In love with today.

Today was the kind of day most people don't like: rainy, overcast, cool. I don't think the sun came out for one minute. But I loved today, every minute of it. Instead of dismal or dull, I thought of pearl gray and muted. The rain made a lulling sound on the pavement and I could hear the creek rushing outside my window. The air was cool enough so that I could turn off my horrible, noisy window AC units, and the curtains billowed and snapped all day. Outside my window, the wind tossed the branches of the maple, and I could see a few bright crimson leaves dancing among the green.

I think I might have reverse seasonal affective disorder. I don't like summer. I find the unrelenting sun, the forced gaiety, the heat to be oppressive. My mood perks up with the autumn, with the crispness in the air, with the cosy sweaters and jackets and boots. With color. Autumn means Christmas, and Christmas means my birthday and James's. After Christmas comes the snow, if we're going to get any. I enjoy spring, the miracle of new leaves, new buds, new warmth, but it seems so pale and weak next to the lushness, the magic of the fall and winter seasons. There is something ageless and witchy and pagan and wild about this time of year. Turning inward, homeward, drawing closer to the hearth. It feels like a veil has been lifted between this world and the next. It reminds us that this world we think we've mastered is wild and unrestrained and chock full of things that are far beyond our ken.

THERE is something in the autumn that is native to my blood—
Touch of manner, hint of mood;
And my heart is like a rhyme,
With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.
The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry
Of bugles going by.
And my lonely spirit thrills
To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.
There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir;
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame
She calls and calls each vagabond by name.

-Bliss Carman

I am finding out all sort of stuff I never knew about myself with this pregnancy. For instance, that I have a very tender cervix that bruises and bleeds at the slightest provocation. This is a surprise to me, since I am usually fairly rough and tumble. I'm hardy and I hardly ever get sick; I guess I thought that would translate to a relatively uneventful pregnancy. Not so, I guess, since I was put on pelvic rest today after a mildly alarming episode of bleeding last night. To maintain at least a semblance of modesty, I won't say exactly what brought it on or what exactly pelvic rest entails, except to tell you that James was very depressed about it. I will be SO GLAD when this first trimester is over and I can relax a little. Only five more weeks!!

I have been having such a nice relaxing time at Aunt Cathy's house. When James left on Sunday I decided to stay behind, partly because my morning sickness won't let me survive a four-hour car ride and partly because I just cannot go back to that cramped and stifling apartment. I feel like all of my troubles live there. It's a dream come true to be able to relax and to get away and to spend a lot of time outside, something I don't get to do when I'm at home, since we have no yard or porch or balcony and our neighborhood isn't the greatest. I spent so much time this afternoon just sitting in the hammock by the lake. The weather was perfect.

One thing that I've been doing with my mom and aunt while I'm here is looking at houses for rent in Richmond. I think the Richmond move is going to need to happen sooner rather than later. I literally cannot stand to be away from my family right now (even my mom, who is being much better) and I know a lot of my depression is tied to living so far away from the majority of my support network. Though they individually drive me crazy a lot of the time, collectively, my family is my life. It's so nice to feel like part of a tribe again. Last night we had a family dinner with Mom and Dad and Aunt Cathy, Uncle Jerry, Aunt Liz, Caitlin, Kelsey. Today Uncle Mike came over to swim. When I am around my family I feel secure, like a part of a whole. When I am away from them I feel unmoored and lonely. I guess this is just because of how I was raised, as part of a large clan that lives nearby to one another and interacts on a daily basis. For better or for worse, it's who I am.

On Saturday, we went up to Richmond and toured some of the houses we'd found online. James and I had scheduled appointments at a lot of townhomes in the urban part of the city. We saw some amazing places, including a row house built in 1853, with all the original fixtures and an old carriage house with slave quarters in the backyard. It would have been amazing to live there, but I am realizing that what I really desire is a little starter home in a quieter, more residential part of town, with a yard and a shady, tree-lined street. The old me would have loved to be in the heart of things, but the new me needs some peace and quiet. I'm not 23 anymore--thankfully and regretfully.

On the drive home, I got in a fight with my mom. It started when I mentioned that I was upset that my Aunt Liz had told my uncles about my pregnancy. I felt it wasn't her place and amounted to a betrayal of trust; my mother felt that Aunt Liz hadn't meant any harm and told me to get over it. That made me feel like I wasn't allowed to be upset, and so I started crying, and I told her that I feel like my whole life, I've felt I'm not allowed to have any feelings unless she approves of them, and that that is stifling me and frustrating me. Things could have taken a turn for the worse, but they didn't. Because we were trapped in the car together, we had to work things out. We couldn't just storm away angry. And so we did, sort of, and so we've been actually able to enjoy each other's company since. It's only been a few days, but I can't help thinking that something has clicked, and things might actually be different from now on. Maybe not 100% better, but it's a start in the right direction. We've both been on our best behavior since, and I am cautiously optimistic. (If James's mother would stop being so petulant about our move, I'd be perfectly happy).

I am sitting out on the deck writing this and it's so beautiful out tonight. There's a full moon and everything is crickety and cool. I broke out my comfy fleece sweater and I'm still a little chilly. I am so excited for fall!

Notes from the Underbelly

Wednesday I had an ultrasound to follow up the inconclusive one I had at the ER at 4 weeks, 5 days. At that scan, they thought they saw something but couldn't even be sure I was pregnant, so I was very eager/nervous for this one. I went with James and my mom and aunt Cathy who drove up from Norfolk to be there, and so we were all together when we got to really see Baby for the first time!

I was 6w1d along, according to my dates, and Baby's size was measuring very nearly on track with that at 5w6d. We saw the gestational and yolk sac and the fetal pole, and then--wonder of wonders!--we saw a very tiny flicking at the base of the fetal pole. Just as if a few pixels in the screen were turning off and on, extremely tiny. It was Baby's heart beating, at 109 beats per minute, just right for his gestational age.

"Perfect," said the doctor. "Everything is perfect."

What a feeling, to see something like that! My baby doesn't have a name yet, but he has a heart that is beating, and I saw the EKG to prove it. It just seems so surreal to me. He is doing OK, even if I am not, and I felt like his presence there on the screen, that rapid but steady little perfect flicker, was his way of saying, "Look, Ma, everything is ALL RIGHT." In fact, everything was so good that I feel a little stupid for freaking out so much. But I've never been pregnant before, and so I'm cutting myself some slack as I get adjusted to it.

(By the way, I have a very hard time referring to Baby as anything but "he" because I am convinced it is a boy. I don't know why, except I just have this FEELING. I don't think I will even prefer a boy, really, so it's not wishful thinking. For the record, my mom and aunt also think it is a boy, but James and my dad think it's a girl.)

After my ultrasound, I drove home to Norfolk with my mom and Aunt Cathy to spend the last few days of summer by Aunt Cathy's pool. And on the way down, morning sickness struck for the first time. I was sick and dizzy--I didn't throw up--but I thought it was a miracle I didn't. We stopped for Sea Bands and sour candy and water and crackers and ginger and vitamin B-6 but nothing helped...until James called the pharmacist, who recommended Unisom, a sleeping tablet that is safe for pregnancy. I took one, and about a half hour later, I was feeling better and able to sleep for a while, which was nice because I haven't gotten a good night's sleep since I found out I was pregnant.

I haven't had nausea that bad since, but a vague queasiness is always there. Sometimes I get a whiff of something completely innocuous, like frosting on a cupcake, and have to leave the room. I miss my raging appetite of a week ago, and look back fondly to the days when everything seemed delicious. Now there is a very small circle of foods I can stand the thought of, and it's always something really random, like corn soup or tabbouleh. And it changes rapidly. Right now, I have a house full of food I bought just yesterday, but I am SURE the only think I could stomach would be Mongolian barbecue, so I am waiting for James to arrive in town for the weekend, and then I am going to beg him to take me to get some.

Since everyone in my family knows (my aunts have trouble keeping secrets) and since we saw the heartbeat (which takes away a superstitious belief that we might "jinx" the baby by talking about him) I have had a lot of people offering their opinions on my pregnancy lately. I am not supposed to: touch anything dirty, touch animals, including dogs, eat sugar, eat fatty food, eat raw foods, use ANY cleaning supplies (but what about the dirty things I am supposed to not touch!?), drive, or walk barefoot outside. Oh, and speaking of names, everybody has an opinion on them, even at this early stage.

Names that James and I like that have been summarily rejected by my family: Helen, Anne, John, William, Nora, Cordelia, Victoria, Grace, Owen, Charles, Louisa.

Names that I don't like that have been recommended by my family: Augustus, Frederica, Rosedonna or Donna Rose (my mom's name and James's mom's name together, natch), Cori-Beth (yes, with an i), Seymour, Laurence (for a girl!), Julianna, Daniella, Francesca, Arabella, Isabella, Bella....

My family is obviously more flowery than J&I are when it comes to names. It makes me laugh, because when people ask me what my favorite name for a girl is and I say, "Anne," they immediately follow up with "...abelle." Or I say, "John," and they finish, "...athon." I guess they never heard the old adage that short words are sweetest. Oh, and the one about how not everyone wants their daughter to sound like Disney royalty or their son, a soap opera character!

So those are the tales from Pregnancyville! and now that I've recounted them I should go work. But before I do: I am very pleased to present to you the very first photos of little Augustus Arabella Laurence Verdier, affectionately known as "Jawbone" to his mom and dad.


Right now he's very small--only 2 mm--which means that any one of those names is literally bigger than he is.

I sat down today to write an entry about some things in my life that are going really well, that I'm happy about, some home improvement stuff, baking sucesses, excitement about things in general...and then I got a call from my doctor and now everything is fucked up again.

My bloodwork from yesterday is shitty. The HCG has doubled from two days ago and that's great, but my progesterone has taken a nosedive from 14.1 to 8.2 in five days. At 5 weeks, which I was yesterday, it should be from 9-47 but ideally around 20. The doctor was quick to point out that he has had women with levels as low as mine go on to have healthy pregnancies and he put me on progesterone supplements, but at the same time, research shows that most of the time, the pills have no effect on whether or not you will miscarry, since dropping progesterone is caused by some underlying defect. Low progesterone doesn't usually cause miscarriage in itself.

I am heartbroken because I think now that my baby is going to die and I am just totally sick of my shitty life, in which nothing ever, ever goes right. It's just always bad news upon bad news. I can't believe this is my life. I hate it. Oh, oh, my heart hurts over this. I wish I could have some hope that things will be OK but I really can't right now.

Sorry I'm always such a drain and never have any good news to report. Trust me, guys, I hate it, too.

I hate everybody a lot or "Pregnancy hormones: American HELLthcare version"

Well, I've had a very eventful weekend, which I will tell you all about below in great detail. I am OK, the fetus is OK, but damned if I don't feel pulled through the wringer and angry with, like, everybody in the world right now (saving y'all, of course).

My doctor was supposed to get back to me on Friday morning with the results of my progesterone test. She didn't by noon, so I called her office. She told me she would call me back between 1 and 4. I waited until 3:30 and called back. They were closed for the long weekend! No results for me.

So I just told myself that I would have a long weekend, and get my results on Tuesday. Sunday I went to a friend's cookout, and had a wonderful time. After having been there for three hours or so I went to the bathroom and (WARNING: I AM ABOUT TO TALK ABOUT MUCUS) when I wiped, I noticed a glob of faint pinky-yellow mucus on the tissue. I knew this was probably normal, but anyway, I got James and we left and I tried to call my doctor's answering service to check it was OK. Oh, except she doesn't have an answering service. "Go to urgent care," said the message on the machine, so I went, and urgent care wouldn't see me and sent me to the EMERGENCY ROOM instead.

At this point, I am pretty sure this is a tempest in a teapot, but once you have started the emergency room process and you are pregnant and you mention bleeding, certain things have to happen. You get a pelvic exam. You get a ton of blood taken. You get a sonogram. You get an IV. You get to wait in a curtained off room for four hours while a person pukes in the room next to you, all the time wearing a thin gown with no back. Oh, and if you're really lucky? You get to do all this with your MOTHER IN LAW there.

James made the mistake of calling his mom to ask exactly where the Alexandria Inova Hospital was, since we are in criminal good health and have never been there. She told us, and we drove there. Then I'm waiting to check in and D. runs up, like, what are you doing here? Nobody asked you to come. And we would have, if we had wanted you here. But we didn't. So can you please go home? "I'd prefer to stay," she says, all reverse Bartleby the Scrivener. And I could not get her to leave. I thought at least she would wait in the waiting room, but when the nurse took me back she barged along with us and into my cube and sat down beside my bed and DIDN'T LEAVE for four hours. I tried to politely ask her to leave and she just didn't get it, or was deliberately obtuse about it, saying, "Oh, I don't mind staying. I'm so worried!" And then I felt like I couldn't be rude to her and be like, "NO. You really HAVE to go."

I know she was concerned and I am trying really hard to focus on that, but it was so humiliating and upsetting to have her there. I am so embarrassed that my MIL saw my bare ass. And it angered me that she kept trying to give my information to the doctor. She doesn't know a thing about my medical history, and she's not "Mom," like she told all the doctors and nurses, so that they thought she was my mom. She had to be literally pushed from the room when I was having my pelvic exam.

So I was mad at her for not taking the hint and leaving, and I was mad at James for not asking her to leave, and I am mad at my doctor for never calling me back with my test results and then I got to be mad at the sonogram lady, who tells me that she can't find anything on the sonogram and am I sure I'm really pregnant? Not what you want to hear when you are in that position, that there's no baby and maybe never was one. "Or it could be too early," she says like it just occurred to her, after I've started sobbing. Maybe you could have started with that? Way to bury the lead, lady.

Long story short: they diagnosed me with a threatened miscarriage, even though I only had that one clump of pink mucus, but the way I understand it is that they only did that because it was too early, maybe, at 4w5d, to find a sac or fetal pole on sonogram. Or else there's not one there and I really am in trouble? I don't know. My pregnancy hormone is detectable and doubling so that's a good sign. It was 302 on Thursday at my OB's, and it was 995 on Sunday night. I had blood taken today and if its gone up, we're happy. My progesterone is 14.1, and it has to be higher than 9. So, fine? Or low, but not dangerous? I don't know, and I wish I could get a straight answer out of anybody, but I can't because everyone seems to talk in circles. "The higher it is obviously the better but you know there's a threshold and yours is above that so that's good, but everything is different, of course, and you probably don't have any reason to worry, unless…" WHAT ARE YOU SAYING? YES OR NO? GIVE ME A THUMBS UP OR THUMBS DOWN, for crying out LOUD!!!!

The doctor told me I "shouldn't worry at this point" and that really there would be no way to see anything on a sonogram until 6 weeks, and that everything is "probably fine," and that's going to have to suffice, I guess. I haven't had anymore spotting or pink mucus since the first and only instance of it on Sunday, and I am still pretty sure that everything is OK, but even so I feel like everyone in the world is conspiring to strip all the joy from this situation that they can and I hate them for that.

And I really hate my mother in law. I shouldn't use the word "hate," but honestly, I think I probably do hate her right now. I don't know where she got this notion that she has lifetime front row seats to every single event in my life. I feel like if she could have, she would have wanted to be there when the baby was conceived. This has to freaking stop or I will seriously strangle her, and I'll probably get off due to my temporary pregnancy insanity right now and now I have to stop. Because this idea is sounding really, really, too great to me right now. Please send prayers both for my little guy and for me, so that I don't actually cause bodily harm to anybody. These hormones are starting to be murder.

I had my first prenatal visit today--my doctor was very understanding about giving me the progesterone test you recommended, Adrienne. I'll get the results of that as early as tomorrow. It is a weight off my mind to know that if there's a problem, YO! I'll solve it. (This is a heavy topic--I felt I needed to add some Vanilla Ice in there for levity's sake.) I also scheduled my first sonogram for next week, and learned that I may even be able to see my baby's heart beating then! I had NO idea that it begins to beat only 22 days after conception and was amazed by that. There is so much that I don't know yet about this process...it's a little daunting, but totally exciting too.

Dr. I also told me that since I am having strong symptoms (I woke up last night every time I rolled over onto my aching chest) that is a good sign. So I am worrying a little less over that, today.

On the way home, James and I stopped by the organic market and let me tell you, grocery shopping has never been this fun. I am so ravenous that everything looks good to me right now. I must have looked so strange, clapping my hands and crying out so enthusiastically over canned soup (Yes! I NEED THIS! YES!) Everything we ended up buying was so unlike the things I usually eat. We bought steaks and crabcakes (I usually dislike seafood), goat cheese (I do NOT ordinarily do dairy, due to lactose intolerance), yogurt (ditto), and dark chocolate (blechh! What is wrong with me?) I seem to want to eat not sugary or carby stuff, but things with a strong sour/bitter/salty taste. SO weird! What's up with that?

That's the question of the day, along with this one: Why is my mom such a [w]itch? I swear, it's not just hormones that make me at the end of my rope with her. Throughout my childhood, she's always been so emotionally (and sometimes physically) hurtful to me. Now that I am faced with motherhood myself, I am having a difficult time processing that kind of behavior. My baby is currently the size of an apple seed, and there is nothing I would not do for it, if I only could.

Yet when I called Mom today, to vent about a minor spat I'd had with James, she started in on her usual routine: You're a horrible person, Cathy, hard to live with, and you don't deserve someone so fantastic. When James loses his temper with you, you should apologize, because it's probably your fault. I started crying: she accused me of being abusive and manipulative. I finally lost my temper with her, screamed at her, and she hung up. It hurts my heart to fight with anyone, but she won't take my calls when I call to apologize. She lets it ring once, and then sends it to voicemail. So I know she's sitting by the phone and screening. Who's manipulative, again?

I hate that I lost my temper with her, because now she will freeze me out until I repeatedly grovel for forgiveness, agreeing with everything she says about me and releasing her from any culpability in our fight. "Say it, Cathy: you were wrong. And I was right." I don't know why I even bother trying to turn to my mother when things are bad. She has never, never reacted in the way I needed her to react. I guess there is some vestigial part of me that thinks "Mother" = "comfort." But it has never been that way in my family, and it never will be. I wish I could get that through my head. It would save us both a lot of stress, and keep me from getting hurt over and over by her. But I don't know how, and so I keep trying to force this interaction that will not and CANNOT take place. I've only ever tried to please her. But I'm never good enough, smart enough, thin enough, obedient enough. I try so hard to honor her as a parent, but she is always so disappointed in me.

At least she's a pretty good primer for parenting. How to Be a Good Parent: just do the opposite of what Rosemary does!

I know logically that I can't change my mother. It's too late for that. She's been like this for too long, and more than that, she doesn't WANT to change. And yet: my heart cries out for that special closeness, for mother. Today I'm praying for the Lord to help me accept the things I cannot change, and to grant me the strength to make peace with the imperfections in my life.

Remembering Mammaw

Today would have been my Mammaw's 77th birthday, if she hadn't died very suddenly seven years ago. I have been thinking about her all day today. Me and Mams were very, very close. I was her first grandchild, and only grandchild for five years. More than that, we were really, truly best friends, in a way that transcended the grandmother/grandchild relationship. She lived less than a mile from my family in Norfolk, and I was literally over at her house every day growing up, for dinner or just to drop in and see her. When I moved away to college we talked on the phone several times a day, for hours at a time. Sometimes we would call each other and watch Law and Order re-runs together (Mammaw loved all cop shows.)

She was a true free spirit. She was so funny, and so dedicated to having a good time. Her laugh was the loudest, brightest laugh in the world. She played Nintendo. I would sleep over at her house every weekend, and we would lay on the end of her bed facing her TV, with down pillows under our chests, eating candy corn from big plastic bins. She was the best cook I know. She listened to G. Gordon Liddy every day and cussed at him to high heaven. Whenever we went to the drive thru at Hardee's near her house, she would honk the horn and shout into the receiver, "I'm comin' around, dahlin!" She wouldn't talk into the box. Then, when we got to the window, she would say, "Hello, I would like a large fry, but only if they are FRESH and HOT." The kid there loved her and knew her by name. Whenever Mammaw saw a fat woman, she would say, "Oh, DORASS!" (Doris was her name) in a sympathetic, exuberant tone of voice. Mammaw loved other people and other people just loved her. Her funeral was full of people from all over the country, and even today, when I run into people I knew in grade school, they always have a "Mammaw" story to tell me. (One of my faves: my Aunt Liz's sorority sisters were spending the night with Mammaw and their sweet tooths got the better of them. They went, in their pajamas, to the grocery store, to the bakery, and ordered a sheet cake. The woman asked if they wanted something written on it, thinking it was a birthday, I guess, and they told her to write, "WE LOVE CAKE!" And she did and they took it home and ate the whole thing.) Everywhere she went, she brought the party and pure joy with her. It really, really bothers me that I can never manage to capture her spirit in words, but I will never stop trying to emulate it in my own life.

I still can't believe that she is gone, but today it was so nice to see that my cousin Mary Anne remembered her birthday. Here's what she wrote:

Mary Anne John-Telinde Happy Birthday to my Aunt Dorassss....Miss and Love her sooo much but makes me happy to know she is one of my angels.....All of our angels...smile everyone b/c you can only hear her laughing at us!!!!

• Pam John Vaughan Boy can I hear her laughing - I LOVE IT
• Janell McGowan OMG, not only can I hear her laughing, I can hear her saying, "Don't tell Rosemary on me." (NOTE: Rosemary is my mom!)
  
• Anna Decker I said Happy Birthday to my Aunt Doris today too!! Love that woman!! She and Momma are partying together-HA!
• Amy Butler Kallenbach Here's to Aunt Dorasssss! May she kick our butts when we get to Heaven just like she did here on Earth! Love her and you!
  
• Diane Rose Decker Aunt Doris is very missed! She was a hoot and also a very wise woman!

It is still very hard for me to think about my wonderful Mammaw without tearing up, but today I am just full of joy over the blessing that I got to know her at all. Thank you, God, for my Mammaw. It's so easy to imagine her sitting up in heaven with my baby on her knee, cuddling and taking care of it until it's ready to come to me.

1950.

1982, with baby Cathy at Nags Head.

2003, with her little brother Peter-Boy, at my wedding.

Doris Barbara Decker Cory, September 1, 1933 - September 28, 2003