catching up

Dudes, I seriously need to set aside a specific time each week to write. So much to say, so many thoughts and observations, so much I want to remember – all evaporated because I can’t seem to settle down enough to actually put the words together and record them. It is frustrating to be so flighty. And also so sleepy by the end of the day that I just immerse myself in TV or books or phone calls to my family.

However, next Wednesday is my last day of work, so hopefully having my days free will help me make the time. I really, really hope so.

Where to start – perhaps a list of pregnancy stuff that I want to remember? Because I know you are all just wetting yourselves to hear about the minutiae.

• Still feeling good, mostly. Have battled some crazy insomnia but it seems to have settled down the past week or so. It is horrible to be awake in the middle of the night for three hours and then have to go to work and pretend to be a normal human. I know it is just a harbinger of things to come, but it really, really sucks when you miss out on sleep. The worst part for me is just feeling like my entire body aches, even my eyeballs.
• I am amazed at my belly and I am in love with it. I could stare at myself in the mirror all day, truly. Manny must be getting tired of my nightly exclamations of how big my belly has gotten, but I am not. I’m trying to enjoy this time because I am in serious denial about what’s going to happen to my body afterwards – I don’t have a single stretch mark yet even though my skin is prone to them, and this helps feed the denial. Like, “Maybe I just won’t get stretch marks and my belly will just spring back to normal after a few weeks. I’ve seen it happen!” I have seen it happen, but it is absurd to think I might be one of those women. I normally wear a B-cup and I have stretch marks on my boobs from when they first sprouted – doesn’t bode well for the belly, which is significantly larger than a B-cup.
• At my doctor’s the other day I was measuring 30 cm even though I was at 34 weeks at the time. He told me not to worry as he said the baby’s head is very low in my pelvis and that some babies just engage in deep pelvic diving expeditions earlier than usual. So I’m trusting him and not worrying. Mostly. I’ve definitely been feeling twinges and jolts in my pelvis which I think is stretching and loosening, and there has been a lot of sensation way down low where he said the head is.
• My weight gain is good (i.e. right on the average) overall, although it has slowed in the third trimester, I think. It was during the second when I was constantly starving that I packed on the most pounds – now I can’t eat as much at once so that helps control things quite a bit.
• Fruit – how I love thee! Truly, I’ve never eaten this much fruit in my entire life. I tend to be fairly picky about fruit and only like what’s really in season – in the winter here, that means basically nothing other than tropical fruits. So I generally don’t eat much of it. But the BC fruit this year has been amazing – peaches, nectarines, apricots, pears, apples, cherries. I’ve frozen a lot of things for use over the winter – Manny was given a vacuum-sealer food thingy for his birthday and I am in love with it. I froze a case of peaches, a bunch of plums, and the few nectarines I managed not to eat.  It will be wonderful to be able to have peaches on my waffles in the middle of winter, or make a plum kuchen to munch on while I nurse my baby.
• I was starting to worry that Manny was freaked out by the presence of a moving, living human in my midsection because we hadn’t had sex in quite some time. But, uh, the other night dispelled all worry. And how!
• Have had some episodes of what I think are low blood pressure – no fainting, but feeling dizzy, woozy, weak and slightly nauseous. My blood pressure is always on the low side but a few weekends back I was really feeling like crap. What clued me in that it might be my BP was that I was insatiably thirsty. And I really mean insatiably – I generally drink at least 2 liters of water a day, and that day I was pretty much drinking constantly, downing pint glass after pint glass and never feeling satisfied. So I did some googling and found that it can be a symptom of low BP- essentially, dehydration and heat (it has finally been summer here this month) can cause your pressure to drop. For me I’m guessing that it just dropped slightly but it was enough to give me symptoms – when I checked it, it was 99/68 which is just slightly lower than it usually is. An interesting piece of information to have about my body, though, and I’ve read that epidurals are not tolerated well by people with low BP so, yet another reason to try to avoid one.
• Blah, blah, blah. Bored yet? Not me.
• We have hired a doula and have our first official meeting with her next week. She is awesome.
• I have attended a La Le.che League meeting – it was sort of weird and sort of great. I didn’t learn too much because my mom was a LLL leader when I was growing up, so I’ve been around this info my whole life and much of it has just sunk in. But it is great to know where to go for both general support and very specific questions and suggestions. If you are hoping to breastfeed and haven’t connected with your local LLL chapter, I highly recommend it. I was a bit worried about feeling like the lone infertile in the room, but then again I always worry about that when delving into that mommy world, and really, I’m kind of used to it. I shared my standard line that it took us a long time to get pregnant and a woman with a baby afterwards actually brought it up when we were chatting after the meeting. Not in a nosy way – she just asked whether we had difficulty conceiving. I said yes and left it at that – I need to prepare the next more detailed response because I tend to get flustered when I think people are pressing me for details, and I don’t want to spill the entire story. Sometimes I good at giving a vague but truthful answer, and sometimes I just don’t know what to say. I guess I’ll get lots of practice – I really do like to be open about the fact that it was not a simple process for us. People need to know that it happens, you know?
• We are taking prenatal classes and have been to two of them now. They are really great – based on the book “Birth.ing Fr.om Wi.thin,” which I cannot recommend highly enough. It’s probably not for everyone, but for me the focus on mindfulness and trusting my own instincts really feels right to me. I’m just not a planner or rehearser – more information often overwhelms me, and since I have a fair bit of experience (through yoga and meditation) with just working with whatever happens in the moment and moving towards those things, even if they are uncomfortable or painful, this approach just fits with me. Manny has rocked my world with his openness and participation in the class – it has been a really good way to connect on this stuff, which I’ve really struggled with throughout the pregnancy. Partly because he was away for 4 weeks this summer, and partly because we just sometimes struggle to find ways to connect and understand each other, and I get to feeling alienated and worried. Having a bit of structure around how we connect is good for us. Must remember that.

There is more, but I’m going to just hit publish now instead of saving this to work on it later. It is nearly time for me to leave work – my boss left a bit early and although I was slightly irritated at that decision, it meant I had the opportunity to write this post, so ultimately, I suppose I must thank him.

I hope to write more about this in future posts, but for now I will just say that I really, really love you, my dear readers. This community has been so good to me and even when I’m not writing, I am reading and commenting (although I am shamefully behind on things this week) and thinking of you all every single day. And it sustains me, knowing you all. So thanks.

no, really. what do YOU think?

A while ago I mentioned that I was invited to write an article about blogging for IAAC’s quarterly magazine, Creating Families. And because I am lazy totally value your opinion, I want to hear from you about your experience in the ALI (adoption, loss, infertility) blogosphere. I may work some of your responses into the article, but I will totally ask you individually for permission before doing that.

For me, blogging has partly been a way to do something I’ve always wanted to do, but never could do consistently: keep a journal. I have probably half a dozen diaries dating back to elementary school (my first one was a Judy Blume diary filled with quotes from her books and photos of cool 70s kids emoting various things ranging from self-esteem-filled to sexually confused to hurt-and-perplexed-by-the-way-girls-gang-up-on-each-other-at-a-certain-age), but not a single one of them is even close to half filled. Of course, most entries are about despair of one sort or another – boy-related, mostly, though lots of stuff that would now fall under my handy, catch-all “my process” tag. When I take the time to read through some of the stuff I’ve written over the years, I’m struck most often by how incomplete it is – how much of the time I have no idea what I was prattling on about and what was causing me such profound distress. And I think that a big part of why I could never maintain a regular practice of writing down my experiences and my emotions was that, somehow, it was a bit hollow for me. It helped to get it out, but then once it was out, I just moved on.

Blogging, on the other hand, offers me a chance to let it out AND have my ego gratified by people reading and commenting. I’m being flip, of course, but it’s true. But more true is that blogging is a way for me to get out of my own head. I can wrestle with the language and figure out my feelings as I write them down, but what comes back in the comments is not just praise or hollow words of comfort. So often, the responses I get from you all challenge me to look at my own situation differently, to get out of whatever trench I’ve just dug for myself and seem determined to wallow in. Pieces of advice or words of reassurance stay with me, and I find myself passing them on to others when I recognize my own experience in their writing.

The blogosphere, at least our little corner of it, is a place where all the journals and diaries have sprung to life, and started talking to each other, trading secrets and insights. They’ve taken to the moonlit streets in the lovely painting you can see on the header of Stirrup Queens, gathering in large and small groups, offering words of comfort, silent abiding hugs, the darkest gallows humour. They’re celebrating and grieving and planning and acting and making friends. And I often feel like I’ve stumbled out of my house in my pyjamas, rubbing my sleepy eyes, amazed by my luck at being able to find such a wonderful place to belong.

The community that exists here in the ALI blogosphere continues to amaze and astound me – every time I click over to the LFCA, or see a new photo of Cali’s sweet boy, or find myself on the receiving end of wishes of love and support after writing a difficult post, I am both humbled and proud of what we are all creating here. We’re forging a new world, sisters, and most of the time it’s a world I desperately wish more closely resembled the real world.

So I invite anyone reading this to chime in about why you blog, about what it means to be part of this community, about risks or drawbacks of blogging – anything. What would you like to say to fellow infertiles who haven’t discovered the blogosphere, particularly those who are feeling isolated either emotionally or geographically?

I’m also taking this chance to invite you to delurk, if you are indeed lurking. Even if you don’t have a blog and just read, please use this as a chance to introduce yourself and tell me why you read.

new order

Well, internets, it seems things are finally starting to shake down in the mind of annacyclopedia. I’ve had a few realizations about why it’s been hard for me to write since getting knocked up, and I’m really hoping that this will help shake loose a flood or even a steady trickle of words from my brain.  I realized the other day that I was holding back from writing about the pregnancy partly because I don’t think it’s that interesting – I’m no different from any other pregnant woman out there who feels tired, nauseous, incredulous, freaked out, bloated, awe-struck, whatever. But also partly because I was having a blog-dentity crisis.

When I started blogging, I was desperate to find others whose stories were just like mine. I combed the blogrolls, searching for my own story told by someone else. The more similar, the better, I thought. And surprise, surprise – there weren’t very many. I found other DI blogs, which was so great, but nobody had gone through a failed vasectomy reversal and gone straight to DI. To this day I don’t think I’ve found anyone whose story matches mine on those points. But I don’t care anymore, because I very quickly realized that it truly doesn’t matter – that the sense of community and belonging I found here in the blogosphere has little, if anything, to do with how similar someone’s story is to mine. Instead, it’s about something way harder to describe – it’s the heart connections that happen the same way they happen in real life. Mysteriously, instinctively, spontaneously –  through the little jokes that I tell that someone actually gets, or the casual mention by a blogger I already read that they love a particular band, or share a particular interest of mine, or the way a woman I admire to the point of being intimidated gives me a shout-out or sends me a sweet, supportive email out of the blue.  The way some of you have taken the time to tell me that my words have made a difference for you, in some small way. The way the guts of our experience – spiritual, emotional, physical, political, intellectual – get shared either through brilliant, detailed exposition or revealing little aphoristic posts so crammed with truth they leave me breathless for minutes or hours or days. 

If all of this sounds incredibly self-centred, it is. For me, blogging has been about finding a place where I belong, where I can tell my own story and be heard and understood. I do it because it is about me.  And in some way, I think that’s true of all of us. At the very least, that’s what draws me in – the appeal of women all over the world, trying to understand themselves and their lives by writing their own stories and releasing them like a cage of doves. 

Somehow, getting knocked up and trying to write about it, I forgot all that. I got caught in the belief that my blog is for other people who might need it, and I feared hurting those women who were like me at the beginning – desperate for a mirror of their own experiences. I didn’t want to have the story someone needed to hear, only to have them show up on my blog and be faced with a post about about stretch marks and the alarming growth of my ass. I didn’t want to let that woman down.

How’s that for wanky and delusional and self-aggrandizing?

I’ve realized that my blog is for telling my story. Plain and simple. That my story now includes being pregnant and hopefully becoming a mother to a healthy and adorable baby. And while I don’t have an obligation to tell it, I do have a desire to tell it, as much for myself as for anyone else. My blog archives are some of the most precious things in my life – it is so powerful being able to look back at a record of who I have been, of what I’ve come through, of what has healed and what remains to be healed.

I realized, too, that while I don’t struggle with feelings of guilt about being pregnant, I was wrestling with some weird stuff about talking about being pregnant. I know that everyone who doesn’t get or stay pregnant easily has their moments of anger and sadness over others’ pregnancies; I’ve had plenty of such moments myself. For some reason, I was taking that on, and trying to protect those of you who are still waiting and trying and hoping. Again with the self-aggrandizing.  I finally remembered that even though I’ve had times when hearing someone else’s good news has been painful, there are lots of times when it’s brought me joy and hope, and that my reactions are largely random, i.e. that sometimes I’m able to be thrilled for a virtual stranger and yet am plunged into despair over my own sister’s pregnancy announcement. And also that all of you dear readers have free will and can click away anytime you want, with my blessing and support. 

So this post is to declare a new order here on my blog. That although I probably will never talk about pregnancy symptoms in great detail, I will no longer be holding back. I’m claiming this space as my own even though it always was. I just forgot. 

Blog-dentity crisis over.

travel plans

First off, all is well. I’ve been quiet lately cause I don’t know what to write anymore. I don’t know how to write about what’s going on with me (email or comment if you haven’t read it yet and want the password) without being really, really boring. And since it’s still top-secret, I don’t want to let it all hang out here. I’m also working on setting up a separate blog, but I haven’t yet decided if it will be completely open to people I know in real life or if it will be invite-only, or what. Basically, I’m still letting it sink in, and it’s hard to write while so much energy is going towards digesting the current state of affairs. Kind of like how going for a walk when you are absolutely stuffed with turkey and gravy and potatoes and pie is a really bad idea. You need to give it some time to settle.  So that’s what I’m doing. 

An excellent distraction and yet another excuse for minimal blogging is my upcoming trip out to BC’s Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island. I get out to the Lower Mainland March 11 and probably will be there until the 17 or 18, when we’ll head over to Victoria. So, bloggy peeps, if you are in the area and are so inclined, I’d love to meet you! Ideally, I’d like to arrange a big get together of bloggers – partly because my time is precious and I’d like to see as many of you as I can, and partly because I practically swoon with envy everytime I see a photo of big gatherings of bloggy girls.  I imagine us taking over an awesome cafe somewhere and totally bonding over lattes and chocolate croissants. Can you dig it?

Let me know if you’re interested and we’ll try to find a time that works. I’m still up for doing some individual visits, but since I’ll be visiting family, I need to guard my time with them to some extent. My mom can get a bit pouty if I don’t smother her with my presence during her available hours.

overdue honest scrap

I’ve been awarded the Honest Scrap award by the lovely, brilliant and charming Loribeth, noswimmers, Blood Signs, and Kate. And because I’m lazy, and also too dumb to figure out how to get the jpg copied and pasted, it took me this long to post the prize and my response. Fortunately for me, the aforementioned Kate is a Mac genius (in addition to her many other kinds of genius) and so she send me the image file along with an explanation of how to do it for next time.

In addition to getting the awesomely retro icon to display on your blog, the other privilege of winning the Honest Scrap award is posting 10 honest things about yourself, which sort of makes me laugh cause that’s about all I write about here, much to the chagrin of people who find my blog by searching “how to get fucked up on things you have around the house.” I don’t know what they are looking for – perhaps there is a secret intoxicating blend of the right proportions of baking soda, dog food, cumin and shampoo that I don’t know about. I guess I just made it even easier for them to find me, but I don’t think there’s too much risk of people I know in real life googling that phrase and finding my blog. I have a strong sense that everyone I know has a pretty good idea of how to get fucked up without googling. Ahem.

1. Ever since I was a brooding 16 year old reading Camus, I’ve wanted to go to North Africa. 
2. I am constantly making up new words to old songs that I can sing to and about my dog, Lucky. My most recent triumph was re-lyricizing Pink Floyd’s “Money” to be all about his gross habits. Sample line:  Lucky! You have gingiviiiii-tis! And you lick your wang like it’s going out of style!
3. I got a Braun Sil.k-Ep.il for my birthday and I love it and will be forever indebted to Lori for her recommendation over at All Thumbs Review.
4. We are still not completely unpacked from our move in November. Sigh. 
5. I’m obsessed by the Dir.ect B.uy commercials and I nurture a deep and abiding dislike for everyone who appears in them, except for one woman who I sort of like for no clear reason.
6. I’d like to learn how to do some basic home repair like plumbing and wiring. Just cause.
7. I met my husband when I was a waitress slinging beer and he was being  slung beer.  
8. Despite what I said a few posts ago about how much it blows being an adult, I get happier as I get older. Whew!
9. I’m starting to have an idea about what I’d like to be when I grow up, but it’s all still very fuzzy. Maybe that’s because what I really want to be is a house wife, and everything else holds little appeal for me beyond the money. 
10. I consider myself a grammar nerd but I still think I use too many commas, and am ashamed to say that the rules of comma use are not really clear to me. 

Now is the part where I’m supposed to pick 7 people whose blogs I find brilliant in content or design. In no particular order, I bestow the right to display the above icon and the privilege/obligation of posting a response upon:

Eden at Life….It’s Nothing Like the Brochure. If you don’t read Eden’s blog, you should. She can speak her truth so powerfully and will make you pee your pants and cry your eyes out. Often in the same post.

Pam at Blood Signs. Brilliant, brave, and beautiful. She can tell a story that is at once an intricate tapestry and a sun-bleached skeleton. She makes me want to work on becoming a better writer.

Jendeis at Sell Crazy Someplace Else. Jendeis is a woman with a tremendous brain and a huge heart, and the courage to lay it all down on her blog. She rocks super hard, offering support even when she’s going through some seriously rough times. I heart Jendeis.

s.e. at Riding the Roller Coaster. s.e. has the amazing ability to stay in the heart space and write it all down. Her spirit is a shining light to me and to so many others here in blogland, and I’m lucky to call her my friend.

circlesbecomeme at My scar smiles at me, I don’t always smile back. This is a woman who has gone through and continues to go through so much in life. And she is a woman who manages to find joy and lusciousness in the simplicity of the world around her. The story of her life and the photos that often accompany it on her blog are like a loaf of freshly baked bread – so perfectly beautiful and pure that it can bring tears to your eyes as it nourishes you.

Spicy Sister.  Spicy’s not blogging quite so much these days,  as she is busy being a new mama to her beautiful son, Zane. But she continues to write straight from her radiant heart. There is no filler with Spicy Sister; everything has been distilled to its very essence.

Io at Who Shot My Stork?  She’s back to blogging after a break, and I couldn’t be happier. Io is one of the first bloggers I connected with and when she became my friend way back in those early days, I felt like a dorky 13 year old being called up to hang with the cool kids.  She’s a funny, angry, sweet girl and is perfectly honest and scrappy, just like this award.

And if you’re one of the people who haven’t yet received this award, jump right in. I am somewhat of an anarchist when it comes to memes and awards – I reckon if you want to do it, you shouldn’t have to wait for someone to tag you.

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