15w 6d

I'm  almost 16 weeks which means I'm close to passing the 4 month mark. I'm getting sick with much less frequency (that's me, trying to be positive), although I pass entire days clutching my stomach in bed and vomiting in the morning. Like this morning. It turns out that no one should indulge a craving for Doritos and gummy worms, no matter how good it sounds. After my second round of Zofran settles, I'm going to see about tackling lunch. Baby steps. I just go one meal at a time.

In other (non) interesting pregnancy news, with the end of my first trimester and start of second trimester, I have symptoms that I didn't know real women actually experienced. Sure, I mean, I figured there had to be a reason for all the hemorrhoid commercials on tv, but I didn't know exactly what it would be like. Turns out that three months of constipation can have some brutal side effects, like hemorrhoids. I also have what pregnancy guidebooks lovingly refer to as, "pregnancy rhinitis". Basically, it's an overproduction of mucus that leads to a runny, stuffy nose. I thought I was getting sick at first (pregnancy colds are particularly brutal), but no other symptoms emerged. Just a chronic stuffy nose, sneezing, and sinus pressure. Awesome.

My pregnancy symptoms almost completely match my Mom's at this point and she had two girls. I'm still leaning heavily that the one inside me is a girl only because it makes sense that another gender would cause all these symptoms to come out - symptoms that I didn't have with Zac's pregnancy. I clearly was not grateful enough for Peanut's pregnancy. This is me, telling the world, God, and fate, that I am utterly grateful for the ease of my first pregnancy and would like some of that to spill over into the this pregnancy.

It appears that I started blogging with Zac around 18-19 weeks and couldn't feel the baby move yet. That's nice to know because I was starting to wonder when I would feel this baby move. Apparently, I've got some time. I also started getting back pain with Zac around 20 weeks. The back pain has started earlier this time, with almost contraction-like intensity. It's a spasm, rather than a constant pain, and it leaves me sore and hobbling around.

I know I've mostly turned this blog over to chronicling my unborn child's progress, but I just want to take a moment to remember on here how much I love my son and what a beautiful, sweet age he is. He likes hanging out with me, but there are times when he will go into his room or can be out in the living room all by himself, playing the Wii or hacking into the Federal Reserve (I kid, he's mostly on PBS websites). His stuttering has faded to every other sentence and it still pains me to listen to. To me, it's like seeing how vulnerable he is when he tries so hard to communicate with me and to his friends. I want to protect him from any pain he might experience, from stuttering or otherwise. The fact that I still walk him three houses down to the bus stop every  morning to keep some neighborhood bullies from teasing him can attest to that. I figure he'll tell me when he's ready for more independence, just like he told me when he developed a sudden on-set of modesty. He completely closes the door when he goes to the bathroom, takes a bath, or changes his clothes. He's still my little guy, though. He had mostly outgrown the desire to sleeping in bed with me, although he's spent a couple of nights this week next to me. Before he falls asleep, he likes holding my hand or throwing a hot arm around my neck. God I love that kid.

Here's to the hope that I have another good one.

15w 0d (Done?)

I basically crawled my way through my first trimester. Between the fatigue, nausea, vomiting, and lack of pooping, it was difficult at best. I am finally starting to see a little bit of reprieve, although I'm still hormonal and "challenging". Basically, I don't want to live with myself most days and I would swear that my son is raising himself. I have no idea how anyone is pregnant with a toddler or, God forbid, another infant. The only way my life works right now is because Zac is seven and can mostly get himself ready for school in the morning and bed in the evening. I love eating, but the act of preparing food makes my stomach flip. Zac eats a lot of microwaved meals, that's what I'm saying. I was never a chef to begin with, but it's ridiculous now.

I'm a pretty, pretty princess now. When I was 23, I had no idea what was happening to my body and I relied heavily on my parents. I lived with them and they took care of me. I'd give my dog to have my parents take care of me right now. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen. Maybe I would consider having more children if I could live with them. Which is both pathetic and sad.

Basically, I've been thinking that this might be last kid. I feel so old. I'll be 32 by the time Baby Bean comes out and that's just significantly older than being in my mid-20s. Before I got pregnant, I didn't understand when my sister said she was too old for kids at 34.. I thought I wanted a three kids and even considered being a surrogate if the situation was right. What the hell was I thinking? Clearly, I had no idea the demands that I child would put on my body and my life. Typing these posts are getting difficult for my pregnant brain. I'll leave it to your imagination how much my work has been suffering.

I don't know if I can go through another first trimester. I feel done with gestating, but I feel like I should consult someone about this decision. There is just no one in my life to consult. FOB would get a vote on this when hell freezes over. KGII can't help me with the kid I've currently got, let alone one or two more. I can't imagine what would have to change in our relationship for me to expand my family with him. My parents want me to be happy and self-reliant. I can't imagine myself asking them when I've never consulted them on child bearing decisions in the past. But like I said, I feel premature making a decision that will grossly impact a future partner by myself, especially since I could potentially have kids for another decade or so.

So, Internet, this is me...consulting you.  Scary, I know. Am I too young and too single to make a permanent decision about my fertility? Or is just a little too easy for me to get pregnant and taking steps to ensure that it won't happen in the future is both practical and understandable given how challenging I'm finding my second pregnancy? Do I make a decision now for my life or do I leave myself open for a future possibility with someone else?

14w 6d (Don't Make Me Kill You)

Some people are bad drunks. They get mean, violent, and crazy. Some people can't take tests. They go blank, forget everything, and can't concentrate. Me? Well, I'm a homicidal pregnant woman. This realization has slowly dawned on me over the past three weeks. Not coincidentally, that's the same amount of time that KGII has been living with me.

I thought what happened the first time with the FOB was a freak occurrence. I had good reason to feel angry towards him. He wouldn't stop drinking and smoking pot and I was obsessed with him staying home (something he would die before doing). He would come home from the bar and I would light into him. Unfortunately, we were a couple of fights away from a domestic violence call because as I would escalate, he would escalate along with me. I had a vision of my life and realized I was going to be seven months pregnant, getting the cops called on me for beating up FOB with a shoe. I didn't want that life and I didn't want that life for my child so I left as fast as I could.

Now I'm with KGII and all of the rage is coming back. KGII has been alternating between sharing my bed and sleeping on the couch. Every morning I wake up at 4:30am or 5am and he's somewhere I want to be. I usually wake him up, forcibly, and tell him to get off the couch so I can lay down and watch tv. Every morning I see him sleeping blissfully while I battle another round of insomnia. He just looks so happy and it makes me want to stab him, repeatedly, with a butter knife. Seriously, I get so irrationally angry at someone who has the gall to sleep while my body wakes me up that I have to control myself from taking a pillow and covering his face, especially when he's snoring.

I can see that I should feel bad about these feelings and I openly discuss them with KGII. He says that I'm just being hormonal, which completely invalidates all of my feelings, but how can you validate physical violence? What's crazy is that at one point in my life (see: not pregnant times) I considered myself a pacifist. I've never been in a fist fight. I don't regularly hit adults or children. I feel possessed by a demon. A very, very angry little demon.

I Give Up. Baby Wins

This is a story about how a woman tried everything in her power to stop the overwhelming urge to throw up and failed miserably. Since I like lists so much, here's what I've tried to stop getting so sick that I think I'm going to puke out my eye balls:

• Alka Seltzer (I'm not even sure this is safe during pregnancy, but stop judging. I took it once, out of desperation)
• Pepto Bismal
• Tums
• Getting all the fluid taken out of my band, which prompted a 10 lb weight gain and still failed to stop the puking
• Sprite and saltines
• No food, only water (have you ever puked up only water. It's brutal. I don't recommend it. Eat just for the sake of having something worthwhile to throw up, that's my motto).
• B6
• B12
• Only taking iron supplements once a day
• Zofran. Not just a little zofran, like, "Holy crap, I may never poop again" levels of Zofran when my Ob-Gyn gave me special permission to take 8mg of the drug at a time every 6-8 hours. Turns out when it slows down your GI tract to keep you from puking, it slows down the entire thing.
• Ginger candy.

The ginger candy was the last straw today. I sprinkled a little bit of sugar on my raisin bran this morning and had to stop at a local Shell gas station to puke on my way into work. It wasn't even a nice gas station bathroom. Let's just say that my vomit didn't hurt the ambiance any. So when I get to work I mention to my cube neighbor that sugar makes me throw up and she said the same thing happened to her when she was pregnant. I think I actually exclaimed, "Oh my God! I'm not the only one. I totally thought that I was the only one" and such is the joy of female bonding.

She said the only thing that helped her was ginger candy which you could buy at World Market. I thought, "hmm..it's candy, but almost every pregnancy guide known to man swears by it. Maybe I'll try it". I dutifully went out at lunch at bought two bags of ginger candy. I got back to my desk, ate two pieces, and then promptly wanted to die 45 minutes later.

Since KGII works in the same building as me, I walked over to his office and handed him a piece of ginger candy. "Here," I said, while thrusting the offensive candy at him, "Eat this and tell me if you get sick in 45 minutes". God bless that man if he didn't eat the candy anyways. He almost threw it up from the burning sensation the ginger produced, but he swallowed it. Nothing. Not even a flicker of upset stomach. Bastard.

I lasted three hours with the candy in my stomach. By the end of it, I had my head down on my desk and was praying for someone to kill me mercifully. The only thing that makes it better at that point is to go home and sleep, which is what I did. Want to guess how hard it is to have a productive day when half of it is spent hunched in a chair? It's tough, that's all I'll say.

So, this is where I say to my unborn fetus: You win. I'll cut out all forms of sugar. Just please make me stop puking. I'll give you food, shelter, and safe haven for another 26 weeks, but you have to stop it with the upset stomach. I can't handle it anymore. Mercy. Please.

14w 1d

These past couple of weeks has made me remember why I started my blog in the first place. People tend to ask the same questions over and over again during pregnancy, which isn't to say that the questions aren't heartfelt or genuine, just that the awkward questions get even worse over time. No one seems to ask me what's really on my mind, like, "How's that constipation going?" or "Why do you think people don't regularly kill or maim overly emotional pregnant women? (answer: I have no idea)"

No. I never get these questions. I could give thirty minute soliquies on both of those questions. Instead, here are the questions that I do get:

1) What's going on with KGII?

He moved back to town to be close to me and close to the baby. Good intentions, just poorly executed. His job doesn't pay a salary, which means he's living with me for the time being until we figure out something else. He's commission only and doesn't have anywhere to stay since his parents live out of town and his job is in my suburb. Actually, let me be more specific. His job is across the hall, in the same building, as my job. I saw him today when I went to the bathroom for the 40th time. It was weird. His plan is to move into a RV on a state park that's close to here (I think. I try not to get caught up in the details). He's been cooking some and cleaning a bit. He spent more than a couple of nights on the couch after the stunt he pulled where he woke me up in the middle of the night because I was taking up too much of my own bed. Most of the time, when I'm not screaming at him, I don't....hmm...I don't know how to describe this emotion. I can only describe how I feel about him in the negative: I don't hate him, I don't love him, I don't want to kill him constantly (only periodically), I don't want bad things to happen to him, and I don't want to provide for him forever.

2) Why are you wearing a wedding ring? Did you get married?

(Is it all hands or are mine particularly ugly? That's actually embarassing to post)

 

 

No, I didn't get married. Far from it. I'm incredibly single right now, but I work in a very conservative industry and have frequent conversations with very conservative people. This isn't my first time being pregnant in Texas. I know how this rodeo works. When you start showing without wearing a wedding band, you get a lot of awkward questions like, "Are you married? What does your husband think about your pregnancy? Oh, you're not married. Well bless your heart. Do you still talk to the biological father? No...oh. Well, I'll keep you in my prayers. I can't imagine being a single parent".

 

Yeah, if one single piece of jewelry could get me out of that conversation for the next, I don't know, twenty years, then sign me up. Here's the thing though: I've never worn a ring, for any reason. I had a high school class ring that I wore for a little while right after high school, but I've never been given a ring by anyone. Wearing this ring is like wearing my own personal albatross. It feels like a burden. I can't seem to forget that I have it on like I do with necklaces or earrings and it feels like a glaring reminder of my own personal failure at romantic relationships. Am I putting too much significance on a damn ring? Absolutely. Will I get used to wearing it? God, I hope so. Right now I wear it as often as I wear a bra - basically every time I leave the house and not a second longer.

 

3) Do you have any baby items yet?

 

Yes, but only because I'm neurotic. KGII set this up over the weekend while I puked:

 

 

and it was so much more expensive than the free crib I got for Zac to sleep in. When I look at it, I just see a baby jail. It just looks like a prison for infants instead of a cozy bed. Maybe I'll feel differently once I get the bedding in and the rest of the nursery set up, or maybe I'll call it the "pokey" every time I put my kid in it, which could be fun too.

 

4) Are you showing? How much weight have you gained? Are you still getting sick?

 

Answers: It depends, too much, and yes, way too often. I feel like I'm not showing if you don't know me, but wow, overly large maternity makes me look huge. I would contend that everyone looks pregnant in maternity wear, even if they aren't. To get a shirt that accomodates my National Geographic boobs, the stomach fabric flaps in the wind. Same with my hips in pants. When I'm wearing regularly clothing (which has gotten a little tighter now and more uncomfortable recently) I don't look pregnant, I just look fat. A woman over the weekend asked when I was due and it made me happy because at least she didn't think I was just chubby around the middle.

 

Since all the fluid is out of my band, I've gained a lot of weight. Like, a freakish amount in a short amount of time considering I was struggling to put on a couple of pounds the 12 weeks before. See also: I look chubby around the middle and my face is getting rounder.

 

My morning sickness is now actually that: morning. sickness. I throw up almost every or every other morning. Usually by the afternoon I feel better, unless I've made the mistake of eating something sweet. Apparently, this baby thinks sugar (even naturally occuring sugar in fruit drinks) doesn't agree with it. No cookies, cake, brownies, donuts, or ice cream. All of it makes me throw up, usually within 30 minutes of eating it. This is especially compounded because I crave sweet food in the morning and because I'm an idiot I keep trying to eat the sugar. "Surely by now I've outgrown this phase of pregnancy," I think while eating sugar rich food, and then I remind myself, violently, that I haven't while hunched over the toilet.

 

That's all I've got, folks. Check in with me next time for my rousing rendition of "I think my baby hates me" also known as, "Second pregnancies suck".

Alone

The house is empty tonight. Zac is singing in church choir and spending the night at my parents' house. The cat is in bed with me, grooming herself, and the dog is at the foot of the bed, looking grateful that she's sleeping outside of the crate. KGII is doing something unknown to me.

I'm feeling monumentally alone tonight, like I do almost every night that I don't have Zac. I'm not sure what I'd do with myself without my son. In recent years, he's become an anchor to reality. Like, yes, I have to wake up every morning and get him ready for school. And, yes, I have to stay awake long enough at night to supervise bath time and make sure he brushes his teeth. He grounds me in both small and meaningful ways.

The fact that I'm alone at the age of 31 (soon to be 32 in December) I consider my second greatest failing as an adult. The first, of course, would be the depression and the resultant suicidality. Nothing can or will ever top that in all-time greatest failures. But being alone comes in a close second. Perhaps my mind is skewed because I live in Texas, where, at the age of 24 with a newborn son, I found myself in the divorcee dating pool. People marry early and often in Texas. I can clearly remember going out with a 28 year-old man that had been married and divorced twice. In his defense, the second time was a stripper and I'm told it didn't count, but that's besides the point.

I've always wished that I could be one of those people who wholeheartedly embrace being alone. Like, "I am complete. I want for nothing. I enjoy my own solitude" and it's funny because I've always thought that I was that type of person. View me joining the Forest Service in rural Idaho then a mere two years later joining Peace Corps and moving to an even more rural village in Mongolia. I thought I was a woman of letters in the classic 19th century sense. I had my books, I had a journal, and I had letters to friends. It's only as I've aged that I've realized I crave connection with adults. Somehow that connection slips through my fingers every time I reach my hand out to grasp for it.

For someone that starts to feel profoundly depressed when left alone for too long, you would think by now that I would have developed better coping skills to meet and retain friends and lovers. If building relationships were this vital to my existence - what I might even argue keeps me alive and breathing - that I might somehow glean enough knowledge to figure out where I'm going wrong. But that's the problem with relationships, you can't study them like a formula and you can't read enough self-help books to make them make sense. If years spent in therapy equaled number of successful relationships, I ought to be worth my weight in gold. But I'm not.

Adding love into the mix just makes the whole equation (which is not really an equation. If it was an equation, I would be able to figure it out. This is more like an unforeseen act of nature) that much more complex. This is what I know to be true: I've never been married. I've never been engaged. I just recently started wearing a ring and it feels ridiculous on me because I have to go to the bathroom so much and wash my hands so frequently. I consider a long-term relationship to be one that lasts more than six months. I am just as talented as pushing someone away as I am being pushed away. I tend to overwhelm people. I don't know how to date casually. At some point in my existence between being a 20 year-old and turning into a 30 year-old, sex started to matter and now I'm one of those people who would rather go without than do it meaninglessly.

I'm also an insufferable bitch. Some women would blame that on their pregnancy, but I actually think pregnancy just brings out some of the more latent character flaws in a woman's personality. I don't blame people for not wanting to date me or live with me. Their rejection just reinforces what I've always felt about myself deep down inside. I don't want to live with me most days.

So I type, alone. I'm swimming against the vortex of self pity, doubt, and depression, but I get tired sometimes. Sometimes I just want a safe harbor. Sometimes that's hard to find, alone.

I Don't Know Why I Gotta Be Angry All the Time

For the record, KGII hates my blog. He hates being mentioned on my blog and really, really hates when I don't tell "his side" of the story on the blog. I maintain that this is my sliver of Internet and those wishing to express their own feelings can get their own damn blog. Or they can comment on posts or I don't know...talk to me about it like a normal human being. Whatever. I digress.

I'm sitting in my room, with Piper lying at the end of the bed, and I feel trapped. About a month ago, KGII moved out. He went to Huntsville because I couldn't and wouldn't give him what he needed for us to work in a landlord/rental dynamic. Being roommates were never in the cards. So all of his stuff left my house for his parents house in Huntsville.  Then he got a job. Not just any job. He got a job in my building, on my floor, across the hallway where I work. The job is commission only which means he will only get paid when he makes commissions.

You see the conundrum here right? He left. All of his stuff is in Huntsville, but he has a job in the same building I work. He has nowhere to live and no way to pay for an apartment. So I let him stay with me until we could figure something out. I don't know how long it will be before he sees his first paycheck. So, he sleeps on the left-hand side of my king size bed (the bed, which I bought, coincidentally, so I could co-sleep with another adult and never have to actually touch them).

I'm not sure what happened tonight. Last night, he didn't get back from Huntsville until midnight, then took a bath for two hours, then woke me up to ask me to not sleep spread eagle in the middle of the bed. It was just so damn inconsiderate that he didn't get to my place BEFORE I went to bed. Since he got there after I was already happily asleep, I figured he got whatever was left over of the bed. He didn't feel that way, which is why he woke me up. This isn't going to make rational sense to anyone who is not pregnant. I can feel that coming even before I type these words, but do you know how precious sleep is to a pregnant woman? I have insomnia, anxiety, and a fervent need to pee every morning at exactly 3:58am. On the good days, I can go back to sleep. I'm not putting enough emphasis on that. On the "Oh Thank You Mother God I can get another two hours of sleep and feel like a human again" On the bad days, I watch a lot of Animal Planet until 6:30am.  I haven't used an alarm clock to wake up in over four months. My body just pops awake and instead of popping awake at 3:58am, it was 2:12am yesterday morning. That's when I was woken up.

It's not the minor inconveniences that drive me insane. It's the major ones. Like that I'm supposed to share my bed with someone that left me and our child because they had a change of heart and got a job without having anywhere to stay. I'm supposed to make that all better and I just...I just...reached my limit tonight. I told KGII that he couldn't have half of my bed and now he's in the living room and I feel trapped in the bedroom. Pregnancy hormones and fear of confrontation and guilt leave me feeling like a giant bitch. I just couldn't keep giving up my bed and a little piece of my sanity tonight. Just not again.