slightly cosmopolitan

We’re enjoying our first warm days of the spring season.  Gabe’s learning to ride a two-wheeler, Isla’s testing her walking skills, and Tahd’s getting ready for our garden.    It wasn’t a hard winter, but it certainly felt like a long winter!  I’m glad it’s finally warm!

 

It’s supposed to be an unseasonably shocking 81 here tomorrow, and I can’t wait!  Our windows are already open in preparation.  I love spring for its warm days and cool nights.

 

 

 

I have my first ultrasound in the morning, and I’m super nervous.  I keep looking at these pictures and smiling because we had such a happy evening outside, and I know there will be many more this spring regardless of tomorrow’s outcome.

Happy thoughts make me less anxious.

But I’m still scared.

I’m guessing that’s pretty normal considering my history.

Instead of trying not to be anxious, I’ve moved on to trying to remain present.  If I’m scared, I’m scared.  But I can be scared and… I can be scared and go for a walk with my family.  I can be scared and go to a girls’ night out.  I can be scared and cook dinner.

 

I’ll be back tomorrow with an update!

 

I’ve found a fabulous way to avoid excessive preoccupation with upcoming ultrasounds and what’s going to happen in the future – a really great intestinal bug (or maybe food poisoning?) that keeps you laying face down on the bathroom floor, alternately trying not to groan and trying not to move.  The good news is that I think it’s mostly over, and I had a solid day where I hardly worried about being pregnant at all!  The bad news is it was a pretty uncomfortable 36 hours and I may have spent it worrying about things like ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease, and cancer.

That’s a totally normal trade off, I think.

Also, in addition to every other manner of crunchy, processed carbohydrates, Isla may have eaten an entire sleeve of graham crackers in 30 minutes.  That’s reasonable, right?

^{Playing in the waiting room}

Isla had her fifteen month doctor’s appointment today, at which I learned that she’s 27+ pounds (hello, 98th percentile), 32 inches (again, 98th percentile) and has a head circumference of 50+ cm (off the charts).  She is, quite literally, a big girl!  The doctor’s greeting to us started with, “So!  She’s a good eater, I guess?”

I also learned – when the doctor inquired about everyone in our household and I told her I was pregnant and nervous – that she’s had several miscarriages, too, and I could tell she meant it when she told me she’d be hoping for the best for us.

Something about the way she spoke touched a raw spot in me, a tender area I’d only recently uncovered.  In the last few weeks, I’ve been remembering again my other baby, the one I had for thirteen weeks and never got to meet.  And I’ve been sad.  I cried the other night while I laid in bed, something I haven’t done in a long time.  But it felt good…needed.  It’s not that I’ve forgotten, or assumed I should be “past this” by now – it’s just that life moves forward and gets busy and there’s not as much room for the grief – which is partly good and partly sad at the same time.

Sometimes I wonder if I’d feel differently if I didn’t have Isla, and then I feel silly for even wondering such a thing because of course I’d feel differently.  Having her healed a very particular part of me in a very particular way.  I’m certain healing could have (and would have) been found in different circumstances, but I think that much life grief, healing marks you as it carves up your soul and puts it back together again, so I’m certain I wouldn’t be the same.

Perhaps if one waits long enough and lives through a lifetime of healing, the results would be the same regardless of the process.  But for now, I am infinitely grateful to have been granted this gift of healing at this time.

Several months ago I posted a request for prayer for a young girl who had contracted a grave combination of several ruthless illnesses – influenza and MRSA.  After numerous holes in her lungs, months on specialized life support (ECMO and a specialized type of ventilator), and many medical professionals who later told her parents they didn’t think she’d survive three days, she’s going home and will undertake the balance of her recuperation there.

She’s going home!

I think about her healing and about what is a nearly unfathomable, miraculous recovery.  But after numerous tubes in her chest wall and multiple invasive surgeries, I know her healing process itself must have inflicted its own suffering, both physical and emotional,  and these remnants will be carried and processed for some time.

I think healing can feel lonely, but I wish it weren’t so.  I think we’re all healing from something, or just healing from the realities or our humanity.

To be human is to break.

Does healing feel embarrassing because it requires us to admit there’s a problem, a flaw somewhere that requires its presence?  Or maybe healing brings us face-to-face with some of our darker questions and feelings, and we’re sure no one else has those kinds of thoughts?  I’m not sure what it is, but I wish the healing process was pursued and cherished instead of being rushed and hidden and shameful like I sometimes think it can be.

Scars hurt.  Old wounds ache.  Sometimes they split open and bleed.  But we are not the only ones.  It happens to all of us.  I know this for sure.

I think we’d be better off if we took the bandages off and gave air to our wounds, even if it means someone else could see them.  Maybe that’s the exact reason we should take the bandages off.  Maybe healing in community would be

more gentle…

more healthy…

more simple…

more hopeful…

than trying to do it alone.

With Gabe, I was just past 7 weeks pregnant when I had my first ultrasound.  Next, I had two miscarriages that happened just after 4 weeks.  With Mara, I had my first ultrasound at 6 weeks on the dot, I believe, and it was the same for Isla.

I’m currently 7 1/2 weeks and I still haven’t had an ultrasound.  At first, this was okay with me.  I figured that for every day I didn’t know what was going on in there was another day I could assume the best.  And I tried.

Really, really hard.

But old habits die pretty hard, and I seem to have reached the end of my ability to assume the best and have moved on to escape and avoidance, conniving to find a way for me to sleep nonstop for the next 7 days until it’s finally time for the ultrasound.

I should say 7-ish days…I put a note on my phone with the appointment, but Isla edited it about a week ago and now I’m not 100% sure of the details…

In other “patience” news, several months ago, Isla yanked on my computer’s power cord.  Immediately afterward, it stopped charging, even when plugged in.  A little investigation suggested that she must have broken the solder point where the power port connects to the motherboard.  Or something like that; I’m not at all literate in computer hardware.  Anyway, I found that if I pushed on the power cord just so, I could make it charge – good news for my checkbook, but quite inefficient.  I don’t really have a few hours a day to sit around holding my computer cord so it will charge.

In need of another solution, I found a large rubber band and wrapped it over the keyboard and power adapter  and voila!  It charged perfectly!  For weeks!  Until this week, when it got much more finicky.

You know that move when you’re putting your baby to bed and she’s laying in her crib and you’re patting her back and she goes to sleep and you stop patting and just leave your hand there until you think she’s totally asleep and you gradually shift your weight away from your hand and when you’re feeling brave you occasionally raise a finger until she’s left with just one finger on her and then you get really courageous and lift your hand completely away but you let it hover there just an inch above her because you’re convinced she can feel its presence in her sleep?  And you do all of that while holding your breath?

Yeah, that’s what I have to do to the charging cord now.  I have to plug it in until it makes the precisely correct amount of contact to start charging, and I have to leave my hand there for some time so it forgets I might leave soon.  Then I gradually shift my hand away from the cord, but slowly enough so that it doesn’t realize I’ve left.  That’s the only way I can get it to charge now.

It is helping me practice my patience, though.

I’m afraid that soon it’s going to grow up and realize my tricks and stop charging at all.

I think we might be in the market for a new computer soon…

A little meme, courtesy of Ali Edwards.

Here’s what’s on my…

vanity || some new MAC mineralize powders and two MAC eyeshadow favorites – All That Glitters and Expensive Pink.

perennial to do list || declutter, lose 15 pounds, go to bed earlier, catch up on our family photo albums.

refrigerator shelves || some broccoli I need to use up, lots of carrots and yogurt, milk, random things I need to go through and throw away.  I think of the cleaning out the refrigerator as Tahd’s responsibility. He thinks of it as mine.  It works beautifully.

itinerary || we’re going to say hi to Tahd’s great-grandparents and parents this weekend.

fantasy itinerary || Tahd is traveling to Europe (probably Italy?) this summer, and I really want to go along and take the kids. Tickets are crazy pricey, though, so I don’t know if it’s going to work out.  I’d also really like to go to a beach with blue water and white sand…any beach like that will do!

playlist || I’ve been listening to classical or opera on the satellite or JJ Heller’s station on Pandora.  Not really feeling inspired in the music category lately.

nightstand || lots to read!  Platform, $100 Startup, and I’d like to add Freefall to Fly and The Power of Starting Something Stupid.  Gabe and I have started Harry Potter and I’m loving them as much the second time around as the first.  But that’s on his nightstand, not mine.  ;)

workout plan || Just walking right now.  I’d really like to run, but for me to run while pregnant will require a doctor’s note.  And courage.

iphone || podcasts!  I’m still loving Simple Mom and Clickin’ Moms, and I have some NPR On Being and This American Life episodes queued up.

top 5 list || feeling rested, having spare time, kairos moments with my babies, remembering I’m pregnant, dates with Tahd.

bucket list || daring greatly, writing a book, taking my children to other countries, eating more clean, moving to a bigger house in the country.

mind || I need to schedule a haircut…I’m hoping this baby is healthy…I’m worried about our discipline strategy with Gabe and thinking we need to adjust…I’m thinking I need to go to bed!

blogroll || I’m loving Mabel’s House, Chatting At The Sky, Melody Joy, The Pleated Poppy, Simple As That.

walls of your favorite room in your house || I love the collage wall in my dining room.  The dining room isn’t my favorite room (don’t know which room is, actually), but it’s my favorite wall in my house.  I showed a picture of it here.

liquor shelf || um, liquor?  We don’t drink very often.  Pretty sure I have some vodka down there, and probably some wine?

last credit card statement || Zero balances!

screen saver || a picture of a mom and her little girl with a quote from Jen Hatmaker that says, “you will never have this day with your children again.  tomorrow they’ll be a little older than they were today.  this day is a gift.  breathe and notice. smell and touch them.  study their faces and little feet and pay attention.  relish the charms of the present.  enjoy today, mama.  it will be over before you know it.”

tv every night || some sort of reality tv.  Maybe I should be embarrassed to admit it, but it’s often one of the Real Housewives franchises.  I also like Celebrity Apprentice, The Office, and The Voice.

^{Love for Boston in our Color Run Race shirts.  Please disregard Gabe’s tongue, which is basically perpetually out when the camera makes an appearance…}

I’ve had an angsty unease this week, not related to this pregnancy but instead to my own self-talk.  Gabe’s had a tough week, I’m not accomplishing the things I’m setting out to accomplish, the Boston bombings are tragic, a friend is dealing with a really difficult situation and there’s nothing I can do, I’m exhausted, and I’m finding myself responding internally to these situations with a negative inner dialog that includes things like

you’ll never finish…

you’re not doing enough…

you’re doing too much…

your voice and efforts don’t make a difference…

it’ll never get better…

one stupid move will probably wreck it all…

I could go on, but I’ll spare you the details!

Like many people, my life looks different than I thought it would.  When I give myself time to pause and dream and imagine the life I want to create, my trip back to reality feels harsh because what I dream seems far from what I have – and what I’m capable of having.  That has discouraged me lately; it seems like I want contradictory things, things that simply can’t coexist.  Like, I want to be a fully present, completely undistracted stay-at-home mother and I want to develop a thriving writing and teaching platform.  And I want both of those things now.

It’s so not possible, and yet I let myself get discouraged by my lack of achieving those (and other) goals simultaneously.

The thing is I’m not willing to let any of my dreams go.  I feel like I’ve come to a good point in my life where I know who I am and where my passions lie and how I want to utilize them, and not honoring them is akin to a slow death of the soul.  I’m not a one-dimensional person who will be fully satisfied by devoting all of my moxie to one facet of life.  I don’t think many people are.  We dream broadly and richly, one of the most beautiful aspects of a human existence.

But sometimes we have to make adjustments, either in the expectations of the outcomes of our dreams or the paths we plan to take to achieve them.

As a child, I grew up with the absolute certitude that I was a teacher – not that I’d become a teacher, but that I was born a teacher and would spend my life passionately guiding people through the knowledge they needed to live successful, happy lives.  I dutifully graduated with honors from college and got a teaching job, only to discover…

I hated it!

It took me a long time to admit I hated it; it felt like the death of a dream, the collapse of an integral part of me.  I felt confused and didn’t understand what was happening.  I only knew I couldn’t teach another day of public school and I had to resign even if I didn’t have it all figured out.

Ten years later, I realize I am a teacher.  My love for teaching has never ebbed; it’s just that the public school setting isn’t the place for me to let that passion thrive.  My skills and gifts will be more clearly defined in a different environment, one I’m starting to imagine.

Another example…a person I believed I could and probably should marry.  (Note to self: if “shoulds” become an integral part of achieving your dream, there’s a good probability something is askew in either your dream or your method.) We’d invested several years in a relationship, and the natural trajectory involved marriage and children and the standard American family life.  That’s another thing I’ve known from an early age – that I wanted to be a wife and mother more than anything else, and the pieces of this relationship all seemed to fit into my dreams for the future.

Except they didn’t fit his, and our relationship ended, and I felt like a part of me died.  I had considered from all angles how a family with him would look, how our personalities and interests complimented one another and how we shared similar overarching values and beliefs about life.  It should have worked.  I couldn’t imagine every finding this combination again, a person who complemented me in this way and could fit into my picture of the future.

Truthfully, I didn’t ever find that combination again.  I found something better, something I didn’t even know I wanted or needed, when I found Tahd.  What seemed so broken and hopeless earlier seems perfectly clear and wise in hindsight.  Our relationship lacks the gloss and perfection of fairy tales, but it’s good and it’s hard, and I’m convinced that anything worth anything is both of those things in varying amounts.

Dreams, it appears, need massaging.  Perhaps not all of them, but I think the negative self-talk in which I’m currently stuck is an indicator that something isn’t quite right.  Is it my expectations?  Is it timing?  Is it environment?  Is it the “shoulds?” Is it that I’ve pictured one thing while something better is waiting in the wings?

I’m not sure.

I am sure, however, that the negative self-talk isn’t going to get me there. I want to make the intentional choice to be gentle and kind to myself while I figure it out.

More like a relaxing hot stone massage for my dreams rather than an intense deep tissue massage.