Tired Friday
I decided it was warm enough for the shoes and a dress. I was dying to get out of my jeans. Fridays are nice, but I'm always beat. There just isn't anything left. The outfit was a true pick-me-up, because sometimes a girl just needs to feel pretty, no matter the shape or size or age. I don't know if this is superficial or what, but a good outfit will often boost my energy by 100%. Add to it that really, I had nowhere to go. I took it out for a stroll to... the market, the supermarket, to preschool and possibly this afternoon I will take it out to... the playground! If I'm not a glamour mom, I don't know who is. That's the thing though, especially if I have "nowhere" to go, wearing clothes as if I do makes me feel like a person. I like feeling like a person. Not just someone's person. Like my own person. And it doesn't hurt that my kids will notice. "I love your necklace, mama!" - Nikola says. Ivan usually comments on my shoes. He likes all my fancy shoes. He's got taste.
(If you're curious: dress and belt are Old Navy, cardigan is H&M, shoes are Born and the necklace is a gift from my husband)
Posted at 08:07 AM on April 20, 2012 | Comments (4)25 Weeks
I realize I posted more pregnancy pictures the previous times, so I'm trying to catch up a bit. It's for my own benefit as well, since I enjoying looking back so much, although right now I'm less than inspired to post.
This pregnancy has been so hard. Much harder than the previous ones. Last time was difficult too but this time tops it all. First such terrible nausea, which occasionally still (!) rears its ugly head and now an achy back and legs which are forced to carry the burden of my tired and worn-out belly. I can't tell if I'm bigger this time around, probably not by too much, but then again I've always had big bellies. Except this time it's the fourth time and my whole body seems to scream daily about how totally done it is with this whole baby-having business. I feel like I've slipped from the first into the third trimester. As soon as the nausea subsided I stopped being able to breathe or bend over or run or do anything for longer than 10 minutes without feeling exhausted. People tell me it's not that, it's that I have three kids to care for, so the burden is multiplied. Maybe they are right. It's more of a chicken and egg situation. What came first?
Again I wish I was one of those happy pregnant women, who blossom into some new kind of womanhood. I don't blossom. Just the opposite, I feel less feminine. I feel fertile, yes and motherly, both of which are very feminine things, but they seem to make it impossible for me to stay in touch with my own self very well. My regular sized clothes wave to me sadly from the left side of my closet, to which they have been banned. The right side is now active, the one with the wide shirts and higher necklines and those absolutely amazingly flattering maternity jeans, the ones with the high panel, yes. Yum-my. (This is a metaphor, where the regular clothes represent the normal me, now crowded out by the gestating process.)
Here's a full body shot, mostly so you can see my new purple flats! I can hear my husband wincing looking at this photo, which has lots of faults starting with the visible flash, but I am happy just being motivated to post, I can't be bothered to fix it.
I've been loading up on accessories a bit, scarves, necklaces, bracelets. There is a slight chance the shiny will distract people from glaring at the obvious. I've already had several "It must be soon now?"-comments. I don't have the energy to feel even a bit annoyed. I can't blame them. I do look big.
I just got these, they are called Ambrosia, by Born. Seem to be sold out at 6pm, which is a magnificent store by the way. I have had great experience with Born shoes.
The one thing that still works are shoes and I'm dying for the weather to warm up so I can wear a cute pair. I can only see them in the mirror anymore, but who cares. Shoes are the one thing I don't have to set aside for the duration of the pregnancy. They stay with me. They remind me it's all short lived. There will be a time, where I will climb on a bike again or run without pain or simply wear my favorite skirt.
For comparison:
25 weeks with Veronika
28 weeks with Ivan
25 weeks with Nikola
I should be baking for Easter instead
This morning. I was sitting at the breakfast table trying to come up with my Easter shopping list in my head. It was not going well, I was too sleepy to care. I was enjoying my food, which I knew was going to make me feel queasy and or bloated in a short while. I'm not sure what that is. I actually already wake up with something that feels like a bubble in my stomach. My husband says that bubble will come out in summer and then the mystery will be lifted. He's onto something. I'm thinking there might be the right foods one can eat with a compromised stomach situation, but see above... too tired to care. That feeling seems to persist lately. It will probably also come out with that bubble in summer.
The kids are on Easter vacation this week and I've made a special effort to keep them entertained for the sake of everyone's sanity (mine), but also because the weather has been wonderful and I rarely have time to dedicate a whole afternoon to a fun outing. Walking down the street and in and out of subway trains and trams I felt particularly visible with three children buzzing around me and myself pushing a forth in front of me, covered by a belly, very visible nevertheless. There were no mean stares (stares yes, not mean or maybe I blocked that out) or comments but I felt so... public. As if I was trying to make a statement. I'm having three children! And expecting one more! Watch how it's done! Or rather: Watch how I struggle! It was a weird mix of feelings. I felt like the embodiment of that annoying comment people tend to make "You've got your hands full!" - in the positive and negative sense. I looked at at them and was amazed, elated, happy. At the same time I felt completely overwhelmed and terrified... There they all are, inching away from me literally, and with each age more apt to be on their own. How will I stay on top of this? I have no clue, which of course doesn't mean anything. I really had no idea how to parent one child. I will have to rise to the occasion, but sometimes the reality of it just hits me.
This was going through my mind as I was eating my cereal. I needed to hurry and get ready. Veronika and I were going to go to confession this morning. Before I was able to finish, she came over with her examination of conscience and asked me if I could help. There was a question she didn't get: "Have you gotten really angry at someone?".
- "Why is that wrong? I'm not allowed to get angry?" she asked. Ah... there's that part about rising to the occasion... giving the right answer, not poisoning her sensitivity with my expectations, yet giving some guidance, then again not be overbearing, just help her recognize my answer in her life... I tried to focus. What do "I" think about anger? By the way, this is the core of parenting to me. The kids want to know who you are and you have to be that person you want them to become. It's just... impossible in its execution, but so necessary.
So I say that it's ok to be angry. It's an emotion that will come when things happen to us, we can't really make ourselves not feel something we do and that's ok. If someone hurts you or annoys you or is being unfair, we are right to get angry, although sometimes we get angry when the other person is innocent, yet maybe it made us jealous or annoyed for reasons of our own. Either way, if you feel angry, you feel angry. But - and here I get interrupted by a voice from the bathroom: "Maaaamaaaaa". It's Nikola's wipe-my-butt-voice. So I tell Veronika to wait and head over there, only he is not done yet as he informs me, but had some strange nose accident, which I won't get into detail here but requires cleaning on my part and also the explanation of certain pressure-related physics when you are uhm, straining on the toilet and also sneezing at the same time. Nikola is intrigued. I am confused because really, nobody prepared me for incidents like this. He tells me to leave since "he's not done yet!!!" .
I return to Veronika and continue explaining that once you're angry there are two ways to react, either you let your anger explode uncontrolled and unfiltered hurting the person in return, or you take a few minutes to calm down and then let the other person know how you feel. And - I don't care how new-agey this sounds - I emphasize this. I tell her, it is important to let people know they hurt us. It's also important to let your anger show sometimes. People deserve to know what they did. But it's very different from lashing out. I explain that the question in her book was talking about lashing out in anger. She gets it. Or so I think. Either way, she leaves, satisfied. I'm left with doubts. As always! Did I do this right? Did I go too far? Oh, to know what is heard on the other side. I know I'm overly cautious, I grew up with a father who would've turned this into a 2-hour-sermon at the end of which neither one of us would've known what exactly we were talking about, and neither would've admitted it either. I think it left my dad with a feeling of satisfaction and release or something like it. It left me burdened. It also left me more and more determined to keep things to myself as much as I could. I always concluded there must have been some proof somewhere in that speech that I was guilty of something. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but there it was. Hardly anyone will be able to absorb much from an impromptu two-hour-sermon. Let alone a child. I didn't know any of that. I walked away with what my father gave me. So, what did she walk away with? I don't know. I pray I got it across. Also, that next time I'm angry I don't lash out, because wouldn't that be just so ironic.
It's time to finally wipe Nikola's butt. "Mama, I always love to go gacksi (poop)!" - Don't we know it, baby, don't we know it.
Parenting is so exhausting. I want to say I prefer the stage where I'm not needed physically so much, that's why pregnancy and the first years are so hard for me. I'd like to think I prefer the intellectual side of it. Being there to answer questions, or give guidance or just participate in the maturing of my kids. Then again, there's not that much science in enduring a heavy belly or breastfeeding or butt-wiping. How wrong can you go? I mean sure, you can, but it's easily corrected. That other stuff, the things you say and teach stay with them much longer. Those challenges might not make me bend over a toilet or hold my breath (that kid can make a stink!), but the effects will be long-term and the doubts are always there. It is my choice after all, I don't want to be the parent dead-sure of everything. It backfires, always. Plus it's dishonest.
I am the thing they hold on to and the thing they push themselves away from. In both cases I need to be strong and firm, but not rigid. If it wasn't so mundane on most days, you could call it art.
Posted at 11:35 AM on April 05, 2012 | Comments (2)Written under the influence (of hormones)
Here goes old news: I'm pregnant with my 4th baby. I've been so sick - as sick only as I was with Veronika, which is not pleasant. I kind of thought I was done with the extreme sickness as with the boys' pregnancies I could still sort of function, but this time, I've been bedridden again, now for almost 2 weeks and sick for almost 6. But anyway, pregnancy does not sit well with me. I think it's safe to say I hate it. And every time the same thing happens. I see my kids and how much fun we're having, especially now that all of them speak and their personalities are blooming and I think: More kids! Great idea! Then I get pregnant and everything changes, everything. I think: More kids! Horrible idea! What was I thinking? How did I not remember how much I hate this? I will lose my body and my freedom and my sleep and basically... control. I don't want this. I want opportunities! Freedom! My skinny clothes! Grown-up parties! And most of all: control! I want it how I want it. I don't want a baby seriously cutting into all that is mine. Obviously it doesn't help that in between those thoughts I'm bending over a toilet bowl. The baby, it took control! It took it all, right away. Poor me.
Yeah, so I'm a very grateful pregnant woman. I count my blessings and whatnot. Seriously though a part of me always knows that this is where my life is supposed to go. I had three kids and I couldn't bear the thought of being done. I love my children and I love my husband and here we are having more, it just doesn't get much more logical than this. The problem is I know I don't see life as it happens. I suppose most people don't. Being in the middle of the story makes it impossible to make oneself an objective picture of it, and although looking back often involves selective memory it is in some ways more accurate in describing what really happened.
Having my first three kids relatively close together was exhausting. I thought it would never end. I was overwhelmed and wanted it all to pass quickly. I don't wish those days back, but I do feel wistful sometimes. I see now that it was just a part of it all while at the time it was all I knew about life with children. The agony of making it through the day was right there beside the joy of the beginning of their (and our) lives. They are inseparable. Sure it could've gone another way, but it would still not have been easy. I struggle with the responsibility of it (see above), but I'm grateful to myself for having done it. I wanted another child because after a few years now I can see where all these diapers and tantrums are taking us to and I like it. I wanted more of it. Except when I didn't. It will always be this way, the commitment and the reluctance at war.
I'm not a happy pregnant woman and I'm not sure I'm a good mother, but my kids are good and it's about them. That is the perspective that connects me to the end of the story and keeps me bending over that toilet bowl a fourth time now.
Maybe next lifetime
I love Adele. I wrote about that a while ago and won't repeat myself. (And won't mention that I liked her before she was popular, which was like uh, 2 years ago? This girl is too young.) I realize part of what makes her so dear to me is the deep voice. I've wanted a deep strong voice all my life. When Lauryn Hill went solo I just couldn't get enough. Obviously the music had something to do with it, but the voice... Sadly I was not blessed with anything that could be called even close to "husky" or "dark" or "deep". Quite the opposite. My voice is light and squeaky at times. I was a soprano in choir. Probably not a full one, it took me a bit of work, I could've been a mezzo I suppose, but anyway. I don't have the deep voice. I don't sound experienced or heavy or mysterious or tragic. In my ears I sound nice. In the very non-exciting sense of the word.
Oh, to have a voice like Adele or Lauryn or Etta James... To make your statement in a song with that heaviness, it won't even matter what you say, people will listen. You can just belt out your point of view and silence you surroundings. In my head that's how it works. I don't know if when I listen to Adele it brings something out in me or I just wear her attitude like a coat for the duration of the song, but either way I can imagine this is what I sound like on the inside. None of that light soprano that glosses over anything important I think I have to say. I am deep and strong and mysterious, but the world will never know. I share this sad fate with millions of other delusional wannabes, who would if they could, but they can't so they just move their lips with the music and pretend...
Posted at 02:11 PM on December 06, 2011 | Comments (6)