The trampoline stays

The trampoline arrived yesterday, and it looks absolutely terrible.

We have a nice backyard with landscaping and a white fence, and the 12-foot trampoline is a black hole of ugly right in the middle of it. We've got majestic redwoods and sweet rose bushes, and now we have a launching pad for the space shuttle.

Last night, Hub-D took a look at it, dripping in the rain and hulking like an embarrassed six foot second grader. "We can't keep it," he said, "it looks terrible."

I knew he was right. It was a mistake. Trampolines are for people with HUGE lawns, where they can landscape around it somehow. They are inherently ugly -- the black netting befits a low-class driving range.

I skulked around the house feeling depressed about it. I had really been looking forward to having a trampoline, but it's true -- it has taken over our whole lawn and wrecked our bucolic backyard. I planned to call the store today and start the return process, but I didn't get around to it.

Then, late this afternoon, a bunch of Chebbles' friends came over. We moms let them bounce for awhile... carefully and cleanly, so that we could still return the trampoline. Suddenly, there were three toddlers and a five-year-old leaping around in sheer GLEE inside that trampoline. They were laughing their heads off, and so were we moms, and of course we bounced as well.

Then, I spotted the neighbor kids peeping over the back fence. "I'm opening the side door, guys, get over here and start jumping!" I yelled. So we added a few big kids to the mix, and we all bounced like crazy well into the evening.

Chebbles sat in the center of the trampoline as her favorite big kid, 10-year-old J., jumped around her. Chebbles was laughing so hard her pigtails were vibrating, then she hollered out, "MOON!"

Indeed, the moon had risen, the stars had come out, and night had fallen without our noticing, so busy were we with the general trampoline hysteria. The temperature had dropped precipitously and everyone's teeth were chattering but we couldn't stop bouncing!

That trampoline is a magnet. Kids, babies, moms, neighbors, everyone loves that trampoline. We almost convinced our 9-months-pregnant friend E. to jump, just so we could get her labor started. And if she'd been able to hoist herself up to the trampoline, she could have!

So anyway, it's an eyesore. You can see it from space. But I called Hub-D and told him tonight, "The trampoline stays."

...Or was it the MILES?

I'm headed into the surgery center again, to the merry tune of $1400, which, if we use our Southwest Airlines Visa card, gives us the same amount of points as a one-way trip to Burbank.

Instead of a royally upsetting D&C, I'm having a hysteroscopy at the surgery center this week. It will be exactly two months since the miscarriage, and BOY HOWDY has this process been expensive.

We've paid for everything upfront with our mighty Southwest Airlines Visa card, and received paltry little checks from Blue Cross in return (e.g., $116 for a $700 procedure). It's like having a stingy dad -- it's almost not worth asking for Blue Cross's payments -- but it's the PRINCIPLE of the thing.

But tonight as I loaded the dishwasher and contemplated my upcoming procedure, I honestly thought, "Well, at least we'll get miles for it."

Hey Mister, can you keep it down?

Chebbles is having a hard time sleeping because there is a man in her backyard assembling a swingset.
She keeps going over to the doors leading to the backyard and peeping at him as he saws.

Chebbles: Own. OWN swing.
Me: Yes, that's your OWN swingset. But you still have to share.
C: (sadly) Shaaaare.
(LOUD SAWING)
C: Noisy! Noisy swing. OWN!!!

Do you want a prune?

Hub-D and I had this conversation yesterday:

Me: Do you want a prune?
Him: (contemplative silence, lasting for 5-10 seconds)
Me: Do you want a prune?
Him: I don't know.
Me: Most people either DO or DO NOT want a prune.

Hub-D disagreed, saying that many people simply do not know whether they'd like a prune. You can help us settle this dispute by participating in this poll. Thank you in advance for your vote.

Do you want a prune?
	Yes
	No
	I don't know
pollcode.com free polls

Family Mom of the Suburbs

When I have more kids, I am going to go completely BERZERK as a suburban mom.

I am loving it here in the 'burbs, raising my daughter among the parks and the neighbors and the lawns and pools. It's great. It's just that I'm not going to feel totally legit until I have a brood. As of now, I'm just a lady with a kid. But once we get another child -- by hook or by crook -- I'm going to go completely apeshit as a Family Mom of the Suburbs.

My whole life is going to be a celebration of the fact I have multiple children. You just watch. First, a minivan. Totally. And the back window will be adorned with little stick figures of our family, showcasing my fertility and my children's brilliance in an envy-inspiring stick figure menagerie.

Oh, and don't think I won't fulfill my long-time yearning to learn scrapbooking. Oh yeah, baby. With multiple kids, I'm going to have a lot of memories to keep track of. I'm going to need all kinds of wooden letters and special scissors in order to nail down all of the major events in our family. I will most likely need a special scrapbooking ROOM in order to accomodate all of the memory-permanizing that will take place.

Please also believe that my family's clothing will match. Oooooh yeah. There are large family ensembles that subtly and tastefully match available at fine retailers such as Hanna Anderssen. Sign me UP for that crap.

I also plan to do a lot of baking once my children are all born and socializing. I'm going to be THAT MOM, because I'm going to spend every damn minute of the day being excited about the fact I have multiple children, that Chebbles has a sibling or two and all of this drama surrounding my reproductive system has come to an end.

Maybe we'll have a family theme song, and we'll sing it whenever we arrive at gatherings together. Plus the horn of the minivan will blare an abbreviated version of it, for sure.

Whereas I am Elle Woods

I have had the songs from the "Legally Blonde" musical running through my head all day long. It's a GREAT musical, I just went to see it again, this time with my Broadway-veteran friend L., who declared it a hit in the making. "Do you realize we just saw the 'Original Broadway Cast' of a hit show?" she asked me in the car. God, we're fabulous.

But now I realize why the story of "Legally Blonde" resonates with me so much, why I keep singing all of the songs and thinking about the story around the clock.

It's the story of a woman who had her life mapped out. She was heading straight into what she thought was her life dream -- then had the rug pulled out from under her. (In Elle Woods' case, it was that her boyfriend Warner did not propose to her, and broke up with her before he left for law school.)

From that point, our heroine is subjected to humiliating tests (LSAT, mean professor, etc.) and she must prove she is made of true grit and determination in order to make her dreams come true. In the end she DOES find true love, and finds a whole new aspect of herself in the process.

How is that different from me and my miscarriages?

Rug pulled out from under my feet? Check.
Humiliating tests? Check.
Finding love in the end? Pending.

I associate with Elle Woods -- she is a "Type A" like me. She enjoys planning out whole chunks of her life in advance. When she's thrown a curveball, it makes no sense to her ("I'm sorry, I was just hallucinating, what did you say?"), because she'd planned it out so differently.

If everything had gone according to my original plan, I would be giving birth today to my first miscarried baby. But instead, I ran into the city with Chebbles, braved a minor earthquake (3.4!) and drank wine at a bar in the Mission with dear Stella, then commuted home with Hub-D, the three of us snuggled up on the subway bench together.

Who knew?

CSI: Feline

It took me a long time to figure out what happened here -- how could this particular pattern of dust have appeared on the floor outside my office?

Then I realized it's exactly in the shape of Otto's butt.

To reconstruct the crime: Otto sauntered in from outside, leaned over to get a drink from his luxurious fountain, and then shook his dusty fur REAL GOOD in the process. So what we're left with here folks is the voluptuous imprint of a cat's rear end.

.!

I think for real this time. Damn. This is the worst psyche-out cycle of all time.

Song of Songs 7

I was minding my own business, dropping off a childhood picture of Hub-D to be framed, when I happened upon this print. It's called "Song of Songs 7" by Raphael Abecassis.

I have never independently purchased a piece of art that wasn't meant to be tacked to a dorm wall. Hub-D has the ability to pick out ART. I don't. So there is no explanation for my reaction to this print.

I kept thinking about it. I called the owner of the shop the next day to make sure it was still there, then I left my child with a sitter and ran back down to stare at it some more. "It's been here for YEARS," the shop owner told me. "I always wondered when the right person would come along."

That's probably an art store come-on, but in my case it was really true. I love this piece of art. I'm not Jewish, I've never heard of the Biblical "Song of Songs" before, let alone #7. I just loved it.

I loved the ladders, the couples, and the lovely bird-boat that whisks our heroine away at the top of the page. So I bought it. After some Googling, I realized that I overpaid for it, but I'm so pleased that it will be mine.

I looked at the other prints in this artist's series, and none of them resonate like this one does. This one is special to me. I've posted the "Song of Songs 7" below. I had a good time plucking out the symbols (the "ivory tower" neck, for example) once I read it myself. And it's pretty sexy!

Song of Songs 7


1 How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O prince's daughter! the joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a cunning workman.

2 Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies.

3 Thy two breasts are like two young roes that are twins.

4 Thy neck is as a tower of ivory; thine eyes like the fishpools in Heshbon, by the gate of Bathrabbim: thy nose is as the tower of Lebanon which looketh toward Damascus.

5 Thine head upon thee is like Carmel, and the hair of thine head like purple; the king is held in the galleries.

6 How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights!

7 This thy stature is like to a palm tree, and thy breasts to clusters of grapes.

8 I said, I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs thereof: now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine, and the smell of thy nose like apples;

9 And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak.

10 I am my beloved's, and his desire is toward me.

11 Come, my beloved, let us go forth into the field; let us lodge in the villages.

12 Let us get up early to the vineyards; let us see if the vine flourish, whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth: there will I give thee my loves.

13 The mandrakes give a smell, and at our gates are all manner of pleasant fruits, new and old, which I have laid up for thee, O my beloved.

.?..???

For those of you who are keeping score, we're at Day 29 of my cycle, day five of light spotting, no period and a fourth negative pregnancy test.

You know how they have those handy multi-packs of feminine supplies at the drugstore? With tampons for lighter, medium, and heavy days, so you can cycle through with just one package? What if they made them for people like me? Each package would contain four big pads for those "I think I definitely got my period" days, then panty liners for those "No wait, that wasn't my period, just spotting" days, plus a half-dozen pregnancy tests for those "I'll name her Evelyn" days, and maybe a free yo-yo, as a symbol of uterine indecisiveness.

In other news, Chebbles has taken to wearing glasses. I think they're very Anna Wintour. You?

Subteams

Hub-D and I have split the house into two sub-teams.

Although our family is usually a united team, we do have some intramural competition. For this, we have finally named and established our two subteams:

The Chubby Adorables

vs.

The Crabby Misfits


The Chubby Adorables consists of Hub-D, Chebbles, and Otto.
The Crabby Misfits consists of Mama, Prince and Stanley.

Hub-D tried to pull Mimi the stuffed panda onto his team this morning, and although Mimi is chubby AND adorable, plus Hub-D suggested Chebble's terrifying Tickle-Me-Elmo as a potential Crabby Misfit, I have NOT accepted these additions to the teams.

We have already started some intramural point accumulation and deduction. Specifically, someone from the Chubby Adorables left a beer bottle on the living room floor when he went to bed last night, and someone from the Crabby Misfits stubbed her toe on it this morning. SO a point deduction was taken from the Chubby Adorables.

Then the claimant from the Crabby Misfits had to take MORE demerits from the Chubby Adorables because of the noisy complaints of unfairness that erupted from the initial point deduction.

I haven't specifically requested credit for the Crabby Misfits YET, but I also dragged all of the garbage cans to the curb at the crack of dawn in the pouring rain this morning, which has got to be worth about 100 points, yes?

I need to rack up as many points as possible, because Stanley is definitely a liability as a teammate -- having three legs and a really bad attitude.

Wish me luck!

.?

OK, what's this? I thought I was getting my period and it completely stopped. It's Day 28 of my cycle.

And, let it be known, that the only time I had spotting like this was at the beginning of my pregnancy last fall. So, hmmm.

This is me, trying not to get my hopes up -- I had a negative pregnancy test this morning, I have no symptoms, and it would be GOOD not to be pregnant so I can get my cortisone and hysteroscopy this month.

And yet, hope lingers.

In the last 24 hours I have had two very good friends let me know they are pregnant -- one with twins! It really highlighted for me how dark, inappropriate and absurd my sense of humor has become. I live in a world where Julie's greeting cards make more sense to me than anything else. This one in particular.

Oh, and Julie's greeting card below? It perfectly encapsulates my reaction to mine, or anyone else's pregnancy noawadays:

.

Well THERE it is. My period, that is.

It has arrived just in time, although I had started to suspect I might be pregnant, due to my "buddha belly" and constant need to pee.

On Sunday, I thought I started my period, but it suddenly stopped. I had a good time attributing that to implantation bleeding. Then today, it seems that I really have started my cycle. I guess my big belly is a function of PMS and overeating. Damn.

I was getting excited at the prospect of being pregnant, despite the gargantuan wave of trepidation that will occur the moment a second line pops up on a pregnancy test.

But the arrival of this period means that I can (a) get the hysteroscopy to determine the breadth of a possible killer fibroid and (b) get the cortisone shots I so badly need in my wrists due to the recurrence of my old pal de Quervain.

So ultimately, it will be a glorious thing, this period. Although today I've got to confess some disappointment.

The Year of the Pig

I was having a rare manicure/pedicure at our local nail salon, and all the talk was about Vietnamese New Year, (which, they informed me, is virtually indistinguishable from Chinese New Year).

They told me it is now The Year of the Pig, and I sat up in my vibrating chair, "Hey, I was born in The Year of the Pig! It must be my lucky year!"

A few of the women exchanged dark looks before telling me in no uncertain terms that it is ALWAYS BAD LUCK when it is the year in which you were born. Roosters have bad luck in The Year of the Rooster, and Pigs like me? Well, I'm screwed this WHOLE YEAR.

Damn! I saw all of the red blossom displays and enjoyed the general hubbub of Vietnamese New Year, all the while knowing that it spells my doom.

Lucky trout

Hub-D and I just returned from a weekend in Sonoma County. We had looked forward to a weekend away from parenthood and pregnancy woes. Sonoma was wonderful. The sun shone on us, lovely wines were tasted, and we hiked in the quiet hills.

Except we just couldn't stay away from the topic of REPRODUCTION.

At this time of year, steelhead trout make their way to a hatchery in Sonoma. Their usual breeding grounds have been replaced by a useful dam, so the nice Fish and Wildlife people established a fish hatchery at the base of the dam, where they relieve the trout of the responsibility of breeding. Hub-D and I happened upon this facility.

We watched the trout swim up the fish ladder to a series of holding tanks. From there, the Fish and Wildlife people tag and measure the trout. When the girl trout are "ripe," they insert a little air blower a mysterious hole into the flank of the female trout which somehow expels her eggs (about 5000) out of her fish vagina.

The lady trouts are sedated for the process, and they don't seem to mind one bit. Once they recover from the sedation, they are returned to the creek, and they swim out to sea and continue cavorting like normal trout.

They expel all of the big orange eggs into a regular plastic bowl, then they grab a "ripe" male trout and strategically squeeze his rear end over the bowl. His sperm shoots right into the eggs, and their mating process is done. There is no sex or fun love dramas, but it's over.


As we watched the process take place from the observation deck above the hatching facility, I was so impressed by the EASE of trout reproduction. They NEVER get 20 different bills for bloodwork, pap smears, ultrasounds, anesthesia, surgery centers or WHATEVER. They just swim upstream, get squeezed by a nice Fish and Wildlife guy, and they're done.

After the fish have headed back to the ocean, the people in the facility just stir the bowl. That's what they do to make baby trout. They stir the bowl. In about a week, the eggs "eye up" -- meaning a dark eye shows up in the fertilized eggs. Then the hatchlings "swim up" for food a few weeks later. Then they swim out to sea, to join their parents in their merry little fibroid-free oceanic life.

Lucky trout.

Anybody gotta problem with eating dirt?

Then you gotta problem with ME.

Sturm und Drang

I have read so much about the snowstorms in other parts of the country, I'm half-convinced that it's snowing here in California too.

My dad was here last weekend, and my mom's here this weekend. Both of them were pretty worried about their flights.

"When is your next guest arriving?" Dad asked at my kitchen table Tuesday morning.
"Mom's arriving Thursday."
"I may still be here then."
"Great! You guys can share a bed!"

These are the kind of jokes that are only funny to the children of divorced parents, but not to the parents themselves.

Then my mom started watching the weather moment-by-moment, for fear that her flight from New Hampshire would not take off. At times it seemed like a certainty that she would NOT be here. (Which would have been good, just in case my dad was still shacked up in the guest room.)

But Hub-D and I are planning our wine country getaway tomorrow, so I didn't care WHAT MEANS she used to get out here, as long as it didn't interfere with my date with my husband AND with a big-ass bottle of wine at an inn far away from our child.

As it turns out, we were all freaking out for no good reason. This is because, unlike San Francisco International Airport, which grounds all planes whenever there is a smidgen of rain, a whit of fog, or a rare bird is breeding (understandably), East Coast airports have their acts together. They are not frightened by a little snow. They are CHALLENGED by it, and they looked that snowstorm right in the eye and said:

"Mama shall NOT be deprived of her Chardonnay! And her parents shall NOT have to share a bed! Keep digging, boys!"

My dad arrived home in Western Pennsylvania just ten minutes late, and my mom just called from Oakland, having arrived here two hours EARLY. So here is a special shout-out to the Pittsburgh and Manchester Airports. I'll be toasting to you!

(But first, I've got to change those guest room sheets!)

You say "fibroid" like it's a bad thing

I couldn't sleep last night, so bothered was I by the notion that there may be some mysterious MASS within my body. And, oh, this mass might be killing my children.

So today I called the RE to ask whether a fibroid really could have been responsible for my miscarriage. "C'mon," I said desperately, "I had two very different kind of miscarriages. And this last baby had a heartbeat! Could a fibroid really kill a baby with a heartbeat?" I was hoping so hard that she would say, "Oh no, that's impossible. Fibroids are our friends."

But no. All she could tell me is that we don't know. And it IS possible that a fibroid is responsible for my miscarriages. And they're going to be able to tell a lot more with the hysteroscopy next month. But we have to wait to make sure I'm not pregnant, perchance, this month, before they go poking around up there.

Why am I so disturbed by this notion? I guess it's because there may be something controllable responsible. If I'd only known before, perhaps I could have prevented these miscarriages? And it makes me mad at my now very former OB-GYN office. I had told them about my crazy post-period bleeding before, and they dismissed my concerns, despite it being a key fibroid symptom. Meanwhile, I may have this ever-enlarging fibroid whacking my embryos from a perch atop my uterine lining.

Dammit, just dammit.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet my fibroid

OK, I don't know I have a fibroid. But I've been having some funky bleeding, and my RE peered around in there this morning, and hypothesized that I may have a fibroid lurking around my uterus.

My fibroid and me.

Anyway, we're going to wait a few weeks before we do a hysteroscopy (Dr. W. is so nice, she spelled it for me really slowly), to see if the bleeding calms down. But if there IS a fibroid in there, I find that really interesting.

See, that would explain my weird bleeding during my last pregnancy, and it could also help explain my June miscarriage. I don't think it would explain my most recent miscarriage, as we had a heartbeat, and the baby was well ensconced by the time she baby (so the fibroid didn't push her out prematurely). But anyway, it's fun to have a new demon. A fibroid. It's nice to think I might have something to fight. Then once I successfully vanquish it, I can breed like crazy until I'm 40.

Or at least that's the plan.

I think I have cat hair in my ovary

I had my hair cut yesterday by a really nice Iranian woman, and she does a damn good job. It's important to emphasize what a great hairstylist T. is before I tell you the story she told me. When I was vomiting uncontrollably during my last pregnancy, I would catch glimpses of myself in the bathroom mirror and think, "Whoa, my hair looks good even now!"

So anyway, she's good at her job. But get a load of what she told me... Her 13-year-old niece was apparently suffering horrible pains in her side. They did some scans and the doctor gave her a dark diagnosis -- it seemed to be ovarian cancer. Egads! In a 13-year-old girl!

So they opened her up to remove the cancerous ovary, and discovered that the ovary was not, in fact, cancerous, but ENGORGED WITH CAT HAIR. T. told me there was a huge ball of cat hair inside her niece's ovary.

"Sometimes, this happens!" she said, snipping away at my hair. "So I tell all of my clients with cats and daughters that this is a possibility."

"Good thing you can still have babies with one ovary," I said weakly, my mind reeling. What in the hell? How does the cat hair get into the ovary? Through the vagina or the mouth? And how does it form a big cancerous-looking ball?

"Every night, she slept with the cat. And see? See what happens? My sister cried so much when she thought it was cancer. But it was the cat." Snip. Snip.

So naturally I raced home and Googled the hell out of "ovaries and cat hair" and came up with absolutely nothing. Stanley looks suspicious nonetheless.

Note

There is nothing more frustrating than ovulating when one's husband is on a business trip, no matter how much one's male friends bring up "The Big Chill," wink, wink, hint, hint.

Sorry dudes, Hub-D makes the cutest babies ever, so I'm going to stick with him.

But still, this really sucks. I was looking forward to getting on with our reproductive career, and a one-month delay feels interminable.

Why does my child have a Boston accent?

She was exposed to the Boston area for a week, and now she has a wicked Boston accent.

To review:
Markers are "MAH-kahs." (And she "draahs" with them.)
Stickers are "STICK-ahs."
And then there's the "cah," which we drive to the "pahk."

I thought little of it until last night, when the Boston Red Sox came up in conversation. She started doing somersaults, squealing and running around the room. (Another child, a 10-year-old with physician-diagnosed ADHD, pronounced her "hyper," much to my alarm.)

Anyway, the Red Sox discussion seems to have activated some latent Bostonian impulse to cheer needlessly for about an hour.

If it wasn't a past life, and it wasn't her exposure to Ben Affleck in "Good Will Hunting," it can only be explained by that brief jaunt to Boston.

There must be something in the "WAT-ah."

You're fired, part 2

I returned a call from my now-fired OB-GYN office today.

Of course I was put on a prolonged hold during which I was treated to a long sequence of Rod Stewart hits. I decided to take offense at the song "Forever Young."

Once the not-quite-nurse-practitioner came on the phone, I learned they had called to tell me my baby's genetic test results. These are the same results that my RE, Dr. W., had procured for me LAST THURSDAY.

What the heck? FIVE DAYS after the results become available, they give me a ringy-dingy to tell me I was pregnant with a "Normal Girl?" Even after I'd called last week, begging them for the results so that I might have some closure?

Well, thanks but no thanks, "Women Caring for Women." Somehow my RE (she is unaffiliated with the OB-GYN office) was able to call me at 6:30pm last Thursday night and carefully explain the results to me.

I told the not-quite-nurse-practitioner how disappointed I am with their office. They KNEW what these kind of results mean to a woman who has had a miscarriage, and they sat on them for five days.

She protested that they always call as soon as they receive results, but HOW IN THE WORLD did Dr. W. get the results five days earlier? Whatever means of communication she has with the laboratory could surely be duplicated by the OB-GYN office, yes?

I've so had it with them. I'm glad I told them so.

Next!

You're fired

Today at my appointment with my grief counselor, I started to talk about my current OB-GYN, and surprised myself by saying, "I NEVER WANT TO GO TO THAT OFFICE AGAIN."

The cool thing about my grief counselor is she agrees with me. They're fired.

Why? They are really busy, they don't remember their patients, their waiting room is stocked with women in their 20's who are having their third child, they put me on hold for a long time every time I call, and their hold music actually includes the Diana Ross tune "Love Child."

At that office, it was the nurse practitioner who discovered my baby had died. After some delay, she was able to pull a doctor into the room to verify her findings. And the doctor did, swiftly and mechanically, before bolting from the room.

It's not that doctor's fault that she left me with an inexperienced woman who (confidentially) isn't even a licensed nurse practitioner, and seemed to have little or no experience informing women that their babies had died. It's just that no one explained to me what the death of my baby meant, or what kind of tests I should ask for, or how the D&C would work, really.

No one told me I didn't HAVE to get a D&C, and that it might be healthier to wait until I miscarry it naturally. No one told me that I could seek out the help of an RE, and my insurance would pay for it now that I have "repeated miscarriage" diagnosis on my chart. Just as no one told me during my pregnancy with Chebbles that I could have a nuchal fold translucency test instead of freaking out about Downs Syndrome during the first half of my pregnancy.

There was no personal attention from the doctor's office as I was dealt this horrible blow. Was I the first woman who learned her baby had died at this practice?

I now know that there are pamphlets to be had, regarding grief counseling and support groups. None of these were presented to me at any time.

This is the same doctor's office that put me in the examining room next to a pregnant woman who heard her baby's heartbeat at full blast... just two weeks after my D&C, and in the same room in which I learned my baby died. I cried like crazy, and the doctor who came in to examine me was clearly uncomfortable by my tears. I felt like I was taking care of HER, and my best option was to just tamp down all of the emotions that the other baby's heartbeat had brought up for me.

Basically, my current (now former) OB-GYN office is just too busy to deal with anomalies like me. They are cranking through the babies and the heartbeats like a little factory. And when a baby shows up with no heartbeat, their job is to get rid of it and hope for better luck in the future.

The stated motto of this OB-GYN office is "Women Caring for Women."

Really, that's a load of horseshit.

It's more like "Women Caring for Diana Ross."

But the awesome news is that there are several doctors in my area who aren't so hot on Diana Ross.

My grief counselor gave me their names, and suggested I set up a pre-pregnancy "consult" with them. My preference is already for the doctor who is closer to me, because you'd better believe that if I get pregnant again, I will be at his door every morning. Maybe they have drive-thru ultrasounds? I'm down with that. Then I could get a milkshake at the same time.

Top 10 Things that Rock Chebbles' World

10. Coco the rat terrier.

9. Stickers! STICKERS.

8. Markers! MARKERS, damn you woman, maaahkahs!

7. Daddy's juice:

6. Big boys, preferably those with sticks, rocks, and/or unusual hats.

5. Crocs. Subcategories of rockin' Crocs: (d) Strangers wearing Crocs. (c) Mama wearing Crocs. (b) Daddy wearing Crocs. (a) CHEBBLES WEARING CROCS.

4. Puddles, splashing in. Preferably while seated within said puddle.

3. Cats. Subcategories of cat preference: (d) Anonymous cats. (c) "Buddy" across the street. (b) Otto/Prince. (a) STAN aka "Tans." NOTE: preference not mutual

2. The special reek of Mimi the Panda.

1. BATH CRAYONS, PEOPLE!!!!! BATH (friggin') CRAYONS.

She's thinking

The Chebs has been dreaming up a STORM lately.

It took me awhile to clue in to the fact she was dreaming. I would go into her room in the morning, and she would be insistent about something.

For example, she woke up convinced there was a train outside her window: "Train! Train!" (wild gesticulation toward the window) "Cu-TIN! Cu-TIN!" So of course I hustled to the window. I've read "The Polar Express." I know it's not impossible.

And this morning, she was shrieking as I ran into her room: "Vacooom!? VACOOOOM?!????" Apparently, a sinister vacuum had haunted her dreams, and we should all be on HIGH ALERT for evil household appliances. Duly noted, Chebs.

It's kind of creepy to me how much she's thinking in general. There is a lot whirling around in her noggin. She's started reminiscing a great deal.

Chebs: Mail, Mama, Mail
Me: You talking about your mail?
Chebs: Yeah
Me: What did you get in the mail today?
Chebs: Stickahs. Stickahs! Stickahs?
Me: Yeah, you got stickers. What was on the stickers?
Chebs: Hooo-Hooo owl. Dog. Cat. Otto.

(She was on a roll there until she alleged that Otto was on the stickers. Otto lurked around when she opened up her card, but being a cat of considerable intelligence, he realized that NOTHING GOOD comes of the cat/sticker combination and beat it out of there.)

I guess I thought she was kind of floating through life, taking it as it comes. We hang out with a dog, we play on a slide, we take a bath -- it all blurs together in one large baby phantasmagoria -- a huge smear of indistinguishable memory.

Not so. She puts crap TOGETHER. Hub-D and I drove past a hiking trailhead last weekend -- where we took her hiking last October. We haven't driven past it since.

"Moooo!" she hollered from the back seat. "MOOOOO!" she insisted, pointing toward the trailhead as we sped past at 40 MPH.

There were NO COWS there, but when we parked there LAST FREAKING OCTOBER, there was a whole herd, and it was her first real encounter with bovines.

And she remembers. So we're still freaked out about it. And right now, she's snoozing away, dreaming about God Knows What (cow stickers?), but I'm sure I'll find out in the morning.

Dee and Daniela

Oh cripes, it's a tough time for my friend Dee. Her blog, The RE's Muse, details the journey of her second pregnancy, and the birth (last week) of her daughter Daniela, during which the baby seems to have suffered a stroke. Daniela's been having seizures, and is currently heavily sedated and on a ventilator while they try to ascertain her condition.

Dee and I learned we were pregnant at the same time last summer. After I lost my baby (the first miscarriage), I hopped aboard Dee's experience. It was somehow gratifying, watching her pregnancy grow despite my own tragedy. I don't think I knew until now how much her experiences had become my own, in a way.

Today, I opened up her blog and she had posted a picture of Daniela on the ventilator. That baby is damn beautiful. And she looks so hearty, it seems certain that she will pull through this scary experience with flying colors, yes?

I've never asked this before, but I wanted to ask readers of this blog to visit Dee's blog and leave her a well-wishing comment if you have a moment today. These good wishes are one of the only things keeping her afloat during this scary time.

I've gotten so much amazing and lovely support from my friends (blogging and non-blogging) throughout the last harrowing month, I wanted to see if I could steer the fire hose of LOVE in Dee's direction instead, because damn, she needs it right now.

Shower survived

It must be a rite of passage for every woman who's had a miscarriage... the first BABY SHOWER one attends. It wasn't easy, as all of the talk was about babies from women who have (blessedly) never experienced a miscarriage.

I miss their land of innocence -- procreating in a sweet bubble of safety. The majority of the attendees were also pregnant, so it really was like heading straight into the Hellmouth for a woman like me, so recently divested of her own pregnancy. And their pregnancies were happy ones, active ones, and I acted reasonably normal as my heart hollered, "Why not MEEE???? Why can't I be one of them TOOOO??? Where did our baby GOOOOO?"

But then I drank the champagne, and ate the chocolate cake, and found some (non-pregnant) chicks in the kitchen and together we escaped the baby talk, laughing about OTHER THINGS until we almost peed.

Normal Girl

We got our post-D&C genetic testing results back tonight at 6:30pm, just as the sitter arrived, just as we were heading out to a pizzeria with friends. Dr. W., the RE called to tell me that it was a "Normal Girl." (In other words, she had no chromosomal abnormalities.)

"Then why did she die?" I asked Dr. W.

"We don't know. But it's good news that we don't need to test you further."

As it turns out, any time they receive results of a "Normal Girl," there is a suspicion that the lab may have accidentally tested the mother's tissue instead of the embryo's. Our embryo seemed to be somewhat disintegrated by the time of my D&C, so it's possible that the tissue they collected was mine, and I am, or at least used to be, a Normal Girl myself.

But Hub-D and I have elected to put that possibility out of our minds and go ahead with the "Normal Girl" result. It's unsatisfying, as we don't know why our sweet baby girl died, who, according to medical science, had no excuse to do so.

And somehow the process feels complete. I had a girl inside me, whose heart was beating and then it stopped. She died and she left my body, and we're sad, but it's all over now. Goodnight, sweet Normal Girl.