Baby Overdrive

Its baby week at our house.
which I should probably view as a preview of things to come --like every week will be baby week.
But up to this point, we haven't had this much baby-ness in a given 5 day span.
Sunday - baby shower.
Monday - nursery furniture arrives
Tuesday - start birthing classes/put together the crib -- the dresser was already assembled.
Wednesday - interview doula
Thursday - hire doula

Whew. Its enough to wear you out. At least wear me out, but I get worn out a lot easier these days.
I will have to get a picture of the nursery furniture. Of course, there is no mattress, bedding, rugs or anything on the wall -- but its a start from an empty room with a box or two and some gift bags.

Birthing classes. Maybe not going to be as bad as I thought. Although we did get some quality mocking of the other couples in class in. And discovered (confirmed really) that neither Joe or I enjoy strawberry/pineapple hand lotion. Long story. Think hand massage and you are on track.
I did have an epiphany. Among the many visual aids that our instructor provided us, one was a tray that had a series of circles on in -- 10 to be exact. Representing the progression of cervical dilation. One ring for each step.
Now, I know most of you -- up until Tuesday night, myself included -- that think 10 cm isn't that big. I would have agreed with you.
Until I saw that last circle.
When its your INSIDES that have to get that wide and still probably won't be quite big enough for a babys head you sorta go -- WTF? OMG? and JEEBUS all at once.
It was an eye opening experience, lets just leave it at that.

As for the Doula. We liked her. She is about our age, has had two kids in the last two years and was pretty candid with us about what to expect at different stages. Asked a lot of questions and laid out a bunch of options that frankly, we didn't know were ours to make. Both Joe and I felt that having someone at our side that is there for us, understands what we want and is going to work really hard to make sure we get it, is a win for us.
I think it will be a good fit. So Thursday, we hired her. Now starts the fun stuff -- working on a birth plan. Which is a lot of details that you would never think to jot down on paper. I shall spare you many of them but we are feeling much better about this whole thing.
And no, this doesn't make me a earth-hippie mom or anything like that. We will be at the hospital, and open to all the possibilities that could face us -- but we are trying to work with her to outline what we would LIKE to have happen and how to react in the event that those things don't happen.
If you are asking yourself, Meghan what in the hell is a doula anyway? Go HERE to get the scoop.

So that is about it. I am getting bigger by the second, or so it seems. Little Leprechaun is all over the place, pretty much all of the time if I am just sitting down and well, not sure that will stop for a bit.
This will be a nice change of pace weekend, with nothing planned but Thank You notes from the shower and hanging out at home. Looking forward to that in a big way.

I do have one bitch today that really gets me.
So in case you didn't know, the Presidential election is next week. You didn't know that? Wow. Hope that you have been on an extended trip to Mars or something -- that would be the only reason for NOT knowing this.
So - Barack Obama has decided to do a final rally in DSM today. This morning specifically. Open to the public. I really wanted to go. I have seen him speak a few times through the campaign cycle. But I couldn't go -- I had to conduct an interview here at work. So I begrudgingly come to work rather than get my politicking' on. And then the guy we were scheduled to interview canceled at the last minute.
GGGRRRRRR.
Dammit man. I have a social responsibility here and you just messed with my Chi or something.
Ok - back to the grind.

Now Listening: Living in Clip by Ani DiFranco

Whirlwind Weekend

Where to start? Lots to catch up.

Lets start with the freshest little nugget in ye' olde' noggin.
They tell you pretty early on that when you get pregnant your dreams have the possibility of hitting the outer stratosphere of craziness. Some blame it on hormones -- which for the record, I think is the medical communities fall back answer for everything odd in pregnancy that they don't understand -- others on the lack of full REM sleep that makes things more memorable. Who knows. But for a girl that never got up at night and NEVER remembered dreams, the last few months have been a bit of an eye-opener in that department.
Lets just say that I think that my sub-conscious has been trying to tell me something for awhile. I have just been too oblivious to it.
Not so much anymore. Last night being a classic example.
For starters, after a very full weekend (more details on that later) I was pooped at the end of the night. Fell asleep on the couch before half time of the MNF game. Woke up to the World Series getting a rain postponement. Went straight back to bed.
So in this dream, I was pregnant - shocker. And going into labor. But when we went to the hospital it was sorta in the middle of a corn field - which our hospital is not, thank you. I mean, yes, we live in Iowa, but not in Hickville, USA.
Anyway, my mom and sisters were with me. And they sent us to this little room. I mean little. And not sure where Joe was during all of this.
A few minutes later - had a kid. No major labor, no big to-do, just boom. Baby. And it was a girl, not a boy.
So they shuffle us through a few more hallways, where I run into two more people I know having a baby. One of which is actually pregnant, one isn't. And then they sent us home. Like the whole thing was just a few hours at this maze of a hospital in the middle of a corn field.
But rather than go to my house, we decided to go to Tony's place. As in Cafe DiScala Tony's apartment. And Joe was there. So we talked for a few minutes about the baby -- no explanation of where he was and then he was like, well, I have to go to work. To which I went ballistic and threw things at him. At this point my sisters and my mom just sorta faded into the wood-work.
And that was the dream.
So go to it my Freudian friends.
The thing about it that sticks in my head was the fact that my mom was there (obviously), the baby was a girl, I was really pissed off about not having a labor "experience" and Joe was no where to be found until the very end.
Any thoughts, insight or theories on this one would be great.
Leaving the slightly esoteric behind....

As I mentioned, full weekend. We had the Race for the Cure on Saturday. Had really good turn out, the weather cooperated (thank goodness) and a believe a good time was had by all. I think the final numbers for the race were over 24,000. Which someone told me puts us close to New York City in terms of turn-out.
I had minimal food left over after brunch (another big thank goodness) and got a trial run at baby-proofing my house with 2 two year olds and 3 under 10 month old babies in my house.
We have some work to do in that arena, but time to get to it. Was really curious to see how the cats reacted to all of it. One hid the whole time, one would hiss at the kids and then walk away (not too happy with that behavior) and one was totally chill with being mauled by little hands.
Saturday night we all went out to dinner to celebrate my sisters birthday. And Sunday was my first baby shower.
Big thanks to all my friends for showing up, family for coming from out of town and just everyone hanging out for a few hours together.
And big shout out to Martine, Lisa and Courtney for throwing it all together.
I had to play one game -- guess the baby food. Which in all fairness, I think I did ok with. My sisters picked up the baby food and threw some combo's in there. Pretty tricky, those girls. But I believe I finished a more than respectable 4 out of 5. I missed applesauce of all things. I thought it was pears.
And for the record, most baby food tastes like crap.
We then moved on to the gift opening. Lets just say that our friends are generous to a fault.
We got a ton of stuff. I mean it.
It took two cars to get it home.
And the coolest part of the day, was the whole party contributing to a Squish Quilt. In short, it is an Asian tradition to create a quilt of good wishes for a new baby. Everyone contributes a piece of fabric and some well wishes.
Now, I am not a "quilt" girl in the traditional sense, but the idea of having one that actually has some meaning behind it is pretty cool. You can read more about them here: www.quiltofsquishes.blogspot.com
As soon as we get it put together, I will get a picture.

So tonight starts our birthing classes. Can't believe that it is here. Can't believe that I am going to birthing classes. That should be, well, interesting. Stay tuned for details. At least the ones that I feel are worthy of sharing.
We also meet with a doula tomorrow. Its like baby over-drive all the sudden.
So that should bring you up-to-date on the latest in our world.
Other than that, just watching the election move towards what I hope will be the right conclusion. Just a week left.
Which is good -- the commercials are really getting old.

Now Listening: Van Lear Rose by Loretta Lynn

The Last Hoorah

I think that the road trip is a quintessential American rite of passage. I mean, don't get me wrong, jumping on a train and going to another country a la Europe is pretty cool.
But -- logging the time in the car, the combo of the company you keep in a very small space, the right tunes on the radio and the ever present truck stop make them a uniquely American thing to do.
I mean, we have movies, songs and books about them.
One of those undertakings where the journey is just as much part of the trip as the destination. In some cases, the journey itself makes the trip.
And I have undertaken my fair share of them since getting that all important drivers license:
San Antonio, TX
St Louis, MO
MPLS, MN
Chicago, IL
Kansas City, MO
And even some less than exciting locations while in college.

So with that somewhat loaded introduction, I am afraid that I probably took my last one this week.

**big collective sigh**

Yes, we went down to KC from DSM to go see Ray LaMontagne in concert. One this was a road trip and two, it was a road trip to see a band -- which is the holy grail of road trips in my mind.
And I will grant you, a 3 hour drive from Des Moines isn't colossal on the road trip scale by any stretch of the imagination. But I took some time off of work -- yes, I took time off of work -- and we headed down. Had a great time -- show was amazing. He hurts my heart when he sings. And it was one of those 2500- 3000 person venues, so our seats were only about 20 ft from the stage. I mean, wow. 2 encores and just a great, great show. Got to share it with our good friends Lisa and Tim. Which was interesting, as she just found out she is expecting, so two of us could drink, two of us couldn't. The boys had to convince the bar tender that being in their presence would NOT get you pregnant.

Which is another side activity of a good road trip -- the drinking. I mean, I did an hour of power out of a bathtub filled with LONESTAR of all things before a U2 show in San Antonio. This was years ago, but you get the idea, and we won't even talk about the beating my liver took on one of my trips to Chicago (it was St. Pat's, need I say more?)
But in homage to the spirit of the road trip, I had a non-alcoholic beer.
Woo Hoo.
I know, how the mighty have fallen, but I have to say it wasn't actually that bad. And for not having a beer -- and loving beer -- in 7 months, it fixed the itch for a little bit.
The saddest part of the whole day and a half, was the realization that this is probably the last true road trip I will take for some time. I mean, we will go places, but with baby in tow.
Whole different ball game at this point.
It made me slightly nostalgic for all the trips of the past.
Ok - enough Debbie Downer, moving on...

Big weekend at the Smith/McConville household. The Des Moines Race for the Cure is this weekend and my first baby shower is on Sunday -- and my sisters birthday is Sunday. So we have company for both events, having breakfast for 40 people at the house after the race and trying to get the house ready in advance of that and getting winded after about 5 stairs has made this a new experience.
I miss my cleaning people.
I miss being able to reach down and pick something up without it being a big deal.
Nonetheless, I am super excited for the weekend. My sisters are coming up, I get all my girls together on Sunday, which NEVER happens, and Julie is coming in from DC for the long weekend.
Woo hoo.
It shall rock.
Ok, back to the grind.

Now Listening: Back to Black by Amy Winehouse

Who me? Irrational? Not possible

I think there is this poster child pregnant woman that everyone has in their minds when the topic comes up.
Some rapidly ballooning, hormone laden, irrational, large ankled woman on the verge of losing it and only staying sane with a gallon of ice cream in one hand and a large vat of pickles in the other.
Clearly this is not the case.
I mean, I haven't craved pickles at all.

Seriously though -- it is true. Maybe not quite to that extreme, but everyone has this idea. Like I could go from 0-Bitch in 6.8 seconds.
Frankly, I could have done that prior to getting pregnant.
I guess what I am getting at, is at any given point, I have experienced one or more of the "typical" pregnant side effects if you will.
And some not so typical, but that is not the story today.
I had been warned by friends of the "irrational" bug. They claimed it was one of the most frustrating things about being pregnant. You KNOW you are being irrational, but you can't stop yourself from feeling, saying and doing X.
Up to this point, I have been just fine in that department thank you very much. I haven't overreacted to too much (at least I haven't been called on it yet) and like to think I have kept a decent sense of reality about this whole process.
Until the last two days.

-you had to know that was coming.

It all stems from the little leprechaun moving around. He is moving quite a bit these days. To be expected. And up to this point, he was most active in the morning and then about dinner time.
Well, over the last few days that pattern has changed. And of course, all the books are saying if anything changes, call your doctor or start charting the babies movement.
Yeah, like that will work -- middle of a meeting and I have to excuse myself to go count kicks.
Practical, really.
I swear these books are written for woman that just sit around rubbing their stomachs and thinking positive pregnant thoughts while only feeding themselves organic, whole foods that they grew in their own garden.
Moving on.

Now, keep in mind, he is still moving. Still feeling the nudges, bumps and kicks. But somewhere along the line I had convinced myself that something was up.
And then today, we had our doctors appt and it took the doctor a few minutes to find his heartbeat.
Total freak out.
I mean, I didn't lose it in the doctors office or anything, but my brain was on total overdrive for like, 3 minutes. It was not pretty. Had it gone a minute or two more, not sure I would have stayed calm. At least on the surface.
But, long and short... they found it. 140 BPM. Right where it is supposed to be. And as I type this he is pounding away on my insides.
Basically, it sucks. You know you are off your rocker and yet you can't stop yourself. Oh, and 12 more weeks of this.
Whee.

Now Listening: Gossip in the Grain by Ray LaMontagne

You did NOT just say that

Its been a week.
Just one thing after another.
So much so, that even my normal amount of bitching seems extreme to me.
Which is saying alot.
But I think the cherry on the sundae came yesterday.
I have sorta begun to insulate myself from the annoyance that comes with the following questions:
"How are you feeling?"
Now, I know people are asking because they care --at least I have deluded myself into thinking that. Its just after the 5,749th time you get asked that in a 48 hour span, you tend to get a little, what's the word.... oh yeah -- annoyed as hell.
However, when I tell them "Fine", I often get this disappointed look. Like somehow they were expecting a horror story of sorts. Sorry to disappoint.
Yesterday afternoon I was at work - where I spend the bulk of my hours these days. And a co-worker asked me the above loaded question, prefaced with my other new favorite....
"You are so cute pregnant"
Erm, nope.
I am learning to just smile, shut my mouth and say thank you. You cannot understand how hard even that is.
Back to the story at hand.
So I get the cute comment, then I get the million-dollar annoyance question.
I reply with my standard -- "Feeling really good. Getting bigger by the day, but good."
And she says - and this was roughly the time in which I wanted to take my shoe and beat her to a pulp --
"You know, it can't be that bad. I mean I have never been pregnant, but how bad can it get?"

Yes, that line you see in front of me. You just crossed it.
Now a little perspective here. I really have been pretty lucky with my pregnancy up to this point. But let me just shower you with a little bit of reality:
I haven't had a good nights sleep in like, a month. And don't expect this to change for well, the next 5 years.
Cherries give me heartburn. Yes - cherries. Not even eating a whole cherry. It was on a danish.
I can't climb a flight of stairs without getting winded.
Putting on shoes and socks has become a major effort
And god forbid I drop something -- which I do with alarming regularity as my joints loosen up -- because it takes 10 minutes to pick it up.

And these aren't major.
I have had friends on bed rest for 30 plus days.
Friends that were sick the entire time.
All kinds of issues.
And we haven't even TALKED about the whole getting the kid out of me process. And I can't even start on that topic as I haven't done it yet --- but you don't have to be a rocket scientist to know that labor and delivery can in fact, be "that bad"

So, Ms. It-can't-be-that-bad ......
Run.
Run as fast as you can.
And take heart in that even if you can't run fast, I probably wouldn't be able to catch up with you anyway.
Because, a beating is at hand.

Now Listening: Whitechocolatespaceegg by Liz Phair

Its the pedal on the right

I will readily admit that I am not the most patient person on the planet.
Or really at all.
But I am trying and that should count for something, right?
So its a Monday, I have slept like crap the night before. I know, I know
"Meghan" you are saying to yourself, "you got the ok to take a little something to help you sleep."
Well, yes I did. Except when you wake up at 1:30 AM and the alarm goes off at 6:45, its too late to take anything.
So -- starting a overcast Monday kinda crabby to start with.
And it would seem that today, I am doomed to drive behind and be trapped next to anyone who thinks that going 5 MPH UNDER the speed limit means the far left and center lanes are where they should drive.
It made me happy.
Really, really happy.
And of course, the slower that they drive, the 'happier' I get.
Lets just say, its a good thing that I didn't have any meetings this morning, otherwise I would have probably been asked to go home and change my crabby pants. Although, being sent home may not have been the worst thing. At least I could sleep.

In other news... we have entered double digits -- leaving the triples in our dust!
As in, I have less than 100 days of being pregnant left.
Woo hoo.
Officially, its 99, but whose counting?
Not this girl, who is getting larger by the second.
Alright, I should get back to work. For a large portion of the country, today is a day off. For me, it is not. However, our client has the day off -- as they are federal. Which means the bulk of my meetings have been canceled and I just **might** get some work done today.
Hold onto your hats, could get crazy up in here.

Now Listening: Trouble by Ray LaMontagne

Full, pink and pissed off

I know, I know. I have been a bad, bad blogger. My excuses for what they are worth, and in no particular order:

• Lack of sleep. I have been battling some serious insomnia the last few days.


• Work has been loco. Which at this point I am sure you are sick of hearing about, but the last week/week and a half has been off the charts.


• Slow build up of stories to share with you all.


• Motivation. Not gonna lie. Throw all the previous issues together and I just haven't even turned on the computer when I get home.

Feel free to let the ensuing judgement begin.
Done?
Good. Moving on.
We will start with a little leprechaun update.
Dr's appt on Tuesday. Had to take a glucose test. Which is a test for gestational diabetes. It consists of the pregnant woman drinking a glucose filled liquid and getting blood drawn at a certain time after you drink it.
Does everyone remember that scene in "Elf" when he chugs the bottle of maple syrup?
Yeah - this stuff is like that, except I don't love syrup the way Buddy the Elf does. But you have to chug it. The whole 20oz bottle has to be consumed in 5 minutes.
So, it was sorta like drinking orange flavored syrup.
Word. Oh, and I passed. So that is the good news.
On to the other pertinent details.
Little man is good. Heart rate came in at 140 BPM. I am measuring right at 26 weeks. And he is moving around just like he is supposed to.
I have gained a whooping 5 lbs this month. Eek. That puts my total weight gain at 12 lbs.
And as we have entered that mystical, magical time frame known as the "Last Trimester", we get to go from monthly appointments to appointments every 2-3 weeks.
And we get to do this for about the next 10 weeks and then we go to WEEKLY appointments.
The OBGYN is my new best friend.

In other munchkin news, the great music experiment isn't really getting me far. As was mentioned in an earlier post, he likes music. Specifically at this point, Radiohead. So I have been making a point of listening to all sorts of genres as loud as possible to see if they warrant a similar reaction.
More brit pop (Amy Winehouse) -- nothing.
Alt-Country (Bastard Sons of Johnny Cash) - nothing.
Rap (Missy Elliott) - nothing
Alternative (Peter, Bjorn & John) -- nothing.
Last night, got to go see The Kooks here in town - more Brit pop. First, totally stoked that we are getting good bands here. That is a great move forward for DSM.
The real test was, will little man react the same to loud music this time as he did before.
During the first set, the answer was no. During the second, he did get a movin'.
I will continue this experiment in the following weeks as we are going to see Ray LaMontagne in about 10 days and I just found out that Dropkick Murphy's are coming to town in November.
Figure I might as well get the shows in now, as post January, those will be a fleeting, distant memory.
Pleased to report that in a nice gender role switch, Joe's friends threw HIM a surprise baby shower on Sunday. And they made him play games. Which, I would have paid good money to see. Still waiting on the pictures. But we got some really nice stuff, and plenty of Bears gear to start down that path.
The only down side was HE got to have drinks at his shower. I will not.
Sucky.
But short lived, and dealing with it.

In the category of public affairs/political news:
Was watching the Presidential debates earlier this week. The outcome of the debates for me didn't really change anything. I do wish to hell that they would actually ANSWER THE QUESTION that is asked of them at the time. Drove me crazy. Or the answer was so buried (most of the time) in a bunch of rhetoric.
The thing that really got under my skin during the debate was a little segue they made prior to the debate starting. I was watching CNN and my buddy Wolfe Blitzer cuts to a picture of the White House bathed in pink lights.
For a reason.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness month.
Pink is the official color of the Awareness effort -- you all have seen the pink ribbons, even on NFL refs this month.
So, our President lights his "house" in pink for the night to show his commitment to curing breast cancer.
Here's an idea you backward man -- allow for stem cell research to continue. Don't set there and tell me that you are committed to a cure, make some hollow PR move like coloring the White House for the night and then cut the arms off the scientific community that is trying like hell to understand and cure this disease.
Can you tell it pissed me off?
**steps off soapbox**


And in my last rant for the day.
I am damned when it comes to Customer Service.
Which I find odd, as I did my time in Customer Service hell. My first "adult" job out of college was a customer service/sales position with the phone company. Yeah, the people you hate to call. I was called every name in the book, insulted in more ways than you can imagine and told more than I care to recall that I was just a "peon" and had no real ability to get anything done. Worked wonders for the self esteem. Suffice it to say, I think that I earned a cosmic get out of jail card with all subsequent customer service people.
Not so.
It has taken me 6 weeks to get our stinkin' HDTV/DVR box to the house. 6 weeks. 4 phone calls to the cable company and many, many minutes wasted away on hold. And so Joe went to get the box this week, got it plugged in and the HD channels didn't work. And they wouldn't talk to Joe because he was not authorized to do anything on the account. So I had to call. And yes -- another 20 minutes on hold and a tech that didn't know what he was doing. Only to have to schedule a tech to come out. With a four hour window of time.
So while I am waiting for the tech to call me, Homemakers -- one of the local furniture stores -- calls to tell me that the BOXSPRINGS I had ordered where going to be another week late.
Let's break this down.
We had an extra bed. We have room in the part of the attic that is finished off. So, make an extra room for guests. Well, since it is an attic, the queen sized box springs wouldn't fit up the stairwell. So, I had to go buy a split box springs. Nothing special, nothing high end. Just a wooden frame with some fabric around it.
But apparently, you need at least a month to get one ordered. It had better be here before the Race for the Cure, or we are gonna have people sleeping on the floor.
So then the tech called, went home, spent an hour working on the HD issue only to be told that basically with the type of TV we have --- its not going to work as is.
Good, good technology times.
And to think, I just wanted to watch some football with a really clear picture.

And to top it all off, we have reached a new milestone in the whole being pregnant thing.
As little leprechaun gets bigger, the stomach takes more room. Which means my insides, and more importantly, my assorted organs are getting all moved around. Including my stomach.
Yeah -- one regular sized meal is enough to send me into misery for a good hour or so.
Who ever got the whole "pregnant women eat all the time" rumor started, is full of it.
No way.
No room.
So working on the smaller, more frequent meals.

Now Watching: A non-HD version of Project Runway Part I of the finale.