The Genes That Bind

Genetics is fascinating. I remember back in the good old days, in biology class in high school, learning about dominant and recessive genes and how we pass on characteristics to our kids. Most of our instruction revolved around the green bean study done by whoever it was that studied green bean genes way-back-when, although we did talk about eye color and the fact that being able to curl your tongue is genetic. Good thing, too, since I thought I didn't have that talent and it turns out I just don't have that gene!

It all seemed so black and white then. Of course, when you get out into the real world, you learn that there are infinite shades of gray no matter what the subject.

I have dark brown eyes, which I had been taught was dominant over each of my baby daddies' blue eyes. Yet only two of my five kids have brown eyes. How did that happen? In #4 (and now #5), that brown eye gene was "overpowered" by the also dominant Waardenburg contributed by DH, which typically brings sapphire blue eyes. However, that doesn't explain why #1 (whose father has no such syndrome that we know of) has eyes that changed over the years from blue to gray to hazel even after most people's eye color is set. Chameleon eyes? How can they keep changing colors? (Clue: Recombination explains the brown/blue versus hazel, one of those mysteries high school biology class did not cover in the green bean discussion.) And what about #3, a full sibling to #4 and #5, who had sensorineural hearing loss at birth but has brown eyes, no white forelock, and years later went on to have normal hearing? Does she have a "broken" Waardenburg gene, or does recombination factor in there, too? Only #2 has "fit the mold" with dark brown eyes.

Anyhow, that dominant Waardenburg gene seems to have found its way into #5. I knew it when I saw her white forelock and eyebrows. Her newborn hearing screening was a "refer," so yesterday the audiologist did some more testing. She definitely has hearing loss, but we need to set up a tone-burst ABR to determine how much and whether she has enough residual hearing to benefit from hearing aids. Not looking real optimistic there, since she failed on all the sounds....

In any case, it's all still fascinating. I need to go read some more now, to satisfy my rabid sense of curiosity on brown versus blue and WHY.

To The Next Day and The Day After

8 pounds 12 ounces, 21-1/2 inches long....
....with big chubby cheeks and a tiny little chin.

The newest addition to our family was welcomed Monday afternoon just after 2:30.

She's got that characteristic white forelock and came out of her newborn hearing screening with a "refer," so likely she is Deaf like Dad. Regardless, she's already got a special place in everyone's heart.

Mother's Day

I've been a mother for a long time (to me, anyhow), 16 years to be exact. When my two oldest boys were little, they proudly presented me with their perennial Mother's Day creations made in school, toiled over meticulously and then stuffed in a bookbag for the bus ride home, sometimes sobbing over the wrinkles and rips their gifts had suffered. I treasured each and every one of them, no matter how tattered and torn, because I knew they were made with love.

These marvelous tributes to Mom stopped with the boys leaving elementary school and walking through the doors of middle school and later high school, and my heart ached over not getting those ripped and wrinkled masterpieces. I had to acknowledge the fact that my babies were growing up and I was getting old(er).

Some years later, I married and became pregnant, twice back to back, and a few months after that my husband's 2 young daughters came to live with us, bringing our number to 8. We've tried to make our new family happy and nurturing, to give all of our kids the best chance at a bright and successful future and, for the girls, to try to ease some of the pain of their past. Of course, I was ecstatic at my "second chance" to surround myself with little ones. No one ever suspected that the fatigue and muscle weakness I was experiencing, at the time only irritating, was the beginning of the rapid decline that would eventually lead to my diagnosis of MS. Everyone, however, suspected that the horror from the girls' past would continue to haunt us and it has, casting a shadow and eating a hole in our lives in a way that no disease ever could.

Today is Mother's Day. Today, besides the flowering cherry tree given to me by all of my kids (with help from Dad), I received gifts from my girls. My 3-year-old proudly pulled from her bookbag a wrinkled and smashed poster she made at school for just this day. My 6-year-old gave me a poem with her handprint, to remind me of how small she once was after she has grown into her own life. My 7-year-old gave me a card listing the reasons she thinks I'm the best mom and why she loves me so much.

It refreshed my heart, my spirit, my well-being, getting these works of art that had flowed through their tiny fingers as their love for me found its way out of their gigantic hearts, tattered and torn in just the way I like them, and somehow they remind me of myself: No matter how wrinkled and broken I become, my children love me anyhow, because that's just the way love works.

I've come full circle, and the tree planted today in my honor will grow and thrive and stand as a testament to what it really means to be a mom.

My Girl, My Heart

My daughter, age 3, cracks me up. She's a night owl like me, bless her little heart, and it makes for a rather exasperating bedtime routine when she has to get up for school the next morning.

"Go to bed."
"No way."
"Go to bed now."
"No way."
"You have school in the morning."
"No way, Jose."
"If you don't go to bed, then you can't go to school."
"NO WAY, JOSE!"

I just don't get it. When she was 2, she bugged me for a whole year to go to school and got PISSED when I told her she needed to wait until she was 3. She loves school. She loves the bus. She loves her book bag. She loves her teacher. She loves her friends. She loves drawing and coloring and counting and reciting the alphabet and writing her name. She just WILL NOT GO TO BED. Actually, I do get it but it's a nightmare of a story that no parent and child should have to live through but do, more often than you might think, let alone recite it.

It's 11:30 p.m. and she still refuses to go to bed after 3-1/2 hours of the above conversation. She is busy sharpening pencils for school, even though she won't go. I have an electric sharpener and a box of about 200 pencils for the kids for school, and she thinks she needs to sharpen each and every one of them. Now. Before bed. As though her life depends on each pencil being sharp. Or maybe she's just stalling.

She puts the pencil in the sharpener and grinds away. She pulls it out and sees it's just not pointy enough and puts it back in. More grinding. More checking. More grinding. When she's done, the brand-new, unsharpened pencil might be 3 inches long.

"Another," she says.
"No way," I say.
"Another."
"No way, Jose."
"ANOTHER!"
"NO WAY, JOSE!"

My God, I've turned into a 3-year-old. But you get the picture. She drew 14 E's on the bedroom wall with a crayon. She took the blue marker and "painted" her fingernails since I didn't get to painting her nails with polish in a timely manner. To top it off, she demanded that I let her help me do my Copaxone injection (she likes to push the button on the autoject device) then laughed when I said "ouch." She's not a beast, though, because it started bleeding and she started crying, grabbing for tissues and screaming "Momma owie bleeeeeeeeeeeeeding!" I think (I hope) she's not really laughing about the fact that it hurt but at the face I made when I said it.

Children and Bodily Functions

WHY do kids think it's so funny when they fart or burp? There's always the inevitable giggle, chuckle, and, if its particularly loud, outright laugh immediately preceding the wide-eyed "excuse me" followed by uncontrollable laughter. I don't think it's just the current crop of kids, either, since I remember going through this with my boys, who still laugh if it's large, compete in belching contents, and know which brands of pop produce the best ones.

It's not just the kids, either, now that I think about it. I once had a friend who in her early 30s could belch in a manner reminiscent of Booger and Ogre in Revenge of the Nerds. It's kinda gross, but nothing I need to concern myself with anymore since she unloaded me like so much extra baggage on the sinking ship that was her life and, in hindsight, probably best for me. I hear about her occasionally and it makes me sad, my best friend for so many years, but I'd still take her back in a heartbeat, gross belching and all.

I had a great post all planned out, something to make you laugh so hard you would pee your pants (even just a little), but I caught this nasty stomach bug the kids have had all week and between that and my memory deficits (if I don't write it down, I forget stuff I would have remembered for an eternity in My Life Before MS), it's just gone. It was good, too, which really sucks.

It Can't ALL Be Just Me

Problem: 2-year-old male child constantly goes into the bathroom and turns on the water faucet, leaving the water running and flooding the floor.

Mom's solution: Close the bathroom door since he's too short to open it by himself.

Dad's solution: Turn off the water valves under the sink so no one can use it.

Seriously, it really CAN'T be all me, can it?

If Only We All Were 3 Years Old

How much simpler would life be, how much more. . . everything wonderful that makes up and follows in the presence of a 3-year-old child, if only we could all be 3.

"Me love you so much, mommy."

My heart stops in my chest now every time I hear that, having gone so many months without hearing it at all and facing the possibility that I may never hear it again. I've spent the last 8 days breathing in and out, amazed and stunned and relieved and ever so thankful to hear those words whispered in my ear, tiny arms wrapped around my neck and baby kisses on my cheeks.

"Me missed you, mommy."

"Why you crying, mommy? Me hug you. You better now."

It takes my breath away. I can't stand being away from my kids for a week, a day, or even an hour and to know that 4-1/2 months passed by, violently and needlessly carved from our lives and nearly destroying me in the process, makes the knowledge that I came through it not just for me but for THEM that much sweeter. Now that the sky has cleared, life moves forward, but at a slower pace, not just due to my multiple sclerosis but more so due to my appreciation for what could have been lost forever.

When It Rains. . .

Miss-thing (big girl) lost another tooth today at school. Thankfully the teacher put it in an envelope and put it in her backpack to bring home. It's her "lucky lost tooth." The kid's turning this into a regular money-making venture. My little entrepreneur.

Three of the kids went back to school yesterday (THANK YOU, LORD). Middle girl's school starts next week (she goes to a school in a different district because they offer a hearing-impaired program) but her start gets kicked off later than that since she's going in for heart surgery next week. Say a prayer, keep your fingers crossed, keep us in your thoughts, whatever method of well-wishing floats your boat, please. AND. . . my littlest girl is being tested for preschool this Friday, and she can't WAIT to start school so she can ride the bus like "Sissy."

My nest is feeling emptier by the day, and my uterus has gone from chanting to shrieking at my fickle ovaries. I'm a mess, but you already knew that, didn't you? Guess I'd better talk to my neurologist at my appointment next week (finally, 6 weeks after my MRI). I've read that MS symptoms tend to go into remission during pregnancy, so I'm trying to convince hubby-man to keep me barefoot and pregnant as long as possible. He's having a stroke, of course. Hey, if God wants me to have more babies, He'll make my uterus and ovaries keep on working. Look at Jim Bob and Michelle.

More Milestones

My big girl is so proud of herself today: She lost her first tooth and can't wait to trade that sucker in for cold hard cash courtesy of the Tooth Fairy:


Every 10 minutes, "Mom, see my tooth?" and "Mom, I won't forget to put my tooth under the pillow for the Tooth Fairy" and "Mom. . . Mom. . . Mom. . . " It's been a lot of years since the boys lost their first teeth and it's just "deja vu all over again."

The other girls trying to copy "Sissy":



My middle girl was excited yesterday when she picked out frames for new glasses (she broke the last pair she owned so badly they can't be fixed) because they were PURPLE. Three different frames (gotta have spares, ya know), all purple. They are "princess" glasses. She cried when she couldn't take the display frames home with her, upset that she has to wait a 5 to 7 days to get her new purple glasses. The lady at Wal-Mart almost cried, too, when she saw those big crocodile tears because she couldn't give them to her yesterday. She made a huge effort for us, trying to get a rush order from the lab, since our girl's going in for heart surgery in a couple of weeks and needs her glasses before she goes - it would be scary for a deaf child who relies on her vision for communication to be in a strange environment if she didn't have them before she went in.

My baby girl is getting ready to start school in the Early Childhood Program, and she can't wait. "Bus." "School." "Backpack." Every day she reminds me she's going to school, and it tears my heart up. I'm just not ready to let go yet; she's only 3. She gets speech therapy, though, when she goes, so I know it's for the best.

They just grow up too fast.

It's Official

I am now the proud owner of a 16-year-old boy. I'm sitting here trying to remember my own 16th birthday but, let's face it, that was just too damn long ago. It's confusing, seeing time go by so fast. My sweet baby boy's not a "baby" anymore, at least in his eyes. He'll ALWAYS be my baby, whether he's 16 or 60. Where did all the years go? No, it's no consolation that I've got 5 more here under my wings, they'll turn 16 themselves in due time, and my heart gets to ache 5 more times, every time it happens.

It's time to get a new photo done (this was from last summer) but my middle son decided to shave his head (don't ask) and I'm pretty pissed about it, so now the photo has to wait until his hair grows out again. But, hey, don't I have awesome kids?

I Love Being Worshipped

It's so awesome.

LOL I don't know if they REALLY worship me but sometimes it sure feels like it, when my stepdaughters and my two youngest babies absolutely MUST take the time - dozens of times a day - to hug me and kiss me and follow me all over the house, racing each other to knock me over and jump on me when I walk outside on break from work (all 4 of them at once, burying me on the bottom of the pile), screaming MOMMY and telling me how much they love me and just making me feel all gooey inside.

I love being a mom. It's the best job on Earth.

Is it Candy, or is it Candy?

My baby boy has a new favorite sign in recent weeks: "Candy." Before that it was "poop," so I guess I'm glad he finally moved on from his poop fixation and settled on candy. He knows mom keeps a stash (read: 4-pound bag from Wal-Mart) of Wint-O-Green Livesavers in the desk drawer (my pathetic attempt at quitting smoking) and his ritual is to come in when he sees me on the computer and ask ever so nicely for "candy." When I don't hand it over promptly enough for him, he sneaks around the chair and gets it himself since he knows I'm so engrossed in my listening and transcribing I won't even see him. Hell, John Cusack could walk in here and I still wouldn't notice and then have to be really pissed that I missed him.

Anyhow. I was having a mad craving for Chester's Puffcorns last night and sent hubby-man out to get me some in the middle of the night. The gas station didn't have any, so he brought me the next best thing: Cheetos. Boy-boy found the bag in the desk drawer and hauled it out, but he couldn't get it open so started poking me in the ribs to get my attention. I saw what he had and asked to have the bag back but he vehemently signed "NO." He pointed at it and then at me and then finally at himself. You get the picture. I open the bag and he starts signing "candy." Of course, Cheetos is candy!

Out of the mouths (or off the fingertips) of babes.

My Poor Berries

Years and years ago, we had about a gazillion blackberry bushes way out back in the woods and red raspberry bushes even further back, all wild and yummy and, of course, free. I hated trucking all the way out there, though, and got the bright idea of dragging a bunch of bushes up closer to the house. I planted them all over the yard, and 20+ years later my efforts have finally paid off.

Last year when the girls came to live with us, I showed them where my berries were growing and taught them the difference between the ripe red raspberries and the not-ripe blackberries, which are also red. There were not many bushes and only a few berries, so I let them have at it and they gobbled them up. This year, the bushes went ape shit, growing thick as can be over an area about 20 x 40 feet and under all the tree rows and even out in the front yard near the road. I saw the berries coming in, huge clusters of berries, getting all excited thinking about blackberry pie. Of course, this year I taught my two youngest how to tell the difference between the ripe and not-ripe berries, and all four of them were having a high time, picking berries and eating them. They didn't get all the raspberries and most of them dropped off and onto the ground, so next year they will spread even more, but they were patiently awaiting those blackberries. I noticed a few days ago that they were ripening beautifully and I was gearing up for that pie. I just went outside to get some berries and they are gone.

Where did my berries go?

Those four little stinkers were out there eating them off the bushes, shoveling them in as fast as their little fingers could pick them or dropping them on the ground and smooshing them. So much for that pie. In a few hours they will probably be yelling about belly aches and pooping in high gear. I'm dying for pie and trying to convince my middle boy to go alllllll the way out back in the woods to the original berry patch and get some more berries, but he thinks I'm torturing him.

It Was Only a Matter of Time

Working on potty issues with our 3-year-old daughter, who has actually been potty trained for the better part of the last 2 years but sometimes efuses to do her deed in the toilet. After all, it's much more fun to drop trou and pinch a loaf in the middle of the living room floor for all 4 of the younger kids to point and laugh at than to do it in the toilet, where no one can appreciate it for the masterpiece it is and it just gets flushed away. ALSO potty training our son, who just turned 2. He's a lovable, jolly little guy with a heart of gold, a total prince (at least until he hits puberty, if he's anything like other boys). He has that "special equipment" that little girls don't have and he's so proud of himself that he's learned to point and aim his gun, locked and loaded and ready for action. He shows off his potty prowess to the entire family and loves to pee for an audience. It's the applause he gets that floats his boat, after all. He pees everywhere: In the toilet, out the patio door, on the cat. When he's done, he shakes it off and puts it away and then laughs and claps, knowing he's done a good job by pissing everywhere but in his draws.

I knew it was only a matter of time, though, until my daughter decided she wanted to piss like a man instead of peeing like a girl, and I almost laughed myself into an aneurysm when I saw it happen. Fortunately my office chair was nowhere in the vicinity and was safe from my laughing so hard I would fall off and break it, and instead I just fell on the floor in a quivering heap of flesh. She lifted the lid, lifted the seat, stood on the step stool to position herself over the bowl, and tried to aim. Since she doesn't have the right equipment for the job, I just knew it would have been a mess like the ones I used to have to clean up in the men's room when I worked at the bar - you know, the ones those drunk fuckers make when they walk in the john and puke, shit, and piss all over the back of the toilet, on the floor, on the wall, in the sink, and anywhere else but IN THE BOWL. Now you know why I hate housework and married a man that had no choice but to stay home and be my "housewife" while I bring home the bacon. (Go ahead, call him my wife. It pisses him off. I do it all the time and it's pretty fun.)

Anyhow, I caught her in time and explained that she has to sit and pee like mommy and not pee like her brother. I've never seen that child look so disappointed. It's just not fair, you know, that boys can stand and pee and girls can't. Boys just don't deserve that privilege.

God was just about done creating the universe, but He had two extra things left in his bag of creations, so he decided to split them between Adam and Eve. He told the couple that one of the things he had to give away was the ability to stand up urinating. "It's a very handy thing," God told the couple. "I was wondering if either one of you wanted that ability."

Adam jumped up and blurted, "Oh, give that to me! I'd love to be able to do that! It seems a sort of thing a man should do. Oh please, oh please, oh please, let me have that ability. It'd be so great! When I'm working in the garden or naming the animals, I could just stand there and let it fly. It'd be so cool. I could write my name in the sand. Oh please God, let it be me who you give that gift to, let me stand and pee, oh please."

On and on he went like an excited little boy who had to pee. Eve just smiled and told God that if Adam really wanted that so badly, he could have it. It seemed to be the sort of thing that would make him happy, and she really wouldn't mind if Adam were the one given this ability.

And so Adam was given the ability to control the direction of his misdirection while in a vertical position. And lo, he was happy and did celebrate by wetting down the bark on the tree nearest him, laughing with delight all the while. And it was good.

"Fine," God said, looking back into his bag of leftover gifts.

"What's left here? Oh yes, multiple orgasms...

Greatest Toy/Kids and Money

This is kind of a combination of two posts, since I am just too lazy to break it down into two and the first kinda sorta leads into the second anyhow. Don’t like it? Tough noodles.

The greatest toys, besides the empty boxes expensive toys come in that kids play with for exactly 4.2 minutes then set aside in favor of said box - almost always without fail - are the ones that don’t cost much.

The kids were being crabby in Wal-Mart and had no desire to wander peacefully up and down the aisles while we gathered “junk” like dish soap, Pull Ups, and toilet paper, so I grabbed some pinwheels (you know, those shiny metallic spinners on a stick?) and they were entertained for so long that I even had time to compare prices instead of just grabbing the first case of shit paper on the shelf. They played with them all through the store (handing them over only long enough for the cashier to ring them up), all through the next store, on the ride home (4 laughing hyenas in the back seats when the air from the windows made them spin really fast), and then for hours after they were home. At $0.97 each x4, I have to say it was money well spent.

My kids are. . . well. . . strange. They got all gooey and excited over SCHOOL SUPPLIES. They went ape-shit over crayons, pencils, and notebooks. I thought they would pee their pants over new backpacks for school. Even my 3-year-old got a new bag since she is going to go to “school” this year in the early childhood program (she has speech/language delay from her sensorineural hearing loss since birth). “My Dora-Dora bag” she says.

Thank Heaven they did not have a SpongeBob bag or I would have never gotten it off her back and would have had to scan kid-and-all at the checkout counter. You laugh, but it has happened to me before: Once when I got her shoes, she refused to take them off after trying them on and I had to put her on the belt after the cashier turned it off, so she could scan my kid’s foot. They were laughing 16 registers on either side. The next time, in a Payless store, she refused to take off the Strawberry Shortcake shoes she wanted (yes, I spoil her) and thought she was going to climb on the belt to get scanned - but there was no belt. The cashier thought I was nuts. The kid refused to take them off though, so she - I can’t believe a 2-year-old figured this out - pulled the tag off and handed it to the cashier. I thought it was hilarious but the cashier was a bit of a wanker.

The kid is too damn smart for her own good, and mine too. At the ripe old age of 2, she had already made the correlation between ice cream and money. I asked her if she wanted ice cream, and what kid doesn’t? I told her that she needed to give this money (I gave her a $5 bill) and told her to give it to Daddy and tell him to get us some ice cream. Now when she sees money, she instantly associates it with ice cream. She finds coins and brings them to me, signs “ice cream” and gets excited. She opened her birthday card the other day and there were two $1 bills in it, and she started flailing the “ice cream” sign. She even tried to hand over the money when we gave her ice cream and cake, thinking she had to pay for it.

Talking to the Wall

As usual. If I’ve told those kids once, I’ve told them a thousand times, stop riding bicycles down the hill. We have a totally cool hill at the end of the house going down to the patio and the kids have found that it’s perfect for running the bikes down FAST. They seem to forget to turn, though, and keep smacking into the tree at the bottom. Yeah, smart, I know.

Anyhow, after months and months of repeating myself (hence, talking to the wall), they finally decided to stop riding the bikes down the hill. I go outside and see them sitting in the back end of the Tonka dump trucks, tearing down the hill like bats out of hell. WTF? The response I get: “You didn’t say we couldn’t ride the trucks down the hill, only the bikes.”

I guess I should have been more specific. The logic of a 6-year-old, huh?

I will win this battle in the end, though. I’m sending them down to pick rocks out of my uncle’s field and we’re building terraces on the yard so there won’t BE a hill for them to violate anymore. HA HA. The logic of a 34-year-old, huh?

APB: BOTL, Thief in Training

The boy is just too smart for my own good. The boy has figured out how to break into my office refrigerator. I heard suspicious noises but thought little of it (working) until I noticed that someone had stolen my beloved Mountain Dew. I figured it was one of the girls, since they swipe my pop (usually right from under my nose and in plain sight) from time to time, so as you can well imagine, I was mortified to learn that it was in fact THE BOY who had pilfered my magic water.

As you know, it does no good to shout to bring it back since the boy does not hear, but the floor was shaking as I stomped around looking for my caffeine fix. The boy saw (and felt) me coming and ran in the opposite direction, pop in hand. I cannot keep up so had to sit that race out but still had to laugh because I know he will not be able to get the plastic doodad off the bottles anyhow.

The boy, fleeing the scene of the crime, evidence in tow, being chased by “the authorities”:

Isn't he just the cutest thing with those little curls and that Einstein thing going on?

Growing Older and Somewhat Wiser

Oh yeah, I feel myself getting old. I can no longer run and keep up with my kids. It's all good, though, since the little ones seem to think I make a pretty good jungle-gym (well, it's all good until they yank a big handful of my hair out as they climb on me).

Things I have learned over the years, having a herd of kids running around here:

1. Never let your guard down. They are watching and waiting for you to turn your back so they can crayon/marker/finger paint the walls.
2. Never leave anything valuable (especially something of sentimental value) in a place you think is remotely safe from little hands. It is not. The only safe place is Fort Knox. If you have no access to that, you might just as well hand it over to them right now or throw it in the trash and skip the middle-man.
3. No amount of money you spend on a toy is ever worth the joy a child gets out of playing with the box the toy came in. Save your money and go to the store and get boxes for free.
4. Always wear a bra if you are not willing to sacrifice a breast to the cause.
5. Always wear a ponytail or keep your hair cut short if you are not willing to sacrifice it to the cause.
6. Always keep your legs crossed if you are not willing to sacrifice THAT to the cause.
7. Always paint with semi-gloss and keep extra gallons around for those spots that just will not come off with a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser.
   
8. Always keep extra Band-Aids on hand.
9. Be willing to share everything or be prepared for wails of extreme anguish when they see mommy using the foot spa, remote control, etc.
10. Never, EVER buy light-colored furniture, rugs, towels, or clothes. NEVER.
11. Wait to shampoo the rugs until your kids turn 18 and move out.
12. Always keep extra night light bulbs on hand.
13. Always keep extra baby wipes on hand.
14. Always remember that Kool-Aid, Pop Tarts, and Popsicles should be kept hidden and doled out carefully as rewards when they are good and not as an everyday expectation.
    
15. Enjoy every minute while they are little because they just do not stay little long enough.
    

Getting Ready for Battle

Cleveland Clinic on Monday. Taking off Sunday night (crikey, later tonight???) to get down there on time, since hubby-man never follows the directions I give him (even if they are from MapQuest, which he requested). He is such a dingleberry sometimes. I admit to being a wee bit nervous but hopeful that I will finally get some answers about what this shit is that has been plaguing me for TEN FRIGGING MONTHS and getting worse by the day. I hear tell this doctor actually LISTENS to her patients (if so, then she is one of only four doctors on the planet who do so) and works the problem until she finds an answer. I consider myself an expert on doctors' bedside manner, having seen it from both sides (as a patient and as an employee), so we will reserve judgment for our own eyes.

That is all I really want: An answer. Even if that is "I am sorry, but you have {XXXX} and there is no cure, you are going to be miserable to the end of your days, and those days are numbered," I would much rather hear that than "I don't know" and/or "It's all in your head, you need to see a psychiatrist." (Fuck your psychiatrist, lady, which you probably already have and that is why you are sending all your patients to him.... but anyhow). It does not bother me to hear "I don't know," as long as it is accompanied with "But I will find the answer" (which I almost never hear). I mean, really, why the hell else am I paying (between my insurance payment and co-pays and deductibles) $200+ a pop for an office consultation? Surely not for a blowjob and a lollipop.

I am gonna beat this, one way or the other. I WILL WIN, BECAUSE I SAID SO AND I AM THE BOSS SO WHAT I SAY GOES. I have people who count on me every day for not only a means of support but mommy love, and I intend to stick around to give out as much of that as I can. My uterus is screaming incessantly "Fill me up, bitch!" but I really need to take care of this other thing first. It is really a pain when you cannot even enjoy yelling at your husband because you are unable to pick your arms up to flail them wildly at him, let alone enjoy holding, snuggling, feeding, and changing a new baby who smells so good and tastes so yummy when you kiss their tiny little heads.

Yes, I look forward to ALL of it: Gaining another 4000 pounds (someday my ass will be as large as my mouth), puking and puking until I can't puke no more and then puking some more anyhow, ankles as thick as most people's waists, stretch marks you could fill with water and drive a yacht through, watermelon boobs, hemorrhoids the size of Texas, and even labor and delivery but ESPECIALLY reveling in that miracle that is a tiny, perfect little person, with every atom in your body, watching them grow and learn (and then wondering where the hell your sweet baby went when they turn 12 and start mouthing off but you really love that, too, even if you won't admit it). Next time, though, I will not be making the mistake of going to the hospital to deliver. Alas. . . That's a story for another day. You'll like it, though (my obstetrician can finally chuckle about it, 2 years after the fact).

Melodies in Motion

I did not realize how pretty this looked but how difficult it was to actually read the text. Sorry about that. In any case, this is an itty bitty ditty I conjured from within this sawdust-filled head of mine and gave to hubby-man a mere 3 months after we were married, which I had penned onto a poster I drew of the ASL sign for "music" as a faint background. I even framed it.

Unfortunately, even if the poster had not had an unfortunate "accident," it would not fit into the scanner, so I nosed around Google Images for a while; unable to find anything similar to how it was originally presented, I stuck it on a sunset instead. I like sunsets. I like sunrises, too, and rainbows, butterflies, dolphins, elephants, dragonflies, roses, and snowmen. You would never have guessed I was so weird, right?

Anyhow,.... What it says is this:

Seeing your hands in conversation

Is witnessing the most beautiful symphony ever composed.

A world full of words

Dancing gracefully from your fingertips . . .

Music in motion,

A melody I see with my eyes and hear with my heart. . .

And having listened, I now know the meaning of harmony.

I love sign language. I love to watch it, especially when performed by a prelingually Deaf individual whose primary language is ASL. I love to try to do it, but mine is only a poor imitation. I love to watch my babies use it and know that they are bilingual at an age when most hearing children are struggling to manipulate a single language.