A Different Kind of 9 months

Oh, dear. I have become a blog-fail statistic. I have abandoned my little mommy blog and given all my love and attention to that squirmy little human. Well, move over, Ninja baby. The bah-lawg is BACK.

I guess I was compelled to return to this space by the event of Ninja's (turns out, not so much a ginger) 9 month birthday. 9 months!? That's the amount of time you think you will be pregnant, even though it's actually like 4 years! I can't believe my little human has been human almost as long as she was a gestating alien squid person in my belly! Just imagine...if I were a completely insane person with super healing and super fertility powers, I could have gotten pregnant the day after she was born and be sitting here blogging about my even cuter NEW baby! Who was born right on time with 3 minutes of pushing.

When I think about how abysmally slow pregnancy was, it's mind-bending to realize this little person has been existing right next to us for the same amount of time. It seems like only a matter of weeks or days since she showed up. Let me try to sum up with some good old fashioned compare and contrast*:

Pregnancy:
Month 1: Well, the fun, R/X rated part, followed by, "hahaha, I might be PREGGO! JK, I'm totally not. Oh, holy crap, I totally am!" Followed by some weird and painful symptoms, followed by a LOT of time with Mr. Googles, followed by,
Month 2: go to the doctor at some point where they make you take a pregnancy test. I guess that makes sense, but when the nurse was like, "Congrats! You ARE pregnant," I was like, *side-eye* "They sell those tests in stores, ya know." Oh, I think barfing starts in here sometime, maybe. I forget.
Month 3: Feels like mono. Or some Victorian disease where you lie about all day, fretting. Or you want to. But you suck it up and go to work and swear you are going to be all hardcore and not be a baby about this whole baby thing.
Month 4: Get fat really fast.
Month 5: Feel better for like 2 weeks. Then all your bones hurt forever.
Month 6: Fatter. Stop taking prenatal vitamins and switch to Flinstones. Barf slightly less often thanks to this discovery.
Month 7: Start a blog about how come this baby can't come RIGHT NOW? Who needs 9 months? My hips and all other parts hurt. Probably some unfortunate/hilarious body fluid anomalies around this time.
Month 8: Start "nesting." Or as my husband calls it, manic cleaning. Actually he doesn't call it that. He just goes, "Ohhhhkay, psycho," grabs a beer and hides in the room I'm not cleaning until I come for him. Then he does dishes or something to appease my motherly rage. If you are lucky, the kind of people who say "Any day now!" to random preggos will only just now start saying this to you.
Month 9: You are the fattest person of all time. Congrats.
Month 9,10-infinity???: You eat spicy things, everyone tells you to have sex to induce labor and thinks they are hilarious/original,  you go on stupid long walks, eat like 45 "labor cupcakes" (blech.), stand on your head, punch people in the face when they ask "When's that baby gonna get here??"
Followed by!

A BABEH!

Month 1: Starts with a surprisingly smooth natural hospital birth. Freak out the residents by pushing the baby out on your hands and knees while naked. In like 20 minutes. They were not fast enough to catch her. Hahaha. Baby is not a ginger.
Followed by, be held prisoner in the hospital for 2 days, escape and go to your quiet little home. Feel that baby does not have enough adventure in her life, take her out on the town for margaritas.
Baby is actually quite chill, doesn't seem as hard as everyone said it would be. Get pooped at sometimes.
Month 2: Baby starts sleeping through the night (It's a MIRACLE, call the pope!). Baby hates swings, likes eating, sleeping. Favorite band: Passion Pit. Oh yeah, now is a great time to live in a tent at your job. Newborn babies love that.
Month 3: Other people besides you start to find your baby cute/notice her AWESOME personality. Baby discovers "raspberry" noise. Starts "tripod-ing," which is a thing.
Month 4: Baby starts busting through milestones. Sitting up, pulling up, cruising, quadratic equations. Decides sleeping through the night is for losers, never does it again.
Month 5: Baby officially declares herself "Team Mom." Suck it, Dad. Goes almost completely bald for some reason. People keep asking if she sleeps through the night yet. Hahahahahaha. NO.
Month 6: Baby thinks about crawling, decides it is lame. Pursues other interests. Develops fascination and undying love for any and all dogs. Meanwhile, you refuse to give up your maternity pants. Too comfortable not to wear forever.
Month 7: Eats everything. Refuses to crawl. Falls on her head a lot. Gets a tooth. Surprisingly not a biter. Poop starts smelling pretty bad. Starts to be wary of not-Mom type people.
Month 8: Level 5 Clinger. Weighs approximately as much as a panda. Must be held at all times. Gets another tooth. Can do some sign language but just signs "dog" for everything. You are functioning on world's worst sleep pattern. It's like payback from when she was an awesome newborn sleeper, but now she's more work in the daytime and everything is backwards. Not fair.
Month 9: Dog obsession reaches all time high. No longer bald. Begrudgingly starts crawling when no one has the decency to pick her up and there is no furniture to climb. Finally embraces that "rolling over" thing and makes every diaper change like an episode of "Swamp People." Baby is the alligator in that analogy but no guns are allowed.
9 month old baby actually poops on her baby toilet. You now have all the evidence you need, for life, that she is a prodigy and smarter than Stephen Hawking. Resist posting pooping photo on facebook. Blog about it and text a bunch of people the picture instead.

I don't know which set of 9 months sounds more fun to you, but I know which one I liked better. So, now we're caught up and I'll try to be a good lil' mama and tell more stories on this personal web blog.


*Based on completely unscientific and anecdotal evidence from my own memory/life

 TIMEWARP!

Newborn ninja

Current ninja

Sleeping Beauty

The pooping was a false alarm, people. Ninja has her held safely tucked in the top of my pelvis and continues to beat the crap out of my insides like she's getting paid to do it. Must be because the government didn't shut down. Thanks a lot, Obama.

41 weeks today. Went in for a non-stress test and it was like she knew she had to put on a good show to impress everyone. I woke up at 7:30 to give myself plenty of time for breakfast and a shower. I can only hope that Ninja's fetus sleeping habits follow her out of the womb, because she is hilariously like her mama right now. If I wake up before 9, she's just a sleepy lump off to one side of my belly. Doesn't move, doesn't kick, except to try halfheartedly to get away from you when you poke her. Shower doesn't wake her, food doesn't wake her, even the car ride to the doctor...nothing. She likes to stay up late and sleep in like a pro. Well, they got the fetal monitor on just in time for her to start her very busy day of kicking me relentlessly, so that was good. She passed, she's allowed to stay in for one more week if she wants.

Yaaaaaaaaay.

I'll take two million, thanks so much.

via My Baking Addiction

A Sign

Uncontrollable, smelly farts.

That means my baby's almost here, right? RIGHT?

But seriously, it's pretty stinky. I feel that should carry some significance.


Signs that my labor is imminent (I'm basically a doctor):

1) So much pooping!
2) Angry fetus bellybutton maulings.
3) False labor every night. YAY!
4) I have not packed a hospital bag.
5) I have not installed any carseats.
6) The dishes are dirty.
7) The government is shutting down.

 This is totally me right now:

A Story in Pictures

This is how fat I got for you, baby.

This is a picture of you making my belly into a butt-shape.

 

This is the miracle I performed to make room for your stuff (the miracle of cleaning out the hall closet).

Here's the corner where you go...good thing you are small!

These are the sweet owl cupcakes Aunt Becky made for your shower. Owls are kind of your thing. You hipster baby, you.

And this is you!

Dear Ninja

Dearest Ninja Babe,
You are nearly cooked. In one week, you are "full-term," the magical time when mommies on birth boards go completely nuts and start drinking castor oil and arguing over non-medical inductions and eating spicy food and having sex whether they feel like it or not (don't forget to ask me what sex is in a few years, I know we are both excited for that conversation), all in a vain attempt to get those babies OUT. Because honestly, even the most ethereal earth goddess of fertility and maternal instincts hits a wall at some point, and that point is right about now.

On the one hand, you have shown yourself to be advanced in all areas, including hair growth, kicking strength and speed, umbilical cord grabbing and chewing, and cervical punching. If you feel like coming out in about a week from now, I'm certain you will continue to excel in life and I will be happy to assist you on your exit strategy. I may be projecting, but I don't think you like being in there any more than I like walking around with what feels like a broken pelvis. We practiced swaddling in our infant class and I could almost hear you laughing at the very idea that you would tolerate being restricted and repressed against your will in such a way. Something tells me you are going to need your wide open spaces, even as a tiny, angry Ninja infant.

Here's the thing, though. You can come in one week and I will just high five you for being so on top of it. On the other hand, I could probably use a few extra weeks. I'm doing this thing called "nesting," but in my typical insane fashion, I've completely torn the apartment (yeah, we don't have a house. Sorry.) apart and am reorganizing everything we own to make more room for you. Oh, and we bought a giant bed to save our marriage from death-by-horrible-mattress, so now there's even less room for you. Don't worry, we have a carseat, diapers, a bassinet and enough outfits to get you through a week, probably. I really hope you think the furry giraffe sleeper I got you is as hilarious and awesome as I do. You're a human baby, dressed up as a giraffe! Great, right? I wish all of your outfits were animal or food costumes.

So there you go. Come when you want, but I'm warning you. Anything past 41 weeks and your life will just be the muffled sounds of me, in bed, eating chocolate and pad thai and watching Netflix. I'm NOT drinking castor oil.


Aw, look at how cute you are!! Kicking yourself in the face. Keep doing your thing, sweet baby.

Stuff You Probably Knew Already About Being Pregnant

There's probably a reason you have to be pregnant FOREVER. I've decided the most obvious reason is that babies are this earth-shattering, life changing developments for which you need time to be prepared. So since becoming pregnant approximately seven years ago, I've used much of my free time to read all about pregnancy, childbirth, diapers, vaccines, sleep methods...there are infinite time consuming possibilities and you might as well study up before you never read or sleep again, right? One thing I've noticed appearing over and over again in every baby magazine, website, forum, you name it, is the "Things No One Ever Told You" list. I always get super excited to read these, because, you know...I want to KNOW. What are the great secrets? What are the unspoken truths that no one has dared reveal until now? Well, in this age of internets and information, these lists are often disappointing. Turns out I have heard about sleeping when the baby sleeps, meconium, nipple pads and nursing bras. But maybe you haven't.

So here's my List of Things Someone Has Probably Told You But I'm Telling You Again About Being Pregnant:

Things You Should Not Say To A Preggo
1) Don't call her preggo. I don't mind it, but apparently many women are infuriated by it.
2) Don't tell her how huuuuuuge she is. I mean, really. We're pregnant. It's not suddenly OK to inform us that we are fat. Even if we are.
2a) This includes comparing us to cows, whales and other large animals.
2b) This includes speculating on how we are probably going to have twins or triplets or give birth to a cow. Yes, she's sure she's not having twins. If she's having twins, she'll tell you.
2c) This conversely applies to telling her she's soooo small, are you sure there's a baby in there? You should eat something! Honestly, how many people really know what the average belly size is during any given month or week of pregnancy? Just say, "Your belly looks awesome!" or something equally inoffensive.
3) "Just wait until the baby gets here. You'll never sleep again!!!!" or equivalent fear mongering. Look, we know babies are nightmares from a demon dimension that deprive you of sleep and meaningful human contact. We've been informed. I do appreciate honest stories and advice from people who have been through it, but right now I'm just a swollen, seasick, injured version of myself who can't sleep, concentrate or go for a run. And I don't even have a cute little human around whom my world revolves to make it all worthwhile. "Sleep now, while you can!" That's great advice...except I can't. I'm an insomniac with heartburn and chronic back pain. Oh yeah, and a crazy 4-5 lb ninja endlessly kick-punching me from the inside. The first time I fall asleep on my stomach (my normal sleeping position) will be heaven. Even if I have to wake up twenty minutes later to change a diaper and feed her...at least she'll be on the outside!
A lady who had just had a baby 5 weeks ago saw me reaching for something on the bottom shelf at the grocery store. I was failing miserably while fighting the urge to pass out. You know what she said to me? "It gets better." You hear that? BETTER. She knows...she was JUST pregnant. Even though she hadn't slept in 5 weeks and that was probably her first time out of the house, she did not look like she wanted to switch places with me. She was like, oh yeah, I remember that one time I was so humongous that I could barely move and my body turned against me and basic functions like breathing were impossibly hard! I traded that in for a screaming infant and my life is so much better now! Oh, and she had a 2 year old.
Come to think of it, that's probably why you're pregnant for so long. So when you you are elbow deep in baby poop and you've lost your hearing and you are operating on a Charlie Sheen level of sense-making because of sleep deprivation, you'll think back to being pregnant and be like "I love this! Babies are awesome!" I'll let you know if that works out for me.

Things That Are Awesome About Being Pregnant
1) It makes people smile. I catch so many people just involuntarily smiling at me after seeing my big belly. I'll admit, it is usually a mixture of "happiness and pity" as Jon has described it, but I still like it.
2) Everything you do becomes sitcom material. I realized this today as I was ranting to Jon in the grocery store about the lack of Girl Scouts in our area. I need my Samoas! Midtown Scouts are slacking! Then I spotted Cadbury Eggs and got so excited I jumped up and down. Now, this is just normal seasonal behavior for me, but now that I'm fat and pregnant...hilarious for everyone! See also: buttoning my jacket, fitting through narrow spaces, etc.
3) It's a great excuse. What? It is.
4) It makes my husband even nicer! I hate to even mention this, because honestly, Jon already does all the cooking and pretty much lovingly does whatever I ask. But I am 100% guilty of taking full advantage of his selfless devotion during this gestational period. I had this theory that because I let my husband do so much for me in normal life, I would do a 180 in pregnancy and have some need to prove I could do it all myself. My theory was WRONG.

Things That, Seriously, No One Told Me

1) I have heard a lot about constipation during pregnancy. Let me just tell you that you can have the opposite problem. 'Nuff said.
2) Half the stuff that conventional wisdom says you can't eat, do or think is just not true. Every doctor should have a myth-debunking pamphlet that they hand you at the first appointment.
3) Delivering the placenta: Ok, why are there five million TV shows about people giving birth and not one of them ever shows this? I know it's gross, but babies are kind of gross too, at least on the way out and they still show that!

Eh, there's probably more, but thankfully I planned ahead and was born in the 80's so that I could give birth during the Age of the Internet. You can pretty much Google yourself through any tricky situation. And if you want to see a placental delivery...there's a YouTube for that.