Happy Birthday to us

My tribute for our baby’s first birthday.

 

Privacy

I have a young relative who has been trying to get pregnant for a long time.  When we were struggling I was sure that she would announce her pregnancy any minute.  I can’t believe that I had a baby before she did, because she’s at least 10 years younger.  She is now in the very frustrating time that is the beginning of seeking treatment, where you simultaneously find out that there are serious physical obstacles  (cysts, endometriosis, male factor, whatever) but that the process leading to IVF, and hopefully a baby, is agonizingly, month-after-month-slipping-away, slow.

I reached out to this woman via a letter a while back, told her about our situation, offered to commiserate, offered my research on the clinics in the area (she is sort of close to a good one).  I would have loved an offer like that when I was first starting out.  But… nothing.  No reply.  When I saw her she didn’t act weird, so I didn’t feel like it was a big deal for her.  I hear about her through her grandmother, who hears about her through her mother, so this woman doesn’t have a lot of privacy within the family.  I fretted about this woman’s rebuff, until a friend pointed out to me that there might be things going on in her marriage or her private life that make it hard for her to talk to me.  Like, maybe she and her husband aren’t on the same page about seeking treatment.  Maybe she’s in agony because it’s her equipment, or his, that is “the problem.”  Maybe she’s so angry about it that she just can’t talk about it without cracking her pretty, nice, upbeat public persona and I’m not safe enough for her to do that with.

I’m hoping she decides to talk to me, but not holding my breath.  But it’s making me think, today, about what I wish I could say to those who say we infertiles should “just adopt.”  I have pointed out before that suggesting someone “just” do anything is almost always going to offend.  “Just” is such a belittling word, isn’t it?  The difference between “Can’t you just exercise?” and “Can you exercise?” is infinite; one question is gentle and considerate, and the other is loaded with judgment and condescension.

So for anyone who has been confronted with the “just adopt” question, the questioner needs to be reminded that decisions of this nature are personal, and there are many reasons why a couple cannot, or will not.  Many of those reasons are none of the questioner’s business, but let’s point them out anyway.  (Parentheses address the inevitable Christian follow-up comments about how “God can do anything… have you prayed for blah blah blah” which generally add insult to injury.  In my opinion).

1. My spouse doesn’t want to, and I do; it breaks my heart every day.  (Yes, I DID ask God to change his/her heart; while I was doing that, and God did not change his/her heart, we got old enough that most agencies and / countries won’t accept us).

2. One of us has a criminal record.

3. One of us has a BMI over the limit imposed by certain countries.

4. Our combined age exceeds the limits imposed by some countries and agencies.

5. We would love to, but one of our parents would never accept an adopted child, and it breaks my heart every day.

6. We tried, and the agency rejected us.

7. One of us has a chronic health condition that makes us ineligible.

8. One of us is being treated for mental illness.

9. We don’t have the thousands of dollars it would take, and we don’t have much hope of saving it because of XYZ financial issues.  (and we ASKED God to provide, but God just doesn’t provide exactly what you ask for, sometimes).

10. We were well on our way, and one or both of us got laid off; our adoption fee savings have gone towards the  mortgage and the COBRA payments and we don’t know when we’ll ever recover financially.

11. We KNOW that there are drug-exposed babies, Downs babies, older children, children of a different race, and other children out there who need homes.  But we don’t have what it takes to take on those children.  We KNOW that we would love them.  We KNOW that parents who give birth to or end up with these special, wonderful children, say that they are “a blessing.”  But we don’t have the emotional, financial, or other resources these special children would need.  Please respect that we know our limitations, rather than insist we take on a burden that most of you, the “why don’t you just adopt”ers, would / did not.

12.  That young, pregnant girl who lives on your street and wants to give her baby up for adoption will choose adopting parents who are younger, richer, and prettier than we are.  Even if she does choose us, there is a significant risk that, after we have fitted the nursery with matching everything and after our friends have had our longed-for baby shower, and after we’ve finally let ourselves fall in love with a child that is really ours – that high school girl will decide she wants to take her baby back.

It’s ironic that most of the folks who are insisting that you and I should / must / ought to adopt, did not.  While most of the folks I know who DID adopt provide inspiration and joy with their examples – and all I’ve seen are happy ones – they are the ones who say “adoption is NOT for everyone” and I’ve never heard one suggest that someone else should / must / ought to.

The extreme suckiness of these situations is breathtaking, even without annoying questions.  Foremost for me is the long list of conditions that disqualify would-be adopting parents, which don’t apply at all to the fertile.  Also heartbreaking is our current economy, which piles on layers of misfortune (layoffs, on top of criminally high health insurance costs, on top of profiteering adoption agencies and very high fees….) and so many more problems that I’m not even aware of are out there.

We didn’t agonize much about adoption; it was out of the question due to more than one of the reasons listed above.  But I watch adoption stories around me with interest, and I know now that the failed or neverstarted adoptions are as sad as any fading beta or canceled cycle.  And a lot of that sadness is hidden behind closed doors and unanswered letters and I guess that’s just the way it is.

 

For unto us

I have always loved Christmas.  Why not?  It celebrates some of my favorite things: food, family, magic, snow, presents, winter, singing.  Even when I was a kid, and I only understood the Christ part of Christmas on a basic level, I loved it.  I think the Christ part of Christmas is something that everyone can enjoy, even if they don’t want to sign up for the whole Jesus-saves ball of wax.  I remember seeing the Charlie Brown Christmas show and getting chills when Linus would say in his lispy little voice “Behold, I bring you tidings of great joy which will be for all the people.”  The idea that a little baby being born can change everything, and that the tidings of great joy were for ALL the people.

For this reason, infertility was extra sucky and painful at Christmas.  About two years before I got pregnant, a couple featuring a very pregnant woman got up to speak at church about how they felt about waiting for their child in the context of  Advent, the season of waiting for the birth of Christ.  It was one of my many painful moments, as I wondered how long my own Advent would go on.

Even as I bought it completely, I always worried about this idea that a little baby can change everything.  There is nothing like the dream delayed to make you doubt the dream.  Was I expecting way too much of a little baby, that if he ever got here he would “make us a family?”  Family is where we find love and support, regardless of kids or biology or gender.  If we couldn’t be a family without kids then we couldn’t expect kids to make us one.  But still I hoped/knew there would be something on the other side and I hoped that we would be changed.

I have always loved Christmas because it’s about transformation.  That one minute there is pregnant Mary, an ordinary young girl, and the next minute the sky is full of angels.  A little baby inspires the thundering Handel chorus: Wonderful! Counselor! The Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.  As I have stumbled through my life with so much brokenness and baggage, I have always chased after transformation, and sometimes found it.  Don’t tell me that people don’t change.  I know that I have.

Now that our precious baby is here, I can say that my Christmas dream is fulfilled.  My husband and I have bloomed during our son’s first year.  Much has been demanded of us physically and emotionally, but we’ve always had enough and have been able to give of  ourselves joyfully most of the time.  We both were so scared of how hard it would be, and we both feel that it hasn’t been nearly as hard as we feared.  I have felt my heart, like the Grinch’s, grow at least two sizes bigger, and seen my husband’s grow as well.

It’s true that it’s unfair to expect a little helpless baby to make us a family.  But ours has. Unlike the Christ child, Daniel is not our savior; but so much has been given to us through him.  The absolute needs of a newborn are so raw yet so easy to meet.  We are buried completely in the needing and the holding and feeding and I find it joyful and satisfying.  When I can pick him up and feel his body relax with that little contented sigh, I feel some remembered comfort from my own babyhood and I feel more grown up than I ever have.  Being able to take care of another human has taught me to take better care of myself.  I have cried so many times at the sight of his sweet face, so perfect and vulnerable as he sleeps.  We laugh a million times a day at his babbles and stumbles and tricks. He has shown us how incredibly fortunate we were before he came, and how our time of waiting strengthened our marriage and our resolve.  He shows me every day how fearfully and wonderfully we humans are made, as he crawls and touches and grows into each new phase.

This was the perfect year for me to sing “Messiah” with our local symphony choir and it was my first time singing those choruses that I have loved for so long.  I learned that some of them are built on dance rhythms of the time and I learned to recognize the musical contrasts between the majesty of God and the humble celebration of the people as we receive this hope of transformation.  I choke up a bit when we get to “Hallelujah,” but what really gets me is “Unto Us a Child is Born.”  Unto us.  A son is given.  He is a gift to us, not deserved, not earned, just: given.  And so much more than we ever dared to hope.

 

Sorry, A.A.

Daniel is seen here wearing one of the many, many Winnie-the-Pooh items he’s received in his short life.  The Bear of Very Little Brain and his posse are all over EVERYTHING.  I’m told this is because the Pooh trademark changed hands this year, and whoever has it now owes A.A. Milne a big fat apology.

You can see in this photo that on this particular (very cute) hooded thingie, Winnie-the-Pooh is driving a CAR.  This is an abomination.  There are no CARS in the Hundred Acre Wood.  Also, Winnie’s smile looks one mouse click away from being a Wal-Mart happy face.  Sigh.

I look forward to reading the actual books and watching the animated versions I grew up on, someday.  For now we’ll just keep on wearing the adulterated Pooh-wear and A.A. will keep on turning in his grave.

 

AD report

So I’m, I don’t know, 12 days or something into my antidepressants. The short version is, I love it!  From the first day I felt more energetic.  Sometimes I feel caffeinated, which I like.  Supposedly the caffeinated feeling will smooth out after a while.  Just like what my friends said at the beginning of the Magic Mushroom trip in college where we ended up going to New York on a whim with no money and I cried for a whole day when it was over.  “Just listen to Bob Marley, man, everything… is gonna be all right…”

Whoa.  Where was I.

I was at the smaller dose for the first week and then doubled it starting last Tuesday.  I still had some blue feelings and black moods here and there, but it was the end of my cycle, and it’s not like I’m supposed to turn into Happy Robot Girl anyway.

I feel a lot more like “myself” and I had been forgetting who that was.  I’ve been back to my therapist, i.e., regular non-drug work-out-your-life healthcare provider, not the shrink who just tweaks my meds.  When she first told me I would benefit from the medicine to help me have the strength to work out the next bunch of painful life crap in therapy, I couldn’t see what painful life crap there was to work out.  Now I see it clearly and I went in there with sleeves rolled up.

Looking back, I can see why I didn’t feel like I was depressed.  I’ve actually been leaking like a balloon, slowly, through the infertility years.  Then I was pregnant, and we moved, and so much was different that I didn’t have anything to compare anything to.  Now I’m having little memories.  When I was working out with my trainer, i.e., the only truly challenging workout of my week, I was remembering how it felt when I was really fit and loved the sprint at the end of the run or standing to climb a steep hill on my bike.   I remember being sassy and fun with my friends instead of just wondering if they even like me anymore.  I remember being confident, and not apologetic, and being creative, and brave.  I know I’ve been brave just to slog through some of the stuff I did in the last year, even while I am also one of the luckiest 46-year olds who ever lived.

I’m also kinda angry.  You know that guy in the old movie “Network,” who throws up his window and yells “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore!” ?  That guy was in his first week of antidepressants.

The particular drug that I am on kicks ass, for me.  I am perky in the daytime but I still sleep at night… in the completely crappy way that I sleep.  I think the shrink was pleased that we could choose from drugs without having to worry about ruining my sleep like some drugs do.  Mine was pre-broken.

About the food thing.  I am feeling a little bit guilty about how much this helps with the food thing.  It could be that without the depression and the shame that I sometimes feel spreading through my body like a dark bloom, maybe I’m just having a Normal Relationship With Food.  Hi, Food.  I’m Normal.  Nice to meet you.  This means that I still ate all the M&Ms out of the Halloween candy… and by the way, I don’t know why they call it “Fun Size.”  It’s no fun opening 200 of those things.

But I didn’t eat all the Snickers, and the Twix, eh.  Come get ‘em, I could care less.

Anyway, normal for me still leaves plenty of room for emotional eating and all that. But I seem to have access to a “pause” button where I can stop and think “well, maybe it’s NOT a good idea to eat all the Snickers while reading a book so that I don’t even remember consuming 1900 calories in 15 minutes, and I’m actually noticing that I’m really full, so maybe I won’t.”  It’s not miraculous, it’s just: possible.

I’m also just not as hungry, and sometimes not hungry at all.  I’ve skipped some dinners. Again, I’m thinking it could be that this is what normal hunger is like when you take away all the Food Craziness, and I’ve had a few times of being really busy and, yes, forgetting to eat.  I’ve always heard that you should eat bigger meals early in the day and around here we sometimes achieve that, and dinner is just an afterthought.  I’m conflicted about this, because when Daniel is older I really hope to have those family dinners that are going to cure everything from bad grades to athlete’s foot and keep the kids off drugs and make us all taller and more beautiful.  If the studies are true.  But if I’m not hungry, I will have to learn to just eat a little bit.  HA HA HA well anything is possible.

The best part of this is that I can glimpse the real prize, which is knowing how to just be.  Not needing to be thinner or more successful to just like and accept myself.  If I can get rid of the dark stain on my soul, that will be what the ADs are really for, and it will be something I’ve never felt before.

 

How bad am I?

I had to take the vacuum to be fixed.  I need the vacuum.  I park right in front of the Sew ‘n’ Vac, which is a tiny place with a tiny parking lot right out front.  I cannot hold the baby and the vacuum.  The only ultrasafe way that I can think of to do this is to take the baby out, put him in the stroller, take the vacuum out of the car, somehow push the crappy yard-sale stroller with one hand without it lurching off to the right (or left), somehow get the door of the Sew ‘n’ Vac open which means put the vacuum down, open the door, get the stroller through, leave the stroller, go back for the vacuum, drag all to the register.

Which is ridiculous.

So.  I parked so close to the front door that I could hardly open my car door, took out the vacuum, locked the car with baby snug in carseat, hurried in with vacuum, (distance from car to cash register: 15 feet) barked my name and phone number at the normally chatty Sew ‘n’ Vac guy, threw the vacuum down and ran back to the car.  Total time away from the car: 39 seconds.

Is that so bad?  Keep in mind that I live in a very small town, half the people here don’t even lock their cars, there are no stores around (the Sew ‘n’ Vac sits alone on a little piece of land near a busy intersection), and I could see my car the entire time I was in the store. And the temperature was about 40.  I feel like a criminal, but people, I need my vacuum.

Am I so bad?  Discuss.

 

Halloween

 

Trunk or Treating Redux

This is a repeat of my trunk or treating rant from last year.

If you aren’t aware, trunk-or-treating is an event, often organized by churches, where adults station themselves next to their cars in a big parking lot, and the kids walk up to your open trunk to say “trick or treat” for their candy.  The kids love it because, as one said in a recent newspaper article, “you can go around a gazillion times and get lots more candy!”  The churches organized it to make Halloween more of a “family event” – it wasn’t, before? – and in some cases, to discourage costumes that were too devil-ish or reflective of other bad influences.  In some cases I have heard of Biblical character costumes being enforced or encouraged.

Sigh.  I’m as saved as any other Christian but come on.  Running around a parking lot in broad daylight, yelling “trick or treat” which doesn’t even make sense anymore, dressed like the Apostle Paul?  What could be more lame?

Aside from suppressing the important creativity and make-believe aspect of Halloween, the saddest things about this, to me, are the other reasons adults cite for the trunk-or-treat trend.  The little dears don’t have to 1) walk as far as they would, going house-to-house; and 2) they don’t have to “go to a stranger’s home.”

Maybe I’ll feel differently when my own perfect, adorable, exquisitely vulnerable child is in this position.  But right now I’m really sad about it.  And kind of annoyed.  First of all, the evangelical churches who love the trunk-or-treating thing are the same churches where you will be urged to spread the gospel, and in order to do so, one must mingle with “the lost.”  We hear encouraging stories about people who organized neighborhood potlucks and soup nights and block parties.  Love your neighbor.  Who is your neighbor (no thanks to Mr. Rogers).  Well, along comes Halloween, perfect opportunity to meet the neighbors, but no.  We must trunk-or-treat instead, and mingle with Our Own Kind.

Second, do the kids really need MORE candy?  Do we really want them to walk a much shorter distance for it?  Or is it more convenient for us, less walking for US.

When I was a kid, our Halloween was an all-day event, loosely organized by our neighborhood grownups, that included a costume parade and prizes in categories like “prettiest” (I never won this one) or “most original” costume (much more my style).  The creativity part was important, long before the candy part kicked in.  But it wasn’t so much about candy, it was about adventure, and it was all about the neighborhood.

I remember trick or treating as a kid, the accompanying parent retreating ever farther into the yard as we got older. We always went after dark, or what was the point?  The really little kids went in the daylight and we pitied them.  I remember the thrill of fear as we approached the doors of our neighbors who we barely knew.  I remember peeking curiously into their houses, smelling their unfamiliar cooking smells, and how fun it was when these stern grownups actually talked to us about how scary we were! how cute we were! and how they couldn’t even tell who we were and maybe we really were two witches and a dog and a robot.

Our parents were on guard.  Someone we knew was given an apple with a razor blade in it, at least that’s what we were told, and our parents had to go through all our candy when the night was over.  As it turns out, documented Halloween poisonings are rare or possibly nonexistent. But we were careful.  We knew full well you didn’t go into anybody’s house, and we had to make sure we could walk in our costumes and see out of our masks.

I know that era is over.  It was half over when I was a kid.  We never “tricked” anybody.  We heard about soaping windows or egging houses but it was always the stuff of legend and we never did it. Ditto bobbing for apples.  I know that we roamed a suburban neighborhood with a freedom that today’s kids rarely have, and that even a sealed bag of M&Ms can be tampered with.  But still, I am sad.  As usual, this reworking of Halloween threatens to get rid of the important stuff – the visiting of neighbors, the important fantasy and creativity elements of dress-up, the flirtation with scariness and fear within safe boundaries – and keeps the least important part: candy.

I’m sure in a few years the practicality of trunk-or-treat will wear down my resistance and I’ll be right there with my own munchkin(s), enjoying the convenience, hobnobbing with all the friends I will have made by then.  But I also hope that evil, dangerous, secular trick-or-treating hangs in there as well.

 

Ahhhh

Obviously I am a drama queen and yet at least some of you love me anyway.

The nurse at my psychiatrist’s office, who is obviously used to dealing with unhinged people, quickly located some of my med* at a Walgreen’s not too far away and I skedaddled up there & got it.

I feel so grownup having both a psychiatrist and a therapist, by the way.  It’s like those people who have not just a hair “stylist” but also a “colorist.”  I personally let one guy do everything that grows from the top of my head, but I guess I’m old school.

So, obviously I am relieved and happy to have the whole psychiatrist-evaluation-prescription waitingwaitingwaiting part of the drama over.  Now I can enter into the “just what is this drug doing to me, anyway” part, and since I was gung ho about taking the medicine –

hm maybe that’s what the waiting was for?

– now I see only good things.  It’s only day 2 and highly unlikely that any of this is real, but I feel like I’m having one of my “good days.”  Good days are when the sun shines, I get enough sleep, I have things to do that I am happy about (like a lunch with a friend), I haven’t overeaten for days and I don’t want to right now, I’m actually interested in doing my workout and working hard, my body doesn’t remind me that we’re carrying many extra pounds, my house is clean, and the Democrats control Congress.

So if this were an organic and naturally occurring “good day” many of those things would need to be true, but only some are.  I have no plans today with friends,  I think it’s going to rain, I have overeaten or eaten things that disgust me the last few days, and the Democrats are probably going to screw things up anyway.  But I feel kind of like I’ve had some new, excellent caffeine, an Acapulco Gold of caffeine that makes me feel peppy and optimistic but won’t give me stomach cramps later.

I hope.

So who knows.  If this is placebo, that rocks too.  I’ll take what I can get.

*The drug is Aplenzin, and what is up with the names of drugs anyway? It is apparently the exact same chemical as Wellb@trin but with a better “delivery system,” i.e., uh, “pill.”

 

Not funny

I waited sixteen days to see the doc.  We had a lovely talk about my problems.  He wasn’t the warm-and-fuzziest but who cares.  He explained the drugs to me

hahahahaha who knows how those things work?  selective uptake blah blah dopamine norephrinone, or is it Nora Ephronone?  Makes you feel like you’re in “When Harry Met Sally?” I’ll have what she’s having.

yeah anyway

We decided on a drug that I’ve never heard of but is apparently the cool younger brother of some other meds that we all know and love.  I drove directly to the pharmacy hoping to pick it up and start ASAP but I have to take it in the morning lest it give me too much energy for sleep.  Energy.  I think I remember what energy feels like.  I went and picked Daniel up from the go-to friend who was kind enough to watch him and went back to the drugstore to pick it up only to find out they have to order the drug and it will come in sometime after 9 am.   Um, thanks for the extra trip people, could you not tell me that upfront?

I’m up at 5:30 with the baby… no I’m actually up at 3:30 with the cat who is meowing loudly.  This is actually a good thing since that is her “I am having diarrhea all over the house” meow and now I know to watch where I step, and find the carpet cleaner.  Ha ha, that’s a joke.  I always know where the carpet cleaner is.   The baby wakes at 5:30 just because.

I wait and wait until after 9.  I feel almost bright and shiny, as if this is the first day of the rest of my life, only to find that the pharmacy can’t get it from their warehouse – not today and maybe not? ever.  But “we’ll call you when it comes in.”  Um, right.  I’m going to sit around for a few weeks waiting for your call before starting my antidepressant?  Are they kidding?  So I tell myself  it’s just Walgreen’s that sucks this much, but no.  My doctor has apparently prescribed something so fabulous that nobody has it.

The irony is that I have samples of this longed-for drug that I now sort of hate.  In my purse.  Three weeks’ worth.  But they are the next level, not the first week low dose I am supposed to start with.  This drug comes in irritating irregular dosage amounts like 172 and 348 and nobody carries the 172.  Or is it 178.   And I can’t just split the pills in half because the delivery of the medicine is crucial and the pill has to break down over time.  Unlike me; I am breaking down all at once.  And there is no fucking around with this medication or I could have a seizure.

Delightful.

I called the psychiatrist’s office and asked his assistant where I am supposed to get this stuff.  She is supposed to call me back and I have no doubt that the pharmacy that has it is on the far side of the moon.  But that’s okay.

Waiting.