altarflame | Entries tagged with belly cast

Our house, the kids, my belly mask - all manner of hoohaw and kerkuffle.

( +20 )

I was so depressed all day today, so unmotivated. I did what had to be done, but not much else. I kept trying to figure out what the hell my problem was. Then, as bedtime approached, I suddenly put together that I've been feeling all fat and bloated, I have a new pimple, and I'm extremely moody. How does this catch me off guard EVERY MONTH? Funny how having the explanation is so immediately relieving - it means the malaise is normal and temporary, anyway.

I got up, did a lot of whirlwind cleaning, got the kids up and dressed and fed and nursed and all that, and then G (nanny) came over. I had a plan for her "shift" (it is a shift, why am I using quotes, why does that word feel so weird?) today. First I took a shower/bath with Elise; our roman tub has a portable shower head in it, so I sat while she stood and it was some cute fun. Got us both dressed, and came out to find G drawing pictures and stamping and tracing hands and other things, with Ananda, Isaac, and Jake, while teaching them silly songs about fish with pockets to put their stuff in. Made myself a quick egg on toast while listening in as she included Elise and then talked and laughed with her about how totally surreal and bizarre it is that she does things SO SIMILARLY to how I do them, with me in the background making an egg for myself silently - it's just bizarre.

Did a little research, made a list of school supplies we need for this year, took it over to Spellbound Books, with A and A (only). They played with their friends there for about half an hour while I browsed and confirmed what I wanted with the mom/owner lady. I feel really good about where we're going, school-wise, I want to make this whole big detailed plan for the first time and maybe we'll stick to it, even! Ha. But, some of the things I'm excited about are a cd of the actual poets reading their poems - Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, many others, and there is a read along book. The readers that I picked out, from Abeka. Story of the World activity guides. And other things. Lots of other things. We ended up going with RightStart math after I found out that Saxon Math, which I'd planned on, was going to be $850 per kid. Seriously. I laughed out loud when I saw that online.

Got back, and G, Isaac, Jake and Elise showed me the dance and song they'd coordinated while I was gone - SO FUNNY AND COOL. Elise was even getting into it, I could die. Checked in, nursed Elise, talked with G some more, went back out - ALONE - made a couple of phone calls, inquired about YMCA membership, got stuff for our lunch, and came back. They were all playing board games. She left, we ate, and then went over to Kristin's to pick up my long-neglected belly cast.

I realized recently that I've been avoiding Kristin and all PATH people all summer because I'm ashamed of myself and uncomfortable about how I'm...I don't know...not doing well all the time. PTSD in general. I don't want to deal with telling my AP mommy friends or my homeschooling group that I've hired childcare help, am in counseling, and can't sleep at night. So I just haven't. I'm really glad I did, with Kristin, today, though - we just had the best talks for a couple of hours, and all the kids had a blast with her kids and her pool (throwing things in and fishing them out when they bobbed to the edge). We made plans to go back and swim on Saturday, after we go up to Miami and have lunch with Grant.

She's also organizing a co-op for chickens and I cannot WAIT to have chickens!!!! They're like $1.50 per bird this way (plus transport), it's insane, and you get all females still as chicks, so they imprint to your family and property and will neither peck you or run off, when they're older. We have to wait til our fence is done and then plan the chicken run around the garden, which has yet to be in the ground, but she hasn't found enough people yet anyway. So hopefully the timing will work out.

I talked to Dama on the phone and found out she is still coming down here, she just had some temporary glitches with paying for the plane tickets because someone stole their account info online and, thusly, her vacation money. So it's just temporary and not some awful thing, which makes me really happy. They're really coming!!! My kids have been writing her kids a TON of letters, I have two sealed and stamped ones sitting right by my arm right now...and wouldn't it be awesome if we had chickens by the time they got here? Chickens, Dama! I'm getting emails now with subject lines like "Bawk bawk bKAWK!" full of pictures of chicks that look like they're made of fluffed out teased wool, or that seem to have hair rather than feathers, all kinds of fascinating ornamental whatnot.

The AWANA kick-off party was tonight, and that was a mixed bag...Dropping Isaac off was a half hour long affair of tantruming, panic, indecisiveness, etc. He is a lot of work. There was a time when I'd try to explain how I did everything right, but I'm over it. They all had a great time in the end. And I had a really productive grocery shopping trip with Jake and Elise while they were in there. They are both always so good and easy to take out.

I've had someone emailing me for info about Nancy because they want to vbac with her, and just talking about how amazingly supportive, helpful and WONDERFUL it is to have Nancy during pregnancy, labor and even a transfer situation just made me warm all over.

So I've got my belly cast hanging in my room. I've got a date for Saturday, a visit from out of state friends tentatively planned, lots of general stuff on the agenda for the next couple of days (like therapy tomorrow, while G is here with the kids, and then Shrinky Dinks with A and A once I'm back, and game night Friday) and all our school things on their way. I've got a house stocked with food and kids who went to bed at pretty good times. My children just had a nonstop fun fest from waking to sleep, with only chores to break it up. I'll take it.

I had a weird moment this morning when I felt like the settlement has altered my life so completely that I can't even see it from the inside. I was sitting in the giant bathtub in this house I own with my baby, while the nanny played with the other kids. And was like, huh. What the hell is this nonsense :p But then I had another moment, talking with Kristen about how I feel and all I've been dealing with, that I was just blown away that the money is gone and yet I'm going to be living this for a long, long time. She is one of many people who think I was crazy to accept the sum that we did. Which I may as well just say was half a million dollars. My mother was making me crazy, she was so adamant that I deserved millions - and I understand where she was coming from. I had days in the ICU, I nearly died after a month of pain and fear and lots of doctor visits, I was separated from my 6 month old baby who needed special home therapies for a week and a half...and then unable to lift her for weeks, when I returned, which made re-bonding awfully freaking hard. But...Most "retained surgical instrument" cases in the Massachusetts area only get like $250-350k if they go to court - we were told this by multiple, unaffiliated attorneys, and saw it ourselves when we looked up headlines and case histories. You only get a million dollars for dying (no thank you). And, lawyers take like 40%, when you go to court - after YEARS and years of appeals. Whereas we got it all, and very quickly. AND, I wasn't really trying to get rich off of the damn hospital, I felt like the sponge thing was an honest mistake and they treated us - medically and as humans treated us - very, very well otherwise. I would still reccomend that hospital to people. I didn't want to destroy that awesome OBs career because the scrub nurse screwed up. It was an emergency situation, they saved Elise's life, all that. I just wanted to be able to seek counseling, and live with Grant's business killed by the whole affair, and stuff like that. So we got what we wanted...

And yet I have a whole other major surgery hanging over my head to fix my belly, since that bowel resection. I choose every single day, when I wake up - do I want to spend 10 minutes squeezing into this crazy thing and deal with wearing it all day and have to dress around it to hide the weird straps, and be that much hotter in the heat...or do I want to have a very bad back ache, hasten herniation and be asked when I'm due everywhere I go? Bah.

I had some sort of inexplicable epiphany today, wherein I suddenly looked in the mirror naked and thought I was sexy. That has not happened in a LONG TIME. I feel sexy fairly often, without being able to see myself, because I have a really great husband that seems to genuinely think I am, and caters to/reassures my insecurities, and so I can be uninhibited with him in the moment. Sometimes, wearing my big support thing with the right clothes over it, I see myself and think I look good, but I think it's a ruse. I like my face, my hair, my style. My boobs. I have a reeeeeeeeeally hard time with my body, though. My belly has become "my body" for me, it's all I see or something...Could have something to do with the many many scars, the messed up texture, the assymetrical hanging, the fact that my daughter abruptly stops talking and rushes out of the room if I take off my shirt, out of fear from seeing my wounds being gauze-packed so often? :/ Not to mention how, when I turn sideways, this crazy lump protrudes out all disfigured - a hard ball of muscle that there is a dip down behind. *shudder*

Anyway, yeah, I still had the assymetrical hanging and the scars and the texture today, but they were in the context somehow of my exaggerated hourglass figure, and all soft and nice, and...it just didn't seem disgusting. It just seemed like my body, it seemed "ok". The lump was there, but I have more control over those muscles than I did a few months ago, by far, and so it doesn't seem to just be some dead jutting disconnected mass. It's...maybe something healing? Slowly? A girl can dream, anyway.

I went out without wearing my thing and thought I looked good, and have been trying HARD to build up my posture and practice keeping my ab muscles engaged (which over YEARS can pull a severe diastasis back together...mostly...sometimes). It's very difficult, I couldn't even feel them TO engage not so long ago. Tomorrow might be a whole different story where I just can't find the perception I had today again, but this has been good, so again...I'll take it.

Current Location: Our House
Current Music: Tori Amos - Silent All These Years

Got up just in time to talk to the life insurance guy - they sent someone over to take our blood, urine, bp and medical histories. I am a fool and, like half the other times in my life I've taken a cup into a bathroom to pee into, I set it on the edge of the sink, sat down, peed as I usually would, and then went "Oh damn! Argh!" Luckily the guy was here long enough that I had some time to chug some ice water :p I felt incredibly validated by him stopping my non-biased, facts-only brief recount of my medical history over and over to say things like, "How could the OB do that? Do you know that's unethical?" and "I can't believe how you've been cheated and injured by hospitals" and things like that. He was genuinely shocked that I'd been routinely scheduled for an induction on my due date with no suspected complications, in a first pregnancy, for instance, and duly horrified by Isaac's misdating resulting in unnecessary prematurity.

Laura showed up at the same time he did, we all played in the yard for awhile after he left - Grant lying in his new portable hammock, which we'll be taking on the PATH camping trip next month. Had lunch at Chili's, very delicious, and then went up to Miami for FROZEN KEY LIME PIE DIPPED IN CHOCOLATE ON A STICK. If you are in South Florida, you absolutely have to go to the Blond Giraffe Key Lime Pie Factory and have one of these. My gosh, I freak out about these things - YUM. Sublime came on the radio and we were both singing along laughing I had a million dollars, but I - I spent it all!.

Then we hit the park for a couple of hours - again with the hammock (and Laura), along with Aaron's recovered bike and Annie's new bike, which she is trying to learn to ride with minimal success due to excessive fear of failure :/ It was a good time, though. My Dad called the cell, just to let us know he's euphorically happy knowing that Elise is walking and talking, I'm alive and doing well, Frank finally got hired by the fire department, G and I are getting a big ol' chunk of money, and we're giving Laura some money to help them get their own place, just that everything is well and we're all great. He sounded so good, like he's relaxing for the first time after basically a whole year worried about us. We're probably going down to Key West to hang out Sunday, when Grant is off again - my dad has a boat he wants to take us out on.

On the way out of the park, Ananda looked sad, maybe about the bike riding thing or maybe because Aaron is better at approaching other kids than her and she ends up left out, but I picked her up and put her on my hip, which is definitely not common anymore - she weighs 74 pounds. But it made her laugh, and squeeze my neck, and I could tell it really went a long way to helping her out. Then I got in the van and Grant told me I shouldn't do that - and he's right, I shouldn't do that, it makes my diastasis bulge out horribly and is going to cause a herniation, which I'm desperately trying to avoid by wearing that thing every day and doing all these special excercises, so I don't have to go through a really extensive reconstructive surgery...and I just cried half the way to Kristin's house, in the van.

I hate how hard it always is to hold my babies, that I have to choose between my back or their comfort, my belly or their safety, my pain or their bonding. I hate that I feel guilty whenever I wear someone on my back or put them in the mei tai because of this, I hate it that Grant has changed all of our newborns' diapers for the first few weeks in the night while I can barely sit up, and that I spent SIX WEEKS this past winter weeping with frustration because I had to call someone else whenever Elise was crying for me with her arms raised. It just feels good to run around the park and climb on things with Jake, you know, like I'm maybe almost normal and not freaking fragile and disabled like Ananda and Aaron both see me as...

It took me off on this whole tangent about how terrified I am of having to go get a serious abdominoplasty as this situation with my muscles and organs deteriorates...multiple drains. Huge infection risk. Two months baseline recovery. Massive amounts of drugs for incredible pain. I don't want to ever have an IV again. I hate being out of control. I hate all of this bullshit. I don't want to die! I get so angry - SO ANGRY - sometimes. I'm writing the most psycho short story about someone cutting themself to pieces just to feel in control after a bunch of surgeries. She can't even feel it from the numbness half the time anyway. ARGH.

I was calmed down by the time we got to Kristin's. And it was really, really good to be there. That's where I had my Blessingway and belly casting, with Elise, and she is so understanding and like-minded about all of this...she needed to see my boobs, to finish the paint job on the cast. So she saw my "prosthetic torso", too, and I told her about that, and about how I actually look under that thing, and we just talked a LOT. I really think she gets it-

Kristin: I want you to know that I will NOT be offended, I mean I'll really totally understand, if you get this belly cast home finished and you take it straight out to the backyard to flatten with a hammer.
Me: I was actually thinking an ax.

I laughed as I said this, though the thought really had crossed my mind, but she didn't laugh.

All of our bigger kids (5) played in the backyard with Grant while we caught up and she showed me her photography - she's doing candid portrature for people now, very similar to

babyslime's stuff in content though I am not one to judge talent or style - I like them a lot, as a lay person, anyway. She said she needs practice and wants to shoot my kids, so, heck yeah that would be awesome! A whole lot of really high quality free pictures? She'll even order the prints from this fancy place she uses that does an ultra-high quality job, at cost. Elise ate one of her homemade rolls and REALLY liked her toddler, Naja. I am increasingly frustrated by my own inability to get good pics of my kids, lately, anyway.

The belly cast as it is (almost done), is overwhelming. Not least because it is just SO. BIG. I seriously just gaped at it in disbelief, shocked and unable to comprehend that my belly was...that big. I put it on over myself now, and G just nodded like "Yep." WHOA.

Before we left, it was dark, and she took us out in the yard and used an owl call to get the owls that live there to swoop down over our heads. It was neato, the kids loved it.

There is a great house for sale at an EXTREMELY good price for the size and the land, though it needs a little fixing up, just a couple of blocks from her. She was basically ordering me to buy it. G and I had gotten out and looked at the yard, peeked in the windows. But...I don't know why. It creeps me out. The first time I went and saw it, alone, I got goosebumps and the hair on the back of my neck stood up, and I felt like when someone is chasing you in a nightmare. I wrote it off the list of options then, after clearing that with Grant, but today we were right there and I guess I wanted to see it with him, on a different day, and prove I was being foolish. And to see what he thought. It mostly just seemed, today, like a good deal but old inside. Slightly creepy. I would not have walked around back without Grant. I just...I dunno. Maybe I'm being stupid. It creeps me the hell out, though. Kristin says drug dealers were living there two tenants ago, using the garage to grow pot...the last tenant was a single mom with 7 kids, and her mom. Bah.

I have great plans for tomorrow. Tomorrow, Friday and Saturday G has 12 hour shifts and will have the van, so we have to be inventive, but I am feeling inventive anyway. Ananda, Aaron and I were talking today about how she has such a long-running love affair with painting, and he seems to have such an ear for the guitar, and I'm going to start structuring in an hour each for those things for them, on "school days", with accompanying "assignments".

Picture dump...( +11 )

I opened my devotional journal for the first time in weeks tonight, and prayed for the first time in days. I mean I've done dinner and bedtime prayers with the kids, little things here and there, but not really repented and connected and sought after God for guidance. I'm glad that I did. I actually came up with a budget that made me feel like things can be simpler and easier to plan, once I had, and I really credit one thing to the other in a big way...

Current Music: Vivaldi, drifting out from the kids' room

I started my period today. But I didn't expect it (I haven't been keeping close tabs on it and just hadn't thought about how long it had been). So, I went to the bathroom, wiped, and went into about a 20 second panic of OH MY GOSH THIS IS IT FUCK MY INTENSTINES HAVE RE-BLOCKED AND BECOME STRANGULATED AND - before thinking, Ok, wait...I am a woman. Let's investigate this further. *sigh*

Ah, the joys of having had a small bowel resection...anyway.

With this period has come a flood of PMS. Or maybe it's just the extremely small quantity of sleep I got two nights in a row catching up? All I know is, I was having a good day and then all of a sudden crashed hard this evening. Everything seems hopeless, and pointless, and usually I only feel this way if I am very, very low on sleep for a couple of days running, or I'm just starting a period.

We have good plans for tomorrow, anyway.

-Breakfast, tooth brushing, morning chores
-schoolwork
-off to Kristin's to hang out - tomorrow's the Every Other Friday that she hosts an organic produce co-op pick up. So we might get some organic produce, too. Or we might swim in their pool. There is supposed to be split pea soup available. She's been painting my belly cast, too, and I'm eager to see it. She said she'd worked on it for awhile today when Darian (5) came and found it and said, "eww, mom, it looks like there is blood coming out of those roses, which made her happy to know she was doing a good job :p She's done some really amazing stuff. Examples can be seen here - I actually think that one on the bottom might be mine, unfinished O_o
-driving around the Villages of Homestead for houses for sale by owner, in case there are some there that aren't listed with realtors and thus not available for browsing online. I imagine that after a long time at Kristin's, Jake and Elise will be napping for this. It will take about half an hour just to get from her house TO the Villages.
-game night at Spellbound Books

I'm still working out how to make dinner fit into this plan.

-I've been having nightmares. Tons and tons of nightmares. In one night I dreamed that;
*I went to Laura's and when I got there, there was police tape up blocking the way into the house, and she was outside on the sidewalk crying hysterically because something had happened to Brian
*I was in the horrible institutionalized place I've had reccuring nightmares about for like a year now, this time with my whole family plus Shaun. Shaun and I ended up tiptoe-ing around in the middle of the night, tense with fear, as I wished Grant were awake with us
*I took Elise to the neurologist and after passing her exam, he said, "You have to understand that she could revert back and lose all of her progress suddenly, at any moment."
ARGH.
-We went yesterday to a potluck meetup with the local Natural Family group - this was hosted by a family with 6 kids, so just between us two there were 11. It was pretty great - their house was amazing, the kids had a blast, everyone loved the food I brought.
-There's been a lot of discussion and decision making that has culminated in my brother moving in with us. He and Robbie will share what used to be the office, and it shouldn't be too bad since Grant's been mostly working outside the house or once kids are in bed anyway. Laura is going to help him get a license and diploma while Grant teaches him computers and I enforce chores for him and generally teach him whatever I can in the course of every day life. Thus far it seems to revolve mostly around basic household cleaning, cooking tips, current events I read about and scientific tidbits the kids are interested in. It's a sort of intensive group effort that was a long time in deciding, but really he is 17, smart, ignorant, giving, unmotivated and just generally teetering on the brink of some sort of adulthood. If we can improve the sort, that would be very worthwhile. Grant Sr is shockingly on board for this. When we broached the subject with him, he had already been thinking about it a lot, and his response was, "I've been thinking there's not much good for anyone in him going back to Jacksonville and taking 9th grade over. I guess I'll order some bunk beds". I think he's mildly thrilled to get Robbie out of his room and have it to himself (the office has an exterior door and he was uncomfortable with Robbie staying in it alone, but this way he's fine about it). Our grocery bill is INSANE - those days of my $125 a week budget are long, long gone. With Robbie home from school and Bob here, in addition to our kids getting bigger and me not cooking every-everything from scratch anymore due to lack of time, it's more like $350 a week. Which is $1400 a month. Which is insane. But most of the time I'm just very grateful that we have it to spend, and that we eat well.

We had a photo shoot the other day. Ananda picked out clothes for, and then dressed Elise. I thought it was cute, but needed something, and ten minutes later was cutting up fabric and tying a giant bow on her head. I have to admit I think it was fabulous, even if Laura and Frank did call her Aunt Jemima ;)

( Read more... )

This morning I woke up and looked at her and it just really, really hit me harder than it ever has before, how INCREDIBLY blessed I am. She's scooting and shimmying her way forward pretty regularly now, and can sit independantly for 10-15 seconds at a time. At not-even-3 1/2 months old. My little girl who was swollen all over from fluid retention with her kidneys shut down (she still has some light marks over her left eye, from her lids being like fat little balls full of broken capillaries, from the pressure). My little girl who's liver might not ever have started up. My little girl with half the heart-rate she was supposed to have, intubated and unconscious for a week - it knocks me breathless. It really does. When I got that first MRI result, and was told she might not ever be conscious and certainly wouldn't have any individual personality, I went back up to my hospital room all raw and weary, and my devotional book was all about miracles and healing. I laughed. I couldn't believe that. I felt so vulnerable, I wasn't going to be neck-deep in traumatizing denial, too. Wasn't going to be let down over and over. Never mind that that book is always right, for years now. I tried, particularly when the next few days were about steadfast faith and believing when it's hard. I showed Grant, and HE believed. I will admit I thought he was getting a bit foolish. I was hoping she'd just open her eyes again one day, and there he was saying she'd be totally alright and completely normal?

Well, I also laughed when he said he loved me when we were 13 and he'd known me for a week. But he's never taken that back, either. I wish I were brave enough to hope in the way that he does, in the face of everything that makes sense, on sheer intuition. Faith.

Even when she was holding up her head and smiling and starting to coo, on the way home, at Dama's house - I showed Dama the book and the things it had said, but in a "Wouldn't that be so awesome, if she could be maybe just mostly alright?" sort of wistfulness. I was still dosing her with phenobarbital twice a day. I was still forcing smiles through tremors (that have almost completely stopped).

Anyway, today I was watching her scooting forward and Annie was making her laugh over and over, and all of a sudden I wanted to run in a tight little circle yelling "Hallelujah!", or something. I had such a crazy lot of joy, just then, I scooped her up naked from the changing table and tried not to kill her with squeezing.

There's just no way to describe the feeling of her on my chest.

SOOooo. Other than all of this sort of thing. Ananda, Aaron and I are really enjoying Narnia. Annie gets it more, he gets it. We've started winding down to reading time with some stretches and slow breathing, and it REALLY helps him to actually sit still and pay attention, like, A LOT. Reading is such a lot of schooltime, lately, because I usually get asked what at least 2 words mean every night, as well as stopping to explain the really staggering amount of Christian metaphor.

AND. Neurology is a thing for me, now. I have a neurology feed in my google homepage, that I read whenever I can steal a moment. I found some absolutely mind-blowing (no pun intended...) neuro articles when we were at the Miami Museum of Science. I've read 3 books about brain injuries, since Elise was born. Grant and my sister have to listen to a neverending stream of things like "Did you know that Einstein's parietal lobe wasn't divided in two, so his spacial reasoning..." and "They actually located the precise spot where the fever response comes from!" I am more of a nerd than ever. And I love it. I've been thinking that once I complete my psych degree I might do under-studying or labwork to become a neuroscientist. Not a neurologist - I can't even imagine going to medical school or performing a surgery or prescribing seizure meds to people. But a neuroscientist, who interprets studies and writes about their field and analyzes patients and talks with parents? Heck yeah. Laura joked that I seem perfect for that kind of work, as someone with an otherwise rather useless level of reading speed and comprehension, and how I'll fit right in with how I can't carry a train of thought and lose everything all the time :p (The neurologists we've met are REALLY quirky people - the first one I talked to was a very old man wearing a bow tie and cowboy boots with his suit). I really like part time/independant study college as a part of my life. It's just enough mental stimulation and "something for me" to satisfy me and make me feel confident that one day the kids'll be grown and I'll be doing my own thing, without pulling me out of the house constantly or making me dissatisfied with my current life.

My current life! OH MAN. Nobody else will find this as exciting as I do, but that does not temper my own enthusiasm one damned bit. I finally figured out what I want on my belly cast. It just clicked, and it's perfect. I want it to be painted like me, realistically, but with the belly painted a la Salvador Dali's The Bleeding Roses. My tender, sore stomach; my being done having kids and soon to start my period; my tragedy that still turned out so beautiful; and that it is raw, and real, and messy, and dramatic, and even a little embarassing. That picture is just exactly how I feel. FYI, if you hadn't noticed, this icon is a crop of the painting. I emailed Kristin about it and she called me back within the hour, also excited - she says people always want the same cutesie stuff and this is like a treat for her.

Current Music: The Diego theme song, HELP ME.

Today was EXACTLY what I needed!

Let me preface this by saying that Isaac got some severe and terrifying croup a few days ago, and we have spent this week going through a wringer of worry, fear, irritation, frustration and exhaustion. There was a whole night that neither of us slept because we were too afraid he would stop breathing. And it's viral, not something antibiotics can treat (you know it's bad since I took him to the doctor...) A major thing about it that has been making us insane is, he can't get freaked out. He can't throw a fit or start crying, or his larynx swells and his breath gets extremely hoarse and high pitched and he starts choking badly. So...we've spent over four days catering to The Tyrant's every whim, rather frantically. Even with us scuttling to accomadate him in every way, there've been quite a few scary crying jags. He has whined pretty much continuously; at the doctor's he was screaming bloody murder, thrashing wildly and choking and squeaking. Grant was holding him outside the door, and the ped asked me, "You have a lot of trouble getting medicine into him?" "How can you tell?", I replied, and he laughed a lot. Grant and I are both starting to go squinty eyed, longing for him to be better again so we can say NO YOU CAN'T! about anything at all and make him deal with it :x He has such an insane lot of totally unreasonable demands. And he's been watching Pirate Dora (the explorer) for the entire time - night and day, endless loop, KILL ME NOW. We KNOW YOU ARE THE FREAKING MAP, STFU!!!
Anyway, then last night Isaac was finally sleeping relatively well, and Jake got a mysterious stomach bug and puked the night away. He was waaaaaaaaay easier to deal with, only crying when he was overwhelmingly nauseas and ready to throw up, and clingy. And HOT. Poor guy. But on the heels of croup, we were just so spent, the both of us.

So this morning it was EXTREMELY difficult for Grant to get me out of bed. Going to my prescheduled belly casting seemed like a chore, albeit a necessary one because I've really wanted a belly cast. Little did I know that Grant was trying to rush me out the door and discouraging me from eating (totally weird...) because it was actually a surprise Blessingway. Melanie was at Kristin's house, and my sister showed up, too. They had copious lunch and decadant desserts ready for me, and a spa style bathroom set up with salts, homemade soaps, and towels set up by Kristin's huge, awesome tub for after I was done with the cast and needed to clean up.

It was really great. It started off rocky, because I sat on this seat while she started the first part of the cast, and all of a sudden out of nowhere got REALLY nauseus and dizzy...I could barely talk to complain about it, and sort of registered that they all looked pretty worried before I lost consciousness. Three times. Each time I would come around in a hazy way thinking, Whoa, I blacked out, and then be under again. Whenever I was semi-coherent I was sure I would puke - there was a bucket standing by and I remember at one point I was leaning back on Kristin with Melanie holding a cold rag on the back of my neck and my nausea pressure point (inner wrist) in her other hand, with Laura standing there with a bucket, but it was just surreal. Finally I layed down on the ground/floor (we were on Kristin's patio, big and private but still outside) and the cast crumpled off of me and I started to come around enough to feel embarrassed and focus my eyes. Sheesh man. I think it was a combination of major sleep deprivation, inadequate food today, sitting totally still and upright for a prolonged time with all this weight of unsupported breasts that I'm not used to, and hot weather + really cold strips of wet plaster on me.

Anyway after a few minutes of talking I got up and put on a bra (I'd been in just pants) and ate some of the wonderful food - Laura made me picadillo and black beans and rice and whole wheat crepes with fresh fruit filling and homemade whipped cream, and Melanie brought this INSANE awesome chocolate mousse cake with brownie base and a layer of dark chocolate ganache on top (!!) that went SO WELL with Kristin's extreme amount of overripe organic strawberries...yum man. After I had eaten like a ~~pig~~ pregnant woman and went to the bathroom and talked for a little while, they got out gifts. Each of them had a seed for me, that represented something - like Melanie chose a sunflower seed because sunflowers have SO MANY SEEDS :p and Laura gave me a spinach seed, because of Popeye and knowing I can be strong. And a bead, that I can wear on a labor bracelet. Melanie also got me a warm maternity shirt and knit me a scarf, for Boston, and brought a picture frame for me to put that first "just born" picture in, and a candle that had already been burned some, to remind me of all the women who've birthed before me. Kristin made me a sitz bath for after birth, completely from herbs that she grew in her garden.

For awhile there that nasty feeling lingered in the background ready to overwhelm again and I was afraid I just wasn't going to be able to do the belly cast at all, which was pretty dissapointing. But then we tried again with me sitting on the floor, tailor style (way better for my circulation) leaning against a wall with a pillow, and I had no problems at all. I really like the way it came out, though it's still "blank" and rough of course. Kristin is amazing, too, you guys should check out the amazing sKiLlz I'm getting for free here at her site - http://web.mac.com/jaydedj/iWeb/Kristin%20Jayd/Bellies.html If you go to the belly gallery, there is this one Where the Wild Things Are one that is *out of control*.

So then I went to the bathroom for my spa bath (alone) and as I stood there in the mirror I was struck by how, for some reason or other...I felt totally ok with my naked body. Somewhere in the midst of 3 other moms memorializing my pregnant glory (and all having to stop to whip out an imperfect boob to nurse someone at some point), and being taken care of and eating together, and looking at all of the different casts Kristin had already made...I just felt completely fine. With my saggy lower belly, with my huge herniated tree stump belly button, with my boobs that are no longer precisely where they were when I was 18. It was really peaceful and amazing. And I got in and scrubbed my moisturized-by-so-much-olive-oil skin down with homemade calendula soap, and then sat down in the HUGE tub and filled it up with several spoonfuls of these amazing homemade bath salts that smelled so good. And sat there for time out of mind, alone with the water noise (the tub probably took half an hour just to fill up) and thought about the fainting thing. I was really glad it happened, in retrospect - because I've never been in a situation like that, where I have some kind of difficulty and supportive, understanding people help me through it and then I go on about my business. It made me feel so good about birth - it wasn't "OH NO SHE BLACKED OUT, RUSH HER TO THE HOSPITAL" they just helped me through it - cold rag, physical support, laying down, juice, food. Then we went on about the belly casting. That's how I want my birth to be. I talked to Elise about it.

And when I came out we did a birth circle, with Ananda (the only child I'd brought along, who'd been happily watching or hanging out the whole time). We took one (very)long piece of yarn and all wrapped it around a wrist, with room for tying, and the promise that none of us would take it off until Elise was born.

By the time I left, I'd been there for SEVEN HOURS (and had no idea that much time had passed). Grant never called or anything, at home with all the boys including two recovering sickies. Annie was feeling special, it was raining lightly and I felt so freaking good. SO GOOD. And there was a package waiting for me!

I have a couple of people to email and one to call - I will do it, either (even) later tonight or tomorrow afternoon.

:)

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A hodge podge of pictures.
I had a really, really good day.
(no subject)
So. Tired.
A little ditty I'd like to call, "My Week"
Surprise Blessingway

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Page generated Jul. 4th, 2025 08:12 am

Life's been good to me so far

I can't complain, but sometimes I still do.

Entries tagged with belly cast

A hodge podge of pictures.

I had a really, really good day.

(no subject)

So. Tired.

A little ditty I'd like to call, "My Week"

Surprise Blessingway