Remembering

So I guess there's a baby coming. At this late stage of 38+ weeks, we finally got down the baby clothes. Amps did a 5-point smell test for mustiness and separated the enormous pile into musty and non-musty. Musty ones will be washed, non-musty ones are hanging near the bedroom radiator. We ordered a crib. Obviously, we are not assuming this child is in any serious risk of being born early. Meanwhile I periodically sit down to see if it's still moving (it is). And I try to remember what it was like, last time. So here are a few quotes:

"we're ok here-- more of a rough night last nightm though, i'm getting frustrated with having NO time for things like email and showers and with feeling so stuck at home. even walking to tesco is so hard with her needing to feed almost continuously. i'm typing thos woth my right hand  on;y --  much slower going than usual, i can tell you. i hope to take her out soon but may use all available non-screaming time showering and getting dressed instead." --Nina was 11 days old.

Will it be like this? Or will this new child be a marvel of sleepy peacefulness (like my friends' second babies)? Or will it be in between, but encouraged in the peaceful direction by the fact that we will, this time, realise that we can put it down now and then?

One more: 

"a quick note before she wakes up - we're fine. our visitors have left but it went very well and they were quite helpful. it was great for me to have more to do. however nina had a very rough afternoon and early evening in the sense that she just finished one breast and went straight for the other one and wouldn't be settled at all. finally amps had her sleeping on him for 4 hours between 1:30 and 5:30, and then she came in our bed because it's easier to nurse and i was desperate. however she's now sleeping in there by herself and has been
for 2 hours, so perhaps the panic is over. don't know if it was a growth spurt or mild stomach upset - but i'll stay away from hummous today just in case that was it. i really hope it wasn't the 1/2 pint of hoegaarden i had - but i'd had one before and don't recall such an episode. but there have been other epic feeding days and other hoegaarden days so it's not ruled out." --Nina was 2+ weeks old.

Ok - I am not concerned about not having enough to do. I guess I was actually pretty bored. This time I'll have days with Nina too, days when she's at her nursery, and some really, really good friends I can call, and go and see. And a car, in which to get there.  After 4 weeks I emailed my dad that I had gone out for a run, twice, to enjoy the sunshine and keep up my mood. Looking forward to that. Just for fun, here's a video.

In other news, I had acupuncture the other day for my back. It was amazing - not so much at the time - it didn't really feel like much, but for the fact that by an hour later almost all of my intense back pain disappeared and it hasn't been back. Wow. The normal me might have wondered about the ontology behind it (is there really qi, or xi - the Chinese life force "energy" and does that make any sense and how can we tell? how does its theory relate to the theories I work with every day? and so on).

    But now: reactions? (1) Among the best 30£ I've ever spent. (2) awesome that this guy could see me the same day I called (3) am going back on tuesday morning (to his colleague, who's also a midwife and who I'd originally planned to see), (4) wow! (5) how'd that work anyway? (6) why did it feel so normal, to get a treatment involving needles from someone I'd never met, in a nice warm room in a house somewhere that was being renovated, with the smell of gently smoking herbs, and the sound of rain? (7) Among the better 30£ I've ever spent ....

38 weeks

The baby is due 2 weeks from today. When I'm at work it (sometimes) feels like it's not long enough. When I'm at home, tired, back hurting, pelvic pain, nausea, limited capacity to eat (but frequent hunger), and very limited capacity to drink wine, drat it .. it feels like WAY TOO LONG to wait. 
  I've been reflecting on ability and disability. Over the past 4 or 5 months my mobility has slowly deteriorated, from me being completely normal, to being unable to run/jump, to being unable to walk quickly, to it being slightly painful the day after I walked quickly to and from work, and ultimately to now. The situation now? I drive to work - turns out they let you park there if you're pregnant, and they even let me park in the disabled bays because of my pelvic separation. I drive to the nursery on the way there and back. I drive everywhere. But if I don't come home at the right time, I can't park - so I try to arrive between 5:15 and 6pm, keeping me out all day... It sometimes takes just as long to drive to the nursery as it would to walk (that is, if one were able to walk like a normal person). On Monday night I went to a really nice, gentle, prenatal yoga class. On Tuesday morning I woke up barely able to walk, with sharp pain in my lower back whenever I took a step with my right foot. I've been hobbling around the house in the middle of the night with a crutch. It's a disaster. It takes forever to roll over in the night. Blah blah rant rant blah. 
   I have an aunt, a wonderful aunt, who's had knee surgery somewhat recently, and can't stand/walk/cook much, and I think has only recently been again able to drive. She was told it would pretty much heal (gradually) over 9 months to a year. She told me she had been on crutches since August. I think of her all the time these days. 
   The thing is, this gets me down. I hate it. I can't stand not being able to walk. After all, where we live it's not exactly optimised for a driving lifestyle and we usually like it fine that way. (Thank GOD we don't live on the third floor of some old building with no elevator.) I want to be able to take Nina to the zoo - no chance. I hate waddling around at work, feeling so conspicuous. I hate seeing colleagues and students slow down, look over their shoulder, as they realise that I can't keep up. I hate looking up a flight of stairs, pretending it's fine as my back pangs. I hate that I can't comfortably sleep on my left side.
   And yet, and yet: this is in aid of something, of someone. Someone who, if all goes well, will emerge (to put it, well, mildly), and will look something like this: 

Nina: less than 24 hours old

And who will grow up too fast, who will learn to sing and jump and ride a bike and who will teach me little songs and who might come home one day and say "I want to HUG you!" and, and, and ... it will all seem worth it? Or something. 
  But most people who find their mobility decaying don't have this sense, this idea that in just two more weeks it will be over, or it will start to get over. That it's all for a good reason. That it was, after all, a choice - I mean, I chose the pregnancy, and knew the risks, and it's been all normal and healthy. And many many people have it much, much worse. 
   I guess what I'm saying is: I have a renewed and deep respect for people who live with disability/immobility/etc, and who must now have other, deeper, more fundamental abilities that they draw on, to live with all these situations that drive me crazy every day. 

Mornings and evenings

This morning was, like most mornings, a bit of a rush. We're lucky in not having jobs that we actually have to be at, at any particular time, unless of course there's a class to teach or a train to catch. And even those tend to be at 10am or later, except the odd 9am class. So we get up at about 8, or later if we're tired or Nina sleeps in. We eat, get ready (quite minimally, usually, in my case), and one of us takes Nina to nursery. This is usually me, especially since my immobile current condition allows me to park at work. We sign Nina in: 9:30, 9:40, 9:45, or 9:50 ... 

    Every morning, I glance down the column of toddler arrival times. Most run to 8:30, 8:15, 8:20; times when we are barely awake. It's vaguely embarrassing, but why should we go early just for the sake of conformity? I like having breakfast together, eating the muffins we make together, having a cappuccino (a 'chuni' for Nina, ie steamed milk, ideally served in her new Mr Strong mug which was among her favourite Christmas presents).  But eventually I start wanting to get on with it. Today Nina wanted me to read her a story. I didn't. Then she wanted to sweep the floor with her new toy-sized broom, before leaving. I didn't let her. Then she wanted to do all her buttons herself. I let her try for a while but it wasn't working so I insisted. Then I put her shoes on for her and rushed her, whining, out the door. Then (heaven forbid) I didn't put her mittens on for the 10ft walk from the car to the nursery door. In short: today was the first day I dropped her off there with her all sad. She went immediately to Sam, one of her favourite staff members there, for a cuddle first thing. It was so sad. I mean, why shouldn't she sweep the floor? (Be my guest, in fact ... it's not like that gets done too often around here) All I was going to do was come back home and work here anyway. 

   I picked her up at 5:30, brought her home, let her sweep the floor to her little obsessive compulsive heart's content, gave her some channa and rice (again) and then we made muffins and she helped me load the dishwasher. Then she had a bath and slipped around grinning with bubbles on her chin and her bathtime letters sticking to her back, dark hair curling perfectly on her gorgeous little forehead. It was a perfect toddler evening, one of those times when the toddler's had a decent nap and is in a good mood, and you can finally do right by them and praise them for sweeping the floor and you can read the favourite stories and have the awesome cuddles. I just hope it made up for the morning.

Buses

This appeared, while I was sitting with Nina today. We put it up on the wall.