Blog- a-versary

Today marks one year of blogging for us. We were so frustrated, confused, and sick of not getting pregnant. We started the blog with the same motto as UterusX2: if you blog it, it will come. Well, we’ve got one on the way and they have one baby here and two in a belly. I’d say they must have blogged harder than us, er, used more uteri at least!

Look at how we’ve grown!


Anyway, this community has been such a blessing to us as we surfed the ever-changing waves of emotions. Comments from those that have been there, are going there, want to get there, and know us in real life (IRL) have boosted us out of slumps, warmed our hearts, lifted our spirits, mad us laugh, and given us the encouragement to be where we are today, 17 weeks pregnant.

There were times when we thought this would never happen. We thought we were on an endless journey toward disappointment. We are now filled with love, satisfaction, and one of us amniotic fluid!!!!!! Thank you all that have been there for us during the tough times. TTCers, are looking forward to sharing this joy with you when you realize your dreams. Preggers, we look forward to growing with you and stepping into motherhood/fatherhood with you all. Doing the Family Thingers, we enjoy watching your families grow though you words and pictures.

Last but not least, Lurkers, we look forward to providing whatever it is you come to our blog to read, see, and observe. We would love to know who you are. Please leave a comment!

Happy Blog-a-versary to you all! And thanks for the year of friendship and support!

Mind the Gap, Please

What is wrong with this world. Why can't companies and people ever learn to laugh at themselves!

The voice over lady for the London Tube was fired this week for mocking the tube and those that ride it on her personal website. I think they could have used some of them in a quirky fun ad campaign! I personally like the one about American tourists!

Check 'em out!

Really her whole website is full of fun and entertaining work avoiding activities!

17 weeks!

17 weeks along!! wow! I can't believe it! Barely 4 months ago, we were starting to believe we would never be pregnant. Now, we are almost 4 months along! By Christmas, we will be just over halfway!

Things have changed quite a bit in the last few weeks. I have sensed my body change a few times, but it has really changed over the last week or so. I'm starting to really grow outward (thankfully, nowhere else!!) I'm also sleeping more comfortably for some reason- I know it has to do with my changing body shape, but I'm not exactly sure how or why. (Not having to get up 4 times in the middle of the night to use the bathroom helps too.)

I've also had significantly more energy. Sure, I'm still tired at night, but I go all day long now. Even a month ago, I was too exhausted to make dinner by the time we were home from work for the day. Now, I wake up looking forward to walking the dog. I'm productive all day long at my job, and then we have 2-3 hours at night where I am still up and around.

I'm also starting to enjoy food again - not completely, but I don't have to eat as often, which makes it less of a chore. I also am enjoying more kinds of food again, which also feels more normal. The nausea didn't leave at the 14 week mark like I had hoped. I don't want to speak too soon, but at just after 15 weeks it disappeared and has yet to rear its ugly head again.

So far, the second trimester is going well - just in time for the overly busy holiday season, which would make me tired on any given year. Yay, 17 weeks!!

Ahhhhh

We're home. We had a very nice visit with my family and a nice quick lunch with Erin's dad while we were back in our home state. The drive on Wednesday evening was less than desirable with heavy traffic and non stop drizzle that managed to severely decrease visibility and about two extra hours on top of our usual drive time; however, no blizzards, no accidents... it could have been worse.

We headed back on Saturday afternoon and had an easy drive home. I was a bit uncomfortable (as I had been on the way there as well), but since E did all of the driving, I was able to shift as necessary. Gladys was a trooper in the car, as always. We arrived home just in time to eat something and go to bed. (OK, it wasn't yet 8pm, but I was exhausted!!)

Yesterday was a fantastic day! We began with getting up early and cleaning the living room and taking Gladys for a walk. We then headed downtown for a fabulous brunch with 4 of our fabulous friends. After a scrumptious meal, we picked up Gladys and went out to the tree farm where we chopped down a Fraser fir for our living room. The rest of the day we spent decorating and eating goat cheese (pasteurized) and clementines. It was a wonderful way to end a long weekend!

From sinner to member…..

This recovering Catholic is officially no longer a Catholic. YIKES! An identity that I carried through 12 years of Catholic education and many years in college, one that suppressed me and helped me grow at the same time, is no longer. I am now a card-carrying (well a coffee mug carrying, they gave us mugs) member of the United Church of Christ. Yup, S and I joined a church yesterday.

Don’t get me wrong, my family was never the, “you are dammed to hell you if you question the Pope” kind of family. We were the arrive 10 min late to the 12:30 pm Sunday mass or work really hard to get it out of the way on Saturday at 6:00 pm family. My parents listened to doubts but incorporated prayer before dinner. The education was stellar in the Catholic schools I attended. I am grateful to them for all the choices they made in sending me to that school and letting me develop my own spirituality at the same time. Besides, what other choice did they have but to raise me Catholic in the Catholic schools since my mother was once a nun. Yup folks, you read that right my mom was a nun for somewhere around 9 years. And, no, my dad did not woo her out of it. My mom decided the match wasn’t right and decided to impact the world outside the nunnery, which she did by teaching overseas, marrying my dad, having my brother and I, and in so many other ways. (I speak in past tense about her because she passed away 16 years ago not because she does not still do these things. She does it in a much more indirect and magical way.)

The Catholics are strange, and I’m sorry if that offends anyone. I kinda mean a good strange. So many of my friends are Catholic (i.e. high school friends). My dad, brother, and sister-in-law are still practicing Catholics, as are many of my extended family members. These people are all supportive of the family S and I are building and do not take the Pope’s words regarding us as vial sinners to heart, and I thank them for that. This is why Catholics are so strange; so many people that walk in the Catholic Church doors come with a broadminded interpretation of the Cannon Laws and the Pope’s dictations, all while under the pretense of following the guidance of the Pope. J You have to admit; it is a bit strange but in a good way. Some would deem freethinking Catholics an oxymoron.

All that said, the Catholic Church itself had turned me off to church altogether. That is till my wife talked about how much she would really like to get back to church. All I could think about was standing in church being bored, mindlessly reciting words ingrained in my head since childhood, and listening to the priest drone on about his old world views of today’s world. YIKES! Since then, we have found the United Church of Christ where they talk about the reality of today’s world, our impact on it, and how our actions are a representation of God’s work here on earth.

So, yesterday we stood before the congregation and were welcomed as an openly lesbian couple into the their community without a question or doubt from them. It was nice to see people take on the teachings of a man named Jesus in their actions, to welcome all who strive to be closer to God. Even more to the point, instead of a sermon this church (which has members that are old enough to be my great grandmother and young enough to be growing in S’s belly) had the PROUD Theater Group (a theater troupe of lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender, queer, questioning, and ally kids middle school to high school age) perform a set of monologues on religion and sexuality, doubt and devotion, fear and pride, and most of all about me an my journey back to a church.

Recovering Catholic no more, now a UCC member. As the UCC motto states, God is still speaking……s/he didn’t forget me while I was away, s/he was and is always speaking. Thanks S for encouraging me to go back. I’m looking forward to raising our baby with the support of this community.

My How We've Grown: For my sisters

10 years ago we lost one of the two most influential people in our lives up to that point. We were all in different chapters of our life: teenagers, early adulthood, high school, college…. We each experienced Dad’s death in a profoundly personal way – to such a degree that sometimes our familial bonds did not seem to help us in dealing with the grief, loss, confusion, even relief… The time before, and the time following Dad’s passing is a time in each of our lives where we learned to come to terms with mortality in a way that few people our age(s) have had to endure. Seeing death and dying in someone you are so close to can only change you forever.

We are all different from one another to this day, but it seems now that the grief and sorrow that felt so personal then, are something that we share now. We each have our own feelings and memories of dad and his passing. Something personal remains, yet I know that all four of us know what it is like to lose someone of that magnitude at such a young age. This commonality exists- even though I cannot understand what is like to lose a father when in high school, and you may not be able to understand what it’s like to lose a father when you’ve just begun to understand how to love him, for the first time, as a young adult.

What really strikes me today, though, is that we have hit 10 years. 10 years of life without Dad. Sometimes, I wish I could just call him up and ask him for some financial advice or bug him to come take me out for breakfast b/c it’s been so long. I wish I could have seen the look on his face when I told him I got a full ride to grad school, and I wish he knew how happy I am now that I’m with the one I love and we’re going to have a baby. How proud would he be of all of us? That we managed to grow up and buy houses, choose careers and start families? He’s missed out on quite a bit, and we’ve missed out on the chance to share it with him.

Over the course of 10 years, I have forgotten things I never wanted to forget about him, but I also now have happier memories. I remember the loud music on the boat, and riding out to see the sunsets on Lake Michigan. I remember how much he loved being in the sun, and how summer always seemed to be a happy time for our family. I recall walking the streets of Chicago, as Dad pointed and explained tall buildings as he marveled at the engineering success of the human race. I remember the Platter, playing sugar football. I remember attending homecoming games and listening to him explain the rules of football to me every year – I loved it; I loved his attention. Dad was far from perfect, and I haven’t forgotten those things, but I enjoy the good memories now for what they are: good memories.

I’m also thankful to him for giving me an important piece of myself. I am driven. I like to get things done; I like to succeed. I know I can figure out how to win, eventually, as all good wins take time. I accomplish lots of things, far more than most, and this energy, I believe, is something I learned or somehow inherited from him. It is a core piece of who I am, and I am thankful for it. All four of us have a piece of this in us as we are all busy accomplishing life every day, every year.

I cannot help but wonder what it would be like if he visited, for just a day. What would he say? Would he see us as we really are? My, how we’ve changed since he last saw us! He would have to see that we’ve grown up; we’re no longer just his four little girls. We’re all women now. Then, we were so much younger, still in school, and none of us had met who we were to choose as life partners. Now, we are still in different stages of our lives, but things have changed remarkably: paying our own bills, college degrees, masters degrees, love, weddings, marriage, first houses, living in different states and cities, dogs, children, pregnancies, new jobs, and so much more to come. We are grown up. We are still growing as individuals, as adults, as women, as a family. I can’t believe that Dad has missed all of this. I can’t believe it has been 10 years. I think, though, that if he were to visit, he would beam with pride at how we’ve turned out. How each of his “girls” has grown.

This song has been spinning in my head for weeks now. I think it’s what he would say to us if he were to come back and see us. I think he would be sad to have missed how much we’ve grown, and sad that he won’t see us as we continue to do so as the years go by.

Natalie Merchant/ Christian Burial Music © 1992
"my, how you've grown"
I remember that phrase
from my childhood days too

"just wait and see"
I remember those words
and how they chided me

when patient was the hardest thing to be

because we can't make up for the time that we've lost
I must let these memories provide
no little girl can stop her world to wait for me

I should have known
at your age, in a string of days the year is gone
but in that space of time it takes so long

because we can't make up for the time that we've lost
I must let those memories provide
no little girl can stop her world to wait for me

every time we say goodbye
you're frozen in my mind
as the child that you never will be
you never will be again

I'll never be more to you than a stranger could be

every time we say goodbye
you're frozen in my mind
as a child that you never will be
will be again

Dad, you’ve missed quite a bit in the last 10 years, but we are all doing well. We are happy, healthy, and pursuing our lives to the fullest. We are in love, and we are all grown up with adult lives: houses, families, and plans for the future. We’re not your little girls anymore, except in memories, which is where you live within each of us.

Paving the way

Sometimes it really strikes me that this world has so much more to learn about, especially when it comes to what it defines as “alternative lifestyles and families”. Sure the term alternative bugs me. Sure I am irritated that I have to educate so many people about how my family is normal. I said a few posts ago that my approach is to inform people about something (i.e. lesbians having babies) and then give them the space to let it sink in, talk to others, and come to a conclusion about how they feel about it. I (as all same-sex couples do) field some of the strangest questions in the spirit of helping this defunked world overcome their personal and societal hurdles. But, if the mission is to breakdown barriers, I have to be ok with answering those questions and giving that space.

As I embark on the lactation induction experiment it is becoming more and more clear to me that I will have to work to pave the way again. As worldly and knowledgeable as the MBC and our MWs are, they seem to be stumped by the protocol for inducing lactation in a non-bio mom of two mom family. The MW that initially asked me if I was going to b/f (breastfeed) seemed to have a decent grasp on what that would entail. However, at our appointment a week ago a different MW and the Lactation Expert (LE) were timid, nervous, and very unsure about what and how this would all actualize. GEEEEZ! You guys are the ones that are supposed to know. They gave me a freaking website to visit…..thanks but I’ve already been there!

Well, now I know. I have been to the website, read everything, been to other websites, and am building my own protocol. I will be the first non-bio mom of a two mom family to attempt this in the care of the MBC and so I will therefore be the one to determine the what, where, how, and why. I will educate them on what to do with two moms breastfeeding. I am not under the impression that my protocol will not need to be altered or refined throughout the process and I also understand that it may not work at all. I just need someone to be confident in the attempt (besides you S, you are awesome and it is because of you we can give it a good go) and so that person will be me.

Watch out MW and LE, you just unleashed a determined, self-reliant, knowledgeable, resourceful, non-bio mom looking to breastfeed. Prepare to learn!

California, Here you come!

E and I had a very nice night last night. We went to a "craft night" hosted by my coworker. We finally had a chance to start working on the other pieces of the nursery. I started cutting squares for the quilt, and E cut out the stencils that she is going to paint on the wall. We still have much work to be done, but at least we've broken ground!

In addition to accomplishing baby-related items, which is always fun, we had a nice social evening. Since I've started feeling better, we've started seeing people socially again, which feels good - probably especially for E, who is by far a more social being than I. We both had a fine time. We brought another friend with us, and 6-8 women hung out all evening working on various things: painting, sewing, knitting, cutting out stencils... while also chatting and getting to know one another. What a nice way to spend an evening!

Today, we are getting some very special guests, all the way from CA! C&C arrive today, and we are picking them up in the early evening. They are gracing us with their presence until Monday afternoon, and we couldn't be happier as it's been nearly three months since we've seen our best gals. (and they really are the best!) Posting might be a bit scant this weekend due to so much friendly distraction, but there is also a chance that I will be the only (insane) soul up at 6am, giving me plenty of time to catch up with all of you.

Oh, one more thing, we're suspecting that C&C want to work on the nursery this weekend with us... so it's slightly possible that pics could be up by this weekend or early next week! I know you're all just hanging on to the edges of your seats!

There's a Baby in there!

Confirmed, our baby is in there! We heard her/his heartbeat again last night! There is not a more beautiful sound on this earth, I have learned.

Other than that, the appointment was loooonnnnggg. We like the philosophy of the Birth Center, but our appointments take forever (1.5 hours!!!!). Some of the things could be gone over in double (or triple) time... Additionally, they have an intern learning to become a m/w, so she was conducting a significant portion of the appointment. I'm a bit of a private person, and I don't appreciate an audience. (E.g. at our ceremony, I was so tired of having everyone "looking" at me!!) She was eager to prove how much she knew and -I'm sure - quite nervous, so we didn't particularly enjoy her. Things did improve somewhat, however, when OUR m/w commended us on our "organization" (list of questions and ability to think ahead.) The intern/resident took a hint that we didn't need to be reminded to 'wash our hands' in order to avoid cold and flu. I'm sure she's a lovely individual, and she's clearly passionate about learning to be a m/w. I just would be perfectly fine if she wasn't my midwife or attending any other of our appointments.

Her worst offense, though: She virtually ignored E the entire time while pouring tons of attention all over me. I HATE that. It makes me want to scream "leave me alone!!" while simultaneously cutting E out of the appointment for OUR baby.

Aside from the intern/resident and the 95 minutes spent in the Center (plus 30 minutes each way b/c it's on the other side of town), the appointment went well. All of our tests are coming back normal and good. I have good iron levels, which I was concerned about with my renewed meat aversion. The nuchal test came back good. The m/w thought I was eating pretty well considering my newly found hatred for vegetables (carrots and green beans as the exceptions.) She was happy with my weight gain. Yada yada yada. Everything is progressing well so far.

Oh, and did I mention that we heard our baby's heartbeat? 160's again. Perfect little baby!

Heartbeats, breastfeeding, and velcro shoes

Today we hear the Tot's heartbeat again. We head to the MW today for a check up, some "teaching" (we kinda hate that they always say they are going to do some teaching), and likely an "exam". It is the first time we have been back since we took our trip to the medical world for the ultrasound. I don't the MW was a big fan of us doing that but who cares! It is our health care and pregnancy after all. They talk a big game about make it all about your pregnancy and you guide the services so that is what we did! :)

On another note, I will be telling the MW today that I am interested in inducing lactation. I'm not sure what kind of regimen that will consist of but I have decided it is the best choice for me, the Tot, and S. I'm actually kind of excited about it. I started to tell people at work so that when I start pumping at work (which could be in a few months) they don't think I'm crazy. I find (as many of us that live "alternative lifestyles" do) that allowing people space to let the things in my life that challenge the norm sink in, they have a better reaction. Ug, the things we do for the "straights"! :)

Last thing, S wants me to share with you all that sometimes people that wear black velcro shoes creep me out. There, now you all can have time to let that sink in and hopefully you will still respect me and my feelings. :)


Happy Monday!

Painted Nursery

The nursery is (mostly) painted! We spent all day yesterday painting the trim and the walls. We were working until nearly 11pm! (Which, as you all should know, is at least 2 hours past my bedtime, if not more!) It looks wonderful! We chose "Gobi Dessert" for the walls, and we painted the trim "Ostrich Egg". We aren't yet ready to post pictures because we have some other artistic touches to add, but we got a lot of work done yesterday!

Today we will be cleaning the house (aka, finally taking care of the piles of dishes in the kitchen) and getting ready for our very dear friends C&C to visit us on Thursday! I'm also hoping to get a jump on the baby quilt as we have plans to attend a craft group on Wednesday, and I would like to work on it that evening. So, lots of baby prep going on here. E really deserves a lot of the credit for getting this big job done. I, of course, need to stop and eat and/or rest every little while, so she was left working by herself on several occasions. She also really drove this project- as soon as she got up yesterday morning, she was moving and shaking in the nursery (b/c it's definitely no longer an office!). We're so excited for this baby!!!!

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!

Big congrats to CD & SP!!! They received the big news yesterday!!!!