46 (or fewer??) days to go...

46 days til due date...

I've been spending lots and lots of time at home... mainly catching up on work stuff in preparation for my maternity leave, and resting. I feel like I'm in a pregnancy bubble... everything I do right now is sooo centered on preparing for this child.

Preparations have been going well, thanks to the help of my parents and my friends.

I've had minimal health issues, mainly pain stuff that we expected to happen, and which is inconvenient and hard to deal with, but luckily is only happening every 2-3 weeks... I guess it happens when there's a growth spurt. It's a weird, intense stretching and tearing of scar tissue in my upper abdomen, thankfully not similar to what I imagine labor pains to be like... so no confusing issues there. Unfortunately, getting my "high-risk" care at St. Luke's means that I'm always an hour away from help. And there are times (4 so far) when a morphine IV has been the only thing to save me from climbing walls and screaming. As I said... it's intense, but treatable, and short-lived if they get it right away.

My hopes for a full circle of support from my own family and friends has been more than I ever could have expected.

Tonight I was told that I was irresponsible for going ahead with this when I knew I couldn't afford to have a child. I guess an abortion would have been preferable to some. Am I crazy for accepting this pregnancy as a gift, and treating it as such? Perhaps in some eyes I am. I don't regret a moment of it. And I know I won't regret a moment of being a mom.

I know this isn't good for me. My stress level is too much right at this moment, and that's just not good for me or Grace. I need to focus on work and health and cutting down on cigarettes and eating healthy.

I miss my friends. I miss Rikki. I think about her a lot. I miss Meggity meg. Heather just comes over cause she knows she can't drag me out otherwise. I haven't seen Lulu or Ames in forever. I've been to one AA meeting in like 6 weeks. I've been skipping church.

I'm going to Sunshine Fri evening and out with friends after, hopefully. I think Scott will go with me to Sunshine's picnic Saturday. That will be good. Going to church Sunday, all day retreat at Unity Village on Monday, then meeting with Rev. Darlene about my life story on Tuesday... to talk about the "You are the hero of your own story" type of series in August at Unity. I think she might let me share some of my story for it one Sunday during this series. Should be interesting. The story sounds better on some days than on others, that's for sure.

Vanity.... click for Lawrence.com article

So I had a few moments of panicked vanity when this article came out. Why couldn't he have used better pics? Why did I give this guy free rein to my flickr site without approving pics? Why? What if I never get a date again? What if my friends enlarge the belly picture and play "Count how many belly buttons it looks like Kalli has?"
Oh yes, they did that.

Then I got an email that turned my attitude around. Someone wrote: "I wondered why you had such unflattering pictures of yourself up on your web site. I thought it was strange that you gave the guy free rein to use whatever picture of you he wanted." This same person has also said " you really have some weird pictures of yourself on your site."

Huh. Now I'm annoyed. Being sick wasn't pretty, we all know that. It was ugly and pitiful and painful and yucky. But it happened, and it is part of what makes up who I am now. I feel like a very different person now than before all of this happened, and quite frankly, I think I am proud of that.

So yeah, there's some ugly pics of me on there, and my belly is scary. At least it's not an open hole anymore. At least I'm not dead.
And at least I didn't suffer through the ordeal without learning a lot of good stuff along the way.

So I realized that it is what it is. It sucked, it left me scarred, but I think it all made me a better person. And my neither my blog or my flickr site is a "dating resume."
I also realized that anyone who'd see the article, or the pictures, and think anything but good things is an asshole, and probably isn't worth being in my life.

So I've quit being vain about it and am concentrating once again on what this event is... a celebration, an opportunity, and most importantly, a chance to do something kind for someone else. As Rikki always says....Life is good, and don't you forget it.

Click for pictures and such...

Hmmm. a pretty article.


I never really understood the joy and necessity of putting your feet up.

I have understood since about age 30 the need to slow down.

I have understood since about age 32 the need to sit down and catch your breath.

I have understood since about age 35 the overwhelming weakness of serious illness that necessitates occasional long conversations with my brain and my body to get up and just get out of the car, or climb some stairs, or even to walk to the kitchen and back.

I used to sit for 5-10 minutes at a time just summoning the strength to accomplish such feats.

But today, on this warm June day, as I sit here with round pregnant belly and swollen ankles and feet, trying not to dread August, I suddenly GET how nice it is to just stop and put up your feet.

Don't even get me started on napping. I could almost have an orgasm just thinking of it, let alone DOING it lately.

Calm...

Tuesday night I finally caved in to the excruciating abdominal pain I'd been telling myself was "gas" for the previous 2 days. When I didn't feel Grace move all day on Tuesday, I finally panicked at about 10 pm Tuesday night and called St. Luke's again. Of course, they said to come in through the ER and get checked out.

That was a different experience... instead of waiting in the room with all the other sad people, I was whisked by wheelchair straight to "Labor & Delivery" which didn't do much for my level of calmness.

I quickly stripped, not even caring if the curtain was pulled, and begged them to get her heartbeat on screen right away. In the olden days I just would have begged for the IV of morphine.

Of course, the young RN couldn't find the heartbeat.

Jamie, my roommate, and I looked at each other with panicked faces as she squirted more and more jelly on my stomach and kept searching around for the heartbeat. In addition, I was hurting like I had a common butterknife stuck right up under my sternum, and this pain was radiating to my back, leaving me convinced that my trip to Biggs BBQ on Sunday had instigated another attack of pancreatitis and then what????

After just a few moments, the young RN called for help. A lovely older woman came into my curtained area... wearing a scrub top that was black with red chinese characters on it, and written all over it in english were the words "Calm" "Relax" "Tranquility" and whatever.
I like the fact that many nurses choose fun and funky scrubs, it's far less boring to look at than the plain ones when you're a frequent flier there. But the "Calm" scrubs were by far the most appropriate ones I'd seen.

She immediately found Grace's heartbeat. Yayyy!!! So, no morphine for me... I concentrated on the sound of Grace's heart and tried to breathe and relax. They did the usual bloodwork to make sure pancreatic enzymes and liver were ok, and they determined that it was most likely a muscle spasm, or possibly some scar tissue adhesions tearing as I stretch. I knew that was a possibility, although not one I've liked thinking about since this adventure started. The next couple of months will certainly be telling.

Regardless, they gave me a muscle relaxer, w/ a follow up scrip, and after about 2 days it's so much better. I've been eating light and bland, taking the meds, and sleeping. Hopefully it's just a small blip and things will be smooth from here on out.

And if this ever happens again, I want the nurse with the "Calm" scrubs to come take care of things right away.