My Husband, the Hero

I’ve never been one of those crazy women who sends her husband out on a hormone-crazed trip to the grocery store at 11:30 p.m. for a very specific type of ice cream. Or chips. Or pickles. But I did send him on an emergency trip to Target a couple of weeks ago. It was a Saturday actually, and during Monkey’s nap that day — the nap that she refused to take for an hour and a half, after getting a terrible night’s sleep and I could just not FATHOM the idea of her NOT taking a nap after how little sleep she got the night before — I broke the sh*tty plastic gate that had been containing her in her room.

I hated that plastic gate.

It was the gate that she climbed over after the first few nights of transitioning to her big girl bed. The gate that we then moved up a couple of inches in the door frame so that she could no longer climb over it. Except, the problem was that we could no longer climb over it then. Especially me, with my big pregnant belly, and my whacked center of gravity. Which meant, that if Monkey was terrorizing her room — throwing socks, completely removing entire drawers from her chest, knocking her pillows off the bed, etc. — we could not easily get in the room and silently lay her back down. And without the gate, well without the gate it was a hopeless cause. Without the gate it was a never-ending frustration parade of getting out of bed over 100 times, me crying, and none of us getting any sleep.

I know what you’re thinking. I hated the gate and broke it in a moment of frustration because she had been crying and hysterical for an hour and refusing to sleep. But actually, I didn’t. It was a real piece of sh*t and I happened to break it when trying to open it so I could get into the room to stop Monkey from terrorizing it. But oh what a blessing it was to break that gate. Because now, now we have this:

I love this gate. Not only can it be unobtrusively pressure-mounted (or permanently installed if you prefer), but it has vertical bars, meaning Monkey literally has nothing to get her leg up on. Plus, it’s 10 inches taller, and the best part — WE CAN WALK THROUGH IT! I LOVE THIS GATE! This gate has been a savior!

My husband is the hero responsible for picking this gate. I wanted him to get the new gate because I had gotten the plastic one, and obviously was not qualified for gate-picking-out duties. My only request was that he get one that had a pass through so that neither one of us had to try to jump over the d*mn thing.

So my husband dashes off to Target after Monkey’s nap (BTW, in case you’re curious I finally gave in and laid down with her, which I hate to do, but praise God, she slept for two and a half hours). While he was there, standing in the aisle and mulling over his gate options, he saw another dad with a wife and toddler, also agonizing over gate choices.

The other dad picked up the sh*tty plastic gate. Just as my husband was about to say “DON’T DO IT, MAN!” the other dad turned to my husband and said, “Don’t get this one. It’s a piece of sh*t.”

My husband laughed and said, “I actually just returned that thing because it broke. I’m getting a new one.”

The other dad just smirked. As he was walking away, my husband saw the other dad selecting the new gate we had chosen.

What an awesome display of dad solidarity!

As long as my husband was going to Target, I figured it wouldn’t be too much of an inconvenience to ask him to pick up some “good” chocolate for me. Chocolate being my sanity during the dark days of big girl bed transition. I told him, “You know, good stuff, like the Lindt dark chocolate bars that I like, the ones with the filling,” I said.

So after choosing the gate, he trudged on through Target to get my chocolate like the hero that he is. Except he wasn’t absolutely sure he was getting the right thing, so he called me (smart move). As he’s explaining the choices to me over the phone, I’m telling him that he’s got all the wrong ones.

“No, not Ghiradelli, I said Lindt,” I told my husband as he asked me if this was the right one.

“Oh, sorry, you must mean this one,” he said describing another wrong one.

I wanted the Lindt dark chocolate bar, the one with the smooth filling!

“Okay, okay, I see it. I see what you mean,” my husband said.

After he hung up, an older woman standing next to my husband said, “Yeah, those hormones. You gotta get the right one.”

My husband, surprised that this woman must have known I was pregnant, confirmed, “Yeah, especially because she’s pregnant.”

The woman looked at my husband incredulously and said, “You better get the right one then.”

Freaking hysterical! At least my hormone-driven grocery runs aren’t late at night!

My husband really is a hero. And luckily for us, he bought a gate that has (pretty much) ended my chocolate binge.

P.S. In case anyone is interested, the savior gate is a The First Years brand and is called “Extra Tall Home Décor Gate.” Currently, it’s out of stock on Target.com, but here’s an Amazon link to it:

http://bit.ly/6U4ULp

Payback’s a You-Know-What that Rhymes with Witch

Hi, my name is Jen and I have a highly energetic, outgoing, freakishly strong, willful, big-emotion daughter. Yes, my relatives all will attest that she is JUST LIKE ME. They are not so secretly ecstatic that she is JUST LIKE ME, and they consider this payback. Retribution. My day of reckoning. Justice for the sheer hell I good-naturedly put them through while they babysat me through various stages of my life. Like, the time I INSISTED that I wanted ketchup on my ham sandwich, knowing full well the entire time that as soon as my aunt put the ketchup on my sandwich I would refuse to eat it. Because honestly, ketchup on ham is just gross. I just wanted to see if I could get her to do it. I did.

Or the time that I convinced my babysitter that I was sick and INSISTED that she call my parents at the bowling alley to make them come home. I wasn’t sick. I was just sick of her. After two calls to the bowling alley they came home at 11 p.m. — I was still up. I found out recently that I made them leave their bowling Christmas party. Whoops!

Or the time that I convinced my idiotic 16-year-old babysitter to take my parents’ customer’s car into town to get ice cream — a car that my parents were REPAIRING, mind you — while leaving a 10- and six-year-old at home. ALONE. I only confessed to that little crime about five years ago. I told my parents that it wasn’t my fault that my babysitter was such an idiot and that she would be so stupid as to listen to a 10-year-old!

Oh, and my mother and aunts would be HAPPY to REGALE you with tales of my varied and wide-ranging tactics to extend my bedtime. You know, the typical, “I need a drink,” “I have to go to the bathroom,” “Read me just one more story,” “I’m going to read to myself in bed,” etc., etc., etc.

Ah, but they do still love me, telling these stories while laughing about what I put them through. And laughing that I AM NOW GETTING PAYBACK.

Lately we have been going through a lot of changes that confirm Monkey’s complete transformation from baby to toddler. Chiefly, getting rid of the nuk and moving into a big girl bed. And it actually makes me a little sad that she’s growing up so fast. It just goes by SO FAST. Part of me was worried that I was forcing the change because the new baby is coming. I didn’t want Monkey to still have a nuk after the new baby came because I figured then she would have it until she was three! And, I need the crib for the new baby. But, honestly, I think she was ready. The nuk weaning went so much better and faster than I expected. We followed the advice of many mothers who have come before, and cut off the tip of the nuk so that it didn’t work properly. After a few days of telling her that it was broken but still giving it to her, she completely forgot to ask about it before bed. And since then, she hasn’t even mentioned it.

The big girl bed transition, on the other hand, has not gone as smoothly. I armed myself with a strategy — using the Supernanny tactic of silently and consistently putting the child back in bed over and over again. I talked with other moms and Monkey’s pediatrician who advised me that this tactic was most desirable. They also forewarned me that I might need a gate to keep Monkey in her room. This way, if she refused to stay in bed at least she couldn’t get out of the room. “Make her room one big crib,” is what her doctor said. So I bought a gate and made sure her room was safe and that the only “toys” in her room were books.

We talked to Monkey for several weeks about her “new room” as we were getting it ready. Painting, hanging new curtains, laying new carpet. Every time someone came over we had her show off her new room. We weren’t actually planning to move her into her big bed and new room until after Thanksgiving. This way she would be comfortably settled in her new room for about two months before the baby came. Then Monkey decided to take a flying leap out of her crib last week. Well, guess what? TRANSITION DATE MOVED UP!

So anyway, I had the strategy and the gate. The first night was too good to be true. Monkey only got out of bed for about 15 minutes before settling down and going to sleep. In my fantasy world, this is how the transition would go:

“Oh mom, you want me to lay here, in this bed, instead of in my confined-space crib? Fantastic. No problem. No mom, I won’t get up and get out of bed. I’ll stay right here with my head on the pillow and the blanket covering me. I wouldn’t DREAM of getting out of bed and coming out of my room 155 times per night over the course of two hours. And if you gated me in my room to prevent me from leaving, I certainly wouldn’t retaliate by pulling every single piece of clothing out of my drawers and destroying every single thing in my closet. That would just be unruly, mom. I would never do that.”

Unfortunately, my nightmare transition consisted of an epic battle with Monkey getting out of bed 155 times and throwing all her clothes out. AND GUESS WHAT? THAT’S PRETTY MUCH HOW IT’S GONE SINCE THE FIRST NIGHT!

Yep. Last night consisted of two hours, 100 times out of bed, me momentarily abandoning the tactic after an hour and a half and losing my cool and yelling, then feeling like a horrible mommy for yelling when I knew I wasn’t supposed to, and a lot of tears (MINE!). So tonight — ah yes, tonight. Tonight consisted of us putting up the gate nearly immediately after Monkey got out of bed five times in the first 60 seconds. She read books in her bed, played in her closet, pulled all the socks out of her sock drawer, and scattered her books around her room. All during the first hour and a half. But, I told my husband, at least we haven’t been standing in the hall, putting her back in bed 100 times, crying and swearing in frustration. At least she’s not hurting anything and she’ll eventually get tired and get in her bed and go to sleep. And then. Then she decided to CLIMB OVER THE GATE. She f&cking climbed over the gate!!! WTF! I mean, there is a reason I call her “monkey,” but seriously! Yep, the little shit climbed over the gate. My husband was soooo mad. And all I could think about was, “Man, this is payback,” while I tried not to laugh. My poor husband — he was a mild-mannered, meek child compared to me. He didn’t deserve this payback. Me, on the other hand …

While I’m in the heat of battle I’m going to TRY REALLY HARD, to remind myself that this won’t last forever, that every parent has gone through it, and that someday too soon I’m going to be reminiscing with Monkey about this hell she put me through.

Miscarriage Sucks

As of a couple of weeks ago, I knew 15 other women who were pregnant. FIFTEEN! It’s a regular baby bonanza! I’m so excited for my friends and I can’t wait to pinch those new baby cheeks and marvel over the tiny hands and feet. Immediately after my daughter was born, while my husband and I were holding her, I couldn’t stop exclaiming, “I can’t believe we made her.” I was in total awe.

Pregnancy is a time filled with anticipation and hope. But nine months is a long time. And inevitably, there’s plenty of worry and anxiety that goes along with the excitement. In the last several weeks, a couple of my friends had their babies. And then someone I’m very close to experienced a miscarriage.

Miscarriage sucks.

It’s so common — 15-20% of all pregnancies end in miscarriage. That seems so high! And this number represents normal women with a healthy reproductive system. The reasons for miscarriage are varied and usually can’t be identified. The most common cause is a chromosomal abnormality, meaning there was a problem with the egg or sperm cell, or the cells didn’t divide properly.

But knowing that miscarriage is common, and that there wasn’t anything you could have done to prevent it, doesn’t make it any easier. It’s a topic that I wish I wasn’t so familiar with.

I suffered two miscarriages before Monkey and one after her. After the first one I remember feeling so naive thinking that I could  just be on the birth control pill for seven or eight years and then just because I decided I was ready, I would go off and get pregnant right away and everything would be hunky dory. I felt foolish, because as much as we like to think we’re in control of the timelines of our lives, we are not in control. A lot of what I feel like I’ve learned from my miscarriages, or at least what they were meant to teach me, was about how I am really not in control of my life.

I’ve also felt somewhat labeled by miscarriage. During one of my pregnancies I remember having to complete a form asking if I’d ever had any miscarriages. It dawned on me that I’d always have to mark that box. I would always be “someone who’s had a miscarriage.” And with my current pregnancy, it’s still somewhat shocking to me when a health professional asks me “How many pregnancies have you had,” and I answer, “This is my fifth pregnancy.” FIFTH. Holy sh*t!

Unfortunately, miscarriage is not something that people talk a lot about. Even if you know someone who’s had one, it can still be an isolating experience; especially if a lot of your friends are expecting babies and having normal pregnancies. So what do you say to someone who has experienced a miscarriage? And if you haven’t had one, how do you know how that person is feeling?

After each miscarriage I felt such a crushing disappointment. All of the fantasies and hopes and plans that I had dreamed up for this tiny being in just 4-6 weeks were suddenly, gone. I also had such a gigantic sense of failure. My body had failed me. Even though my doctor reassured me that miscarriage is nature’s way of eliminating babies that won’t survive, and there was nothing I could have done to prevent it and nothing I did to cause it, I still felt like I had failed. It was my job to grow this baby and I had failed. Keep in mind that hormones are still raging at this point, so feelings may not always be completely rational. But feelings are feelings; they’re not right or wrong. It’s totally normal to wonder, “What’s wrong with me?” The answer is “probably nothing.”

I also felt jealous of other pregnant women. As happy as I was for my friends who were pregnant, I also had a slight pang of jealousy that they had something that had been taken from me. I also resented women who took their pregnancies for granted. Didn’t they know what a gift it was!? Didn’t they know it could be taken from them?

Obviously I also was angry. Angry that it happened to me.

The loss itself is emotionally painful and messy. And then on top of it, you have the physical aspects of ridding your body of the poor lost baby, and that is equally painful and messy. I will spare you the details, but suffice it to say, it is a very — trying — time.

And then the waiting begins. Waiting until you’ve had at least 2-3 periods since the miscarriage, waiting until you can try again, if you’re ready to try again. I always felt like, “This is such a waste of time. Why couldn’t I have just not gotten pregnant at all if it wasn’t going to work out? Because now I’m wasting time, waiting for my period, when this is time that I could be trying again.”

The whole experience is emotionally, and physically, EXHAUSTING.

My point in explaining my gamut of emotions is to hopefully help someone who’s had a miscarriage, or to help you commiserate with a friend who’s had one. Because honestly, even after having three, it was hard for me to know what to say to my very close friend last week. I really had to think about what was comforting to me, and what wasn’t.

What was most helpful, was the most simple — “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that you have to go through this. Is there anything I can do?” It was also somewhat comforting to hear people say “It’s nothing that you caused, and there’s nothing that you could have done.”

Secondly, I appreciated it most when people simply listened and validated my feelings. I was sad, and mad, and depressed, and jealous. I wanted those feelings to be acknowledged as okay, rather than having someone try to distract me by changing the subject or coming up with a “On the bright side …” Losing a baby is just like losing another person in your life, and you will go through the stages of grieving. And that’s okay.

If you know your friend’s spouse, be sure to ask how they’re doing. Honestly, it was hard for me to remember that my husband was going through the miscarriage too. As the woman, you think, “This is happening to me, it’s my body.” But really, they’re grieving the loss too, even if it’s not as profoundly as you.

It wasn’t always helpful when people said “Everything happens for a reason,” or “God works in mysterious ways.” Because that just made me think “Why?” What’s the reason? Believe me, I spent a long time angry with God after my second miscarriage. While I may believe that everything does happen for a reason, it’s not always helpful to hear that right away. That kind of realization comes on your own. With time, and introspection. Instead, if you’re a faithful person, offer to pray for your friend and her family, including the lost baby.

Another thing that comforted me was when a friend (who also had a miscarriage) shared, “I knew when I got pregnant with (next child), that I was supposed to have her, which I couldn’t have if my last pregnancy went to term.” This only made sense to me after I’d already had one child though. Because it was only then that I knew what she meant when she said, “I knew she was meant for me.” I do believe Monkey was meant for me. I can’t imagine my life without her. And she wouldn’t be here if my prior two pregnancies came to term. And I know in my heart that this next baby is meant for me too — yet she wouldn’t be possible if I hadn’t had that last miscarriage. This doesn’t mean that I don’t think about my “angel” babies though. I do. I think about them frequently. I think about meeting them some day in heaven. I think about the fact that they “belong” to me too, even if they never belonged to me on earth.

One thing that I didn’t think of, but one of my friends who’s had a miscarriage pointed out — don’t avoid the topic of the person’s miscarriage altogether. In a way, it’s easier to deal with someone trying to say something comforting, and screw it up, than not saying anything at all. According to my friend, “It’s not an unmentionable, embarrassing don’t-talk-about-it thing. It’s real. It matters. Grieving is hard when it’s an elephant in the room no one wants to mention, out of fear for saying the wrong thing.”

Lastly, don’t forget about your friend. The first week after a miscarriage is really tough. But as so often happens when a loved one dies, friends forget to check on you after the first week or so. Follow up with your friend in two weeks or two months to see how they’re doing. At times I remember thinking, “I’m still sad!” while feeling like the rest of the world had moved on.

I am grateful that I’ve never had trouble conceiving. After every miscarriage I was able to get pregnant again within a couple of months. I have several friends who have tried for years to conceive and I can’t even begin to imagine how painful infertility is, physically and emotionally. Pregnancy doesn’t seem like it should be so hard.

Hopefully, you’ve never experienced a loss. But if you have, or know someone who has, I hope this provides a little bit of comfort.