girlfiend

One last tidbit, just because.

One of my mother’s favorite things to do is to change the linens. Her house is never actually clean. (My house is never actually clean these days either, but my excuse is that I have three children, two cats and a man thwarting my efforts.) Her house always looks magazine ready, as things mean a great deal to her, but if this is any indication of her level of cleanliness, she only bought a broom, dustpan and brush after we bugged her about it. If you walk barefoot in her house, your feet will be black. She didn’t even have hand soap in her bathrooms until we complained about it. Anyway, she loves to make beds. She is good at it. They look beautiful.

When she told us where we were sleeping my mother told us the linens were freshly laundered. Iit never would have occurred to me to ask, but she seemed to take pleasure in saying the phrase freshly laundered that day. The bed, as always, was made, so even after changing the “freshly laundered” filthy crib sheet I didn’t think much of it. Later that night, after the hideous conversation with my mother and the subsequent loading of the car, Boyfiend got into bed and asked, “Why is there sand in the bed?” I didn’t know what he was talking about. “Put your hand here.” Sure enough, right in the middle of the bed, was a small pile of sand. In her freshly laundered linens.

Was it just another of her small, inconsequential lies? Or, like the missing clothes and the beach cart the workmen must have thrown away, was just a passive aggressive way to fuck with us?

It’s been two weeks since we got home from the hospital and I am having a tough time adjusting to three kids.

Like his brother before him, T has decided that napping is for babies. With F it wasn’t that much of a surprise- he was barely napping to begin with. But T was napping for 2-3 hours a day in his crib before this nap strike. Now that he learned to climb out of his crib- the day we got home from the hospital, of course- it’s a lost cause. I put him in his room and he plays quietly for an hour, but he doesn’t sleep then he is tired and cranky. I hope it’s just a strike and he’ll go back to napping, but I fear that this may be permanent and I may lose my mind. He’s only two. He needs a nap.

The Fiendling is doing well since he adores his sister. But he’s been regressing in a lot of ways, telling me he doesn’t know how to put on his clothes or shoes and he’s been speaking this irritating brand of baby talk, either speaking nonsense (WTF is Safa and why does he keep insisting it’s on the dining room table) or adding the long e sound to everything(I want the greenie platey). I am trying to be patient, but I am not. Especially when he takes his goddamn sock off after I put it on him because even though he gave me his left foot, he wanted me to put the right sock on before the left.

The new baby is wonderful. I love newborns and wish I’d known how easy they were when I had the Fiendling. She is sleepy and hungry and has gained more than a pound in two weeks. She is up a pound and a half from her discharge weight. She is starting to wake up a little and act a little fussy, but she’s a newborn, so she’s easily soothed. I wish they were all so easy.

My mother is out of her goddamn mind and we’ve only spoken twice since she stormed out of the house 2 weeks ago. The situation is not good, and it looks as though we won’t be spending much time at the beach this summer. Which sucks for the kids, but is good for my stress level. I will write out the story one of these days, cutting and pasting from emails, but I need a good chunk of time to compose the story because it is lengthy and crazy and infuriating.

It’s tough getting out of the house and it’s tough rounding them up and getting them home. It’s not easy feeding and watering everyone and keeping everyone content. The lack of T’s nap is making it incredibly difficult for me to get things like housework and laundry done. Thank god for my friends who have been delivering meals, because we’d be eating pretzels and nutella for dinner without them. I am tired and I wish I had more time to myself. I am sick of the tantrums and one child starting to cry after another has stopped. Mornings like today, when all children were crying at the same time before nine are morale killers. I just want to get back into bed, but I can’t, because my door doesn’t lock and the kids just follow me in, crying even harder. My sister-in-law, who has been very helpful, said that she didn’t want to bother me by calling because it looks like I have everything under control. I do not. I have very little under control, but I’m trying.

I either have four or five weeks left before B is home from the summer. I hope I can make it.

I have an induction scheduled for Tuesday but I may chicken out. We’ll see what happens. I have an appointment tomorrow morning to discuss the induction. As of Friday I was 2cm dilated and 60% effaced. Which means nothing, but it’s better than the previous week when I was high and closed.

Initially my due date was yesterday. An early ultrasound dated me close to a week ahead, but not a full week ahead so they didn’t change my due date. A later ultrasound dated me way ahead of my due date, so far ahead that the doctors at the perinatal testing center told me that I needed to have this baby by the end of April. But by the end of April the baby was measuring so small that I needed an ultrasound to confirm everything was okay with growth, my placenta, etc. Everything was fine. But now it’s not a problem that I’m overdue. The baby is small, I have plenty of fluid and if I decide not to go with an induction Tuesday I can schedule one for the following Tuesday if I still haven’t had the baby. They’ll just see me more than once a week.

But T was a full 8 days early. So we’ve all been expecting this baby since April. Even my OB said, my god, I can’t believe you haven’t had this baby yet. I have been on edge for weeks, trying desperately to keep the house in some semblance of order so it’s not a disaster after two days of my mother in charge. I’m winning the laundry battle, the floors are swept and/or vacuumed daily, the refrigerator is stocked and clean. Even my bedroom is orderly. It’s exhausting. And I’m so uncomfortable.

I do not like being pregnant. I do not like the foot protruding from my right side. I don’t like the contractions and the cramps and the sharp, stabbing pains. I do not like being aware of my cervix. I don’t like peeing every fifteen minutes then peeing again a minute after I’ve peed the first time. I have weird rashes, dry skin, my hips keep going out on me. I want this to end.

I fear that if they induce me something will go wrong. I’m afraid that I won’t progress and I’ll have to have a c-section. I know that the odds of that are pretty slim: I’m already dilated, I’ve done this twice before, my body knows what to do, I trust my OB and she said that she’d send me home if the induction failed. But if they break my water I’ll be stuck and that is what makes me nervous. I just don’t know if I can deal with this for another week.

It is never okay to call a pregnant woman and ask if she has had the baby yet.

This is just to say that I would like very much to not be pregnant any more.

For the second week in a row I missed my OB appointment. Last week I showed up on Friday morning, only to be told my doctor was out and I was a no-show on Wednesday. I was mortified. I got a print out of my appointments to avoid similar fuck ups and went home only to do the same thing today. On my calendar my next appointment is clearly marked for April 9th. But in my wallet planner and on the print out the 7th is the date scheduled.

I missed an appointment, again, because I fucked up in transferring the date from one place to another. Awesome. If it’s this hard for me to get my shit together now, how on earth am I going to deal with schedules for myself and 3 kids?

The good news is that the baby has turned and I think it’s stayed that way. I feel feet where they should be. I’ve unfortunately hit my pregnancy limit well before my due date. I’m ready to evict this baby now, and I’ve still got a good 4 weeks. I have another ultrasound on Monday and I keep fantasizing that they’ll find a reason to recommend an early induction, which is fucking ridiculous because the last thing I want is to have a baby come when my body isn’t ready. I guess intellectually it’s the last thing I want. Emotionally I want this baby out.

For the fourth day in a row, T told us he had a poo in his diaper by sticking his hand in it and waving it around. Luckily, today I caught it before he had the opportunity to wipe his hand off on his clothes and toys. The other day I was not so lucky and needed to wash and disinfect half of the playroom.

Aside from putting him onesies, which I hate in general and don’t actually have in the appropriate size, is there a way to stop this disgusting monkey behavior? The Fiendling never did this. I am at a loss here. I am way too pregnant to deal with this (his) shit.

B’s mother and aunt called, and his sister who is currently vacationing in Florida texted to wish me a happy birthday. As I mentioned, my dad came by earlier in the day with a check and a card. Real friends called, emailed or texted and the facebook greetings from people with whom I haven’t had a verbal conversation with in 10-15 years in some cases are still rolling in. But my mother? I checked my email this morning to see a 10:45pm, too late to call so I have to email, happy birthday email written in a giant purple font in all caps. Think the font makes up for the fact that she forgot to wish me a happy birthday until I was already in bed?

My friend sent me a list of 17 ways to turn a breech baby. Most I was familiar with. Some were new to me.

5. CD/iPod headphones - place them inside mom’s pants toward her pubic bone and play classical music for 10 minutes 6-8 times a day.

Never occurred to me to put my ipod in my pants.

We made it through the great blizzard of 2010 without incident or major tantrum until bath time, when F sat in the (by then) cold water screaming at the top of his lungs for a good half hour. He did not want to get out. Yet, by the volume and intensity of his screams, he did not wish to stay in. A conundrum. So we did what any good parents would do and ignored him. We let him shiver in the cold bath until he was done screaming then got him a nice warm towel which is a wood stove bonus. We are spoiled by warm towels. F likes to go to sleep with a warm towel at night.

I baked two loaves of bread, a few dozen cookies, 2 dozen mini and 8 large sweet potato muffins, a focaccia, 2 pizzas, and made some sauce to go on the pizzas. The cookies are all gone, the boys ate more than dozen mini muffins, we ate half a loaf of bread and most of the pizzas. The focaccia is for later.

In a few hours, after B shovels the 2 feet of snow from the sky and the 3 extra feet of snow the plows pushed in front of our driveway, then goes down the hill to shovel the two feet of snow in front of the properties he manages, we’ll pack the car and begin our annual trek to New Hampshire. This is the trip where B ice fishes for 10 hours a day leaving me inside with the children. We go with two other couples (three this year) and it’s always a good time, except for the fact that I’m bitter about being stuck with the children. Oh, and the drinking. There is a lot of drinking. We are the only couple with children and our (who am I kidding, my) ability to drink freely is hampered by parenting. Then add in the pregnancy and my good time is further curtailed. But I’d be even more bitter if I was stuck at home with the kids while he was off gallivanting with friends for 4 nights, so I go. Without the kids it’s a 7 hour drive. With the kids, it’s 9. This is F’s first post-potty training long car trip, so I’m a little nervous.

And it should be noted that while packing for two children is ridiculous, packing for two children and three adults going to a cold climate in the winter is even more fucking ridiculous. Between the sweaters, snow pants, hats, gloves, boots, pack n play, toys, books, and diapers you’d think we were going a way for a month, not a long weekend. It’s a good thing we bought a giant car.