First Rule of Fight Club...

...don't have fight club in Mommy's belly. Please.

So, I've been getting these great little flutters from the baby. Sort of like gas, but it's adorable, because, you know...it's your unborn child and everything. All were greeted with the appropriate response, I grab Matt's hand and we gaze into each other's eyes, swooning with delight at the active little person we've managed to create.

Which brings us to this morning. I wake up at 4:30am, getting the crap beaten out of me from the inside. I'm not seriously begging for this to be a boy, because I'm not sure I can handle a girl child that is holding in that much aggression.

That was nearly 8 hours ago. It hasn't stopped. You know how when your neighbor is doing construction, and it's loud and you want it to stop, and finally it does and right around the time you get comfy again, after ten minutes of perfect silence, they start the saw back up? That's how this feels.

I get it. You're cute. You're alive and happy to be swimming around in my belly. But, if Mommy doesn't get some sleep soon, it won't be pretty for any of us.

Besides that, everything is going super! Pregnancy really is a joy, and all jokes aside, I'm not sure if I would take back this ass kicking for anything. In two more weeks, we get to find out if it is indeed a masculine child, like all the kind strangers at HEB keep insisting, or if it's a girl. I'll keep you guys posted!

(First published: December 20, 2007)

The Best Part

the best part of being pregnant so far? Besides the guilt-free indulging in McNuggets, SpaghettiO's, 5 solid meals a day, popcorn, etc, etc, etc, it's the happy wash. I'll be walking along, not really thinking about anything, and then I'll feel this warm glow coming from the inside. Man, I know this sounds lame, but the sun comes out from behind a cloud and I get this huge smile on my face. I feel loved, I feel loving, I feel that everything is going to be okay in the world.

You see, I'm a worrier. I worry about, well, pretty much everything. I worry that I'll never be able to afford a house on a social worker's salary. I worry that I won't be a good social worker. I worry that my kid and I won't get along. I worry that my kid is going to be into 50-Cent. I worry that someone will buy my kid a Bratz doll and I will have to be the mean mom and throw it away and it will scar them for life. I worry that I won't be able to afford a prom dress. I worry that we'll still be at war and that my child will get drafted, and he'll return as a triangular flag. I worry that civilized society will have completely and totally broken down, and that life will resemble Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451." That one I really worry about.

So, when I'm walking along and someone sets off the happy wash, it's even better if I've been deeply eembedded in Operation WorryNow all day. Because for a few minutes, the world is a safe and lovely place, where people are kind. Kids are only interested in furthering their education and the pursuit of music, poetry, photography. For a minute, I can go back to my PollyAnna roots, and remember that we'll always have enough. That I'll always be enough for my kids, and that they'll never forget where they came from.

It's at that moment that I can say with complete and total plausibility that life is really, really swell.

(First published: October 6, 2007)

My Heart Is Now Spoken For...

...I've been feeling this horrible pain in my stomach lately. Love's lost or past regrets? Neither. My jeans. While I'm not exactly at that stage in the pregnancy where I've got the big belly, I'm just at the 'my pants are a wee bit too tight mode.' Unbuttoning them in the car was always an option, but when I gave up whatever dignity I had and did it in class today, I decided enough was enough.

I went to the store, not knowing what to expect. I'd seen maternity jeans, but had never put them on. I have a pair at home, that were passed down from my sister. They are designed so that the whole thing goes up and over your belly with a cotton panel and drawstring to keep the whole thing in place. In three more months, these jeans will be what I wear night and day, but for the moment, I need something a little different.

So, I grab the first pair, and begin the examination. The wash is downright fashionable without being too trendy, the pockets look about right, I like the cut of the leg, and the 4-inch wide elastic waistband is both intriguing and ingeniously colored so as not to be noticable.

I grab a pair in my current size, and in the next size up. Hey, who know how large this Czech ass will become? I go off to the dressing room, to meet my destiny.

Oh, what joyous events unfolded. I slip ever so slowly into the pair in my current size. They fit beautifully. Better than beautifully. Jeans have never made me feel so lovely, not even my ridiculously expensive Lucky's or Seven for all Mankind's. I do some squats to test their stretchiness. I do some high-kicks. I could a couple of Chuck Norris roundhouse kicks to an imaginary attacker. At this point, satisfied my jeans will move ever which way, I stop because it's just depressing to see myself doing roundhouse kicks and not-so-high kicks, especially after this weekend's marathon "Making the Team" where really, really skinny women try to become Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders. (By the way, did anyone see the girl, who not only thought Condoleeza Rice was a man, and called her Condoleeza Jones, she said she didn't know who she wanted for the next pres, cause she was so happy with our current one? Yikes!) I could squeeze a family of four in there, and still look stylish. The elastic waistband sits ever so comfortably right underneath the "bump and beer" I have, the pooch I have that's equal parts baby and the many, many, many lagers, hefeweizens and ales I consumed before I knew this seamonkey was coming. I can stretch out the ass, stretch out the belly, I'm golden. Just in case, I try on the next size up. Luckily for me and everyone here, I'm swimming in them, no way would they ever fit.

I grab a few new shirts to go with, some actual maternity tees, that look like everything else in the world, except they say 'Mom-To-Be' on the label and some organic stretch mark cream and belly oil, and I'm off to the races.

Who knew that an elastic waistband, could make one woman so happy? So my advice to you, go get some maternity jeans, even if you aren't pregnant. If they increase the happini like I think they will, well then, Mister, I'll have created Utopia.

(First published: October 1, 2007)

September Update

Ok, so at this point, I'm coming up on 3 months preggo, and I still don't have an exact due date. Extremely scientific resources have indicated that it might be March 18th, and since this, according to St. Bede, was the day the world was created, I'll take it. They never hatch on their due dates to begin with.

So I'm approaching this milestone, the blessed end of the first trimester, and I've noticed that a lot of people are commenting on the 'changes your body will go through.' Very Disney, and nowhere near accurate. You wake up one day and you are PREGNANT. It's very disalarming.

Here are some changes I've noticed.

1. Instantly, I feel ten years older. I'm surrounded by children at school all day. Sure, they're only a few years younger than me, at most, but they just feel so, well, child-like. I just want to mother them all.

2. I realized that if anything besides Trivial Pursuit was going to make me competitive, it's motherhood. Holy crap. I find myself judging other's kids, their baby accessories, their parenting styles. Likewise, I am now in admiration of "the perfect kid," but I realized that I am much harsher on other moms than I thought I would be.

3. Suddenly, I'm a big fan of milk. And pickles. And Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Oreo Cakesters, Helene's Applesauce Bread, cookies of any sort, and peaches. And don't get me started on the birthday cake craving.

4. My concentration is nil.

5. We've picked the girl's name. The whole name. Not that we know it's a girl, but just to be ready. This is information that I would like to call everyone in the world and impress them with. I'm not. I'm kind of tossing the first name out there, but I'm guarding the middle name with my life.

6. I have the overwhelming urge to become as self-sustaining as possible. I want to garden, so that my child can have homemade baby food with Mommy's fresh asparagus. I bought a sewing machine, so that all my kid's Halloween costumes and blankets and prom dresses can spring out of Mommy's bare hands. It's kind of sick, actually.

7. And the biggie. Time. Time used to be this ever expanding thing, I never really cared about. I had plenty of it, I could waste a day or two of it. Now, (with the exception of nausea so horrid I'm suddenly a big fan of the couch) I feel as though every wasted day was an affront to humanity. I FEEL every day. It's as if I'm suddenly budgeting time and realizing how little of it one actually gets. I can stay in the present, but I feel the future weighing down pretty heavily. Odd.

So, there you have it. Expect more news as it happens, but I'm saving the updates for the bigger moments.

(First published: September 13, 2007)

Happy Birthday To Me

So...every year on my birthday, I do an introspective blog, mostly to help myself mark down where I was and what I was doing with my life at that time. Last year, I was just returned from Japan, and was about to start another semester of school.

The past year has been crazy. I've changed in a million ways, been on a million adventures, shared a million laughs, and I think I've hit the quarter-century mark with quite the bang.

This birthday finds me in a different spot. Last week, I found out I was pregnant. Yes, I'm going to be someone's mom, sometime near the end of February.

So drink a beer in my honor, because, of course, I can't. But I will say, this is the best birthday gift I've ever received.

(First published: July 30, 2007)