Operation Pink Herring

Week 7.5

First of all: thank you guys for all the lovely comments about Madison. I loved how so many of you mentioned what a "sweet" cat he looked like! Oh my, he was anything but sweet. He was a very bad, very dumb cat, and we loved him for it. It's very odd having only one cat for the first time in my adult life, but we're all adjusting. Thank you.  

Second of all: Hey, remember how I said I had a couple of early pregnancy posts saved in my drafts folder? Yeah, I forgot too. Until now. This one is from January 31, when I was 7.5 weeks pregnant (counting the stupid "correct" way).

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OMG with the nausea. I am so very, very tired of feeling like I have to puke every minute of every damn day. Luckily ("luckily"), my particular brand of pregnancy sickness tends to be worse at night, so I can get through the workday OK most of the time. But by the time 5pm rolls around, I am just barely hanging on. I cannot wait to get home and stuff my face/lie on the couch in misery, if only home weren't so very, very far away. And by very, very far, I mean three quarters of a mile. I have the easiest commute known to man. But the thought of having to 1) stand up out of my chair 2) walk to the parking garage and 3) swing my leg over my bike to actually get ON that goddamned thing and then 4) keep the bike upright for the entire five minutes it takes me to coast home... the task seems similar to... something hard. Trying to come up with an appropriate comparison is also very hard.  

When I used to get home from work, I'd immediately start in on dishes/dinner making/cleaning up with a little Gilmore Girls or Law and Order on in the background. I got a lot accomplished. Ah, those were the days. Now, it is all I can do to plod up the first set of stairs (so. much. fucking. work. with. the fucking. stairs.) before I collapse onto the couch.  I have not done a dish in weeks. I have cooked maybe 2 meals out of the past 10. I had a snow day last week, and I managed to vacuum 3/4 of our 1300 square foot house and do three loads of laundry in the eight free hours I had. And that, my friends, took a lot of excited you can do it! from my inner cheerleader.

Oh, and remember how I used to be an insomniac? Now I often go upstairs before 10pm. I don't go right to sleep, but when 9:30pm rolls around, being awake and on my feet suddenly becomes much more than I can handle and I just want to be nearthe bed. In case I need it. Just lying in bed, not sleeping, is my new favorite activity. No thinking, no moving, just being in bed. It's fun, you should try it!  I thought it would be a real bitch to give up my nightly dose of benadryl, which I was highly dependent upon to fall asleep. (I always liked how Tylenol PM claims to be "non habit forming." Sure, unless you like sleeping. And you can't sleep without knocking yourself out. In that case, you might want to make a habit of taking it every night!) Even though benadryl is supposed to be safe to use when pregnant, I just don't feel comfortable taking it every day. I was prepared to deal with some brutal rebound insomnia, but so far I have more trouble staying awake all day than I do falling asleep at night. In fact, mornings have been a bit easier because I've been going to sleep so much earlier than I used to. So, thanks for that, baby!

The worst thing, by far, is the nausea. Sometimes in the winter I feel so cold and miserable that I can't even remember what it was like to feel hot. Right now I can't remember what it's like to not feel like barfing. But I realize actually quite lucky here, because so far I've only actually barfed one time.  And that was triggered mostly by overzealous toothbrushing, so I was positioned neatly over the sink and everything. I hate the feeling and the noise and the smell of throwing up so much that I usually start crying while I'm throwing up, and the crying makes me throw up harder and it's just really unpleasant. I am really, really happy that I have been spared the actual act of vomiting so far. But still. This sucks.

However, Joel reminded me last night that when I had a couple of good, nausea-free days I was convinced it was a "bad sign" and I actually WISHED I'd feel nauseous again. So... yay! I'm nausous again!

My nausea does not prevent me from eating, oh no. No siree. It's a very bizarre feeling to be both nauseous and ravenous at the same time. At first I'd just take a tentative bite, afraid that consuming actual food would trigger the dread vomiting. Now I'm an old pro at shoveling in the food while feeling like barfing. Sometimes the food helps! Sometimes it just makes me feel bloated. But it's all so delicious that I just don't care.

We have our first ultrasound tomorrow and I am SO excited. I know it's just going to look like a blueberry-sized tadpole blob, but it will be confirmation that there is actually a baby in there, not just 1) a blighted embryo (pregnancy hypochondria!), or 2) a figment of my imagination. I've heard so many people talk about the experience of first seeing their baby on the monitor and I just can't envision it. Will it be one of the moments I remember for the rest of my life? Will I cry? Will I finally believe in this mythical baby and stop thinking in the back of my mind that all those pregnancy tests were wrong?

And then there was one

We had a euthanasia appointment scheduled for two weeks ago, but I cancelled it at the last minute. The steroids seemed to be helping quite a bit and Madison had perked up. Not that he didn't look sick -- he certainly didn't look healthy -- but he didn't look like he was lurking on death's doorstep, waiting to be let in. I just couldn't do it.

But one thing I learned from going through this with with Max was that trying to evaluate day by day whether it was finally time to throw in the towel was a terrible idea. It's too hard to judge decline day by day, and it just never seems like TODAY could be the day.  Instead, I made another appointment for two weeks later. The vet said she was happy to cancel again if he still seemed to be doing OK.

Today was two weeks later. I didn't cancel.

This morning I woke up to find two cats pushing me out of my own bed for the last time. (Although, as you can see, Madison is not the one to blame for the pushing.) 

It was very peaceful. I'm so happy we were able to find a vet willing to do this at home, with no claws and angst and bloodshed. The vet said he was in liver failure, and possibly also pancreatic failure. There was absolutely nothing that could be done.

I am sad. I can't think or talk about it without crying, but I don't feel crushed by guilt like I did with Max.  I still don't feel good about how things ended with him. But Madison was so obviously in pain that it really did feel like the humane thing to do. By yesterday he not only wasn't eating his regular food, he was refusing a smorgasbord containing three types of wet food, two types of dry food, two kinds of treats, and a can of chunk light tuna. For his last meal, last night I helped him drink out of the toilet. That's sure something I never thought I would do: hold a crippled cat over the not very clean toilet for five minutes while he lapped away. But if that's the only comfort I could give him on his last day of life, hell. I don't care.

It's going to take a while to remember that we no longer have to guard our drinks and keep the toilets closed at all times.

Goodbye, pooker. You were a very bad cat and I miss you already.



4.5 weeks

I wrote a couple of posts and saved them in my drafts folder before I was ready to announce the pregnancy news. I figured I'd publish them now, just so later on I can look back and laugh at just how ironic it is that I started feeling like complete and utter crap (but simultaneously wanted to steal food off my coworker's plates at lunch because it all looked SO FUCKING GOOD) three days after I wrote that I wished I'd feel sick or something so that I could feel pregnant.  

This one is from January 7, the day before I turned 30. At the time I was about 4.5 weeks pregnant, if you count the two extra weeks that pregnancy calendars and doctors just tack on for no apparent reason (and I am counting those two extra weeks now, by the way. I think it's stupid, but I got tired of saying "I'm either 10 or 12 weeks pregnant, depending on whether you count the real way or the stupid way.") 

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I went to a pregnancy yoga class last night. I was expecting there to be five or six people there, as weeknight classes are usually pretty empty. There were thirty people. THIRTY. That's the max for the room. And most of these ladies were very pregnant. I felt like I should have brought my fistful of positive tests with me as proof I belonged there. I am pregnant! I swear! I mean... I think. Right? Eight tests in a row? GUYS?

In the very beginning of the class I turned around and recognized one of the students that works in my department. 

"Oh... hey!" I said. "I... didn't know you were pregnant. Congratulations!"

"You too!" She replied. "I... didn't know you were pregnant either."

"Oh, I'm not really," was what I almost said.

We promised to keep each other's secret. She's job hunting, and I'm... just not ready to have it out there in the real world yet. I am torn each minute between wanting to broadcast my new status to everyone and wanting to keep the secret all to myself. I'm kind of amazed that people can't magically tell that everything has changed.  But I'm afraid that once the news is out there, it will somehow cease to be real. Or maybe it will be TOO real. Although I feel like it's on my mind every second of every waking moment, every few days I'm just hit with the fact that holy shit, we're going to have a baby. It's the exact same sense of disbelief that would hit me every once in awhile when we first got engaged. I'd look down at my hand and see that ring and realize that we were going to get married. Like, for real. It's impossible.

Possible or no, my hypochondria is already working itself into overdrive. I used to be able to convince myself, simultaneously, that I was both pregnant and infertile. Now that I am 99% sure that I am pregnant (eight positive tests in a row, I'm preeeetty sure) I've been able to convince myself that I've killed the baby in a new and novel way every day. Going to hot yoga. Doing belly-down poses. Drinking half-caff coffee (I'm weaning myself off, but it's haaaaaaard). Wearing a belt that's a little too tight (already?! WTF?) all day. Taking a calcium supplement without clearing it with my doctor. Eating raw cookie dough. Having electric stim on my knee at physical therapy before I thought to ask if that was a bad idea during pregnancy (turns out, yes, it is. ACK!). I am still taking a pregnancy test every morning, just to make sure that 1) I didn't imagine the whole thing, and 2) the baby is still alive. I realize that this has no medical validity at all; the baby could actually die and I'd probably still get a positive pregnancy test the next day. But it makes me feel better.  So far, so good. 

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I picked up a copy of What to Expect When You're Expecting at The Book Thing. I wasn't expecting much, especially after being so annoyed by the tone of Taking Charge of Your Fertility and because of the cover. I mean, really? Is that what I'm supposed to look like now? I guess I'd better go out and buy myself a pink muumuu and a rocking chair.

The book, while annoying in some parts, has actually had one really helpful piece of advice for me so far: It's OK and normal if you don't feel pregnant, or if you feel detached from your pregnancy. That's exactly how I feel, and I had pretty much convinced myself it meant I was going to have post-partum depression (you guys, I am not kidding about the hyphchondria). I have convinced myself that I am pregnant, but I just don't... feel pregnant. I don't feel sick. I don't have any weird cravings (at least, none that I didn't have before I was pregnant). I almost wish I could just throw up or something, just so I could feel like this was real. I feel a little weepy, but that's nothing new. I have to pee an awful lot, so I guess that could be something.  Knowing that it's not terrible that I feel totally un-pregnant and detached makes me feel a lot better.

That little bit of comfort almost makes me forgive the book for this sentence:

Every time you pick up your fork, ask yourself: is this the best bite I could possibly give my baby?

ALMOST.

Less happy news

Back when I did that annual New Year's survey thingy, I mentioned that I didn't think Madison would last through 2011. Now I'm not sure that he will last through March. It's become increasingly obvious in the past few weeks that Madison is not going to be around much longer, and it is breaking my heart.

Madison has never been a good cat. In fact, he is a very bad cat. He scratches people, he behaves like a maniac at the vet and he tries to run away every time we open the a door.

Well, he used to do those things. Now he doesn't do much of anything, other than lie on the couch and limp around the house. Suddenly, I'd be delighted to chase him across the neighbor's roof. I happily watched him slurp water out of my glass on the coffee table yesterday because I was just relieved to see him interested in doing something. Anything other than sit curled in a small ball on the blanket downstairs, looking miserable.

We don't know exactly what is wrong with him. A couple of years ago we noticed that he seemed to have suddenly lost a lot of weight. It's kind of hard to tell because he is covered in fluffy fur (which is often matted, since he does not clean himself and will not submit to brushing), but one day I was giving him a couple of back scritches when I noticed that his hip bones were kind of stabbing me. That's... not good. We took him to the vet, where many expensive tests were run and several veterinary employees received flesh wounds. Unfortunately, no conclusive diagnosis was reached.  Some of his bloodwork was a little wonky, but without further expensive testing the vet couldn't be sure if it was cancer or some other crazy disease.  Since Madison will not submit to taking medications, I decided it really didn't matter what exactly what the problem was -- we would just try the prescription food for sensitive stomachs and go from there.

And lo and behold, that prescription food seemed to fix the problem. He went back up to a normal weight and we all just pretended that he didn't have some mysterious problem lurking underneath that mangy fur.  Maybe he just has a sensitive stomach after all, I told myself. Problem solved!

About a year ago I noticed that he was looking very thin again. His hip bones could be felt protruding through his fur when I petted him. I could easily pick him up with one hand and feel all his ribs when I did.  I took him back to the vet in January, and more expensive tests were run. His bloodwork was again wonky, in a way that again suggested cancer.  I sprung for an x-ray of his stomach (thank god for pet insurance!) because I was convinced that he had a giant hairball lodged in his stomach, but everything there looked normal. He'd lost 30% of his body weight since his last vet visit, a year before. That was a bad enough sign. The fact that the vet was able to draw blood and take three x-rays without sedating him was even worse.

Since January, I've purchased every kind of wet food for sale in the Northeast. I hate the smell of wet cat food, and I especially hate it now that all scents are magnified 1000% by my Pregnancy Nose. He turns up his nose completely at 90% of them, and eats only a bite or two at the few he does approve. Of course, the one he likes best is this: 

I have to punch myself in the face every time I put it in my grocery cart.

We have even put him on an appetite stimulant -- something that is quite entertaining to me, as a person who used to have to feed her 16-lb cat (RIP, Max) diet food. Again, that is bad enough. Even worse is the fact that I'm easily able to give him the pills. Instead of fighting me at first, he just sort of flopped over. Now he's taking the appetite stimulant AND a twice-a-day steriod without an iota of fuss.

I hate being in this position, trying to decide each day whether it's time to call the at-home vet and make a euthanasia appointment. We found a vet that did home visits when we finally had to put Max to sleep because I just couldn't bear the thought of his last moments being filled with fear and distress.  That decision was the only part of the entire process of putting a pet to sleep that I felt good about.  I'll definitely go that route with Madison, too. It's just a matter of when.  Something is now wrong with his back leg; it looks almost dislocated as he limps around on it (when he does get off the couch, which is rare).  Last week he tried to jump onto the dresser and missed, crashing back to the floor (and leaving a nice scratch on the surface of the dresser). Every day he seemed a bit worse, but now the addition of the steriod seems to have helped a bit. He's at least pretending to eat and he's managed to clean the crusted food off his snaggletooth and his chin! Then again, I came home on Tuesday and found a turd in the bed. The next day we found another in the hallway, in the exact spot where he likes to camp out at night.  That's... probably not good. (And more than a little disgusting.)

I know it's almost time to schedule the appointment. Just not today. Maybe tomorrow.

But at least I didn't mention Twilight

One of my coworkers rides the Baltimore metro to work in the mornings. The Baltimore metro is a whole post in itself, but to make a long story short: there is only one line. It goes from a random suburb into downtown, so only people who need to travel along its non-sensical route can make use of it. Largely it is populated by crazy and/or homeless people who ride it around aimlessly. My coworker often regales us with stories of the insanity she witnesses on her 10-minute ride to work.

This morning she told us she'd seen a painfully young mother dragging her two-year-old down the metro stairs, shouting "Come on Muggles! We've got to catch the Hogwarts Express so we can do some magic!"

There was some discussion of how this was a cute way to get her child to hurry for the train. And it is! Except... it doesn't make sense. And I really tried to keep my mouth shut, but I couldn't. 

"Heh, I wonder if her kid is going to hate that nickname when he gets older and reads Harry Potter for himself." [Blank stares] "'Muggle' is kind of an insult." [More blank stares] "Because... muggles can't do magic?"

"No, that's not true," another woman replied. "Hermione was a muggle and she did magic."

Oh, dear.

"Well, actually, Hermione was muggle-born." I clarified. "Her parents are muggles but she is a witch. That's why purists like Draco made fun of her. Her parents can't do magic. Because they're muggles. And muggles can't do magic."

"Oh."

And now I can never come to work again.

The longer version

Thank you guys, for all the lovely comments on the last post. We are quite excited about the whole situation, especially because now I can air all my pregnancy-related complaints on the internet! Joel is getting pretty sick of hearing about how bad I want a Wendy's Homestyle Chicken Sandwich, but you guys. Do you have ANY idea how bad I want one of those chemical-laden, cancer-causing slabs of fried chicken? Any by "one," I mean I want two. At least. Right now.

Anyway, Blob's due date is September 13. That means I have a long, hot summer of being extremely pregnant in front of me. Possibly we are not very good at planning and counting to nine and remembering, in the dead of winter, just how hot this city gets in the summer. But too late now! And with a newborn in the house, I'll have a perfectly good reason to stay inside all next winter.

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We've been angsting over the are we actually ready for a baby or maybe not quite yet question for a while. We'd talk about having a baby, and it would sound like a pretty good idea... but one that could certainly wait another six months. Or a year. Or however long. But in the back of my mind, the hypochondriac in me had that nagging what if machine going. What if I can't get pregnant? What if it takes forever? I mean, I'm 30. I know that's not old, but I'm not getting any younger. We want to have more than one kid. We've still got time, but not that much time.

And to be honest, it was only half hypochondria and half actual valid worry. Instead of evening out and coming to some kind of acceptable equilibrium, my cycles just got longer and longer after I stopped taking the pill in May. After I finished a lovely fifty-seven day cycle, I decided to take myself to the doctor just so I could stop worrying. I was pretty sure that everything was fine, and this wasn't a new problem. It probably wasn't a problem at all. It's pretty much the way I remembered things being before I went on the pill in college (and actually, that's why I went on the pill in the first place). I expected to go to the doctor, be told that everything checked out just fine, and just go on enjoying having half as many periods as you poor 28-day ladies do.

Instead, it turned out that my bloodwork had some abnormalities. And that my wonky bloodwork, combined with my inexplicably long cycles and some other lovely factors (hello, adult acne), my doctor felt reasonably confident that I might have Polycystic Ovary Syndrome.

I was not 100% convinced of this diagnosis because Dr. Google informed me that I was missing several of the other key indicators, such as unexplained weight gain. All my weight gain can be traced directly back to homemade pizza and nachos and the stupid TVs at the gym always being broken. But I was still a little unnerved that something -- PCOS or not -- was amiss.  Where was my reassurance? My "you're fine, stop being such a hypochondriac"? I've been convincing myself I have every illness that I've ever read about for half my life, and now you're going to tell me that I actually HAVE one?  No, no, that is NOT how this works.

Whether it was PCOS or not, my doctor felt it was likely that we would have trouble conceiving. Our orders were to begin trying as soon as we were ready, and -- whenever that was -- we should only wait three months before coming back to start fertlity treatments.

Let me tell you something: there is nothing that will make you ready to have a baby faster than being told that you might not be able to have a baby. My very mature first reaction after seeing the very faint positive pregnancy test (well, right after holy crap) was SEE YOU CAN'T TELL ME I CAN'T HAVE A BABY. I do what I want!

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I still had a lot of anxiety over the official decision to start trying to get pregnant. One minute I'd be hoping desperately that I was already pregnant and the next I'd find myself hoping we'd have more time to ourselves. The thought that we might not be able to have a baby someday about killed me, but the idea of having an actual infant human being RIGHT NOW scared the life of out of me. Why do people want babies, anyway? I have always known that I want a family, and I want to have children. But... why? Every time I see a teenager being an asshole on TV, I think "why would I do that to myself?" What if our child grows up to hate us and only grudgingly comes over at Christmas and Thanksgiving? Why would we willingly throw our lives away like this, purposely conceive a being that according to all reports is going to rob us of all our sleep, time, and money for the rest of our lives? Is the biological drive to pass on our genes so strong?

My friend put it this way several months ago: her husband resisted getting a dog for years for the same reasons. It would cost money to vaccinate and feed and care for the dog, they wouldn't  won't be able to travel at a moment's notice or stay out late or do last-minute things without finding someone to watch the dog.  They'd constantly be sweeping dog hair and cleaning dog pee and picking up dog poop. They'd have to walk it in the rain, in the snow, in the cold, in the dark. Why would they pay money for a being that was going to essentially ruin their lives?  Eventually she won out, insisting that she'd do all the dog-work. And my god, they love their dog. I'm pretty sure it's the happiest, most loved dog on the planet. And it's not that all those things -- the money, the responsibility, the poop -- didn't come to pass. "Our lives are so much more awesome now that we have her," she said, "imagine how great it will be with a baby." 

That framed things in a way I could really grasp. My cats are huge pains in the ass. I'm not going to pretend that they're not. Madison is a general jackhole who does nothing but sleep, skulk around the house, choke up hairballs, knock over unattended drinks, and attempt to run away. Henry yowls his face off every night, beginning -- without fail -- at the exact moment I'm about to fall asleep. And Max. Oh my god, Max (rest his soul). Max ruined carpets, threw up in the bed, peed on furniture. He had every medical problem known to cat and cost us thousands of dollars in vet bills.

These things are all true. But I have never regretted my decision to bring these furry idiots into our house. Even though Madison is an undeniable jackass, even though Henry is loud and clumsy and dumber than a bag of bricks, even though the day Max died was the worst day of my life -- I wouldn't change a thing. I wouldn't go back and not adopt them, I wouldn't pick another cat instead. And though I may gripe about it, and I guess I do wish that Max wouldn't have completely destroyed that rug... I don't care. Not at all.

When we were first thinking of adopting a cat (notice how I say "a cat"? We were supposed to have ONE), I worried that it would be too much of a hassle. I'd have to wake up early to feed it and the food would cost money, and I'd have to vacuum more often and sweep up cat litter all the time. Did I really want to do that? Yes, I decided. It would be OK. And now those worries seem so stupid. Yes, it takes me an extra five minutes in the morning to scoop their litter (although, now it takes Joel five extra minutes! Pregnancy card!) and put out some new food. Yes, I have to vacuum more often and there is constantly cat litter being tracked around the house.  Yes, they cost money. And it's worth it. Why? I don't know. I can totally see why people don't want pets. It makes sense, logically! Why do I love them? I don't know. I just do.

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I can't express how thankful I am that we were able to conceive relatively easily. Maybe I really do have PCOS, maybe I don't. I guess we'll never know. I don't really care. I had pretty much worked myself into depressed frenzy over my impending infertility. Remembering how afraid I was that this would be unattainable has actually made it easier to soldier through the eight freaking weeks of "morning" sickness, the biggest misnomer on the face of the planet. (And "soldier through" is a term that is easy to use NOW, when the worst of it seems to have passed.) (Please, god, let the worst of it have passed.) And really, all-day-and-all-night sickness and all, I could not be happier about our little blob and the fact that on or around September 13th, we'll get to meet him or her in person.

Internet, meet Blob

I have felt like crap for the last two months. You're lucky I have not felt up to blogging, because my posts would have been something like: "I spent the evening on the couch. Again. Watched some Law and Order. Again. Felt pretty much like death. Still. Again." It has been a little repetitive. I imagine that the only thing more boring that feeling like crap for two months is hearing about how someone has felt like crap for two months.

Yes, two months. Of feeling like crap. It's been super. Maybe I should go to the doctor and have that checked out, you're thinking. Well, never fear. I did. And there's a perfectly good medical reason.

 

Yes, seriously. 100% morning sickness and everything seriously. I love how the ultrasound tech wrote "baby" on there so we'd know it wasn't, like, the remains of a Chipotle burrito or something.

And as of this morning, Sir Blob looks less like a blob and more like a.... baby.

An alien baby with a very large head, but still.  Dudes, it was moving! I watched it kick the hell out of my uterine wall on the video monitor and then it flailed its arm around like it was rubbing its eye (or eye socket, since I'm pretty sure it doesn't have actual eyes yet) and it was, hands down, the most adorable thing I've ever seen in my life. 

I can hardly believe it. I could not be more excited. Slash scared out of my mind. Slash emotional. Slash craving a Wendy's chicken sandwich AND a milkshake AND a raw red pepper.

(For the record only the very last of those things can be directly tied to the pregnancy. But now I have a great excuse for all my random food cravings!)