Shamefully, another long stretched of time has passed since my last turn at the keyboard. In some ways, a lot has changed since my last entry- I'm currently 5 months pregnant with my first child (and truly, amazingly thrilled and excited about this). In other ways I feel as though my life still revolves around dealing with and bitching about the same aggravating circumstances that work and general life bring---except with 15 extra pounds on my body and a painful lack of red wine and full strength java in my soul.

Being (now visibly) pregnant at work has been an amusing experience, as I feared/assumed it would be from the beginning. As any woman who has brought a child into the world has discovered, simply being pregnant invites all manner of boundary-less comments and advice from friends, family and total strangers. This I accepted as par for the pregnancy course. At work, I knew that my "condition" would not only invite questions and curiosity from colleagues, but also the clients with whom we work. As a social worker, this was new and unusual territory for me. Professionally, my boundaries are pretty clear and clients never know even a fraction of the information about my personal life that I know about theirs. My belly inevitably betrayed me, though, and out popped very clear evidence of something I had been involved with outside of work...

Not surprisingly, women who were mothers themselves were the first to notice the reason for my sudden penchant for oversized tunics. When I confirmed their hunch, they were practically high-fiving each other for their successful "outing". About a week later, a young man who had clearly been absent for the initial unveiling, announced from across the community room that I was "getting really heavy". When I informed him that I was actually with child and not just with cheeseburger and fries, he excitedly said "Really?" and scooted over to me to inquire about how I was doing. How is it that one person can squeeze abject rudeness and endearing sincerity into a 30 second time span?

I'm also tickled (not literally, good God...I pray nobody at work tries to tickle me literally) by the ways that my pregnancy gets woven into stories that some clients tell in almost rote fashion. One gentleman, who I have worked with on and off for eight years, who delivers the same monologue every week about the Bruins disappointing season (funny that he hasn't had to change that story over time), his psychiatrist's advice for staying out of McLean Hospital (take your medication and lay off the Molson), and the fact that Canadians will probably always be superior to Italians in ice hockey stopped by to see me a few days ago. When I walked out of my office to greet him, he glanced down at my round belly, inquired "What are you, pregnant?" and then proceeded to tell me that his mother thinks he's too obsessed with hockey but he's counting on the Bruins to pull it off this year. He didn't miss a beat. Similarly, a female client who often feels the need to check in with me about urgent matters, pulled me aside, stating that she needed to talk to me about something, but required privacy for the conversation. As she intently locked eyes with me, she began whispering conspiratorially that I looked too small to be 5 months pregnant and that it was a bad thing to have small babies. Here I was, thinking that she had her own crisis situation at hand, but she was more concerned with the circumference of my stomach. Just yesterday, this same woman announced (as I reached into the refrigerator for my lunch) that I should "go natural" when I gave birth. "Don't get that epidural!" she warned. "Of course you've got to have a high tolerance for pain..."

Funny scenarios aside, I'm also treated with incredible kindness...one woman inquired if she could "tempt" me with a blueberry muffin one morning. Others have offered to run to the store for me if I need it (I don't take people up on these offers, mind you. I've got to hold on to some professional boundaries!) Perhaps the sweetest interaction though, was with a young man who approached me earlier this week and innocently inquired: "I heard that someone here is pregnant, do you know who it is?" I swear to you, this guy almost bounced off of my protruding belly as he approached me, but I simply answered "Well, yes, it's me." and he gave the biggest smile and said "That's really nice. Congratulations!"

As I'm sure many pregnant women have felt, some days I wish I could suck in my expanding gut and go back to blending in with everyone else but I've got a few more months to go until that happens. In the meantime, I'll try to hold onto the humor of these situations, so that some day, I can tell my daughter, "When you were in mommy's belly, people used to tell me the funniest things..."

Oh, the sacrifices...
It is that hopeful/painful time of the month for my trying to conceive self when I will my period not to come and my mind's eye pictures a wee zygote making a home of my womb. In a few short days I should know either way; in the meantime, my husband is planning to lock all of the home pregnancy tests in the safe. We don't have a safe. My compulsion to pee on those things is so problematic that he will need to go out and purchase a safe just to make good on his threat.

Pregnancy tests aside, there are other worldly delights that don't fit in the plans of a pregnant woman, and as I am hoping to be one, I am practicing removing them from my system and my psyche. Do I miss having the option of having a glass of wine? Sure. Did I want to set up an IV of Pinot Noir following my crappy work day today? Absolutely. But, I contently poured myself a glass of ginger ale and lost myself in a plate of triscuits with cheese. It is the absence of coffee, however, that will be my undoing.

I'm pretty sure that the only reason I get out of bed 9 out of 10 mornings is because there is a promise of coffee on the other side. Sometimes I think it is the only sign of beauty in a cold, ugly world. I tried cutting back to 2 cups a day back when the baby making plan started, but inevitably, my consumption crept right back up to 3 or 4 cups and my standard cup measurement was somewhere between "thermos" and "fishbowl". Well, this month I've gotten serious...by force. As I was enjoying my second cup on Sunday morning, my husband rudely read me a statistic about the dangers of pregnant women drinking more than one cup a day during their first trimester and well, I just lost the taste for those next few sips. Later that day at the grocery store, I broke down and bought a container of decaf. Even if I ended up not being pregnant this time, it was becoming clear that this addiction was getting the best of me. And I hate losing.

So this week is weaning week. I am allowed one cup of regular coffee a day. My plan involves tricking myself into thinking I'm getting more by having a first cup (of which I consume one half) at home and a second cup (which I allow to get cold and unappetizing part way through) at work. The change hurts...and I'm not even on decaf yet! I wish I could explain to my colleagues the reason for the reduction of bounce in my step, and the increase in sudden violent urges. God help my self-pitying ass when I reach the point of needing to make actual important changes in my routine. A java-lite existence will surely seem insignificant by comparison.

Spent...

is exactly how I feel. Not just because I stayed up later than usual watching the Super Bowl, and not because New England's beloved Patriots fell short of the perfect season (not a huge sports fan here, I'm just into the game for the wings and cocktails). Today was just one of those days when you are so ridiculously overworked and busy that the only solution that seems to make sense is crawling under your desk and wimpering softly.

Bronchitis is currently sweeping through my office, leaving the few healthy beings left unscathed to cover the work of the many who are affected. We all run around frantically, pretending that we are beyond human, praying to the gods of echinacea and Tylenol. And in those moments, you feel as though you can't handle one more thing. But one more thing comes. I found myself continually saying in my head "I can't do this". I walk into the office and there is a question about billing- "I can't do this!". My husband requests that I meet him over my lunch break because he forgot his pharmacy card- "I can't do this!". I head to the office kitchen to find a sink full of dirty dishes, a counter smeared with coffee stains and crumbs, and one of the wheels to the dishwasher mysteriously resting near the toaster- "I can't do this!" I wonder if I just sit on the kitchen floor, pound my fists and wail if anyone will say "Oh, she can't do this" and give me the rest of the day off.

Who's that nervous lady in the corner? Well, um...that's me.

The best part of my week was by far the realization that we are now fully staffed at work, I no longer have to deal with the interviewing process, and there is hope that I may be able to resume my usual work duties sometime in the near future. The downside is that my anxiety about being competent enough, smart enough, experienced enough and self-assured enough (ha!) to do my job is freshly peaked as I face two strangers who (in my mind) wonder how a frizzy-haired, squawky-voiced, skinny little twenty-something (actually I'm a thirty-something who dyes her grey hairs) came to be their supervisor.

I am a moderately nervous, self-doubting person at baseline. I work pretty hard at whatever I do and I don't seek praise. This has made me a favorable employee for past supervisors (I actually had a supervisor once highlight my "lack of whining" on a performance evaluation), but it helped me none when I found myself in the position of supervising other people. I kept hoping that my dedication to my work would simply inspire other people to do the same and that I wouldn't have to actually address icky issues like "tardiness", "incomplete documentation", and "not showing up due to consuming too many Jello shots". Well, I was wrong, and every time I had to face such issues, I would shore up my confidence, remind myself that I was capable of dealing with this stuff and try to tackle it without too much hemming, hawing and "I'm so sorry to have to say this but...". And I would survive it, but I wouldn't like it.

And now I am having to face my anxiety again as I train new employees and establish myself as their knowledgeable supervisor. "What if they think that I'm really high-strung and nervous?" I asked my husband the other day. "Well...you are." he replied. This did not make me feel better. "But you're still really good at what you do, and they'll come to see that."

My struggle to hold onto my confidence will undoubtedly continue and I will foolishly look for artificial ways to make myself look official (like the ill-fitting pantsuit I wore last week that so looked like something a pre-teen stole out of her mother's closet). I can only hope that at some point I will settle down and relax about how others perceive my intelligence and abilities. It's not as though as I'll be any less frizzy-haired or squawky-voiced when I'm in my fifties. If I can hold the nervousness in check, though, I just might make it.

Should I have ended my last post "to be continued...in two years"?

Whatever the reasons for my disappearance, I find myself inspired to returned to the blog. Perhaps it was my husband's insistence that I "should write a book" about the things that I feel compelled to blather on about every night. Is he thinly masking a request to take my complaining elsewhere so that he can watch "CSI" in peace? Quite likely, but I will choose to see the good in his statement and bring my musings to the masses.

Today was actually a rather humbling day on a personal front. I realized that I have become (in no uncertain clinical terms) a dime a dozen wannabe pregnant crazy lady.

My husband and I have been trying to get pregnant for about six months. We had settled on our starting time early last year, making allowances for massive wine consumption at my brother's wedding and several months of FREAKING OUT about the possibility of creating a child. Having been raised with a fear of God and Pregnancy, I was certain that once the birth control pills, condoms, and IUDs were out of the picture, I was a few romps away from being with child.

So, I dutifully printed out calendars that identified my peak fertility days, posted them on the fridge to the delight (or was that utter amusement?) of my husband, frisked about when I felt most fertile (with an extra thrill every now and again) and waited for the inevitable union of egg and sperm. I scoured message boards of newly pregnant women, eagerly reading up on the early signs of pregnancy that I knew were just around the corner. I'd convince myself that mild stomach twinges were evidence of the egg implanting in my womb, that I felt irritable at work because of hormones just beginning to pulse through my body, and that any yawn before 9pm was a clear indication of pregancy fatigue.

Enter the home pregancy tests. The damn box says you can test up to 4 days before your missed period. That was my downfall. Of course in my mind, the fertilized egg can travel at light speed, so my body could probably know it was pregnant even earlier, right? Argh. I peed on the sticks, prayed for a positive, closed my eyes tight and then peeked at the results to see a big fat nothing. Sadness. But then the hope that maybe I tested too soon. So I test again. Same result. And then my period would come.

Repeat the above for the next few months, every time vowing that I will not take a pregnancy test until I have a late period. Every month folding when I feel a hunger pang that I'm certain is some sort of hormone-driven food craving. And I pee on the sticks and they tell me "NOT PREGNANT" or "-" or simply nothing. And I cry, because I'm frustrated that I can't make this happen and I'm so used to being able to set my mind to something and do it. And I fret that I may never be able to get pregnant. And I feel bad about my self pity. And I feel guilty that I want to get pregnant and not immediately adopt a child who already exists and needs a good home. And I resolve to be more accepting of life and whatever it will bring...until the next month.

So month 6 arrives, I insist that hubby and I extend our frisking timeline and I AM CERTAIN that we have been successful in our efforts. Inevitabley, I take a home pregancy test a few days before my period is due, and alas it is negative. No fear, I will wait a few days and then test again. (We've begun referring to this as "taking a $6 pee" around our house). A few days later...negative. But then, sweet miracle, my period does not arrive. Nor does it the next day or the next. So I do the only logical thing and call the doctor for an appointment. Wanting to head to the appointment with some awareness of the life rooting itself in my womb, I take another test. It is negative. I have convinced myself that the blood test that the doctor administers will reveal the truth. Instead I arrive at the office and I am given another pee test. And it is negative. The panic starts to set in that not only may I not be pregnant, but I have now become a contributer to the rising cost of healthcare and the increasing cynicism of doctors who begrudge their patients' insistence on Googling every odd sensation they notice in their bodies. The doctor enters and I am treated to a lovely conversation with Dr. X and Jose, the 3rd year medical student, who I'm sure was delighted to hear that I attributed my sore nipples to being newly pregnant. By the end of the visit it has been established that it is mostly certain that I am not pregnant, that I do not need to freak out about getting pregnant until we have tried and failed for at least a year, and that a $15 pee is more more humbling than a $6 pee. The last point was more personal reflection than medical opinion, but it's probably the point that stays with me the most. I thought of Dr. X talking to Jose after the appointment, picturing him saying "A lot of women in their 30's who are trying to get pregnant can react that way. They don't realize that it usually takes a couple of months, they assume that anything unusual they notice in their bodies is due to pregnancy, they request that we rule out ectopic pregnancies." Oh yeah, did I mention that I told the doctor that my period might be late because I had an ectopic pregnancy? Yup. That was me. I was that woman.

At this point, my fridge is free of ovulation calendars. I have to trust that having sex routinely will eventually lead to pregnancy if my body is meant to be pregnant. If it's not...then it's not. I cushion the potential blow of not being able to get pregnant with thoughts of never needing to give up coffee or my skinny jeans. I preach a lot of "staying in the moment", "accepting life on life's terms" philosophy to other people. We shall see if I can do this for myself.

I am so overdue for a new post. Over the past two weeks I've had experiences that have prompted various level of ponderance (yeah, I doubt that's a word as well...) but none of them seemed to be able to stand alone as issues I wanted to explore more fully. However, in the interest of bridging the time gap between my last post and present time, and in the interest of paying homage to life's smaller moments, I present to the reader a recap of my potentially pointless recent experiences:

* I used my brand new garlic press for the first time yesterday. That little sucker is amazing. I am an average-to- below average cook, but I think that my life might be heading into an upswing.

* I found out that crappy conservative/nasty homophobic/frighteningly uninformed, yet devious groups in Massachusetts have been tricking many people into signing petitions that would allow a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage in 2008. My husband and I were preyed upon outside of a Target store and though I was able to see through their crafty word games: "Don't you think it's important that decisions about marriage are in the hands of the voters?", (Um, no actually, I don't. The "voters" did not have a say in the fact that I got married..) they have been clever and vague enough to get many people to sign this petition. More disturbing, in some situations these people have outright lied to potential signers about the contents of the petition that they are signing. If I ever have to hear one more word about how liberals change their stories to suit their needs...fucking conservative shits.

* My best friend is pregnant and I am beyond thrilled for her. This is not a new development, but one about which I had not previously written. There is a wide expanse of country (many, many Red states) separating the two of us physically, but I am trying to keep tabs as best I can and cheer her on in my ignorant, child-less way. You, go momma-to-be!

* I have recently taken my wee cat to the vet for her first visit so that she can return to be spayed in a few more weeks. Full grown, Lucy weighs in at a darling 6 pounds. She remains a total nightmare during the early morning hours (hair chewing, watch hiding, and glass breaking are regular orders on the menu) but I am hoping that she will come to be a mellower sort once she is free of the influence of her kitty hormones. I just hope my heart doesn't break too much when I take her for the appointment.

* My darling husband is recovering from injuries incurred by a small bit of metal making a home of his left eye. As best we can guess, the offending bit came from his weights (thus proving the fact that exercise is DANGEROUS) during an early morning workout. Without knowing the cause, Terry pushed through day after day of ocular irritation before seeking medical advice. When the doctor realized that the problem was a foreign (and rusting) object, it was determined that it needed to be removed promptly. I accompanied dear hubby to the appointment and gave him the same speech I had given our cat during her recent vet visit: "You were very brave when they had to use the needle. I'm very proud." Terry didn't respond as well to the kiss-y noises and didn't care for an extra round of dry kibbles, but he seemed to appreciate my support nonetheless. Today, I'm happy to report that the injured eye is healing well and that there will likely be no scarring. Go opthamology!


Looking forward to future adventures...

Like many people, my work days are hard sometimes. I get frustrated with petty problems, I fuss about how some people misuse sick time, I bitch that my supervisor doesn't really understand where I'm coming from. Fortunately, I feel good enough about my work and career choices overall to ride out the more painful waves in the hopes that the end result is worth the struggle.

Today was actually a pretty good day. I felt purposeful in my interactions with people. There were several positive changes to be noted. Certainly, there have many, many days when I have left the office with a crappier general mood.

As I walked to the subway station to head home, I debated whether or not I should head toward the prime shopping area to go in search of the perfect chocolate brown sleeveless top. (It would be the ideal complement to my camel skirt and knee high brown boots. ) Fiscal responsibility won out and I approached the subway entrance. Normally, as I make my way down the stairs, my eyes seek out the least resistant path to the turnstiles. Today, I spotted an elderly gentleman struggling to mount each stair as he relied on two crutches and carried no less than four plastic bags. I spotted many people scurrying by (as I often do) in order to catch the next train. Had I continued on my path and scooted past this man, nobody would have blinked an eye, but somehow I couldn't let myself do that today. I walked down the steps to where he had paused to catch his breath. "Can I help you?" I asked. He shifted his hunched over posture and looked at me. "Well, you could walk with me." I had no idea where he wanted me to walk with him. "Would you like me to carry something for you?" He handed over a lightweight plastic bag and continued up to the next step. I offered my arm but he pointed out the obvious: he needed to use both of his arms for his crutches. And so I walked up the stairs with my newfound acquaintaince, keeping a step or two ahead of him, serving (at best) to keep other stairway passengers out of his path so that he could take the time he needed to reach the upper platform.

I wasn't sure if he would ask me to continue walking with him. "Okay, I'm going to get on the bus heading toward W___". He looked me in the eyes and said "Bless you. Thank you for walking with me and thank you for carrying my bag." I told him that I was happy to do that and he told me again how much he appreciated my "help" (which, honestly, I did not think I had offered much of). After sorting out concerns about each of us getting home safely, my acquaintance extended his hand to me. I shook his softly wrinkled hand and told him to take care. As I walked back down the stairs in my usual hurried fashion, I felt a catch in my throat.