scan, hopefully, in two weeks. Then I should see you - then belief may become a solid, tangible thing. I desperately want to believe in you, to indulge in you.
I protect you, fiercely. You would have thought it funny to see me the other day out walking with your father, and I turned away from a group of lads playing football, just in case a ball were to hit me, you. You are so fragile, so delicate, yet seemingly so impossible to please and so all-consuming.
Your father is working for you in London at the moment. Father is a word for books, for literature really, dad sounding somewhat childish oddly in a novel.
Your dad I should say, for I can't imagine you ever calling him father unless you absorb some sort of misplaced public school education throughout your early childhood. He adores you. He has visions of you, a genderless image, but his, all his, holding his hand so tightly, splashing in the sea, in the bath, you will be a water baby in every sense of the word (and at your birth, perhaps...?). You will adore him, I know. And he will adore you more than he has ever loved anything, even me.
I understand that, I understand he will be consumed by you. That is a strange feeling. Maybe if I didn't know I was to be too, it would be different. But I have no choice, he has no choice, we will become your slaves.
He told me yesterday he can stay in London until the summer, so that we have enough money for when you arrive, so that I don't have to work. I didn't have the heart to tell him I wouldn't be able to work, but I knew what he meant. I felt a pang of selfishness, as if already you were demanding his love, his time, his attention more than me. As if you were more important, your birth and the time after more important than me, now.
He would be absent for most of my pregnancy. I know that importance does not feature and he is so homesick and aching for me, for our life, but my emotions spike me angrily, a surge of sharp, cutting, isolated attacks that I loathe but that I allow myself to indulge, to weak to rationalise. I face a long six months.
We have not agreed to anything yet, but how can we not. He left his job in November, for us to start a business. We chose to conceive, we had discussed it for such a long time. Were we terribly naive in the assumption that we wouldn't need such a vast injection of cash, that we weren't going to be in the financial stability we would have longed to be in, that both of us working freelance together, your dad himself starting a totally new career, was a gamble that jars icily with your conception, your birth? Or were we presented with an option that would make everything easier, in that holy grail, that distant reward, of The Long Term?
I am not sure it is the long term. He will continue his work, then return, perhaps not until August. Then he will be back in his old career, too dangerous, too unstable to immerse himself in a new one, in the business. And I, I am alone again, freelancing on my own. But we can only choose one path to take. We will both work so hard, we can only both do so much.
Your dad is my rock. He is everything to me. I adore him with my whole heart. I adore him and I will adore you. We will be such a loving family, I promise you.
I hope you consider my outpouring this morning to be something of a good thing, and to not scare you off, not to terrify you of an emotional, unstable, selfish mum who aches for your protection and your health and your happiness more than you will ever know, throughout the rest of your life, and asks only for your love in return.
Steps to Stardom
"If your dreams seem more bizarre than usual, filled with images of sex, talking animals, and huge, towering buildings, you can put them down to a combination of the progesterone surging through your veins and your excitement and apprehension about pregnancy and motherhood. "Dreams reflect your emotional reality," says sleep expert Mary O'Malley. "Pregnancy brings up positive and negative feelings that you'll digest through your dreams."
Another reason why your dreams may have changed in style is that you are more likely to interrupt a dream-filled cycle of REM sleep by frequent waking during the night to go to the loo, ease a leg cramp, or move to a more comfortable position.
Source: www.babycentre.co.uk
On Sunday night, among other peculiarities, I dreamed that Amy Winehouse was formerly one of the key members of Steps.
She was receiving an award for her musical achievements (obvious references seeping in to my REM) and they presented a brief flash back of her previous pop career. There she was, in a video not quite of anything, with a soundtrack equally as bland and unmemorable, standing next to Faye (if she's the dreadlocked one) doing some sort of choreographed dance routine.
I thought to myself it was surprising I had not noted this previously, but didn't find it all that surprising, drawing comparisons with Robbie Williams' former boy band career in Take That.
On Monday morning, where her gentle soothing airs and graces wafted over the airways in an award winning speech regarding a recent award (ahem), there was brief moment of total belief that her career in Steps had been the springboard to greater talents.
Then, sadly, reality kicked back in and I remembered that no such wholesome career had prececeded her rise to Diva-esque fame.
Another reason why your dreams may have changed in style is that you are more likely to interrupt a dream-filled cycle of REM sleep by frequent waking during the night to go to the loo, ease a leg cramp, or move to a more comfortable position.
Source: www.babycentre.co.uk
On Sunday night, among other peculiarities, I dreamed that Amy Winehouse was formerly one of the key members of Steps.
She was receiving an award for her musical achievements (obvious references seeping in to my REM) and they presented a brief flash back of her previous pop career. There she was, in a video not quite of anything, with a soundtrack equally as bland and unmemorable, standing next to Faye (if she's the dreadlocked one) doing some sort of choreographed dance routine.
I thought to myself it was surprising I had not noted this previously, but didn't find it all that surprising, drawing comparisons with Robbie Williams' former boy band career in Take That.
On Monday morning, where her gentle soothing airs and graces wafted over the airways in an award winning speech regarding a recent award (ahem), there was brief moment of total belief that her career in Steps had been the springboard to greater talents.
Then, sadly, reality kicked back in and I remembered that no such wholesome career had prececeded her rise to Diva-esque fame.
Friday 8 February 2008
Week 9: A good week for crackers, a bad week for Newf digestion
Friday. I feel my whole body breathing a sigh of relief. My partner will be home in just over 12 hours.
Looking back on this week and I see a blur of tears (mine), diahorrea (Newf's), sickness (both of us), exhaustion (mine, Newf sleeps approximately 70% of the day so its difficult to tell whether she is in any way affected by her inner turmoil), loneliness (mine) and wonderful support (family, extended family and exquisite friends, partner).
Throughout all of my dark moments, my loneliness, my exhaustion and my coping strategies crumbling around me (as they usually involve eating and exercise and I have failed to do either with any success), I have felt like there are these invisible hands, from people 20 minutes away to those hundreds of miles away, holding me up, helping me, telling me everything is going to be alright.
As we tell more people, I am beginning to feel less introverted, more supported, more secure. Every time I tell someone I feel some inner strength hold me up, announcing that no, I'm not nuts and miserable and generally about as fun to be around as a really un fun thing (at least well I am, but I have good reason to be).
But there is a dark side of me, a shadow that follows me, haunts me, magnifies every twinge, amplifies aches and discomforts until they overshadow my consciousness and become all I can think of. With every person I tell, it is in my head that there is one more person to tell if and when things go wrong.
The worry, I have noticed, has begun to subside, or at least be eclipsed by time advancing towards the holy grail, that 12 week mark when the chances of miscarriage are supposed to dramatically reduce (some say 16 weeks, but one step at a time). But then often, occasionally but with fierce determination, it forces its way through my conscious and presents itself at the forefront of my brain, proud, assertive, strong. And with every person I tell it is there, knowingly, a smug older sibling elated with experience I can only be humbled by, riddled with statistics to present to me and my newly informed friend.
I cannot live my life through worry. But all the same if I am to forget, I am reminded, complacency will make a fall harder than I could ever knew.
But after nine weeks of carrying a growing life form, I can't imagine how anyone could ever cope with loss and it terrifies me more than I could ever know. I understand a little now about the bond between parent and child. That you would do anything, anything, to see your child healthy and happy, no matter the cost to you.
Sometimes I forget that, constantly to be honest, when my sickness overwhelms me and I beg it to stop. For my sickness to stop now it would mean a loss I can comprehend.
Looking back on this week and I see a blur of tears (mine), diahorrea (Newf's), sickness (both of us), exhaustion (mine, Newf sleeps approximately 70% of the day so its difficult to tell whether she is in any way affected by her inner turmoil), loneliness (mine) and wonderful support (family, extended family and exquisite friends, partner).
Throughout all of my dark moments, my loneliness, my exhaustion and my coping strategies crumbling around me (as they usually involve eating and exercise and I have failed to do either with any success), I have felt like there are these invisible hands, from people 20 minutes away to those hundreds of miles away, holding me up, helping me, telling me everything is going to be alright.
As we tell more people, I am beginning to feel less introverted, more supported, more secure. Every time I tell someone I feel some inner strength hold me up, announcing that no, I'm not nuts and miserable and generally about as fun to be around as a really un fun thing (at least well I am, but I have good reason to be).
But there is a dark side of me, a shadow that follows me, haunts me, magnifies every twinge, amplifies aches and discomforts until they overshadow my consciousness and become all I can think of. With every person I tell, it is in my head that there is one more person to tell if and when things go wrong.
The worry, I have noticed, has begun to subside, or at least be eclipsed by time advancing towards the holy grail, that 12 week mark when the chances of miscarriage are supposed to dramatically reduce (some say 16 weeks, but one step at a time). But then often, occasionally but with fierce determination, it forces its way through my conscious and presents itself at the forefront of my brain, proud, assertive, strong. And with every person I tell it is there, knowingly, a smug older sibling elated with experience I can only be humbled by, riddled with statistics to present to me and my newly informed friend.
I cannot live my life through worry. But all the same if I am to forget, I am reminded, complacency will make a fall harder than I could ever knew.
But after nine weeks of carrying a growing life form, I can't imagine how anyone could ever cope with loss and it terrifies me more than I could ever know. I understand a little now about the bond between parent and child. That you would do anything, anything, to see your child healthy and happy, no matter the cost to you.
Sometimes I forget that, constantly to be honest, when my sickness overwhelms me and I beg it to stop. For my sickness to stop now it would mean a loss I can comprehend.
Wednesday 6 February 2008
And here's one I wish I'd made earlier...
Last night I did my best housewifey bit for Newf and cooked her battered cod, which I then scraped all of the batter off lovingly (with a rather unsettling desire to munch on that and the anaemic looking fish inside, slightly worrying for a strict veggie) and served it with long grain wild american rice (I was unprepared for Newf to be the consumer of such a purchase).
She adored it. I don't think I've ever seen her quite so determined to give herself heartburn by eating so fast.
So last night, I purchased some frozen cod fillets and some less expensive white rice to give her a few tasty meals over the next couple of days.
The only slight issue I am currently facing is the thought of cooking said Newf food this morning.
She is sulking beside me, unsure of what exactly I'm up to, and certainly not impressed with whatever it is as it certainly isn't preparing her breakfast.
I wonder if she'd care for a weetabix with low fat soya milk instead.
She adored it. I don't think I've ever seen her quite so determined to give herself heartburn by eating so fast.
So last night, I purchased some frozen cod fillets and some less expensive white rice to give her a few tasty meals over the next couple of days.
The only slight issue I am currently facing is the thought of cooking said Newf food this morning.
She is sulking beside me, unsure of what exactly I'm up to, and certainly not impressed with whatever it is as it certainly isn't preparing her breakfast.
I wonder if she'd care for a weetabix with low fat soya milk instead.
Tuesday 5 February 2008
Mid-morning moan
My longed for piece of jam on toast was hideously misguided.
To the point I have had to consume a mountain of Swedish crispbread to calm the volatile, angry foetus that obviously wasn't impressed.
I have so far eaten:
1 x bowl of cornflakes with low fat soya milk and a teeth decay inducing volume of sugar
1 x piece of granary toast with olive spread and low sugar jam
5 x dry Swedish cracker breads
It is 11:07. I feel obese. My fat cells are having a party and it seems that everyone's invited.
And I appear to have forgotten how to design. Quite problematic as a web designer or, under my more pretentious alter ego, a digital artist.
Today does not bode well.
To the point I have had to consume a mountain of Swedish crispbread to calm the volatile, angry foetus that obviously wasn't impressed.
I have so far eaten:
1 x bowl of cornflakes with low fat soya milk and a teeth decay inducing volume of sugar
1 x piece of granary toast with olive spread and low sugar jam
5 x dry Swedish cracker breads
It is 11:07. I feel obese. My fat cells are having a party and it seems that everyone's invited.
And I appear to have forgotten how to design. Quite problematic as a web designer or, under my more pretentious alter ego, a digital artist.
Today does not bode well.
Canine Culinary Creations
The lovely vet called me and told me that as long as Newf was excitable and lively not to bring her in. The best thing I could do was not feed her (I didn't mention I had already...) and when I did feed her later to cook her some chicken and rice, or perhaps a little white fish.
Brilliant for the near vegan with morning sickness who's meat cooking abilities, while not totally ignorant, are far from culinary brilliance and who's stomach is about as stable as a fat man on a tightrope.
My SP has just given me chicken cooking instructions for idiots. Let's hope I don't give Newf food poisoning. I don't think that'll help with her constitution.
Brilliant for the near vegan with morning sickness who's meat cooking abilities, while not totally ignorant, are far from culinary brilliance and who's stomach is about as stable as a fat man on a tightrope.
My SP has just given me chicken cooking instructions for idiots. Let's hope I don't give Newf food poisoning. I don't think that'll help with her constitution.
The foetus wants pancakes
I discovered, with a certain amount of hesitation and excitement, that I am actually not seven weeks but nine weeks pregnant.
I hadn't trusted the doctor's assessment that I was further on than I was due to a mumbled discription of the first day of my last period, as he also predicted I was due in early October. The midwife had just looked at my notes and scribbled something down. I just relied on guess work and numerous dodgy online calculator predictor things.
But, apparently, its true. 40 weeks starts from the first day of my last period. I am in my nineth week of pregnancy. Woop woop!
My good friend Yorkshire Lass negotiated a whole heap of public transport to come and visit my messy self on Saturday. She told me repeatedly that I personally didn't have any control over the goings on and had basically been consumed by an alien, who had comandeered my body for its own use. It was to be in control now, of whatever it decreed suitable. Sleep, food, rest, (and, in my case, TV and music, for I have now developed an uncontrollable desire to watch Red Dwarf and listen to Cats).
She was immensely understanding, even through my constant cracker grazing, my whining about my sickness, my troubled, guilt ridden mind and my chocolate cake baking indulgant (one vegan cake later, and after a small piece on Saturday night, I had to pass the majority over to her, the sight or even thought of chocolate making me feel a little bit on the queasy side).
Last night I had a strong urge to make pancakes today with my sister (I won't dwell on this for too long as pancake isn't a food I can negotiate discussion with at this time of the morning). Yorkshire Lass called me to make sure I was still vaguely hinged (after a few slightly worrying emails I had sent to her throughout the course of yesterday) and I informed her of my desire.
She said simply 'the foetus wants pancakes'.
And I thought, yup. Okay. I'm going to go with this one.
Right now, the foetus wants some jam on toast, even post breakfast. I need to seriously adjust my portion size if grazing is going to keep me sane (and from doing and work it seems).
Oddly, I realised after attempting two scales, I have actually lost 4lb since becoming pregnant and weigh now just under eight stone. This was a rather terrifying realisation as my breasts are growing at quite a rate and my stomach is inflating at a similar worrying speed until I realised with terror and horror that all those months of hard work, muscle control and toning are unravelling before my eyes.
My muscle is turning to fat.
Oh bugger it, a piece of toast and jam isn't going to make much of a dent on my unravelling body now (I can hear the voice of weight watchers all over the country screaming that it will be my downfall).
I hadn't trusted the doctor's assessment that I was further on than I was due to a mumbled discription of the first day of my last period, as he also predicted I was due in early October. The midwife had just looked at my notes and scribbled something down. I just relied on guess work and numerous dodgy online calculator predictor things.
But, apparently, its true. 40 weeks starts from the first day of my last period. I am in my nineth week of pregnancy. Woop woop!
My good friend Yorkshire Lass negotiated a whole heap of public transport to come and visit my messy self on Saturday. She told me repeatedly that I personally didn't have any control over the goings on and had basically been consumed by an alien, who had comandeered my body for its own use. It was to be in control now, of whatever it decreed suitable. Sleep, food, rest, (and, in my case, TV and music, for I have now developed an uncontrollable desire to watch Red Dwarf and listen to Cats).
She was immensely understanding, even through my constant cracker grazing, my whining about my sickness, my troubled, guilt ridden mind and my chocolate cake baking indulgant (one vegan cake later, and after a small piece on Saturday night, I had to pass the majority over to her, the sight or even thought of chocolate making me feel a little bit on the queasy side).
Last night I had a strong urge to make pancakes today with my sister (I won't dwell on this for too long as pancake isn't a food I can negotiate discussion with at this time of the morning). Yorkshire Lass called me to make sure I was still vaguely hinged (after a few slightly worrying emails I had sent to her throughout the course of yesterday) and I informed her of my desire.
She said simply 'the foetus wants pancakes'.
And I thought, yup. Okay. I'm going to go with this one.
Right now, the foetus wants some jam on toast, even post breakfast. I need to seriously adjust my portion size if grazing is going to keep me sane (and from doing and work it seems).
Oddly, I realised after attempting two scales, I have actually lost 4lb since becoming pregnant and weigh now just under eight stone. This was a rather terrifying realisation as my breasts are growing at quite a rate and my stomach is inflating at a similar worrying speed until I realised with terror and horror that all those months of hard work, muscle control and toning are unravelling before my eyes.
My muscle is turning to fat.
Oh bugger it, a piece of toast and jam isn't going to make much of a dent on my unravelling body now (I can hear the voice of weight watchers all over the country screaming that it will be my downfall).
What goes around comes around...
Yesterday was, in no uncertain terms, a right off. A complete and utter waste of time. To the point that, after collapsing into my second 'nap' of the day, I had a stern word with myself and decided that the day was deemed a sick day.
True enough, the guilt hounded me throughout the day, nagging me, pestering me, breaking my deep sleep with worry. By the time it was official work 'hometime' and my mum, worried for my sanity, paid me a visit, I had managed to shake the guilt but instead bombarded her with questions as to how she coped with morning sickness and general pregnancy related shenanigans firstly at work with my sister and secondly looking after a toddler when I decided to make an appearance in her womb (I was the one that caused havoc for her unfortunately, my sister it seems, slept gently through her foetal growth while I was already establishing my many food intolerances by forcing them back up my mum's throat to which, thankfully, she does not hold a grudge).
She said it wasn't easy.
My guilt is much to do with my work load, my mounting tasks coupled with their weak, feeble excuses (my tongue forming the words I'm Pregnant over and over silently, my emails and phone calls pathetically stating I've been a bit ill, using up my postpone-already-late-task-with-no-consequences cards left right and centre, not knowing how they'll take it to know that I'm still, well, ill).
But it also is heavily related to all those women enduring the suffering in classrooms, offices and 'real' work environments across the country (I can't even begin to absorb the guilt if I am to think about beyond England's borders right now, I think I might just become the product of consumption by guilt).
If they can do it, if they can struggle through, why am I constantly collapsing?
Luckily, the sickness has subsided to a controllable state. Unfortunately this is resolved by eating little and often.
I'm not sure what the technical term is for 'often' but I'm sure I've blurred the boundaries between that and constantly several times over the past few days.
I did feel, at the end of the weekend, despite my strength and emotions being shattered because of the departure of my partner for the first of 3 months worth of weeks in London, I was going to be okay. I could even eat a variety of foods (accompanied by the ever present constantly necessary carb) and even manage the occasional half cup of tea (on a good day).
But something went horribly wrong yesterday morning.
It wasn't helped by waking up to learn that Newf had screaming diarrhoea.
My partner had dealt with carnage in the lounge on Saturday morning (from what end he wasn't able to ascertain, always a worrying sign). But, even despite brightly coloured excretions, the colour of fluorescent yellow for those interested in the detail, she was perky and bounding around and I thought no more about it.
Yesterday I was woken to my mum gently saying that perhaps Newf needed to go to the Vet. She hadn't touched her breakfast and there were more fluorescent discoveries.
It was 7am. The vet didn't open til 9am and I had a task list that was already starting to make me feel queasy (along with everything else).
This didn't help Week #1 of independence.
So I waited. I let Newf in to see how the patient was about 7:30. She bounded straight towards the cat food, splattering the kitchen with mud and generally causing a large amount of havoc.
So, I tried her with some carrot and apple. Fine.
It occurred to me she was just being fussy. Off her dried food because that's what (she thought, in her Newf brain) had made her poorly.
So I bundled her into the car and drove home where I purchased some wet food for her, which she devoured, and some suspicious looking vague diarrhoea tablets' (which, apparently, relieve the symptoms of diarrhoea, although it doesn't say how, what it does, or what symptoms specifically).
She bounded, tried scaling the fence and was generally her old self.
True enough, I had a few disastrous occurrences on the pavement on two walks, one where I had to trek home to get a bottle of water to dissipate the aftermath (I was not amused), the second time I was prepared (and had my mum to hold Newf).
By the time I went to bed, although Newf was washed out, I was confident that she was going to be okay.
Then, after falling in and out of dream filled snoozes, kept from deep sleep due to my stomach running riot and the foetus complaining unsubtly about the tea I had lovingly created, I thought I smelled something. Something bad.
It crept up my nostrils and lingered for a brief moment, but I dismissed it, thinking I was just worried and over sensitive.
Then it came again. And again.
I knew.
I donned a dressing gown and some trainers and opened the bedroom door.
The smell nearly knocked me sideways.
I trudged down the stairs to where Newf was curled up, awake but dozy, exhausted, in the corner of her area.
Before her lay carnage.
It was up the walls, in her water, all over the floor.
The problem with having a large dog is that what can feasibly be excreted from them is also to the same ratio.
I set to work with kitchen roll, a mop, disinfectant, and shoved a blindfold over my gurgling, active and nosy stomach.
Newf stayed perfectly still as I mopped around her, watching me, eyes of apology or pity or just exhaustion, I couldn't tell.
I finally got to bed at midnight, and drifted into sleep about 2am.
As if to punish myself for yesterday's lack of vet visit and the sleep I indulged my aching, collapsing body into, today I feel like I've been up all night drinking neat gin and feasting on undercooked curry.
I have used up my sickie. I have indulged my body and no remnants remain of that blissful deep slumber I allowed myself to have yesterday, to stop the headache, my tired limbs, my unrelenting stomach activity.
I am not sure whether to take Newf on the hour drive to the vet. She is now proving that she can pass solids and proved so in a slightly mocking way in the park this morning. They open in 20 minutes.
True enough, the guilt hounded me throughout the day, nagging me, pestering me, breaking my deep sleep with worry. By the time it was official work 'hometime' and my mum, worried for my sanity, paid me a visit, I had managed to shake the guilt but instead bombarded her with questions as to how she coped with morning sickness and general pregnancy related shenanigans firstly at work with my sister and secondly looking after a toddler when I decided to make an appearance in her womb (I was the one that caused havoc for her unfortunately, my sister it seems, slept gently through her foetal growth while I was already establishing my many food intolerances by forcing them back up my mum's throat to which, thankfully, she does not hold a grudge).
She said it wasn't easy.
My guilt is much to do with my work load, my mounting tasks coupled with their weak, feeble excuses (my tongue forming the words I'm Pregnant over and over silently, my emails and phone calls pathetically stating I've been a bit ill, using up my postpone-already-late-task-with-no-consequences cards left right and centre, not knowing how they'll take it to know that I'm still, well, ill).
But it also is heavily related to all those women enduring the suffering in classrooms, offices and 'real' work environments across the country (I can't even begin to absorb the guilt if I am to think about beyond England's borders right now, I think I might just become the product of consumption by guilt).
If they can do it, if they can struggle through, why am I constantly collapsing?
Luckily, the sickness has subsided to a controllable state. Unfortunately this is resolved by eating little and often.
I'm not sure what the technical term is for 'often' but I'm sure I've blurred the boundaries between that and constantly several times over the past few days.
I did feel, at the end of the weekend, despite my strength and emotions being shattered because of the departure of my partner for the first of 3 months worth of weeks in London, I was going to be okay. I could even eat a variety of foods (accompanied by the ever present constantly necessary carb) and even manage the occasional half cup of tea (on a good day).
But something went horribly wrong yesterday morning.
It wasn't helped by waking up to learn that Newf had screaming diarrhoea.
My partner had dealt with carnage in the lounge on Saturday morning (from what end he wasn't able to ascertain, always a worrying sign). But, even despite brightly coloured excretions, the colour of fluorescent yellow for those interested in the detail, she was perky and bounding around and I thought no more about it.
Yesterday I was woken to my mum gently saying that perhaps Newf needed to go to the Vet. She hadn't touched her breakfast and there were more fluorescent discoveries.
It was 7am. The vet didn't open til 9am and I had a task list that was already starting to make me feel queasy (along with everything else).
This didn't help Week #1 of independence.
So I waited. I let Newf in to see how the patient was about 7:30. She bounded straight towards the cat food, splattering the kitchen with mud and generally causing a large amount of havoc.
So, I tried her with some carrot and apple. Fine.
It occurred to me she was just being fussy. Off her dried food because that's what (she thought, in her Newf brain) had made her poorly.
So I bundled her into the car and drove home where I purchased some wet food for her, which she devoured, and some suspicious looking vague diarrhoea tablets' (which, apparently, relieve the symptoms of diarrhoea, although it doesn't say how, what it does, or what symptoms specifically).
She bounded, tried scaling the fence and was generally her old self.
True enough, I had a few disastrous occurrences on the pavement on two walks, one where I had to trek home to get a bottle of water to dissipate the aftermath (I was not amused), the second time I was prepared (and had my mum to hold Newf).
By the time I went to bed, although Newf was washed out, I was confident that she was going to be okay.
Then, after falling in and out of dream filled snoozes, kept from deep sleep due to my stomach running riot and the foetus complaining unsubtly about the tea I had lovingly created, I thought I smelled something. Something bad.
It crept up my nostrils and lingered for a brief moment, but I dismissed it, thinking I was just worried and over sensitive.
Then it came again. And again.
I knew.
I donned a dressing gown and some trainers and opened the bedroom door.
The smell nearly knocked me sideways.
I trudged down the stairs to where Newf was curled up, awake but dozy, exhausted, in the corner of her area.
Before her lay carnage.
It was up the walls, in her water, all over the floor.
The problem with having a large dog is that what can feasibly be excreted from them is also to the same ratio.
I set to work with kitchen roll, a mop, disinfectant, and shoved a blindfold over my gurgling, active and nosy stomach.
Newf stayed perfectly still as I mopped around her, watching me, eyes of apology or pity or just exhaustion, I couldn't tell.
I finally got to bed at midnight, and drifted into sleep about 2am.
As if to punish myself for yesterday's lack of vet visit and the sleep I indulged my aching, collapsing body into, today I feel like I've been up all night drinking neat gin and feasting on undercooked curry.
I have used up my sickie. I have indulged my body and no remnants remain of that blissful deep slumber I allowed myself to have yesterday, to stop the headache, my tired limbs, my unrelenting stomach activity.
I am not sure whether to take Newf on the hour drive to the vet. She is now proving that she can pass solids and proved so in a slightly mocking way in the park this morning. They open in 20 minutes.
Friday 1 February 2008
Achievements: 1, Crackers: 4
I did it! I finished a well-overdue research/observation document. I had begun the limp looking document well over a week ago but due to, well, being pregnant and all the fun I've been having alongside that, have barely managed to function with regards to daily workload and academic analysis has all but gone out of the window.
Oh, fabulous - just received an out of office from the recipient til the 5th of February. Harumpf. Must maintain enthusiasm...
Now it is ten to twelve, when I can officially abandon the morning and welcome the afternoon with a marmite and cucumber sandwich. Gone are the carb-free days of yesteryear, where I used to sup on chickpea and spinach soup of a lunchtime, perhaps with a cracker or two mid morning or afternoon, and a few pieces of fruit. Gone are controlled breakfast proportions. Gone is delayed breakfast eating, gone is the distant days of old where I could go until 2:30 before heating my soup (beans on a Friday as a special treat, woop woop!).
The last two weeks have seen me stomach only simple, mostly carb related products, with frightening regularity. On a morning I have to eat breakfast instantly, to settle the wakening demons within my stomach, to appease their unrelenting demands, less I feel sick to the point that I can't think.
This has caused a major shift of my day in terms of food consumption, with hunger pangs now kicking in at an ungodly 10am, my last meal in the early hours of the morning, to the point that by lunch time (if that's what you can just about get away with calling midday, although to my mind 1pm was always a safer bet) I have consumed an unhealthy amount of crackers (I have an assortment) and usually half a pound of dried apricots.
My usual trick of settling my ravenous stomach has been a cup of tea. Not so any more, when I have to psyche myself up for a cup of the once devoured drink. I long to ache for a cup of tea, rather than go 'hmm, I think, if I'm careful and reassess the situation presently, I might have a small cup of tea in about half an hour'. I am miserable.
So I have achieved. This is very exciting. I have many more achievements that really should have been done about 10 days ago, one that is excruciatingly late but involves me making an assessment of a terrifyingly complicated Flash file and giving a predictably poor quote for the development of it, which I shall loathe and dread from start to finish.
Five minutes to go. If I take a steady walk to the kitchen and prepare my sandwich with precision it may be an acceptable time to Consume Those Carbs (I might get that printed on a tee-shirt. That is my life.).
Oh, fabulous - just received an out of office from the recipient til the 5th of February. Harumpf. Must maintain enthusiasm...
Now it is ten to twelve, when I can officially abandon the morning and welcome the afternoon with a marmite and cucumber sandwich. Gone are the carb-free days of yesteryear, where I used to sup on chickpea and spinach soup of a lunchtime, perhaps with a cracker or two mid morning or afternoon, and a few pieces of fruit. Gone are controlled breakfast proportions. Gone is delayed breakfast eating, gone is the distant days of old where I could go until 2:30 before heating my soup (beans on a Friday as a special treat, woop woop!).
The last two weeks have seen me stomach only simple, mostly carb related products, with frightening regularity. On a morning I have to eat breakfast instantly, to settle the wakening demons within my stomach, to appease their unrelenting demands, less I feel sick to the point that I can't think.
This has caused a major shift of my day in terms of food consumption, with hunger pangs now kicking in at an ungodly 10am, my last meal in the early hours of the morning, to the point that by lunch time (if that's what you can just about get away with calling midday, although to my mind 1pm was always a safer bet) I have consumed an unhealthy amount of crackers (I have an assortment) and usually half a pound of dried apricots.
My usual trick of settling my ravenous stomach has been a cup of tea. Not so any more, when I have to psyche myself up for a cup of the once devoured drink. I long to ache for a cup of tea, rather than go 'hmm, I think, if I'm careful and reassess the situation presently, I might have a small cup of tea in about half an hour'. I am miserable.
So I have achieved. This is very exciting. I have many more achievements that really should have been done about 10 days ago, one that is excruciatingly late but involves me making an assessment of a terrifyingly complicated Flash file and giving a predictably poor quote for the development of it, which I shall loathe and dread from start to finish.
Five minutes to go. If I take a steady walk to the kitchen and prepare my sandwich with precision it may be an acceptable time to Consume Those Carbs (I might get that printed on a tee-shirt. That is my life.).
XX or XY?
Apparently the sex of my bean/foetus/collection of cells/baby* (*delete as appropriate) will be distinguishable by ultrasound in week 18 - 22 by ultrasound. Then I will be able to decide if I want to know or not.
Of the increasing number of people who now know I am up the duff, most people are of the assumption I am having a boy. Now, I am not aware or supersticious or other worldly so anything I presume will merely be guess work, and I am imagining so of my other friends - my SP was so convinced her sister's baby was going to be a girl that when we received a voicemail in the middle of the night on an overnight stay in Birmingham that she had given birth to a healthy baby boy, she just harumpfed into her pillow and went back to sleep, so I'm not entirely sure I'm going to rest with her (usually more accurate and trustworthy) judgement this time around. My partner, bless him, has said he doesn't care what it is other than it is healthy and happy.
Before I became pregnant, my partner and I often daydreamed about our children as babies, toddlers, children, teenagers...thinking through their lives in a conversation at terrifying speed. Now realisation is settling in I see my beautiful little baby girl storming up to her bedroom, telling me she is pregnant aged 14, or running away with a 'youth', and my handsome little baby boy snorting coke in his bedroom, staying out all night, refusing to acknowledge his downtrodden mother in the street when he passes me with his friends.
At the moment, the thought of my 'condition' turning into an actual baby rests somewhere between unrealistic, laughable and impossible. The fear of miscarriage, of something going wrong, eclipses daydreams and nightmares of motherhood swiftly, leaving me in a dark, cold, lonely place, fearing for the weakness of my body.
There are times, like yesterday, when I cry uncontrollably, overwhelmed and consumed and exhausted. Hating the way I am feeling, hating my body. But the fear of this being over, the fear of this being snatched away from me, of having to try again, back at the beginning, of the intense pain of loss, terrifies me more than I can really feel. I feel like a constant battle is playing out within me, and all I can do is hold on. I have to.
Of the increasing number of people who now know I am up the duff, most people are of the assumption I am having a boy. Now, I am not aware or supersticious or other worldly so anything I presume will merely be guess work, and I am imagining so of my other friends - my SP was so convinced her sister's baby was going to be a girl that when we received a voicemail in the middle of the night on an overnight stay in Birmingham that she had given birth to a healthy baby boy, she just harumpfed into her pillow and went back to sleep, so I'm not entirely sure I'm going to rest with her (usually more accurate and trustworthy) judgement this time around. My partner, bless him, has said he doesn't care what it is other than it is healthy and happy.
Before I became pregnant, my partner and I often daydreamed about our children as babies, toddlers, children, teenagers...thinking through their lives in a conversation at terrifying speed. Now realisation is settling in I see my beautiful little baby girl storming up to her bedroom, telling me she is pregnant aged 14, or running away with a 'youth', and my handsome little baby boy snorting coke in his bedroom, staying out all night, refusing to acknowledge his downtrodden mother in the street when he passes me with his friends.
At the moment, the thought of my 'condition' turning into an actual baby rests somewhere between unrealistic, laughable and impossible. The fear of miscarriage, of something going wrong, eclipses daydreams and nightmares of motherhood swiftly, leaving me in a dark, cold, lonely place, fearing for the weakness of my body.
There are times, like yesterday, when I cry uncontrollably, overwhelmed and consumed and exhausted. Hating the way I am feeling, hating my body. But the fear of this being over, the fear of this being snatched away from me, of having to try again, back at the beginning, of the intense pain of loss, terrifies me more than I can really feel. I feel like a constant battle is playing out within me, and all I can do is hold on. I have to.
Beany Baby
Yesterday I hit 7 weeks. Apparently my baby is now the size and shape of a bean.
This has caused much hilarity with my partner and sister as beans are among my most-consumed food. It has caused me some slight concern in the fact that it perhaps may just be a bean. My partner did highlight that this would be a lot easier to give birth to (obviously being well informed and experienced in the subject matter) because it would just 'fire across the room'. Hmm.
This week I've leveled and troughed. I don't think I got as high as a peak, although the closest thing was probably seeing that my boyfriend had put up blinds in the kitchen so I didn't have to look at Dead Guy's House (currently up for sale), who's derelict kitchen door and grease ridden windows face straight into my kitchen window. Even a 6'7" fence hasn't obscured the view. When I came home from the first 30 minutes of exercise I had managed to haul my hefty, exhausted body to for a good few days and discovered the revelation of my now protected kitchen, I felt tears spring to my eyes.
There have been times this week, low, introverted, lonely times, when I could not see as a person what I am offering anyone at the moment. The loneliness is all consuming, my mind and body constantly goading me, coaxing me into shut down, into turning inwards, into sleep, rest.
The all consuming exhaustion, the constant sickness, becomes overwhelming and I cannot see beyond that. There are times when washing up, tidying clothes, making a drink feel like such an effort. I have watched my partner transform the house these last few weeks as I have moved around a hollow person, a ghost of myself, barely interacting. I feel like I am merely observing life, but I am too all-consumed by my own discomfort, sickness and exhaustion to become involved.
This weekend I have a good friend coming to visit me. She doesn't know yet. I will tell her, I can't not, not with the physical, emotional and mental wreck I am holding together at the moment. I am scared, nervous, as I have been meeting friends, socialising these last few weeks. I summon every ounce of energy, of happiness, of comfort - I find nice-ish clothes, I straighten my otherwise terrifying hair (the ill conceived 'I'm pregnant and depressed, I'm going to get my hair cut' hair cut). But it quickly falls away, abandons me, an hour or two in.
My sister and my family have been an incredible support. Despite my sadness, my lowness, my self absorption and my exhaustion. They listen, they tell me not to be stupid when I am apologising, they offer practical, helpful advice. So much so I am following my sister's advice and plan to have a Chinese dude stick pins in me in order for some relief (or distraction, either being a welcome change) from morning sickness.
There are some women on the forum I am on who haven't experienced any symptoms other than 'feeling a bit tired' and 'having sore boobs'. How I long for such tame, un-consuming symptoms.
I am: A mess. I cry frequently (big, unfeminine tears, accompanied with something similar to the wail of a banshee), I burp constantly, I am like a Tiny Tears baby, except with more bladder control.
My partner leaves for 3 months in London on Sunday, back for less than 48 hours every weekend. I am terrified of myself.
Last night I daydreamed as I was trying to sleep that I was doing a monotonous office job. Stamping endless forms, not thinking, not feeling. A non-caring, non-committal bliss settled over me like a blanket, I processed the days, no emotional output, no nothing. Instead I have a pile of self-generated, emotionally and mentally consuming work to tackle, all whose deadlines have been and gone, through a continuous stream of apologies and postponements.
I wonder if I can stomach a cup of tea before I start.
This has caused much hilarity with my partner and sister as beans are among my most-consumed food. It has caused me some slight concern in the fact that it perhaps may just be a bean. My partner did highlight that this would be a lot easier to give birth to (obviously being well informed and experienced in the subject matter) because it would just 'fire across the room'. Hmm.
This week I've leveled and troughed. I don't think I got as high as a peak, although the closest thing was probably seeing that my boyfriend had put up blinds in the kitchen so I didn't have to look at Dead Guy's House (currently up for sale), who's derelict kitchen door and grease ridden windows face straight into my kitchen window. Even a 6'7" fence hasn't obscured the view. When I came home from the first 30 minutes of exercise I had managed to haul my hefty, exhausted body to for a good few days and discovered the revelation of my now protected kitchen, I felt tears spring to my eyes.
There have been times this week, low, introverted, lonely times, when I could not see as a person what I am offering anyone at the moment. The loneliness is all consuming, my mind and body constantly goading me, coaxing me into shut down, into turning inwards, into sleep, rest.
The all consuming exhaustion, the constant sickness, becomes overwhelming and I cannot see beyond that. There are times when washing up, tidying clothes, making a drink feel like such an effort. I have watched my partner transform the house these last few weeks as I have moved around a hollow person, a ghost of myself, barely interacting. I feel like I am merely observing life, but I am too all-consumed by my own discomfort, sickness and exhaustion to become involved.
This weekend I have a good friend coming to visit me. She doesn't know yet. I will tell her, I can't not, not with the physical, emotional and mental wreck I am holding together at the moment. I am scared, nervous, as I have been meeting friends, socialising these last few weeks. I summon every ounce of energy, of happiness, of comfort - I find nice-ish clothes, I straighten my otherwise terrifying hair (the ill conceived 'I'm pregnant and depressed, I'm going to get my hair cut' hair cut). But it quickly falls away, abandons me, an hour or two in.
My sister and my family have been an incredible support. Despite my sadness, my lowness, my self absorption and my exhaustion. They listen, they tell me not to be stupid when I am apologising, they offer practical, helpful advice. So much so I am following my sister's advice and plan to have a Chinese dude stick pins in me in order for some relief (or distraction, either being a welcome change) from morning sickness.
There are some women on the forum I am on who haven't experienced any symptoms other than 'feeling a bit tired' and 'having sore boobs'. How I long for such tame, un-consuming symptoms.
I am: A mess. I cry frequently (big, unfeminine tears, accompanied with something similar to the wail of a banshee), I burp constantly, I am like a Tiny Tears baby, except with more bladder control.
My partner leaves for 3 months in London on Sunday, back for less than 48 hours every weekend. I am terrified of myself.
Last night I daydreamed as I was trying to sleep that I was doing a monotonous office job. Stamping endless forms, not thinking, not feeling. A non-caring, non-committal bliss settled over me like a blanket, I processed the days, no emotional output, no nothing. Instead I have a pile of self-generated, emotionally and mentally consuming work to tackle, all whose deadlines have been and gone, through a continuous stream of apologies and postponements.
I wonder if I can stomach a cup of tea before I start.
Tuesday 29 January 2008
Excuses, excuses
A necessary interlude from eating crackers, supping luke warm water and sulking.
An important conference call with a large client of a company that I have worked for for many years, and am now freelancing for.
I hate conference calls at the best of times, it is constantly impossible to interject a meaningful, useful comment or issue in between silences, apologies and multiple conversation strands (none of which I ever appear to be a part of).
I was introduced to this conference, unaware my ex-boss was already within the conversation. I started introducing myself to these incredibly scary, high powered business people within this incredibly important client business, as the 'HTML person that had been doing a lot of work on the project' and continued in nervous, vague and unstructured babble, until my ex-boss dragged me out of my pit of self despairing and waffle to tell them what I was actually here for.
I had, incidentally, not fifteen minutes before, had an informed, eloquent conversation with my ex-boss, a PM and a designer regarding this project and had generally not made such an incredible arse of myself during that previous, yet unimportant and dramatically overshadowed, conversation.
Coupled with my inability to articulate myself in front of important clients, I also have an unrelenting and stubborn headache, and the sickness is showing remarkable vigor this morning, tearing through the weak barriers of my acupressure bands and running riot, stirring up numerous grumblings in the stomach acids rebelling currently within my stomach.
Not in the best of moods, and it is sadly only 10:30. An age until I can break for yet more carbs (the cream crackers aren't touching my wretchedly active stomach acids this morning), no drink I can enjoy, not even that hallowed thing, once my partner, my soul mate, my cup of tea, and a pile of work to complete.
I am debating on how to redeem myself from my former self humiliation, but the only plaguing words, the only accurate description, is something I can only utter to my partner (which I do regularly).
I'M PREGNANT.
I think that just about covers me for any grumpiness, sulkiness, stubbornness, poorliness, depressive episodes and general lack of communicative abilities across all social and work scenarios for the next 7 months.
Shame my ex-boss and everyone at this very important client just thinks I'm a bit thick.
An important conference call with a large client of a company that I have worked for for many years, and am now freelancing for.
I hate conference calls at the best of times, it is constantly impossible to interject a meaningful, useful comment or issue in between silences, apologies and multiple conversation strands (none of which I ever appear to be a part of).
I was introduced to this conference, unaware my ex-boss was already within the conversation. I started introducing myself to these incredibly scary, high powered business people within this incredibly important client business, as the 'HTML person that had been doing a lot of work on the project' and continued in nervous, vague and unstructured babble, until my ex-boss dragged me out of my pit of self despairing and waffle to tell them what I was actually here for.
I had, incidentally, not fifteen minutes before, had an informed, eloquent conversation with my ex-boss, a PM and a designer regarding this project and had generally not made such an incredible arse of myself during that previous, yet unimportant and dramatically overshadowed, conversation.
Coupled with my inability to articulate myself in front of important clients, I also have an unrelenting and stubborn headache, and the sickness is showing remarkable vigor this morning, tearing through the weak barriers of my acupressure bands and running riot, stirring up numerous grumblings in the stomach acids rebelling currently within my stomach.
Not in the best of moods, and it is sadly only 10:30. An age until I can break for yet more carbs (the cream crackers aren't touching my wretchedly active stomach acids this morning), no drink I can enjoy, not even that hallowed thing, once my partner, my soul mate, my cup of tea, and a pile of work to complete.
I am debating on how to redeem myself from my former self humiliation, but the only plaguing words, the only accurate description, is something I can only utter to my partner (which I do regularly).
I'M PREGNANT.
I think that just about covers me for any grumpiness, sulkiness, stubbornness, poorliness, depressive episodes and general lack of communicative abilities across all social and work scenarios for the next 7 months.
Shame my ex-boss and everyone at this very important client just thinks I'm a bit thick.
Monday 28 January 2008
The long road to...where?
On Saturday, I travelled to the seemingly eternally flooded Tewkesbury to meet my SP.
There, after eating a vast quantity of marmite sandwiches in the sunshine and reading Rebecca in the gardens of the Abbey with the sun shining on my skin, grabbing desperately at invisible drops of Vitamin D, my SP found me and took care of me.
She had bought me ginger and lemon tea, ginger biscuits, aromatherapy oils (checked and cleared for a lady of my condition) and a bag full of baby clothes and books from her sister. Due to my poorly controlled emotional state, even the thought of her kindness now makes me feel a bit blubbery.
There, in a hotel room, I talked and talked at her, about my worries, my fears.
I told her about my battle with exercise, how my figure, a constant source of resentment and unhappiness over years of teenage and twenty-something traumas, that had finally settled into some sort of aesthetic agreement with myself and my perception of my fatty deposits, had suddenly morphed out of control, inflating at speed, cascading over the top of my trousers, pushing hard and fast on jeans, taut and stretched and all a little too early from everything I'd read.
I told her about my sadness, jealousy, my aching for losing my pole classes. On Friday night I had dreamed, such a vivid dream, of dancing in class, of returning to my old class, to an unfamiliar studio, to a room filled with poles, and girls on these poles, to a place with a stranger that I had to share, self conscious and out of condition. I woke up that night, and ran over move after move in my head, praying I wouldn't forget, that I wouldn't lose it all, not completely. Not after what I'd achieved, where I'd got. In my mind, I inverted, I spun, I performed tricks and spins effortlessly, one after another after another.
Then I told her of my fears. How swiftly I bounced from my own selfishness of such superficial visual worries, to my inner terror, my dark place, my lonely place.
I told her my worry of losing this baby, this tiny collection of cells inside of me, this silent, motionless, creature, undemanding yet needing and wanting everything seemingly beyond perfection to survive these fragile, delicate months.
My bump, this thing, my...baby?...could be already gone, vanished, or never even properly evolved. The chances of miscarriage are frightening, I having already witnessed a few in my virtual baby community. Virtual meeting place, real people, real experiences, real pain.
It is such a very long road ahead. I am seven weeks now, or there abouts. I have such a long time to go before I am even allowed to know if there is something growing within me (apart from fat deposits which seemed to have jumped on the bandwagon excitedly at the thought of establishing themselves on my once generous, more recently economic, hips, of settling comfortably on the never quite conquered back fat, slipping back into their positions grinning satisfactorily, perhaps with a slight hint of superiority, a knowing 'I told you so' at their lips).
It seems an eternity before I even register for my scan. Then such a long, long journey ahead, and that is if that goes okay.
I never understood before the pain a miscarriage must cause. I have seen it, in friends, in handed down stories, in literature, in film. But until I became pregnant (I nearly wrote a mother - again, an uncomfortable betrayal of how I sometimes let my thoughts unravel), I couldn't have foreseen the tumbling of thoughts from cell cluster, from foetus, to dependent baby, to demanding toddler, to stroppy teenager, to drug taking rebellious youth, to adult.
The scenes collapse into one another with no control of my own. I watch as their life, and subsequently my life, unfolds like dominoes collapsing, too fast, never able to take moments back. I am scared for myself as a parent, I will have to toughen up to the harsh words of children, to their icily sharp observations, their bitter and cutting remarks, their casual use of hatred, of love.
I watched Neighbours during my half hour cardio session (a sweat and breathlessness arising after merely stepping onto the stepper these days, according to my midwife signs that I should stop my exercise...but does this apply to the suddenly painfully unfit?) and I noticed the remarks - nasty, bitchy, angry, venomous remarks that children flung at their forgiving, despairing, loving parents and sympathised, for the first time, with the parents' never ending battles for equilibrium, for love in return, for peace, for happiness.
But I am getting ahead of myself once again, in the way that my mind does at the moment. Now I am still buried deep within first trimester sickness, my bands not holding back the waves, although calming them somewhat (or at least distracting me), and scared for each day that passes, each twinge magnified, resonating throughout my inflated body.
There, after eating a vast quantity of marmite sandwiches in the sunshine and reading Rebecca in the gardens of the Abbey with the sun shining on my skin, grabbing desperately at invisible drops of Vitamin D, my SP found me and took care of me.
She had bought me ginger and lemon tea, ginger biscuits, aromatherapy oils (checked and cleared for a lady of my condition) and a bag full of baby clothes and books from her sister. Due to my poorly controlled emotional state, even the thought of her kindness now makes me feel a bit blubbery.
There, in a hotel room, I talked and talked at her, about my worries, my fears.
I told her about my battle with exercise, how my figure, a constant source of resentment and unhappiness over years of teenage and twenty-something traumas, that had finally settled into some sort of aesthetic agreement with myself and my perception of my fatty deposits, had suddenly morphed out of control, inflating at speed, cascading over the top of my trousers, pushing hard and fast on jeans, taut and stretched and all a little too early from everything I'd read.
I told her about my sadness, jealousy, my aching for losing my pole classes. On Friday night I had dreamed, such a vivid dream, of dancing in class, of returning to my old class, to an unfamiliar studio, to a room filled with poles, and girls on these poles, to a place with a stranger that I had to share, self conscious and out of condition. I woke up that night, and ran over move after move in my head, praying I wouldn't forget, that I wouldn't lose it all, not completely. Not after what I'd achieved, where I'd got. In my mind, I inverted, I spun, I performed tricks and spins effortlessly, one after another after another.
Then I told her of my fears. How swiftly I bounced from my own selfishness of such superficial visual worries, to my inner terror, my dark place, my lonely place.
I told her my worry of losing this baby, this tiny collection of cells inside of me, this silent, motionless, creature, undemanding yet needing and wanting everything seemingly beyond perfection to survive these fragile, delicate months.
My bump, this thing, my...baby?...could be already gone, vanished, or never even properly evolved. The chances of miscarriage are frightening, I having already witnessed a few in my virtual baby community. Virtual meeting place, real people, real experiences, real pain.
It is such a very long road ahead. I am seven weeks now, or there abouts. I have such a long time to go before I am even allowed to know if there is something growing within me (apart from fat deposits which seemed to have jumped on the bandwagon excitedly at the thought of establishing themselves on my once generous, more recently economic, hips, of settling comfortably on the never quite conquered back fat, slipping back into their positions grinning satisfactorily, perhaps with a slight hint of superiority, a knowing 'I told you so' at their lips).
It seems an eternity before I even register for my scan. Then such a long, long journey ahead, and that is if that goes okay.
I never understood before the pain a miscarriage must cause. I have seen it, in friends, in handed down stories, in literature, in film. But until I became pregnant (I nearly wrote a mother - again, an uncomfortable betrayal of how I sometimes let my thoughts unravel), I couldn't have foreseen the tumbling of thoughts from cell cluster, from foetus, to dependent baby, to demanding toddler, to stroppy teenager, to drug taking rebellious youth, to adult.
The scenes collapse into one another with no control of my own. I watch as their life, and subsequently my life, unfolds like dominoes collapsing, too fast, never able to take moments back. I am scared for myself as a parent, I will have to toughen up to the harsh words of children, to their icily sharp observations, their bitter and cutting remarks, their casual use of hatred, of love.
I watched Neighbours during my half hour cardio session (a sweat and breathlessness arising after merely stepping onto the stepper these days, according to my midwife signs that I should stop my exercise...but does this apply to the suddenly painfully unfit?) and I noticed the remarks - nasty, bitchy, angry, venomous remarks that children flung at their forgiving, despairing, loving parents and sympathised, for the first time, with the parents' never ending battles for equilibrium, for love in return, for peace, for happiness.
But I am getting ahead of myself once again, in the way that my mind does at the moment. Now I am still buried deep within first trimester sickness, my bands not holding back the waves, although calming them somewhat (or at least distracting me), and scared for each day that passes, each twinge magnified, resonating throughout my inflated body.
Friday 25 January 2008
And now, to sleep...
It is Friday night, just after 8pm.
Every bone in my body, every tissue, every muscle, every nerve pulse, is aching, exhausted.
My hands are slumped lazily over the keyboard, moving occasionally, trying to pretend that my words are in some way productive, even though my partner is still working on the house, despite my feeble, shallow attempts to assist him.
My exhaustion is all consuming, and terrifying. I have no control about the increasing onslaught of tiredness that I can feel creeping up on me. But I am fighting it, I am struggling against it, forcing myself to drive into it, onwards.
The idea of letting it swallow me is inviting, too much so. But it is never ending. Every night I collapse into bed, every morning I struggle to get up, aching for more sleep.
He is finishing soon, and I will do my best to entertain something of an evening for him, but I can feel that even that feels like an empty, unstructured promise.
I have no idea when this will end. Tomorrow I meet with my SP, the second to last time I will see her before she leaves for Dubai. I wish I was energised, my normal self. I know she understands, I know she will allow me to indulge in my self pity, my fits of exhaustion.
But I wish I was myself for her, for our precious time together.
I am wearing sea sickness bands to help cure my nauseous stomach. I thought they were helping. I'd be happy with a placebo, I'd be happy to indulge in my psychosomatic symptoms, if only the sickness left me, or subsided, or only came in short, succinct waves, preferably when I was in deep sleep.
Anyone for a dry cracker?
Every bone in my body, every tissue, every muscle, every nerve pulse, is aching, exhausted.
My hands are slumped lazily over the keyboard, moving occasionally, trying to pretend that my words are in some way productive, even though my partner is still working on the house, despite my feeble, shallow attempts to assist him.
My exhaustion is all consuming, and terrifying. I have no control about the increasing onslaught of tiredness that I can feel creeping up on me. But I am fighting it, I am struggling against it, forcing myself to drive into it, onwards.
The idea of letting it swallow me is inviting, too much so. But it is never ending. Every night I collapse into bed, every morning I struggle to get up, aching for more sleep.
He is finishing soon, and I will do my best to entertain something of an evening for him, but I can feel that even that feels like an empty, unstructured promise.
I have no idea when this will end. Tomorrow I meet with my SP, the second to last time I will see her before she leaves for Dubai. I wish I was energised, my normal self. I know she understands, I know she will allow me to indulge in my self pity, my fits of exhaustion.
But I wish I was myself for her, for our precious time together.
I am wearing sea sickness bands to help cure my nauseous stomach. I thought they were helping. I'd be happy with a placebo, I'd be happy to indulge in my psychosomatic symptoms, if only the sickness left me, or subsided, or only came in short, succinct waves, preferably when I was in deep sleep.
Anyone for a dry cracker?
Quick! Get thee to a midwife!
Yesterday, my partner and I visited my midwife for the first time.
This was the second time I had graced the local health centre with my presence, the first time being when I had just found out I was pregnant, and was something of a total disaster.
The doctor, a young, nervous looking public school type, had stuttered through a number of vague questions and practicalities, skirting around the edges of intimacy and giving a wide birth to anything that I might have deemed relevant or helpful. Even after indicating several times that I couldn't eat any dairy (including eggs) or meat, he still ploughed through his rehearsed list of danger foods.
I did try to interject on numerous occasions to inform him that I wasn't likely to tuck into a raw steak, nor was I about to indulge in mayonnaise littered with uncooked eggs, and I certainly wasn't going to have a big slab of blue vein ridden soft cheese any time soon. But there was no stopping him. He had his list, he was damn well going to say it.
So then came the question: What exercise could I do?
He informed me that I was fine to continue with my normal routine pretty much, listing jogging and swimming as possible favourites. He asked me, almost relaxed in our dialogue by this point, 'What exercise do you do?'
When I told him, his stuttering increased ten fold as he searched for something to steady his clearly wrecked shredded nerves. He clearly was not expecting this small, child-like, innocent looking pregnant woman to tell him she was a pole dancer.
His exercise knowledge on this topic was as poor as I imagine a vicar's might be, and, after watching him floundering wildly for a few moments, I rescued the situation by saying that I probably had a better idea of what that entailed and whether it was suitable or not.
I slipped out of the office, clutching a post-it note stating "congratulations form" that I was to hand over to the lady on reception.
By this point, I was ready to leave. I had followed the instructions on no less than three positive pregnancy tests that had informed me to visit my doctor, I had done so, and I had gained nothing by this point: no enlightenment, no information, no knowledge. He had even informed me, on calculating that I had conceived in early December, that I was due in October. And that was using a pregnancy wheel. Genius. I was not feeling comforted by my experience.
So I subtly passed this post-it note over to the lady on reception, one of a series of severe, middle aged, self important women who patrolled the office like the gates of Mordor. She read the post it aloud. Very loud.
I winced. I debated on telling her, asking her, pleading with her to be a little bit subtle. But I could tell that would probably only encourage her further.
By that point anyway she was part way through her next sentence, directed not at me, more at God and all who fell beneath him on this earth.
"I don't think we have any congratulations forms, [name of other severe middle aged self important woman], do we have any congratulations forms?"
A loud, uncensored discussion ensued between the severe middle aged self important woman, which resulted in phoning a desk 'upstairs' and eventually, finally, after the women interjecting 'congratulations form' into every sentence possible during the age that I was standing nervously, uncomfortably at the desk, a woman hurried down, presenting woman #1 with the hallowed form.
Woman #1 said to woman #2 'it's for this....woman'. I could see her eyes flicker up to me, the pause the size of the grand canyon, the word 'girl' substituted so inelegantly, and under duress, for 'woman'.
I filled in the form, and shuffled home, with a few leaflets, one containing, yet again, all the foods I was forbidden to eat. No meat pate, shellfish or Marlin for me then.
Yesterday, our visit was somewhat less harrowing. My midwife, who, from what I have been able to interpret from other people's experiences, fits the stereotypical mould like a hand in a stiff, yet effective and productive looking glove, disproved of my dietary 'issues', and seemed a little too disappointed that neither mine or my partner's immediate families had anything interesting to contribute to the illness or disease section.
More baby admin. That's basically what it was. 30 minutes of foetal paper work.
I came out with a large brown envelope and instructions to call the hospital for a scan appointment in three weeks. And the knowledge that morning sickness may wear off after 12 weeks, but sometimes it's just there for the whole duration, like an unwanted, irritating, vomit-inducing yet relentlessly enthusiastic sidekick.
Today I have woken up feeling a little lost. Still sick, still lacking the much begged for concentration and personal application to my work, still grumpy, still aching for the love of a cup of tea to return, still riddled with exhaustion, still tied in numerous emotional knots, double bows and the occasional velcro strap.
This was the second time I had graced the local health centre with my presence, the first time being when I had just found out I was pregnant, and was something of a total disaster.
The doctor, a young, nervous looking public school type, had stuttered through a number of vague questions and practicalities, skirting around the edges of intimacy and giving a wide birth to anything that I might have deemed relevant or helpful. Even after indicating several times that I couldn't eat any dairy (including eggs) or meat, he still ploughed through his rehearsed list of danger foods.
I did try to interject on numerous occasions to inform him that I wasn't likely to tuck into a raw steak, nor was I about to indulge in mayonnaise littered with uncooked eggs, and I certainly wasn't going to have a big slab of blue vein ridden soft cheese any time soon. But there was no stopping him. He had his list, he was damn well going to say it.
So then came the question: What exercise could I do?
He informed me that I was fine to continue with my normal routine pretty much, listing jogging and swimming as possible favourites. He asked me, almost relaxed in our dialogue by this point, 'What exercise do you do?'
When I told him, his stuttering increased ten fold as he searched for something to steady his clearly wrecked shredded nerves. He clearly was not expecting this small, child-like, innocent looking pregnant woman to tell him she was a pole dancer.
His exercise knowledge on this topic was as poor as I imagine a vicar's might be, and, after watching him floundering wildly for a few moments, I rescued the situation by saying that I probably had a better idea of what that entailed and whether it was suitable or not.
I slipped out of the office, clutching a post-it note stating "congratulations form" that I was to hand over to the lady on reception.
By this point, I was ready to leave. I had followed the instructions on no less than three positive pregnancy tests that had informed me to visit my doctor, I had done so, and I had gained nothing by this point: no enlightenment, no information, no knowledge. He had even informed me, on calculating that I had conceived in early December, that I was due in October. And that was using a pregnancy wheel. Genius. I was not feeling comforted by my experience.
So I subtly passed this post-it note over to the lady on reception, one of a series of severe, middle aged, self important women who patrolled the office like the gates of Mordor. She read the post it aloud. Very loud.
I winced. I debated on telling her, asking her, pleading with her to be a little bit subtle. But I could tell that would probably only encourage her further.
By that point anyway she was part way through her next sentence, directed not at me, more at God and all who fell beneath him on this earth.
"I don't think we have any congratulations forms, [name of other severe middle aged self important woman], do we have any congratulations forms?"
A loud, uncensored discussion ensued between the severe middle aged self important woman, which resulted in phoning a desk 'upstairs' and eventually, finally, after the women interjecting 'congratulations form' into every sentence possible during the age that I was standing nervously, uncomfortably at the desk, a woman hurried down, presenting woman #1 with the hallowed form.
Woman #1 said to woman #2 'it's for this....woman'. I could see her eyes flicker up to me, the pause the size of the grand canyon, the word 'girl' substituted so inelegantly, and under duress, for 'woman'.
I filled in the form, and shuffled home, with a few leaflets, one containing, yet again, all the foods I was forbidden to eat. No meat pate, shellfish or Marlin for me then.
Yesterday, our visit was somewhat less harrowing. My midwife, who, from what I have been able to interpret from other people's experiences, fits the stereotypical mould like a hand in a stiff, yet effective and productive looking glove, disproved of my dietary 'issues', and seemed a little too disappointed that neither mine or my partner's immediate families had anything interesting to contribute to the illness or disease section.
More baby admin. That's basically what it was. 30 minutes of foetal paper work.
I came out with a large brown envelope and instructions to call the hospital for a scan appointment in three weeks. And the knowledge that morning sickness may wear off after 12 weeks, but sometimes it's just there for the whole duration, like an unwanted, irritating, vomit-inducing yet relentlessly enthusiastic sidekick.
Today I have woken up feeling a little lost. Still sick, still lacking the much begged for concentration and personal application to my work, still grumpy, still aching for the love of a cup of tea to return, still riddled with exhaustion, still tied in numerous emotional knots, double bows and the occasional velcro strap.
Thursday 24 January 2008
All in perspective
A post just on the thread I belong to: a miscarriage at 5.5 weeks.
Somehow my symptoms are all in perspective. And the possibility of things going wrong are all the more real.
Somehow my symptoms are all in perspective. And the possibility of things going wrong are all the more real.
Concentration, concentration, concentration
It is now Thursday.
I have achieved, in financial terms, in personal terms, in workload terms:
Nothing.
I have, this week, attended a few meetings and workshops, written a proposal in about the amount of time I would possibly have normally completed the work outlined in the proposal, and generalyl failed to do a lot of my assigned tasks.
My sickness, close to sea sickness or motion sickness, rides with me constantly. Coupled with a constant, overbearing headache, resting on my temples like a slovenly, awkward cat, I feel like I have PMT, a nasty stomach bug and a gin hangover day after day.
There is no cure, there is seemingly no end.
Working on a site build, as I was hoping to, would have been okay. Structure, completion. Beginning, middle, end. Creativity aside, just function, methodology, no conception, just conclusion of someone else's designs. Replication. I was always good at that.
But instead I am lumbered with vague, unfocussed, never ending research.
My sister comforted me today telling me not to panic, that it was like sleep, you can't force it. Worrying about it will just make it worse. "This is probably what it feels like to be a man who can't get an erection."
I am hoping that through writing I will be able to purge the sickness and the worry that circulates endlessly, encasing any strands of productivity and suffocating them with overbearing thoughts of panic and dispair.
I am scared.
Last week I worked long hours, 13 hour days, tears streaming down my puffy cheeks, tracksuit bottoms stretching uncomfortably around my swollen belly. The sickness came and went, I drank tea, I worried, I stressed, I earned money, I paid the mortgage.
Now the deadlines for that start, that middle, that end, that structured work, have passed. I am waiting for work, I have been all week. The sickness swells but doesn't rest anymore, constantly plaguing me, rising in my throat, filling my stomach, an acid-ridden balloon.
I am not without tasks to complete, deadlines to meet, but the work I have is vague, unstructured, and I can't apply myself. And with lack of application comes self-loathing, a twisted, gnarled hatred, distraction tinged with anger, naps full of worry, walks plagued with unfinished tasks, delayed deadlines.
I shouldn't punish myself, I know. But I imagine those other secretly pregnant women across the country, the world now, and how they are coping. Stories of women discreetly, or not-so-discreetly, vomiting in bushes waiting for buses, or stopping to be sick cycling to work. Women who take power naps propped up in public toilets. Women who manage to steer their other offspring through morning rituals and off to school, while their stomachs are goading them to the basin. And what am I sacrificing, what am I suffering?
Sat at my desk, with an attentive partner, a depressed Newfie (in a cruel irony, this week she was spade and is now battling with an oversized cone and an unbearable itching - she is lying now, exposing her scar to me, as proof of our crime, our theft). I would be brought cups of tea, could I stomach them. I am able to take precious cat-naps, in my own bed, if I need to (so far I have succumbed to two this week) while the rest of those women bearing their pregnancies silently battle through their jobs, physicially challenging, mentally draining, emotionally exhausting.
I am angry with myself, not just in my lack of application and concentration. But for those other women who have no choice that are suffering in silence.
I do, on the plus side, have some (minor) boob growthage.
I have achieved, in financial terms, in personal terms, in workload terms:
Nothing.
I have, this week, attended a few meetings and workshops, written a proposal in about the amount of time I would possibly have normally completed the work outlined in the proposal, and generalyl failed to do a lot of my assigned tasks.
My sickness, close to sea sickness or motion sickness, rides with me constantly. Coupled with a constant, overbearing headache, resting on my temples like a slovenly, awkward cat, I feel like I have PMT, a nasty stomach bug and a gin hangover day after day.
There is no cure, there is seemingly no end.
Working on a site build, as I was hoping to, would have been okay. Structure, completion. Beginning, middle, end. Creativity aside, just function, methodology, no conception, just conclusion of someone else's designs. Replication. I was always good at that.
But instead I am lumbered with vague, unfocussed, never ending research.
My sister comforted me today telling me not to panic, that it was like sleep, you can't force it. Worrying about it will just make it worse. "This is probably what it feels like to be a man who can't get an erection."
I am hoping that through writing I will be able to purge the sickness and the worry that circulates endlessly, encasing any strands of productivity and suffocating them with overbearing thoughts of panic and dispair.
I am scared.
Last week I worked long hours, 13 hour days, tears streaming down my puffy cheeks, tracksuit bottoms stretching uncomfortably around my swollen belly. The sickness came and went, I drank tea, I worried, I stressed, I earned money, I paid the mortgage.
Now the deadlines for that start, that middle, that end, that structured work, have passed. I am waiting for work, I have been all week. The sickness swells but doesn't rest anymore, constantly plaguing me, rising in my throat, filling my stomach, an acid-ridden balloon.
I am not without tasks to complete, deadlines to meet, but the work I have is vague, unstructured, and I can't apply myself. And with lack of application comes self-loathing, a twisted, gnarled hatred, distraction tinged with anger, naps full of worry, walks plagued with unfinished tasks, delayed deadlines.
I shouldn't punish myself, I know. But I imagine those other secretly pregnant women across the country, the world now, and how they are coping. Stories of women discreetly, or not-so-discreetly, vomiting in bushes waiting for buses, or stopping to be sick cycling to work. Women who take power naps propped up in public toilets. Women who manage to steer their other offspring through morning rituals and off to school, while their stomachs are goading them to the basin. And what am I sacrificing, what am I suffering?
Sat at my desk, with an attentive partner, a depressed Newfie (in a cruel irony, this week she was spade and is now battling with an oversized cone and an unbearable itching - she is lying now, exposing her scar to me, as proof of our crime, our theft). I would be brought cups of tea, could I stomach them. I am able to take precious cat-naps, in my own bed, if I need to (so far I have succumbed to two this week) while the rest of those women bearing their pregnancies silently battle through their jobs, physicially challenging, mentally draining, emotionally exhausting.
I am angry with myself, not just in my lack of application and concentration. But for those other women who have no choice that are suffering in silence.
I do, on the plus side, have some (minor) boob growthage.
Early days
The title of this blog is a little presumptuous.
And also a bit inaccurate.
I am now, today, six weeks in to my pregnancy (although the doctor, with his nervous stutter - I think he would have preferred a verruca to deal with - and Wheel of Birth, managed to predict that I was not only 6 weeks pregnant 4 weeks ago, an impossibility, trust me, but also that I was due in October, therefore assuming that I hadn't yet conceived).
Today I see the Midwife. I am not sure what will change.
My persona, abandoned 11 months ago, rises up again, albeit a little confused. Mainly because that is who I am - I tried to come up with another persona, to suit the situation, so no virtual paper trail scattered links from one to the other across the web, so no connections were made between old and new. But there is safety in eleven months, and that safety is forgetting, is losing the ritual of blog checking. The knowledge my former readers (mostly kind friends, bored at work) are now all settled in different daily reads, gives me some comfort in anonymity.
The familiar blogger window (with a few more posh hovery boxes), the familiar comfort. I have been longing for it for such a long time.
I always imagined I'd blog my pregnancy. I have written daily entries in my virtual post-it notes scattered over the bedroom air as I try to sleep. I have even gone to write in this very window several times over the last few weeks but something stopped me. Fear of being found out, fear of being a fraud, fear of some lunch break detective stumbling over profile connections.
And the sickness made me too ill to write. Too ill to find myself. Too ill to express my loneliness, my sadness, my tears, my worry, my fear.
But today, what changed?
Perhaps because over the past few days I have joined a lovely online group who I am able to spit rants at and ask questions to ladies all due in the same month as me.
Perhaps because I am hitting despair with my work struggles and worry.
Mainly because I just need to write.
And also a bit inaccurate.
I am now, today, six weeks in to my pregnancy (although the doctor, with his nervous stutter - I think he would have preferred a verruca to deal with - and Wheel of Birth, managed to predict that I was not only 6 weeks pregnant 4 weeks ago, an impossibility, trust me, but also that I was due in October, therefore assuming that I hadn't yet conceived).
Today I see the Midwife. I am not sure what will change.
My persona, abandoned 11 months ago, rises up again, albeit a little confused. Mainly because that is who I am - I tried to come up with another persona, to suit the situation, so no virtual paper trail scattered links from one to the other across the web, so no connections were made between old and new. But there is safety in eleven months, and that safety is forgetting, is losing the ritual of blog checking. The knowledge my former readers (mostly kind friends, bored at work) are now all settled in different daily reads, gives me some comfort in anonymity.
The familiar blogger window (with a few more posh hovery boxes), the familiar comfort. I have been longing for it for such a long time.
I always imagined I'd blog my pregnancy. I have written daily entries in my virtual post-it notes scattered over the bedroom air as I try to sleep. I have even gone to write in this very window several times over the last few weeks but something stopped me. Fear of being found out, fear of being a fraud, fear of some lunch break detective stumbling over profile connections.
And the sickness made me too ill to write. Too ill to find myself. Too ill to express my loneliness, my sadness, my tears, my worry, my fear.
But today, what changed?
Perhaps because over the past few days I have joined a lovely online group who I am able to spit rants at and ask questions to ladies all due in the same month as me.
Perhaps because I am hitting despair with my work struggles and worry.
Mainly because I just need to write.
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