The FSFM post

Otherwise known as the Feeling Sorry For Myself post.

If shows of emotion are a good sign while waiting for a baby (heightened hormones? Stress release?), then I'm doing wonderfully! Since Monday when my in-laws had to leave SD after a week waiting to meet their new grandson, the waterworks have sprung frequently and liberally. I'm not proud of this. Trumping disappointment, guilt, anxiety and more disappointment, is an overall feeling of being upset with myself. I know better than this. I have people close to me who are unable to conceive or conceiving and then suffering the loss of miscarriage. What an idiot I am to be wallowing in self pity for having carried a healthy pregnancy to term but having to wait a few extra DAYS (maybe weeks at most) to bring him into this world?! Really, is that my biggest problem? I guess it is, and therefore I should be counting my lucky stars, not blubbering like a teenager who just got dumped.

So what's all the fuss about anyway? Sometimes I don't really know. But the emotions start to well when I have my midwife team tell me (like they just did this morning) with their best smiles, that while I'm "softening" and my cervix is moving forward, like it should, neither my dilation or effacement have progressed since our apt. last week. After weeks of trying every natural induction technique possible, I'm stuck at 70% effaced and only 1 cm dilated.

I know I should be happy there's been any progress, rather than disappointed that we're not looking at an arrival today or tomorrow or maybe another week or even more. Moreover, there is a side of me, as I've mentioned before, that -if we lived down the road from our families all in one country and this was some boring month with nothing going on - I would be fine to kick back and watch the world go by for another week or two, trusting the wisdom of my body and Noah to simply come when he's ready. Unfortunately, the world we live in has dates such as Christmas Eve - 3 weeks from this Saturday (the amount of time it will take Noah to get his birth certificate so we can leave the country); and Monday - the date my parents are both scheduled to fly home (though they've said one will delay their flight if baby's not here yet); and logistics such as the house my parents are trying to finish building before we (and other guests from as far as the UK) arrive for the holidays; bureaucracy such as birth certificate and passport wait times; and flight rules, fees and availability for Brent, me, Thea, Noah and my folks to try and make it to Canada for Christmas once he does come.

So yes, it upsets me to think we might not make it home by Christmas. It worries me the stress my folks will be under to get their house built if they stay to support us. These seem like real concerns that loom larger with each day I don't go into labor. But worse than this, in many ways, is how this is affecting my feelings about a birth we've painstakingly planned to be as positive as possible, and a son who I love and have yet to meet.

I know it's not Noah's fault. It's my body that's taking its time to get ready and if my disappointment should be directed anywhere, it should be at myself (which it is). But what can I do about it? I've read every list available on what to do to bring on labor:

Walking. Acupuncture. Evening Primrose Oil. Raspberry Leaf Tea (to help uterine tone). Wearing a compression band to keep Noah's head pressing on my cervix. Visualization. Relaxation. Spicy food. Hell, I even drank a hot water "tea" of 1/4 cup of melted chocolate chips and 1/8 tsp. of cumin based on word of mouth that it induced labor (yuck!). You name it, I've been doing it!! The only exceptions have been castor oil (I even asked, my midwife said don't bother yet because my body was still so unready) and membrane sweeping (midwives couldn't reach it with my dilation being so small), but heck, I'll even try them as soon as they'll let me!

In the meantime, writing this all down has helped diffuse the emotion (I do have pregnancy hormones as an excuse!) for the time being at least. Mom and Dad are talking about delaying Christmas, and filling our remaining waiting days with fun activities rather than obsessing with stressful thumb twiddling (and doing all of the above list over and over again). I see my only job now to be letting go and trying to recapture the positive anticipation of this birth and meeting our little Noah (I hope he's still little by the time we get to meet him! ;-).

Pet Peeves

Finally, a post that has nothing to do with kids!

Well, almost nothing to do with them... I think the hormones of pregnancy do
contribute to my occasional oversensitivity, or as a former classmate puts it,
"Grumpy Pregnant Lady" syndrome.

So, to get the creative juices flowing, or just me back writing (we all fall off the bandwagon from time to time), I have chosen to share a few of my latest (and ongoing) pet peeves!

1) Toilet Paper Tantrums

In this case, I'd understand if it was a toddler thing. A fairly common hazard of potty training (or just having someone in the house who's newly tall and mobile enough to reach both the TP and the toilet bowl) is an overenthusiastic TP user who unravels half the roll into the water thinking, "What fun!" But to the best of my knowledge, my place of work does not have a hidden contingent of child labor. Nor does the pub we patronized in Portland. Nor do many other establishments where I have entered a perfectly good bathroom stall to find the bowl choked with white, soggy, 2-ply mush! There may or may not be a floater under there, but can't you FLUSH?! If this was consistently a plugged toilet reaction, "Ack! I just laid a huge dump and the toilet won't flush! Quick, cover the evidence in copious amounts of TP and no one will know!" it may be forgiven. But after I recover from the (now familiar) revulsion of having to stare at your soggy left-overs, a quick foot to the flush demonstrates that 9.8 times out of 10, these TP Overusers are just lazy, inconsiderate (to our future generations who will have to visit trees in museums because of your toilet habits) and rude! People.

2) (Excessive) Idling

OK, stoplights are permitted. Stop signs. At the airport where the pacing TSA /police zealots get their daily giggles for yelling at you to move. But hanging out in an underground parking lot with your exhaust spewing out around the pregnant lady huffing past to the stairs to escape? Not cool. Idling for 10 min while your hubby runs in to get milk so that your sleeping baby doesn't overhead in his carseat in 90+ degree temps? Granted. Unleashing half an hour of SUV exhaust so your middle-aged wife and you can listen to the radio or bask in A/C while you gaze at the ocean that is overheating due to your excessive carbon emissions? Nope. People!

3) Inability to use a Turning Indicator

Are you invincible? Cuz I'm not. And neither is this baby I'm carrying, or the rest of my irreplaceable family. So Mr. I'm too lazy/distracted/unskilled to move my hand 6" to flick a handle, signal before you change lanes/turn a corner/cut me off so I at least know you're about to do it! People.

4) Parking Hogs

If you want to waste the equivalent of a downpayment on a house on a bucket of bolts, fine. But unless you want to leave a $20 bill on the extra parking space you chose to occupy with the rear half of your diagonally-parked car to compensate me for the time and effort it's going to take for me to go find another space 5 blocks away, you may have to invest a lot more in re-painting the side I'm considering keying.*

5) Not being able to think of a 5th Pet Peeve

Just when you get a good list going, your brain craps out with writers block. I'm talking about pet peeves people! The things that really irk me that I should be itching to rant about. Not serious stuff like political or social beliefs, or the nit-picky little things like college-educated professionals who seem to have skipped every grammar class in their 16+ year education and still passed... but where's my long list? Four? Seriously? I mean, there are a few others: litterers; leaf blowers; people who drive through crosswalks while I'm crossing; text-and-drivers; talk-and-drivers; Harley owners (and others who don't seem to believe in mufflers) driving through residential neighborhoods with sleeping infants, especially when it’s mine; passive aggressiveness (because in addition to my conviction that it's an underhanded way to try to make your point, it's also contagious and what I dislike most is when I return the favor); good plots that are ruined by bad acting; other people's hair in my shower; always ending up in the slowest checkout line; blog sites that completely ignore all your attempts at formatting, to name a few. But how does a post dedicated to ranting look when I can't even manage a measly half dozen?

If there are some particular ways that you feel people step on humanity's (or just your) toes that I seem to have overlooked, feel free to add your own.

*In truth, I'd never really key a car, but sometimes I do enjoy contemplating it :)