Off Topic Post

This was written by a woman who goes by Riuaki who is a member of the Atheist/Agnostic families board that I often post on. I love it and hope it helps those of you who question my choice.

Do not pity me, do not feel sorry for me. I have chosen my path by my own free will. I am not lost, so there is no need for me to be found. My life is not empty. I know who I am and I know my purpose. I love, I am loved, and I strive every day to make sure I leave this world in better condition than I found it. My world is not dark and it is not cold. I see beauty and divinity in the world around me, and it is in no way less meaningful than your world ruled by a deity. My divine is love and nature, physics and chemistry and respect. I can respect you without agreeing and love you without believing that my love was directed by a higher power. Disagreement is not mocking, but instead is a quest for mutual understanding. I have no reason to mock you and it is hurtful when you proclaim how sorry you are for me.

Have you ever tried to see the universe from a different perspective, maybe one you were not taught through tradition? I can see your point of view because I explored it in my initial wandering. I do not wander anymore. I now understand my place in the universe, and it is right here where I am. I may be small, but I am not insignificant. I can touch the lives of others, and my small caress can ripple through humanity in a subtle wave. I do not need to make the world mine, I just need to make my own world matter. I need to make it matter for my son, my husband, my friends, and my family.

I am not lacking for anything intangible, so do not pity my lack of belief. I have hope, but it is centered around humanity instead of the vague promise of reward based on faith. I see hope and wonder in the eyes of my child and I know he is something special and unique, as is every child in the world. I have not squandered the concept of a soul, for all my soul is is my individuality. I am not like any other even though we are all fundamentally the same, and that spark of uniqueness is my soul. I have morals, and I try to live my life as well as possible because I am living for this life and this life alone. I am living my way so my progeny can thrive in a safe and clean world. I am not selfish. I have sacrificed an incredible amount for other people, so do not trivialize my achievements just because they were not accomplished under the banner of a belief. I try to always be honest, even if the truth isn't always what people want to hear. The truth is deserved by all and it is told out of love and not fear.

Do not pity me, my friend, for I do not live in fear. I lost my fear when I found myself. I found intense love for humanity, respect for the universe and everything in it, virtue in rationality, and innate values which embrace the best of all religions. I respect you as an individual, so please respect me. If you feel you must pray for me, go ahead, but I do not need it and it honestly makes me a bit uncomfortable if you tell me outright that you are. A kind word and a kind thought will suffice, and I will reciprocate the same to you. Work toward your own peace as I work toward mine. Embrace me because I am different from you, since it would be a boring world if we were all the same.

Facebook could be my breaking point

Beyond just being killed with the overwhelming posts of ultrasounds, pregnancy announcements, birth announcements and the such, I was just confronted with a whole new, strange feeling. One of the mamas from my, now assumed to be retired, moms playgroup has a 7 week old baby girl. She was due just a week or so after when I would have been due from m first miscarriage. Anyway, on Facebook she just posted a request for advice on how to get her 7 week old to nap longer. Her first born, in her memory, didn't have this issue. I honestly did not feel qualified to answer. Why do I feel less of a mother because I only have one child who is no longer an infant? One of the responders was ANOTHER mom from the group who ALSO just had a baby girl in July and yet another had one in May. I feel left out. I feel like crap.

Liliana is incredible and has become so interactive and amazing (um, not that she hasn't been amazing from minute 1). She started at a new day care today which I am so thrilled about. Next post will be all about Liliana and her new day care.

Breaking news! 2 days after Liliana's 2nd birthday, she took it upon herself to poop in her potty! It was, by far, one of the largest poops I have seen.

Just a different spool of bad luck?

Just throwing this out there quickly. Not much to say really. I am feeling better by the way. Had a good, productive day of work today which really helps my state of mind. I also am going to the RE's office tomorrow with Chris to get Karyotyping done to make sure we don't have some genetic mismatch that luckily didn't meet with Liliana but could be coming together with these last pregnancies. I highly doubt it but at least it will be another thing we can rule out. I am also having my uterus injected with dye and x-rayed in a few weeks to see if there are any scars or adhesions that my be a problem. Again, I doubt that is the problem but after these 2 tests, we will really be done with all investigative testing. Now for the clencher, my doctor did confirm that it is very possible that the SCH (sub-chorionic hemorrhage) may have caused THIS miscarriage. That actually makes sense to me because different from the other 2, this pregnancy was not measuring behind or anything. It really seemed like it was healthy. How would that be for bad luck that we finally catch a good egg and then something totally unrelated causes the miscarriage? Not trying to sound like Debbie Downer. In fact, I almost feel relieved if this is in fact true (though we will never know for sure). At least I know that I am not doomed to popping out bad eggs forever. So I am going to go with this belief because my gut tells me this was a healthy baby otherwise. I felt it in my bones.

Is this rock bottom?

I really don't feel like writing right now but I also don't want to go to sleep. I have an early work day tomorrow and am feeling so scatter brained and sort of like an outside observer to my own life. Have you ever felt that way? I am not my together, organized self. Things still need to get done and responsibilities are still there both with work and home but I am just going through motions and not putting any thought or care into it and it is freaking me out. I am unprepared for work stuff, I am unprepared for Liliana's care. I am winging it. I think what it is is depression. I am depressed. I just want to put life on hold for a couple of days so that I can catch up. I cried hard a lot of the morning today. I am exhausted from it.

I wanted to write about what a complete ass the doctor was to me this morning but now I don't even think I want to rehash it. One thing to point out though is I asked him if my sub-chorionic hemorrhage could have caused the miscarriage and he said "maybe". That was it, no elaboration or explanation. I didn't press it. I figured I would ask my doctor when I speak to her. I don't know when that will be though. I left a message and hope to hear from her tomorrow.

I feel like I used to when I would drink a lot on a Sunday- late into the evening and then have to go to work the next day. It would mess my whole week up because I am the type of person that needs life neat and orderly when I have other responsibilities to tend to. Help, I need to get control of my life.

Weekend Update

Are you sitting on pins and needles waiting and wondering? Well I didn't make it. Started cramping pretty severely yesterday late afternoon and by 7:30 I knew it was imminent. I had Chris put Liliana to bed and I drove myself to West Sub hospital here in Oak Park. It is only 5 minutes from home. I waited the mandatory ridiculous amount of time to be seen but they seem to keep your hopes up and your body and brain occupied by calling you back to triage then sending you back to the waiting room. Then another lady pops out and they call you back to register then send you back to the waiting room. Finally I was called back to the heart of the ER where the nurses were standing around chatting with the security guard and random patients wandered from their curtained rooms to the bathroom. It was a pretty quiet night in the ER thankfully. Another huge time suck occurred just trying to figure out the hospital gown. Am I the only one that is consistently intimidated by these things? First of all, I have never seen 2 alike. Just when I think I have the style mastered on which way it goes on, where it ties, what extra piece of fabric goes through what random role they present a whole new gown style. The one last night actually required me to create my own sleeves by snapping them together. I had to figure out how to do this though my cramping. When the nurse came in I was still standing there almost naked in just my underwear and sandals holding the limp piece of fabric in my hands almost in tears. She snapped it up for me so I could get dressed.

I relayed my story for the 3rd time that night to the nurse who took my vitals and asked a lot of questions about my situation I think more for her own personal curiosity. Finally, after I was pretty comfortably laying on the examining table under a couple of blankets the doctor came in. She was probably younger than me and seemed very nice but also a little nervous about my situation. Trying to be sensitive and not say the wrong thing while I tried to be as blunt and open about it as I could to hopefully put her at ease but I think I came across as a little cold and removed from the situation. I was. I had to be. I was there for a reason. I fought back crying on 2 occasions already(minus the gown fiasco). One when I was walking back to the examine room and two as I sat there alone in the room waiting, thinking too much and realizing that I was parting with a baby, my baby, chris' baby that had, up until last week, been growing inside of me and even more significantly been forming in my future plans for our lives.

So back to the matter of fact Leigh who was thrilled and relieved when the nervous doc immediately commented upon peering up between the plastic speculum that the "product of conception" (doc's words) was right there. She plucked it out with some forceps and put it in a cup to send up to pathology. I told her how relieved I was because having genetic testing was so important for us. I had explained earlier too the whole reason I came in and needed the tissue collected was for genetic testing. Want to see if miscarriage was a result of triploidy... I actually said Triploidy. She suggested I have my doc call the lab in the morning to tell them exactly what tests they want done. I asked for the direct number and she provided.

She told me I could get dressed. I put my underwear and shorts back on but was having an extremely difficult time because I had a stick in my vein at the crook of my elbow that the nurse left in the event I needed meds or fluids. I was unable to bend my left arm. The nurse returned and asked me to leave a urine sample. Ummmm Okay. I am tempted to go into detail here but I think I will leave it alone. Let's just say with the inability to bend my left arm, my ridiculous gown that was now untied and draping and flowing all over and the aftermath of what was going on (said in whisper tone "down there") it took me close to 5 minutes to leave a urine sample plus add in all the cleaning I had to do after. My apologies to the janitorial staff at West Suburban ER.

Okay, fast forward. I got myself home, happy and relieved that all turned out okay. I got hold of the on call doc at my OB's office who immediately sounded concerned that my sample went to "pathology". He called the number and I got a call back in minutes. He informed me that the sample was not marked for genetic testing and they put it in something that instantly makes genetic testing an impossibility.

I am very upset but not as much as I imagined I would be. He said if there was any result to be concerned about the next step would be to have Chris and I tested so he said we could go ahead and do genetic testing on us anyway. Something to consider. He also gave me a lot of hope about my age and that it is a crap shoot but odds are still in our favor. Yay! So now I am over the hump and can start counting my HCG levels down to zero and get back on the trying to conceive horse.

Bye for now

The weekend wait

I hope to make it through the weekend for my D&C on Monday. I am cramping and bleeding heavily and it is only Friday morning. I have all my hopes in the genetic testing of the tissue. If that isn't able to happen I am going to have so many unresolved questions and feelings. I plan to try and lay low and not exert too much. My sadness is starting to increase as the shock is wearing off and reality is setting in.

These days are the hardest

So the period between finding out about the loss and ridding the pregnancy from my body is the hardest time. With my first miscarriage it was so fast. I took the pills the same day I found out and it was so quick and easy that by the same evening, I had fully miscarried. The second miscarriage was more complicated as I was farther along and had actually been carrying the baby (I changed the word to "baby" from "fetus" for some reason) around for weeks without knowing it had died. As you remember from previous posts it was a LONG drawn out process of taking meds that didn't work then thinking I needed a D&C then miscarrying naturally 2 days before the procedure. Overall it took almost 6 days. Then you still have to wait for your hormone levels to fall to zero before feeling truly "normal" again because then your cycle returns and you can start trying to conceive again! So here I sit, cramping, spotting and waiting for my D&C to be scheduled. They want to do it Tuesday...TUESDAY! What! First of all, I am certain to miscarry naturally by then, if not I am extremely uncomfortable and miserable with a dead baby inside of me! I don't want to go naturally because then I can't get the ever so important genetic testing done. PLUS, Tuesday is a huge work day for me. I am already feeling guilty by rescheduling my last 2 days due to unrelated illness. I can't miss work on Tuesday. This is already dragging on too long. I am, believe it or not, already thinking about getting pregnant again and want to move this parade along. In the meantime, I sit vacillating in the area of pregnant woman, not pregnant woman. It is an area I don't find very pleasant.

Damn

I am not writing a long post, there will be plenty more to follow as the numbness wears off. I had a 3rd miscarriage today. Rather I found out today that my baby had no heartbeat and stopped growing last Wednesday at 8weeks 2days. We kept this pregnancy really quiet and were going to announce at our pulled pork party at the end of the month. I even bought a "I'm going to be a big sister" t-shirt for Liliana to wear to make the announcement. It is the same story, saw heartbeat, everything was fine then same day as ultrasound baby stops growing. I have the flu or something like it and have been feeling really rotten all day. After the Tylenol kicked in I noticed pretty significant cramping. I went into my doctor's office to be checked and that is when we received the news. Unbelievable. I am an Atheist and I tell you, I actually wondered today if there is a vengeful God out there that is punishing me for my lack of belief. Of course I don't believe this, especially when I see on Babycenter so may religious girls talking about God taking their baby to heaven and how it is all part of his plan. What bullshit.

Good Girl

Quick post-
A while ago I posted about putting Liliana in "time out". That was probably 6 months ago or so. I then read that it isn't effective until age of 2. So I gave up on the time out for awhile and all has actually been pretty great. Well now we are teetering on the edge of "2" and Signorina Sassy Pants is in full swing. We have had a couple attempts at time out on the naughty step to no avail. She just leaves the step and goes in the living room to play or one time Chris opened the front door to bring her outside to play with the neighbor girls.
Fast forward to this evening. We were all three playing on the living room floor and Liliana threw a wooden spoon and a bucket at Chris. I looked her in the eye and told her not to throw stuff at daddy. As usual, she looked me in the eye and laughed. I became very serious and told her the next time she threw something at someone she was going to have to sit on the naughty step. Chris and I resume conversation and about 60 seconds later, Liliana exclaims "bye, the step". She then walks over to the first step and proceeds to put herself in a time out. She just squatted her cute, tiny tush right down on that step. It was so sweet. We had to explain through giggles she wasn't in a time out right now. So, not sure she considers it a negative consequence at all. Man this kid is so much fun!

If things turned out differently

Strange to think that I would be home with a newborn right now if I hadn't had my first miscarriage in November. I was due 7/15. It is also strange to think that I most likely wouldn't have my job with HON if I hadn't lost the baby. And if they were so gracious to hire a 5 months along pregnant woman, it would be very strange to be leaving a new job after 4 months for maternity leave. I guess what I am saying, is that looking at the positive side of things, I am very content with where my life is right now and it feels right where I am sitting at the moment. I am not sad to be realizing I have passed my due date. I am excited about my future with this job and pregnancy at the very beginning probably just wouldn't have fit. I hate the saying "everything happens for a reason" as much as you probably do but I think it fits here.

Sometimes I even question if we want a second baby. I feel so fulfilled with Liliana that when I think about a baby it kind of freaks me out! But then I think about a family of four and it makes me giddy with excitement. One day at a time.

What are words for?

And here they come...words! A couple new words every day! Nose, lollipop, towel, mama's keys, both, block party, shoes, stairs...I am so relieved but knew it would happen. That is all I have for right now.

Feline dreams

I had a dream last night that I was pregnant and ready to give birth. I was all alone on an examining table with my OB Dr Roth. She cut me open and told me since we had done this before, it would be easy. Since she had installed a 2 way zipper on my uterus she just unzipped vertically then horizontally. Then out jumped a tom cat. A full grown, kind of straggly, tabby. I tried to grab him so I could nurse him but he got away and ran down the hall. I was so concerned b/c he needed to be nursed but Dr Roth insisted it was common for them to need to explore and he would be back in a few days. I was horribly disappointed. The disappointment didn't stem so much from the fact that I gave birth to a full grown cat and not a human, but that he was so plain and feral. I was thinking that this was the last chance I had to have a baby and he didn't even possess an interesting fur pattern or a cute, round face. He eventually came back and I tried to nurse him. Needless to say, he wanted nothing to do with that. I woke up very relieved that I had not birthed and nursed a feline.

Social Moron

I think for the first time in almost 2 years I am starting to have a real urge for adult only time. I can't believe it actually took this long. Maybe it is the holiday weekend, or maybe it is that Liliana is at the age where I can't leave her sleeping in a car carrier or wear her while at a party and I also can't leave her to play on her own or run around solo because she is too young to fully understand the safe dos and don'ts. We had so many fun plans on the books for this weekend and nothing has quite turned out as planned. A city visit to Tammy and Andrew's had to be chucked due to sickness and a BBQ next door was cut very short to put Liliana to bed. Even while I was physically present I was only about 10% there mentally. This leads me to another side effect of parenting that I thought would have gotten better by now. I have no attention span. I can sit having a conversation with someone and my mind wanders. I honestly have no idea what the person I was just speaking with has said. I consciously make an effort to pay attention but then my thoughts go to the issue of my attention span and from there it branches off into several directions. I am not sure if this is a common ailment of parents with toddlers or if there is something wrong with me. I fear people think I am a social moron.
It makes me not want to go out anymore. I am much happier at home reading a book or watching a movie. I want to be more outgoing as a family and expose Liliana to fun stuff but it needs to be totally kid focused. I can't try and be the parent who goes to an adult function with my kid and try and have a good time- even if she is welcome and invited I have decided it is just not worth it. It is not enjoyable for me. I know people would suggest a date night or adult only night for Chris and I to get out but quite honestly we can't afford that right now. It is expensive even to go out and get a drink because a babysitter is required. So I will just suck it up for now and accept that my brain is mush and I am boring. At least Liliana finds me entertaining so that keeps me going.

Like Father Like Daughter: a poop story

Some stories from your childhood are repeated in family and party circles over and over. My mom likes to tell how she found me chewing on a razor blade when I was about 2 or 3. My brother Garry drank turpentine on my Aunt and Uncle's wedding day. My oldest brother Doug would only eat mayonnaise sandwiches. Then there is the colorful story about Chris and his twin Tia and the nap time poo fight that resulted in creative poo art on the walls, crib and, of course, each other. That story comes up often. It is ingrained in the memory of my father in law for all time I imagine. Over 40 years later and he can still smell and visualize the famous poo fight. Thankfully Liliana would never do anything like that. She is too sweet and concerned about her cleanliness to ever play in her own poo- or so I thought until last night.

Lately her diaper pail has been smelling pretty bad even after cleaning so I began moving it out of her room at night. I felt bad that she has to sleep in the subtle smell of poo all night long. Last night I creaked open her door to do my routine admiration, covering up and gently kissing good night when I noticed it still smelled like poo in her room. I assumed she may have pooed her diaper because she has been sick lately with diarrhea and is going a lot. As I moved closer to the crib I saw her bare bottom glowing in the moonlight. Awww, cute she took her diaper off again. Something she has been doing off and on for the last few weeks. Then, not so cute I saw the pile of poo behind her that she had contorted her body to be away from before she fell asleep. Baby doll's leg was in the poo so I gently removed her and washed off her plastic parts. I decided this was a job too big for me to handle alone and calmly went downstairs to inform Chris of the situation. We tip toed back up the stairs, not sure why we were afraid to wake her when clearly this was going to have to happen soon. As I guided Chris to the mess, I noticed it was a much greater problem. There were other spots of poo surrounding her. Wally had poo on him too. We finally woke her and as she sat up in a pie eyed gaze it became clear that she had enjoyed a solo poo fest. It was in her hair, on her face and completely covering her hands. I had already started running the bath and picked her up but held her at a distance the same way I would before plunking a skunk sprayed cat into a tub. I expected the same result too but she was remarkably calm and still half asleep. I struggled to pull her shirt over her head and after I freed her I scrubbed her entire body for almost 15 minutes to get the dried poo off. Chris in the meantime was a star getting everything in the wash and cleaning the mattress. 1 hour later we were ready to get our squeaky clean babe back into bed where she fell asleep promptly but not before expanding her vocabulary by 1 word: poo-poo.

Running out of Steam

I used to look forward to posting and sharing on this blog. Lately I just am not sure where to start. That first year of life is so full with amazing milestones that reporting is easy! Plus the feelings of being a first time parent are just so intense and accessible. I am not implying that I no longer feel that intensity of parenthood, in fact Chris and I are knocked down over and over again with how much we are in love with Liliana. It is just so much part of our daily grind now that I can't really bask in the newness of it all. She is constantly developing new skills and her personality grows richer every day but I for some reason have lost a desire to write about it here.

What I really want to write about is how badly I want another baby. How my last 2 pregnancy failures still are raw and painful. How I can't see pregnant women on the street without thinking that should be me and wondering if I will ever experience it again. How my heart just sinks every time someone else announces their pregnancy even though I am happy for them.

I also want to write about the stress of our lives on top of all that. How the shitty economy and new laws surrounding the appraisal market have left us struggling to pay our mortgage every month. How we have found ourselves totally upside down in our house and fear daily that we will lose our home. How I am working double time trying to get Chris' appraisal business stimulated but fear it won't work and I have no other ideas in my head if this fails. How despite all this I am strangely happy because I love my family, enjoy my new job and I feel that something good has to come out of all this.

Leaps and Bounds

We are currently experiencing a massive learning spurt. It is freaky how quickly things change at this age! Every time she does something I consider amazing and surely advanced I take a mental note that I must blog about it. Now I can't remember exactly all I wanted to share. Also because they come so fast and furious, changes that had us shocked 3 days ago have become old hat and are shadowed by something greater. I guess it is just an overall "wow she is actually a little person" realization. Very hard to describe unless you see and experience it. She has a sense of humor, she listens to directions, she purposefully makes me laugh. She is awesome.

Liliana makes it very clear when she wants her diaper changed. She will lay down on the ground, sometimes with diaper in hand, and put her legs up in the air. Then she gropes for the velcro tabs keeping her Cruisers in place. It is quite cute but after I noticed a very wet, sagging diaper at the playground a few days back, she made a big show of becoming supine on the sidewalk.

She is really showing off her maternal, care giving instincts with her baby doll and Wally. She diapers both of them (she is quite good at it) and is now rocking baby doll in her arms. Her dexterity is taking off too. It is very easy for her to buckle Wally or Baby Doll into her mini stroller and take them for a walk. Speech is starting to come in tiny spurts. The debate is still on in my head about speech therapy. I am sure I will get a call next week from my case coordinator about what we are going to do.

I can also recognize signs of "two" behavior peeking out. Several seemingly pointless, lay on the floor boneless tantrums a day occur. Luckily they last about 10 seconds. She has also reverted back to a shy, clingy baby when around strangers. She has to be held when she sees people coming and she lays her head on our shoulder and won't let us put her down. I just keep remembering what my brother told me- everything is a phase. I appreciate a certain amount of stranger anxiety but she is being very anti social. She has also developed a hatred toward baths. She used to love splashing around in the tub but now you would think I was bathing her in razor blades. She screams and cries so hard and won't even sit down. She tries to climb out of the tub. I try and get in with her to hold her but she will have none of it. It takes all our physical and mental strength just to wash her hair. These things are so minor though. The joy and fun we are experiencing with her right now is beyond description. We are having so much fun- can't wait to add one more to the mix so Liliana can practice those sweet, caring acts on a real baby!

Posting through text because I can't gain access to wireless in my wonderful Comfort Inn hotel room. Things good with training but being away from Liliana is even harder than I expected. I woke up with a start at 6 this morning in a half sleep state thinking I needed to pick out liliana's outfit. When I realized that I was in a hotel room in Iowa I experienced this strange sense of sadness, lonliness and loss. I am not sure why loss but I was overcome with that emotion. I am still dealing with miscarriage emotions and found out today that my hormone levels are still not at zero. They are at 2. Uggh. This is dragging on too long. So is this post. Not easy to do through text so I will say goodnight now.

I know I know

I owe you all (my five readers) a really good post! But tonight is not the night. I will be in Iowa all week for training so I imagine I will be very reflective AND have the time to post- a perfect recipe. I did want to document the amazing leaps and bounds that occurred just this evening. Liliana said "BYE" not "buh bye" in a baby way but "BYE!" in a very adult, clear, accentuated way! Then, ten minutes later while reading her to bed, I pointed at the baby wearing a diaper. I asked what the baby was wearing (because I am always encouraging her to speak even though I don't expect an answer) and she, as clear as day, said "diaper". Chris and I looked at each other in shock and amazement, high fived each other and then high fived Liliana. She loves to high five and high ten. All that positive reinforcement has got to lead to more words. Which it did because then she identified the baby's eye when asked. Screw the speech therapist. I am calling next week to tell them to close our file.
BYE! More from the town of Muscatine.

Whose your Mama?

Today marks the day that Liliana finally said mama! She may have started a couple of days ago but today it was clear she was referring to moi! Go baby go! I should also add that she is starting to add some other words to her vocabulary but they are all versions of her original word for "ball" which sounds like "bah". That is her word for "bath" and "belle"(the dog next door). "Basketball" is "bah bah bah". She also says "boo boo" in reference to her scab on her ankle and the freckle on my ankle. She clearly likes the letter "b". In typical toddler fashion, "no" is also very popular. Finally, the girls that watch her at the gym daycare are so in love with her. They say she smells like cookies.
Pictures and video of Liliana playing a mean harmonica coming soon...