Saturday, March 26, 2011

direction

much to some peoples' surprise, i'm really enjoying pregnancy. physically, i feel great: if it weren't for my growing abdomen and the fact that i haven't had a period in 4 months, i would doubt that i'm even pregnant. also, being pregnant has really motivated me to maintain healthier habits. i think my diet is probably more balanced than it's ever been. aside from walking the dog every day, which i normally do, i've been lifting weights and doing some yoga stretches, too. i'm very focused on having a completely natural childbirth, in any position but flat on my back, and i know that getting in the best shape possible will help me to that end.

mentally and emotionally, i'm really comfortable and at peace with this turn my life has taken. through much of my adult life, i've asked myself the question "what is my purpose here?" i've always felt like i should be doing "something" with my life. formal education and a career didn't happen, and although i go through bouts of creativity, any kind of dedication to writing and being a writer has also not happened. finally, though, i feel as though i've got a real direction. i never thought i'd be that person...never thought i'd WANT to be that person: "A MOM". of course i get satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment from my job, and from pass times like cooking, birdwatching and hiking...but none of these have ever felt like the stuff of legacy. i'm beginning to wonder if that's a big part of why i feel so accepting of this pregnancy and coming child...because it's exactly what i'm supposed to be doing in my life.

it's given me a different outlook on the world. in the past, and just recently, i've wondered how i could effectively raise a child in a world that i don't have much faith in, but today while i was out walking, i thought about how wonderful it's going to be to teach a child about this world, to share it all with someone who's experiencing it for the first time...all the beautiful, and all the ugly, too. i saw a bird today that i'd never seen before (american dipper) and just that simple thing brought me a lot of joy...it made me think about seeing each and every bird again for the first time, through my child's eyes...

of course my kid could end up hating birds, but for the first few years, they're coming along birdwatching whether they want to or not! strapped to my back to start with...

Thursday, March 17, 2011

...and another thing

i suppose, like people laying their hands on my belly as it grows, i must get used to the unsolicited advice i now receive on the daily. what i find most amusing is that the advice is coming from the mostly intoxicated people i spend most of my evenings with.

"quit working at the bar or your baby will be screwed up!"

"eat more beans!"

"rub olive oil on your stomach"

"take all the drugs they offer you"

"you were meant to do this, just let it happen"

"don't lift that keg!!"

i find this all to be touching, infuriating, and hilarious.

what really gets my back up, though, is not so much the advice as the people who now tell me how i feel or how i should feel. the people who tell me how i'm going to behave in all of this.

for example:

"don't be silly. once you have the baby, you're not gonna want to use cloth diapers. you'll be too exhausted!"

this next one just made me shake my head, the kind of idiot's logic you can't bother to argue with:

(again, regarding cloth diapers) "that means you'll have to wash, like, 14 cloth diapers a day! it'd be cheaper just to buy towels at the thrift store and throw them out!"

??

the cloth diaper thing bugs me. granted, if i don't have laundry facilities, i'm pretty sure i won't attempt cloth. but if i do end up with access to a washer/dryer, i don't see why i wouldn't use cloth most of the time. these people telling me that i'm "not going to want to" don't know that i've been using cloth pads for the last 9 or 10 years. i'm already very comfortable with the idea of reusable. it would be stranger for me to buy and then promptly pitch the pampers.

or towels, for that matter.


on an unrelated note (well, related in that it's about pregnancy and childbirth), i've been thinking about NOT finding out the sex of little ziggy at the ultrasound...and also i've been thinking about interviewing doctors in whitehorse. i want to learn everything i can about hospital procedure and i want to choose the doctor who's going to be best for me.

so much to think about! good thing gestation is 9 months. sheesh.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

dreams

been dreaming quite a lot lately, and remembering them.

snippets i recall from last night:

taking refuge from some unknown monster in a basement bathroom somewhere. first i broke open one of those little silica gels packets and spreading the contents across the doorway. there was someone else with me, we were preparing to make a stand against the monster....i think the silica gel was supposed to be a repel the thing. anyway, the other person was crouched in the bathtub and i was crouched by the counter, a pair of sharp scissors clutched to my chest, waiting for the locked knob to start turning...

in another dream i was walking around a huge, uknown university campus, looking for something...eventually i ended up taking a combined creative writing/math exam. i hadn't been to the class in months and i had no understanding of the math component. i've had variations of this dreams before, always a math exam for a class i stopped attending. i always end up wondering why i even bothered to show up for the exam.

okay. back to the dishes.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

pep talk

so i just got a phone message to call the doctor's office...i call them up, and the lady on the phone goes right into how i have an appointment on whatever day in april at 1:30 and i'll have to have a full bladder and then i stopped her and said "wait...what is this for?" an ultrasound, apparently. i'm super annoyed with my regular doctor right now. annoyed enough that i feel that i don't want to see her when she gets back to work. when i got back from mexico, i saw her in the final couple of days before she was taking a few months off. she was incredibly rushed and hurried (read my chart wrong several times, had to take my blood pressure 3 times because she kept forgetting to write it down)...anyway, she sort of left me hanging. i haven't been back to the doctor's office since i saw her in january. so i explained this on the phone just now and was informed that i should have been coming in for monthly check-ups. GRR! so i've got one of those next tuesday, and an ultrasound in a little over a month.

i understand that this is partly on my shoulders, and i've been intending to phone and find out if i need to see a doctor in town any time soon...but i feel like this is also very much their responsibility. it's not like i've ever been pregnant before. anyway, all will be well, i suppose. just highly unimpressed right now is all.

i've been all right. feeling a lot better physically, but this winter business is really gettin' me down. i'm having a very hard time staying motivated, and having satellite television included in my rent isn't helping the situation. it's so easy for me to sit down in front of the t.v. and lose several hours out of my day. there are dishes to be done, floors to be swept, firewood to be moved, plus a million other things i could be doing besides watching iron chef, dr. phil or 16 and pregnant. although that last is pretty entertaining. i bought myself a set of weights last time i was in whitehorse and also an exercise ball because i figure i want to start "training" for this incredibly huge task looming ahead of me...namely LABOUR. but of course i haven't taken those things out of their packaging yet. i can, however, tell you that iron chef cat cora won battle venison and ferreh's mom is a controlling bitch. ridiculous.

SO. time for a little bit of discipline. because i'm pretty sure that it's gonna come in handy once i have a baby to care for. the other shitty thing about this lack of motivation is that after spending a couple hours in front of the t.v. i feel guilty and i beat myself up for all the things that remain undone. i can't get that time back, though, so i'd best stop mourning it.

gotta shower now and try to get in a better headspace for work.

it's still cold at night but warms up nice in the day. bright blue sky, beautiful sunshine...winter's last gasp. i can not only survive it, but thrive in it!