Back from the dead (sort of)

Would you believe I'm still sick?!?  This is for the birds!  I've never been this sick for this long in my life!  I laid on the sofa all day Saturday and Sunday and still called in to work yesterday.  Now, let's face it - being a receptionist is easy and there's really no reason to call in sick ever so it had to be really bad, which it was.  There are medicines I can take and I've taken them all but since pregnancy changes your body chemistry, even the plain stuff doesn't work the same.  Usually Benadryl puts me to sleep and I was counting on that since I haven't had a good night's sleep in over a week.  Ha!  I took a Benadryl and was up every two hours because I was so wired.  Plain Tylenol had me breaking out in sweats.  Plain Sudafed gave me medicine head so bad I didn't want to take it again.  Plain Mucinex produced truly impressive quantities of snot - I went through an entire roll of toilet paper that night I was up every two hours.  Then came the low-grade fever with the chills - this whole business is just not fun.  Not fun at all.


But there were two shining points.  One, my little baby has kicked me non-stop this whole time I've been sick.  I've been so worried because I haven't had an appetite and I've been eating less than I normally do.  I've been trying to force-feed myself as often as possible but it hasn't been easy between my inability to smell/taste anything and eating isn't very conducive to breathing since mouth-breathing is all I can manage right now - hot, right?  The steam facials work for the fifteen minutes that I'm actually doing them and then I get stuffed up again but they do work.  I just wish I could do them all the time.


The other shining point?  The bright sun in this horribly crappy crap?  My Prince Charming, my angel, my dear darling husband!


Damn Desiree, what did this man do?


Y'all - he cleaned the house.  Front to back.  Top to bottom.  He cleaned the house!


I could cry all over again just thinking about it.  All last week, it took everything I had to simply drag my ass to work.  I was fully confident that by the weekend I would be back to my old self and everything would be fine.  Unfortunately, that wasn't the case.  Drew came home Friday and I was no better.  Saturdays are usually my cleaning days and when I woke up feeling worse, I started to get worried.  I didn't directly ask him to clean but I was so scared that he was going to leave everything for me to do once I felt better.  But I couldn't even muster the strength to voice my concern.  So I slept - all day Saturday.  By Sunday, laying down was starting to hurt so I moved to the sofa and set up shop with my pillows and blankets.  I was dozing off and on when I heard the most glorious sound in the world.


He was vaccuuming.


Soon after, another angel joined the choir:  the dishwasher!  I could have wept with joy - in fact, a tear or two may have escaped.  He swept and steam-cleaned the whole house, took out the garbage and the recycling, and even did the laundry!  And I'm talking he moved stuff out of the way to fully sweep - he got under the sofa and pushed out all of Maya's chewies and all the dust bunnies.  He did it all - so I wouldn't have to!


And he went to the grocery store, made two dinners, went to the pharmacy three times for me AND checked on me the whole time.  Now, I know y'all can feel me on this one.  You know when you feel so bad that the thought of chores or even leaving the house makes you just want to cry?  To where you'd give anything, anything in the world if someone would just come mop your floors?  That was me.  And to hear the angelsong of appliances whirring and sweeping and general cleaning, well that was enough to make me want to dance and sing - if I could have stopped coughing and snotting long enough.


Once the house was safely sparkly clean, I confessed that I was scared he was going to leave the cleaning to me.  "Oh I definitely thought about it.  But then again, you're really sick."


I can live with that - it's okay to contemplate doing the wrong thing, as long as you end up doing the right thing.  And thank the baby Jesus, my husband did the right thing and our house is nice and clean.  I'm just hoping that I'm better by this Saturday because while he's an angel, my hubs is still a man and I know better than to expect a repeat performance two weekends in a row.


But it sure is nice having a clean house - especially when I didn't have to do it.  Thank you baby!

When is a post not a post?

When your head is full of crud and you're coughing and sneezing and blowing your nose and you can't take Nyquil and have a better morning.  Or however the commercial goes.  I have AppleTV - I only see commercials in hotel rooms when we travel and I'm not missing anything.


However, my brain is full of thoughts as well as mucus so something's got to go.  The mucus is being asshole-ish and all nah, I'm cool.  I think I'm going to stay awhile.  So the thoughts have to go.  Be warned:  I'm bitchy right now.

• We drop our drycleaning off at a place that's a block away from my work.  You can put your credit card on file and they have drive-up service so I love them.  I checked the bank account Monday morning and we'd already been charged for the clothes so like a rational person I assumed the clothes were ready since they already took our money. Wrong!  Hey guess what, drycleaners!  You take my money, y'all betta have my clothes ready!  However, I'm sick so my bitch-voice is not as effective.  
• I may have found a Sherwin Williams color close to the wall color in the nursery.  However, I can't be sure since I have yet to see the color in daylight.  Thanks to winter, it's still dark when I leave the house and dark when I come home so I can't be 100% sure.  Hopefully they sell samples and I'll cross my fingers and hope it works.  
• I really can't stand when people talk to me like they know my job better than I do.  And I'm just about done with arrogant new hires.  Whenever I'm the new kid, I hang back and observe and do my best not to piss people off.  I'm super glad you were King Shit at your old job but this is a new game homie.  Don't piss off the sick pregnant receptionist - that's a rule.  I give people one chance to be stupid and three dudes have run out of chances with me today.

But there is some nice stuff swirling around my head too.

• Maya was being extra cuddly this morning and we spent about ten minutes in bed while I rubbed her belly and her tongue just flopped out with pure contentment.  I wish someone was there to see it, but then again I was happy it was just the two of us.  It was our bonding time.  Cesar Millan says you don't get the dog you want, you get the dog you need and I think he's right.  My big ol beast suits me just fine. 
• I feel better about the baby shower invites and I'm getting excited about people receiving them.  My mom and my cousin are helping so much with the shower and I've been looking all over the internet for thank-you gifts for them.  It has to be perfect.
• Not that I'm completely over my fear - it's just transferred itself to the baby registry.  We didn't register when we got married and I feel weird making a list of things I want people to buy me, I mean the baby, but whatever.  It feels weird.  This means I'm going to get nothing but newborn pink onesies.  F.  There's a place on the registry where you can leave a note for people looking at it.  I would never be so rude but I really just want to put Thank you so much for thinking of me but I'm freaked out about having to return this stuff if my baby dies so can you just get me a gift card so I don't have to look at a stroller I may not get to use?  A gift card I can put in a drawer and forget about.  
• I know I have to stop thinking like that.  I'm trying.  It's not easy.
• I feel like I'm getting to know the baby.  She's got patterns of activity and quiet.  Thankfully, the quiet times are few and far between.  Even though the kicks are stronger and now she's rubbing her knees across my belly and that's extra odd-feeling, I love it all.  I feel like she knows I need her to move lots and she obliges.  Although I can't tell if she likes or hates peanut butter, but I'm craving it and whenever I eat it she kicks in high-gear.  I hope she likes it.  
• I figure it's her knees because she's head down and the movement is right where knees should be.  The lower ones are punches and I don't get those as often, which is nice.  She's not a rude baby, punching her mom in the cervix.
• This is why it's hard to stop thinking about losing her.  I'm sliding down the slope of getting attached to my baby, like for real for real.  I daydream about her, about reading to her, singing songs with her, teaching her about boys, doing her hair, playing dress-up, teaching her baby yoga, and if I don't get to do any of that I may just .......I don't even know.  I'm falling in love and it's so freaking scary.
• Drew's been gone all week and I can't wait for him to come home tomorrow.  He was home for three weeks in a row over the holidays and it was really nice.  The first night he's gone is always the hardest and the last night before he comes home seems to drag.
• I made spaghetti with meat sauce last night and I added dried oregano and basil from our garden.  It was really good and easy!  I'm getting more and more confident about this cooking thing - just in time to spend another $50,000 at the grocery store.
• I can't imagine cooking and grocery shopping for more than the two of us.  I get so annoyed when we run out of things because I really hate going to the store for one or two things.  I told Drew he needs to stop eating three times a day when he's home.
• I'm not lactose intolerant right now, isn't that so weird!  In honor of that, we have real milk and cheese in the house (well, not right now because I have to go to the store) and I think we went through a half gallon in a couple of days.  Real milk is good!  
• It's almost go-home time!  I made it through another day!

Thanks for letting me dump y'all!

The last 100 days

I was going to be clever and post this when I actually had 100 days left to this pregnancy.  But I missed the date.  And I'm near positive I'm not going to my due date so I had less than 100 days before the actual 100 days mark.  So the title of this post doesn't work at all, but it sounds very profound, like it should have an echo behind it or something so I'm leaving it.  When you read this to yourself, please provide the echo and the forceful male announcer voice.  Thank you.

You know what this is?

These are the baby shower invitations that are going out today.  I just finished addressing them and they are in the mailbox as I type this.  I'm surprised I can actually type this because I'm freaking out.


We had our hospital tour last week.


I did my pre-admission paperwork at the hospital today.


I had my glucose tolerance test today - the one you take right before you enter the third trimester.  


The baby shower invites are gone.  They're mailed.  I can't recall them.  


People, other people, are now going to prepare for a baby.  It's not just me and Drew anymore.  There will soon be a date on other people's calendars - for my baby.  I'm freaking out.


Right after my doctor took my heart tones this morning, the baby gave a big whopper kick that we both saw.  She said, "Huh, she must not like me messing with her."  I'd like to think it was a 'hello, I'm still here' kick.  


I wasn't nervous about the nursery decorations, but the baby shower invites just about sent me over the edge.  I bit Drew's head off last night because I couldn't get the printer to work and I was messing up the invitations, but I couldn't articulate that it wasn't the invitations themselves.  It's never that thing in that moment, is it.  


What if it goes south and we have to cancel?  When people RSVP to my mother, what if she has to tell them that actually, there won't be a shower?  I've ordered decorations, I've purchased favors for our guests, I have the list of food sitting on my desk and I'm nervous to place the actual order.  


Drew and I were so naive - when we found out the first time I immediately called the childbirth class lady and inquired about openings.  I happily sent my deposit to hold our spot in class and I remember the day I had to call and ask for it back because we'd lost the baby.  It was terrible.  Of course, she understood - she'd had three miscarriages of her own so she was very sympathetic but I remember that feeling.


I'm telling myself that I have to shake this - I have to attract positive energy to me all the time.  Every day I say to myself my daughter will live.  I will hold my healthy daughter in my arms on her birth day.  I am excited to meet my daughter.  My daughter will live.  We're all making it through this alive.  Every day I listen to my Positive Pregnancy Affirmations from my Hypnobabies.


There's just something so real about sending out invitations to a baby shower, about scheduling maternity photos.  The same thing happened with the photographer.  I didn't have anything on the books with her but she took our wedding photos so she knew that I was pregnant when we got married.  I emailed her that we lost it before she had a chance to ask and feel awkward but this time I boldly scheduled a maternity shoot with her on Feb. 19th.  


It's happening.  Baby showers, pictures, maternity leave, the waddling.  Yes, I've started waddling.  I swore to myself I wouldn't waddle but some days my hip joints feel like I have jello in them and I swear waddling makes me feel more steady on my feet.  It makes no sense but I've given in to the waddle.  It's not every day and it's not horrible (is what I tell myself) but I waddle.


I'm trying to stay positive and get excited and focus on the good things.  I just can't help but be afraid to let myself want this, to publicly declare to the world that I'm going to have a baby, even though my belly is kind of doing that for me.  I still check every morning that it's still there, nice and round.  I don't dwell on the negative and most of the time I smile.  It was just something about sending out those baby shower invites that sort of shook me.


I can do this.  I'm going to have real live baby and we're going to have a party to celebrate that.
Fear won't take this away from me.  That's why I got the tattoo, right?  So I could remember and be comforted?


I have less than 100 days left.  I, no, WE will make it to the finish line.  All of us.  ALIVE.