Pregnancy and Motherhood Archive

I started Sophia in swimming again. I’m taking her to a new place. I like it a lot better than the high school pool classes we took her to before. The first two sessions at this new place were very similar to the old place, lot of songs and singing Humpty Dumpty before counting to three and letting the baby swimmer ‘jump’ into the pool. The difference was that there were a lot more toddlers in the class and the instructor tries to get to know the infants and toddlers. Also, since those first to sessions the class has progressed and the class we took before never did.

Tuesday and Thursday were her third and fourth swimming sessions. On Tuesday the instructor held one side of a hula hoop while toddler held by a parent holds the other side of the hoop and we passed our infants and toddlers through the hoop to be briefly held by the instructor. He then had them ‘swim’ back to mom or dad. I thought for sure Sophia would cry, but she did fine. She wasn’t sure what to make of this person holding her, but her face didn’t turn upside-down slowing burning red with tears and shrieking like it usually does with many other people.

Thursday we put the kids in lifejackets for a while and let them float around. I had Sophia on her back. Again, she did really well. Some stress showed on her face when she realized it wasn’t me that was holding her up, but she just quietly floated near me on her back with her arms and legs tucked in close to her body like a furless sea otter. I wish I had a picture to show, but since I have to be in the water with her, I have none.

Commercials and other age defying cures drive me batty, so I must inform that there isn’t a magic lotion or any other type of topical ointment cream, wrap or elixir that will give back the great young skin everyone wants. Stretch marks, cellulite and wrinkles are part of life. Grow up and old and just fucking accept that the enemy of imperfect skin is deteriorating collagen fibers.

Collagen is a protein in the connective tissue of animals (yes, humans are animals) that allows young skin to have its elasticity. Stretch marks are caused by gaining weight too fast for collagen cells to keep up. This is at cellular level people hence topical crap simply won’t cut it. The best way to avoid stretch marks is to not grow fast, which due to genetics maybe impossible at puberty (I have stretch marks on my knees from growing too fast as a kid). During pregnancy the growing parasite inside and your hormones, determine when you’re hungry and if the food is going to stay down. I was hungry ALL the time when I was pregnant. I remember my stomach waking me up (not the creature inside, but my actual stomach) at 2am and I HAD to eat something. I would be famished even after eating a large meal for dinner. – For those of you from the Midwest, when I say dinner I mean the evening meal not lunch. The evening meal is dinner not supper. The last supper was like 2000 years ago. There’s a painting showing the last supper hanging in a museum somewhere, so stop calling it supper. It makes my ass twitch to hear the word supper. It sounds stupid so just stop, ok?

Whether from puberty or pregnancy you won’t be able to control the rapid growth. **Pregnancy is not a time to diet.** So unless your mother, grandmothers and great-grandmothers all came away from pregnancy with out a mark you’re doomed to see those red lines. They will eventually fade and then only show up when attempting to tan. I think my red lines finally went away a couple months ago. I didn’t really notice when they disappeared. They didn’t leave a note. But I do know it took months because I remember wondering when they would finally leave.

Nothing topical helps cellulite either. The keys to keeping cellulite at bay are:

• Eating plenty of fruits, vegetables, and fiber
• Staying hydrated
• Regular exercise - this doesn’t mean marathon insanity just get up and move around. Walking is great exercise
• Maintaining a healthy weight for your body frame/type (if you’re doing the previous three listed bullets and there are no medical conditions or medications affecting weight, this one should fall into place on its own)
• Not smoking

Cellulite forms when collagen in areas that have fat near the surface of the skin – mostly tights and butt on women - stretch, break down, or pull tight. This doesn’t mean that only fat people get cellulite. It has to do more with being female (it’s more common in women than men – lucky us) and the collagen stretching and/or breaking down because skinny women can have it too. Several things may play a role in cellulite forming, genetics, hormones, fad dieting, slow metabolism, and even dehydration.

I gained 42 pounds when I was pregnant. My digestive system slowed down, and hormones ran amuck. I had cottage cheese ass and it wasn’t pretty. I’m back to my regular 130 pounds and things are mostly back to normal. I don’t have the dimples, but some stuff will never be quite like when I was 23, ever.

The only thing the topical lotions/ointments and other crap are good for is dry itchy skin, however the itchiness isn’t going to go away completely if your skin is healing scars or stretching across a pregnant belly. You’ll only get temporary relief from that.

In the US we tend to bathe too often and it doesn’t help our skin at all. Note that though I’m aware of this tidbit I still shower daily unless I’m camping or I just want to be left alone to my dirty-hippy-vegan-patchouli-oil-wearing self. No, I’m not a vegan. I’ve never even considered being vegetarian, and I’ve NEVER used patchouli oil. For those of you who do use it you should know that those of us that don’t think you smell funny and not in any sort of good way. Now go take a fucking shower and wash your funky hair.

Using regular soap instead of soaps with their natural glycerin byproduct removed and/or added detergents really helps. If you want to know what’s in your soaps, lotions and other cosmetics go to the Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety Database.

Today I was making dinner when all of the sudden I hear Kurt say, “What are you doing baby?!” I run out of the kitchen to see what’s going on. It’s like two steps. We have a very tiny kitchen (hint to Kurt that I want to move out of this house). I see Sophia on her Radio Flyer Scoot About. She had pushed the front of it right up to the steps leading up, which are right next to the steps leading down that didn’t have a baby gate across them at that moment. I thought that was the concern, but no. Baby Evil Knievel had her hands on the handles and her feet on the seat. She was STANDING on her Scoot About. Kurt and I broke into instant Gallagher skit.

Me: I told you to WATCH the BABY!
Kurt: I was just keeping an EYE on the baby.

If you read my very long ranty, I-hate-TSA post (nobody did, so don’t feel bad) you might be wondering how Sophia did without me. She did really well, just not on the first night. Poor Kurtie.

After a couple of hours of fussing, Sophia finally went to sleep the first night. She woke up at midnight and started SCREAMING when she saw daddy’s face instead of mine. She screamed for two hours. She woke up early, still tired, so Kurt had her fall asleep with him. I called at eight in the morning to see how things were going and woke them both up. Kurt said that the rest of the day wherever they went in the house, Sophia would look all around the room to see if I was there. That evening I called again. Kurt said that she was ok during the day, but looked very sad. She was playing quietly while he talked to me, then he put the phone up to her ear. I talked to her, she recognized my voice and she started crying. Kurt said she looked at him as if to say, “How dare you put my mommy *in* the phone”. The next night went better. She was so tired from the previous night that she “passed out” in Kurt’s arms at six that evening.

Other than that, things went well for them. The whole month prior to my trip, I gave Sophia her morning cereal with formula so that I knew she’d be ok with that different taste and it wouldn’t upset her stomach. She was already ok with a bottle since daycare; so the lack of nighttime mommy milk machine that was the only tough part.

I was nervous all day Thursday and the night before about going on a trip without Sophia. I know she’s fine during the day with Kurt but because I’m the one with the functioning boobs I’ve always been the sole nighttime caregiver, and to top it off Kurt will be feeding her formula because after having her in daycare my freezer supply is depleted and it’s hard to build an excess when she’s always draining me. I tried weaning her onto solid food for one meal a day so that I could pump and save some, but aside from going to bed at 7pm I can’t get her to do anything consistently. It’s just not in her nature.

The other thing that worried me was not the flight like it might be for some people but airport security. I’m not afraid of the uniform, I mock all uniforms, it’s the arrogance and curt manner with which many of them address passengers. Some of them really take their rent-a-cop job much too seriously. They aren’t there for our safety. They’re only there for an illusion of safety. If you really think that making us all look foolish walking around in our stocking feet while ensuring our shoes go in a separate bin from our laptops and reducing our cosmetics to three ounce bottles all contained in a bag no bigger than a quart size, you’re really fooling yourself.

No one seems to question that prior to 9/11 airport security used to make passengers turn on their cell phones and laptops to make sure they function and aren’t just cases for something more sinister than Tetris. They don’t do that anymore. Instead, they tell us tweezers and nail clippers could be used as weapons of mass destruction, no wait, they’re ok. It’s the various liquids consumed internally for nourishment and the viscose liquids used for external personal cleansing and moisturizing that will invoke the wrath of the board-to-tears-wanting-something-exciting-to-happen-team. Oh but it’s for our safety you say. “Whatever it takes to be safe” Really? What if that retarded ‘shoe bomber’ had hid his matches in a plastic bag up his ass? Would a cavity search be ok with you? And don’t answer with, “Oh, but that’s over the top no one would require that of us.” It does give an indication of where your limit is, but it’s not an answer. I’d also like to point out that after the ‘shoe bomber’ incident that it was lighters that were banned not matches. Carrying matches was still ok. And now out of the blue, lighters are no longer a threat, but ‘loose’ lithium batteries are a no-no in checked baggage. I’m at your assistance, so here is how to carry your ‘loose’ lithium batteries. *eye roll*

Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety. – Quote generally attributed to Benjamin Franklin but probably by Richard Jackson.

Obviously, I’ve informed myself with the most current random rules, so why was I worried? I didn’t want to pay to check any bags nor risk loosing my one very important bag for my very short trip. Without that one large camera-case-like square black bag my boobies would explode! Oh, wait, sorry I didn’t use the “E” word. Note to self not to use the “E” word in an airport even in whispered conversation.

Kurt assured me that I was not the only on to ever carry a breast pump through security. But I try to never underestimate human stupidity and who knows what a square-ish non-descript black bag with a pump and air tubes may look like to them on those scanner thingies. It may very well look like a bomb. OHMYGOD – I didn’t just use the “B” word. I’d never use the “B” word, ever! Note to self – don’t carry an oddly square black bag and utter the “B” word within a ten-mile radius of any airport, even one that only caters to Cessnas and Pipers.

As Kurt drove me to the airport, I played the possible airport security scenarios in my head. The one that stood out went something like this:

After spotting me in line juggling a square black bag, shoes, quart size clear plastic bag filled with mini bottles of various viscose liquids, a laptop (because I’m physically attached to it and must carry it with me at all times much like a security blanket), and a regular carry on bag I reach the front of the line and place all of my items on the conveyor belt. My square black bag that was made to be discrete for taking to work is now scrutinized by airport security. “Ma’am, can I ask what’s in the bag?” I bite my tongue to keep from answering that type of question in my usual smartass manner. “It’s a breast pump.”

There is snickering from the two TSA girls that are now behind him. “Can you open the bag for me ma’am?”

MYGOD it’s so tempting to give a quip that would instantly emasculate him. I keep reminding myself that it isn’t the time to be a smartass. There is no freedom of speech in an airport – the humorless bastards. “Of course” I say. The pump I use is an old Medela model that I bought on eBay. You may think it’s gross to buy such a personal item used but I replaced the personal parts and anything that typically is exposed to the breast milk. I open the flap that covers one zippered pouch in the front and two on the top, and then unzip the two top compartments. One is insulated for keeping pumped milk cool and the other houses the personal things that attach to my person and make me feel like I belong in the barn at a dairy farm. I open the small front pouch that reveals the air tubes and control panel. This is when my warped mind flies way off the deep end.

In my ultimate TSA attitude scenario, Mr. TSA realizes that the compartments don’t reveal the entire inside of the bag. He becomes a little twitchy. I explain that the area not exposed by the compartments houses the pump part of the breast pump. He doesn’t care and asks how he can know for sure. Cringing at the thought of him possibly wanting a demonstration of the pump at work, I suggest that I could plug it in. This actually causes further aggravation because he now believes my black bag is going to take out the whole terminal. At this point relying on a hand pump doesn’t seem so bad. I have a hand pump that came with the electronic one and I’ve used it a couple times. I don’t like it. It takes F-O-R-E-V-E-R and I’ve never wanted to build my forearms up like a lonely man with a bottle of lotion.

I abandon the airport scenario here because I’m sure you’ll wave the bullshit flag when I mention the bomb sniffing dogs, S.W.A.T team repelling down the walls, the helicopters, and the acrobatic way in which they combined their efforts to whisk my bag into a blast proof room and detonate it.

The way to my destination was relatively uneventful except for the new annoying recording they play while going through security.

Transportation security officers need to quickly determine whether or not a bag possibly contains a threat. You already know you’re not a threat, show us by packing smart. Think layers. One layer of clothes, one layer of electronics. That way, it’s easier for us to determine what’s in your bag. Mam, boarding pass and id. Also, being prepared when you approach the checkpoint will make the whole process a lot faster. Lastly, don’t forget to carry only three ounce, travel-sized liquids, gels and aerosols when taking them in your carry-on bag and remember to put them in a clear, quart-sized, resealable plastic bag and place them in the security bin. So next time, simplifly your bags and you could get through security a little faster.

The, “show us” bit really bothers me. Does it sound like innocent until proven guilty to you? Or maybe the other way around?

I only had a tiny issue with carrying 4 ounces of sun block instead of the allowed three ounces within a bottle specifically labeled as 3 ounces, four being right out! Yep, they’re that anal. The nice TSA person let it slide, which confirms for me that the rules are truly unimportant and just plain retarded.

My breast pump didn’t cause any problem whatsoever until the way back. I swear the technician radiated the hell out of it trying to figure out what was in the bag. As I looked down the conveyor to grab my other bag he sized me up, just stared at me. I could see the little hamster running on its wheel. He was trying to decide whether to inspect further. I started to get nervous all over again, but it either, didn’t show (yeah right), they have no clue how to identify body language, or the only reason he was eyeing me was that he just wanted to know what that damn thing was, and I wasn’t about to tell him.

It’s not that I’m embarrassed about carrying a breast pump. I loathe having to explain myself. Obviously I don’t mind writing about me, but this is on my terms. So if I had been forced to explain it would have come out something like, “It’s a FUCKING breast pump, okay?” Yes, I retain all the qualities of a defiant teen except the wheelie shoes. He finally said, “I have to let this one go.” Thankfully the wiring for a breast pump is all wrong for a bomb (damn, there’s that ‘B’ word again). They also paused on the sun block and let it go, again.

I walk away feeling like I got away with something because I had an extra ounce of sun block in my bag, but you can carry scissors with blades shorter than four inches. There is no length restriction on Knitting and Crochet Needles, but “tools” must be less then seven inches. In there link about matches and lighters they write,

Lifting the lighter ban is consistent with TSA’s risk-based approach to aviation security. First and foremost, lighters no longer pose a significant threat. Freeing security officers up from fishing for 22,000 lighters every day (the current number surrendered daily across the country) enables them to focus more on finding explosives, using behavior recognition, conducting random screening procedures and other measures that increase complexity in the system, deterring terrorists. The U.S. is the only country in the world to ban lighters – all other nations, including Israel and the U.K., do not.

I find it amusing that they’re telling us how tedious the ban on lighters was and for some reason felt that it was necessary to mention that no other country had the retarded rule.

I laughed when the ban of liquids came into place. We’re made of mostly water and do I need to empty my bladder before going through security, were my thoughts. Though I knew it was an absurd rule it didn’t really bother me until now. Airlines don’t serve free drinks anymore. Even prisoners get free water, but for an airline passenger it’ll cost $2.00. Of course you can buy it in the secured areas of the airport, but where I was, it was $2.00 plus tax. Tell me the system ain’t stupid. By the way, if you’re traveling with a children you are allowed to bring breast milk, formula, and juice. And nursing moms are allowed to carry breast milk even when traveling without their baby. You just have to have it out and warn them before they see it or they may freak out and bleed from the eyes.

Now that Sophia sits up and can stand on her own for almost a minutes I’ve ditched the bath seat for a rubber suction cup bath mat. She loves the new bath time freedom and butt scoots all around the tub. I first gave her this freedom a couple weeks ago, but the night before last was the first time she tried one of her mealtime booster seat tricks in the tub. Imagine if you will, an infant sitting nekkid in the tub. Usually girls don’t create their own personal showers like little boys do, so you really don’t know if you’re ever washing them in their own urine. Maybe you can if there is a lot, I don’t know. Sophia was sitting in about three or four inches of water with her feet in front of her. Her legs weren’t straight in front of her because nothing extends straight out on an infant except their arms and then it’s only when they’re reaching for something you’d rather them not have and you aren’t really looking but know they simply couldn’t have reached that from over there, but I digress.

She’s sitting with legs in front, knees slightly bent towards her sides. She leans in towards the water with her mouth open and touches the water with her tongue. She did this repeatedly. The water was soapy from washing her, but all I could think is, “mygod I hope she didn’t pee!”

Today is my evening off.  Because our little monkey is so stubborn and smart, I have to actually pretend to leave the house so that she will accept that dad is in charge otherwise all I hear all night is her fussing.  Kurt says she’ll stare at the door to the master bedroom as if to say, “mom is in there, just go get her”.  I got my coat on and said goodbye and went out the front door.   Kurt took her to the bay window to wave goodbye and then took her upstairs.  He showed her that the master bedroom was empty, closed the door behind them and then went into the computer room closed that door turned on some music.  He opened the curtains to signal me that I could come back into the house and relax in our itty-bitty master room.  Thank goodness it has a bathroom.  This was the first time we tried this charade and it’s the first time I didn’t sit in the room trying desperately to ignore the crying, lamenting and gnashing of teeth.  Ok so there isn’t usually a lot of gnashing, but you can’t have lamenting without gnashing of teeth, so I’m keeping it together or the whole world may fall apart.  This is what I get to go through for some time away from baby.

I did hear Kurt at one point say to the baby, “Yes, I grit my teeth.  Stop laughing at me.”  I waited until she went to bed to ask him about it.  He was making himself macaroni and cheese with hotdogs (barf with fake meat chunks), and he was trying to separate two hotdogs from the rest of the frozen pack.

I have to go back in time now.  Kurt and I went to a friend’s house so that Kurt could help them level their yard.  They had rented a Kubota front-end loader for the job and Kurtie was operating it.  Our friend’s mom saw Kurt operating the machine and commented, “Wow, he’s having a lot of fun on that.  Look at him, he’s smiling.”  I told her that he was actually clenching his teeth.  “No,” she insisted, “he’s smiling” I didn’t say anything to her but I had lived with the man for years.  I think I know clenching when I see it.  He clenches when he backs the car out of the driveway.  The man doesn’t know the word, relax.  It’s all intense all the time.  And we all tease him about it ALL THE TIME.  We tell him it’s because we love him; really, we’re just a bunch of cruel bastards.  Back to today with Sophia…

Sophia, my darling evil genius, was staring at her daddy as he’s trying to separate the frozen hotdogs and laughing.  He was clenching.  And she’s my girl, she was laughing at him.

Every morning after Sophia gets her second diaper (yes, second diaper, not first) changed she scoots over to her crib (it’s a small room, she doesn’t have far to go) and reaches through the bars for ‘friend’ if she can’t reach him (can a pink blanket be a ‘him’?) she’ll get upset and I toss the blanket to her. She will then pop her thumb in her mouth and flop forward onto ‘friend’ as if she’s praying to Mecca. No, she doesn’t face the same direction every time, and I have no idea which direction would be the appropriate one to face in my house. Anyway, it’s hilarious and I have pictures for you my pretties. This morning she took it a bit further and drug the blanket with her to the next room. She’s getting extremely attached to ‘friend’ and she won’t nap without him. I wash ‘friend’ each time she recovers from a cold or stomach flu and it’s hard to time it so that he’s clean and dry for her nap or bedtime. I can see her ‘friend’ looking very much like Kurtie’s old ‘friend’ very soon. Would it be appropriate to name a girl Linus?

She’s laying on her side in this shot. It was the best “Mecca” pose I got. Usually she’s totally flopped forward with her face buried in her blanket.

Sophia doesn’t put every thing in her mouth like most babies do. She never took to pacifiers and isn’t into teething rings. Usually she mouths her stuffed animals, ‘friend’, cold washcloths, my house keys, the jewel cases to our CD collection, and that’s about it. The teeth marks on her old crib were from the previous owner, but now that we have the new crib, it’s a giant, $145, teething ring.

Someone told Kurt about crib rail guards, so we bought some. We should have just saved that ten dollars. When Sophia has sat in her crib long enough (three seconds), she pulls off the rail guard and beats the crib with it. Then proceeds to chew on both.