Random Thoughts

I think periodically I'll start just posting my random thoughts.

Yesterday on the way home from a meeting at another location, I was faced with rush hour traffic. In the exit ramp I wondered if now that I'm pregnant I qualify to use the carpool lane.

According to the law: At least two riders are required for the carpool lane.

I'm guessing I probably don't qualify as it's likely the rider must be in their own seat, but it was an amusing thought.

Hold On I Have to Flush

As of late, my second office seems to be in the bathroom. People know that if I'm not at my desk, I'm likely in the loo and will be back momentarily. The best news about the pregnancy from a convenience standpoint so far has been that my cubicle is the closest one to the bathroom.

I've made it known before that I'm not a huge fan of cell phones in general. I definitely dislike them when people are chatting in places that I find highly inappropriate (such as while driving and not using turn signals or bothering to look to see if there's a car there before merging). I have had run ins with texters at the movie theatre--nothing more distracting than the little blue phone light flashing on and off two rows in front of you while you're trying to watch the movie. I also love (dripping sarcasm) the headsets where you can't tell if someone is on the phone and they're having a conversation that starts with "Hi" which compells me to think I have to answer then feel like a dork when I realize they're on the phone.

There is one thing that now I think trumps all of my cell phone dislikes though. I have a coworker who thinks it's appropriate to bring her cell phone in mid conversation into the bathroom. REALLY!!?? When did sitting on the toilet become an appropriate place to have a conversation with someone? Not only do I find it disgusting that the poor person on the other end of the phone has to listen to her do her business, flush and wash her hands, but now that person is subjected to me doing my business in the stall next door, flushing, and washing my hands! AND I'm made uncomfortable because there's some stranger listening to me tinkle and flush.

I just can't imagine being on the other end of that conversation either. "Yes, the most amazing thing happened today...I'm sorry is that you peeing in the background?"

Anyway, EWWW.

Rejects

I've had to begin the unpleasant task of maternity clothes shopping. I'm not a fan of clothes shopping in the first place and buying even bigger clothes is definitely not appealing.

I had some cute things the first time around, but they've long since been given away so I'm back to square one.

I went online (because I far prefer shopping online than in a store) and found a couple lots from different ebay sellers that seemed reasonably priced and had some possibilities in them.

The lots turned out to be ok and I found several decent items that turned out to cost me under $5 an item total. I was left with a box though of those items that didn't fit right, I just didn't like, or made me look like I was wearing a tent.

In my wisdom, I folded everything neatly and took the box to a second hand clothing store (albeit a little upper scale, but several of the items were name brand). They didn't buy a thing. Nada, nothing. I was told that the items were out of style. OUCH.

Now granted, I shouldn't have felt rejected, but oddly I did. How dare they dismiss my castoffs as out of style??!! Note the irony. I had also dismissed the items, yet I had bought them originally so I felt let down and rejected by someone else questioning my taste.

The box is now sitting in the living room until the church rummage sale next month. Someone there will want them I'm sure and if not, I'll never find out!

The Lima Bean

The largest (and physically smallest) thing on my mind the last few months has been whether or not to expand our family.

In late January, I had some ovarian cyst issues that necessitated a temporary change in birth control. J and I discussed throughout February whether or not we thought we were really done having children. I think since Alanna was about 5 we had decided we were done with one. We even got rid of almost all of our baby stuff from the shed that summer; we have one bin left of the cutest of the baby things that we thought she may want someday when she's an adult.

We never really landed on Wanting to have another child, but we landed on not wanting to regret not trying for another. So by March we were visiting the dr to discuss my medications and see what we should do if we wanted to try to have another baby. Basically, the answer was get off of the Trazodone and the Ambien. I'd already given up caffeine and started eating breakfast (yay, those two habits actually stuck!), so the rest of it seemed pretty straight forward.

We determined that we didn't really want our children much more than 8 years apart, so we gave ourselves a super small window to work with and declared it up to fate and the powers that be to determine if we ended up getting pregnant.

I'm 7.5 weeks pregnant--apparently we're fertile, and the powers that be have one hell of a sense of humor. The lima bean appears to be doing well so far, but is literally sucking all of the energy out of me. It's all I can do to make it through the day and not just collapse when I get home. So much for any to do list. Oh and that voice in my head that's constantly chattering about things that I need to get done has been suspiciously quiet. Too quiet even (never thought I'd say that!); it's almost like my brain has gone blank.

It's been a hard few weeks. I know everything will be fine and that this is a blessing and that Alanna will be a fantastic big sister. But I can't help wondering "What the hell was I thinking??!!!" I found out I was pregnant literally about the same week I had decided that maybe it wasn't such a good idea for us to be trying. After all, I have an unemployed husband half-way through going back to school, I have no baby stuff, I have a small house where I will need to redo the downstairs bedroom for when Alanna wants her own room, I have our bedroom to rethink so the baby can be in there for the first year or so, I have a little girl who is such a good girl that I'm scared that this will upset the apple cart (someone told me that her brother is 7 years older than she is and that he declared she was the worst thing to ever happen to him), etc. etc. Basically, it comes down to being far more scared than excited. It doesn't help that I see babies EVERYWHERE now as well---it's some mass conspiracy from the universe.

I'm not sure how much of it is real either, which doesn't help matters. Without the medication, I've not been sleeping well. I finally did have to acquiesce to 1/2 an ambien nightly with the dr's blessing, but it still doesn't give me much in the sleep department. I had my last "official" appointment with C a couple weeks ago, which should have been a major milestone, yet all I can think of is maybe I wasn't ready, maybe I can't do this on my own, maybe I'm not sane enough.

J has been wonderful and supportive, but I know my fear wears on him. After all this baby stuff was my biological clock moreso than his. He is fully behind it, but he asked me the other night if I was sure I wanted to go through with this, which means apparently I'm not hiding my fears very well. I said that I do; we're commited and barring major complications, there will be a new person in our household in January.

I hope it will be easier by the next ultrasound at the end of June. The Lima Bean will look more like a baby rather than a speck with a flashing heartbeat. And maybe after testing that day rules out any major issues, I can feel comfortable buying a thing or two.

I feel like such a bad mother for even thinking these thoughts, and now for writing them down. But they are what they are. I'm sure once Lima Bean gets here, all of these hesitations will drift away and it will be like with Alanna where she was such a miracle that there's not even a moment's thought to missing life before she was around. For now though they dance around in my head and I feel horridly guilty--well and exhausted.

Overrun with Dust bunnies

Yep, the blog looks positively overrun with dust bunnies. Seems very similar to my life as of late. Things have just been moving on one day at a time, somewhat in a daze and then I look up and a month (or six) has passed. After all, the dust bunnies are pretty cute to watch bounding here and there.

It's not that I haven't had things I wanted to talk about, but more things I'm scared to actually see myself write down and then have to look at. It's a lot like my to do list around the house, the house is ok the way it is, if I start working on the list then I'll realize how much left there is to tackle.

It's Enough

Often I need to step back and remind myself to give myself a break once in a while. I've spoken before about how the standards I hold myself to are often impossible to meet and when I don't, the voice in my head is more than happy to tell me all the ways I've fallen short.

--Minor digression-- When I first started seeing C for therapy, he asked me who the voice in my head was. So at the time we named the voice "He who shall not be named" as I found it highly amusing. I just call the voice "Mort" now for short.

Mort is pretty hard on me and also pushes me to make crazy goals with the hopes and knowledge that I will fail.

Last weekend, I looked in a mirror and was disgusted with myself...again. I vowed to make dramatic changes this week and going forward. I would no longer eat out at lunch with my coworkers, I would eat breakfast every day consisting of yogurt smoothies so I'd get my calcium and a little protein first thing, I would no longer drink caffeine, I would no longer eat out with my family other than maybe one time a month, I would exercise more. I think there may have been another goal or two, but at this point I'm not sure.

I went out to eat with my coworkers 4 days this week. I brought home Little Caesar's Pizza for dinner last night. I didn't turn on the Wii exercise game once. I overate at home. I bought Everlasting Gobstoppers at Target in the Valentine candy aisle.

Mort is having a field day.

The logical, realistic, rational me though says that I need to give myself a break. I did give up caffeine this week. Even though at one point I drove through the Caribou Coffee parking lot so very close to giving in, I continued driving and didn't stop. Even though I had a horrible week at work, I didn't drink a drop of coffee or buy a soda from the vending machine. I tolerated the caffeine withdrawl headaches and made it. I drank disgusting Yoplait Light Smoothies every morning this week. (I've never been a fan of breakfast, so eating anything in the morning is going to turn my stomach. At least I can just gulp these down and be done with it.) I took a 10 minute break 3 times this week and did two brisk laps around the warehouse which is about the equivalent of 2 square blocks in total. I did at least try to make smarter choices when we went out to lunch.

In my mind it's not much and I failed horribly, but I need to allow myself to accept that at least for this week, it's enough.

Back to Basics

Goodness, it's been a long time since I posted here. I admit, I've thought about posting off and on but I always either get distracted or decide that frankly it's a little painful to post and decide "not today".

Today a good friend reminded me through her blog that I've been remiss in posting and when I thought about why I hadn't been posting the reasons all pointed to one thing, "it's easier not to."

It's easier not to not due to the time it takes or the discipline to remind myself to post, but because when I think about this semi-anonymous outlet I think about it in terms of divulging things I wouldn't normally talk about with the general populous. I created this blog as a hiding place for me to talk freely. Somewhere to expose a bit more of my soul from time to time or just post about the little things that happen that frankly most people couldn't care less about, but that for whatever reason I find amusing.

I've had a pretty crappy past few months from an emotional standpoint. Externally, I've been putting on a damn decent front and if I look through the window from outside my life it looks pretty nice. Nice home, good job, husband who's thoughtful and a good dad, beautiful daughter, supportive family, etc. So it feels selfish to post anything negative. How dare I want to run away from home or work when I'm fortunate enough to have a home and job at all!

Anyway, so now it's back to basics. Let's try this blogging thing again. I can't guarantee the content will be entertaining, but I'll try to at least commit to content and see where we go this time.

Who Matters

I'm normally not a fan of forwarded emails, but once in a while I get a good one.  Tonight I got an email with this sentiment that I really liked (unfortunately I don't know who the original author is):

"There comes a point in your life when you realize:

Who matters,

Who never did,

Who won't anymore,

And who always will.

So, don't worry about people from your past; there's a reason why they didn't make it to your future."

I sometimes (more than I'd like to admit) let my thoughts drift to people in my past and mistakes I feel like I've made.  I get caught up in worrying about how people labeled me in my youth and what they would think of me now.  This sentiment is a good reminder to myself that it really shouldn't matter what happened in the past and I definitely have nothing to prove to those I look back at who said hurtful things in my younger days.  

Happiness and Regrets

One of the tv shows I enjoy watching is "House".  I was catching up on this week's episode tonight and had to write down this line as it seemed rather poignant.  The plot focuses on a woman who was a top cancer researcher and left her career to do something that would make her happy over something that she felt she "should" be doing.  Towards the end of the episode she's talking to one of the dr.'s treating her and he remarks that he often thinks about what he will regret when he's lying on his deathbed reflecting on his life.  She answers him, "You're going to spend one day of your life on your deathbed.  It's the other 25,000 we should worry about.  Go to bed happy tonight."

I often have to remind myself that no one will look back on my life after I die and say, "Gosh, she was a great Business Analyst." or "She really had a knack for redoing templates at work and project management."  At least I really hope that's not what I'm remembered for.  I'd hope that people look back on my life as being a good mother, wife, and kind person.  I'd like to believe that those things I do outside of my 40 hours a week at work make an impact on others and at the same time make me happy.

I would love to find a job that I could also count in the makes me happy column, but I'm not sure I'm ready for that leap yet.  For now I content myself with enjoying the people I work with (well most of them anyway).  

I do think I'll have regrets in the end; I'm guessing most people do.  I hope though that if I can confine them to the part of my life that falls lowest on the totem pole of overall importance that it won't be so bad.

Granola Contraband

Yesterday in true Mommy fashion after work I picked up Alanna, went to Costco to pick up a multitude of items on the grocery list, then took her to Target to get new tennis shoes and the remaining household list items.  

In a likely vain attempt to try to take small steps towards losing weight and save money at the same time, the items on my list included diet soda (so I wouldn't be tempted to spend an insane amount at the overpriced soda machine at work) and healthy snacks.  One of my coworkers has been raving about Kashi granola bars so I thought I'd pick some up while at Target.

In the granola bar section of the store, it was obvious all of the Peanut Butter flavors had been pulled from the shelves due to the recall.  So I picked out Chocolate Raspberry, Trail Mix, and Dark Chocolate Cherry.

At the checkout, the guy began ringing up my items and got to one of the boxes of granola bars.  He scanned it, stopped, looked at the screen and got this deathly serious look on his face.  I honestly thought from the look that perhaps the computer had frozen and he was going to have to rering the items that were already bagged and in my cart.  He looked me square in the eye and in this secret service tone uttered, "Ma'am, I can't sell you these granola bars."

I quizzically raised a brow and said, "Why?  They're not peanut butter ones.  Those were all gone from the shelves."

He replied again in this OMG serious tone that they were marked for recall.  He then proceeded to wave over an Asst. Manager type young lady.  As she was walking over, he continued ringing my items and came to another box and the computer must have told him it was an evil bad box and that it too could not leave the store with my person because he got "that look" again.  "I can't sell you this one either", this time with almost a tone of sympathy as if my granola bar box had just passed on to the next life.

At that same moment, Asst. Mgr comes over and looks at me (I kid you not!) with this accusatory gaze and asks, "Where did you find these granola bars?"  

Because obviously I had uncovered some secret contraband stash of recalled granola bars and was in league with a whole group of people conspiring to purchase them openly at the cash registers.

After I replied that I found them on the shelves in the GRANOLA BAR SECTION (don't worry, I was nice about it even though the DUH was coming through very loudly in my head), she rushed off with little red baskets one can only assume to remove the foul boxes and have them promptly destroyed by people in HazMat suits.  The world can breathe easy once more.