Less Snow, Less Shoveling

I have done more raking and shoveling this year than I ever expected to do.  As the brawn in this relationship, she is the designated lifter, hauler and forcer.  I flutter my hands and provide helpful suggestions.  Or bossy suggestions, depending on who you ask.

Vegas means that she takes it easy while watching me strain and groan under loads of groceries, bits of furniture and, most recently, piles and piles of wet snow.  To her credit, she isn’t lolling about demanding figs and grapes.  She’s standing by with hot tea, a pair of advil, a grateful hug.

Let me tell you, I am delighted at the idea of a weekend without shoveling.  A weekend where I can focus on my favorite pursuit…listening to all the things happening with our baby.  The latest?  Less nausea (yay!), a bit more fatigue (more veggies maybe?), she’s more feisty and so is Vegas (pinching, fluttering and stretching against her organs), and she’s not sleeping as well (see pinching, Vegas and fatigue, causing).  Most exciting?  She’s showing.

Here’s a pic from SnOMG! 2009:

He Can’t Even Cheer Yet

Vegas,

Santa was thinking of you this year.  He brought you two Chris Cooley Redskins onesies that should fit by the time football season comes around again.  Babydoll, this is what your mother said.  “Great!  Skins game, bottle for Vegas, beer bottle for me.  Yeah!”  This was followed by a fist bump.

I cannot promise you that you’ll get to sit in the garden with me on Sundays.  I think you have plans.

Merry Christmas, Vegas.

Georg-ado

I knew it couldn’t last forever.  You know what I mean; the glorious, cushioned world in which nobody bats an eye at your gay wife and nobody says anything that would make you feel anything less than overjoyed at having a baby.  It’s okay.  If you want to go beat him up for me, go ahead.

She’s 14 weeks and, despite having just had the ultrasound, we were in for our regular appointment today.  We knew weren’t seeing our fun, happy, pregnant (and some, ahem, say hot) doctor today but instead we’ve started our long slow rotation through the rest of the practice.  There are six other doctors and we get to see all of them before delivery which, great but also, sooo many more chances for someone to say something wrong.

Okay, I’m a little sensitive, I know.  And we did pick this practice for that very reason (if, by pick, you mean charged headlong into because we still haven’t got any idea what we’re doing) but it’s a bit nerve-wracking every time.  I expect the best of people though, and generally, they oblige.

Today, we got a doctor straight out of the 80s.  He looked just like a cross between George Hamilton:

and Ricardo Mantalban:

No, seriously.  And he blustered in, all shiny smile and perfectly coiffed hair and said, “Who’s Debra?”***  And just there, I didn’t like him.  Look here, Dr. Georgardo, the woman ON THE TABLE is likely to be the pregnant one.  We are not indistinguishable.  She looks pregnant!  And she’s sitting on that damn crinkly paper!  I am here, IN THE CHAIR.  (As an aside, have you seen that Eddie Izzard clip where he speaks in French about the monkey being on the branch and even if you don’t know French it’s understandable and funny?  Well, I think it is.)

He redeemed a very few points by being equally as friendly to me.  Look, I’m tolerable of some personality flaws sometimes.  So he gets a pass on this one.  Then he spent some time reminding us about eating well and exercising and being healthy.  And that sounds all right doesn’t it?  All right BUT FOR THE TONE.  Look people, larger sizes (and here we’re not even talking much larger) do not mean unhealthy.  What would it take to understand that?  Not all people bigger than a supermodel sit around on the couch, stuffing Cheetos into their mouths and practicing for their first heart attack.  They. Do. Not. Many of them are fit, active and healthy.  Because size is not the single measure of health.  Well, now that I’ve gone on about that, you can see why I might have taken his words in a less than flattering light.

I wanted to give him a good shake and say, “She has lost 10 lbs.  She has not gained one ounce in 3 and a half months.  Give us the benefit of the doubt!”  It is unreasonable to assume that she is not eating fruits and vegetable and conducting life in a generally healthy manner.  Good lord, Georgardo!  Cut us some slack!  D for her part, did not seem at all put out by the conversation and obligingly laid down to get the heartbeat.  I thought, this is a highlight of the visit and Georgardo cannot spoil it!

Oh but he tried.  First, he said, “I’m going to need to get in right around your hairline”  And I thought, why does he need to be looking at her scalp?  DOESN’T HE KNOW WHERE BABIES COME FROM?  Oh, that hairline.  Look, we all know where the baby is – well, except possibly you – so let’s not be cutesy about it.  Then, he spent an inordinate amount of time listening in the wrong place.  Then, he muttered and fluttered about with a tone.  HE HAD A TONE.  His tone implied that he couldn’t get to the heartbeat because of her.  Her breakfast maybe, or some other ridiculous reason.  But in the end, he was just about 3 inches and one directional change away from Vegas.  Even Vegas was thinking, “Dude, come on, if you were a pirate, you’d have run us into a reef by now.”  Look, Vegas is just like that.

The heartbeat was lovely and slower than last time but perfectly normal (thanks, kid).  Our chromosomal testing came back normal as well.  We’re delighted to still have a completely average baby.  More importantly, we’re spared Dr. Georgardo for the time being since we’re rotating on to the next fellow in January.  January – can you believe it’s only another six months?

***Debra is her actual name.  Mine is Meridith.  Now that we’re out and about to all and sundry (like how I just slammed those two completely useless sayings together there?) we don’t mind flaunting our names to the world.  Still though, I’m too lazy to type things out, so you’ll probably still see our initials more often than not.

Warning, language.

There actually is language in here, so if you’re pure of heart or simply want to spare your eyes, move along.

There are a lot of reasons why we have to get our act in gear right now.  We have some bad habits to break and only…182 days, 7 hours and 51 seconds (according to my ipod app)…left to go.

1.  No more hollering at the dog.  Moses, no!  Moses, stop whining!  Moses!  Moses, leave it!  Moses, drop it!  No, Moses, no!

2.  No more goddamn its.  Moses, goddamn it.  Leave.  It.

3.  No more whining about having to get up in the morning.  Please baby, just 5 more minutes.  What is that noise?!  Goddamn it, Moses, be quiet!

4.  No more colorful names.  No dillweed or its variations.  Nothing with the word douche, and so on.  Moses is at no time a dick.

5.  The word fuck is overused.  Really, as a verb, as a noun, in every sense.  Moses, I’m looking at you on this one.

We’re perfectly well spoken in every situation, except when we get home.  At that point, it’s like we’re drunken, bawdy sailors with a shortage of fine rum and loose women.  While we joke that our child’s first word will be no,moses,no, it will probably be something more colorful if we don’t nip this in the bud.

We’re getting to the point where a swear jar might be in order, except that neither of us could afford to participate.  So we’ll just have to do it by force of will.  The next thing we’ll work on is ignoring the dog when he’s being a twat.  Sorry.  Twit.

I’m telling you…

I think we’re in a first/second trimester limbo.  No one is full of energy or starving or happy as a lark (okay, no one actually said that bit about the lark).  In fact, there’s a lot of droopy eyelids, restless nights and lackluster dinner enthusiasm.  And that’s just me.  No, I’m kidding.  It’s both of us.  We’re plumb tuckered out.

Some of it is emotional.  Telling our 600 closest friends that Vegas is on his way resulted in a completely unexpected outpouring of good wishes.  I had no idea people liked us that much.  Or, at all.  Of course, everyone likes a baby and we are more than happy to oblige.  Here!  Here’s our baby!  Because…

That baby will not let her sleep.  I know, it’s going to be his full time job as we get later in the pregnancy and once she delivers him. But for the love of pete, Vegas, let the woman get some shut eye.  She says her stomach is gurgling.  That it feels like the baby is scratching and pinching.  Her insides are stretching.  It’s waking her up at night and she lays there, wondering what he’s doing in there.

On the plus side, we’re not relying so much on the nausea to know things are happening in there.  On the minus side, you leave your mother alone.  CHILD, DON’T MAKE ME COME DOWN THERE.

…As in Las

Do they do that on purpose?  Play “What Child is This?” while the ultrasound tech finds your baby and he pops up on the screen in all his big-headed 12 weeks glory?  We celebrate a range of religious events in this household, so the red velvet bows, candle cut outs and restful winter cheer alone might have been enough to make me tear up but carols, which do it to me anyway, sent me right over the edge.

That baby is in there and he’s doing everything he’s supposed to.  He posed for the tech and sat still for all of the pertinent measurements.  He also wriggled and arched his back, swinging his legs and throwing up a hand for show.  He is a perfectly average baby doing perfectly average things.  Yay for average!

I am happy that it’s too early to see if he’s a boy or a girl (a note here on why we’re defaulting to he) because I don’t want the dream to be spoiled.  I’ll admit it, I really want a girl.  So I’m content to wait the entire nine months hoping that I can influence the sex by sheer force of will.  Sure, we both feel like it’s a boy, but that doesn’t stop me from dreaming.  Just in case, we’ve picked out a boy’s name that will make up for the fact that he isn’t our girl.

To make up for being such judgmental parents already, we’ve nicknamed him Vegas.  For a few months, we were pretty sure that would be the child’s actual name until we came to our senses and realized the wrath our families might shower down on us.  That, and, have you ever imagined a Supreme Court judge named Vegas?  While Vegas suits a rock star fine (and that’s way more up our alley), it just doesn’t scream hire me!  And we want the poor thing to have a job.  We might even call him Vegas once he’s born though, if we get a girl, I think we’ll skip that as a nickname.  Stripper, right?

So, looking like every other 12 week ultrasound you’ve ever seen, meet Vegas!

What Just Happened?

It was a particularly hard week for me. Fortunately, I have tomorrow off while I send my wife and that child off to earn the bread.  Speaking of bread…  Oh, I know, you deserve a better segue than that.  I’m sorry.  Please accept this fruitcake as an apology.

While we’re on the topic of food…I know!  I’m sorry, I can’t help it!  I’d like to tell you something that took an exhausting week and transformed it into something amazing.  My wife consumed an entire plate of food.

Since we’re attempting to give our budget CPR in the form of not gift wrapping each cent and handing it to restaurateurs, we’ve been eating at home this month.  That has involved vats of soup, piles of tangerines, and bits of protein in microscopic amounts.  She gets about two bites down, turns green and sets her dish aside.  I clean my plate and sit, staring solemnly at it and picturing a large, chocolate mousse.  I don’t know if you knew, but you can’t exactly imagine one of those into existence.  No need to thank me for the tip.

So at the tail end of a rough week, it’s not surprising that I forgot to thaw some chicken.  Or that we had eaten all the soup.  And that I wasn’t about to try to dream up a new concoction that wouldn’t be chocolate mousse.  By the way, don’t try to whine to your pregnant wife about your period.  Or, at least remember to duck when she swings her belly at your temple.

So we walked to a favorite restaurant after work.  It was rough and windy outside and warm and friendly inside.  It’s a small place where we’re recognized and it feels a little like supper with friends.  Unlike supper with friends, I managed to order and eat while talking and never taking a breath.  I monopolized the conversation (sorry darlin) and when I looked up, this is what I saw:

I’ve never seen such a beautiful sight in all my life.  Her appetite is back.

I realize the tide could turn at any second, but for one brief moment, we had a quease-free meal.  It was like the sun broke over me and little fairies fluttered all around my ears.  People, I had a moment of hope.  And it was good.

Subtract Three from Eighty Seven and…

People, I was bad at Algebra, but this is ridiculous.  Can someone please explain when we can say “I’m 12 weeks pregnant!” and be telling the truth?  Right, then.  Let’s get started.

Tomorrow we will be 12 weeks and 1 day.  Is this then the 13th week?  Assuming at one point we would have been one week and one day (way before.  Yes, I did okay in Geometry) it would actually be eight days which would have been the second week even though it was ONE week and a bit.  And we would have told people (again, I know we weren’t actually pregnant) that we were IN our 2nd week.  So logically, at 12 weeks and 1 day, we’re IN the 13th week. Right? Or…

People, I need to know which week to stalk on every baby website in the world.  This is critical information.  Is it the 12th week?  Is she still supposed to be nauseous?  Or is it the 13th and should she be feeling spry?  Hear that, darlin?  SPRY.  I know that this doesn’t matter really but I’d like to be telling the truth when I say we’re 12 weeks.

Are we 12 weeks all the way through 12 weeks and 7 days?  And if a train is coming toward you from the west at 70 miles per hour and there is a stack of diapers on the track ten inches before the switch, what time will dinner be served on the train approaching from the east 12 weeks later?  WHAT TIME?

Consider this part of my peace of mind.  Actually, consider it part of my wife’s well-being.  Despite my devoted cream rubbing, food tempting and back massaging, her head is beginning to spin a touch when I ask again, how far along are we?  Then it spins, you know just a little, blurring right around the ears.

I promise to stop bemoaning my pitiful math skills in a few weeks.  I vow not to care again until we’re near the end.  However, 12 weeks is exciting and 13 weeks is even better and I’d like to know.  Which is it?!

P-A-C-I-F-I-E-R

Folks, I’ve descended to a whole new level.  Instead of pondering world peace or coming up with interesting dinner topics, I’ve become fixated on the bippy.  Boppy.  Bippy.  Nuk.  Pacifier.

This is a perviously foreign object to us.  My recent memories of these rubber soothers are pop culture related.  I’ll spare you from the Britney Spears pic, but here’s what I’m talking about – straight from Fashion Week.

If I could find the picture of Left Eye Lopes with one, I’d tack it here too.  Imagine the fun the search engines would have with that.  Back to the point, we don’t usually have any pacifiers in our house.

No, as babyless adults, we have skipped pacifier purchases in favor of beer.  I know.  Surprise.  When our friends with twins (FWT) came to visit, they came armed with a few carefully selected pacifiers.  There seemed to be a “travel” one and a regular one for each child.  I’ll admit, we lay in bed the first night of their visit thinking, why not just carry a case of them?  Perhaps sew clothing with hundreds of pockets to jam them into.  Because it’s the simple law of babies, right?  Nothing stays in their mouths.

Pop!  Pacifier on the floor!  Rinse!  Pop!  Dog is licking pacifier!  Find a new one!  Pop!  You get the idea.  With thousands of pacifiers at the ready, you are prepared for any popping crisis.  The FWT did a remarkable job keeping track of those suckers.  They didn’t need thousands because they never lost sight of the ones in play.  But I’m scatterbrained (at best, y’all) and I’m going to need buckets full.

I wouldn’t be obsessing over the little things but for the pacifier that turned up in our dog’s GIANT CRAW after the FWT left.  I doubt they want it back at this point.  Maybe it’s the poop he just licked off his paw.  No, I’m kidding.  He wasn’t licking it, HE WAS CHEWING IT LIKE BUBBLEGUM.  At any rate, here is this tiny blue pacifier and it’s in our laundry room on our dryer which begs the question, what do we call it?

I grew up in an (obviously by this point) pacifier house.  The thing is, this is a lot of syllables and it seems people have begun to shorten it drastically.  Bippy is a favorite.  I’ve heard boppy.  Since I’ve also heard folks refer to pillows and seats as boppies (is that even the correct plural?) I think boppy could be confusing.  But bippy is the name of my mother’s dead cat and, well, you can see why I’m not jumping at the chance to use that.  Then there’s the economical nuk.  This is one syllable and reminds me of Nanook of the North.  I understand both bippy and nuk are brand names though, which makes sense.

So what are we going to call it?  I’m leaning toward paco just now.  See?  Where’s the paco?  No, the blue paco.  No dammit!  The BLUE paco.  Forget it, just give me the damn red paco and leave us alone.  Oh wait, it wouldn’t happen like that, I promise.  For the baby.  By the way, I am pronouncing this pahco like a Sonoran guy I once knew and not peco or packo.  Let’s be clear about that anyway.  No!  The BLUE one!

Sorry.  Distracted by my future.  Anyway, I’d like to know.  What do you call your pacifiers?  I assume if you have the this one, you just go with “bling”…

And now for more of the same…

We spent thanksgiving with 3 month old twins.  Their mothers came too, which was lovely, as four on two is better than any lesser alternative.  Though we saw the babies the day they were born, it has been more than a month since I’ve seen them last.  That’s like me not having see you in the last 15 years (you look different, lovelier).  The twins are bigger and stronger.  It’s fantastic to see the whole family bouncing back from the chaos of the last few months.

It was also fantastic to spend time with babies.  We’re in a pretty adult world.  Our local friends have grown children (or none at all) and while many of our local acquaintances are part of the under 2 set, we don’t know them well…yet.  Happily, our couches held up to fountains of undigested formula and our home to the tasks of keeping babies clean, fed and warm.  We were able to put our recently acquired cosleeper to use and found it worked nicely.  Most importantly, our personalities and good humor held up.

I’m sure it will be different with our own child (isn’t that what you’re supposed to say here?) but I was pleasantly surprised at our ability to let the tears and the screams roll off, plans develop gently and change at will, and experience the peaceful feeling of hearing the baby settle from red-faced sobs to sleepy coos.  Honestly, I didn’t even mind the shrieks.  If I were a baby, I’d be hollering too.  Two days wasn’t long enough to let the tiredness and tension build and break, but it was enough to bolster my confidence.  I know exactly what I’m doing.  Mostly.

I’m impatient to get fully past 12 weeks so that we can tell folks in the traditionally acceptable time frame.  I’m ready to tell now – doctor’s appts. have started, she’s exhausted and, if you know her well, she’s beginning to show.  I’m sure her belly will sneak around under bulky sweaters and the like for several more months (though we’re not trying to hide anything).  It’s just a subtle change that I notice because I spend all my free hours looking at her body.  What?  She’s hot!  Even though we have no reason to expect anything will go wrong, I’m looking forward to the ultrasound in another couple of weeks.  Mid-December we’ll get to spill the beans.