january 10th,,,the date i had been looking forward to ever since i peed in a shot glass (instead of drinking out of one!) & found out that i’d be having one more baby…this time we have been eager to find out the sex, while in the past we had not found out that news. we waited and wondered,,, we assessed ALL my symptoms, and tried to figure out whether it’d be a boy or girl based on things like “i don’t feel like chocolate or meat AT ALL” & “I’m not quite as emotionally disastrous as i was with elle, am i?” (i have been worse!)
20 weeks! the morning of,,,
the morning started out rough, which must have been my forewarning… this week we experienced SNO.M.G. (thanks lisa frame) and the temps had been SO LOW, that we were stuck indoors all week. literally…my husband went to work & my son was lucky enough to get an invite to go bowl with our super considerate friends & then out to lunch, as i stared out the window wondering if the sun was just playing jokes..it wasn’t! it was so icy out there that we really didn’t plan to get outside,,,until friday (jan 10th),, when temps rose to a humid 30.
i geared up, and got my drunken octopus childrens’ limbs crammed into layers of sleeping bag equivalent pants & jackets, forced their tiny fingers into mittens and gloves, and strapped those boots on SO tight i was sure we would be outside just as long as it took me to actually GET US READY… unfortunately the snow was just so deep that as soon as elle took steps, her boots got swallowed by the snow undertow and somehow her socks were missing too. i didn’t notice at first but once i did, it became a game of boot & mouse and our ventures quickly turned into two screaming children being crammed into the side door as i refused to deal with my sons morning of whining and my daughters attempts at frost bite. i came in and told my son to quit all the whining, that if he is whining about something, then that something is going to end. in this case: the outdoor adventure we all craved so much. i instantly felt bad for not being sure if he understood me, and i felt guilty and sad. an endless battle in parenting, at least for me (especially for me with him, he is verrrry sensitive). we wrapped up the tears and had some hot chocolate and i considered ideas for “how to end impatience, in an impatient situation”… i did come up with an idea & i hope to write about it asap…
boot the boot
the plan this morning was to grab an early lunch & meet my husband after his short day so that we could all go to my US as an eager family. i felt like i was running late but met my husband at a coney island not far from my doctors’ office. my anxiety had already been tested and pondered, but adding the children to this visit after a chaotic lunch was just a bad idea. elle is pretty awful whenever we go out to eat. she hates the high chair but is not big enough for the booster and we are left moving her around every few seconds to appease her, so we can TRY to eat. she screams and cries, eats crayons, and rubs food in her eyes and hair. it’s pretty. william gets anxious about me being upset and tries to make sure everything is going to be ok, and i ALWAYS leave to either put elle in the car to relax (she actually loves it) or go to the bathroom to wash her hands and face. i actually usually eat before we go so i don’t have to get pregnant-crazy-woman hungry where i rip waitress’ souls out with my eyeballs as i wait for food. this lunch was pretty typical.
just an example of her expressions while dining out
after elle & i got out of the bathroom, matt & will were ready to pay up and get to my appointment. at this point i was about a 7 out of 10 on the anxious scale, partially from my morning, and the other part being that i was nervous about scary US news. i mean, this IS the only time when you get to “see” your baby. i hadn’t done any genetic testing because i just followed suit with my previous pregnancies, and this US is where you get an “idea” that things are going smoothly…or not. effing scary right?! elle rode the quarter horse and we raced out the door!
i parked like a crazy person and raced into my dr.’s office, signed in and was told right away to just “head on back”,,, matt followed shortly behind me with the confused & tired kids and the US tech was ready & waiting for us. we were’t late but i know that we could have been earlier to arrive (ie. seemingly earlier to leave),,,which would have let my brain rest, knowing my kid would be one step closer to getting her demanded rest. as soon as i lied down, we handed the kids suckers and elle started screaming as if to say “what the hell is happening to my mom!?” and within 3 minutes, i had matt take her out to the waiting room where i heard her wail as if to say “i need that lady you are ripping me away from!! she is THE ONLY PERSON WHO CAN TAKE CARE OF ME OR IM GOING TO IMPLODE IN 30 SECONDS!!!…” i guess it helped that matt took her out, but now it was just will & me,,,and my exciting news… the US tech was very thorough and i told her we did want to know the sex. she scanned and william held my hand,, he’d glance at the screen and say “look mommy, it’s the new baby, aww, it’s so cute!” and i actually felt more adoration for him as he popped his sucker in and out of his mouth and gazed at what he had no idea was 4 chambers of a healthy heart. good start! the tech was confident and talking with me as i asked a few general questions and she captured pictures of the baby i wished i’d had the chance to grovel over. she scanned the vaginaballs area and right away i thought,”whoa!? it’s a boy!” and then i learned that that boy was actually the umbilical chord spun between it’s legs,,,and it wasnt going anywhere! i was squirming from side to side, and flipping around trying to help her get a good money shot, but nothing. the tech was sure i could come back later on for a gender US and otherwise said that the baby looked great at 14oz.
she ran the wand up the baby to the head to get a few more pictures and said, “oh, there’s a cyst in the brain. yep. there are choroid plexus cysts. yep, that side too. i just have to get pictures of that.” and all the sweet moments went down the mom soul drain as if i were just proposed to but all i heard was the “will you marry me?” part. it was more than THAT intense, but it was equivalently & exponentially opposite in happiness. i was devastated. i had no idea what choroid plexus meant and all i could think was, “are these tumors? is this baby ok? why am i here? is this a genetic thing? whats happening?” the tech explained thoroughly that it was nothing to be concerned about. she went into detail about what those parts are and how this type of thing occurs and even said that they’d likely dissolve. i was still shaken but i was ok. i felt a bit relieved knowing that my husband could hear about this from me rather than just next to me, holding our pissed off toddler. the tech was very good. i liked her even though i was unsure about that news, and i got cleaned up and walked out with a poppy angel boy, and a cyst covered sex-secret unborn baby. none of this was how i’d expected it’d go. but i was so warmed having been told that the baby looked great. that part was imbedded into my heart & soul, and even with this news of something i was not sure about, i have had a very sure feeling that no matter what, this baby is doing well. i am not positive what that means, but in my deepest self, i have had good feelings about him/her. i walked out to the waiting area where my daughter leapt onto me like a leach and my son lied down flat on the ground. i told my husband that the sex wasn’t revealed and that the baby looks great. i said that it has choroid plexus cysts, but i was assured it was nothing to be concerned about…. and then i hit 10.
matt instantly started searching stuff on his phone,, my overtired & pressed baby was crying and nestling into me, and my son was blankly laying on the ground. i was upset because our plan was for me to wait for my actual 20 week appointment to see the doctor and matt was to take the kids home. instead i felt like i was being smothered with thoughts and concerns (and by people: inside & outside of me)–i had not gotten to experience the fun of ‘finding out’ that i’d imagined, and my general feelings of trying to meet my kids’ needs in an environment that i put them in, that wasn’t really meeting any of our needs, was stressing. i had to ask matt to “not do this right now” and that “i was not sure what any of it really meant and that i could ask the doctor”. i don’t love looking up horror stories on the internet immediately after finding out new words,,, and NOW was not the time. the tears started and they didn’t stop for 4 hours. it was all just too much.
he left with the kids and i stayed for my appointment. it was a flop. the doctor looked at me as if i were crazy when she walked in and i said “hi. don’t be alarmed. i am crying because of the cysts and i don’t know what they are or what it really means and thats why i am happy to see you, so you can explain it all to me.” she literally had a partially opened mouth as if i were crazy and told me to stop crying. she said that the baby looked great & that we’d continue as normal. that this is common and likely only visible due to high quality equipment so they document it, and that was it. she asked if i’d had cramps or questions and we began to wrap it up. i asked about doing sit ups,and i wondered if it was ok to do them if i were instructed to in a class and for how long? she basically told me to not do sit ups, that “she didn’t know what kind of working out i was doing” and that they pretty much just recommend yoga. awesome. I’m not scheduling with her if possible and i will probably be induced just to get the doctor i prefer. pretty immoral for me but i was really upset and i didn’t feel compassion. besides, there’s a chance my neighbor or husband can deliver if i do go into labor on my own. it should only be about an hour or two !
she told me to “wait it out,” which i guess meant to “get my ugly-cry face cleaned up before i leave to check out” and that was it. i barely brought myself to not-tears and just walked to the front desk unashamed, and sat there very overwhelmed with my orders to “be happy & do yoga”, then scheduled the next appointment. i got out to my car, sat there crying because of such a day & finally started driving and just thinking with weepy tears, not full-blown screamer tears. i (parked) had texted stephanie one thousand times and got her support (thanks for that steph!) and i just sat there numb… it wasn’t just the cysts, or the umbilical vaginaballs, it was everything. i was just having a very bad day, and the events of it didn’t help. my friends were sweetly bombarding me with wishes to know the sex and all i could do was try to explain that i didn’t know,, and it wasn’t really on my mind anymore. i know people were excited, but after all the energy i had put into that morning and then all the energy drained from me through a few confusing moments, i had nothing left. i drove and wondered, what now? are you just done or what? my little blankie picked up 2nd hand cigarette smoke from the smokers outside the office and i puffed it all the way home.
i often find myself driving behind cars of all sorts, with one break light out. it happens usually twice a day if i venture out and it always happens when i am in a pit. it happens in moments when i feel out-of-control or in moments when i am wondering about my life. for real…i started up woodward avenue and looked for my “sign”… no such luck.. i drove and wondered what exactly was digging so deeply into my emotional self and i just cried. i passed the mall and my old school, i forgot about the burnt out break light i never saw and took an ambivalent right onto a road and there it was…
and a mercedes at that!
while things like this bring me such relief, and i really believe they are my own little reminders that life is just as its “supposed” to be, i couldn’t fully just accept the events of the day. but i AM so grateful that the break light happened that day,,just when i stopped looking…
Once i got home, i was very tired & drained…i didn’t get on my phone..i just set it down & tried to enjoy the thrill that my kids express at my company. matt had looked deeply into the cysts and into medical journals enough to ease my worry and we ate food and watched sofia the first,,,again.
late that evening, when my friend amy texted me asking if i had still planned to run the “bling in the new year” race we had considered, i explained to her my day & her response brought me such light. she told me that her son had shown the same cysts on his US, and that it was nothing to worry about. another friend told me her friends child had them and again,,it was nothing.. i started to think that racing the next day might lift my spirits, shake the sad from my innards, and MAYBE even soften the giant cry bags that were consuming my face! i told her i’d go and i registered as her partner.
the next morning was ridiculous. this race was new to me but i had seen it before on runmichigan so i figured it was just composed of little online. the details said : 9:30am. that was it. we came by 9 and got to talk the whole way there about my previous day. amy is one of my best listener friends and in that,, best friends. anyone who can sit long enough to listen, really listen to another persons words is someone to cherish. she really heard what i had been saying and she was so sweet in her support and by the time we got to the race start bar, i was lifted so much of my concerns over the cysts and previous happens of the bad day. thanks amy !!!!
we sat at the bar after we had been given a map and a list of store names, and we were told we had to scheme a path to hit all the stops, to collect “the goods” and once we returned, we would have run a 5k. we hilariously tried to figure out where the places were that we had never heard of and i quickly gave up saying “well, if we don’t like it then we can just go for a leisurely run and come back”. but once we were out,,we were committed.
first we ran to hollywood market and the challenge was to answer a question about the stores history or run extra distance and come back. i was deflated. it felt weird running after having been mostly in the gym and i was getting bigger (20 weeks), so i said i wasn’t going to do it. amy ran in, got the date, and we grabbed our beads and headed to the next 14 challenges.
there was even karaoke & i sang MY HEART OUT!
there were numerous stores and places to run to. some with fun challenges like throwing a disc onto an inflated octopuses tentacle, and answering questions from a teenage boy such as “when is the next leap year” & “name 3 greek gods” but my very favorite one was the aquarium.
you walk into this dark, stinky reptile store,,,walk ALL THE WAY TO THE BACK, and there was this guy standing there with a fishing lure type box that had a hole on top. i instantly knew I WAS NOT GOING TO DO THIS ONE. he explained that one of us had to grab our beads from the box, after reaching through the thousands of crickets that were in there. eff no. somehow, amy agreed to do it & i pretty much was peeing my pants while my unborn baby peed out it’s vaginaballs!!! she was grabbing handfuls of crickets and throwing them out as she squealed in an attempt to get that damn beaded necklace. bugs were flying everywhere and i was laughing so hard on the inside, my smile looked dumber than the one i made during that zumba class i did in december. after a few grab and trows, she got the beads and we raced out. i was screaming “animal abuse” and we just quivered at what she had actually just done! it was THE BEST!!!
i still cannot believe that she did it !!!
we got to all the challenges, got all our beads and headed back to the bar in what seemed like the most schematic way and when i looked at my mapmyrun app, we had run just over 4.5 miles…guess we took the path less traveled, but it was so fun & on top of it, we got a really exciting run in! apparently we came in 18th which we think is false, but we sat at the bar and got our complimentary beers (half for me) and headed off to lunch at lilys seafood.
so, after a very emotionally consuming weekend, i just let the next few days roll off the calendar and have found that i am feeling fine. finally. it takes so much out of you just being a parent. top that off with concerns over your pregnancy, a broken dryer for three weeks (!!!) and emotional reactions to your children’s behaviors and you too will sign up for the next best race just to get in-touch with you. for me, it helped ! i don’t know how to end this as far as the cysts go,, my dr says there is nothing to even follow up but i may ask to see if they do dissolve, for my own peace of mind. we go back (ALONE) to see the boy or girl soon & i just can’t wait to know this time !
happy saturday !!
