Inhospitable

Sucking, in more ways than one

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve started this post. If I had known how hard it would be to get past that little hurdle, I would have abandoned the attempt and just started in the middle somewhere, in mid-sentence if necessary. Because if you’re going to forgive me for nearly six months’ worth of missing posts (and please, please do forgive me), you’re probably going to get past a missing beginning. Right? And here I am, writing a beginning.

I wish I could say that the past few months were so blissful that I simply forgot all about the world around me: What, blog? When there are fragrant little toesies to nibble on? But alas, no. I had rightly suspected that the first few months with a newborn and a toddler would be hard, but then a few other unforeseen factors pushed things way past “hard” and solidly into the red zone, namely:

 -- a bad case of colic;

-- a death in the family; and

-- a tax audit.

 But first, let me start at the beginning, in happier times. Let me finally introduce you to my little Melon. 

Melon was born on March 27, 2009, via scheduled c-section in the same hospital where Banana made her debut. She was 7 lbs. 8 oz. (3400 grams) and 20.5 inches long, and a born sucker. She had sucked her hands so enthusiastically in utero that she was born with blisters on both wrists, and once out, made it her mission to do similar damage to my breasts. And wow did she ever. Even the midwives looked on in pity. She didn’t have much technique – her latch was part stapler, part lawnmower – but what she lacked in finesse she more than made up for in good old-fashioned brute force. For three days straight she was on me, and somehow my milk never had a choice but to come in well. In short: no supply issues this time around. (And don’t worry, I won’t talk about two freezers filled with my overflow – my experience with Banana gave me such an aversion to pumping that I have not done it at all.) There was the little matter of her persistently poor latch, though, which we eventually determined was due to a short frenulum (tongue tie). We had it clipped when she was five weeks old – a surprisingly low-key affair – and since then her latch has improved greatly, to my unending relief.

I had been very worried (and guilt-ridden) about how Banana was going to cope with another fruit in our midst, and was so gratified to find out that she was fine. She was a bit stand-offish while visiting me in the hospital, but that, I think, had more to do with the strange environment than with any sort of realization of what was going on. That realization came very slowly, and much later. When Banana got upset, it was more about my not being able to pick her up (that was the hardest part about having had a c-section, that moratorium on picking up Banana for six weeks) or not being available for playing when I was nursing. She never seemed to be upset at Melon, though, only at me. Melon got Banana’s nurturing side. Whenever Melon cried, Banana motioned frantically at me to pick her “Up!”

Pretty soon there were a lot of opportunities for motioning. So many, in fact, that soon Banana was equally frantically signaling to me to put the screaming baby down for once. As with her sucking, Melon proved incredibly tenacious as a screamer. For hours every day, she was inconsolable. Hours. Hours and hours and hours. Of screaming. Clenched-fist, contorted-face, legs-drawn-up screaming. It jangled my nerves, got under my skin, made me doubt everything I was doing – and eventually, after weeks and weeks without respite, made me feel more aggressive than I’ve ever felt in my life. Not that I ever did anything, God forbid, but sometimes I felt almost blacked-out with impotent rage. It wasn’t just the cumulative toll of all the infant misery combined with the sleeplessness, it was also frustration at not being able to be there properly for Banana, not having any opportunity to recharge, not ever having more than one hand free. Inexplicably, that last thing was almost the worst. I’ll do anything for you, I felt, anything you need to feel better, but please please please give me back the use of my body every once in a while. (Sling, you say? Baby carrier? Melon scoffed, nay screamed, at such ridiculous ideas.)

So. That sucked. It really, really, really sucked. And then, fairly suddenly, in her fourth month, an alien ship swooped down and replaced my screaming, sucking need machine with a happy, contented, downright fun little baby. Thanks, aliens!

 

With the arrival of Melon 2.0 came the departure of my mother-in-law. After hanging on much longer than any of us could have imagined two years ago, she succumbed to her advanced dementia at age 77. It was very sad, though there was a great sense of relief throughout the family too. M was fairly matter-of-fact – he had done most of his mourning in installments already – but it hit me harder than I had expected. Thinking about her last years, how frightening it must have been to gradually lose everything she had been and known and loved, and then to live in constant blackness, I felt so unutterably sad for her. And it brought up again how I miss my father, who died 13 years ago of heart failure at age 58, and how I wish my children could have known those two grandparents.

The other matter, the tax audit, was not terrible or anything, but pleasant it was not, and above all it ate a huge chunk of time and energy we did not have. I’m talking in the past tense here, but technically it is still ongoing, as we have not yet heard a final official verdict. And why would we, after more than two months? Anyway, I won’t bore you and agitate myself with the details, but suffice it to say that I don’t think I’ll be keen to do that again.

What I am most keen to do these days is sleep. I am so sleep-deprived, it’s almost funny. I sure hope that one day, when I can finally get some sleep again – maybe, oh, in 2013 – I’ll be able to retrieve some functioning brain cells from somewhere, because they sure aren’t accessible now. It’s almost painful, the fog I’m in these days and the sheer repetitiveness of the things I forget – damn, where did I put those keys I picked up just now? What did I come into this room for again? What was that one thing I absolutely needed to buy? Don’t tell me I forgot to turn the dryer on again! You get the idea. I hardly dare hope that last night meant anything – the night that Melon slept from 7 to 6:30 without waking up once. Unless she did wake up and I staggered over there and fed her and simply forgot about it, or unless she woke up and screamed for three hours straight and both M and I were simply too comatose to notice, but let’s just assume she slept. And let’s hope she does more of that soon.

I was going to give you a full update on Banana now, and a description of Melon, but you know what? I’m going to post this before the kids wake up from their naps, just so you have something from me now.

I’ve missed you, and I thank you so much for hanging in there.

Okay, okay, okay...

Before any of you lovely readers worries about me one second longer – now that it seems I’ve even found myself mentioned (gulp) on the legendary LFCA – I just wanted to come out of hiding and say thank you, and I’m so sorry. Thank you especially to Lioness, Beagle, Flicka, Thalia, Tinker, Kimmer, Sherry and KidKate, who gently checked in and reminded me over the past – heavens, three months plus – that they were thinking of me. And my sincere apologies for disappearing without a word for such a very long time.

Before I go on: everything is all right. We’re all fine, the pregnancy (at, wow, 35 weeks today) seems to be going very well, and we even have a date for the C-section – exactly three weeks from now. I still can’t quite wrap my head around that one.

So, why did I disappear? I’m almost ashamed to say it, but I was once again hit with a hefty dose of depression – one of those seemingly groundless but nevertheless crippling episodes I seem to go through, when I’m still functional (sort of) but everything requires an immense effort, and I hide from everyone, even if the guilt of hiding makes everything worse. Then there were a few other factors – the little boy’s death I wrote about in November, worries about the company M and I own, worries about M working so hard he might just keel over one day, worries about not being able to manage what little work I have left, an unpleasant conflict with my mother, a few weeks of awful rib and pelvic pain in my pregnancy, worries about being a good mother myself, worries about being able to handle two children, shock at our three-days-a-week child-minder (Banana’s beloved Nana) leaving us to take on a new full-time job just weeks before I’d been counting on her to step in while I was in the hospital, etcetera. All these factors on their own would have been difficult enough, but the depression, of course, didn’t help at all.

So. But along with the all-too-brief return of some much-needed sunlight and warmth to our corner of the world, my cloud seems to have passed, too, and everything is shrinking down to a more manageable size. I’ve even started getting caught up on all of your blogs again – I just haven’t had the courage to make a comment, thinking it would seem freakish just to pop up in a brief comment after being in hiding for so long. (Another chain of reasoning that somehow doesn’t stand up to scrutiny... but hey, that’s par for the course for me in these yucky states of mind.)

One factor in my life has been nothing but a joy, though: my Banana, who at 17 months is a funny, affectionate, flirtatious, uncomplicated (so far) toddler. To give you an example of how uncomplicated she is: she loves going to bed, even going so far as to walk up to it and demand entry. Just now, I put her down for her first nap of the day (she still takes two), and as soon as I held out her pacifier to her, she started giggling with happiness. (She gets the pacifier in bed only.) And now, there is complete silence from that room. Usually she falls asleep right away, but if she doesn’t, she talks softly to herself and her teddy – we’ll hear her murmurs and giggles through the door. Often, after a nap, she’ll stay in bed voluntarily to get a little more pacifier time and bond-‘n-babble with her teddy. If you come in before she’s completely ready, she’ll hold out the teddy for you to cuddle while she takes a few extra drags. Then, and only then, does she put the pacifier down on her pillow and extend her arms to be lifted out. At the moment, she’s still on a two-nap-a-day schedule, putting her at around three hours of sleep during the day, though I expect that to change soon. We have no complaints about her night sleep, either, which seems to be shortening from 12 hours to 11. (Note that with everything I write here about her, I have at the back of my mind: Who knows how that’ll change when her little sister arrives??)

Banana started walking when she was 15 months old and then kinda forgot about it again for three weeks, reverting back to her hilarious-looking knee walking. (Did I mention that she did that for months? I’ve never seen a kid scooting around on her knees like that – except for my brother, who did that until he was 18 months old. Is that kind of thing genetic, I wonder?) So in January, at 16 months, Banana finally discovered bipedal locomotion in earnest. Now she is surprising me with her stamina – last Saturday, she toddled all the way from our place to the town center, which is not only more than half a mile away, but also involves a rather steep incline. All the time, she waved off all my attempts to hold her hand (not that I gave her much of a choice when near traffic). When we got to town, she patted her buggy to get in, but then spent the next hour running around the busy marketplace and forcing us to chase her everywhere. When we got home, I was far more in need of a nap than she was.

As for language development, she’s not rushing things there either. Her active vocabulary is still pretty limited – Mama, Papa, her own name, Nana (that’s her babysitter as well as banana), hewwo, bye, teddy, kitty, doggy, moo, cococo (cockadoodledoo), Kette (that’s necklace in German), Auto or brrrm-brrrm (you know what), ba (ball), tea, keem (cream), and a lot of beginning letters, like nnnnnnn for her pacifier (short for Nuk, a brand here), bbbbbb for belly button, and mmmmm for Moni (our neighbor) – but we’re not concerned about it, as we figure she’s got two languages to process, and she seems to have no problems understanding things or making herself understood, even if it’s through protracted let’s-pretend-I’m-speaking babbling.

She’s still a great eater. Yesterday, she even chowed down on a salad and demanded seconds. (Granted, the salad was prepared by Moni-the-abovementioned-neighbor, who is a fantastic cook.) Her favorites are fruit – apples, pears, grapes, tangerines*, raisins. Her dietary range, however, is still a bit limited by the fact that she’s got only five teeth, none of them molars. (Teeth and hair – these, too, are taking their sweet time.) Now, with all the activity, she seems to be losing some of her baby girth, and her shape is elongating. If my measurements are accurate, she is just over 87 centimeters (over 34 inches) long. I saw her standing next to her Nana the other day, and thought, man, that girl is tall! (The contrast, I am sure, helped. Nana is very short – barely five foot one).

Banana is her mother’s daughter in that she’s a voracious reader. She loves sitting on the play mattress in her room, looking at her favorites. One of them is a pop-up book on human anatomy, which used to live on Papa’s bookshelf and one day mysteriously wandered over to hers. Beats me what goes through her mind as she pages past the chest muscles and rib cage to get to the inner organs, but hey, far be it from me to practice censorship! Richard Scarry is another favorite, as is Colin McNaughton’s “Boo!” and an unspeakable German book about a mole who pops his head out of his mound at the wrong moment one day and gets shat on – and goes around to all the other animals and asks them, with the decorative turd still perched atop his pate, “Did you poop on my head?” And, of course, to prove their innocence, the animals show him what their poop looks like. The culprit (caught with the help of some forensic flies) turns out to be the neighborhood dog, on whom the mole takes oh-so-sweet revenge by climbing up on the doghouse and dropping a little mole turd on the offender’s head. I am not, repeat not, making this up. It’s titled (the German equivalent of) “About the Little Mole Who Wanted to Know Who Pooped on His Head” and it’s a big hit among kids here. Write to me for ordering information – I’m sure you’re all atingle to get your hands on this full-color, pop-up masterpiece. Anyway, safely back on Planet Palatable, Banana’s current favorite is the lovely “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt”.

Just one more thing about Banana at 17 months before you all expire of boredom: she loves music. At the slightest hint of a melody, she sticks her butt out and rolls her hands in front of her, an impromptu move that so far constitutes the extent of her disco repertoire. It unfailingly brings tears of laughter to people’s eyes.

OK, I’d better wrap this up before it just ends up getting saved and remaining unfinished and unposted forever.

Last tidbits: I am now an official member of the Mile High Club – “the other one,” as my sister put it, “the one that’s less talked about.” This surprisingly large but unpopular club (sort of like infertility, it occurs to me) is made up of people whose infants or toddlers have upchucked on them in flight. (In my case, copiously and repeatedly. Everything was soiled and smelly down to my shoes. And I only had changes of clothes for Banana, of course. My poor seat neighbor.) The initiation rite sucks, I tell you, but the payoff in anecdote material is huge.

So – C-section on March 27 in the same hospital as last time. I hope Banana will be OK with my absence – and with the shock of having a baby sister. There’s really no way to prepare her adequately at her age (except with the help of picture books, which she is currently not connecting in any way with her own situation), so I just hope and trust that it won’t be too traumatic. And I hope with all my heart that everything is OK with the baby.

And on some irrational yet understandable plane, I am hoping for another one just like the one I have.

It’s good to be back here. And thanks so much for putting out your hands to pluck me out of my hole!

* which we have discontinued for now because we suspect they were responsible for a very puzzling bout of exzema on Banana’s arms and back.

A black day

It seems my last few posts have been full of happy crying. Not this one.

This one is full of crying about an event so sad that it seems to turn the laws of the universe inside out: the death of a little four-year-old boy, my sister-in-law’s nephew. He died after a 12-hour operation that was supposed to give him a chance at a normal life, an operation that would literally rewire his coronary arteries to give him a viable heart circulation. This procedure was the largest of many the poor little guy had to endure since birth, and the one that the whole family had been dreading for years. It was already clear during the operation that his chances were becoming more and more dire, and the surgical team decided to reverse what they’d done, to give him at least a sliver of a chance to live for another month. But he had lost too much blood, and he died last night at 3 this morning.

For the next two days, his broken little body will be lying on his bed in his room at home. His mother, who is going insane with grief, is lying next to him, holding him for as long as she can. And that image, her unbearable loss, haunts me every minute. I don’t know how to stop crying, for him, for his parents, for his little brother who will not remember him, for his grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins, all of whom loved him dearly and prayed and hoped that one day he’d have a real chance.

You leave a big, big hole, sweet little A. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.

Final results in

In her last comment, Tinker asked about my final amnio results -- and I did want to write about them here, only they arrived on election day and it felt quite odd to write about my happiness at Obama's victory and then say "Oh, by the way, I just got a letter from the geneticist which I did some happy crying about too." I don't quite understand my reluctance anymore -- it actually seems like a good news combo now -- but there you have it.

In a practical verbatim repetition of the letter I got about soon-to-be-Banana, this letter said that the baby is a "chromosomally normal female," and that there was no indication whatever of neural tube defects (spina bifida). After the usual disclaimer about not being able to rule out chromosomal defects that were too small to detect, it went on to say that they (the genetics team) were happy for me and that they wished me a healthy and successful pregnancy. Just the kind of letter, in other words, that one wants to get from a geneticist. (And incidentally, it was again from the geneticist whom I nicknamed "Dr. Spark" in March of 2005 for providing that little spark of inspiration that helped to get me out of my post-second-miscarriage depression. The man, in other words, has been responsible for a share of Kath happiness quite out of proportion to the time we've spent together.)

Tinker also asked about Banana's reaction to the news about a little sister. Well, Banana is still too young to understand what's coming. She does seem inordinately interested in my belly and my disappearing belly button, but she has no idea what it means. (I'm not sure I've grasped the full import myself, actually.) It's ironic, though: I've always wanted to give Banana a little brother or sister so that she could grow up like I did -- but now I'm apprehensive about whether she'll actually like the new situation. Will she feel rejected? displaced? jealous? Will I be able to do justice to her needs when there's another baby to tend to? Will she get along with her little sister? Is this actually the worst thing we can do to her right now?

And I still feel as if I'm tempting fate, writing as if there will certainly be a little sister. It's not that I'm pessimistic, really, but I am aware of all the things that could go wrong before or at the end of March... (My due date is April 10, but my cesarean would probably be two weeks before that.) And that's also why I reacted with alarm when M mentioned that a (female) friend of ours had suggested I have my tubes tied during the cesarean. Not that that's a bad idea in itself -- we did want two -- but it's so final, and feels so... hubristic and reckless, and good Lord, let's start to think about crossing that bridge when we're within a few miles of it, shall we? Gulp.

Gulp.

Bawling, on an on

I woke up this morning to the sounds of Banana babbling to her Papa on the changing table two rooms away and immediately fumbled for my remote control. Thanks to the wall-to-wall coverage even in Germany, I didn't have to wait five seconds to find out that Obama had won. Great, I thought, what a relief. Great. Great. And then I went to the bathroom, and as I was washing my hands I simply burst into tears, and the tears just wouldn't stop. I've been crying so much since then I even have one of those pressure headaches around my eyes.

(Crying has been an uncharacteristically big thing for me lately -- I even lost it repeatedly during that half-hour Obama infomercial. Is it simply being deeply touched, or are those p-hormones turning me into a faucet?)

I know the road ahead is going to be far from easy, but this is such a positive start, and right now am so very, very proud of my country.

Preliminary results in

When I hadn't heard anything by 4:30 this afternoon about the results of my FISH test, I finally got up my courage and called the geneticist's office directly. And they told me: negative for trisomies 13, 18 and 21, normal sex chromosomes -- and it's a girl.

I don't think I need to tell you how much relieved and happy sobbing I did today.

Keyses, needles and pins

I’m sorry about yet another disappearing act – I’ve never been as unsure about what to write here as I have been since this pregnancy began. I try not to think about my state too much, as thinking just makes me worried. I’m still curiously detached much of the time, just like I was the first time around. And worried or not, detached or not, I find myself feeling reluctant to share my feelings here, as I fear I will cause pain, or at the very least strain others’ capacity for empathy. But in fairness, I do owe you an update, and the short version is that I am fine, everything still seems to be going well with the pregnancy (15 weeks 5 days), and Banana is now 13 months old and thriving.

Now for the longer version. The following two parts come with a caution.

**************Banana first. Skip this part if you can’t stomach gushing right now*****************

She is getting funnier and more interactive by the day. It’s fascinating how she stares at me now when I talk to her, as she anticipates understanding exactly what I say. “What does a doggy say?” I ask, and she makes a pointy-mouthed “Oh! Oh!” sound, mimicking my “Woof woof!” She has me in stitches when she imitates my nose-twitching rabbit imitation – the effort to contort her face makes her look more constipated than anything else.

She is not walking yet, though she now eagerly takes several steps when we hold her by the hand. And sometimes she scoots through the room in teeny-tiny increments on her knees, which is something my brother used to do until he got so good at it we thought he’d never learn to walk. (He did, eventually, at 18 months.) In other milestones, Banana is no longer completely toothless – right before her first birthday, she got her first and so far only tooth, the bottom left one. But even with her limited means, she chews food with a passion, and can still inflict pain with a little bite.

She is getting so heavy it’s quite a shlep taking her up the two flights of stairs to our apartment, particularly with shopping. (And no, we don’t have an elevator. And yes, we are screwed.) We finally bought a new stroller, since her convertible buggy didn’t have any seat belts and she was getting up all the time to force me to carry her. The stroller I chose (against M’s understandable opposition, as the thing is fiendishly expensive) is a P*hil & Ted*s inline buggy, which converts to a two-seater should the need arise (ahem) but for now is just a comfortable one-seater that is super easy to steer. Banana is happy and so am I on our daily outings into town, so M can just grumble away. (Especially since I’m the one who paid for it!)

Yesterday and today I had doctor’s appointments (more about that later) and I had to leave her with friends for four and three hours, respectively. Both times she was completely happy the whole time, and just grinned at me when I came back. “What an incredibly easygoing kid,” the babysitter from yesterday remarked, and I agree. If she knows you, she is totally trusting and happy. (I wonder whether that will last?)

She pulls herself up everywhere, and loves nothing more than to stand at our coffee table and devour a bunch of seedless grapes. Literally a bunch. She is a total grape fiend, like her father. I used to peel the grapes for her and halve them, since she is obviously not well equipped with masticating implements, but “Good God woman, will you hurry it up already?” was the gist of her reaction, so first the peeling, then the halving fell by the wayside, and Banana just happily chews away with what little she has. As for occasional episodes of choking, she takes that in stride. So far a bit of firm patting on the upper back has always done the trick, and now she even anticipates that and starts patting the side of her head when something threatens to lodge in her throat. It cracks me up every time, especially since the patting hand immediately goes back to the plate for more. She’s not only a good eater, she’s a dedicated one – and if you are eating something, then woe betide you if you don’t give her some on the double, even if she’s just eaten. Poor thing, she got that from both sides of the family.

She is very generous with affection now, and responds beautifully to requests for kisses. This morning, she was gumming Papa’s keychain, so I asked her to “Give Papa the keys, please.” And she turned to him and puckered up. (Maybe I should work on my Spanish accent, eh?) Ah, but Papa. She absolutely adores her Papa. When he’s at work and I ask where he is, she smiles and waves bye-bye. When she hears his key in the door, she literally squeals with delight, and from that moment on it’s wall-to-wall Papapapapapa. It might help that he’s the one who gets her out of bed every morning and gives her her first drink of the day. They spend the first hour of every day together in the living room, she with her milk bottle, he with his cappuccino. Ah, the life! At least it is for me, who gets to sleep for an extra hour every day.

Speaking of milk bottle: In spite of an increase in dexterity that is everywhere else in evidence, Banana still refuses to hold her bottle herself. Instead she’ll hand it (or the sippy cup) to you with an impatient “Ugh!” and then tilt her head up obligingly while her hands lie completely flat on the table or by her sides. It’s almost as if she were sitting on them to make her point that she simply can’t do this. If it weren’t so damn cute, we probably would have forced her to stop that a long time ago. But hey.

She’s still a very good sleeper – she still takes two 90-minute naps a day, and usually sleeps well at night. (And I know I’ll be punished for writing that, so pretend I didn’t.)

**************End of Banana gush. Now on to the work in progress.*****************

So far, this pregnancy has progressed uneventfully. I was of course happy when the first trimester was behind me, but I still have occasional bouts of sudden and extreme nausea that are worse than they were last time, and worse than in the first trimester. Very puzzling, but at least I haven’t actually had to vomit – which is a good thing, considering the nausea always strikes at a time and (public) place where it would be awful to have to do that. Brushing my teeth is still the worst – I retch every time. Not that you asked.

This afternoon I had an amniocentesis. (I have had no other prenatal diagnostic or screening procedure, such as a nuchal fold translucency – they don’t provide them here if you plan to have an amnio done. So I have no idea of my actual, as opposed to age-related, risk of anomaly.) It went as well as the last time (in April 2007 – I’m reclining and can’t figure out how to link at the moment). The procedure itself was preceded by a long and detailed scan by the same maestro who did the last one. He pronounced everything normal-looking as far as he could tell at this early stage and considering the awkward position of the fetus behind the placenta (another anterior placenta, like last time) and a very thick uterine wall. He recommended that we come back in week 21 or 22 for a Level II for a conclusive all-clear on certain structures. But he was able to visualize the four chambers of the heart, the face, the spine, the legs and feet, the arms and hands, the bladder, the brain, and the umbilical cord. (And yes, this time, the umbilical cord has three vessels and not just two.) Then the maestro found a good pocket of amniotic fluid away from the baby, and I was swabbed with iodine solution and prepared for the procedure. He told me not to laugh or cry or cough or sneeze or breathe too deeply. “Just make sure your abdomen is completely relaxed,” he said helpfully, as he was holding a three-foot needle in his hand. (Just kidding – it was a two-foot needle.) But I was pretty relaxed, particularly as I trust him and as I knew what to expect from the last time. It was just as I had remembered, though possibly a bit more painful when the needle went into the uterine wall, and it seemed to go in deeper than it did last time. Again, M and I were able to follow the whole thing on the video projection on the wall. It’s fascinating how the maestro can figure out exactly where to go in and how to angle the needle to hit just the right little pocket of amniotic fluid when the ultrasound transducer, angled just so, is providing an image from another part of my abdomen. But that’s what makes him the maestro, I suppose. Like last time, he held the syringe with the amniotic fluid out to me afterwards and pronounced it “nice and clear and yellow”. He seemed quite happy with the way things went. And so was I, especially later when I was hooked up to a contraction monitor for half and hour and everything seemed nice and calm in there.

I spent the rest of the day either in bed or resting on the sofa, as per instructions. I was also told not to exert myself at all for three days, take baths, have sex, do sports. The last three are no problem – especially that “sports” one – but exertion in general? I asked the maestro: “My daughter weighs over 12 kilos, and we live two flights up – can I carry her?” “Well, at over 12 kilos, she must be walking, right?” he said, thinking she must be three years old. He looked a bit goggly-eyed when I told him the truth. Anyway, the long and short of it is, I can’t pick her up for three days. Which is a bit of a challenge, considering that even if we don’t leave the house and if I feed her and change her on the floor, she has to be lifted into and out of bed several times a day. Not to mention the fact that she would throw a fit if I never picked her up on demand. Anyway, through an amazing stroke of luck, or cleaning lady-cum-babysitter, L, is free tomorrow and will have her all day. Now we just have to figure out the following day or two.

Tomorrow afternoon we will get the preliminary results from the FISH test, showing us whether there are any trisomies of chromosomes 21, 13 or 18 (Down, Patau or Edwards Syndrome) or any sex chromosome anomalies such as Turner (XO) or Klinefelter (XXY) Syndrome. And we’ll find out the sex. All other results (for which my age does not pose an increased risk) will have to wait about two weeks. Am I nervous, you ask? In a word, yes. Much more worried than last time. I realized today how detached I had been feeling when I saw the little baby tuck its arms behind its head, as if reclining on a hammock. (I say “it” simply to avoid “he or she.”) Before my OB/GYN appointment yesterday (to get a referral), I had not seen the baby for over a month, and here it was, playing Joe Cool. My detachment (which, let’s face it, was not too convincing in hindsight) just flew out the window.

I’ll let you know.

**************End of pregnancy news*****************

On a totally unrelated note, I just wish the U.S. election were over and done with. My interest has turned into a veritable obsession, and my surfing has even cut into my sleep time. I’ve always been interested, but this has definitely crossed the line. I was so relieved when I got my ballot and sent it off two weeks ago – civic duty done – when it promptly turned up in my mailbox three days later. My address, you see, was printed upside-down on the top left of the pre-printed envelope, so if you turned the envelope around and ignored the position of the stamp and the fact that the other address was five times as big, you thought it was addressed to me. Undeterred by these amateurish vote suppression efforts (have I been reading the blogs or what?) I returned the envelope to the post office to have them try again. And so far, so good.

OK, now I must really, really go to bed. Thanks for hanging in there with me. I’ll update as soon as I can.

My submission to the "World's Worst Mom" contest

I hurt my baby today. I hurt my baby, and I still can’t quite get over it.

M and I came home from a walk with Banana this afternoon, and I asked M to take her upstairs (our apartment is two floors up) while I went to get the laundry from the laundry room downstairs. When I came up, I pushed against the heavy apartment door, which M had left slightly ajar, and immediately hit a hard obstacle. There was a loud thump, and I heard a sharp little intake of breath. With a sickening jolt I realized Banana had crawled right behind the door, and that I’d just knocked her in the head. A split second later the baby had finished sucking air into her lungs and was releasing it in a hysterical, warbling wail, and of course I couldn’t get in because she was still blocking the door. I called desperately for M, who was apparently in the bathroom. Luckily he came out right away and picked up Banana, who was crying in a way I’d never heard before, gasping and screaming. My heart wanted to jump out of my chest, it was beating so hard. I was terrified – that door is so heavy, that thump was so loud, and she is so small. I took her in my arms and held her tightly while stroking her head and face and trying to feel for damage. She seemed OK externally, but oh that sobbing...

Luckily, she soon calmed down, and resumed her normal baby activities. I think the whole episode from beginning to end took no more than two minutes, but I think it aged me by two years. And now, several hours later, the point of impact is visible – she’s got a red line running down from her left eyebrow to her left cheek, with a red area on her forehead, too. Tomorrow she’s going to have a shiner. Let’s hope her eye won’t be swollen shut.

Poor little thing. And I did that to her.

OK, Kath, here is where we pull ourselves together and give everyone a quick update while we’re here.

M is OK. His gastroscopy revealed no worrying problems. I was so frightened of stomach cancer (M was obviously concerned about it, and this is a guy who doesn’t ever take his own health seriously) and now I am so relieved.

Banana and I went for her one-year appointment last week. She was too heavy for the baby scales, so I had to get on normal bathroom scales with her and subtract myself. By that imprecise measurement, she is now 12 kilos on the dot (26.4 pounds). She also only just fit on the baby-measurement thingy, which is 80 cm (31.5 inches) long. The nurse looked quite taken aback at my big’un. Still, Banana is now no longer above the 97th percentile in everything (length, weight and head circumference), but solidly on that line with all three. The doctor was very happy with her development and said she was now free to eat anything she wants. (And she wants, she wants!) As a parting, er, shot, he gave her the MMR vaccine in the upper arm, which she was pretty indignant about. But as is her wont, she soon regrouped.

Oh! And her very first tooth has broken through! A bit late, but hey. At least I was right about her teething.

My tiredness is still bad, but it seems to be improving. I think I hit a real low point last week Friday – I felt physically ill from exhaustion, and must have looked so ashen that our cleaning lady stayed on two hours to take care of Banana while I slept, bless her – but now it’s just garden-variety fatigue that can be cured with a nap, when I’m allowed to have one. Otherwise, everything seems to be fine with the p-word. I’ll know more on my next appointment on September 22, which is a day after Banana’s first birthday. I can’t believe it’s been a year already.

And I can’t believe I hurt her like that. Ugh.

Relief

I’m really sorry I didn’t post yesterday. Last night (which was the first chance I had, after tending to an ultra-grumpy Banana all afternoon) I was in Typepad, starting my post, when my computer and I both started to display clear signs of malfunction. I couldn’t keep my eyes open, and the laptop took ages to register any character I typed. After battling away for two lines’ worth of text, I finally packed it in and went to bed.

Anyway, I have good news to report. The ultrasound yesterday revealed a 21-mm embryo, which is pretty much just as it should be at 8w5d. The heart was beating away and everything looked good. What a splendid sight to see. Dr. Wonderful said she was “so pleased” and added encouragingly that “We’re very optimistic now, aren’t we?” I love that woman. She left it up to me to say when I want to come in again. I decided to be comparatively brave and leave it for two and a half weeks, so my next appointment is on Monday, September 22. That would be 11w3d. Let’s see how brave I feel when the glow of this appointment wears off, but I think that was the right decision.

The fatigue, though, is really really bad this time. I could take three naps a day. Often I feel so guilty when I’m in the living room with Banana and not playing with her, thinking I must be the lamest mother in the world. And Banana is going through a very intense phase of grouchiness and pick-me-up-and-carry-me-around right now, which is not helping at all. She has taken to getting up in her buggy (which has no seat belts!!!!! And yes, we’re looking for another one) and forcing me thus to pick her up. And then she hangs there on my arm like a sack of potatoes, all 12+ kilos of her, while I have the privilege of not only lugging her, but pushing the buggy too – and there are lots of hills in our little town. If I put her back in the buggy and she’s in a bad mood, she either screams or simply gets up again. I was so exhausted getting home the other day that I almost cried. And Banana’s been sleeping badly at night the past few days, too – something is up with her. I wonder if she might, finally, be teething for real?

Anyway. I must go now and get the place presentable for our two guests, who are returning today and staying for a week. Hurricane Banana has been raging here again – papers, napkins and toys are all over the floor thanks to her fondness for cleaning out cupboards and drawers – and laundry desperately needs to be done. And in 90 minutes I take M to have a gastroscopy done at the hospital. He’s been feeling some pain in his stomach recently, and since he’s had a problem with acid reflux for years, I’m a bit worried. Let’s hope everything’s OK on that front... Please. Sigh.

First appointment

I just wanted to give you a brief update on what is happening. On Wednesday I went to Dr. Wonderful for a first check-up, thinking that, if there was going to be a heartbeat, it would be visible by then (6w5d). After peeing in a cup, I was asked by an assistant I’d never seen before: “You did know it was positive, right?” When I answered in the affirmative, she nodded and said, “Do you want to keep it?”

After a few minutes of mutely gathering up the shards of my exploding brain from the lab floor, I was having my blood drawn and filling out a questionnaire — and an hour later, I was sitting across from Dr. Wonderful. She was happy to hear about the positive tests (and, it turns out, less happy about her assistants). Knowing how nervous I was, she soon escorted me into the examination room. She was brilliant as always and said, just one second after putting in the wand, “I see it, and it’s just right.” And there it was indeed, a round gestational sac, a neat little yolk sac inside, and next to that a 6 mm embryo with a rapidly beating heart. I wanted to hug the monitor, I was so relieved and happy. I did note that the computer aged the embryo a bit younger at 6w3d, stashing that little bit of information in the back of my brain for later worrying. I also noted with pre-worry (I do most of my worrying outside of that practice) that no corpus luteum was visible — I remember having a huge one with Banana. But common sense tells me that it must be there, or the rest wouldn’t be.

My next appointment is on September 3. I should be 8 weeks and 5 days then.

I still have no major symptoms to speak of, except for crippling fatigue (which has effectively nixed my cleaning frenzy for the time being) and, since very recently, a bit of nausea when I’m hungry.

As for my emotional state, I am doing far better than I was doing the last time around, though I cannot say I am expecting this to go well. Don’t get me wrong — I’m not pessimistic either; instead, I’m just waiting and seeing. Mainly I am so distracted by my little waving, clapping, standing, dog-loving Banana that many hours can go by without me thinking about what’s going on inside me. And that’s a very good thing.

You might be asking yourselves why I didn’t update earlier. The truth, as so often, is very messy and complicated. Part of me feels like a fraud here now, and I’m scared of causing irritation and pain. The “infertile” label never really fit me as a recurrent miscarrier, but at least I felt at home in this community. But now? An “infertility” blog, written by a woman who not only has a baby already, but who conceives spontaneously again within a few months of trying at 40? What right do I have to be here and take up your air time, much less ask for your support?

Told you it was messy. Now I just have to figure out whether to try to get over myself, or to heed these feelings and go.

And lady? Yes. Yes, with all my heart, I want to keep it.