What are you looking at?

Speaking up for gray

This week I came across a handful of blog posts that turned my blood cold. They were uncomfortable to read and left me squirming in my chair, upset, confused, embarrassed. No longer sure what to think of experiences I made peace with years ago.

Why I Talk About Rape

On being an object, and then not being an object

It should be said.

The rape article was the hardest to get through, but it was a line in Liz's post in her account of a sexual assault that brought me to the computer. A simple sentence, stripped of layers, absent of clever innuendo or metaphors, but it was powerful nonetheless.

I remember that at 17, the idea of waking parents seemed somehow worse than anything.

Let me be clear. I have never been raped. But as a young woman, GOD did that general sentiment ring true for me.

-------

When I was 17, I landed a job at a laid-back mom-and-pop video store in my neighborhood, a job I chased after for an entire year because I loved the idea of getting paid to watch movies, do my homework, and hang out with friends twelve hours a week. The owner put me off until I was a senior in high school because the store had a...shall we say...robust adult section, and I was underage. But I was an ambitious 17-year-old, and I had excellent references, so it was only a matter of time before I was collecting late fees from local enthusiasts for titles like Hein*feld and Wednesday is Hump Day. 

On one of my last nights there before leaving for college, I was closing with "Frank," a middle-aged guy with two kids and a day job as a paralegal. He was normally a pleasure to be around, very helpful and kind - he always gave me a ride when we closed, saving me a ten-minute walk home. On that night, we were talking and laughing as usual, but on this night Frank had a few beers on our shift. I don't know that this would have been discouraged by the owner, exactly, since he was known to have a can of something in plain sight of customers while he balanced the books, but it was a first for Frank, and you could tell he was buzzing. As the night went on, he became looser with his tongue, and he kept saying how nice and pretty I was; next thing I knew, he was approaching me from the back and wrapping his arms around me in a close hug.

I was taken off guard; what the hell did I know about inappropriate? It's not like he was grabbing at the waistband of my pants or even trying to kiss me. And it was over as quickly as it began, so I don't remember how I acted in the moment aside from making some lame joke while sliding out of his arms. He was such a nice guy, after all, and not himself from the beer, and he still had to drive me home. Because of course I let him drive me home.

I reflect on this now, and I'm angry. I'm angry that a grown man thought it was okay to throw a few back on the clock in the presence of a teenager who assumed she could get through a four-hour shift without having someone's hands on her hips. But I'm also so sad for the girl who felt that she had to act like it didn't happen, who felt obligated to get in the car with him, EVEN THOUGH HE'D BEEN DRINKING, because she didn't want to be rude, and who made light of the whole thing when he called to apologize the next day. (See? Such a nice guy.)

Sometimes, Breain, it's okay to be impolite.

-------

When I was 20, I had sex when I didn't want to. He was older, and I was intoxicated with the attention. In previous conversations, I'd told him I wanted to wait, but in the moment, I never said no. When it was over, I didn't know how to react except roll over and cry. All he could do was apologize for misinterpreting my body language. I could see that he meant it. I knew he felt terrible.

If I would have pushed him off me, said WAIT, STOP, I'M NOT READY YET, I know he would've done it. But we'd been fooling around night after night for almost two weeks, and I sure did like him a lot, and I didn't know how to switch gears. How do you talk through such an intense situation when you're physically trying to recover from it - literally catching your breath, pulling an arm through a shirt sleeve, waiting for your half-asleep eyes to adjust to the light? And that's the problem, I guess. I was more concerned with the awkwardness of the after, with the proverbial waking of the parents, than the hurt I would feel from the during.

He and I went on to date for almost a year, and nothing about our relationship was coersive or forced or any of the adjectives typically used to describe a violent situation. He is even someone I call a friend today. Looking at that one night, though, from the perspective of a grown woman with a daughter of her own, I wish I hadn't cared about the after. I wish I'd been strong enough to say no. 

-------

The posts I linked to at the start of this entry describe ecounters twenty times more heartbreaking and terrifying than mine. But I think that's what drew me to share. It's so easy to write off those experiences we believe to be less than someone else's. But not every incident is that black and white, and there is equal value in talking about the gray. I don't want the women in my life thinking they ever have to tolerate the less than. And I hope with all my heart Kara never gives a thought to waking me up.

Happy is as happy does

After posting two entries' worth of pep talks, I wanted to share some of the ways I'm trying to bring more joy and perspective to my day-to-day.

This is especially important right now because Luke and I are too busy paying down debt to account for anything grandiose - we've already scrapped our plan to upgrade the family car, for example. Anything we take on over the next year has to be free or non-commital (i.e., pay-per-use or of the "cancel at any time" variety). So, really, free. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Journaling

l adopted this habit over the summer, inspired by Gretchen Rubin's stab at a gratitude journal. Her original intent was to write daily, but after finding it to be more of a chore than a stress reliever, she switched to writing one sentence a day about those in-the-weeds moments that tug at your heart but are likely to fade over time. Learning from her experience, I started my own journal as a combination of these ideas  - I focus on what I'm thankful for, but I don't write every day, and I don't limit myself to any kind of subject matter. Sometimes I've got pages of bullet points, and sometimes just a few lines. Sometimes they're big picture, like having enough money to pay our bills, and or they're as simple as the name of Kara's imaginary dog Bingo Benjamin (Bingo from Ladybug Girl, Benjamin from Liam's middle name; isn't that something you'd want to remember?). I don't want to lose these moments any more than Rubin does, and I can think of no better way to frame them than through a lense of gratitude. Plus, the fewer parameters I set for myself, the better my chances of keeping this up.

I do, however, have one restiction: I'm not allowed to pat myself on the back for house cleaning. It's important to me to keep up on things as best I can, especially now that Liam is frog-hopping everywhere and crams whatever he can into his pie hole, but I don't want to delude myself into thinking the ninety minutes I spend scrubbing down bathrooms is equal to an afternoon playing Memory with the kids. That's not what I want to reflect on when I go through these books five years or even one month from now. Not every "good" thing needs to be documented.

Quotationing, Information Collecting

Rubin had another reason for starting a notebook that I found really appealing. She talked about her love for the physical act of note taking and how journaling provided an outlet for this. She also talked about writing for its own sake and forgetting about results. As in, it's okay to collect information and not know what to do with it. It's okay to jot down ideas just because it's fun.

I, too, love note taking, and anyone who's known me longer than five minutes knows I have a pen in my hand almost all the time, just waiting to desecrate a blank piece of paper with my scribbles. (Remember my yada yada yada banner?) So I started a second notebook to serve as a random repository of all things Frema. I've written down books I want to read, movies I want to see, plot points for a TLF part three (when I thought about tackling National Novel Writing Month in November), and quotations. Pages and pages of them, mainly because I get Rubin's "Moment of Happiness" daily quotation delivered to my e-mail and ninety-five percent of them are ones I don't want to forget. Here's a gem from last week:

Also, no, I'm not being compensated for my repeated references to The Happiness Project, why do you ask? I've only cited it eighty million times in this entry.

Reading

One of my goals this year is to read more. Pretty lofty, right? And yet, there it is. Books have always been a huge part of my life, but with all the new demands on my time these last few years, I've been lazy in making them a priority. Part of the problem is that I think I need more time to keep up with reading than I actually do - i.e., I don't have to set aside an hour before bed to wind down with the Dalai Lama. I can grab twenty minutes at lunch or five on the john. (TMI?) All of those minutes will eventually lead to one finished book.

I'm not aiming to hit a specific number of books because that seems overwhelming, but I know that I need some measure of accountability to help me stay on task. Thus, my bookroll was born. Here's to tearing that bad boy UP come December.

I'm also trying to limit the amount of guilty-pleasure reading I do - less Soaps in Depth, fewer sensationalist blog posts that were clearly written to drive traffic or stir controversy. Half these sites aren't any different from the grocery store mags that recycle headlines every 18 months. This is much harder to do, because junk reading requires such little effort, but I'm trying to remind myself these things don't bring me happiness in the long run. I'm ready for something new.

Blogging

In case you haven't noticed, I've been trying to return to a regular posting schedule - as in, posting at all, period. This is mainly because I've always enjoyed working through my thoughts and feelings online, and I've missed being an active member of this community. I won't lie, though; I'm also still trying to figure out if this space can pave the way for other freelancing opportunities. Whether it can or not remains to be seen, but even if it doesn't, I'm having a great time, and that's all that matters in the end.

Churching

After almost a year-long hiatus, Luke and I are back in the habit of attending church, and we are both so happy about it. When Kara was a baby, we were going to an Episcopal church we liked a whole lot, but then we bought our house and moved to a new part of town where the Anglican congregation was wonderfully kind and generous but essentially in preacher limbo, having gone without a full-time pastor for almost two years, and it showed. When a pastor did finally sign on, despite her being a lovely person, Luke and I weren't as happy with the sermons or the way Sunday worship was organized, so we decided to explore other options. Since Kara and Nathan were already attending preschool programs at the local Methodist church, which is known for being super active in our community, we went to a service late last fall and have kept going ever since.

This is the first time in my adult life I'm continually excited and inspired by going to church. As someone who grew up in a conservative Catholic family with extended relatives who weren't exactly tolerarant of other faiths, even Christian ones, it's been an eye-opening process to evolve from Guilt-Ridden Catholic to Nervous Catholic Light to Full-Blown Protestant. The nice thing is that all three traditions? PRAY TO THE SAME JESUS. It's true! Plus, I can let the most fulfilling parts of each experience inform my overall relationship with God and faith. I never could have predicted the spiritual journey in store for me back when I first started debating my religion, but I couldn't be more thankful for where it's led me and my family.

Less Yelling

I constantly tell people it's a good thing tLuke is the at-home parent in our marriage because my level of patience fluctuates wildly when it comes to the kids. I'm making an active effort to find other ways to handle these situations, because when I do, the results are worth their weight in gold. I just need to do it more.

Sleeping, Exercising

Actually, these are the only ones I'm NOT doing yet, but I want to be. I'm sold on the why when it comes to both; it's the how that holds me back. How can I go to bed when there are pages to read / journals to update / blog posts to write? On the flip side, how can I get up to Shred when I was up until two o'clock reading, journaling, and blogging? You see where this is going. In the end, I need to accept that I can't do eight things in a day, pick the two or three that need the most attention in that moment, and hop to it.

-------

I am trying so hard to focus on improving the "little" parts of my day, because really, isn't that the bulk of our lives? It's not often we're keeled over by outlandish moments of grandeur; I need to enjoy each day for what it is and explore happiness in my current set of conditions, instead of hitting the pause button until all obstacles have been overcome. I've made significant progress in this area in the last year and a half, but I can always do better.

How are you doing on your 2012 goals and resolutions? What are you doing to keep happiness at the forefront of your life? I would love to hear from you.

Thirty-two

Yesterday was my birthday. I know this because Kara charged into the bathroom while I was getting dressed and cried out, "Mom, it's your birthday! We got you presents! Come and check it out!" My Facebook wall exploded with posts of happy thoughts, well wishes, and proclamations of "The Year of Bree," and flowers and bagels welcomed me when I came into work. I am blessed to be another year older, surrounded by all this love. I am blessed to be thirty-two.

In a lot of ways, I feel thirty-two. Luke and I will have been together eleven years this year, married six in May, and we have far surpassed the honeymoon stage of our relationship, now challenged with keeping things fresh amidst regurgitated formula, clogged toilets, and stretch marks. I have kids who wear UNDERPANTS and make grand statements about going to KINDERGARTEN next year (hear that, Kara? NEXT YEAR) and who remind me not to talk with food in my mouth. I've spent late nights and long hours combing through finances at the dining room table to make room for insurance premiums, association fees, and preschool - and cried when I couldn't do it. On those nights I think about my own parents with tremendous respect and empathy for the decisions they had to make to raise five children. I never feel more adult than when I'm sitting at that table.

I've walked away from relationships, and I've been dumped. I've feared for my job and my health. I've lost faith in childhood heroes. I've taken the wrong side. I've eaten plenty of crow. 

And yet, at the same time, I'm still a bright-eyed, virgin fifteen, waiting earnestly to come into my own, wondering if I'll ever nail the part of a mature, sophisticated woman. Last month Luke and I took the kids to a Christmas program in town, and we bumped into the mom of one of Kara's friends from preschool. Her perfectly applied make-up and posh handbag put my clearance fleece from Target and ratty Sauconys to shame. How can we possibly have children the same age when clearly I'm late for P.E.?

Mistakes and petty hang-ups aside, my goal for thirty-two is to be more intentional in my thoughts and actions every day, because it's hitting me like a ton of bricks that this one life - this one day, really - is all I have. If I want memories I'm proud of, if I want change, if I want to make a tangible, meaningful impact on this world - it is up to me.

Thirty-two, bring it on.

We get by with a little help

While riding the gallbladder rollercoaster, I had a "come to Jesus" moment about how much people need each other during times of crisis and how difficult it can be to offer and accept help.

When I first saw the OB on the last Monday of November, it was after six hours of intense pain that had me crying harder than Sally Field after Shelby's funeral in Steel Magnolias. And yet? I drove myself to the appointment. Later that night, after five hours of lying on a gurney half-asleep from narcotic medication in the E.R., I proceeded to drive myself home. The painkillers were out of my system by then, so it's not like I was driving under the influence, but I was struggling to concentrate on the road. On the expressway. In the rain. The minute I reached my driveway, I sent fervent prayers of thanks to God that I made it home in one piece.

It did not have to be this way.

First of all, I was surrounded by coworkers who are kind and caring and would have been more than willing to take me to the hospital. Second, once I was at the E.R., I was in constant contact with Luke and my boss the whole time, and both of them would have dropped everything to be with me and make sure I was okay. But in typical oldest-child people-pleaser fashion, I didn't want to bother anyone. In the moment, I couldn't justify asking Luke to pack up three children under the age of four at two hours before midnight and subject them to a ninety-minute screamfest "just" to bring me home. I should've gone with Plan B - crashing at my boss's house the next town over, just fifteen minutes from the hospital - but I didn't want to impose or come off as a drama queen, even though I knew her offer was genuine. I could walk, yes? I wasn't seeing double? So long as I was able to do those two things, I figured I should take care of myself.

I can see now this was wrong of me, especially since it wasn't true. I didn't have to take care of myself. When someone reaches out to lighten your burden, let them. Don't make the decision for them or overshadow their kindness with your own trivial hang-ups. Isabel wrote a great post about this last year that has stayed with me ever since. Even Jesus had help carrying the Cross.

As it turned out, there would be another opportunity to accept help graciously, sooner than I expected. Not twenty-four hours later, I could barely sit up in bed, let alone drive a car. Luke and I had to admit that our family couldn't handle this alone.

The grandest gesture came from Luke's parents, who stayed at our house three to four days at a time two weeks in a row to lend a hand with the kids. Words cannot express how grateful we are for their willingness to put their own lives on hold and place our needs first, without any advance notice, and for spinning it in such a way that you could almost trick yourself into thinking they had the better end of the deal. ("We enjoy spending so much time with our grandchildren!") We received an outpouring of love and concern from other friends and family through phone calls, texts, e-mails, and Facebook, but it was Grandma and Grandpa D who proactively came to the rescue in the area we needed it most, even when it couldn't have been convenient for them.

Their act of selflessness has reminded me that I've not been nearly as generous with my own time. It's easy to make abstract statements when life is all sunshine and rainbows; it's much harder to follow through when hard times present themselves and a loved one calls your bluff. When you learn on a random Monday that your mother's favorite aunt, your late grandmother's sister, has passed away and the viewing is on Thursday, for example.

My mother didn't ask me to attend the service; I think she told me NOT to come, actually, since I was in my second trimester with Liam, and sick all the time, and Luke had a cold himself, and the funeral home was four hours away, and we didn't have the money for gas. She knew all that and didn't want us over extending ourselves. But I felt drawn to be there for her just the same and told her on Tuesday we would make every effort to come.

After a lot - A LOT - of discussion, though, and proposing a million different scenarios, Luke and I decided that we just couldn't do it. We were too sick. We were too broke.

I remember calling my mom to tell her about the change in plans and feeling like an absolute tool for letting her down, even though she couldn't have been more understanding. I felt terrible for not making her pain more of a priority. I asked myself again and again if my short-term issues trumped the long-term gravity of the situation, and what I would think of my response five years down the road.

I don't hold this up as an example of a time where I should have made a different choice - right now I don't regret the decision we made - but it paints a very real picture of the factors people take into account when responding to requests for support (direct or perceived), and how easy it can be to fall short. I acknowledge this was a perfect storm of circumstances where I happened to be physically,mentally, and financially tapped out, and that in the last few years I have busted ass to be present for some life-changing events for family and friends. Births. Deaths. Miscarriages. Missing siblings. Weddings. Baptisms. Birthdays. 

But there are also plenty of instances where I wish I would've stopped fretting over some perceived obstacle that seemed monumental at the time but in reality was more of a discomfort and just been there.

I hope to be there a lot more in 2012.

A year ago, and a lifetime

Liam turned seven weeks old a few days ago, and when I compare where we are now to where we were at this point with Kara and Nathan, I almost can't believe it.

For one thing, of my three maternity leaves, this one has definitely been the most active. I've brought the baby to work and met coworkers for coffee and lunch twice; scheduled several playdates with friends; went with the entire family to our local Children's Museum (and finally secured our membership); took the toddlers to a splash park and numerous trips to Target; and saw the doctor (OB/GYN, dentist, and pediatrician) more times than I care to count. We drove to Chicago and northwest Indiana last weekend to attend my nephew's third birthday party and spent two nights away from home, Liam just six weeks old - the earliest we've ever traveled with a newborn.

Walking with Grandpa

Cuddling with Auntie Samantha

Mugging with Uncle Geo

Another first: exercise. I didn't work out at all after Kara, and Nathan was five or six months old when I welcomed The 30-Day Shred into my life, but this time around, I started exercising in the same week I was cleared to do so. Two Jillian Michaels DVDs and a couple of easy runs totaling about a mile each. There were times during each of the videos where I found myself flopping around like a fish, and I think a snail passed me on the trail yesterday, but still. For my physical health and mental sanity, I am making fitness a priority, and DAMN, does it feel good.

It helps that Liam is such an easy-going baby, save for some recent episodes of evening-time grumpiness. He is cooing and smiling and most often content so long as he is snuggled in your arms, which I am happy to oblige, even though my floors need mopping and phone calls need returning and hey, the checkbook isn't going to balance itself. I start back at the office the Wednesday after Labor Day (on a somewhat reduced schedule, thank goodness), and that familiar Oh my God, I'm going back to work dread has already started creeping in, reminding me how important it is to savor this time while I still can.

Last August, I felt trapped in my own life. I loved my husband and children beyond measure, but our future was blurred, seemingly without direction, and I had no idea how to best move us forward. I missed my extended family something fierce and cursed the miles between us. My writing goals were drastically changing shape but equally undefined. I struggled to make peace with not having any more babies, and Luke and I were in the worst financial shape of our marriage, having first fallen into the trap of paying everything by credit card, then depending on quarterly bonuses to catch up on bills, and fnally spending more each month than we brought in.

I became insanely jealous of those who seemed to have it all figured out, and I couldn't stop comparing our situation to others with similar demographics. I found myself asking, "Is this all there is for us? Is this the best that life can be?"

Thankfully, the answer was a resounding NO. 

I still don't have all the answers, and our path isn't completely clear, but for the first time in years, I can finally see its shape.

What a difference a year makes.

Tuck it in, tuck it in *(belly, not baby)

Six weeks and six days ago, I had a baby. Here he is.

The Beach Boys and hottie John Stamos aren't the only ones who want to go to Kokomo.

At six weeks and six days, Liam:

• Has been diagnosed with and declared healed from umbilical granuloma
• Indulges in self-torture by way of pulling his own hair
• Screams after said hair pulling but requires Momma to free him from his iron grip
• Smiles when you plant puckery kisses on his mouth
• Is drawn to light, especially when it's shining through half-closed blinds
• Cannot maintain a dry diaper for longer than eight seconds
• Is settling into a feeding pattern of four ounces every three hours and is already showing signs that he's ready to ditch his middle-of-the-night feeding
• Spent a half-hour awake and smiling in his cradle swing today. THIS IS HUGE.
• Has perfected several facial expressions, including Zoolander's Blue Steel
• Is already losing his hair. Maybe, son, it's because YOU'RE PULLING IT OUT BY THE ROOTS
• Will probably grow up answering to Luke's and my primary nickname of choice: Nathan

Harbored behind those bright blue eyes and chipmunk cheeks is an ocean of wisdom.

Meanwhile, this is me.

At six weeks and six days postpartum, I:

• Drink a lot of coffee, as evidenced by ninety percent of my Facebook posts
• Call milk and cookies my evening poison
• Sit almost five pounds under my pre-pregnancy weight, despite my brand loyalty to all things Oreo
• Lay claim to one (1) infection-free c-section scar
• Have hosted a lengthy visit from the nefarious Aunt Flo
• Heard the phrases "tummy tuck" and "plastic surgeon" uttered by my OB/GYN during last Thursday's postpartum follow-up
• Feel super awesome about this!

Let me explain.

Early on in my second trimester, I was diagnosed with having diastasis recti - the separation of your abdominal muscles into left and right halves. It felt like a pretty big deal at the time, as I cried out in pain whenever someone so much as brushed against my stomach, but by my third trimester, the discomfort was gone and I assumed I was out of the woods. Prior to my c-section, though, my OB/GYN promised to be mindful of my abdominal area and do what she could to tighten things up during surgery, if such tightening were necessary.

The first few weeks after Liam was born, I was in such hell from my c-section and then so focused on recovering that I didn't think much about the diastasis recti, until a fellow Hoosier blogger posted about her own dance with the condition. I wasn't feeling any of the pain Casey talked about, but my stomach protruded in a similar fashion, albeit saddled with eight extra tons of Frema flab. Now, I've never rocked a six-pack, or even a one-pack for that matter, but maybe at least some of the flab could be attributed to this? I decided to ask my doctor about it at my six-week check-up.

The exam itself went great. Incision healed, vitals normal, birth control taken care of (thanks again, honey), physical activity approved.... All good news. Then I brought up the diastasis recti and waited to hear the recommended course of treatment. Ab splint? Physical therapy? Whatever it is, I said, I would do it. Bring it on.

My OB/GYN was silent as she rested her hand slightly below my breasts.

(Get your mind out of the gutter, you.)

"There's still a slight separation I can feel right here," she explained, her hand still in place, "but most of what we're dealing with is stretched out skin."

Hmm. Not exactly the verdict I was hoping for. "Since I'm cleared for exercise, would that do anything for me?" 

She tilted her head as she considered the question. "It could help some, but typically excess skin, once it's there, doesn't go away without surgery."

Enter abdominoplasty/tummy tuck conversation here.

Before you start railing on my doctor, please note that she did not in any way, shape, or form suggest that I need to have this done. If you had been a fly on the wall for my entire check-up, it would have been obvious to you that the thought of carrying around this amount of skin for the rest of my life made me more than a little uncomfortable. She also went on to say that during my c-section, she added some extra stitches to tighten things up around my abdomen and pointed out that internally I am not completely healed. "It's too soon to make any decisions right now. See what you can do with diet and exercise, and after some time, if it still bothers you, I can give you a referral for a plastic surgeon, and you can schedule a consult to get more information."

So, there you have it. One more bullet point to add to my list of "Things I Used to Scoff At Before I Became a Mother."

Seriously, though, I'm not sure what to think. On one hand, even before having kids, I've always had a bit of a belly overhang that kept me from effortlessly shopping for clothes, being naked in front of other people, and having sex without feeling at least a little self-conscious. After Kara, that bit of overhang turned into a tire gut, and after Nathan, graduated to the dreaded "mother's apron" (a term I just today learned from Shape of a Mother, thank you very much), and now? Well, let's just say even the worst "Before" pictures on Wikipedia's abdominoplasty page don't do my midsection justice. Yet, all this time, I've never before entertained the idea of having it surgically removed. Girl power, love yourself and all that jazz. And now as a parent, in particular a mom to a daughter, I worry about the kind of message I would be sending about self-love and acceptance by submitting myself to unnecessary plastic surgery. How can I encourage Kara to embrace who she is, AS she is, if I'm having my own imperfections hacked off with a scalpel?

On the other hand, it's not as if I'm in danger of becoming the next Heidi Montag. Overall I quite like my body and thank God for all it's been able to do, including but not limited to carrying three healthy babies and running a half-marathon. I have no problems walking out of the house sans make-up, even to work, and I can take or leave coloring my hair. Getting a tummy tuck would be a specific answer to a specific problem that's frustrated me for years. And unless I changed my zero-tolerance policy on bikinis and tube tops, the only person besides me who would even notice the end result is Luke. Which is fine by me, since I would only be doing it for me.

As for Kara and the boys? Well, I may be relatively new to parenting, but even I know enough to appreciate that this one choice wouldn't negate years of consistent teaching and role modeling when it comes to loving yourself as you are. Plus, while I believe in the importance of self-acceptance, I also support making your own happiness and not closing a door out of fear for what others might think. 

On the other OTHER hand, cosmetic surgery is not something to be taken lightly, and after three c-sections, going under the knife a fourth time to basically improve my self-esteem hardly sounds appealing. Also, I'm nowhere near convinced that the benefits outweigh the risks when I've barely scratched the surface when it comes to improving my commitment to physical fitness. I may never eliminate my gut entirely that way, but who knows? I might come close, all on my own, and that may be enough.

Also, dudes. Tummy tucks? Not cheap.  Even if I was resigned to having it done, we couldn't afford it until Luke was back at work, which could be another five years away, and even then I'd have a hard time justifying the cost when the money could be deposited into one of our retirement accounts. 

Maybe one day Liam would take pity on me and HE'D pay for the surgery. We could call it the Mother's Day gift that keeps on giving. You think?

Luckily, this is not a decision I have to make (or can afford to make!) tomorrow. What I can do is run over to Wal-Mart, pick up a new Jillian Michaels video, and draw inspiration from one Marty McFly: "If you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything."

Now for what YOU can do: Ripped in 30 or 6-Week Six-Pack?

* ETA because I didn't even think about the title indicating that this might be a sleep entry.

This is what four weeks postpartum looks like

Four weeks ago yesterday, at 9:48 a.m., the last child I will ever carry (that is, unless Luke is fatally injured, I meet Joshua Jackson, and he requires biological offspring in lieu of a marriage prenup) was strategically evicted from my uterus. Only it doesn't feel like four weeks ago, more like an eternity, because it's already that difficult to imagine what life was like without Liam.

Fortunately and unfortunately, the biggest hurdle to overcome thus far has been my own physical recovery. There's some persistent fluid build-up causing tenderness in my abdominal area, tenderness that until a few days ago inspired mild nausea whenever anyone came into contact with my stomach, and my tire gut contributed to bacterial and fungal infections around my incision that interfered with the normal healing process. Apparently, all that extra skin (sexy!) worked against me when it came to keeping the scar dry, turning the whole area into a red, blotchy mess. I've been to my ob/gyn's office twice since coming home from the hospital, with another follow-up slated for today. 

Luckily, an elaborate ritual involving cotton balls, hydrogen peroxide, MY FRIGGING BLOW DRYER, anti-fungal powder, and hospital-grade gauze applied twice a day for the last week has resulted in me finally feeling like myself again, my personal best, even, since before the onset of my first trimester morning sickness. I'm feeling so good, in fact, that I also have two full days of meds-free living under my belt, with not so much as an over-the-counter pill in my system. Hooray for me, and also, IT'S ABOUT DAMN TIME.

It's only because I'm doing so well I can admit that in those first few weeks, all that unresolved pain paired with the traditional complications from this type of surgery seriously impacted my ability to function. What I said about mornings being a cherished part of my routine in my last post was true, but it's also true that they were the hardest part of my day. I posted a lot of jokes on Facebook about my A.M. coffee intake, but truly, I was no good to anyone until half-way to lunch, even though Luke and I shared night duty for Liam, and even though Luke continued to get up with Kara and Nathan just as he does when I'm working so that I could go back to bed for another couple of hours while Liam dozed after his first morning bottle.

For so long I was embarrassed about this, would apologize to my husband for having to pick up my slack, and felt like less of a mother because I couldn't push through my own issues to be fully present for ALL the members of my family. It wasn't like I was completely detached from daily living, but oftentimes even simple tasks such as giving a bath or unloading the dishwasher put too much strain on my body, so that I couldn't do more than a couple of things like that in a 24-hour time span. Now that my infections are just about healed and my overall pain has been downgraded to annoying at best, all I can do is recognize that I'm not Wonder Woman, acknowledge that I needed help - a lot of help - to get back on my feet, and thank my lucky stars Luke was around to give it to me. His being the at-home parent in our relationship allowed Kara and Nathan to get the care and attention they needed and enabled me to focus on bonding with Liam and getting better. I'm not proud of how often I fell short, but I can forgive myself for it and move on.

And yet, even in those early weeks when I would cry over not being the wife and mother I wanted to be, I was still in much better shape mentally then I was after having Kara, as I learned how to integrate the role of mother into my life, and after Nathan, born not fourteen months after his sister, who was still just a baby herself. This time around, there was no veil of self-doubt, no wavering in making decisions that were best for my family. I was still able to embrace each day for the gift it was, laugh through the building of Lego towers with my toddlers, and appreciate every hour of snuggle time with my new baby.

I keep comparing this maternity leave to Kara's and Nathan's, and each time, I realize how far I've come since then. This is the first time I've been able to bring home a child and hold onto the best, most confident parts of myself. I am so grateful for that. This focus and sense of peace I've discovered since Liam was born, it's such a blessing.

Speaking of Liam, he continues to knock our socks off. He's finally "woken up," so to speak, and joined the world of the living in that he isn't sleeping twenty hours a day anymore; he has fussy periods in the morning and evening hours, but they are not unbearable or even a surprise, given his age. At last Friday's weight check, he clocked in at a whopping 10 pounds and 3 ounces. Two days later, he rolled over for the first time. He enchants us all with gassy smiles, wide eyes, and pursed lips. Poor thing still has traces of Kara's and Nathan's cold, and it appears that we are dealing with a clogged tear duct in his right eye, but again, nothing unbearable. I can't believe how lucky we are to have him, or that I owe his existence to a bottle of red from Walmart. Miracles, though, aren't picky.

As for me, I am good, so very, very good, if not a little stir-crazy from mostly hanging out indoors, partly due to the above-mentioned ailments and partly from the Midwest's record-breaking humidity. I've generated a few unexpected bills since my leave began (damn crown, breaking off two days after coming home from the hospital!), and since we had to deplete a lot of our savings before Liam's birth for a variety of reasons, I have decided to return to work two weeks early so we can avoid financial strain. This puts me back in the office the week of Labor Day instead of late September. 

In the past, the very thought of this scenario would have reduced me to a weepy puddle of WAAAH, but I'm okay with this decision, too. I'm not wishing my time away with my family by any means, but there is a piece of me that's eager to embrace our new normal, and that new normal includes me going back to work. Plus, there is so much for us to do now that Liam is here; prepare to put our house on the market, for one. Pay off our credit card debt (and new array of medical bills) once and for all. Start tending to my professional network again. In other words, make our dreams come true. 

I am so ready.

Filled to the brim

These days, mornings are a cherished part of my routine. For one thing, there is coffee, something I didn't miss much during my pregnancy but has quickly become an invaluable commodity since Liam's birth. Second, I'm fresh from at least a few consecutive hours of sleep. And finally, there are all the positive feelings associated with the promise of a new day.

I'm very aware that I could jinx our good fortune by speaking this out loud, but Liam continues to be the most easy-going newborn Luke and I have parented. Despite all the pictures we have of his bright baby blues, the boy sleeps ALL. THE. TIME., usually only waking to eat or poop or make funny faces at his brother and sister. He is especially fond of sleeping on my chest, so that's how I spend a lot of my day. It is exactly what I wanted for this maternity leave, this unfettered snuggle time with him.

Everything else is okay. C-section recovery is still slow; I run out of happy pills today, and I have to figure out if I want to call my OB for more or figure out a lesser way to handle my pain. I never came to this point with Kara or Nathan - possibly needing more drugs than originally prescribed - so I can only assume opening up a twice-healed abdominal scar one last time would of course produce some unanticipated physical effects.

It doesn't help that I've been on my feet more this time around, but with two toddlers craving activity and attention from a mother who is now home 24/7, sometimes there isn't a choice. I'm so excited for us to start having our adventures, and it already feels like time is flying by so fast, but Luke keeps reminding me there are many good days ahead of us and that I'm not doing myself any favors by taking shortcuts around my recovery. Sound advice, but hard to follow nonetheless.

Here is my last belly shot with Liam from June 28, at the start of week 39, twenty-four hours before Baby Day. Already, it feels like this shot was taken forever ago, and that Liam's been with us for so much longer than one day shy of two weeks. Luke and I were talking last night about how we each feel differently, now being parents to three children, but it's hard to articulate why. For me, there is a feeling of completeness I've never known before, a confidence that I am on the right path, and a sense of peace in knowing that all the right puzzle pieces are finally in place. Liam's arrival has also increased my capacity to love all the members of my sweet little family, as well as my desire to do right by them, and myself.

I don't know what the future holds for us, but I'm eager to take it all on. Nothing feels impossible.

The big 3-0 and musings on the working mother balance

Folks, we have officially entered single-digit territory - no more than nine weeks until we bring Baby Brother home. My word.

 

I will shoot daggers at anyone who might dare utter this to me, but at 30 weeks, even I have to admit that I'm looking large and in charge (and also in need of a haircut; THAT I hope to remedy next week). Sitting both children on my lap for storytime is damn near impossible, and several items of maternity clothing are no longer fit for public display, especially button-up shirts, which mistakenly give the impression that this child is going to burst through my uterus Incredible Hulk style. Thankfully, I have some things to tide me over courtesy of my book club friends until my sister delivers an entire bin of looser-fitting summer clothes late next month, because the goal is still to spend as little money in this area as possible. (To Katy: I get compliments on this top everytime I wear it, and your patterned black skirt, too.)

Despite the iron supplement I'm taking to address my anemia, I wear out so easily these days, and if there is ever an opportunity to nap on the weekends, I jump on it immediately. Unfortunately, now that we're inching into the final weeks, those opportunities are few and far between. Last weekend was all about The Great Bedroom Merge, and the weekend before that I FINALLY started on Nathan's baby book. Our current goals are to focus on preparing Baby Brother's room and addressing minor touch-ups and eyesores throughout the rest of the house. I've also been busy at work, training my coworkers to handle various projects and to-dos while I'm on maternity leave for 12 weeks.

The closer we get to the big day, the more apprehensive I feel about making it through those early months with a new baby. As a mother of toddlers, I have no doubts about their attachment to me or their understanding of my love for them. This knowledge has allowed me to grant myself permission to strike a manageable balance between my roles as mother, wife, working professional, and individual who continues to exist alongside (and sometimes independently of) all of those identities. In my day-to-day, that balance looks something like this:

I do not bring work home. I will arrive at the office early, or I will stay late, but aside from regularly checking e-mail on my smartphone, work stuff stays at work. It is much easier to stay put until the job is done than it is to stop my train of thought, pack up my laptop, get through dinner, clean-up, and bedtime, and THEN try to pick up where I left off. Not only am I easily distracted at home and get little accomplished whether the kids are awake or not, I also feel cheated out of quality time with Luke. So if coming home late for dinner once in a while helps me to be a more attentive wife (and really, a better employee), than that is what I will do.

Dinner clean-up is done after dinner, not after bedtime. I fought this for such a long time in the beginning, because I felt like those precious minutes before the bedtime routine begins should be spent on the living room floor playing with my kids, not at the kitchen sink washing dishes. So I used to let everything sit until after they were asleep; however, Kara and Nathan were not made from the early-to-bed cloth, so often I wouldn't be arriving downstairs until well after nine o'clock, which meant it could get as late as ten before my "real" evening officially began. This made for a crabby Frema and, once again, a neglected husband, who by this point was in dire need of adult interaction. Finally, I realized that it wasn't the end of the world to listen to the kids laugh and rough around with their father while I puttered around in the kitchen. There are some exceptions to this; on those days where I do come home late, for example, Luke is usually quick to shoo me into the living room while he takes on kitchen detail, and lately he's been making things even easier by wiping out the pre-dinner dishes before he starts cooking. Especially because of this last thing, I am often able to do both.

(Have I told you lately how wonderful my husband is? Because truly, he is so wonderful.)

I do not miss bedtime. This isn't an absolute, of course; sometimes there are evening work functions (though none during this pregnancy so far), Luke and I have splurged on date nights if we are in the vicinity of grandparents or can afford to hire our sitter, and for a few months in the fall I attended a monthly book club gathering on the other side of the city, but overall my general rule is to be present for Kara and Nathan's bedtime. Sometimes it's frustrating if the kids are acting up, and sometimes it's inconvenient, like last summer when I was constantly late for my weekly run with Jenn, but overall it's worth it to consistently be there for bathtime, lights out, and everything in between. I revel in holding them close and sniffing their freshly shampooed heads while reading them stories. It means a lot to me to be able to kiss their cheeks and tuck them in. So I make it a priority.

I do not volunteer. This one I'm not proud of, and it's another reality I fought for a long time, but in the end, it is what it is. I was a member of my college's alumni association for about five years, and I loved doing it, but the distance between Indianapolis and Rensselaer made traveling for quarterly meetings and participating in campus events highly undesirable, especially when I already spend enough time away from home. So in 2009, I sadly turned in my resignation. My employer is great about allowing time off during the work week to participate in volunteer activities, and on and off for a couple of years I was involved in a grade-school reading program for an hour a week, but once I had kids, even that one hour away from my desk was enough to throw off my entire day, so at the end of the 2010 school year, I told the program director that I wouldn't be signing up again. Last fall, my desire to reach beyond myself grew again, and I looked into donating my time at a local women's and children's shelter, possibly on the weekends. Then I got pregnant again, and then I got sick, and now the recommendation letters I solicited are collecting dust in my mail basket, and I'm at the point where I have to admit that now is not the time to throw myself into extracurricular activities that take me away from my family, no matter how worthy the cause. That said, Luke and I recently began going to church again, a church right here in town, and we sometimes talk about looking into their soup kitchen or Bible study classes or something to that effect. So it's not like I'm swearing off do-gooding or charitable works completely, but I have realized my limits, and I have to respect them.

All of that to say - almost three and a half years into this parenthood thing, and I have finally figured out what works for me and my family. And we're about to turn all of that on its head.

Because for me, as a working mother, when I have a baby and then reach the point where I have to go back to work, I'm NOT as secure in our attachment like I am when they're older, so everything feels like it's up for grabs. You can talk to a toddler about things like having to miss dinner and they understand. That is not the case with a baby. So my big-picture focus changes from maintaining balance to simply being there as much as I can.

What this translates into on a micro level: It's hard enough being away for an average work day when they're so little that the last thing I want to do is sit at my desk even one minute after five, even if the alternative is nodding off at my laptop at ten. And when I'm dividing my attention among three children, why would I concern myself with dishes when I could be doling out hugs and kisses? On top of all that, Luke and I have not wavered on our plans to put the house on the market next year, and whether it takes a month or a year to sell, preparing for the next stage of our lives will require me to start using and building on my professional network, and part of that will entail opening myself up to extracurricular programs and events, whether it's the right time or not.

I think about all of this, toss in a few random worries about nursing (yes, I have decided to try again), and my brain threatens to explode.

Then I remind myself to breathe and not get so caught up in the future. I remember that fortunately, another reality is that Luke and I are not brand spanking new parents anymore, and we HAVE figured out a system that works for us; and while there will be an initial period of deviation from that, eventually the dust will settle, and we'll embrace a familiar version of normal once again, even if it's not identical to what we had before. Until then, I will have to grant myself permission to take it one day at a time.

So, to sum up: I am 30 weeks pregnant. I am a tad worried about managing life with a third baby. But I'm also more seasoned now than I was with the first two. Plus, my husband rocks. It will be okay.

Be happy

Confession: I am a terrible book club member.

I fully embrace the concept of reading materials that fall outside my radar and that I would otherwise never be exposed to. Even more than that, I love getting together with folks who are reading these same books in order to generate thoughts and ideas about characters, plot, and overall meaning.

What is NOT working out for me, however, is actually reading the damn things.

While part of this can be attributed to pregnancy fatigue and its accompanying short attention span, I think the bigger issue is that it's difficult for me to push through books I personally wouldn't have selected for no other reason than to meet a deadline. The gals in my club are highly educated and have extremely smart taste (waves to Katy), and I'm sure I would enjoy these books if I could get over the inital reader's block that goes along with picking up a new title. Unfortunately, these days my ability to just hang in there is already at capacity. And because at this point I can only focus on one book at a time, what ends up happening is that I put off reading things I'm sincerely interested in in favor of fulfilling my "obligations," but because meeting those obligations feels like a chore, I find myself not reading anything at all.

For someone who's always described herself as an avid reader, this is unacceptable. Also, since I've taken a leave from the club to conserve budget dollars, anyway, there's no reason to continue this self-imposed form of restriction.

So this weekend, I returned last month's selection to the library and immediately dove into The Happiness Project, a book I've been chomping at the bit to read since I first heard about it last year. I even shelled out precious actual dollars to buy it when it was released in paperback earlier this month, because inherently I knew it would be the sort of book that required underlining, note-taking, and eventually, re-reading.

Funny, isn't it? In order to read The Happiness Project, first I had to grant myself permission to be happy.

-------

In the middle of last year, at a point where I felt stagnant and uninspired, I started giving serious thought as to why I felt unsatisfied and what it would take to make me happier. It involved owning up to my shortcomings and limitations, defining my long-term goals, and re-evaluating my priorities. It required sharing those insights with Luke and the two of us formulating a plan for changing the direction of our lives. Thankfully, we were in agreement as to what should come next, and while we're experiencing a brief delay in regards to its implemention, this plan is constantly at the forefront of our minds; it drives our savings habits, influences our short-term decisions, and keeps us hopeful about the future. I also find it easier to accencuate the positive in the day-to-day I have now, appreciate my blessings, and gain perspective.

But again, in order to reach these conclusions, Luke and I had to admit that all the great things we have in our lives right now aren't enough to bring us long-term joy. We also realized that we can't improve our situation by hoping to magically inherit traits and desires that aren't in sync with who we are.

Our plan will take some time to accomplish--many months, I'm sure, possibly even years. There are a lot of moving parts that can't be achieved in tandem. But I would rather spend the next few years in slow, baby-steps transition than an indefinite amount of time trying to settle for what society says should make me happy.

On breastfeeding (or not) again

One of my biggest, all-consuming fears about having baby number three is breastfeeding.

Part of me feels ridiculous admitting that to anyone. After all, I've gone through this twice already! Shouldn't I be a pro by now? Or, at the very least, accept that breastfeeding is not my fight and write it off altogether? After all, to say I've been unsuccessful at nursing would be a vast understatement. To say I'm excited to try it again? That would be a lie.

It's funny; the content of this post has been on my mind for weeks, but now that I'm writing it, I'm not sure what to say.

When I found out I was pregnant again, I resolved to do everything in my power to make breastfeeding a reality for my family. I have read The Books, and the blogs, and the comments to those blogs, so the health and bonding benefits of breastmilk (and, consequently, the drawbacks of formula) are not lost on me. Plus, it's no secret that we are living on a pretty tight budget, so the cost savings aren't anything to laugh at, either. More than anything, though, was this feeling of wanting to overcome a hurdle that has previously appeared insurmountable.

I'm not blaming low supply because honestly, I'm not convinced that was the problem. With Kara, I couldn't keep her on the breast for more than a couple of minutes before she was crying and pushing me away. The lactation consultants at the hospital checked her latch several times, and it seemed fine to them, but who knows? It's not like I had any idea what I was doing, despite reading all those books, so it's very possible my technique was off or Kara's positioning wasn't right or any number of things related to my management of the situation. I never got more than a couple ounces from the pump in a session, whether I pumped every two hours or four, but again, what the hell did I know? Maybe my volume would have increased over time. Maybe I should have just been happy with the amount I was producing and made peace with supplementing the rest of the time.

I didn't try nipple shields, and I didn't attend any support group meetings (though I did call about the one offered through our hospital, and sorry, that once-a-month get-together slated for next Thursday isn't going to help me RIGHT NOW). It's not like I kept at it until my boobs had nothing left to give. It truly was my decision.

So for those who think I didn't try hard enough, well. I suppose they are right. But during those initial weeks of breastfeeding, my mind went to some very dark places. I felt terrible about myself as a mother, which in theory should have been enough to make me go the distance for as long as I could, but even more than that, I hated the idea of doing all those things and STILL most likely failing. Aside from the first couple of days of her life, feeding Kara was a source of stress, self-doubt, and guilt. At some point before the six-week mark I decided that suffering through those feelings for even one more day was more than I could bear. The reality of motherhood, I quickly learned, is that sometimes, when there's a conflict of interest between what you could ideally accomplish as a parent and what you can realistically handle, your own mental sanity has to win out. Second best just has to be enough.

... And THAT was breastfeeding with Kara.

With Nathan, things felt like they were getting off to a better start. I had still had trouble perfecting my latch, but he didn't fight my efforts and ate as often as I would let him, so I was hopeful that this time, please, this time, things would be different. However, at his two-week appointment with the pediatrician, my stomach dropped after the nurse checked his weight and announced a paltry two-ounce gain. TWO OUNCES. My God, did I feel like shit then, and my mind immediately went back to my experience with Kara, and how I fucked that up, and by the time we saw the doctor, any shred of confidence I had about nursing was gone. I continued to pump for another couple of weeks, but I don't think I ever put him on the breast again.

And now, I get to do it all over again with baby number three.

Like I stated above, when I first learned we were having another baby, I was set on doing everything within my power to make breastfeeding work this time around, and hey, third time's a charm, right? I talked about it with Katy, who nursed both of her boys into toddlerhood; borrowed more books; researched lactation consultants; and gave myself numerous pep talks that this time, things would be different.

But now? I honestly don't know. I hate that my first months at home with Kara and Nathan are tainted with such strong feelings of failure. As a working mother, that time to bond means more to me than almost anything else in that first year, and Luke and I are doing everything we can to stock our bank account accordingly so that I can take all twelve of those precious, job-protected weeks off without suffering serious financial repurcussions. I cherish that time to connect with my babies, to snuggle them in the rocking chair and take naps with them on my chest and cover their hands and cheeks and toes with kisses and overall just get to know who they are. It would be so much easier to say, This is not for me, and release myself from ever having to think about this again.

Then again, this time, things might be different. Baby Brother 2.0 could prove to be a fantastic nurser and all my worries could be for nothing. (Kind of like all those "Should we have a third baby?" conversations!) And I do appreciate the benefits, and I do really want those cost savings. Just not at the cost of my self-esteem.

One of the most popular retorts I've heard spoken by the more judgemental nursing mothers and that has most enraged me about the entire breast-or-bottle discussion is the whole "Well, if you aren't willing to make sacrifices for your children, why did you bother to have them?" It makes my fists clench and blood boil and and smoke shoot out of my ears, because really, when did how you feed a baby in the first year of life become the sole measuring stick for quality parenting? And who is anyone to say that I don't make sacrifices for my kids? Luke and I bust our tail to live on one income so they can enjoy all the benefits that go along with that. We painstakingly chose our house because we wanted to make sure they could go to one of the best public school systems in the city. We pack their meals with fruits and vegetables and whole grains, and they have yet to even try soda. We have slashed our household budget more times than I care to count in order to enroll both of them into Kara's day-out program this fall. I can't tell you the last time we bought clothes or shoes or even a magazine for ourselves, but Kara and Nathan get everything they need and then some. 

I did not become a mother because I wanted to breastfeed. I became a mother because I wanted to experience the joy of raising children and because I thought I could do a good job. I did not promise to make every right choice. I did not promise to always put myself last. But I do strive to give my family the best that I have as often as I can. I am proud of the home Luke and I have made for our kids and the life we are able to give them. And when I don't have it in me to reach the ideal, I will forgive myself (eventually) and try to move on.

This all sounds so good in black and white, doesn't it? Let's see how well my heart can embrace it, come June.

MyTubes*

* I changed the title because "Headaches, rambles" was very boring and vague and hello, there is an actual topic for this entry, only I didn't realize that until the drive home last night, which is when I thought up this little gem. How could I not use it?

I hit 11 weeks in this pregnancy yesterday, and the most noteworthy tidbit I can offer regarding this topic is that I've been plagued with a recurring headache for more than a week now that can't be alleviated with soda or chocolate. No change in my level of fatigue, nausea, or tendency to gag over smells ranging in intensity from air freshener to number two diapers (thank you, son). With Kara I started feeling better around week 20; Nathan was a few weeks earlier than that, so let's cross our fingers that the month of January brings wondrous feelings of joy and mirth.

My second prenatal appointment for Number Three took place on Monday, where I heard the baby's heartbeat through the Doppler for the first time, pounding away at a whopping160 bpm. Was it a sign that I'm having a girl? A byproduct of my key lime cheesecake from lunch? The world may never know. In any event, things are looking good, fetus-wise.

I also spent some time talking to my ob/gyn about having my tubes tied sometime after delivery.

Seeing as this is our second surprise pregnancy, and knowing that Luke and I conceived Kara when we were open to children but not officially "trying," it shouldn't shock anyone that I am obsessing over the best way to shut down this baby train. While there has always been a hankering for a third baby, I harbor no such illusions regarding a fourth. I am deeply grateful that I have been able to conceive so easily, without the aid of charts or medication or invasive procedures that can go on for years, and that I have given birth to two beautiful, healthy children. But still. Overall, I do not enjoy pregnancy, and I am still freaking out over earning enough bacon to support five people, and my husband would like to go back to work before he turns 50. That is not too much to ask.

Speaking of Luke, he has always been willing to "take care of things," so to speak, and that is still an option. Early next year we hope to get him to the urologist for a consult and determine how much of The Snip is covered by our insurance. If we can swing it financially, we would love nothing more than to "address this issue" before I go under the knife in June. (Are you loving my double entendres today?) That actually makes the most sense, since a tubal would require yet another surgery for me. I deliver at a Catholic hospital, so a two-in-one deal is not an option, and I'm not sure how long I would need to wait after delivery to have it done, and I don't care to leave myself susceptible to another happy surprise for very long.

For a while after Nathan I seriously considered the Essure procedure, which seems to be my practice's first choice for female sterilization, but reading this thread about failures and complications was enough for me to say KEEP THOSE COILS AWAY FROM ME, YOU.

I think this is all coming about because I'm feeling pretty powerless these days. I can't help myself physically feel better, our household budget is in chaos after paying on life insurance premiums, car repairs, and (drastically scaled-down) Christmas expenses all in the same month, and our place is a mess because I can't bring myself to even fold a basket of laundry. (Did I mention that I am an absolute baby when I'm sick?) The idea of snuggling a squeaky little newborn excites me beyond belief, but preparing for that baby will be a lot of work, and the adjustment period will be a lot of work, and I know myself well enough now to say I am not in my element in the first year. Although, recent interactions with Kara lead me to think that the toddler years aren't shining the light on my finest hours, either.

Anyway, I am done with surprise pregnancies and worrying about birth control and stressing over various infant-related issues. Part of what is getting me through this first trimester is knowing that I'm doing this for the last time. The sooner I can enjoy reproductive freedom, the better. 

(I did mention that I'm grateful for this, too, right? You all know what I mean.)

"Why are you selling the house?"

A couple of months ago, I wrote a post about revisiting major life choices, reflecting on the outcome, and wondering if I'd do it all again. I followed up a week later with the age-old question, "To live or not to live near your family?" My first entry for October talked about revamping our budget to accommodate new goals. And my last one highlighted our latest in a string of whirlwind weekends up north, with a good-natured jab at caffeine.

Put those macro-level concepts together and it's not hard to understand why we want to sell our house.

 

Luke with the kids at a nearby orchard earlier this month. All hail the beauty of a simple but meaningful day.

That is not to say that Luke and I have a carved-in-stone plan we are following or that we have any idea how this process will play out. We want to get closer to our families, but that could mean finding a place on the other side of town just as easily as it could translate into planting roots in one of their zip codes. And we are not willing to compromise the basic elements of our lives just to reduce the mileage on our cars: anyplace we live must be affordable on a one-income salary, have a solid school system (not five star, but pretty damn good), boast of parks, walking trails, and other forms of outdoor recreation, and be a managable commuting distance from my employer (whether my current one or another). We just have a new non-negotiable to add to the mix, and that is yes, reducing the mileage on our cars to spend more time with the people we love. No Impact Man would be proud.

We don't know what the future looks like, but we DO know that in order to get there, we can't stay as we are.

There are so many things to love about our current community. So much of what we are looking for is right in our backyard. I can access an entire trail system simply by hopping my fence. The integrity of the schools is without question. The town is quaint, easy to navigate, and cheap. But those things on their own are not enough to keep us here forever.

I long for the days when we could visit during a holiday and still crash in our own bed at night. I lament over missed time with friends because you can only call on so many people over the span of a weekend, and family touchpoints have always come first. I want to offer a shoulder and an ear more often in the literal sense than I'm able to now. I would love for Samantha to be able to call me on a random Saturday morning to watch Danny and Rosemary so that she and Dan can drool over tile. And Luke and I certainly wouldn't say no to the free baby-sitting likely to be offered in return.

These desires do not seem unreasonable to me.

Many people live away from their hometowns and do just fine seeing their parents at Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. But Luke and I have never been those people, and it's time to start carving out a life that more honestly reflects our behavior. Our home is with each other and the kids, obviously, but as a wife, mother, and full-time employee, I appreciate the whole "It takes a village" mindset much more than I did as a single twenty-something grad student, that's for sure. And as a stay-at-home dad, Luke identifies with it on a different level even from me.

There are non-family issues at play here, too, of course. Like, our grocery stores are mostly filled with boxed, frozen, and/or imported items, with nary a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods or like-minded retailer in sight. Public transportation is limited and inefficient. Diversity is somewhat lacking, at least compared to a population like Chicago's. But I know that being a child of Chicago means I am setting the bar relatively high in that area.

Originally, the plan was to put the house on the market come spring; that plan has changed for reasons I can't share yet. But Luke and I are in agreement that, as soon as it's feasible, we will put our house on the market, and we will sell it, and we will rent an apartment near my job's new headquarters, and THEN we will be in a position to answer the questions that until now have been hypothetical at best. And I can't wait.

 

On using, not finding, the time

On Tuesday, I went running for the first time since August. Of course, it was amazing - not once have I ever regretted a run. And while I know that 12-minute miles aren't anything to write home about, it felt so good to hit the pavement again, and to readopt a posture that for a while came so naturally: arms at my sides, feet skidaddling over the ground a la Fred Flinstone and his caveman wheels. Why do I let myself fall out of sync with activities that make such a positive impact on me?

-------

On Wednesday, I left a "meaty" comment on a blog entry for the first time in - oh, I don't know, years? (Discussion of religion will do that to you; best of luck, Christy!) After having Kara and returning to work, I had to cut back on the timesuck somewhere, and that somewhere, unfortunately, was not only my presence on this here website but also in the comments sections of my most favorite internet people. So many of you consistently respond to my brain dumps with kind and thoughtful words, and I'm disappointed in myself for not returning the favor. I gain so much value from the blog community, personally and professionally, but in the day-to-day hustle I consistently overlook the importance of giving back. Sometimes it can be as easy as tweeting a piece of content that impressed or resonated with me. Othertimes, a little more uncomfortable, like going against the grain when my belief system isn't popular, or finding the right words to disagree.

Part of my growth as a writer and as a person in 2011, I think, will be to identify which of my causes need the most attention and how I can use my voice to raise awareness and call others to action. I don't consider myself a "safe" blogger, necessarily, but I'm not picketing on Election Day or writing letters to my senator, either, content-wise. There's got to be a happy medium.

Without morphing into a judgemental asshat, of course. 

-------

I'm already thinking about goals and aspirations for the New Year, and instead of hammering out the usual list of resolutions, I'm thinking of focusing on a couple phrases that cover more ground. "Escape velocity" has been a huge one for 2010 and will most likely carry over as I work on executing short-term projects falling under that umbrella; also, "moving the Titanic" (is that an insensitive reference? I sure hope not), since right now it feels like I'm aboard a massive ship that can't be steered with one quick motion, but instead requires tiny corrections and adjustments to slowly change course. My iceberg is in clear sight, and if I don't start redirecting soon, I fear I will soon be trapped into a life of what-ifs as a result of my own inaction.

But it won't be easy. "Moving my Titanic" will require maintaining my current level of responsibility (parenting, working, budgeting, wife-ing) while also making room for new endeavors that will help me change my path and generally just make me happier. For example, if I want to formally launch a part-time freelance business next year (which, newsflash! I want to launch a part-time freelance business next year!), I can't grab extra hours by cutting back on my day job; if anything, my current workload dictates ramping things up to help the company through a critical time of year. Likewise, if I want to run more or increase my blog presence or pick up crocheting again or FINALLY get some ink onto the pages of Nathan's baby book, I can't score the time by staying up any later than I already do, especially since another priority is to get better sleep. And I can't incorporate everything I want to do into every single day.

At times it's discouraging, this survival-of-the-fittest approach to time management - pitting your functions and interests against each other and balancing which ones should come out on top at a particular moment in time. But then I remember that everyone is faced with the same conundrums and challenges, all of us given the same number of hours in a day to live our lives, and it is plenty time enough to accomplish some pretty fantastic things. Myself included, even, with the right mixture of commitment and energy. The time is there. I just need to use it more effectively.

I have more thoughts and ideas to touch on (including the answer to Eva's "Why are you selling your house?" question posted to my last entry), but until then, I leave you with Nathan's latest words of wisdom:

"Dammit.... Don't say dammit."

My son, the sage.

On living honestly

This morning, Luke and I registered Kara for preschool.

Well, technically, not preschool. It's categorized as a children's ministry program, offered through a nearby church. Four hours a day, one day a week. The program isn't accredited with fancy acronyms, and the staff members don't have teaching licenses, but there will be free play and music and snack time and show-and-tell and take-home bulletins once a month. Plus, we'll have to get her a backpack and lunchbox. So for a two-year-old girl who's been hanging out at home with her dad and her baby brother almost her entire life, it's close enough.

It's plenty close for her parents, too.

-------

In an effort to get a better handle on our finances, Luke and I are trying something new at home. Suze Orman calls it the back-to-cash movement. I like to think of it as our new reality.

The new reality is this: Gone are the days where we put everything on the credit card and pay for it at the end of thirty days (which, near the end, wasn't working out so well, anyway). Good-bye to Excel spreadsheets that were intended to help us budget on a monthly basis rather than per-paycheck. From now on, if we want to buy something, we are going to the bank, making a withdrawal from the ATM, and paying for it in cash. There will be occasional exceptions, of course, like purchases online or the occasional Redbox rental, but ninety-five percent of the time, them's the rules.

We started on October 1. Six days in so far, and doing well.

 

-------

Luke and I have been talking a lot about what we want to accomplish in the short term--realistic goals we can achieve in the next six to twelve months. In the short term, we want more social networking opportunities for Kara and Nathan (not the Facebook and Twitter kind), to give them a chance to explore interests outside the confines of our living room, interacting with adults who are not us. We want to enjoy financial freedom and not have to itemize every single penny of a paycheck two months in advance in order to afford concert tickets or Christmas presents or a random date night. We want to formally close the baby chapter of our lives by New Year's and put our house on the market come spring. And I want to volunteer.

However, we're also in agreement on what we don't want. For example, we are not quite ready to enroll Nathan in any sort of program that takes him out of our care. He can have a few more months of home time with Luke and Kara, and enjoy the precious one-on-one time he's about to score with his dad, and at least blow out the candles on his second birthday cake before we re-evaluate our position. Also, we are not ready for Luke to go back to work, even if we could put another salary to good use ($1,600 worth of car repairs on the Outlander, I'm looking at you). We appreciate and depend on the benefits of being a one-income family: the extra bonding time for Luke and the kids, the flexibility of managing only one work schedule, the ability for me to concentrate on my corporate to-dos as needed instead of tossing my laptop into a bag the minute the clock turns five. We wouldn't be any worse for the wear for having those issues, but they would most definitely complicate things, and we have all the uncertainty we can handle right now, thankyouverymuch.

We've talked about me picking up some freelance work or Luke taking a part-time job with night and weekend hours to bring more money through the door, but honestly, right now we are content to just buckle down and do the best we can with what we have today. There is enough to pay the bills and buy the organic yogurt we like and travel north and even score dinner out once and a while. We are beefing up our short-term savings and still making regular deposits into our health savings account for medical expenses. We don't need a second mortgage, and we aren't defaulting on Sallie Mae. In every area that counts, we are fine. And believe me, we are thankful.

But still, we are making hard choices, like back in August when we discontinued satellite. This month, we stopped all contributions to my 401(k), an account that's been funded every two weeks rain or shine for the last five years AND saw generous matches from my employer, to make room in the budget for Kara's tutition. I am disappointed over this and understand there may be long-term ramifications come our golden years, but I do not regret it. Luke and I have been preparing for the future since before we even married. We're proud of the money we've accrued for retirement already. But right now, it is time to plan for now.

 

-------

In a conversation with Molly earlier this fall, she used the phrase "living honestly," and it has stuck with me ever since. Because that's what it feels like we're doing now: living a life that reflects our priorities and our resources, and sorting out the white noise that only gets in the way. For the first time in a long time, we're putting our money where our mouth is. What's that worth to you? I ask about almost everything now, from wedding RSVPs to a bag of Gummi Bears to preschool. What are you willing to sacrifice to make this happen?

Our short term is paving the way for the long term, a reality in which we are mortgage-free and in a position to entertain housing options that bring us closer to our loved ones, who I am missing more than ever these days. A reality that has both of us in careers that we love and best align with our strengths and passions. A reality that includes another child, obtained in a non-traditional way. It will take baby steps, but we will get there. I know it in my bones.

 

-------

As Kara and Nathan grow older, I become more aware of all the ways we can screw them up. I know, I know, they're only babies, all they need is love, blah blah blah, but even at this young age, we are setting the bar for how they will realize their potential. Take Kara's "school," for example. She'll be three in December, and is intellectually capable, I think, of handling a (slightly) more rigorous curriculum than the one we are placing her in; kids younger than her do this all the time in daycare, yes? But that benefit of school is not important to Luke and me right now, and as a result, her experience will be missing that formalized educational component. We'll revisit our feelings next year, obviously, but for now that's where we stand. 

We are also setting the bar for ourselves, I suppose, in regards to what Kara and Nathan can expect from us as parents. We did what we felt was necessary to get Kara into school, but we didn't even consider placing her more than one day a week (baby steps, remember?) or research more expensive options like the Goddard School or Montessori. We already know that retirement savings will always trump a 529. Many parents have different opinions on this, and that's okay. But as much as Luke and I want to give the kids the very best of ourselves, we are going to make ourselves a priority, too, and not apologize for that to anyone.

 

-------

I have come to learn that as a mother, I enjoy the toddler years far more than the infant ones. Kara's humor and sass are shining through these days, the product of two wise-cracking parents, to be sure, and builds upon both by relying on her razor-sharp memory. One day while we were eating dinner, she thought it a good idea to let milk dribble out of her mouth. She laughed as the milk traveled down her chin, and I hid a smile as I said, "Kara Leigh, please don't do that, that's not funny," and she replied, "Well, maybe a little funny," a phrase Luke uttered in passing the day before. (Thank you, dear.)

Meanwhile, Nathan speaks in full sentences and punctuates the majority of them with a question mark. "What's that noise, Mommy?  Want to build Mrs. Potato? Where's the moon, Mommy? Is that a oak leaf, Mommy? Want to read Turtle, Turtle, Watch Out? Should Momma hooold you?" And so on with the inquisitiveness. He is so curious, so observant, so willing to sit back and watch the action unfold. That is, when he's not bouncing off the couch, roaring like Michael Jackson circa "Scream," or body slamming his torso into the nearest gate.

They both have insatiable appetites for reading, which has been further enhanced by the recent discovery of our local library. At first I was worried they wouldn't get the concept of borrowing books, afraid they would pout and fuss when it came time to return them, but they totally get it, and now live for the next chance to play with the trains and scramble through the catepillar tunnel featured in the kids' room.

Our new reality is that our toddlers are becoming full-blown children. And man, do we just want to do right by them, and ourselves, too.

 

And things we're all too young to know

My oldest friend Gina, whom I've known since kindergarten, got married on Saturday. I was a member of the wedding party, and as I watched her walk down the aisle with her dad, tears sprang into my eyes, because she looked so beautiful in her dress, and her father so proud to have her on his arm. And when she met her husband-to-be at the altar, the soft way he looked at her made me cry some more. They've been together about ten years, but I truly believe that a couple's wedding day is the beginning of a whole new life. I am so excited for them to begin this journey.

Of course I got to thinking about my own marriage, which turns five years old in May.

-------

In the year following our wedding, I listened to a handful of husbands and wives in Blogland talk about how difficult marriage can be, and it's not that I didn't believe them, but...I didn't believe them. At least, it didn't seem applicable to us. Luke and I dated for five years before we tied the knot and lived together months before, and in those years and months we experienced a lot of drama over a Mary Poppins carpetbag full of issues: relating to each other physically and emotionally, establishing our relationship as an independent unit, setting priorities for the future. We trudged through painful conversations about sex and child-rearing and religion. We (eventually) learned to celebrate the best and accept the worst in ourselves and each other, and to aim to improve where we could. And once we (finally) got engaged, we embraced the sentiment of marriage with our whole hearts, banishing the word "divorce" from our vocabulary. "Always remember what brought you here," our pastor told us over burgers and fries at Joe's Crab Shack, two months before the wedding, and we promised to do just that.

In my opinion, the most difficult part was the getting there. Now that we weren't laboring over our intentions as a couple, now that we knew the general shape of our life path, there would be no stopping us.

It was with this unwavering mindset that we said "I do."

 

On our wedding day, May 12, 2006. How lovely we were, and utterly clueless, too.

Today, our marriage is almost equal the length of our courtship, but the highs and lows on our marital grid have delivered much stronger punches. We began with two full-time jobs, one sweet freelance gig, and only a teeny one-bedroom apartment to maintain, with no debt save for my college loans, and flexibility up the wazoo. We were making plans to move back to Chicago, travel across the world, add to our family, and phase me out of the workforce to fulfill my dream of being a stay-at-home mom.

It's easy to be idealistic when you have money in the bank and there is nobody to tend to but yourselves. It's easy to move into the future when everything is going according to plan.

By our first anniversary, I was pregnant with Kara, and we quickly learned that our neat and tidy life map simply wasn't sustainable. Luke didn't bring in enough money at his non-profit for me to stay home, but my job could support all three of us, so the day after his thirty-fourth birthday he bid farewell to office life and I prepared to wear the clothes of a working mother. I went through a lot of ugly feelings then: sadness over anticipated time lost with my daughter and any future children we would have, resentment over taking on a role I didn't want, fear of the unknown, and just plain anger because goddammit, I did not sign up for this.

Then, not six months after my c-section, I was pregnant with Nathan. Oh my goodness, what a blessing, and whoa, motherfucker, what have we gotten ourselves into.

So we whittled away the remainder of our nest egg preparing for our second life detour. Purchased a house to make room for another baby, investing in a down payment and closing fees and new carpet and paint. Bought a second set of nursery furniture, a different type of breast pump, more baby clothes. Accepted federal stimulus money we will have to repay in half-grand increments over the next fifteen years to afford a 2003 Outlander plagued with nail polish stains and a questionable smell that lingers almost two years after the sale. To offset the loss of all that cash, we pieced together a maternity leave comprising paid FMLA time from my company and ten vacation days, eight weeks total, even though I'd be recovering from another c-section, even though I'd be tangled up with an infant and a toddler. We anticipated the hospital bill that was sure to come from having an HSA baby at the start of the year instead of the end and were not disappointed.

Then Nathan was born, and we were over-the-moon happy to welcome him into our lives, and yet almost as frustrated, learning to deal with a newborn that was so drastically different from our first: he spit up all the time, cried for hours a day, and was overall hard to console until he was old enough to crawl. My stomach collapsed into itself from all the baby-making and lack of exercise, and it totally sucked the joy out of getting dressed for almost a year, which of course had an effect on my self-esteem, which doesn't exactly help you put your best foot forward in your most intimate relationship. We couldn't figure out an after-work routine that got the kids fed, bathed, and story-timed AND our kitchen cleaned before 10 p.m. until embarrassingly recently. Sometimes I still can't manage to put in a full day at work and still make it home for dinner.

A lot's happened in the last five years that's called us to re-examine our life plans and reshape our priorities. We are still trudging through painful conversations.

But we are making it.

-------

As husband and wife, Luke and I wear many hats. Sometimes it takes all of our energy to be parents and housekeepers and worker bees, and sometimes they are so in sync that we find 30 minutes in the day to spend as lovers. We don't have "Date Night" enough. Sometimes conversation is like a song and sometimes it just takes one misplaced sigh to throw the entire day off-track. Sometimes we huddle close in bed and sometimes our backs are turned. We apologize a lot, almost as often as we say "I love you." There are times when the cheap shot wins out over being the bigger person. We don't always make the effort to understand.

We have born witness to the most physically humbling moments of our lives. From his end, Luke has seen the slicing of my abdomen, the production of milk from my breasts, and postpartum blood in my underwear. There were entire months when my fingers resembled sausages, my legs tree trunks, my face a balloon. He's privy to birth marks and blackheads and cellulite and more loose skin than even Buffalo Bill would know what to do with. It's a miracle he found me attractive enough to conceive two children.

Money has played a bigger force in our marriage than I ever thought possible. We started out practically debt free, and now there are times when we're robbing Peter to pay Paul. To pull or not to pull out of my 401(k)? Do we have enough life insurance? How can we increase our income in a way that keeps our family arrangement and sanity intact? Will it always feel like we're catching up? When can we finally start getting ahead? And the kicker is that in this economy, we're actually doing well.

Sometimes it's hard to live up to our promises from 2006 and remember what brought us here. It is an active choice to be made every day. Many times we make the wrong choice.

But we are making it. Despite the hard times, somehow, we thrive.

-------

On the series finale of Scrubs (the Zach Braff finale, not the clunky Med School spin-off), they play a song near the end called, "The Book of Love." The Scrubs version is sung by Peter Gabriel, but at the time we downloaded it the only available file was the original, by The Magnetic Fields. Anyway, it's been years since I posted lyrics in an entry - so cheesy - but I can't help myself this time, because the words so simply capture the monotony of love, as well as the joy.

The book of love is long and boring
No one can lift the damn thing
It's full of charts and facts and figures
And instructions for dancing but

I...
I love it when you read to me and
You...
You can read me anything

The book of love has music in it
In fact that's where music comes from
Some of it is just transcendental
Some of it is just really dumb but

I...
I love it when you sing to me and
You...
You can sing me anything

The book of love is long and boring
And written very long ago
It's full of flowers and heart-shaped boxes
And things we're all too young to know but

I...
I love it when you give me things and
You...
You ought to give me wedding rings
I...
I love it when you give me things and
You...
You ought to give me wedding rings

 

 

In which I (eventually) compare myself to Keanu Reeves

I'm not sure of the exact moment I started feeling better, but I'm pretty sure it was sometime after Luke's and my latest round of Scrabble, the beginning of which is captured below.

 

First person to use these words in a sentence wins the award for "Dirtiest Internet Mind." God help us all.

Anyway, I do feel better. My recent blog entries proved to be the content of some pretty interesting conversations between Luke and me, and for the first time in ages, I feel like we are moving forward in a specific way towards our future, as opposed to floundering like fish. For us, "moving forward" means:

• Being open to more children but closing the chapter on growing more babies in my uterus (on purpose, at least).
• Exploring opportunities to move closer to family but not ruling out a permanent stay in central Indiana.
• Investigating new career possibilities. 
• Remaining in this house until we know for sure where our next career paths will take us.

On the surface it reads like nothing's changed on a tactical level, and that may be true, but on a big-picture scale, this is huge. For so long it felt like I personally was operating from a black-and-white standpoint, where option A was all that and a bag of chips and option B was crippling devastation. Like, having another baby was the best (seemingly only, at the time) way to spice up our family dynamic, while settling down as a party of four without an option for more biological children would be like completing a jigsaw puzzle save for the most important piece. Moving back home would meet all of our needs for friendship and connectedness, and residing here would damn us to a life of isolation and misery. I felt pulled in conflicting directions and limited in my capacity to be the best version of myself, and it was affecting all the areas of my life.

Luckily, I have a very understanding husband who is willing to talk me through these middle-class, post-thirty sorts of crises. I also clocked a lot of driving time last weekend to attend a wedding shower up north, which gave me some time to reflect and ponder and dream. In the end, I was able to see more clearly that the grass on my side of the fence is growing just fine, thank you very much, albeit a little dry and brittle. But so what. I have a sprinkler. I can replenish my lawn.

(Your mom replenishes her lawn!)

(I'm back, baby!)

 

Kara's first night in her big girl bed this past Saturday. Two sets of smiles, only one crier.

Because I am still in a pensive mood and this is my blog so you have to listen to every word I say, let's elaborate. Take the issue of more children, which I not so subtly hinted at in my last entry. To three or not to three has been on my mind since we brought Nathan home from the hospital. Before then, Luke and I were both open to three. Afterwards, we weren't, at least for the first few months. And then, suddenly, I was. But Luke wasn't. Even after endless pestering and hypothesizing from me. (I know!) Eleven months ago, he STILL wasn't. And today: still, no.

And oh, did I fight this idea. I kept telling myself it was just a matter of time, that he needed to be away from the newborn stage long enough to miss it, that one day he would stand in the doorway with arms crossed and a tear in his eye as he observed the products of our love delight in each other's company, and he would bring me in for a hug and whisper, "Hell, what's one more, right?" And we would run upstairs right then and there to do the deed, giggling the whole time, and when we were done he'd lay his head on my stomach in anticipation of the life we had just created. Because that's probably what happened on an episode of Family Ties. Or maybe Growing Pains. That show was always the racier of the two.

But surprise! Life is not a 30-minute sitcom. Luke is not up for having another baby. The man's 36. I need to let him be done.

Plus, it's not even like he's saying no to more children. He's still interested in foster parenting and adoption for an out-of-diapers demographic as previously discussed, and pinky-swears he's not just saying this to appease me in the short term. But still, I wasn't ready to let go of baybee number three.

And as hard as it might be to believe, I did try. I told everyone, when asked, that we were finished with babies and Luke was going to get snipped and 13 months is an awfully close age gap and really it's better this way. But I never fully believed it.

And because he knows me so well, Luke didn't, either. So when I told him two Fridays ago that I wanted another baby, I could just have easily stated that the sky is blue. His reaction would have been the same.

"Okay."

"I'm not trying to change your mind," I said, and I meant it. "I just need to be honest about my feelings."

"Okay."

And yesterday, when I told him to start making calls for the snip, he said "okay" to that, too.

You guys. This is such a messy topic, how many kids to have, and not black-and-white at all. I think I was looking for the perfect answer that gives me complete peace. And I am finally trying to accept that such an answer does not exist for me. Would I welcome another baby? Yes. Would I be a loving mother to that baby? Yes. Would three babies/toddlers be an absolute blast? Yes. It would be wonderful.

 

Nathan, 18 months, 26.2 pounds, height already forgotten. Who wouldn't be up for another child when they come out this good-looking?

The stress would probably also kill me.

Not the run-of-the-mill "adding another person to the family" stress, but my specific circumstances. Being a working mom, for one, and coping with being separated from yet another infant for (at least) forty hours a week, while mourning the life of a stay-at-home mom and all the perks that go wth it, again. Being a person who is not instinctively patient, who benefits from regular doses of "me" time, who is doing her best to break unhealthy cycles decades in the making. None of these things would have kept me from having another baby, but it certainly would have made the experience ten times more frustrating. And in the process of accepting Luke's feelings, I need to acknowledge that in a lot of ways, this works out pretty well for me, too.

Same thing with where to live, and wanting an easy answer. Again last weekend, again for the zillionth time, I proposed the idea to Luke of moving closer to our families, and for the first time we actually had a productive dialogue about it, outlining what would need to be in place in order to make it happen. Later, on my own, I began to consider, maybe also for the first time, what we might lose if we stayed.

Another tough set of questions here. When it comes to family, how far is too far? Do I have it in me to forgo a "Wednesday night dinner" type of relationship with my parents, siblings, nieces and nephews, and friends during such formative years? Can I be just as useful and influential in their lives? On the flip side, how close is too close? Can I handle taking on a larger role of responsibility for issues I currently witness from the sidelines? Will I regret it if I don't?

Again, no black and white here. There is dark and light to everything. But at least I have the opportunity to ask the questions, make a choice, and follow it through. Not everyone is so lucky.

This new heightened sense of awareness has me feeling a little like Neo in The Matrix when he finally realizes the magnitude of his power and stops bullets with the simple raise of his hand. That's where I am now: paralyzing obstacles, discovering my potential. It's a good place to be.

-------

And now, photos.

 

I know the quality is poor, but I adore this shot of Kara and me at my company's "Bring Your Family to Work Day" a couple Fridays ago. People constantly call her my Mini-Me, and I just eat it up.

 

I'm also loving this one of me and my boy, with my jack-o-lantern grin and his piercing, dark-eyed stare. And the pout, of course, to die for.

 

We are making it, friends. I am making it. Thanks for hanging in there.
 

Go your own way

Well. That certainly was a lot of emotional vomit I spewed onto your monitors last week, wasn't it? Sorry about that. But if it helps any, it sure made me feel a whole lot lighter.

The biggest reassurance throughout this recent Self-Discovery 2.0 is that as I evaluate each major life choice, I'm still pretty sure that I/we made the right one.

The biggest was my decision five years ago to accept a new job opportunity in Indianapolis, a decision that placed two hundred and forty minutes and almost three hundred miles worth of distance between me, my parents, my siblings, and all of my closest friends. And in the five years that I've lived here, I have missed a lot. Ryan's wedding shower before her husband's move to Germany. The birth of my first nephew. Being within arm's reach for countless family crises, and unavailable for any function falling on a Sunday afternoon. It is something I have wrestled with on an almost daily basis. And while I know that many people are separated by even more hours and even more miles and make it work splendidly, it has never been a comfortable separation for me. I still think about the job offer that could have been and how things might have been different if only I had chosen a zip code closer to home.

But I am still glad to be here. Thanks to THIS zip code, Luke and I have carved out our own path together and learned to make it on our own, and we have two beautiful babies, and a stay-at-home parent, and a secure job with a thriving company, and a ridiculously affordable cost of living, all at a quieter pace and in the type of community-like atmosphere that is harder to find in the area where I grew up. That is not to say that we will always stay here or that we aren't considering life outside these walls, but I am grateful to have started out here, and we are in a better position to know what we want out of life as a result of having made this choice.

Our second most important decision, in my opinion, was to buy our house. This twelve-year-old house that seemed bright and perky enough when we signed on the dotted line but has revealed more wear and tear than we anticipated. Once again, it inspires the same cycle of questions, Luke and I wondering if we should have coughed up the extra forty dollars a month to go with one of the houses that didn't require brand new carpet from top to bottom or a new sliding glass door or brand new windows or a drastic revamp of the back yard or the eventual purchase of a brand new A/C unit. We are now an extra forty minutes and twenty-five miles away from our families, and in the spring I will have a forty-five-minute commute to work, and I never liked the exterior to begin with, and we detest the lack of cabinet space (and yes, still, the cabinets themselves). It's hard not to walk into other people's homes and ooh and aah over the features they have that we so desperately want for ourselves--bigger eating area, more storage, classier entranceway, sturdier bathroom elements. All of that in addition to more accessible options for organic produce, and less motherf*&!ing construction.

Round and round we would go while studying our financial situation to determine how much of a hit would we take on this investment if we were to put it up for sale tomorrow, how long we'd have to stay here before the money we've poured into this place (so far) isn't flushed down the toilet, the amount of money needed to fit it to our liking, the debt we're willing to accrue in the name of buying our dream home. This is where the green-eyed monster tempts me most, because of its intimate nature. This is where I eat my breakfast and pay our bills and tuck our children into bed, and it's hard to fall in love with your home when all you can see are its flaws.

But despite those flaws, I reluctantly still believe we ended up with the best house available at the time. For one thing, the mortgage can't be beat. In the almost two years we have been here, we've paid less to the bank than we ever did to our apartment complex, with double the square footage and one hundred percent autonomy to boot. Unfortunately, we just learned that our escrow payments are going up by $116 next month, but tightening the purse strings even makes that doable, which wouldn't have been the case if our inital payment were higher. Plus, aside from our kitchen grumbles, the space meets all of our needs. Adequate number of bedrooms and baths, separate loft for the computer, open first floor to accommodate boxes of toys and the constant patter of little feet. Again, it's not like we'll plan our funerals here, but we have what we need, and we know now what we want for the future.

-------

On Friday I saw my ob/gyn for the obligatory annual check-up, and one of the topics that came up was my family history with cancer--two maternal aunts, one of whom has already passed away from brain cancer (she also had breast cancer) and another who's battling breast cancer in the late stages. We talked about options for genetic testing and ways to reduce risk in the event that were deemed necessary. It's a scary talk to have, that's for sure, and heart-wrenching to think about losing precious years with your husband and children and everyone else who loves you. I spent a lot of time over the weekend thinking about this and how important it is to be honest with yourself about what you want out of life. Like, maybe I want another baby, so what if my patience is already stretched thin with two kids and the mere thought of washing baby bottles again makes me want to hurl. Even if that path never come to fruition (Luke has definitely not changed his mind here), simply giving myself permission to say it without attempting to justify it is so freeing, like the equivalent of a huge weight being lifted off my shoulders. There are tons more examples like this, goals without a strategic plan or pros and cons list, and I'm so excited to see where they end up, and how I will make the right ones a reality, and which ones will be left to God. At least I am open to the possibilities.

Escape velocity

Bright and early Monday morning, camped out in a harshly lit conference room, parked in front of my laptop, nursing a badly needed cup of Joe, waiting to press check a marketing piece literally months in the making, I stumbled across this video rallying viewers to reject the horror that is the average metropolitan commute. My own employer will acquire a new headquarters on the other side of town this spring, which will add an extra twenty minutes to an already tedious drive. It will only be my second facilities transfer since starting with the company five years ago, but I've definitely played musical chairs when it comes to office space. There will be moving of photographs, file folders, Post-It notes, again, for the zillionth time.

I sat up straighter in my chair.

Then I got to the post about "escape velocity", at which point a hand reached into my brain, fumbled for the proverbial light switch, and rattled the walls with a deafening slam on its way out the door, tripping over a big fat DUH in the process.

I mean, SERIOUSLY, people. While I may not have been aware of that phrase as defined by the blog writer or even the science community at large at the time of my last post, that's exactly what I was talking about, right? "Leaving a situation that isn't healthy or desired"? In that case, the situation was my health. But it applies to a lot of other aspects of my life, too.

I don't know what it is these days, but I am feeling uninspired, trapped in my day-to-day struggles with work, money, weight, home ownership, and a big-picture path for the rest of my life. I know where I want to be but it seems impossible to get there, or to even find the right words stating why I think that place is the best place for my family. I am too occupied with trivial concerns like All My Children and a trendier work wardrobe and affording new windows for the second floor of our house. I find it easy to become envious of others, forgetting the hard work it took for them to find their own paths, only seeing the end result of their efforts. I focus too much on what I want instead of what I am lucky enough to have. Most of all, I forget that I am in control of my own destiny, and that every single obstacle I face can be overcome.

You can understand, then, why blogging has been sporadic, yes?

It is time to start knocking down those obstacles and gain some fucking perspective.

The biggest obstacle is money. Surprise! What isn't a surprise is that Luke and I took a hit financially when I lost my Parents gig last summer, a hit we are still recovering from. Losing almost a thousand dollars a month, who wouldn't? You would think we could have made the appropriate adjustments before now, but no, we spent like even a fraction of that money was still there, and bonuses made up for it most of the time, but they are not the answer to our problems anymore. Just like my personal experience with exercise, so many of the right puzzle pieces are in place: affordable mortgage for a one-income family; owning our cars outright; saving for retirement and medical expenses accordingly. We just have to take a few extra steps to make sure we are living as honestly as possible. Some of those, thankfully, are small, like reducing our cell phone plan or buying generic contact solution, and others are embarrassingly more difficult to execute, like discontinuing satellite service and possibly adopting a "kids-only" gift policy for Christmas. These choices are not essential to the betterment of our lives by any means, but when you're in the habit of maintaining them, it's frighteningly easy to think otherwise, and equally as hard to tell yourself to let them go, that saving face cannot be a reason to avoid change anymore.

There are happy steps, too, like exploring new volunteer opportunities, discussing our own possible relocation at some point in the future, and maybe even a career change or two. Thanks to Facebook, I just learned that Trophy Frema's ex-boyfriend is in talks with an editor to publish a memoir collection based on articles he's added to his "Notes" section. After raising a fist to the ceiling and wailing "Why not MEEEEEEE?" for an entire night, I realized it's time to answer some important questions about the place that writing has in my life and the role I want it to play in the future. "HE's going to publish a book? Hell, I could be just like Carrie from Sex and the City and put together my own freaking collection of blog entries and do the same damn thing," I fumed to my poor wide-eyed husband, who could only sit back and watch me regurgitate thought tracks and questions about overall talent, ability, and persistence. "Well, why don't you?" he finally asked, and I thought, hmmm, well, why don't I, and the truth is, I don't know. I wanted that at some point for myself. I don't know that I do now. I certainly don't want to be a marketer for the rest of my life.

This is definitely worth finding out.

I am so excited for Luke and I to take the bull by the horns and begin spending our time and money in ways that are more meaningful for our family, to shed what is unimportant and demonstrate to our kids that anything is possible if you're willing to work for it. Even if it means bidding a sad farewell to "Toot and Puddle"* and SIRIUS radio. Good-bye, Coffee House. May we one day meet again.

* Thank goodness for the books.

Or bust

I am no longer training for the Chicago Rock 'n Roll Half Marathon.

Despite the month-long inner turmoil I have been experiencing over this issue, in the end it was a pretty easy decision. My outside runs in the heat have been brutal, and finding motivation to hit the gym before work has been difficult; therefore, I can count on one finger hand the number of times I've hit my target mileage since starting in May. Not good when you're just aiming to FINISH a half, let alone improve your time.

Plus, the guilt I've experienced over missing these goals is drastically affecting my overall activity--as if strength training is only a reward to be earned through tempo runs and intervals. It's like I needed to abandon this race before granting myself permission to incorporate other types of exercise into my life.

Do me a favor and smack me in the face (live or via e-mail) if I ever contemplate running 13.1 miles in the summer again.

-------

It seems like I am constantly locked in battle with my best possible self, fitness-wise, trying to strike a healthy balance between how I want to look and what is realistically achievable. Pursuing aggressive goals without setting myself up for failure. Celebrating my progress without comparing it to others. I know it isn't just me, that lots of people have trouble maintaining their goal weight and a healthy body type, but come on now. I am 30 years old, not some in-the-dark teeny bopper who thinks she can eat a cheeseburger a day and not have it metabolize in her ass. I know that my physical AND mental health benefit when I take better care of myself. And yet, I am constantly surrendering to the same poor impulses, forever digging myself into the same proverbial hole.

And the older I get, the harder the battle. When losing weight in my early twenties, I was able to drop 17 pounds by just following Weight Watchers. There were a couple times where I pulled out my Richard Simmons videos, and Luke and I did the occasional hike on the weekends, but exercise wasn't a regular part of my day. Then I had kids, and everything changed. Even after hitting my pre-pregnancy weight last fall after months of careful eating, dedicated Shred workouts, and a semi-regular running schedule, my body was still different. The by-products of my crappy twenty-something choices were still there, only multipled (damn you, tire gut). Drastic changes to flaws I've been complaining about since high school will involve a higher level of dedication than, say, shredding a few times a week. Semi-related to this is the fact that I want to graduate beyond the point where I'm convincing myself to slip on my running shoes or pop in the Shred - rookie motivation problems that should no longer be an issue at this point in my life (HELLO YOU ARE A GROWN-UP JUST GET OFF YOUR ASS AND MOVE ALREADY). I'm tired of using excercise as a means to a tactical end - a way to drop weight, a method for improving balance or gaining strength. It's necessary right now since my body isn't as fit or capable as it could be, but one day I want to do these things just because I enjoy them. How funny that Linda just published a post on this very concept. Her "now" is my goal.

On the bright side, at least reaching that goal feels possible. Next month will mark my first running anniversary - the longest I've maintained any athletic endeavor - and I am so insanely proud of this words can't even express it. Despite a lack of speed, consistency, and flexibility, I can call myself a runner. If I can do that, I can do anything.

-------

I've been pecking away at this post on and off for more than a week now, and frankly the original point is lost on me. It's not about dropping out of Chicago or chasing down the body I had at 23. It's just that I feel like I'm thisclose to nipping this thing in the bud, this one-step-forward, two-steps-back mentality that zaps my enthusiasm for wellness and short changes my total potential. It doesn't help that my world feels so small lately, so self-absorbed with short-term goals and material objectives (buy a toddler bed replace our kitchen table fix the floor boards the fridge is on its last leg ahhh), and now that Kara and Nathan are older and our family more grounded, it's becoming more important to me to leave a bigger mark on the world, to contribute in a way that lightens somebody's load and benefits society as a whole. There are certainly more important issues to focus on than the size of my waistline. Believe me, I know this. But right now, that has to be a priority, too.

Part of accomplishing this, I think, is working with my reality and not against it. For example:

The earliest I can get out of bed to exercise is a quarter to six. Not 5:15, not 5:32, not 5:40. Blame it on laziness, insanely late bedtimes, the rain, whatever. Either way, I need to acknowledge this truth and plan accordingly (i.e. no five-mile runs before dawn).

Commuting to the gym does not work long term. Sure, I managed to stay on task during most of my training for the Mini, diligently rolling out of bed half-awake two to four times a week to make the twenty-minute drive, but when motivation is at an all-time low, even the thought of packing a locker room bag is reason enough to scrap a workout completely. Plus, I hate starting my days without seeing Luke or the kids, and when I go to the gym, that's exactly what happens.

Luckily, there is a solution, in the form of a YMCA-like facility within walking distance of my house that has a decent enough fitness center, evening classes that mesh perfectly with bedtime, and reasonable membership rates to boot. Luke and I never explored this option before because he wasn't interested in hitting the machines, so it was easy enough for me to just go with my employer's "in-network" option, which is actually the higher quality gym, and suck up the drive. Now that Luke's been running again, he's more open to strength training and cross, so now it makes sense to go with something that accommodates our entire family. And no driving for me + free childcare for Luke = win-win all around. We'll sign up first thing next month, and I can't wait.

Working out after bedtime is the exception, not the rule, and never to be counted on, no matter how appealing it seems at the time. The longer I have to postpone a workout, the less likely it is to happen. (Running dates with friends aside, of course.)

Willpower is good, but abstinence is better. It's much harder to avoid eating the ice cream in your freezer than it is to refrain from buying it at all.

-------

Okay, seriously, enough navel-gazing already. To make up for the lack of cohesion in this post, here are shots of my kids from two weeks ago, at a park you've never heard of, where we hung out with people you don't know. Enjoy.

Bird-watching at the park's nature center.

Momma: "Kara, can you see anything?"

Kara (Enthusiastically): "No!"

 

Father and son on the move.

 

Stair-climbing to a lookout point.

 

Girl power at its finest, with friends from our Rensselaer days.

 

It all really boils down to this, doesn't it?

Mom in training

Here at work, March 1 kicks off a month-long spotlight on the annual performance review. Instead of being evaluated around the anniversary of your hire date, The Powers That Be decided to make it more efficient by subscribing to a more collective approach, setting company-wide deadlines for completing your self-evaluation and meeting with your manager to discuss what you're doing well, where you'd like to improve, and how the company can help. Last Monday was the cut-off for turning in self-evaluations, and it got me thinking: if there were performance appraisals for parents, what would they look like? Who determines if we're doing a good job? How do we know if we're getting better?

Before I had kids, I had pretty specific (if not slightly traditional) ideas of what it meant to be a good mother. I would stay home with my babies, for one, and spend oodles of time with them every day. I would learn to cook and bake so I could fill their tummies with mouth-watering, nutritious, interesting foods. We would visit the park and check books from the library and go swimming and biking just like the Von Trapps and hang out with friends and family and "talk out" our problems and always, always have naptime.

By those standards, Donald Trump would have kicked me out of the mommy board room at the end of my first maternity leave.

-------

The most glaring disconnect between the mother I thought I would be and the mother I am is the working. For better or worse, I am and probably always will be the primary breadwinner for my family. Full time, outside the home, Monday through Friday, with occasional travel and evening conference calls and the need to be accessible 24/7. I can count on one hand how many hours I spend with Kara and Nathan on a typical work day; usually I'm home long enough to eat dinner and rough around for an hour before we jump into Nathan's bedtime routine, followed by Kara's, followed by Nathan's sporadic cries and Kara's pleas of "Mommy and Daddy sit with you?" followed by oh, yeah, my husband, there you are, hello, now who gets to wash the dishes? Though really, since Luke cooks, it should always be me washing the dishes. It takes all my reserves just to complete fundamental tasks to get through the day; forget luxuries like updating a baby book or posting to my blog (a fact that doesn't escape my readers, for sure).

My most upsetting fail as a parent, though, is my struggle to stay patient in times of stress: Kara's random tantrums when asked to pick up her toys or brush her teeth; Nathan's restlessness in the middle of the night when bouts of cradling, rocking, and sitting beside his crib all fall short in their attempts to comfort. To me, THOSE are the instances where you demonstrate true growth in parenting, putting your "training" to good use and pushing beyond your natural instincts to achieve new results. I know hissing at Nathan to "just be quiet!" won't help him fall back to sleep; I know threatening to skip stories at bedtime won't encourage Kara to clean her pearly whites. Yet so often I'm the hamster on the wheel, repeating old behaviors, hissing and threatening in the hopes that this time it will resonate, but it never does. Instead, they get upset, and then I get upset, and then I feel guilty because shouldn't I know better by now? Is this really the example I want to be setting for them, that these are the only tools at my disposal?

But then Kara will shout "Oh, Mommy! There she is!" and clamour for a piggy-back ride, and Nathan will clench his arms around my neck before plopping into my lap for a story, and I feel so damn good about my relationship with them and how connected we are, and I vow to hold fast to the "quality versus quantity" mindset and stop measuring myself against other women. Even wonderful women whom I love and admire. When it comes to mothering, somebody will always outperform me in one way or another, but I have my own strengths, and my kids seem to like me just fine.

(For now.)

-------

When it comes to assessing future growth opportunities, I think that for as long as there are children under my roof, I will have to constantly re-grant myself permission to be anything more than "just" a mother--to also invest in my marriage, extended family, community, friends; my faith, work, education, health. How to get it all done? You can't. At least, I can't. So I'm trying to focus my attention on two or three tactical objectives for any given day and appropriately prioritizing the rest, all the while knowing that if my kids don't rank first from that perspective (their safety and well-being is always top priority on a grand scale), they sure as hell are going to come second. I stole the basic idea from our chief operating officer, who says he spends his hour-long commute to the office reviewing what's on his plate and determining where his presence will make the biggest impact. "Some days that means all eyes on human capital and not touching sales and marketing. It's all about making the best use of my time for the people that need me most for that moment in time."

As a mother and not a c-level executive, this translates into leaving my laptop at work to make a deposit in the "mommy bank" even if there's an end-of-quarter presentation looming over my head. Other times it's dragging my ass out of bed and working on my fitness when I want to cuddle with Luke instead. On the days I travel, my primary goal is to make the trip worthwhile for my company, and my roles as wife, mother, and fledgling athlete fall into place where they can. And so it goes, trading long runs for blog time, bedtime for work time, bedtime for date night, and understanding I will never do them all in the same 24-hour period. Some dreams will collect dust for years, dreams like earning a second master's degree or changing career paths or running my first marathon. I am slowly learning that the key to preserving my sanity is treading water when I know I could swim, being just good enough when I'd rather be great.

-------

When I was a junior in college, on the day a term paper was due, students were commiserating with each other over the hellish writing experience when somebody warned the professor to expect flaws in her draft, explaining her difficulty in managing coursework with on-going family issues and a part-time job to boot. She wasn't making excuses, exactly, more just disappointed for not meeting her own expectations. "If only I'd had one more night," she said wistfully. "Just one more night and I could have really given it my all."

My professor just shook her head.

"You can't look at it that way," she said. "We faculty don't expect our students to live in a bubble. We know you have other responsibilities and that school can't always be your focus. All we ask is that you do your best in your current set of circumstances. If that turns out to be A-level, great. But if not? That's okay, too. Just do what you can with whatever you've got, and show us that you're trying."

Hopefully our children will be at least that understanding when grading our performances as parents--if not now, then at least when they're grown and in the same boat. And if merit increases are involved, may they all be prorated.

Scrambled, grounded

This past Saturday I thought it would be a neat idea to run through five miles' worth of trails, ravines, and puddles in the woods.

On second thought, "run" probably isn't the best verb to describe my experience. When I first signed up to do the Outback Scramble at Eagle Creek Park back in October, I pictured jogging on an easy to moderately difficult trail while admiring the splendid reds and oranges of the changing leaves, smiling at chipmunks as they crossed my path, and bobbing along to Miley Cyrus on my iPod as I slowly but steadily made my way to the finish line. I ran two to three times a week after work and eventually hit four miles in preparation for the event to up my chances of completing the course, if not score an impressive finish. My company paid the registration fees for employees and a plus one for each of us, so I invited Katy of Must Be Motherhood--my Mini-Marathon training partner in crime (MMTPIC?)--to be my guest, and since Katy is a more seasoned runner than I am, I assumed the Scramble would be a fun way to gauge how we gelled together, pace-wise. Sure, the ads warned we'd get wet and dirty, but duh, we were running in the woods; I could handle some raw Mother Nature. I threw on my crappy maternity lounge pants, stashed a couple of towels in the car, and figured I was good to go. Having one 5K under my belt helped to soothe my fears about performance so much that my sole focus was making sure I arrived on-site in enough time to pick up my tee-shirt.

It wasn't until I found the entrance and spotted a sign that read "Are you sure you want to do this?!" that I started questioning my ability to, well, do this.

By the time I parked my car, encountering a helpful "Last chance to turn around!" sign just before pulling into a space on the grass, you could say I was a bit nervous.

I found Katy a couple of minutes later. We didn't know what we were in for but were optimistic nonetheless.

The calm before the storm.

Even talking with several experienced Scramblers and learning we'd made a crucial mistake in neglecting to bring gloves wasn't enough to faze us. "We can finish this in an hour, right?" I said to Katy as we took our place within the crowd. "Five miles at ten minutes a mile should have us done in about an hour."

"I hope so," she said.

You're smart people. I think you know where this is going.

Roughly an hour and twenty-five minutes later, we crossed the finish line--mud caked into the cracks of our hands, gym shoes soaked to the bone (at least mine were), and aches in muscles I didn't even know I had. Meanwhile, the awards ceremony was more than halfway through; I later learned that another member of my department finished the race in 45 minutes, arguably leaving us with a tiny window for improvement next year. Teeny-tiny. Positively miniscule, or whatever.

As you have no doubt already guessed, this was more than just a casual jaunt through the woods. In total, I would guess we only ran about a mile of the entire course; the rest of the time we were parting through trees, sliding down ravines, hiking up the opposite side, and generally praying to God for that branch not to break from the stress of our body weight or our toes not to lose their fragile grip on the various footholds barely visible beneath the earth. We dashed over puddles and balanced on tree stumps. We pulled up on bungee ropes and slid in the mud. And the kicker is that Katy and I weren't even all that slow; we never collapsed in a heap on the grass or took a sitting break or even stopped for very long to catch our breath. It's that the people in front of us wearing their afro wigs and mismatched pajama bottoms combing the grounds for rubber snakes and party hats just to shave a minute off their time were batshit insane.

 

My shoes will never be the same, will they? Sob.

Despite the face that my left arm and both thighs still ache from climbing around like a jungle cat, I would do it again in a second. I had a great time talking with Katy, who I first met at a local blogger thingy at Rock Bottom way back in March 2008, not even a full week after returning to work from my maternity leave with Kara, unfamiliar with the role of working mother and missing my baby something fierce. I felt supremely out of my element that night, to say the least, and quickly declined an invitation to bowl after dinner so I could rush home and cry into Kara's shoulder, clutching her with all the strength inside me after being separated for just two hours. Afterwards, I tried to keep up with everyone's blogs, anxious to make friends in a city that after three years still felt so foreign to me, but I was barely able to stay connected to the bloggers I knew while keeping my own site fresh and making sense of my routine. Failing on all three accounts, I quickly lost touch with everyone, and friendships were formed without me.

You'd think that living in the same city would have me at least bumping into someone at the grocery store, but almost a year and a half would pass before I saw Casey and Emily again, at BlogHer this past summer, once again during an emotional low point as Luke and I had a terrible time managing the kids and I was reeling from the loss of my Parents job, in addition to seriously examining the role that I wanted blogging to play in my life. I wanted to be approachable and happy, I hated being on the verge of tears in my sweat pants at 8:30 p.m. while they were dressed to the nines en route to a party, but I didn't have the strength to be anything else; those three minutes I spent avoiding eye contact in the elevator with a tight-lipped smile frozen on my face were the most awkward of my trip. I can only imagine what they thought of me, if they thought anything at all.

It's only now that Kara and Nathan are older and I'm feeling more confident in my ability to work and parent in tandem that I'm finally ready to reach out, only I didn't have to because Katy did it first by suggesting we train for the Mini together. In addition to enjoying the easy conversation, it felt good to know that at least one mom from that night would get a chance to see the real me feeling comfortable in my own skin. Plus, it was awesome to push my body in ways I've never used it before, on a beautiful day, with the sun shining brightly and Indianapolis fall weather at its best.

Not a bad way to earn my second number.

   

Dream managing

The last eight days have been equal parts frustrating, heartbreaking, and overwhelming. Kara came down with a 103-degree fever two Fridays ago that left her lethargic and achy, which gradauted to a nasty cough/cold, which led to Nathan getting sick, which led to ME getting sick and also taking three consecutive half-days at work to play point with Luke at home.

But being caught in the time-suck that is sickness isn't what I want to write about.

I want to write about a book I finished recently, a business parable I read for the book-club component of my company's leadership development program. Titled The Dream Manager, it's about a fictitious janitorial company struggling with high turnover and deciding that the best way to retain employees is to help them achieve their dreams--both personal and professional. The part I found most interesting was the simple call-out to name my dreams--one hundred of them to start with. The author went on to list the twelve areas of life that a person's dreams will likely fall into and recommended categorizing your dreams into short- and long-term goals, but right now I'm intrigued enough just with that very first thing. I'm a list-maker at heart, and seeing as I've been trying to update my 100 things meme from eight million years ago with minimal success, the dream exercise seems like the perfect solution. Though nothing's been committed to paper just yet (the author suggests keeping a dream book, and I am so on board with that), I've already spent a lot of time (29 years' worth, really) reflecting on what I hope to accomplish with my life; why not give all those hopes a permanent home on the Internet? And why not give it a whirl yourself?

Frema's Dream List, Big and Small (But Not Comprehensive):

1. Organize my filing cabinet.
2. Create a living will and trust (hangs head in shame; Suze would be so disappointed).
3. Get back to a single-digit pants size.
4. Earn another master's degree, this time in an area that has nothing to do with writing. Dietetics? Career counseling? Who cares, just sign me up.
5. Retire.
6. Celebrate a fiftieth wedding anniversary with Luke.
7. Watch my children graduate college.
8. Become a world traveler.
9. Learn how to swim properly--no more of this doggy-paddle business.
10. Read all of the original Nancy Drew hardcovers.
11. Read the Bible from cover-to-cover.
12. Become a foster parent and adopt a child. I want to do this so badly that I'm willing to forgo having any more biological children. (Luke is not open to more than three.)
13. Speak another language. (The two years of Spanish I took in high school hardly count, though I do have a favorite Spanish sentence I put together completely on my own: Tu mama lleva botas sin calcetines.)
14. Have clear skin.
15. Celebrate ten years with my current employer. (Only six to go!)
16. Start a 529 plan for the kids by the time Kara starts kindergarten.
17. Fund Luke's Roth IRA to the max every year.
18. Start a Roth of my own. (I do have a matching 401(k) through work, though, that I've been funding almost the whole time I've been there, so it's not like I'll be starting from scratch when I do.)
19. Build an emergency fund with six months' worth of living expenses. (Suze recommends at least eight months, but baby steps, people.)
20. Run a half-marathon in 2010.
21. Run a full marathon...at some point.
22. Consistently get at least seven hours of sleep a night.
23. Take my children to Disney World.
24. Visit the Grand Canyon.
25. Spend New Year's Eve watching the ball drop in Times Square.
26. Visit Harvard.
27. Own a brand-new bedroom set--everything from dressers and nightstands down to the mattress.
28. Figure out how to turn off the TypePad function that has those crazy-colored boxes appearing next to everyone's comments.
29. Learn how to sew.
30. Learn how to knit.
31. Relearn to crochet.
32. Make a quilt. 
33. Eat pasta in Italy.
34. Own a weekend getaway near the beach.
35. Visit Napa Valley and drink lots of wine with my husband.
36. Become better-versed in politics.
37. Move back to the northwest side of Indianapolis in the next five years.
38. Tour New England in the fall.
39. Meet Suze Orman.
40. Hear Tori Amos in concert every time she's in town.
41. Open a bed and breakfast.
42. Break my movie theatre hiatus; the last flick I saw was Saw IV more than two years ago, and if that's not enough to make you cry into your pillow, I don't know what is.
43. Learn how to cook.
44. Learn how to bake.
45. Have a signature dish that isn't spinach dip.
46. Play an instrument.
47. Ride an elephant in Africa.
48. Stop being terrified afraid of traveling to Africa.
49. Snorkel in Florida.
50. Get leid in Hawaii.
51. Read the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
52. Finish the Chronicles of Narnia.
53. Buy my children their first cars.
54. Pay off my student loans.
55. Enter my retirement years mortgage-free.
56. Read The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged again.
57. Visit the place in Austria where Julie Andrews and the Von Trapp children pranced around the fountain.
58. Visit Ireland.
59. Go whitewater rafting again.
60. Visit a park in all 50 states.
61. Learn how to back up my blog files.
62. Die of natural causes at an age older than ninety.
63. Own a brick home.
64. Introduce Kara to The Baby-sitters Club.
65. Starting in 2010, take a family vacation every year.
66. Own a Coach purse.
67. Own a house where I can designate one room as a library, furnished with wall-to-wall bookshelves, a fireplace, and several end tables and arm chairs with handmade blankets draped over the backs. Warm and fuzzy drinks like hot cocoa would be acceptable, but NO EATING ALLOWED.
68. Learn how to change a tire. (No, honey, not tomorrow.)
69. Build a home. (Not personally, mind you. Just oversee it.)
70. Learn how to garden.
71. Track down my first boyfriend, Nick, to make sure he's okay. I loved him for a long time when I was young, and he didn't always take care of himself.
72. Publish a memoir.
73. Apologize to Billy Hall from seventh grade for laughing at him when he gave me a love letter. I wasn't trying to hurt his feelings, but I was so surprised I didn't know what else to do. Plus, if we're being honest, he wasn't very popular.
74. Find Billy Hall's love letter.
75. See my parents retire.
76. Attend the Olympics the next time it's hosted by the U.S.
77. Open a used bookstore.
78. Make at least one real friend in this city of mine, the kind who won't crack jokes when you ugly cry and who knows your Starbucks drink by heart.
79. Relocate to the East Coast for a really cool job.
80. Learn to surf.
81. Print out all my photos from the last four years and place them in albums like I should have four years ago.
82. Learn how to stop interrupting people when they speak.
83. Start Nathan's baby book. (Sorry, son.)
84. Eliminate my tire gut.
85. Start a scholarship in my family's name for my undergraduate alma mater.
86. Watch my children live long and happy lives.
87. Hold my grandbabies.
88. Be a godmother.
89. Be a mother-in-law.
90. See Luke publish a children's book like he's always wanted.
91. Watch him achieve the rest of his dreams.
92. Call myself a runner without feeling like a poser.
93. Live to see a cure for all cancers, especially those that kill children.
94. Have a job in which I advocate for children.
95. Mow a lawn.  (NO, HONEY, NOT TOMORROW.)
96. Become a personal finance consultant. 
97. Re-connect more regularly with old friends.
98. Find a song I first heard in sixth grade (circa 1992) called "Happy" that they used to play on B-96 in Chicago.
99. Find a song I first heard in college on a friend's mixed tape called "Thankful for This Day."
100. Dance without feeling self-conscious.

What are your dreams?

Luke and Bree plus three?

Now that the kids are a little older and every second of the day isn't solely focused on survival, Luke and I are finally in a place to start putting the finishing touches on our home. We made the move last October, and yet we still have walls that are bare, pictures that are outdated or missing altogether (didn't we give birth to a son in January?), knick knacks that need staging, files that need organizing, boxes that need sorting through.... You get the picture. As a result, we're now re-evaluating the usefulness and/or necessity of every piece of furniture, every stitch of clothing, every picture, file, and knick knack that we have, the goal being to keep only those things that bring us the greatest joy, meet our basic needs, and make our lives a little easier so we can spend less time picking up after ourselves and more time doing. Yesterday, I gave an armful of clothes, five pairs of shoes, and several old duffel bags to Goodwill, and looking at all the new space in my closet was not unlike going on a first date that involves dinner and second base. Not that I could recite the technical definition of second base, mind you, but in my head, it's some pretty good stuff.

Anyway, when I received word that my Parents job was ending, another goal was thrown into the mix: make a little money. In this economy, it's all about the Benjamins, y'all, one man's trash is another man's treasure, and I've got my mind on my money and my money on my mind. (If you can think of other personal finance cliches, knock yourself out. Bonus points for those born from early nineties rap.)

ANYWAY. Enter the baby clothes.

As Kara (rapidly) outgrew each stage of (her precious, adorable) clothing, everything was laundered and folded and blessed and placed neatly into Tuperware bins to use for the next baby. Items ranged from onesies she practically lived in to a three-month winter suit she wore maybe once on a stroller ride with Daddy to a newborn coming-home outfit she never wore at all because as it turns out, eleven-pound infants were not built to wear such tiny things.

 

Another Parents.com gem taken about ten days after Kara was born, just in time for our annual Christmas card. In case you're wondering, the sleeper and the Santa hat both made the cut.

Since Nathan's closet is smaller, we've been going through his things every couple of sizes, but except for one major purging before we moved into the house, Kara's things were left relatively untouched. As she is our first precious baybeee, it was emotional for the both of us, going through those bins, and there were tears and heartfelt talks over what we wanted to hold onto and what we were okay offering to the world (for cash), and as I sniffled sadly into the sleeve of my shirt and lamented the possibility of never being in this exact stage again, I wailed for the zillionth time, "Do you really think we're done?"

My husband blew me away by replying that he really wasn't sure. However, he added, "I think we're sad for different reasons."

"What do you mean?" I said, recovering from my latest Ugly Cry.

"I'm sad about Kara never being this little again, not about not doing this again."

 

Kara at eight months, watching me leave for work on a random weekday morning. I can't remember if we kept these pjs or not. I hope so.

The topic of more children was revisited Saturday morning, after I reorganized Kara's closet to store our bassinet, which until today had been residing in our master bedroom, serving as a drying rack and/or storage unit, take your pick, and isn't THAT exactly what you want in your line of vision as you get ready to...well, you know.

As I refolded the few baby blankets we decided to hold onto and placed them on the bassinet's mattress, I asked Luke again, "Do you still think you're okay not having another baby?"

And he sighed, because hot damn, is he married to a woman with a one-track mind or what, but once again, he conceded, "Maybe not. I don't know. I don't mean to leave you hanging, but I really don't know," adding, "...but probably."

The conversation rarely ends here. There's been a lot of talk about other ways to add to our family; the door is currently open to either adoption or foster parenting, though Luke isn't ready to do any soul-searching on either one. Which is totally understandable, seeing as our oldest isn't even potty-trained and our youngest can't stand on his own two feet without assistance. Why do I keep pushing for an answer to a question that doesn't need an answer right now? Why can't I just be happy with the family we have and let the future work itself out?

 

Me at 40 weeks with Kara. If a third pregnancy isn't in the cards, I certainly won't miss looking like an item of interest on a whale expedition.

I'll tell you why. Because I don't want to worry about contraception for the entire length of my thirties. Because I don't want to drag out my child-birthing years with large age gaps between a second and third child. Because I know Luke wants to go back to work someday. Because I know we would want a parent at home with any kids younger than school age. Because we have other plans for our life, plans that don't include changing diapers, washing bottles, or rocking babies to sleep at two o'clock in the morning, and I want to know when those plans might possibly become a reality.

When it comes to physically producing another baby, Luke is very, very hesitant, not just because he's quite happy with the two we already have, the two who are extremely close in age and who try his patience on a daily basis, but he's also concerned about what a third pregnancy might mean for me. I developed pre-eclampsia with Nathan, and in hindsight, I think I probably had it with Kara, on a low enough scale that the doctors just missed it. If that's actually the case, I got it the second time around a little earlier, so who knows when it would rear its ugly head with number three. Plus, you know, gestation, so tiring, so draining, and recovery from a third c-section? I don't even want to think about it. Breastfeeding/pumping/weaning again? I DON'T EVEN WANT TO THINK ABOUT IT. It's just been in the last few months that I've finally started feeling like myself again. It started with the 30 Day Shred back in May and has climaxed these last couple of weeks as I build on my training for my upcoming 5K. I am 29 years old. I want to look and feel 29. I don't think that's unreasonable.

But then I think about never getting a positive pregnancy test again, never seeing a baby of mine on an ultrasound again, never feeling kicks and flutters inside my belly again, never having the most perfect human being I've ever seen in my life be removed from my uterus again, and I am filled with sadness. I remember being in recovery with Nathan a couple of hours after he was born, resting in bed, holding him in my arms, nuzzling his cheek and kissing his head, and telling Molly, "I understand why some women have eight babies." And I did understand. Those moments of getting to know him were worth every ounce of discomfort, every minute of confusion. I knew it with Kara and confirmed it with my son.

 

Nathan at eight or nine weeks, I think, donning a sleeper that Luke wore when he was a baby. I don't care if we get our next child at eight YEARS old, he/she is wearing this sleeper, damn it, family traditions and all that.

In the event, though, that we did close the pregnancy chapter of our lives and expand our clan using alternative methods, I think adoption or foster parenting would be a wonderful fit for Luke and me and the kids. I've always been drawn to the idea of taking in a child who needs a loving home; when I was in middle school, I told all my friends that I would never give birth to a baby, not ever, because there were too many children already in the world who didn't have anybody to love them. I spent half my junior year thinking about becoming a nun because I adored the sisters at my high school so much, so obviously lil' Frema's decision-making processes were a little extreme back then, but I still agree there are too many children who need parents and love and education and quality medical care, and Luke and I have such a good life to offer another child that I can't imagine not doing it. Though I can imagine not doing it, because of the oodles of money you have to shell out and the hoops you have to jump through and the fact that patience has never been my strong suit and it's already spread thin with two kids. A third might very well push me over the edge, however he/she gets here.

Nothing is set in stone either way, and like I said, Luke really isn't up for talking about this in-depth right now, but so far it seems like we might lean more towards foster parenting with an open option to adopt. I attribute my feelings to reading The Pinballs in fifth grade. What? It was a really, really good book.

 

Nathan around four months, probably, because he's still in his swing. Actually, it's Molly's swing, but whatever, we're all family around here.

Finally, I haven't written off going along with Luke's initial thought of just being happy with the two beautiful children we have. There's something to be said for leaving these early years in the past and enjoying the new experiences that come along with getting older. Luke and I have loved watching Kara come into her own, increasing her vocabulary, showing interest in potty training, delighting in chapter books, going down kiddie slides at the park. And Nathan is in one of my favorite baby stages--he can transport himself to any area he wants and entertain himself for longer periods of time, he's smiling and laughing and snuggling and kissing (read: sucking on your knee). And while he's once again taken to waking up at night, we can still count on getting in a respectable block of sleep. His newborn days were hard, so very hard, and it took us completely by surprise because Kara was such an easy-going baby, no gas problems, no screaming for hours a day despite being nestled safely in our arms. Who knows how a third child would rock our world?

We also have big plans for retirement savings and 529 plans and traveling the world and being charitable, and all of that takes money. The bigger our family, the smaller our financial nest egg will be for all of these areas.

 

This is a recent, non-Parents shot of Kara and Nathan oohing and aahing over the Lost A Sock family's shiny, red fire truck. It wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, bestowing my mad mothering skills only upon them.

The hardest thing about this decision is that there's no right or wrong answer. All of the reasons I've given for having another child are just as valid as the reasons for being done. In the end, it's not really about money for your golden years or nursing difficulties or your personal reserves, it's about what you feel called to do in your heart. All I can do right now is think and pray and continue to share my feelings with Luke and also SHUT UP ALREADY, because holy hell, the last thing we need as we work this out is pressure. Sometimes the best action plan isn't to search for answers, it's to let them come.

Flowering

It never fails; going for long periods of time without updating means I'm guaranteed to suffer from writer's block so severe that I spend hours reading blogs Twittering posting on Facebook avoiding the necessary task of "catching up," which in my case means covering as much literary ground as possible using the fewest number of words. Doesn't that make for fun reading! And yet here I am, catching up, anyway. Hopefully, for the last time, made possible by...

Parents.com
On Monday I wrote my last entry for "Parental Discretion Advised," the blog I religiously posted to three times a week for two-plus years on Parents.com. Farewell, mainstream Internet exposure! Adios, freelance check that covered my mortgage with six cents to spare! May we someday meet again.

All last week there was a lump in my throat when I thought about saying good-bye to two years' worth of writing and comments that spoke to some of the most exciting (and sleepless and heart-breaking and frustrating) times of my life; it didn't help that I spent hours combing through the archives and reminiscing over those early days when I was pregnant with Kara and everything seemed so simple--Luke and I eating dinner at Culver's every Friday, just the two of us, before our childbirth classes at the hospital; sleeping in and going for pancakes before ANOTHER trip to Babies R Us; cleaning our entire two-bedroom apartment in sixty minutes or less; and waiting, waiting, waiting in those final days for Kara's arrival, walking the halls of that spotlessly clean apartment, fingering sleepers, folding baby blankets, longing for her to come and wondering what it would feel like to hold her for the first time. Losing access to my Parents blog means losing a physical connection to those memories, and I am so, so sad about that, even though for months I've been ready to move on.

I'll talk more about the logistics of my Parents relationship soon; for right now, I want to focus on being thankful that I had the opportunity to share my experiences on such a widely popular platform in a way that padded my bank account, too. Also, a HUGE thanks to those of you who took the time to follow both blogs--steady traffic is the reason I was able to re-sign when other contracts were allowed to run out. I never, ever took those numbers for granted.

 

Luke and Kara at our family trip to the Indianapolis Zoo last Saturday. They're looking at rhinos. Or maybe ostriches. Whatever. The important thing is daddy-daughter pictures = adorable.

 

Nathan and I in front of the llamas at the petting zoo. My seven-month-old (!) is equally adorable but not as impressed with animal antics. He's probably entertaining himself by wondering why his mom thought it was a good idea to match that hat with those pants. If you ever bump into Clinton and Stacy, son, tell them Mommy needs pants that don't slide off her ass.

Priorities
There's been enough transition in my life lately--the closure of Parents, a new reporting structure and improved clarification of department goals at work--that have inspired me to evaluate where I funnel my energy and to make sure that my own values and goals are receiving more of my time and not less. I also attended a women's health conference on Friday where I sat in on sessions about life balance and intentional change, which got me to thinking about how often I use being a mother to young children as an excuse to avoid pushing myself in challenging situations. One of the speakers talked about her daughter's love for animals and her passionate desire to go on an African safari. She talked and talked and talked about it until her mother finally told her to GET ON IT already, and in the end, it only took her two years to save the money. Two years! She probably spent more than double that just sitting on her hands, lamenting the impossibleness of it all, and now not only has she achieved her goal, she's got the rest of her life to make another one come true. A simple story, but it was enough to get me talking with Luke about our personal goals and plans for the future. I really liked the exercises from those conference sessions, so maybe I'll post my responses here sometime soon.

Anyway, so far I've found that implementing little changes one day at a time has made prioritizing a more manageable task. In the beginning it was as simple as committing to my 5K training and letting go of the guilt I felt in abandoning the Shred. Silly, right? But that's the thing about me: if when I embrace a new project or activity I can't find a way to sustain it long-term (i.e. longer than ten days), I eventually give up and start pursuing the next new thing. For example: I love that I'm training for this 5K even if I don't love every minute of the actual training, and I sure hope I make it to race day, but after September 26, then what? Soon it'll get colder and the days will be shorter and I don't want to run on the trail after dark and how much will it cost me to buy warmer gear and what do you know, I've just up and killed my running career. If I can't stick with it, why even start?

But that kind of attitude won't get me anywhere, so I'm trying to change my way of thinking. Maybe this isn't a character flaw like I originally thought; maybe I just need to admit that I have a shorter attention span than the long-range planner in me cares to admit and start embracing it. Maybe it's OK if running (or whatever activity I'm into at the time) doesn't end up holding a permanent spot in my life; that doesn't mean it doesn't serve a purpose today. 

 

Here's Kara catering to her love of sharks. The pure joy on her face almost brings me to tears. I hope she's always this happy.

 

Meanwhile, Nathan caters to his own desires of spitting up on everything in his path--carpet, pillows, flooring, and favorite my work fleece. Thanks, son.

Money
With the loss of my Parents gig comes the loss of money. Money that we counted on to cover day-to-day expenses, invest in savings, and eat out as often as we wanted. Without it, things are tight. Not "We're going to lose our house" or "Which adult gets to eat today?" tight; more like, "Damn, PB&J for dinner AGAIN?" tight. We can pay all of our bills without issue, and we're still putting something away in savings and my 401(k); we've just needed some creative thinking, is all. 

We've attempted to follow a budget on-and-off for years, but this was the motivation we needed to stay on track. So we referred back to our old spreadsheets and totaled receipts every week and when we tallied our expenses at the end of August, we were only $83.43 over budget. People, this is HUGE. But obviously, there's still work to be done, as my last Parents check is due in the next couple of weeks, so if we screw up in September, we'll have to pull from savings to make up the difference. I've got a longer post brewing inside me regarding personal finance strategy, but I will share this: Learning how to auto-calculate sums in Excel? LIFE-CHANGING. You're welcome.

 

Kara at the White River Gardens, which is adjacent to the Indy Zoo and therefore covered in our annual membership fee. Doesn't it look like her hands are in full bloom? I love that. What a great metaphor as I (we) take my (our) next steps.

Whose horse is this and why am I beating it to death?

Listen.

It's been almost two weeks since I attended BlogHer '09 in Chicago, and the longer I wait to reflect on my time there, the less interested we all become. To be honest, I'm half-way there already, but it's important to me that I document this for my archives. Plus, I really think I can write about it in a way that highlights my unique experience instead of rehashing everyone else's talk tracks. So here I go.

To start: this has been a weird blogging year for me. On one hand, I'm the diligent worker bee, consistently posting updates to Parents.com three times a week (except for those first months I had Kara and Nathan. Slacker!). I rack my brain for story ideas. I follow comment threads. Occasionally I add to the conversation. And while I've never been the most sought-after blogger over there, my traffic is consistent and respectable. And that's the goal, right? A frequently touched blog with vibrant signs of life? All of that should have left me in pretty good spirits about going to BlogHer--meeting readers, sharing my blog with others, even just feeling like an active participant in the blogosphere as a whole.

It should have. But it didn't. Not when it's such a tightly controlled space representing such a segmented part of my life. And I when I say that, I don't mean that the editors influence our content. We've always been given free reign over the topics we choose to write about. No, it had more to do with a sense of longing on my part to reconnect with THIS blog, where I first fell in love with blogging. This is where I can paint a picture of my life using broader brush stroke, where I can curse freely and post silly little writings, where my history includes a life before children, before marriage, before my graduate degree and move to Indianapolis. It's the URL I type in whenever I comment on somebody's site (admittedly a rarity, these days) even if the most current entry is three weeks old because this blog will live longer than any freelance gig, and it's the one that best speaks to who I am. I have thousands of readers on Parents and only a few hundred here (Red Rover, Red Rover, let Parents.com readers come over), but on the World Wide Web, this is home. And I miss it. So, so much.

(Thus ends mushy love letter to a non-living entity. Get a room, Frema!)

I was so excited to attend the conference, but once I got there, I was surprised to observe how disconnected I felt from everything. For BlogHer 2007, I had a close-knit group of online gal pals to have dinner with and attend sessions with and overall just have a good time with. I even had a real-life blogging buddy as a roommate! And in the weeks leading up to it, we were in constant contact with each other through e-mail and comments, so by the time we finally met each other, we didn't miss a beat. We talked about our non-bloggy lives and rubbed bellies (well, mine got rubbed, anyway) and took pictures and laughed and hugged and enjoyed each other's company. BlogHer WIN.

This time around, my buddy didn't come, and I chose to bring my family instead of looking for somebody else. I didn't take part in any meet-ups or even make a concerted effort to find out who was going. My hectic schedule has resulted in me falling out of touch with most of my old blogging circle, so while I did chat with these ladies for a couple of minutes at the start of the conference, unfortunately, that was the extent of it. (It was so good to see both of you, though!) And I found that inserting myself into situations with new people (which I did during lunch and between a few of the sessions) wasn't actually the best way to connect with them. I much prefer doing that in the context of being around people I know and who know me.

Pair my loneliness with keeping tabs on work, learning quite suddenly about my Parents contract being allowed to run out, mourning the relationship I used to have with my personal blog, missing Luke and the kids, and feeling conflicted about the increased marketing presence (yes, I'm grateful lunch was free, no, I don't want my picture taken with a life-sized jar of spaghetti sauce), and it's no wonder I looked like a deer in headlights the entire time I was there. My sincerest apologies to those of you gracious enough to approach me and introduce yourselves, as I know I wasn't the most engaging or captive audience.

To top it all off, I only took two pictures while I was in Chicago. This one of Luke on the Dan Ryan driving to the hotel:

 

Taken with my smart phone for work. Fancy!

And this one of the "Room of Your Own" session featuring the women of MamaPop:

No, I'm not a professional photographer, why do you ask?

That all said, I did have a good time. I walked (most of) the BlogHer 5K hosted by PHAT Mommy, Nathan happily in tow via baby carrier, and after the stress of the last few days, it felt so good to just hang out with fellow shredheads and cuddle Nathan close as we traipsed along the lakeshore. I also liked most of the sessions, though a gem to keep in mind for next time is to attend sessions based on the speakers even if the topics themselves don't grab my attention as opposed to going on topic alone, because the former were the ones I found the most entertaining. Another nugget would be to attend on my own dime, because while I did glean some tangible to-dos for my company's social media strategy, I often felt restricted in how I spent my time. The MamaPop session was one of the few guilty pleasures I gave in to.

As I wrap up my time with Parents, I'm allowing myself to feel the loss of a job that, while tedious, also provided a legitimate reason to write about the minutiae of my life as a new mother, minutiae that otherwise might have gotten lost in the shuffle. I have a four-part birth story for Kara's baby book and monthly updates for Nathan's (your story's coming, son, I promise). I have a shiny new bullet point for my resume and a much better handle on how to negotiate a freelance contract, the details of which I will be more than willing to share with you when it's appropriate. Finally, I have a chance to return to my blogging roots and relax a little, to post because I want to and not because I'm being paid for it. Though I am still interested in being paid for it, so long as it's managed differently and the content doesn't compete with what already appears here. Amalah and her various columns for Alpha Mom spring to mind as an ideal compromise.

So, despite my personal turmoil, BlogHer '09 couldn't have come at a more opportune time. And when the logistics didn't meet my expectations, I thought about how much I loved loved LOVED meeting blog readers. Seriously, you guys can't fathom how much you made my day just by saying hello. Who knows? Maybe BlogHer '10 will be even better.

That is, if I can afford to get there without being sponsored by a jar of spaghetti sauce.

(Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

But I haven't given in to Starbucks

So! I had this brilliant idea yesterday. Seeing as I'm on the cusp of attending a three-day blogging conference where I'll be passing out business cards with my URL on it, I thought it might make sense to--wait for it--BLOG. I know! Am genius. Tell all your friends.

Wonderful things have been happening these last few weeks, many of them related to my job, so that's what I'm going to start with first. If you follow me on Twitter, you know that my employer dropped two happy bombs on us in less than one week: the half-year profit-sharing bonus we received in June and the CEO's decision to transfer ownership of the company to his workers through an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP). You can learn more about ESOPs from our trusty friend, Wikipedia, but basically it means that the founder has given his baby, the business he started almost twenty years ago with his personal life savings, to those of us on the payroll. It translates into additional retirement savings for every one of us and voting rights on major decisions involving the company's future, not to mention a more tangible motivation to continue our current level of success. It was an emotional day when he broke the news, and as I learn more about the specifics, I am blown away by how lucky I am for not only having a stable job in a shaky economy, but a rewarding job with a company that only projects good things on the horizon, not to mention the opportunities I have to advance my skills and challenge myself professionally. As a result, for the first time in my life, I'm taking a proactive approach to my career, assuming new leadership roles and working alongside my boss and other team members to develop strategies for our department that will enable us to work more effectively. I've also been involved with some pretty exciting writing projects that jazz me up like nothing else, even when those projects are equal parts frustrating.

So many women who work outside the home are miserable in their jobs because they are unfulfilled by what they do, making it even harder to be away from their babies. And it IS hard to be away from my babies; I never look forward to Monday even after the most hectic of weekends, I'm always craving more time at home. But I can say with absolute certainty that my time away from them is well spent. Finding myself professionally has inspired me to take a long, hard look at my priorities outside the office and how I want to spend my time (contributing to this is the fact that I'm still reading Eat Pray Love and feeling very connected to the idea of nourishing my personal core). I'm also reflecting on the lessons I want my children to learn from me about finding their passion and also turning raw lemons into lemonade. It's been an energizing process, to say the least, and enlightening, to form a relationship with my company that mirrors a long-term partnership, a marriage of sorts where each side is committed to giving as much as it takes and overcoming obstacles in a way that leaves everyone's dignity intact.

-------

Things have come to a bit of a standstill on the fitness front, and I can't believe I don't feel guilt about it, but I don't. Even with sporadic exercise and frequent surrenders to peanut butter cup blizzards, I've maintained an average loss of eight pounds, so I can't feel too bad when it's clear I must be doing something right. Unfortunately, an eight-pound loss post-baby isn't the same victory as an eight-pound loss before your body carries a child--my mid-section still looks three months pregnant--but hey, I'll take what I can get. I knew that the more time I allowed to lapse between workouts the harder it would be to get back into a routine, but life is still so topsy-turvy for us right now, and I hate to keep using that as an excuse, but it's also the truth. My girl crush on Jillian Michaels remains as strong as ever, but I'm at peace with sometimes (OK, a lot of times) choosing other ways to spend my time, knowing that life will settle down little by little and a night of rocking my son back to sleep won't always kill my desire to Shred the next day. I did buy some new gym shoes, though; that counts for something, right?

 

Nathan and me at Indy's "Unite to Fight: Race Against Prostate Cancer" family walk a couple of weeks ago. I carried Nathan while Luke pushed Kara in her stroller.

-------

The continued anticipation of my Tori Amos concert next month along with the recent death of Michael Jackson (and I'll admit it, I am still so sad about that) combined have restored my interest in music. Not that I ever stopped being interested, but most of Luke's and my CDs have been living in a beat-up Tupperware bin in the back of our closet since we moved into this house, and I've been too lazy to dig out stuff as it appeals to my mood. Yesterday I got to thinking about all the songs I've been out of touch with simply because I haven't been able to find them, and it kind of pissed me off to the point that I finally said ENOUGH and organized the CD rack we bought well before Nathan was born. Alphabetized and everything, though I do wish I'd been able to categorize discs for each singer/group in the order they were released. Baby steps, people.

I also made a mixed CD of what I consider to be Tori Amos essentials so I don't have to switch discs to hear all my favorite songs. One of the reasons I'm still attracted to her music after all these years is its ability to become relevant as I gain more life experience. For example, Boys for Pele freaked me the hell out as a God-fearing high schooler, but as a married woman with two kids and a more sophisticated religious and world view, I'm more comfortable with the appeal they hold for me. When From the Choirgirl Hotel came out my senior year, I couldn't get past her new band sound to appreciate the lyrics, but in just the last week or so I found new meaning in a song I had completely written off. The biggest surprise has been my fascination with The Beekeeper. Those who only like Tori when she's angsty have no use for this one, and I understand; I didn't like it, either, not until well after I had Nathan and the softness of those songs found a place in my head. Anyway, all of that to say that the Tori I became enchanted with at 17 is not the same Tori I relate to today. It's pretty awesome when music grows with you.

-------

I'm drinking coffee now. Me, the woman who swore she would never succumb to the drama that is depending on a caffinated beverage for survival, typically enjoys a thermosful doused with skim milk and sugar on the drive to work. With all the late nights I've had in the last month or two, I've been so tired in the mornings that one day when Luke asked if I would possibly benefit from a liquid pick-me-up I said HELL YES, WHERE DO I SIGN UP. And I said it again and again until Luke was grinding coffee beans as part of his morning ritual while I finished getting dressed. There's something to be said for sitting in my car with one hand on the steering wheel and the other balancing a drink, an act that wakes me up and transitions me from home to work in a way that my sans-coffee routine didn't. Maybe I feel more adult. Maybe the beans are that strong. Either way, I like it.

-------

Luke spent this past Saturday at a theme park with a friend, so Molly and I took the opportunity to co-host Baby Day 2.0, and the kids had a blast together. They are all at such different stages now that it's hard to believe there's barely a full year between any of them. The Baby Day sequel marked the third weekend in a row that we had company, and it's been so nice to invite people over and watch their kids play with ours. Kara's now getting regular exposure to her peers through the daycare/nursery at church on Sundays, but other than that, not so much. So it was great to have my sister Samantha and her family with us for the Fourth of July and my friend Maia and her two girls the weekend after that. With upcoming BlogHer taking place in the trenches of my hometown, we'll have a straight month of Saturday-Sunday fun.

Here, the photographic evidence:

 

Kara and baby Danny, who will celebrate his first birthday next month. I say this every time I mention him, but I swear he is the spit and image of my sister.

 

Auntie Samantha and Uncle Dan entertaining their first and only nephew, with Nathan loving every minute of the attention.

 

Baby Day 2.0. Kara's all, "Girlfriend, where did you get that awesome striped shirt-dress? Don't hold out on a sista," And Marin's like, "A fashionista never reveals her secrets."

 

Meanwhile, Nathan and Marin decided to pose as if they were attending their first Baby Prom. Nathan may have even tried to grab her hand.

 

Molly loving on her godson. (At least, he will be her godson, once Luke and I can secure the fall baptism date with our pastor.)

-------

And that's all, folks! I hate that my writing is so sparse here and that the entries I do post have to cover such a large span of time, but that's another aspect of life I'm slowly making peace with. Despite my fallen-to-the-wayside personal blogging, I'm super excited about BlogHer this year and learning new ways to feed my addiction increase my overall knowledge of social media. I'm probably one of the few attendees whose primary reason for going is to actually take part in the sessions. This year is weird, though, in the sense that I'm not part of any big blogger meet-up like I was two years ago, and since Luke and the kids will be with me, I doubt I'll make any of the parties. I'm OK with that, but I really hope to meet at least a few of the bloggers I read and/or who read me so I don't totally miss out on the networking aspect of the conference. I'm also debating whether I should bring my work laptop and try to liveblog any of the events. I've never been good with crafting blog posts on the fly (aka the reason this site so frequently collects dust), so I'm not sure how solid my entries would even be, but I'm definitely thinking about it.

Will any of you be in Chicago? If so, I'd love to say hi. And if you're doing the BlogHer 5K on Friday morning, you'll get to meet Mr. Nathan in person. If that's not reason enough to walk three miles before breakfast, I don't know what is.

Happy is as happy does

It's amazing that even though I'm now a wife, mother, and respectable working professional, I still have the overwhelming tendency to act like just like I did in high school. Putting off major projects until the last minute. Staying up ridiculously late. Pissing my time away because I don't have the wherewithal to focus. Or the ever-popular combo of staying up ridiculously late to finish a major project at the last minute only to piss my time away. Case in point: Last night I brought my laptop home to work on a draft of an article I've pledged to complete by Friday, only I've been so excited about scoring tickets to see Tori Amos in August that instead I fooled around on her Web site, searched for videos of favorite songs on YouTube, and searched for reviews of her latest album, a CD I'm desperately trying to make sense of. Two college degrees and I still don't know what she's singing about half the time. Some things never change.

But some things do. Things at home are still rocky on the maintainence front, and I often wonder if there will ever be a time where two baskets of laundry won't be sitting in our bedroom waiting to be folded, but I've worked on my priorities some to accommodate my new fitness regimen. After the kids are asleep, instead of picking up or working or freelancing or whatever, I've taken to shredding and showering right after (if from that statement you've concluded that before I was going to bed a hot, sweaty mess, you, my friend, would be right). Not only does this new plan have me exercising when I'm likely to have more energy, it's also a tangible way to prove to myself that personal health is more important to me than the state of my house. As of this morning I noted a loss of 8.4 pounds on the scale, and when packing for my overnight trip to Springfield, Missouri, I was able to include a pair of "transitional pants" I bought near the end of my maternity leave with Kara. I couldn't even button them a couple of months ago, so even though they still leave a faint trace of muffin top, I am immensely proud.

Aside from the weight loss, I'm not really noticing any other changes in my body---my arms aren't buffer, and my abs continue to be held hostage by my massive waterbed of a gut--but it's making all the difference in my mental health, I think, encouraging me to look beyond my comfort zone and experiment with new things. I've talked before about my company's willingness to sponsor employees in races throughout the city, so Luke and I participated in a 5K for prostate cancer a few weeks ago. I mainly did it as a way to incorporate a new fitness activity and enjoy some time outdoors; it wasn't until after walking the first mile did I realize this would actually be work, traipsing over hills and around bends and through globs of people who were there to honor a loved one, or even honor themselves. It was a great night, and while I don't count walking 3.2 miles in an hour and thirty-one seconds anything extraordinary, I already have visions of maybe possibly trying to run the Indianapolis Marathon's 5K in October. Many of the shredheads just finished a couch-to-5K program that I might take up closer to the time of the race (at which point I hope to invest in my first pair of running shoes), and to keep the momentum going, I'll also be doing the BlogHer 5K next month. Luke, Kara, and Nathan will be joining me in Chicago while I attend BlogHer Business as well as the general conference, and Luke was initially worried about managing the kids by himself that morning, so I volunteered to take Nathan along in the baby carrier. Quality time with my baby boy while enjoying the Windy City's lakeshore? Count me IN.

-------

This afternoon, Nathan had his four-month appointment, and typically before he begins his examination of the baby, our pediatrician asks how Luke and I are doing. I talked about exercising and bouncing back at work a little more smoothly than last time, and then I proceeded to talk about everything Nathan's been doing, smiling and cooing and rolling over with a vengeance (so much so that he's waking himself up at night; what's up with that?), and I must have been pretty enthusiastic because he made a point to comment on it.

"You sound good," he said as I nuzzled Nathan's neck and kissed his cheek (my son's, not the doctor's). "You look happy."

And I am. I feel like for the first time in my experience as a parent, I'm making good on my promise to take better care of myself, and I'm no longer using my kids as an excuse to avoid fulfilling my potential. Sure, it'll be awhile before I carve out any significant time away from home, and it's not like I'm running out to accomplish world peace, but it's amazing how a twenty-minute workout video has inspired me to examine other areas of my life. I'm ready to start thinking about the big picture again, the goals I have for my personal life and for my family with Luke and my relationships with other people. I want to be more a part of things outside myself and see how I fit in the world. I want to stop getting angry about things I can't change and be proactive about the things I can. Luke and I have recently started going to our neighborhood Episcopal church on Sundays, which I've enjoyed immensely. We talk about finding baby-sitters closer to home and one day take up running together. Today I opened a book for the first time since January and actually started to read it. It's Eat, Pray, Love, and I can't think of a better way to embark on this new life journey than delve into somebody else's. I really love it so far.

-------

The first part of this entry was written last night at home, but I'm finishing it in Springfield, where I'm spending the night so I can ride along on some sales calls with one of our reps in the area tomorrow. Once again, it was a bitch to leave my family behind, but on the other hand, being able to read something other than a magazine in a place other than the bathroom for longer than ten minutes? Well, there are worse things in life, let me tell you.

(Still, though, I'd rather be at home.)

-------

Finally, because you all have been such good sports about my sporadic posting and complete negligence in sharing adorable pictures of my kids, I leave you with this:

  

My little tornado of fun currently clocks in at 14 lb 12 oz, putting him in roughly the fiftieth percentile for weight, and at twenty-six and a half inches, he's close to the seventy-fifth percentile for height. But when it comes to being joyful, he's off the charts.

(I'd upload a photo of Kara, too, but this is all I had in my e-mail. Luke, if you read this tonight, be a dear and send one to me, will you? We're all about fairness here.)

Edited to add: Thanks, honey.

 

Kara turned a year and a half last week. Where does the time go? I swear she was just in my belly.

Ready for take-off

When you are the parents of a spirited fifteen-month-old and slightly crazed ten-week-old and you can barely keep up on your laundry or the bills or the mountains of dishes mating in your sink or even sleep for longer than four hours at a time, it's easy to let a trifle of a day like Easter slide right under your radar. You know, the day Jesus rose from the dead? Totally a Hallmark holiday anyway, right?

(Just kidding. So sorry, Jesus.)

Even though I do think we're getting better at managing our household and this new family dynamic, it's still way too easy to get so caught up in our day-to-day routine that we forget about the big picture, the issues that make up the fabric of our lives (and you thought it was cotton!). This is the first time in several years that I didn't at least attempt to do something extra during Lent, and we gave little thought to how we would introduce Kara to the concept of Easter. On a smaller scale, we didn't even talk about coloring eggs until yesterday, when Luke asked the question and I shot him down, focused on the mess we would make instead of the joy Kara would take from the activity. We just have so much mess these days that I hesitated to make more. "Next year," I promised him. "We'll do it next year."

We did have the wherewithal to make an Easter basket for the kids, but when you're shopping for items the day before, your choices are somewhat limited. Since we knew the Targets and Wal-Marts would be packed with last-minute shoppers like us and since we planned on boycotting candy this year, anyway, we went to Barnes and Noble to pick up some books and other non-edible goodies for our clan. Kara and Nathan each received a God-themed book and a few other things that we crammed into a bag we already had at home, a fun bag that a girlfriend of mine bought for me to store nursing accessories back when I was pregnant with Kara, a bag I didn't use at all with her and only a few weeks with Nathan, a bag I loved nonetheless for its bright colors and various pockets. The Frog and Toad dolls we found in the children's section fit perfectly right up front. The bunny you see was a token present we bought for Kara at a Cracker Barrel two weeks ago on our way home from Merrillville, but we stuffed that in the bag, too. You know, in honor of the day.

 

Luckily, our hodge podge pseudo basket went over just fine. We've already read My Little Book About God three times to Kara, who adores her Frog and Toad dolls, and well, neither she nor the boy had the slightest clue what today was, anyway, so really we could've done nothing and they would've been none the wiser.

Nathan turned ten weeks old yesterday, and even though I'm trying to cut myself some slack and not sweat the small stuff, I'm ready to move past the minutiae we're currently entrenched in and get on with our lives. I hate that our day is filled with maintaining the status quo in terms of laundry, dishes, and bills. I want to get back to long-term financial planning; home improvement; phone calls with friends; baby books and photo albums; books of my own to read; more time for writing; trips to the zoo; family vacations; hell, even long walks as an after-dinner staple instead of a special occasion when we're not too tired would do for now. I want us to make a place for ourselves in this new community we worked so hard to find. I want get involved with good causes, Luke and I both, so we can meet new people and make friends. I want to lose this effing baby weight and pay closer mind to what we're putting in, on, and around our bodies. And somewhere in the middle, I want to spend one-on-one time with my husband.

(That, actually, is already in the works. For our anniversary next month, Luke and I have booked a night in southwest Michigan and made plans with his parents to watch the kids while we enjoy an adults-only getaway. We won't even be gone a full twenty-four hours--Saturday afternoon to Sunday morning, tops--but I'm already so excited I can't see straight.)

I know that the time and energy I need to accomplish all those things aren't too far off. The older the kids get, the easier it will be to focus on more than one or two things at a time. And this is such a special time in our lives that the last thing I want to do is wish Kara's and Nathan's early years away. I love them so much, just the way they are. But after being in the pregnancy/baby grind for literally two years now, I'm ready to broaden my horizons a bit. I'm ready to see what my awesome little family is capable of--what I'M capable of. And sometimes, I'm tired of waiting.

 

Not that I don't LOVE getting up at 3 a.m. for this sweet litle face.

Ode to my fourteen-month-old*

Having a newborn in the house again has caused me to look at Kara in a whole new light, bringing an acute awareness to the big girl she’s becoming and also how young she is at the same time. When I look at my daughter and watch her run around our living room, flip through books, and dance to music, it feels like her infancy happened a lifetime ago. And yet, when I hold Nathan, I’m instantly transported back to last winter, when I spent much of my time camped out on the couch, snuggling Kara close to my chest, breathing in her smell, and allowing sleep to wash over the both of us every afternoon. Each day I’m reminded that these early moments really do fly by so fast, and each day I pledge to soak up every minute of my children’s babyhood, no matter how frustrating things get at times.

Kara has been such a trooper since we brought Nathan home. Her needs at this point are really pretty simple: read to her when asked (which is pretty much all the time), feed her when she’s hungry, change her when she’s wet/dirty, and overall keep a watchful eye. With two full-time parents currently in the house, it’s been relatively easy to keep her happy, but there are plenty of times when one of us is taking a shower or running an errand and the other is charged with watching both kids. And when that happens while Nathan is awake and wanting to be fed or held or changed, Kara is left standing there, holding her copy of Mr. Brown Can Moo! Can You?, and I feel a wave of sadness that she’s dealing with so much change at such a young age.

But she’s hanging in there. When one arm is cradling Nathan and the other is balancing the spine of her book on my knee, she stands next to me as close as she can, a big smile smeared across her face, content to hear the familiar words of her beloved story even if she can’t sit on my lap. When the baby's passed out in his swing and it's just me and Kara, she revels in the quality time, having completely forgotten that I snapped at her for clawing at her brother's face only minutes ago. Sure, she's thrown her share of tantrums these past few weeks, but for the most part, she is patient with us as Luke and I master this new juggling act, taking what she's given and enjoying the moment for what it's worth. She'll take story time however she can get it. She'll take MY time however she can get it. And boy, am I happy to give it to her.

Before I had even one child, I would read about one of my favorite bloggers giving birth to her second, see adorable pictures of said newborn, and almost immediately forget the older one even existed. Because babies are shiny and new! And toddlers and young kids...well...they're not. And when I thought about having my own children someday, I worried that my love for a shiny! new! baby would be so all-consuming that Number One would seem run-of-the-mill by comparison. Now I realize how silly I was, because nothing in the world, not even Nathan's intoxicating baby smell, could make me view Kara as anything less than extraordinary.

 

* I originally wrote this entry for my Parents blog, but for reasons I can't explain, I wanted it to live here.

You're mine, '09

A few days ago, while reading through my Holiday archives, I realized that 2007 was the first year in the history of this blog that I didn't write a post in honor of the New Year. Don't believe me? See for yourself:

So Long, Farewell, 2004

The Best of 2005, The Worst of 2005

On the '06

My references in the first two posts are fairly obvious, but in hindsight, I'm hoping at least a handful of readers back then caught the Jennifer Lopez one.

This year, there's no trace of pop culture in my title. Instead, the focus is on me. Because in 2009, the focus will be on me.

Well, as much as it can be when you're a wife and a mother to two small children.

 

Here I am at the end of 2005, posing with Luke for the closest thing I have to an engagement picture. It's one of my all-time favorites, so much so that I recently framed it for viewing in our new house. The issues I was facing seemed so monumental at the time--deciding whether or not to Live in Sin, figuring out how to share myself without losing myself, dealing with the whole religion thing--but now they've been resolved for so long that it's hard to remember how stressed I was about them. However, I can still appreciate that for the first time in my adult life, I was making decisions that forced me to...not take a stand, exactly, but to separate from traditions and values I'd experienced in my family and held dear for a long time, even when they no longer fit with the woman I had become. They are decisions I stand by to this day, and there are no regrets, just a feeling of peace.

Also, can I tell you how much I loved my look here? The hair cut, the color, the oversupply of clothing from New York and Company, The Limited, and Bakers? I don't care if it sounds superficial, I loved my style, and I love that it made me feel good about myself.

 

Less hair but more attitude. I was a married woman with the world at her feet!

 

More hair, less attitude. I was a new mother with the world falling at her feet! (At the same time I was falling in love.)

 

Just...more. More, more, more. More hair, more attitude (though not always the right attitude), more weight, more babies.... Just more. (Random aside: Recovering from one pregnancy and immediately starting another meant that I couldn't fit into my wedding rings for the entirety of 2008. Way to go, Frema!) 

(Also random: I look at the gradual decline of my physical appearance and can't help but think "Going...going...gone." Though I challenge any brand-new mother and/or woman who's 33 weeks pregnant on Christmas morning to take a picture worthy of Glamour Shots.)

-------

Looking at these images, I feel a wide range of emotions. On one hand, I'm proud and amazed at how far I've come. I went from being a twenty-something woman with a list full of unachieved goals to being a master's-degree-level graduate, Circle City transplant, Suze Orman devotee, wife, mother, working mother, and finally, a homeowner. My secret pre-30 wish list has actually come to fruition.

On the other hand, I still have a long way to go. I'm still learning how to remain a well-rounded person outside all those titles. And it's hard--really hard. My reading is spotty and mostly confined to books I already know inside and out (see: Flowers in the Attic series), mail-subscription magazines, and Archie comics. Eager to delve into something meatier, I started rereading Atlas Shrugged sometime over the summer, but half-hour lunches meant I couldn't get through more than 15 pages per sitting, and soon I was abandoning it altogether to surf the 'Net and chat on Gmail. And my personal blogging has been sporadic for just about the entire year. I'm sadder about that last one more than words can say.

Some bloggers don't pay much attention to their archives, but I'm in mine all the time, trying to remember a detail that long ago disappeared from memory, laughing over my half-hearted obsession with Weight Loss Wednesday, reveling in Tragic Love Friday, heaving a sigh at all that baby talk. I used to rely on this blog not only as a source of entertainment but also as a way to keep me focused, to remind me of my goals and dreams and how they fit into the core of who I am. And in this last year, it took a backseat as I navigated through my first round with motherhood. Suddenly, I couldn't come home from work and hammer out a post because now there was a baby I was away from all day, a baby I loved more than my own life, and I had to make every minute count. Once she went to bed, I was balancing household chores, domestic projects, freelance work, occasional day-job work, phone calls with loved ones, and oh, yeah, time with my husband.

For a while, I thought I could manage everything by just staying up ridiculously late. As it is, I'm rarely in bed before midnight. But when I really, really push it (like right now, writing this draft at one-thirty in the morning), I totally ruin myself for the next day. I'm less productive at work and less present at home, and all the progress I made in whatever venture the night before pales in comparison to what I'm missing right in the moment.

To be fair, a lot of these balancing problems could have been solved if only I were more efficient in how I managed my day. But one big lesson I've learned this year is that being a parent isn't always as big a motivator as you'd like when it comes to correcting your flaws. Before having Kara, I thought I had it all figured out; I came back from maternity leave and arranged for a 7-3:30 work schedule, agreeing to a half an hour for lunch, so that I could put in a full day and still spend oodles of time with my family. I thought that as long as I kept my nose to the grindstone, I'd be home by four o'clock, help with dinner, and enjoy some downtime with Luke and Kara before it was time to put her to bed. I'd get a few things done after she went to sleep, I'd be in bed by ten-thirty, tops, and get up the next morning with enough energy to do the whole thing again.

I don't know what I was smoking.

In the beginning, it was OK. I stuck to my work schedule no matter what time I turned in, and I tried my hardest to stay focused. But eventually my true colors were begging to shine through, and I was catching up on the All My Children message board, reading blogs, and sometimes just sitting there like a deer in headlights when I should have been posting to the Web site, writing a newsletter, and so on and so on. Which sometimes meant I was staying late just to make up for lost time. At night, I'd sit in front of the computer to write a post for Parents and suffer from a complete and total brain fart, sometimes wasting a full hour before committing anything to the screen. By then Luke would long be asleep, I'd be bone tired, but by George, I had to publish my column. Even when it resulted in me being too tired to get to work on time. These days, my actual schedule is closer to 8-4:30. If I'm particularly on the ball, 7:30-4. And again, that's if I'm not running late, which I have been lately, since things have been so busy.

As terrified as I get sometimes over having two children less than a year and a half apart, I truly believe it's a blessing from God, because He knew if left to my own devices, I'd continue to piss away my time until the next one came along and upped the stakes a bit. If Luke and I decide that two is enough for our family (and there's a good chance we will), then come February 2009, this transitional baby-making phase of our life will be over. Then the focus will shift from adding humans to simply maintaining what we have and finding a way to make everyone happy. And after years of constant change, I can't tell you how excited I am just to simply be. No more job searching. No more house-hunting. No more new-additioning (at least for one calendar year, please, Lord have mercy). Just taking the hand we've been dealt and owning it, embracing it, and improving it every day.

For the big picture, this year I pledge to:

• Reclaim my body
• Remember my priorities--to my family, to my work, and to my own mental well-being
• Own Luke's and my parenting decisions with more confidence and drown out all the background noise/unsolicited opinions/general assvice, even when given with the best of intentions
• Sleep more. Seriously, the ability to accomplish all these other goals will be directly affected by how many zzz's I catch

On a more tangible level, I want to:

• Write a will and establish a living trust like I said I would a year ago
• Fully fund a Roth IRA for Luke
• Pay off our new (used) car (Yes, we finally upgraded Luke's dying Lumina! More on that in another post)
• Start a true emergency fund, to be used in emergencies and not when we come up short on the Visa bill
• Take a family vacation
• Take a kids-free vacation
• Establish and stick to a bedtime routine (Turns out they're not just for babies!)
• Post on my personal blog at least once a week
• Read at least one new book a month
• Incorporate exercise into my everyday life
• Find a church in our new community and attend regularly
• Be more strategic about how we spend my quarterly bonus money

How I'm going to make all of this happen, I'm not yet sure. But the desire is there, and wanting it's half the battle. Right? Oh, wait, it's knowing that's half the battle. My apologies, Joe.

This is not for you

When I first started blogging in 2004, I didn't have a set list of goals or a long-term plan. I didn't know about revenue streams or the Long Tail or Technorati. I blogged because writing has always been important to who I am, and publishing online was the best way to do that at the time.

And four years later, it still is. Though the medium is different from handwriting a journal, the result is still the same: putting my thoughts into words and making sense of what I feel. Working through complicated emotions to get to a better place. Not all of my entries are like that, of course, but each time my fingers are brave enough to verbalize the tangents in my mind, there is always a sense of clarity. And I'm thankful for that. I'm thankful to have a comfortable way to express myself. And I'm thankful to have found friends through this Web site who like to read about me and my family and want to see us succeed.

But I'm not writing this blog for you.

I got to thinking about this because of a comment thread on a blog I've been following for years. Julie from a little pregnant always talks frankly about her struggles with infertility, child-rearing, and growing her family. Not even two weeks ago she gave birth to her second son, and on Sunday she shared with the Internet her decision to stop nursing her baby. A brave move, to be sure, because as we veteran blog readers all know, just about every breastfeeding discussion turns into a heated debate filled with catch phrases like "breast is best," and "I had formula and I turned out fine," and nursing advocates post facts about the substandardness of formula, and at least one formula feeder refers to members of La Leche League as Nazis (which is definitely one of the most insulting things I've ever heard. SO inappropriate), and it's always the same argument over and over and over until the blogger closes comments and everyone takes a cold shower. You know, because they're all heated up.

Anyway, as usual, the comments started out innocent enough: women sharing their nursing stories, both positive and negative, and then commenter #120 (if you check it out, remember that author names appear below their comments) tells Julie to "suck it up" because she herself "kept at it and it got better." Of course, readers jump out of the woodwork to defend Julie, #120 comes back to explain her position, and yet another person (#173 on this entry) laments over everyone's inability to respectfully disagree with Julie's "position." She said:

I agree with the decision not to nurse, but I don't agree with the notion that nobody is allowed to disagree on a public blog on the very public internet. Isn't sharing a ideas part of why people write on the internet? If they couldn't handle disagreement, they'd just talk to their best friends. To me, it lessens the value of the blog if everyone acts like a rabid dog, needing to defend the author, every time someone states an opinion that isn't popular here.

A few more popped up like that, and it really bugged me, but I couldn't verbalize why. It IS a public forum, right? Most bloggers DO appreciate comments, right? So they should be strong enough to let presumpious remarks roll off their backs, right?

Um, no.

I don't where people got the idea that a blog entry about someone's life is just as open to criticism as a newspaper article or research paper. Not all topics are deserving of the same type of scrutiny. For example, in this case, Julie blogged about why she plans to discontinue nursing. She talked about why it wasn't working for her, how she tried to rectify the situation, and why she ultimately decided to let it go. She acknowledges that breastmilk is the nutritionally superior food source, and she doesn't try to make formula sound better than it is. She just says that bottle feeding is the choice that allows her to hold onto the most of her sanity.

She's not writing an op-ed for the American Academy of Pediatrics. She's not trying to turn the tide against nursing. She's just talking about her life. On her personal Web site, a site that's not supposed to serve as a be-all, end-all source of information. So when people disagree with her, they're not disagreeing with facts. They're disagreeing with her life. They voiced confusion over Julie's reasons for quitting and disappointment in her choice, neither of which were up for public debate.

And that's what pisses me off. Oftentimes people get so caught up in taking a stand for their cause they forget there's a human being on the other end of the computer, reading words that were no doubt meant to shame and hurt and judge, words that'll be ignored for that very reason. How many women continued breastfeeding because somebody called them a fuck-up or a terrible mother? Whatever happened to "You can catch more flies with honey than vinegar"?

But this isn't about breastfeeding.

I read enough blogs that it's not uncommon for someone to post a sentiment I don't agree with. One of my favorite reads recently talked about how she thought she might have been pregnant with a surprise third child, and how if she had been pregnant, she would have considered having an abortion. Talk about hitting close to home! I'm pregnant with a surprise baby, and abortion was never an option for me. It was sad to think about that being an option for her.

But you know what? Despite my strong feelings, I stayed out of her comments section. Not only did she not ask for my opinion, my opinion didn't matter. She was obviously in pain about possibly having to make the decision in the first place; nothing except "Take good care" would have been the slightest bit helpful. Plus, I deeply respect this woman as a writer and a mother, and if part of the reason I enjoy her blog is because of her wit, then I'm going to assume she's an educated person who can manage her own life. And if she's not? It's not my place to tell her what to do, especially since there's nothing I can do to help her. If she was pregnant and she did have the baby, it's not like I could pinch-hit for a midnight feeding or baby-sit her older kids or even bring dinner.

(Unless it was spinach dip. But I digress.)

It's been said a thousand times before, but I like to think of visiting another blog as visiting another person's home. If I wouldn't say it in someone's home--better yet, to their face!--I won't say it on their blog. That's not to say I always keep opinions to myself, but it's important to remember what it is you're commenting on. If my opinion has the potential to hurt someone's feelings, I don't say it. It's just good manners. And manners have a place on the Internet, too.

One of the best blog taglines I've seen is from Erika of Effected: "More for my benefit than yours." Mainly because it's so true. I love writing this blog, and I love the community that's been fostered here, but I don't owe anyone anything. I'm not (nor do I try to be) everything to all people. I never promised to make every "right" choice or promote a certain agenda. I'm here to have fun, document details and thought processes that might otherwise get swept away, and gain new persective as I review what I've written over the years.

I'm also here for your mom, but I'll let her explain that one.

[end rant] 

Closer to Free

Geez, where have I been? You would think I have a full-time job and a family to tend to. Hmmm.

I'm working on a post about my high school reunion, but today is Luke's and my second wedding anniversary, so it's only right that I take some time to talk about marriage after two years in the trenches.

In the weeks and months before my wedding, I was a nervous wreck. I loved Luke and wanted to be with him, but I was also afraid. Afraid of having to negotiate who I was (long-time readers will remember how conflicted I was over changing my denomination), afraid of being a selfish wife, afraid that my ambitious nature would eventually clash with Luke's tendency to go with the flow. But second-guessing is a part of who I am. I keep one foot in the moment and the other on the fence, always looking for the first sign of trouble, searching for a sign that something is not meant to be.

But on May 12, 2006, standing in front of our pastor as the wind wrapped around our gazebo like a blanket, surrounded by family and friends, I believed our love was enough. I believed our future would be more than worth any hardships that came our way.

And there have been a few, the most significant one thus far being our decision to keep me at work and Luke at home. On paper, it was the best way to achieve all the goals we had for our family, but in my heart, I struggled. The weekend before I went back, there was a lump in my throat that would not go away, a proverbial devil on my shoulder that told me to be angry with Luke for not doing everything in his power to "let me" be a stay-at-home mom, to resent him for positioning me as Breadwinner, a title I never wanted.

I knew marriage would be hard, but only in the broadest sense. For the first time, Hard was tangible.

But I swallowed my tears and bit my tongue and became the person my family needed me to be. It wasn't easy, but here we are, two and a half months later, and there is a rhythm to our life that I never thought possible. Now I am completely sure it was meant to be this way, couldn't work any other way, and both our marriage and our daughter are better for it. It was only after saying good-bye to my preconceived notions of Wife and Mother and letting the good of our family take the lead that I found a level of fulfillment that couldn't have been achieved otherwise.

In the media and in our personal lives, relationships solidify and dissolve like snowflakes that stick to the pavement until the sun melts them away. And now, just two years into marriage, it's easier to understand why. I can't count how many times I've given Luke the cold shoulder over a perceived injustice, content to bask in self-righteousness, only to hang my head in front of him the next morning--unable to meet his eyes, tears running down my face--and stumble through an apology.

It's frustrating to rank second in the interest of the whole. It's embarrassing to say "I'm sorry." It's much easier to scrap the whole thing and start over with someone new.   

At our wedding, I thought love would be the glue that held our marriage together, but now I know it's commitment. Love is easy. People break up all the time and talk about how they still love their exes. Every person has traits worth falling for. But to accept their shortcomings? Forgive when they hurt you without keeping score and STILL be in love? Nothing is more difficult.

Or more rewarding.

When I was senior in college, in a class that placed my faith-based coursework in a wider context, my professor said something that really resonated with me. He said that with each choice you make, you become more free.

On the surface, it seems contradictory--when accepting one path, you inevitably say good-bye to another--but it's through the process of decision making that we open ourselves to advancement. My life with Luke is proof of that, because prior to our wedding, we were in a constant state of flux: should we say "I love you," should we move in together, should we tie the knot. Once we did that last thing, a brand-new set of choices lay before us, more sophisticated than those we contemplated before, but not as fundamental. Suddenly we were concerned with how to manage our careers, where we wanted to live, and when to expand our family.

These days, our jobs are chosen, for now. Housing will soon sort itself out. And we have the most beautiful baby I've ever seen. Now it's time to sort through the details, like saving for college and building retirement and bringing more children into the mix. I don't have to worry about whether or not we'll make it. The alternative is no longer an option.

Happy anniversary, honey.

-------

Visit Parental Discretion Advised to read about Kara's upcoming foray into cereal, my new parenting mantra, and the details of a very special Walgreens trip. You won't be disappointed.

Let Freedom Ring

There is a buzz in Indiana today as Hoosiers flock to the polls; apparently the idea of actually influencing the selection of a party candidate has us all atwitter, because according to the local paper, turnout is more indicative of a general election than a little ole primary.

I hit my polling station on the way to work, and as I parked my car, I realized that for the first time in my entire life, I was truly excited to vote. In fact, it wasn't until very recently that politics meant anything to me at all.

Growing up, the whole function of government seemed a mystery not unlike the Bermuda Triangle. Sure, I took the Constitution test in eighth grade (and passed, lest you deem me a complete moron), and it was interesting enough, but when it came time to apply those principles to the world around me, it was too overwhelming. Hell, I could barely get a handle on basic algebra--there was no way I felt smart enough to talk about the merits of those running for office. My parents are loyal Republicans, and I have memories of watching the news with them at dinnertime, my father complaining about Mayor Daley's latest crime against the Chicago Fire Department, my mother nodding her head in agreement, and I remember feeling slighted on their behalf, too young to do anything but pretend I understood. When I was eight years old, I distinctly remember asking my mom why she didn't like Michael Dukakis and her telling me he wanted to kill babies. Kill babies! I was horrified. Lil' Frema had visions of men in uniforms lined up against a concrete wall, cradling newborns in their arms, each waiting to rid the planet of their vast uselessness.

(And here I must tell you writing that last paragraph was really uncomfortable for me, and in no way do I maintain a cavalier attitude towards abortion, but I'm assuming you all can appreciate my attempt to liven up a hazy childhood memory with the humor that accompanies a child's literal interpretation of a statement way beyond her level of understanding. You got that, right? We're still friends? Good.)

That political naiveté stayed with me into early adulthood. The first time I was eligible to vote was during the 2000 presidential election, but I was attending school in Indiana, and my permanent residence was Illinois, and I didn't know enough about the issues (or care enough, if we're being honest) to request an absentee ballot at the time. I did vote in 2004, at which time I knew enough about politics to label myself a Democrat, but I was only slightly put off by the results, not emotionally invested in John Kerry by any means, and certainly not heartbroken over the outcome.

But now I am different. Now I am motivated by our current state of affairs to want better for my family--specifically, for Kara. Now I follow the news to learn more about the goings-on in my city and surf the Web to become more educated on which candidates best meet my criteria for local and national leadership. Luke and I are currently rooting for Barack Obama, so much so that we seriously considered attending one of his rallies last night, but having a four-month-old baby who wants to be fed and changed and entertained on her terms, not ours, was reason enough to stay home (read: go to Applebee's, where we didn't have to wait in line for two hours and beg for admittance). But we listened to several of his radio interviews, and we watched last month's debate, and we talk constantly about how inspired we are by his vision and his ability to stay gracious under fire.

Also, his winning smile. So dreamy!

 

I like Barack and I cannot lie.

But this post isn't about who I voted for or why (so please don't flame me for my opinion, I have a "Delete" button and I'm not afraid to use it). It's about my new appreciation for the way leaders are chosen in this country and how grateful I am to have a voice in the process. This morning, I almost teared up reflecting on how lucky we Americans are to be able to elect our commander-in-chief (however imperfect the process may be) and support our favorite without fear of repercussion.

And Kara is lucky, too, because finally, she has a mother who cares.

The names have all changed since you hung around, but those dreams have remained and they're turned around

Well. I'd like to think you guys are ready to welcome me back with open arms, but after gauging your responses to Kara's recent posts, it appears my presence on this blog is obsolete. Luckily, I'm the parent, and this is not a democracy.

(Your mom's a democracy!)

Clearly, I'm feeling much better.

Ever since I posted that last entry, I've been debating when to return. As much as I love being a part of the blogging community and using this site as a means for creative expression, the way in which I was participating needed to change. I had gotten so caught up in posting for posting's sake that I forgot it should mean something to me. Tuesday night would roll around, and I'd want to talk about my upcoming high school reunion, but instead I posted a Weight Loss Wednesday because that's what I was supposed to do. So I did, even if I didn't want to. Thursday night would come, and I'd be inspired to write about the latest Clinton/Obama debate (first forty-five minutes equalled BOGUS), but instead I poured through e-mails about the return of Tragic Love Friday because tomorrow was Friday and that's what I was supposed to do. So I hatched up a few plotlines, even if I didn't want to.

You see the pattern, yes?

I wanted to return but wasn't sure how to break that cycle. I wanted to get back to the days where I blogged because I wanted to, not out of obligation. So I filed those questions away and focused on writing for Parents, trusting that when the time was right, I would know.

This past Saturday, I knew.

It happened at a conference here in Indianapolis, where local bloggers came together to provide insight on how to enhance one's personal and professional presence on the Web. I originally signed up to learn more about blogs as they relate to smart business practices but walked away with renewed energy for my own blogging vision and met some great people who will serve as blogging resources for me in the future. (If only I'd met Doug Karr and Chris Baggott before teaching my class! Missed Opportunity, you are a son of a bitch.) Like I said earlier, this blog is not a democracy. I like that it makes people happy, and I really enjoy the conversations, but ultimately, it's an archive of my life. A place where I can assign words to my feelings and explore new territories and reflect on what kind of person I want to be. And in order to make it worth my time--something I have much less of these days--I have to do it on my terms.

So I'm making some changes.

Effective immediately, I'm discontinuing all weekly features on this site. No more Weight Loss Wednesday, Brain Fest Friday, or Tragic Love Friday. I'll still write about health and wellness, but I won't let the calendar dictate when I do so. I'll still pose funny questions for us to laugh over, but I'll let them come naturally instead of forcing inspiration when it doesn't exist. And as for Tragic Love Friday.... What can I say? The whole idea of a part three started with readers volunteering to help, but when push came to shove, nobody had the time. And I completely understand. Hell, I don't have the time, and it's my damn story. A bunch of us came up with some great ideas, and hopefully, one day, I can do something with them. But until then, we'll have to make do with lil' Frema's original masterpiece, which I still think is pretty effing awesome, and if you haven't read it yet, now you know there's one more way to kill time at the office. You're quite welcome.

The new plan is to start including blog posts about topics that are important to me but haven't received much air time here in the past. Perfect example: politics. I am not a political guru by any means--ask me to name the mascot for the Democratic party and I will probably mimic a deer in headlights--but now that Luke and I are parents, now that we're laying down roots in Indianapolis, now that I'm old enough to appreciate how politics affect my quality of life--I'm determined to take a more active interest in our local and national elections. I want to figure out who I stand for and who stands for me. I want to ask hard questions and receive thoughtful answers from you. I've been afraid to tackle issues like that in the past because I am super sensitive and HATE the idea of someone judging me just because I hold a different opinion, even though I read posts from plenty of bloggers with completely different views and always appreciate seeing issues from other angles. As Doug said at Smaller Indiana's conference on Saturday, "Afraid of conflict? Don't blog." And not blogging? Is not an option.

I want to learn more about the opportunities available through blogging and make that learning process more transparent here. I presented a Blogging 101 session at a writing conference last fall. I studied blogging issues for a whole freaking semester! Why didn't I link to that PowerPoint? Why not post my syllabus? I don't know. But I won't make those mistakes again. 

I also plan to do a better job highlighting the writing I do for Parents.com. I'm not sure why I downplayed this before--I'm proud of the work I do for them, just as if I were freelancing for a print publication. Plus, I've found that with my friends who write for other Web sites, the more they link to those gigs in their personal blogs, the more likely I am to read them. I trust that's the same for you. If not? Um, that's OK, too. (Frema says through gritted teeth because total monthly page views play a key role in renewing blogger contracts. But no pressure. Am Zen.)

After experiencng a brief, emotional bump in the road, life is sunshine and roses again. I have a wonderful husband and beautiful baby girl who both have given new meaning to my life. I work for a company that (finally) challenges me creatively and compensates me well, thanks to a new supervisor and more structured environment. Dare I say I love my job now? That I like being both mother and breadwinner? Because I think I really do. I'm no longer resentful that Luke's at home with Kara instead of me. How can I be when he's so damn good at it? It's no accident we each ended up in the roles that we did. Even though I miss them something fierce when I'm away.

Anyway, the point is I'm in the perfect place to take this blog to the next level and make it more reflective of who I am today.

So that the answer to "What're you lookin' at?" continues to be me.

Admitting defeat

All week I've been thinking about the return of Tragic Love Friday, mainly because I've been trying to find time to write it.

On Monday, I went back to work after bawling my eyes out on Sunday night, sobbing, "I hate this, I hate this," "this" being having to go to the office all day just as Kara's starting to do more than lay on a blanket and mesmerize her father and I with her adorable, fleshy gums. Samantha was still in town, so we all had dinner together, only I could barely sit still, wanting to finish up as fast as I could so I could have the baby in my arms again but also wishing I could have another cry and wondering why my heart still hurts so much when I've been doing this for a week and a half already. I put on a happy face for Luke and my sister and spent my free time wiping down countertops and picking up toys so there wouldn't be as much mess for Luke to worry about the next day. I was already leaving him with a sinkful of dirty dishes, and as we all know, the cook should never have to clean, but by the time I finished my Parents entry, it was past ten, and I had to get into bed soon or my eyeballs would explode the next day from the lack of sleep. Thus, no TLF writing on Monday.

Tuesday wasn't any better. I had to go to the dentist because last week I bit on a raisin and felt a shooting pain in my mouth that stayed with me for a good five minutes. Only after forty-five minutes of sitting in the waiting room, flipping through the latest issue of People and staring at my cell phone, wanting to call home but not wanting the waiting room patrons to think I was one of Those Moms who couldn't even go to the damn doctor without checking in on her kid, the dentist couldn't find the source of the problem and actually asked me why I didn't bring in any raisins to demonstrate what was wrong. Another half-hour in traffic, and by then I was really charged up and barely said ten words to Luke the entire evening, in my lame-brained attempt to shield him from my bad attitude, but when I told him I wanted to pick up some more work clothes because I'm tired of trying to squeeze into tops that don't fit my belly, he asked where, and I told him, "The store," I'm pretty sure he was able to see I wasn't sunshine and roses. Was major bitch. I'm surprised I wasn't directed to the couch. No TLF.

Last night I thought about it. I'd apologized for my behavior and come home at a decent hour. I scored plenty of play time with Kara and posted a quick entry on Parents, leaving me with plenty of time to draft a chapter or two. But then Kara decided to take a nine o'clock nap before her last feeding, and she took that last nap in my arms, and all I could do was snuggle her close and sniff her head, which smelled wonderfully of Johnson's shampoo. By the time we started her bedtime routine, it was almost ten, and Luke told me I'd better get ready myself, since it appeared I'd actually have a chance to slip under the covers before eleven. I did, and I did. STILL no TLF.

This morning, before I got into the office, I set aside twenty minutes to get some writing done, with the assumption that I could continue my train of thought at lunchtime. Only it was then I remembered that I needed to find updated headshots of the actors and actresses playing each character, and it had to be done NOW because how could I post the beginning of part three without a character introduction, so I got caught up in doing that, and instead of stopping at 6:20 like I planned I stopped at 6:26, leaving me only nine minutes to pack a lunch, brush my teeth, throw on some make-up, and get out the door. I walked out the door at 6:40, just as Kara started to stir, so I hurried out as quick as I could because it's so much harder to leave when I have to say good-bye. Only when I got to my car, the windows were covered with frost. FUCK. So I let the car run and hurried back inside, where Luke was getting ready for Kara's first feed, so I changed Kara's diaper, smothering her face with kisses the whole time. Then I cursed myself out for even picking her up in the first place because of course there were tears in my eyes as I left, and then I felt bad even for that because who would pass up a chance to spend a few minutes with their baby before a long work day?

As delusional as it sounds, I contemplated doing some TLF stuff on my lunch hour, but fooling around on the computer this morning and having to let my car warm up meant I was twenty minutes late for work, and that's when I started thinking, Maybe trying to post TLF tomorrow isn't such a great idea.

Yes, it really took that long, partly because I was so excited to sink my teeth into a project that had nothing to do with work or parenting, but mostly because I've been going on about it for weeks, and I didn't want to let anyone down. I didn't want anyone to miss their TLF fix because I was "too busy" to write it, like I was this big important person with far more sophisticated ways to spend my time then work on the sequel to a story I started when I was fourteen.

But really? I am too busy to write it. To be honest, I'm barely holding it together.

I'm fully aware I put this pressure on myself. On the surface, I feel like nobody expects me to dust and vacuum every week or send baby gifts out on time, but underneath, I constantly think people are judging me, wondering why I can't shape up or get into the rhythm of things. I can't stand it when people appear to be pitying me because I have to go to work and my husband stays home. Samantha called me "noble" and I cringed, because there are so many people in harder situations, so many people with more difficult problems then going back to a job where my work is valued and well compensated. The last thing I want to do is martyr myself. On the other hand, I can't deny that my plate is too full. I'm feeling pulled in all directions. I can't keep up with the pace I've set for myself.

Something's got to give. And right now, that "thing" is this blog.

I won't be gone forever, or probably even as long as I think. I love posting and talking with all of you. This Web site has (sadly?) become a huge part of who I am. But I don't have room for it right now. My plate is too full. I want to spend time with family without scrambling to the computer every ten minutes. I want to write TLF part three without feeling like there's a gun to my head. I want to learn how to be a working mother without trying to spin every single moment into some literary masterpiece. I'm already doing that for Parents. I can't do it here.

I want to read books again. I want to comment on your blogs again. I want to join the gym and talk on the phone and refocus on my job again.

In a nutshell, I want to figure out how to enjoy my life and my new role as a working mom. I've got a wonderful husband and a beautiful daughter who both amaze me every single day, and yet, somehow I've allowed the Internet to cast a shadow over both of them because I'm afraid of losing readers. I look back at Amalah's archives during her period back at work and honestly can't believe she posted as often as she did. Even during her maternity leave when she was breastfeeding all the time. I gave in to formula before we even left the hospital and I could barely manage once a week. I've re-read her entries countless times, banged my head against the proverbial wall, thinking, What the hell is my problem?!

Now I get it. My problem is not knowing when to say When. So, just for a little while, I'm finally going to say it.

See you back here soon.

L&D Q&A numero tres (aka: The one about breastfeeding)

Be sure to read parts one and two. 
 
I would like to hear how breastfeeding went the first few times. 

Oh, breastfeeding. How I wish we'd gotten better acquainted.

Growing up, I never gave much thought to how I'd feed my kids. My mother tried breastfeeding me for the first few days after I was born, but that was the extent of it, and I can remember just one time I saw somebody nurse in public—one of my aunts, when I was twelve, at our family Christmas party. She was on the couch, babe in arms, blanket draped over her shoulder, and as I went to kiss her good-bye, I noticed my tiny cousin attached to her breast. I blushed, embarrassed, thinking I'd seen something I wasn't supposed to see. All of the other babies I'd known were sustained with formula. I'd given countless bottles to my youngest sibling and tons of cousins. In my world, nursing wasn't something "normal" women did. And when Luke and I started dating seriously and talking about the future, the topic of breastfeeding came up, and I didn't hide my trepidation. I knew plenty of people—myself included—who were formula-fed and turned out just fine.

Then came the Internet.

I discovered blogs in 2004, and it didn't take long to notice that a significant chunk of them were written by women, particularly mothers, and it wasn't until then that I learned about all the hype surrounding breastfeeding—the benefits, the challenges, and the "new" connotation often associated with formula feeding. I saw new mothers struggle with poor latches, mastitis, low milk supply, unsupportive partners, and a myriad of other problems to nourish their babies with their breasts, and after weeks, sometimes even months, I saw some of them give up. But not without a lot of tears and even more guilt. I admired them for trying so hard, but I still didn't get it. In ten years, would it really matter?

THEN came my first positive pregnancy test. You know the saying, "It's different when it's your kid"? It really, really is.

I still didn't care how other women fed their kids, but I suddenly cared a hell of a lot about mine. I scoured the Internet for more information on breastfeeding, read lots of books, and took classes at our local hospital, and for mini-Bree's sake and mine, I knew it was something I had to try. I was in awe that my body could produce a perfect mix of nutrients for my baby; that it could provide her with unique antibodies to protect her from illness; that it could protect me from several types of cancers, some of which run in my family.

Also, that it was free, free, free.

After Kara and I were wheeled into recovery that fateful Monday night, we were given the opportunity to nurse, and words can't describe how wonderful it felt to be that close to her, connected to her in such an intimate way. Luke, Molly, and Samantha were still in the room, but all I could see was my daughter.

In the first few days that followed, things continued to go well. The nurses said it was my colostrum that helped the meconium pass out of Kara's system so quickly, and one of the lactation consultants complimented my knowledge of breastfeeding terminology. "If every new mother were as prepared as you, I'd be out of a job," she said, and I beamed with pride. I may not have been able to give birth the way I wanted, but this? This was in my control. This was something I could do.

Until Wednesday.
 
It started around nine o'clock that evening, Kara's fussing and eating of her hands, and Luke brought her to me in bed so she could nurse. She latched on for a couple of minutes but soon grew restless, pulling her head away and crying. I kept putting her back on, and she kept forcing me out of her mouth. Confused, I switched sides and tried again, only to get the same result. Her crying escalated and I turned to Luke, not knowing what to do. "Maybe she's too wound up to eat. Let me calm her down," he said and took her in his arms for some quality father-daughter bouncy time. It worked; she did settle down, but she was still eating her hands and smacking her lips—classic hunger cues—so he brought her back to bed with me. Again, I latched her on, and again, she pulled away, crying.

We did that for six hours. It was awful. I've never felt so helpless.

At one point my nurse came in and noticed our situation. "I can see that she's hungry," I said tearfully while Luke drew Kara to him for the zillionth time that night. "She wants to eat. But I can't get her to stay on. I don't know what else to do."

She hesitated a moment before asking: "Do you want some formula?"

"No!" I cried immediately. "We're nursing. I can't risk my milk supply." I wiped at my eyes, afraid I'd lose it in front of this poor woman who was only trying to help me. "Let me try again," I said and hobbled over to the bed, the best place for me to nurse while recovering from my c-section.

Soon it was five o'clock in the morning, and Kara was inconsolable. Luke and I were both crying. Despite all my good intentions, for whatever reason, my breasts weren't doing their job.

"I think—I think we should give her formula," I said.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"No, but she's obviously hungry," I cried. "We have to feed her, don't we?"

Ten minutes later, after just a half an ounce of formula, Kara was asleep in Luke's arms. She stayed that way for three and a half hours.

I wept the entire time.

Four days into this motherhood gig and I'd already lost control in an area that had quickly become so important to me. The Books clearly stated that introducing artificial nipples so early could sabotage breastfeeding efforts. The Books said that babies didn't need much to eat in the first week and my breasts would produce enough to satisfy my daughter's tiny appetite. According to The Books, I had failed.

At the same time, I hated myself for not giving her the bottle sooner, when it's clearly what she needed.

Luke tried to comfort me, but I was too far gone. It didn't help that I was running on four hours of sleep accumulated over three days and still in a lot of pain from my c-section. I tried to control my breathing and attempted to lie down, but then I'd picture Luke giving her that bottle, and the hysterics would start all over again.

Eventually, through talking with our pediatrician, my ob/gyn, and one of a long line of lactation consultants, I got myself together enough to realize that supplementing wasn't the end of the world. Plus, the formula had filled Kara's tummy enough to curb her hunger, but not so much that she wasn't willing to nurse, which made things much easier. We continued to supplement as we waited for my mature milk to let down. Thankfully, it was in by Friday, but on Saturday night Kara's wet-diaper count was pretty low for being almost a week old—just five to six a day—and the doctor was concerned. He put us on a strict two-hour schedule that involved me nursing and pumping, and Luke feeding her the expressed milk, topping her off with a bit of formula if she wanted more. She always did.

I won't lie; that was a pain in the ass. I was never able to pump more than an ounce or two at a time, and that was from both Thelma and Louise combined. It wasn't long before Kara was once again unhappy at the breast, latching on and pulling away even though we knew she was hungry.

The last time I nursed her was in the early morning hours of Christmas Eve. I pumped until she was a month old, but by then Luke was back at work and it was too hard to manage without having somebody on hand to tend to Kara's needs. This past Tuesday, I packed up my Ameda Purely Yours and haven't looked back.

This (seemingly never ending) entry wasn't written to scare anybody off from breastfeeding. Luke and I plan to have more children, and when the time comes, I plan to try again. I still believe in the benefits it has to offer and the bond it can nurture between a mother and her baby. But I talked so much about nursing while I was pregnant that I thought it important to relay my experience as honestly as possible.

Am I disappointed over how things turned out? Yes. Could I have tried harder to make it work? Probably. Do I feel guilty? Sometimes. But I'm not beating myself up about it anymore. I'm at peace knowing I did the best I could and that breast milk is just one of countless gifts I hope to pass along to Kara as she grows up. There are many more to come.

----

Excerpted from Parental Discretion Advised, originally published on Parents.com. Copyright 2008 by Meredith Corporation. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

L&D Q&A numero dos

You know the drill, part one is here, blahdee blah blah.

Did you feel as if they rushed you through labor? Or were you able to go at your own pace? Also, is the pain really as severe as people say it is?

When pregnant with Kara, I took three different childbirth classes and read a bunch of booktalk that outlined the nitty-gritty of labor and delivery, and the most important piece of advice I gleaned was to be my own advocate; that I had a right to express my wishes, ask questions, and know what was happening to my body at all times, and I had a right to know why. Giving birth isn't like mending a broken arm; it's not about fixing what's broken but facilitating a process that's natural and beautiful, and it's not unreasonable for a woman to hope that process stays as intact as possible. Until I was admitted, I was afraid of the hospital staff placing their own scheduling needs above my desire to let my baby come in her own due time. We were already nudging things along with the induction, and while I was in full agreement about its necessity, I wanted to keep further interventions down to a minimum.

I say all of that so you can appreciate how relieved I was to learn that my medical team felt the same way. When my nurse started my Pitocin drip, she did so at the lowest amount possible and slowly increased it over a period of hours. When my contractions hit their stride, the dose was scaled back. Cervical checks were done sparingly, and I was mostly left alone to dilate and efface in peace. I received the epidural when I asked for it, but it wasn't pushed on me, and the nurse didn't laugh when I told her I might try to go au naturale. And it was only after twelve hours of labor that the idea of a c-section was even brought up as an option. All of my questions were answered promptly and completely, and my husband and I both were treated with dignity and respect. So no, I don't feel like I was rushed through labor, and yes, I most certainly was allowed to go at my own pace. I'm glad I was prepared to speak up in case things were moving too quickly, but things never moved too quickly. I have no regrets.

Also, HELL YES the pain is severe as people say it is; at least, it was for me, though to be fair, it's well known that contractions jumpstarted with Pitocin are more intense than those that come about naturally. It's hard to describe what they felt like; it's as if a giant hand had wrapped itself around my uterus to squeeze it like a grape. At their worst, I remember thrashing my legs about, trying to focus on another part of my body, but it didn't help, and breathing didn't do anything, either. Praise Jesus for the epidural, is all I have to say about that.

What were your first thoughts when they decided to do a c-section? Were you relieved, sad, scared? Was there ever a point where you had to ask people to leave the delivery room to give you privacy? Was it nerve-racking having so many people focused on your lady-parts?

Wow, lots of questions here! To say I was scared about having a c-section would be a gross understatement. Aside from minor dental surgery—a root canal here, an implant there—I'd never gone under the knife. Nothing sprained, nothing broken, nothing removed, and I had hoped it would stay that way, thank you very much. I was terrified that the epidural would stop working mid-procedure, like it had for my mother fifteen years ago. I hated that my chances for future vaginal births would be in jeopardy. And I was worried I'd come to resent my baby for making things so difficult for me.

Once the doctor left to let me think things through, I sobbed good and hard for at least ten minutes. Crying has always been the best way for my body to get rid of bad feelings, so I didn't try to fight it. But surprisingly, when I was done, I was really done. I was done trying to question all the ways my operation could go wrong. I was done praying for my cervix to dilate that last fateful centimeter or for mini-Bree to get to her proper station. I was ready to meet my baby, and at least with the c-section, I didn't have to wonder when that was going to happen anymore. And once she was out, nothing mattered but her.

In regards to having people in the delivery room with me, long-time readers will recall that I went back and forth on that issue way before the big day. On one hand, I wanted my family and friends to be with me on one of the most important days of my life. On the other, I was afraid I'd be too intimidated with everyone there to practice all the natural coping techniques I'd learned in childbirth class. I was also nervous about Luke and me not having enough time to just be together and take everything in.

In the end, though, it turned out the big crowd I was hoping for/afraid of wasn't meant to be. Most of our family members were too sick to make the trip to the hospital, but my sister Samantha and good friend Molly braved the questionable Midwest weather and came to Indianapolis. They showed up around lunchtime, which meant Luke and I had the whole morning to ourselves, and they really helped me keep my mind off all the "what-ifs." They brought me presents, they made me laugh, they massaged my feet. And when I found out about the c-section, they told me they loved me and said everything would be OK. I'm so glad they were there.

As far as the whole privacy/lady parts thing goes? Any shred of modesty I had left by that point in my pregnancy went out the window the minute they gave me those crappy gowns to wear; after that, I truly didn't care about trying to stay decent. Molly and Samantha were told by the nurse to leave the room for every cervical check and the insertion of my epidural, but other then that, I was perfectly fine with them sticking around as much as they wanted to.

I would like to hear how breastfeeding went the first few times.

Oh, this one’s a doozy, so I’ll save it for next time. Be sure to bring tissues.

----

Excerpted from Parental Discretion Advised, originally published on Parents.com. Copyright 2008 by Meredith Corporation. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

L&D Q&A numero uno

OK, folks. Now that my birth story has been laid out for all of you to see, it's time to address some of the questions you posed before I was admitted to the hospital. Because I have delusions of self-importance, and also because I like to babble incessantly about my female parts, I'll break up the answers into a series of posts and scatter them throughout the next couple of weeks. At this point, Kara will be hitting her first birthday and I'll STILL be philosophizing about her birth. How boring am I?
 
Don't answer that.

Let's get started.

Was it easier or harder than you imagined? 
Nothing like easing into things, eh? This is actually a hard one to answer, because really, it was both. It was harder than I imagined for a lot of reasons. I always pictured myself going into labor on my own without any trouble, and that didn't prove true for me. Kara went a week past her due date, it took a Pitocin drip for my contractions to finally reach a consistent pattern, and even after a full day of labor, I still ended up with a c-section. For a gal who once contemplated giving birth in her own home without the assistance of pain meds, things definitely didn’t go as expected.

On the other hand, it was also easier. I was able to handle my induction quite well for the first half of the day, I felt wonderfully cared for by my nurses, Luke was by my side the entire time, keeping me focused and calming me down when I was unable to cope, and Molly and Samantha pampered my feet with Warm Vanilla Sugar body lotion. Plus, most importantly, being in the thick of things made it truly real that this baby was coming. I was in the hospital, wearing those crappy gowns that never cover you completely, epidural in place. This experience couldn’t end any other way, and when times got really tough, that was the thought that made it all bearable.

I’d like to know if the nurse that put your IV in poked the area that she had just placed your IV and then had the audacity to ask if that hurt. Mine sure did! 
My nurse actually did a decent job; the biggest surprise was that she placed it above my wrist instead of on my hand, which is how it was done back in October when I went to the hospital worrying about pre-term labor.

Now that you’ve had your baby in the hospital, will you be more receptive or less receptive to my pro-homebirth brainwashing? 
This question comes from Katie, a longtime reader of my personal blog who, in case you couldn’t tell, isn’t a cheerleader for the medical profession, at least when it comes to childbirth. Sorry to disappoint you, Katie, but I was quite satisfied with my birth experience. Read on to learn why.

Did you feel prepared to deviate from your birth plan as needed? Did you feel supported by your medical team? And okay, did you poop? 
First things first: The whole poop issue actually turned out to be a non-issue, seeing as I never even reached the pushing stage of labor. And because I don’t see myself being brave enough to attempt a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) with any future children I bring into the world, I’ll never worry about it again. Score one for surgery.

Second, the birth plan. I’m so glad I had a birth plan. It was a simple one, really, and mostly consisted of things that were already hospital procedure, but as a person who makes her living as a writer and thrives on list-making, it was important to put down on paper what aspects of labor, delivery, and recovery meant the most to me—or at least, what meant the most to me at the time. Keeping that list down to just a handful of bullet points helped me not sweat about the small stuff, and when things didn’t go as planned (i.e., “No interventions unless medically necessary, i.e., Pitocin”—ha!), it felt good to know that at least my plan was a starting point.

I don’t know why birth plans get such a bad rap. We go through our whole lives preparing for best-case scenarios and re-adjusting when things deviate from our expectations. Does that mean we shouldn’t plan for anything, shouldn’t hope for anything? If you ask me, that’s a pretty pessimistic way to live.
 
So really, the problem isn’t the birth plan, it’s the attitude of the person writing the birth plan. During one of my later prenatal visits, my doctor once mentioned a woman who wrote a SIX-PAGE birth plan, filled with stuff like the temperature of the room and how often she’d be checked and how she did NOT want a c-section. Good God, the thing should’ve been copyrighted and displayed in the window of a Barnes and Noble. Do you think everything went according to her control-freak novel? No, it didn’t.

At first glance, it may seem like a lot of things in my birth plan didn’t come to fruition. I had a Pitocin drip and IV fluids from the very beginning, and I had continuous fetal monitoring. However, when you see that the phrase “unless medically necessary” is attached to almost all of them instead of “not at all,” you’ll see that actually, everything went according to plan. I didn’t want Pitocin unless it was medically necessary. Was it medically necessary? Since my doctor and I were both in agreement about induction, and since Pitocin makes inductions possible, yes. It wasn’t my first choice, but in the end, it was still what I wanted. You could say the same thing about my c-section except it wasn’t in my birth plan. I tried to include things that would reduce my chances of needing a c-section, but I knew if I needed one, I’d have to get one. No wiggle room there.
 
And you know what? I don’t regret that, either. My biggest fear was having something done to me that I didn’t understand. I was afraid of having a labor progress slowly but normally and a doctor who wasn’t patient enough to wait it out. But that’s not what happened to me. We’d given a vaginal birth the best shot we could, and Kara still wasn’t budging. Once I agreed to the c-section, I was freaked out and sad and scared, but I knew it was in my and the baby’s best interest, so at least I didn’t have to worry about whether or not I was doing the right thing. It’s not something I give much thought to these days. I’m ready to move on.

Some things that we thought we wanted didn’t happen. With all the hullabaloo in the OR, Luke didn’t cut the umbilical cord. He probably could have, but he totally forgot to ask. Does he care now? No.

And yet other things went right according to plan. I wore my contacts during labor and nursed Kara as soon as we were wheeled into recovery. Luke was with her when I couldn’t be. And nobody offered the baby pacifiers, sugar water, or formula. All in all, my birth plan kicked ass.

Pardon the French. 

More tomorrow.

----

Excerpted from Parental Discretion Advised, originally published on Parents.com. Copyright 2008 by Meredith Corporation. All rights reserved. Reprinted with permission.

Frageelay

Nice of me to post again before 2008, eh?

I wasn't lying in my last post; things are much better, but it's still overwhelming, trying to work your schedule around a tiny human being who eats and relieves herself every couple of hours and doesn't much care for being out of your arms. Plus, I don't know if it's postpartum hormones or just a natural reaction to this huge change that's happened to our lives, but I find myself weepier than ever. Kara's umbilical cord stump fell off the day after Christmas, and Luke and I were relieved to not have to manuever around it during diaper changings. Once she was cleaned up, I said to her, "That's what connected you to Mommy all those months," and the next thing you know I was crying into my hands. Suddenly it felt like things were moving too fast, she was growing up too quickly, and I was scolding myself for doing things like wiping down the toilet or attempting to update this blog when I could've been banking precious snuggle time with this little person who would one day refuse the comfort I can so easily offer her now. I had the same epiphany the following afternoon after rocking her to sleep. Luke came into her bedroom and found my eyes dripping all over my poor baby's head.

I've never felt so vulnerable or been so paranoid as I have since Kara's been born. When Ryan came to visit for Christmas, I had to be the one to transfer the baby from the bassinet to her auntie's waiting arms, even though my sister is almost twenty-two years old and perfectly capable of picking up a newborn all by herself. I forget to offer her to visitors because I'm having such a good time holding her myself. It breaks my heart to hear her cry, even if her only grievance is the too-cold touch of a diaper wipe. Hell, I'm even afraid to leave the house without her, not because I don't trust Luke wholeheartedly but because I know how much I'll miss her.

I haven't been this afraid of love for years, not since Luke and I first started dating. But this...there are no words to describe what it feels like to love your own child. You know that saying, "It's different when it's your kid"? It really, really is.

Speaking of cliches, there's a second one that's also rung true for me, and it relates specifically to my breastfeeding struggles: "You have to do what's best for your family." And for this family, the best thing has been to stop trying to breastfeed. Kara is still getting my boob juice, mind you, as I pump every two to three hours, but I haven't put her on the breast since the wee hours of Christmas Eve.

I read that last sentence and feel like I should feel like a failure. I'm well aware the initial weeks of breastfeeding are a learning period for both mom and baby, and things probably would've gotten better if I'd kept at it. Throwing in the towel after seven days doesn't seem like I gave it much of a chance, especially when I think about how passionate I was about trying to make this work.

Then I reflect on the hours I spent crying because I couldn't get Kara to latch, because she'd take my nipple just long enough to spit it back out, because her gums would bear down hard on my aerolas, and I think there were a lot of minutes in those seven days where both of us were miserable, and I'm slowly finding out that more often than not, it's the passing of each of those minutes that ends up wearing you down. Ironically, the days go by much, much faster.

Anyway, even though it's more work for me, what with having to pump and bottlefeed, this new plan overall has been much more manageable. We're still supplementing with formula because I'm only producing about an ounce and a half during each pumping session, but I feel good that she's getting all the milk I have to give. We have our two-week well-baby visit in a couple of hours, so we'll check on her weight then, but I already know we have a happy, healthy baby, and truly, that's all that matters to me now.

As we make our way into a new year, I've been struck with how content I am, despite the wild card hand of emotions I'm wrapped up in. For the first time, I have no list of improvements to work on, no major goals to accomplish. All I can think about is how lucky I am, how complete I feel, and how wrong it would be to want for anything when I've clearly been given so much already. If Luke and I never leave this apartment, if I never finish those damn photo projects, if I never get more than three hours of sleep in a row ever again, I'll still consider myself the happiest woman on Earth.

'Cuz I'm the queen of wishful thinking

FYI: Today's post is dedicated to Isabel, who's always on the ball when it comes to updating her many blogs. Isabel, you have my blessing to take the day off. I hear eating spinach dip can be a fulfilling way to pass the time.

Over the last few months, I've found myself constantly thanking God for all the good things in my life. Marrying Luke was one of the best decisions I ever made, and I'm reminded of that every day when he kneels down to tie my shoes, refills the prescription for my prenatal vitamins, flips load after load of dirty laundry, and understands when stress and fatigue wreck our weekend plans yet again. I can't remember the last time we took a walk through the park or visited an orchard or even did anything that wasn't related to preparing for this baby. Still, he refuses to complain. I think the man's incapable.

I'm thankful for a day job that allows me the option to work from home so I don't have to spend ten minutes rummaging through my closet for an ensemble that doesn't expose my belly. I have generous benefits and paid time off. And while I won't see a dime from my boss during my maternity leave, he's been completely supportive of me taking the maximum FMLA time in order to spend a few months focusing solely on motherhood. I'm thankful I earn enough to support my family so that Luke can be with our daughter full time.

I've been lucky to find additional work freelancing for Parents and adjunct teaching for my alma mater, which has allowed us to enjoy one last pre-baby vacation (a vacation that took place a lifetime ago, it seems), upgrade our living room furniture (my sister Samantha and her husband, Dan, can personally attest to the quality of our sleeper sofa), move into a two-bedroom apartment, pay off my car, and purchase hundreds of dollars worth of "must haves" for little Freka, all without running up our Visa bill.

I feel blessed to have such a supportive network of family and friends. I say prayers of gratitude for being able to conceive so quickly, sustain a healthy pregnancy, and receive quality medical care. I praise my daughter's insightfulness at arranging her birth to take place before the end of the year. Hello, tax credit!

It would be pretty hard for my life to get any better. I know this.

Yet, I see Samantha bask in the glory that comes along with thriving in a new work environment and I'm jealous. I watch my sister Ryan prepare to move to Germany with her new husband, imagine the adventures they'll have exploring a new country, and I foam at the mouth. I see my good friend delight in the comforts of her new home and succumb to violent bouts of house fever.

Luke and I are about to experience the biggest change of our lives. So why am I craving even more?

Maybe because it feels like I've been pregnant and anchored to this apartment for thirty-seven years. Maybe because the changes that accompany new jobs, new continents, and new houses seem easier to handle than those associated with a new baby. Maybe because all those things would have less of an affect on my identity than becoming a mom. I don't know.

Please tell me I'm not the only one to feel this way sometimes.

Desperately Seeking Gender

The waiting game is almost over, folks. Come this time tomorrow, Luke and I should know (hopefully) (God willing) (please, baby, don't be shy) whether our little Freke will have a penis or a vagina. Never have I been so excited to feast my eyes upon another person's reproductive parts.

As a young girl, whenever I imagined being a mother, I always envisioned having girls. Makes sense, right? After all, I was a girl and fairly certain I knew what to expect. Girls liked to wear frilly nightgowns and draw pictures of princesses and orchestrate steamy make-out sessions between Barbie and Ken in the back of her pink convertible. Girls tried to emulate Nancy Drew and the members of the Baby-sitters Club and watched My Little Pony cartoons before getting ready for school. They never pulled down their pants to pee on the sidewalk, and they weren't big on Transformers, though they didn't mind playing G.I. Joe. So long as they got to be Jinx.

When I first found out I was pregnant, I secretly hoped for a girl, using pretty much the same line of reasoning, albeit on a slightly more sophisticated level. In my twenty-seven years on Earth, I've gained a wealth of life experience that'll be handy for a daughter but not so much for a son. A boy of mine will never hear the story of my first period or my thoughts on tampons (um, ick). He won't care that I once hated bras and put off wearing one for as long as I could. My shaving tips will fall on deaf ears, because he'll be getting that lesson from his father. And how can any of my botched dating experiences bring some sort of meaning to his life? Does a son really want to know about his mother's run-in with STD testing, or should I lock up that gem in the TMI vault?

I picture having a daughter and I think of late-night talks over hot cups of cocoa, frenzied trips to the mall to pick out her prom dress, and bonding over matching mani-pedis on Mother's Day. Meanwhile, it's hard not to wonder if I'll be anything more than a spectator in my son's manly little life, pestering him to wash his hands, comb his hair, keep his hands off his crotch, thanklessly grooming him for some woman who's destined to turn him against me, because as we all know, a daughter's a daughter for all of her life, a son is a son 'til he takes a wife. Which isn't true all of the time, but let's face it. Don't most of you ladies take charge of family holidays, schedule your weekend plans, and generally hold final veto power when it comes to deciding whether or not the kids can spend the night with your mother-in-law?

I suppose there's hope if he turns out to be gay, but that seems an odd thing to pray for.

With time, I've grown comfortable with the idea of having a boy. As the oldest of five, I sometimes wished for an older sibling, and it was always a brother. I liked the idea of having someone around who wanted to watch over me but had zero interest in borrowing my shoes. Plus, my friends with boys seem to have such a good time with their planes and trains and automobiles. I can do that. I want to do that. I want to take whichever path holds the most excitement, the most adventure, the most promise for my child, and if that happens to be laden with snips and snails, then by George, I'll snip and snail with the best of them.

As we get ready for the big day, I'm less concerned about what this baby's gender is and more excited about just plain knowing what kind of person I'm carrying in my uterus. To begin putting a face to one of the names we've chosen, to stop using generic pronouns like "it," to buy clothing completely devoid of green and yellow undertones will be a welcome joy and help us prepare for the long journey ahead.

Still, though, just in case, would it really be so wrong for a boy to own a few Nancy Drews?

Trading Spaces

Last night, for the first time since it was put on hold for us a month and a half ago, Luke and I walked through the two-bedroom unit we're scheduled to move into this weekend.

When we first discussed the possibility of upgrading our apartment, we were given the keys to the model unit behind the clubhouse and oohed and ahhed at the thought of gaining an extra few hundred square feet. Our bedroom would be smaller, but we'd have a separate dwelling place for the baby. Our living room would shrink, but we'd gain a dining room. There'd be less overall closet space but an extra bathroom. For the extra ninety-five dollars a month, the trade-offs seemed worth it.

I don't know what I was expecting when we entered the premises yesterday evening, but for some reason I was taken aback at how small everything seemed. Either the model falsely advertises a more spacious unit or my imagination's spent the last forty-five days restructuring the entire floor plan to its liking. Both are possible, but either way, we'll have just enough space for the impending third member of our family. Nothing less, and definitely nothing more.

My heart sank a little as I viewed what would soon be our home. I love the unit that Luke and I currently live in, and I hate the idea of moving into a place I'm not as crazy about. On the other hand, I'm so glad we can afford to make this move, and I know it's necessary. It really is the best thing for us.

When I was younger, I always thought that your "next step up" was bound to be better than the one you took before. As in, the next job I get will be more fulfilling than the one I have now. The next place we move to will be more exciting. This moving experience is the best example I have to show me each life upgrade won't be one-hundred-percent satisfactory. In any situation, you'll always find flaws.

Luckily, though, it can still bring you a whole lot of joy.

I've never lived in a two-bedroom apartment before, and I'm excited that Luke and I are doing this to make room for a child we created out of love for each other and the family we want to build. That's a pretty awesome upgrade, if you ask me.

Although I think we've changed our minds on the changing table. Ain't nothin' wrong with the crib or the floor.

(Luke also suggested the couch--the beautiful queen-sized sleeper sofa we ordered in beige to better match our decor--and if looks could kill, I'd be welcoming Freke into the world as a single mother.)

In which I ponder moving to Canada. I hear mothers get one year of PAID leave there.

This morning I finally gathered the courage to speak to my human resources manager about an issue that's been troubling me for weeks.

Maternity leave.

First, some backstory.

It's no secret to anyone who reads this blog that the idea of being a stay-at-home mom has always appealed me. I grew up the oldest of five children with a mother worked maybe six months the entire time I lived at home, and I appreciate that she was there when we came home from school, there to see us perform in assemblies, there to put a hot dinner on the table for us every night. I loved having that mom, and I feel passionately about providing a similar environment for my own family.

When I first proposed the idea to Luke, he was supportive of the concept but worried about the money. When he first moved to Indianapolis and was searching for work, we were able to live on what I made with little problem, but we'd never had to do the reverse. Once we crunched the numbers and reviewed the data, I was shocked, because even though he has a great position that requires a college degree and years of professional experience, he works for a non-profit group and thus earns a wage that's not enough for a family of three to live on and still afford insurance. Hell, it'd be hard for even two.

And yet I was still determined to make it work. I was heartbroken over the thought of having my motherhood dream taken away from me. "Besides, it's not like you'd be willing to quit your job and stay home in my place," I said accusingly.

Only, as luck would have it, he was, which threw my desired family plan into a complete tailspin.

For as long as I'd been sniffing baby heads, I'd never really considered working after my first child was born, for a lot of reasons, but mainly because I never thought I'd have to. I always assumed that by the time we were ready to have kids, my husband's income would be enough to financially support us. I never imagined a scenario where we'd need two incomes to survive. I also never imagined marrying a man who'd eagerly "switch roles" and take on the role of primary caregiver while I took the corporate world by storm. But there it was, right in front of us, this new solution I'd never believed to be available, this new solution that looks like it's going to be the best fit for us.

What does all of this have to do with my maternity leave?

A lot. Once we decided to follow through with our new family plan, I realized the FMLA time I take after Freke's birth may be the only time I get to be a stay-at-home mother, so when Luke and I discussed the length of my leave, I was adamant about wanting the full twelve weeks. Even though not one cent of it will be paid.

I don't know any woman who's taken twelve weeks of maternity leave. In my experience, most take six weeks off and go back to work. When my mother's youngest sister had her daughter in the late nineties, she took three. THREE! But never twelve. I remember following Amalah's pregnancy and feeling a sense of awe that her employer "let her" stay away from the office for three months. That's like a whole season! Can people really DO that?

Turns out they can. Like I said waaaay back at the beginning of this entry, I spoke with HR this morning, and I outlined my situation, and the manager was totally supportive. It wasn't until then that it hit me how scared I was that work would be ticked off at me for requesting "so much time off," like I was a little girl who wanted a candy bar but was afraid of having my hand slapped and being told "No." Imagine my delight upon learning that if I want the leave, I have the leave, and there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it. I was so happy, I almost shed a tear in her office.

Luke and I will have to pad our savings account well before December 10th to make this happen, but we have enough time and dispensable income (right now, anyway) that money won't be a problem. We've even started discussing how long Luke might want to join the baby and me at home, so we can prepare for that, too.

During my meeting, I learned a surprising fact: it just so happens that I am the first person at my company to request the entire amount of available FMLA time. For an organization that's been around for almost twenty years, I'm once again in awe, only this feeling is tinged with sadness, because how many mothers would choose to spend more time recuperating from childbirth and adjusting to life with a new baby if they could? How many women have to go back to work because they can't afford not to?

I have a lot of thoughts swirling around in my head about this topic that'll probably inspire a series of posts in the near future. For now, though, I want to hear YOUR stories. Mothers and fathers out there, how long did you take off work to care for a new baby? Did you find yourself wanting more time, or were you ready to go back earlier? For those without children, what's it like when a co-worker takes maternity/paternity leave? Are people resentful? Supportive? Or just happy about extra vacancies in the company parking lot?

Testing 1-2-3 Wednesday

Yesterday I had a follow-up doctor's appointment to check on my recent weight loss. Turns out another three pounds have gone by the wayside since I was in last, but since my appetite is slowly starting to return, the physician I met with saw no reason to take any further action. I heard the heartbeat again, whooshing away at about a hundred and sixty beats per minute, and we talked about the ultrasound I'll be having in roughly eight to ten weeks.

She also brought up the idea of prenatal testing. Hmmm.

I know that testing can be important for many types of women. Those of certain ethnicities, for example, or who are over 35, or whose family histories include physical or mental disabilities. I know that testing can determine whether or not your baby is predispositioned to genetic defects and provide couples with an opportunity to make critical, sometimes heartbreaking, decisions prior to delivery. I know it and appreciate having the choice. But I don't want it.

My reasoning? Neither Luke's nor my cultural backgrounds are prone to anything out of the ordinary. Experiencing my first pregnancy at 27 years old is far enough from 35 to categorize this gestation as low-risk. I'm healthy. Our families are healthy. Everything should be fine. But if for some reason it isn't? Well, I don't know that we'd do anything about it, anyway. After all our talk of wanting a baby, we've been given a baby--a miracle, a gift we've done nothing to deserve. We will take this gift and care for this child the best way we can, for as long as we can, whether it's eighty-three years or twelve days or six minutes or just nine months in utero. Even the best testing can't guarantee anything, even the best testing can be wrong, and I would hate to play God based on the number of dots or squiggles printed on a piece of paper, then wonder for the rest of my life if I should've left things alone. I'd much rather take each day as it comes and prepare for the worst when there is a legitimate reason to do so.

Tell me, parents out there, what's your take on or experience with prenatal testing?

Edited to add: In reading through your comments, I realized my post reads as if I believe the only reason to move forward with testing would be to determine if termination is "necessary," which isn't true at all. There are many afflictions that can plague babies but don't prevent them from living long and happy lives, and many parents want to have that information. Again, though, for me, it wouldn't help. How does one mentally prepare for something like that? As far as medical arrangements are concerned, Luke and I have chosen a hospital that's well-equipped to handle any complications with my labor and/or the baby's arrival, and if specialists are required, we can receive recommendations at that time.

I briefly considered going through with the first-trimester screening, a non-invasive way to detect chromosomal abnormalities, but to have a test done simply because it was non-invasive didn't sit well with me. Since ultrasounds between eighteen and twenty-two weeks are routine and have the capability to provide physical evidence of a problem, that's enough 411 for this mother-to-be. Finding out the gender? Will be icing on the cake.

Tragic Love Friday: The Idiot's Guide (and Some Random Jack Handy-Type Deep Thoughts)

When I unveiled Tragic Love Friday during NaBloPoMo, I had no expectations for the outcome. Mainly I wanted to hop on the "I have a weekly feature" bandwagon without putting in a lot of extra effort and poke fun of my adolescent persona at the same time, a little person with a flair for the dramatic and a passionate yearning for love, specifically the love acts she read about in her V.C. Andrews novels.

My biggest fear? That people wouldn't like it. That people would dismiss even the idea of the story as childish and amateur and not worth the four minutes it would take to read each post. I paid special attention to the comments section, looking for specific names and wondering if their absences equalled a lack of interest. As the conclusion to part one drew near, I played around with writing a comprehensive synopsis outlining the characters and major plot points, hoping to entice my non-TLF-reading buddies to at least give the sequel a shot. (Then I got smart and finagled you people into doing my dirty work for me. Thanks again, Internet!)

Whenever a person does anything creative, it's hard not to become attached to it and want others to do the same. That piece of work reflects blood and sweat and tears and effort, makes a statement about what you value. When somebody rejects it--for whatever reason--it's hard not to take it personally. Because it is personal. Even if it's silly, it's part of who you are.

It wasn't until today, though, while combing through three uniquely fabulous TLF reviews, that I realized getting caught up in who's not paying attention does a serious disservice to the ones who've joined you for the ride.

Make no mistake, I'd love to get more readers for Tragic Love Friday. I harbor wild delusions about book agents and script writers stumbling across this small-town Web site and pestering me for full-time work so I can quit my day job and become important and famous. But until then, I'll be focusing on how happy I am that anyone reads this blog, period. If you love TLF, that's wonderful. If you don't, that's OK, too. (Not wonderful, but OK.) It's nobody's job to fawn over every damn word I post. (Well, except maybe Luke's, and even he's stopped following TLF.) Just the fact that you guys keep coming back here leaves me humbled and eternally grateful.

Hmmm. That was pretty deep for a Friday, huh? I'm going to shut up and my reviewers do their thang.

-------

SYNOPSIS NUMBER ONE
by David McNelis

(Which I inwardly refer to as "No He Did Not Just Write A Freakin' HAIKU About TLF")

David was stupid
and he slept with two best friends
Consequences felt

His sister was nuts
and plotted to kill Jenna
by running her down

Kayla was to help
since she got knocked up as well
David was fertile!

Mike stood by the side
A real invisible man
in love with Jenna

Jenna wasn't sure
what the hell she was thinking
when she stole Katherine

But she was distraught
from being made to go "POP!"
by her friend Kayla

And since her David
was struck outside the DQ
by Kayla and Cass

She took the biggest
butcher knife in the hiz-ouse
to snatch a baby

Frema had crafted
A super-max with babies
That let Jen in

Pick up the kiddie
and stash it inside her shirt
Blind security

Let's go to Iowa
And dumb Mike comes along, too
Map reading be damned

Wisconsin it is
With sunglasses and kissing
Police do close in

After being on
the hood of Whitesnake's (Mike's) car
Confessions too late

Prisoner transport
across state lines just to see
a baby is safe

A year has gone by
and the baby starts talking
A one-year-old talks!

But now it must leave
To Jenna's arms it will go
and Michael's arms, too

They had a wedding
and a Paris honeymoon
Do not go to jail

Five years down the road
Twins, a teacher, and Jenna
Living in Iowa

Tragic Love Friday
takes a hiatus for now
See you here next time!

-------

SYNOPSIS NUMBER TWO
by Silly Hily aka The Hilarazzi

(Before she wrote this, Hilary printed out every page of TLF because she didn't want to "leave something important and vital out." I am in Internet love with her.)

Part I

Chapter 1

We are introduced to most of the gang on their last day of school. Only the summer separates them from their senior year of high school. They have all the knowledge and wisdom in the world. They are adults. (Come on, isn't that what we all thought at that point in our lives.) Jenna and David were maybe forced to grow up before the others. They are expecting a child together. Cassie, David's sister, was excited to be an aunt. Kayla on the other hand was a bitter bitch. She had been David's girlfriend for a year and a half. Kayla asked Jenna to talk to David since they were having problems. They broke up though and in the process of Jenna consoling David, they fell in love. Fast forward three months and Jenna was knocked up...by David. You'd be a bitter bitch, too. Oh, and did I mention that Kayla and Jenna were, and I stress "were," best friends? Kayla's family was like a second (or first) family to Jenna, since her parents were often away. Jenna had another best friend to rely on though. His name is Michael. He's that guy friend that every girl wants. The guy friend that you can talk to and will always be there giving you great advice and a healing, strong hug. They are a Will & Grace pairing, only Michael is straight.

Frema's best commentary (in brackets):  "After a while, though, the sparks that left Kayla's and David's romance came into our friendship." [Obviously that's not the only thing that "came."]  [Ba dum bum ching!]

Chapter 2

Cassie and David have an adult conversation at the kitchen table while drinking coffee. Didn't you do that with your siblings at 17? We learn that their mom is a slut and is also never home (these poor kids). We also learn that Cassie is very protective of David. She doesn't want him to marry Jenna because he feels he has to. David swears that he's marrying Jenna because he loves her, but Cassie knows better. Cassie doesn't like Jenna because of what she did to her best friend, Kayla. She's the bitter-best-friend bitch. David is a smart young man. His only problem is keeping it in his pants.  He works at McDonald's as a cashier and is looking forward to making a lot of money during the summer. Money he can put away for him and Jenna to start their life together and raise their baby (what a responsible baby daddy). The baby that they find out is a girl. The two sort through names like Candy (David, are you wanting her to make a living as a stripper?), Michelle, Mary, Mary Ellen, and Mary Anne before finally deciding on Mary Katherine.

Mama Slut goes out of town leaving David and Cassie some money. David is stressed about work, the baby, etc. etc. so he snatches $50 of the $200 (thanks Mama Slut) and calls Michael to go hang out and drink some beer. After having one too many, David opens up about all the problems him and Jenna are having.  Michael ever so slyly implies that maybe David is still in love with Kayla. All of a sudden, she is all he can think about. He wonders why he ever broke up with her. Which brings me to...

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): [Nothing says "I love you" like breaking up with your soul mate and boinking her BFF.]

Chapter 3

Still drunk, David ended up at Kayla's house. She wasn't able to sleep and was just fixing her some warm milk (how does anyone drink warm milk?), something David observed she only does when she's bothered or worried. Kayla's parents are home (finally, someone who has visible parents) but they could obviously sleep through a tornado, or their own doorbell ringing, or their own daughter doing the nasty. Yes, that's right, David and Kayla got it on for the first time. (Cause that's how Kayla rolls. She waits to have sex for the first time after David has become her ex and knocked up her best friend.) David even told Kayla that he loved her. They fell asleep in each other's arms only to have David be gone by sunrise. Cassie notices the next day that Kayla is a complete wreck about something and continues to be on Kayla's side. David ends things with Kayla (again) for good. (He just wanted to pop that cherry first.) Kayla vows to save David from Jenna. To SAVE HIM!

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): "You didn't hurt me on purpose. You're in love." [That's the way...it should be...] (In which we all carried on the cheesy Wilson Phillips song in the comments section. It was great.)

Chapter 4

David gets a promotion at McDonald's. Yippppeeee. David has super sperm...Kayla finds out she's pregnant. Good thing you got that promotion, you baby daddy times two you.

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): There are sooo many good ones from this post (Dec. 22, 2006, go back and read if you can) but if I had to pick one it would be: "When are you two getting hitched?" "A week or two after the baby's born." [This seemed so logical to me at the time, but now I'm all, "What's the rush? The kid's already a bastard."]

Chapter 5

Kayla tells David she's pregnant. David tells Jenna. Jenna punches David. Jenna calls Michael for comfort and support. 

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): "Jenna, wait! Let me explain!" [I think you covered just about everything but positioning, buddy. She gets it.]

Chapter 6 & 7

Cassie turns into a complete psycho and suggests that Kayla "get rid of" Jenna. Cassie devised a plan to to hit Jenna with a car. It would simply be an "accident." David reconciles with Jenna. In the middle of the Dairy Queen parking lot, Kayla drives the car into Jenna while Cassie sits in the passenger seat. (What, she's not going to jail for murder. She only came up with the plan. Kayla has to do the dirty work.)

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): "You need to get rid of her....then David can give you everything you and your baby deserve." [Um, I was just going to suggest getting a lawyer and suing his ass, but murder works, too.]

Chapter 8

Whoops. Wrong person killed. David pushed Jenna out of the way. HE was the one killed, not Jenna. However, Jenna landed on her belly and Mary Katherine didn't survive. Kayla and Cassie were arrested two days after the "accident" (read MURDER). We learn that Cassie is in a state of shock over her brother being killed (duh, it was HER idea to do this in the first place) and that's about the last we hear of her. Kayla is a wreck as well (duh, way to kill your baby daddy). Jenna is full of hurt, sorrow, pain, and anger (duh, baby daddy dead? Check. Baby dead? Check check). I'll never understand how Jenna says that she can forgive Cassie because she was just trying to "save her brother...to protect him by trying to kill me." Tha hell?

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): Jenna after finding out she had lost the baby The bulge I had loved to touch so much was gone. [There is a double entendre here somewhere, itching to break the surface, but I'll refrain out of respect for the dead.]

Chapter 9

Cassie is sentenced to three years in prison with possible parole after a year and a half. Kayla gets six years. We fast forward seven months. Michael goes to visit Kayla and ends up going off on her for hurting Jenna so much. As he's leaving, Kayla asks Michael to tell Jenna that she's sorry and would like to see her face to face. Kayla delivers a baby girl and decides to name her Katherine Marie (after her dead half-sister. She honestly thought that would be a good idea. Yeah, she's a dumbass. Kayla that is, not either baby.) Jenna calls Kayla for the first time and Kayla gushes about her baby (again, she really has no clue).

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): I felt guilty as I talked about Katherine. "Yeah, A little girl. She's adorable." [Motherhood is so rewarding and fulfilling and I've never experienced such unselfish love in all of my life! Not that you would know anything about that. My bad.]

Chapter 10

Michael gushes and gushes over Jenna. He loves her, has for years, and always will. Jenna calls him for a ride to the prison to see Kayla. 

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): As I went home a few hours later, I thought about everything that had happened in the last 7 months. David had died, and so had Jenna's baby. Two of my friends were sent to prison for their murders. It was a lot to handle. What a summer this turned out to be.  [I could've had a V-8!]

Chapter 11

Jenna visits Kayla in prison. She sees the baby and learns that her name is Katherine. At this point she becomes outraged and feels that she could give Katherine a better life than Kayla ever could. Frema put it best by saying "Poor Jenna. Girl done lost her mind." Yes, but really, she's been through a lot and totally has every right to lose her mind. And lose it she does. Learning from Kayla's mistake of no disguise, she cuts and colors her hair and steals Katherine right from underneath the nose of prison security (or clearly, lack thereof). She hits the road, planning on making one last stop before she leaves the state (with NO carseat).

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): The deskman looked surprised as I walked slowly, my arms wrapped around my belly [a baby's limb poking through the sleeve of her coat...]. "I have to go," I gasped. "My period is really heavy this month." He reddened. "Go on," he said, waving me away. [Ah, the old menstrual card. Well played, Jenna!]

Chapter 12

Thank God Jenna stops by Michael's house to say good-bye because she was as prepared as Anna Nicole's will (read: not prepared at all) for taking Katherine away for good. Michael stole some money from his parents and hit the road with her. We also learn that when Michael gets fed up, he hits. Other than that, he's Jenn's hero.

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): "Michael? Michael, what's going on?" I heard my mother call from upstairs. "Nothing, Ma," I called back. "It's just the T.V." [Nothing, Ma. Just smacking around the woman of my dreams!]

Chapter 13

Kayla is informed that her baby is gone. She's interrogated by the cops. It doesn't take her long to realize that Jenna is the kidnapper.

Frema's best commentary: [Also, Lifetime? Feel free to approach me about a movie script at any time.]

Chapter 14

Michael and Jenna take turns driving through Wisconsin to get to Iowa. (Shut up. Frema was a damn good writer at the tender age of 14, you can't expect her to be good at geography, too.) Jenna has time to do a lot of thinking and realizes that she misses Kayla and their friendship and knows that by taking Katherine from her, she's hurting her. The two turn around and head back home. Jenna can't cross that state border yet though. She wants just one more day with Katherine before giving her back to Kayla.

Frema's best commentary: [This girl so owes Michael a blow job. Really. At this point the poor boy's balls must be bluer than the sky.]

Chapter 15

Kayla is informed that a witness has spotted Jenna and Michael in Wisconsin. Kayla persuades the cops to take her with them to retrieve her daughter.

Frema's best commentary: "Maybe. But I have to be there when you find my baby. Please! You can cuff me, gag me [hold me, thrill me, kiss me, kill me], whatever!"

Chapter 16

Michael FINALLY gets the balls to tell Jenna how he feels. She doesn't believe him and simply thinks he's lonely. Before she has a chance to realize that the feeling is mutual, the cops have their car surrounded.

Frema's best commentary (in brackets): I grabbed her shoulders. "You have to know!! I need to know!" [OK, OK, I love you. Just please don't hit me again!]

Chapter 17

It's all over. Jenna and Michael are caught. Katherine is returned to Kayla and the security (yeah right) of the prison. She decides to not press charges against the two, claiming to understand why Jenna did what she did. Jenna finally realizes that she's in love with Michael.

Frema's best commentary: "If you don't have any plans for the rest of your life, I thought that maybe we could get together..." [Oh my gosh, I'm cringing, you guys. CRINGING. Forgive 'lil Frema for the cheesiness.]

Chapter 18

One year later, Michael and Jenna are married. Kayla's year with Katherine is up though and her parents won't take her (shitty ass grandparents). She asks Jenna and Michael to take her.

Frema's best commentary: There was a small reception, then we flew to Paris, where we stayed 2 weeks. Her parents paid for the expensive trip. Out of guilt, I guess. [Geez, wasn't the counseling enough?]

Chapter 19

Katherine is taken from Kayla. Yes, I totally cried. Shut up.

Frema's best commentary: "Ma-ma! Ma-ma! No-no-no-Ma-ma!" Her face was blotchy, and her arms reached out to me. Her little body shook with sobs. [Mothers in the house, are you still with me?  Hang on, it's almost over.]

Chapter 20

Five years later Jenna and Michael have spit out twins of their own, making them a family of 5. They are living in Jenna's dream place. Florida? New York? No, Iowa. Michael is training to be a teacher and Jenna stays home with the kids. I'm wondering how this is financially possible and want in on the action so I can stay home so easily with my kids. All seems perfect. However, Kayla will be released from prison this year. Hell-oooooo sequel!

Frema's best commentary: [Ah, Jenna's mothering skills haven't changed one bit. Have fun dangling over cement and wood chips, foul-mouthed toddlers! Also, TWINS. Did you expect anything less from Michael's sperm and Jenna's uterus?]

-------

SYNOPSIS NUMBER THREE
by Molly

(Mad props to Molly for slipping in her very own "your mom" joke!)

The Tragic Love Friday series began to unfold back in November, when Frema decided to share the soap-like multi-triangular fictional work of epic proportions, written by none other than her young, romance-craving teenage self. The story involves main characters David, the double-duty burger-flippin' baby daddy; Kayla, the first love then dumped then knocked up then turned vengeful murderer baby mama number two; Jenna, the once friend of Kayla and fiance of David, baby mama number one who ends up not only with dead baby but dead boyfriend all in the same day, eventual wig-wearing prison baby kidnapper of baby mama number two's baby and then in the end happily married to her good baby stealing buddy, Michael; Michael is the bitch-slappin' best bud to Jenna, who hangs around and baby naps while he bides his time waiting for the piece of ass that turns out to be his eventual wife; and last but not least, Cassie, who is much like seaweed to the story--she's David's sister and gets wayyyy too involved with his girlfriends, eventually plotting with baby mama two to kill baby mama one.

The plot of the story is thick and juicy, just like your mom, and full of unexpected awesomely dramatic twists and turns. And as a bonus, it's loaded with Adult Frema's hysterical commentary on the writings of 'Lil Frema. So without further adeiu, I present to you a different sort of summary, in the quips of Adult Frema:

"Obviously that's not the only thing that came!" "The condom, David. The condom is what went wrong." "Yes, Kayla. He love you long time. For about eight minutes."

"Um, I was just going to suggest getting a lawyer and suing his ass, but murder works, too." "But you're still pregnant, so you win!" "I suppose when you kill your ex-best friend's unborn baby and soon-to-be husband you can afford to be generous with forgiveness. Also, is anyone else flashing to mental images of Glenn Close and dead bunnies?"

"I see you've dropped a quarter down your panties. Let me get that for you!" "Ah, the old menstrual card. Well played, Jenna!" "Clever strategy, Jenna. The police would never think to search for a missing baby one state over!"

"Sweetie, if Katherine hasn't eaten since she left the prison, she's probably dead. No need to rush."

"OK, OK, I love you. Just please don't hit me again!" "Hold me, thrill me, kiss me, kill me"

"This girl so owes Michael a blow job. Really. At this point the poor boy's balls must be bluer than the sky." "Bitch is gonna make ME cry!" "Ah, Jenna's mothering skills haven't changed one bit. Have fun dangling over cement and wood chips, foul-mouthed toddlers! Also, TWIINS. Did you expect anything less from Michael's sperm and Jenna's uterus?"

Can't wait for the dramatic sequel!

-------

Clearly these are excellent write-ups that make it impossible for you to keep dry underpants. Clearly it is a monumental task to select a winner.

Therefore, once again, you're doing the hard part for me. Tell me--either in the comments or via e-mail--which reviewer should receive the first season of 90210. All three rockin' authors have earned their very own Love, Betrayal and a Baby Original Mixed Compact Disc Soundtrack, featuring songs to be determined by Silly Hily and me. And yes, David, "Invisible Man" will totally be on there as Michael and Jenna's theme song.

We are going to have big fun with the sequel, friends. BIG FUN.

Double-Duty Wednesday

I was pretty sneaky last week, huh? Going on about my teenage years and former flames, parental trials and tribulations, basking in the afterglow of the Internet's sympathy, all the while ignoring the white elephant that was Weight Loss Wednesday.

I didn't skip out completely--I did submit myself to the unforgiving nature of the scale, and I was neither pleased nor surprised with the one-point-two extra pounds of insulation I seemed to have accumulated watching all those DVDs from Blockbuster Online.

Things aren't much better this week:

LAST WEEK'S WEIGHT: 138.2
CURRENT WEIGHT: 137.8
POUNDS TO GOAL WEIGHT: 12.8

Apparently skipping out on my after-dinner ice cream indulgence last night was just enough to register a loss this morning. Go me.

After work yesterday I abandoned the business-casual khakis I wore to the office and slipped into a pair of my favorite NY&C jeans, and I was horrified to realize how tight they felt in the thigh. I could still button them without cutting off circulation to my brain and legs, but it wasn't a comfortable fit, and I didn't make it further than watching Monday's episode of Heroes before I was rummaging through my dresser drawers, searching for my favorite draw-string pajama pants, pants that probably deserve an Honorable Mention in my hypothetical top five, so often are we together.

As I mull over another week of missed opportunities to become a stronger, healthier person, I also remember that today is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent, the first of forty days (forty-six, actually, thanks Wikipedia!) spent in preparation for Jesus's death on the Cross and subsequent resurrection. I can remember going to church after school with my mother as a kid to receive my yearly thumbing of ashes, contemplating a suitable sacrifice to show my thanks, which usually turned out to be something like cookies or chocolate (Chips Ahoy products being the ultimate tester, Mom loved to keep a package in the freezer) and I never made it past week two. Since stumbling blindly into adulthood, I can't remember making any Lenten offerings, but this year, in light of all that's taken place in my spiritual journey and how truly blessed I feel to enjoy this stage of my life with such a wonderful person, I think I have a special responsibiltiy to do something outside of myself, something to show God how appreciative I am for everything He's given me, which includes the body I spend so much time picking apart.

I complain and complain and complain about my rolly-polly belly, my alarmingly round face, my flabby back fat, and yet I continue to gorge myself on cookies and candy and handfuls of shredded cheese when I'm supposed to be washing pots and pans. I'm not thirteen pounds overweight because of a slow metabolism or gestating baby, but rather a lack of self control, and I've been so angry with myself for caring more about snacks than the importance of maintaining a healthy weight. It's not right, especially when I have an actual condition to control. In addition to wanting to be around for my husband and our future children for decades of years to come, I have an obligation to God to make smarter choices with this body He created specifically for me.

So, during this season of reflection, every time I reach for that bag of Keebler Fudge Stripes, every time I think of diving into a mountain of berry rainbow sherbet, I will remember what God has done for me and and treat my body with more respect. I will think before I open the pantry door. And I will remember that my spinach-dip recipe doesn't really need a full cup of Parmesan cheese. (Ah, cheese, both friend and foe!)

I am also giving up All My Children. What, you didn't think I'd take the easy way out, did you?

Since I've been dragging my feet over the weight-loss thing for such a long time, and since it's actually a personal benefit to slim down and eat better, it didn't seem right to offer my harmful caloric intake to God. I thought it would be more of a sacrifice to cut out a vice, something I genuinely love and encounter on a regular basis but doesn't add to my quality of life. Luke suggested spinach dip, but since I only pig out on a batch once or twice a month, that didn't work, either. Then he suggested my blog, and I laughed hysterically. AMC it is.

I also wanted to make a positive commitment during this time and settled on reading some part of the Bible every day. I like hearing scripture readings during church services, and though I studied scripture in high school and college, I don't remember a lot of what I learned, so I'm looking forward to reaquainting myself with the Good Book.

There's still one week to go before March, but already I'm experiencing a new beginning.

It's Important to Share Exquisite Pain with the Ones You Love

I don't think I'm cut out for this whole Cringe Book thing.

This morning I ditched the office again so I could continue to sift through journal entries documenting my tortured past and submit the most awkward ones for possible inclusion in a book that'll be publicized on a national level. And when I first pulled those books out, it was fun. I'd shriek with delight over each memory and eagerly shove a diary into Luke's hands so he could read passages aloud in his best little-Frema voice. Oh, the days when life's biggest problems included agonizing over which New Kid to pine for!

However, as I moved on to my pre-teen years and straight into full-blown adolescence, it became harder and harder to laugh.

I've written enough about Nick--The One Who Went For Three Weeks Without Calling, the boy who happily accepted my offer of virginity before I took off for college, the guy I obsessed over for FIVE YEARS--on this Web site that the following entries don't need much backstory. The first one was written on February 6, 1996, almost four months after we broke up for the first time.

See how "grade" I was doing? So what if I was afraid to leave the house in case I missed a potential phone call? Who cares I was creating elaborate schemes to make secret contact with the boy who plainly told me I needed to be with someone else, or that I included phrases like "exquisite pain" in my vocabulary?

We got back together that June, but by August we were fighting again. Break-up number two involved confessions of drug use, theft, and contact with another girl in a nearby suburb, with a big "Fuck you!" from me as he fled the scene as fast as his legs could carry him. By spring of my senior year, we were dancing around each other again. We went to prom. We did the Deed. And in between, there were missed phone calls, week-long absences, and awkward conversations about "where this is going." Just like before.

So when I read the entry below, written just days after admitting to my part in our Horizontal Tango (in such detail that I made myself blush, and I wrote the damn thing), I really do physically cringe.

Page 2:

Stupid, stupid, stupid girl! I can't believe how stupid. I was preparing to spend the rest of my life with someone just to rid myself of religious guilt. Because God would've much preferred me to commit to a man prematurely rather than just call a spade a spade and let him go. Classic flawed logic--like when I was debating sex in the first place and thought we shouldn't use a condom because the Catholic church is against artifical contraception. A+, Frema. Well done.

I read these entries and can't decide which is worse: that I let myself get so wrapped up in a relationship before I was ready to stand behind my beliefs or that one day I might have a daughter who feels the same way and I will have to watch her suffer the same way my parents watched me. I was so angry with them, especially my mother, who I often yelled at for not having enough trust in me to make good decisions, right before I ran to Nick's house and spent four hours on the mattress in his bedroom pretending to watch Die Hard. I was in control! I knew when to stop! And when I finally gave in completely, I still believed I knew what I was doing. It was my body! My choice! Who was she to tell me what to do?

I think about having similar arguments with children of my own when they're that age and I'm petrified. I'm in awe my mother was able to restrain herself from popping me in the mouth.  I wonder how many nights my father had to comfort her to sleep because I was so quick to declare my independence, so cocky as I threw her teenage pregnancy in her face and informed her how much smarter I was, how I was determined to live a different life than the one she'd panned out for herself. I acted like her advice couldn't possibly have value because I didn't want to admit how self-destructive it was for me to insist on staying with Nick, refusing to "give up" even when he wanted me to. As wrong as he was for me, he wasn't a bad person. He gave me plenty of outs, and if I'd told him to stay the hell away from me, he would've done it. It was me who kept going back, enticing him to come back, making excuses for his behavior so I wouldn't have to think about life without him.

I'm glad I gave this Cringe Book a shot. I'm glad that I'm twenty-seven years old with a wonderful husband (who celebrates his thirty-third birthday today, Happy Birthday, sweetie!) and insanely understanding parents. I'm glad I wrote these entries because the act of putting my feelings to paper was sometimes the only way I could get a handle on my emotions. But I'll also be glad to pack these books up and retire them to my closet again. Refusing to share them out of context with a mass of strangers (I refuse to think of you guys as strangers) will be the Valentine's Day present I give to myself.

Say A Little Prayer For Luke, Because He's Subjected to My Nonsensical Ramblings Every Single Day

Only thirty days into 2007 and already I can cross one of my New Year's resolutions off the list.

Luke and I, we'll not be paying off the car.

All this time I've been focused on eliminating the three-hundred-and-thirty-dollar monthly Cobalt payment from our vast array of bills, convinced that doing so would put us in a better position to buy a house. Financial advisors often encourage buyers to whittle down their consumer debt before applying for a mortgage, and if we could just "make do" in our one-bedroom apartment until next summer, the two of us could not only own our car outright, we'd also accumulate about ten percent for a down payment on a modest starter home. If we extended our lease to September 2008, maybe fifteen. As far as the whole baby thing (BAAAYBEEES), well, if the good Lord blessed us with one before we dug our heels into the confusing world of real estate, we vowed to make it work until our lease was up because it'd only be for a few months and Leigh wouldn't notice how cramped we were until she was ready to walk, but we wouldn't be in the apartment long enough for her to start walking because Hello! Our plan was to be in a house by then. So no worries.

(This "new" plan has, in reality, been in place since we got married, and yet I'm still inspired to rehash it once every three weeks or so, punching various numbers into my calculator and pestering Luke for his thoughts on what we can do save more more money, stressing how important it will be for us to choose a home that can be maintained on his income because that's what will enable me to stay at home with Leigh (or Lucy. Or Jillian. Or Nathan, because legend has it some women give birth to boys). And because Luke is used to my love for Rehashing Important Issues We've Already Covered In Excruciating Detail, he slips into his Devil's Advocate gear and reminds me of our salary differences and how difficult it might be to make ends meet with me out of the work force, all the while supporting our common goal to care for a child without forking over wads of dough to a daycare facility. Apparently we save all our fancy dance moves for the choreography of thought-provoking conversation.)

In order to get ready for the upcoming buying frenzy, we find ourselves drawn to the bookstore every few days, perusing the shelves for advice on how to select a home and how to pay for it without defaulting on my student loans. And every few days, we walk away empty-handed because I remember we still have my sister-in-law's copy of Home Buying for Dummies and Suze Orman's Money Book for the Young, Fabulous & Broke, both of which have a wealth of practical information, and also because spending money on financial-planning books may not be the most sound financial plan. Anyway, while reflecting on some of Suze's gems, I recalled a scenario she described in which a young woman had several thousand dollars worth of credit card debt at an interest rate of twelve percent and a savings account that yielded an annual return of point-three percent at best. Why, Suze asked, why oh why was this girl socking away money at such a low rate when she could be using it to pay off the high-interest cards? "Use your head, girlfriend!" she said, wagging a literal finger as demonstrated by her flagrant use of exclamatory sentences.

And that's when it hit me: I was that young woman.

I don't know if I've ever shared this with you people before, but I have very good credit. When I bought the Cobalt in 2005, I scored a two-percent interest rate. Two percent! Over the life of my loan, I'll have shelled out fewer than four hundred dollars in interest to GMAC. Another tidbit you may not be aware of: the interest rate on mortgages? They are not two percent at all. In fact, they are the opposite of two percent, which is Frema-speak for triple. What the hell am I thinking, rushing to pay off a car three years early in order to save a few hundred smackers when we could be funneling that money towards a house, the cost of which will most likely pay for a bachelor's degree at a private college? Also, where did I get the lame-brained idea that we'd have any money to save once a baby enters the picture, especially since we plan to live on one income? My thought process was so faulty you'd swear I spent my free time drinking gasoline and then inhaling the fumes leaking from my ass.

Our new, "foulproof" plan: use our savings to get into a house sometime this year. Our lease ends in June, but if we need to, we can extend it for another three or even six months to make sure we're really ready. Once we're in the house, we can start saving to pay off the car. This plan allows us to properly situate ourselves as homeowners before the introduction of any offspring (BAAAYBEEES) into our family, which we both like. Not that there's anything wrong with apartment living. We love our little unit and have everything we need, but we'd have to make some major changes to accommodate the cohabitation of another person, even if that person's activity level will be limited to producing smelly bowel movements and sucking on my boob (God willing).

Now that we've got the financial logistics straightend out, we can devote our time and energy into my new favorite topic: Who Gets To Stay Home With The BAAAYBEEES?

It's no secret to the Internet that I want to stay home with my children, at least until they're in school. And even then, the idea of being That Mom, the mom who bakes cupcakes for snack time and volunteers for field trips and has dinner sitting on the table at five-thirty every night, stamps a smile on my heart, so I guess I just want to stay home. I have career aspirations, too, but I'm more than willing to put them on hold while Luke and I are in the early stages of building our family.

However, it's also no secret that by some divine twist of fate, I currently make more money than Luke, so much so that if our roles were reversed--that is, if I had Luke's job and he had mine--the question of whether or not we could afford to keep me at home wouldn't be an issue. We'd do without cable for another few years, and our dinners out would be reduced to an occasional extra-crispy chicken bucket from KFC, but it'd be managable.

In previous discussions regarding our previous plan, I would sometimes casually suggest that Luke consider being the at-home parent, and we'd both laugh, and he'd reply that he wasn't sure how he'd feel about taking a break from the traditional nine-to-five work force, and I'd breathe a sigh of relief because that meant it was OK to resign ourselves to a life of (temporary) poverty. If Luke didn't want to be a stay-at-home dad, I would never make him. But I still didn't want to pay for daycare.

That was all before this past Sunday, when Luke and I were out for breakfast and we let our collective gaze wander over to the table across from us, where a blond-haired, blue-eyed little boy who couldn't have been more than eight months old was blowing raspberries with Gerber's latest fruit-and-meat concoction, and Luke said, "Maybe I could be a stay-at-home dad after all. It would make better financial sense."

At that point, my head started to shake and my eyes bulged out of their sockets, but not before they reduced Luke to a pile of ashes with the deadliest, most evil If Looks Could Kill staredown in the history of the universe.

After I stopped banging my head into the restaurant's coat rack in an effort to permanently erase his comment from my memory, I let myself process the information so we could give the matter some serious thought. When I think about having to redefine the image I've made for myself as a mother, I want to grab Luke by the collar and plead with him to work two jobs so I can bring that picture to life. But when I think about what's truly important to me--the ability to enable our children's parents to serve as their primary caregivers--and I realize that THAT dream can still come true, I start breathing again well enough to remember this family is not all about me. And Luke is going to be such a wonderful father. Our children would be truly blessed to be able to spend so much time with him.

Right now, it's too soon to make any definite decisions. Individually we'll keep doing our thing, career-wise, and revisit the issue once we have a baby to stay home with and I get a chance to see how I hold up after a three-month maternity leave.

Yesterday in a Google chat with Molly, I joked that I've gone from being a Catholic singleton with SAHM potential to a Protestant working mom. It's a good thing Luke can cook or this whole "challenging myself to be a more open-minded person" thing would be such a waste of time.

Football and Churches and Ducks, Oh My!

First things first: Did anyone watch either one of the two AFC games yesterday? Because oh my God, the Midwest is having a collective heart attack: for the first time ever, the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts will face off in Miami at this year's Superbowl. While I'd never describe myself as a football fan---it took me twenty minutes to figure out what the hell AFC even stands for--but as a Chi-town native and current Hoosier resident, the anticipation over "the battle of I-65" has inspired me to save both the front page and sports page of today's paper in order to document this historic moment for my future offspring. Next thing you know I'll be wearing team jerseys and chugging copious amounts of Miller Light from a plastic hat. And I don't even drink beer.

It was a good weekend. I did file my work samples into three-ring binders and plastic sleeves and tossed out two garbage bags worth of trash and dusted and vaccuumed and almost orgasmed from the cleanliness of it all. On Saturday night, Luke and I rented Little Miss Sunshine and Snakes On A Plane. One of those movies had us guffawing and crying and celebrating the acting chops of one very talented Office actor. The other also induced tears, but for vastly different reasons. I'll let you determine which is which.

We also went to church.

Since the start of the New Year, I've been thinking a lot about how it's time for us to start searching for a parish of our own, one that provides a strong foundation for the core Christian beliefs we both share. With the Frema-Useless Clutter household currently subscribing to a complicated mixture of Methodism and Catholicism, our research revealed we might both feel most comfortable in the Episcopalian faith. We visited an Episcopal church together last spring and had a good experience with the Mass, though I was intimidated by the grand scale of the architecture. This time around, we chose a church in a neighboring town a little closer to home, on a Sunday when the streets were filled with snow and the plow trucks were nowhere in sight, but we made it, and our appearance was received in a manner similar to Howie Mandel at the Golden Globes, which is to say very, very well, or at least it would have been if I'd been stalking the red carpet.

Because of the snow, there were only a handful of parishoners in attendance, so we basically stuck out like sore, spiritually lost thumbs. We were bombarded with outstretched hands during the offering of peace and personally encouraged to take communion from one of the ushers. At the end of Mass, one of the priests invited us to have coffee and doughnuts in the church's kitchen, an invitation we originally planned to decline, so overwhelmed were we with all the warm welcoming, but the song in her voice was like an imaginary hand gently guiding our footsteps to the room where lukewarm Folgers and supermarket pastries awaited consumption, and soon we were visiting with other families, making small talk about the weather and how we found ourselves in Indianapolis.

All that to say we really liked the parish and plan on visiting again, though we still might check out a few other churches before commiting ourselves to any one place. I could feel those old feelings of sadness bubbling up inside of me again as I sat next to Luke in the pew, just like last time, at the idea of saying good-bye to the faith I'd grown in for so much of my life, and once again I reminded myself that the God I talked to and prayed to and wept with and thanked in the Catholic church was the same one waiting for me in this new Episcopal one, and I wasn't saying good-bye to Him, just worshipping with a new group of people who really weren't as different as I thought they'd be. At least, not in the ways that mattered.

After church, Luke and I went for breakfast and did some shopping. When we finally came home, we noticed this sight in the pond across from our unit:

We didn't think much of it until Luke peered out the window a couple of hours later and saw that the goose was still there, perched in the exact same spot. Figuring the poor thing must be stuck, we marched outside and tossed some stale bread crumbs his way, hoping the promise of food would provide ample motivation to free himself. When that didn't do the trick, Luke hurried upstairs to grab a broom with the intention of breaking through the ice with the handle. Before he could pierce the surface, though,the goose must've questioned the validity of our plan, because he made a clean break for the sky, leaving behind chunks of Market Pantry whole wheat bread as a tribute to his courageousness.

Since we still had three or four pieces of bread left, we circled the pond looking for other feathered friends with which to share our feast, partly against my better judgement. The ducks and I, we have a history, you see.

It started out calmly enough, with the whole flock keeping a respectable distance in the pond, perfectly content to eat crumb after crumb in the water, until they decided they needed to experience their snack up close and personal.

The farther away I walked, the braver they became. Which made me quite nervous. I hastily abandoned a half-piece of bread in the snow, hoping to distract them, but it only left them hungry for more.

I thought walking in the street would instill some fear, surely put them in their place. It didn't, those brazen bastards.

At that point, after many pictures were taken to document my fear, Luke (finally) came to my rescue. Thank God.

 

He makes it look so easy, doesn't he? Not scary at all!

And then the ducks blew him kisses of gratitude, and I began to feel a little silly.

But not TOO silly. After all, I did see Snakes On A Plane. For all we know, the ducks are just biding their time.