2/26

In honor of One Weird Mother, who encouraged me to stop complaining and start acting. I wrote this e-mail to my future city government after reading these two articles that One Weird Mother linked to on her blog.

I agree with her. It's time that both women and men start addresses the systemic imbalances that working parents face - in the workplace, in civic life, and within our homes.
______
Dear Fruity Parks and Recreation Department,

I'm moving to the City of Fruit in Spring 2007. I went to the City's Parks and Recreation Department website this afternoon and was amazed at all of the activities that you offer for city residents! It's great to encourage residents to be active and involved in their community, especially while getting to know their neighbors.

However, I was extremely disapointed that most of the activities for younger children are offered exclusively during the day. I would love to enroll my 20 month-old son in Toddler Buds tumbling class or take the Awesome Abs or 20/20/20 fitness class for myself, but all of these activites are only offered during traditional working hours. Fortunately, there are other fitness classes that are offered for adults in the evenings that I could attend, but that isn't the case for toddler classes. Both sessions of the Toddler Time class, in addition to all of the preschool activities, are offered only during the morning hours.

As a working parent, I'm frustrated and confused as to why the Fruity Parks and Recreation Department would choose to only schedule classes for children and their parents in the morning. Working parents deserve as much quality time, interaction, and city-sponsored activities with their children as those children that are fortunate enough to have stay-at-home guardians, especially for toddler-aged children.

What are the plans to address this situation in the future? I'm cc'ing JB, Director of Parks and Recreation, and MS, Recreation Superindent in the hopes that these individuals can help shed some light on the scheduling issues and the plans for making classes more inclusive for working families. Thank you.

Sincerely,

NSP
Future City of Fruit Resident

1/16

I apologize for all of you that got late night phone calls from me last night. I had a headache and couldn't sleep. Then I started crying.

Tears are my Achilles heal. Some people cry and feel better. I cry and feel like I'm staring down rabbit hole. I'm so scared that I'm going to fall into the hole and never find my way back out. I apologize constantly if I'm on the phone with someone while I'm crying, even though I know that the only thing more annoying is someone who apologizes while drunk. Don't even get me started on drunk crying. I've done that recently and it's the worst because I can't stop it. The tears just keep coming then, in embarassingly strong heaves and whimpers.

Do me a favor: if you know me on here, or even if you only know me from here, e-mail me. and let me know who the insomniacs or the, "I don't mind being woken up at 1am" folks are.

It's not easy for me to ask for support.

NSP
notsopregnantintexas@yahoo.com

1/14

Dear Mr. Tugboat,

This hurts. I feel like I wasn't prepared for how much this was going to hurt, regardless of my own mistakes. The good Lord knows that I've made plenty of mistakes along the way. Mistakes that hurt myself and others.

I never meant to hurt anyone else, especially those that I care the most about.

Yet, we keep repeating the same mistakes with each other. As I said on the phone, I'm angry at myself. I'm angry at you. I'm angry at how vulnerable that night made me and how I've been trying to recover ever since.

Maybe I should have written the, "Five Things You Don't Know About Me:" meme so you would learn a little bit more about what I was hiding. There is so much that I hide, even from those closest to me.

I guess there is no time like the present, here is my, "Five Things that Someone That is Dating Me Wouldn't Know" meme:

1) I'm looking for the grand romance. Sometimes, when I'm in the middle of getting to know someone, when I smile when they call, when I feel so special, when they make me laugh, I feel like I'm the best version of myself. One day, I want to be able to find that version of myself without the interest of someone else. I'm working on that. Until then, sometimes when I start dating someone, I think, "Is this it? Is this the romance that I've been waiting for because, good Lord, I've been waiting. I'm trying to be patient. I'm trying not to force it. I'm trying. Oh shit, this isn't working. I am forcing it. I suck. I'm pathetic and I suck."

2) I wish with all of my being that I was perfect. I will never be and everyday I think about what I could have done better.

3) It's not just that I like to be held. I like someone to reach out to hold me, to tell me with their actions that I'm the person that they want closest to their being.

4) I'm scared that I won't find anyone that will truly love me.

5) When I'm feeling insecure, I'm ten times more likely to spend time with someone that will find me interesting, appealing, and wonderful, even when I'm not. It's my greatest, most embarassing flaw: my need to be liked.

So, that is it. Here is my heart, laid bare. So unbelievably lame. I wish I were different. I wish that I could not care about anyone. I wish I wasn't crying right now. I hope that in the morning, I'll forget that I even wrote this.

Sincerely,
NSP

10/19

Letters:
________
Dear Zac,

You are 15 1/2 months old now. You are funny, creative, inquisitive, and so amazingly good and throwing a ball that we only give you foam ones to play with because we are afraid for our lives if we give you anything heavier. Please start walking soon. Mommy's getting tired and you are getting so big. Walking is fun! Everyone I know loves to walk - even that kid at Weight Watchers last night that stole your bottle of milk and made you cry. He loves to walk. I think you would like it too. At least then you could chase after milk theives faster.

Love,
Mommy
_________

Dear FR,

I've been thinking a lot about what you commented yesterday regarding "intuition" being used as an excuse to justify racism. As I commented back, I thought about that when I was writing the post and wasn't sure how to address it then. Thank you for calling me out on it and making me reevaluate my words.

The only concrete thing that kept coming to my mind when I mulled over what you had written was that only 20% of violent incidents are commited by strangers. 80% of victims report that they had some kind of relationship with their attacker as: neighbors, coworkers, former bosses, lovers, partners, friends, contract workers, child care providers, doctors, lawyers, priests, pastors, rabbis, clerics, or some combination of all of these. That's a huge statistic. Of course, it's the 20% of cases that get the most media attention. "Senseless," "unthinkable," "abhorrent" acts of violence will keep Americans glued to their tv screens and constantly refreshing their MSN browser. It's the large amount of personal, intimate violence that we can easily dismiss by saying, "There is nothing like that going on in MY family," with the certainty that only people in denial can really muster.

In those cases, I do think it's important to listen to your intuition. If someone that you have to interact with (on a date, when you drop off your kid to daycare, at the dentist's office, when a former coworker gets fired) creeps you out, then it is most likely something more than "nothing". It is valid in those circumstances to listen to what you are feeling.

However, people do need to evaluate their own internalized racism and the legacy of oppression for any kind of difference when thinking about fear out in the public realm. It is racist for a white woman to be afraid to walk next to a black man simply because of his race. Just as it is racist to not board a plane because "suspicious looking Arabs" were planing to board. Wasn't it Jesse Jackson (God help us all!) that said if someone came up behind him at an ATM, he always hoped that it wasn't a young, black man? That shit is totally crazy. The media blows all of these cases up to such huge proportions, that it leads to the (incorrect) assumption that violence is only committed by non-whites living under the 130% of the poverty limit.

So, that's all I've got for now. It's not much. I miss you and your blog. Please keep writing (maybe sharing it) and commenting on here. Please also tell Sebastian to write on his blog. I miss his work as well.

Much love back,
NSP
_________
Dear self,

Next time you want to convince yourself that you look good in a tank top, please remember the pictures from the gala and try to save yourself the embarassment.

_________
Dear blog readers,

I've made my pictures on Flickr' private and taken them down in other forums. I tried to invite everyone that I could to become a "contact" as a friend or family member, but I'm sure I missed some people. I'll be uploaded some new pictures of Zac later on tonight that I want to share. If you want to be added, please e-mail me at notsopregnantintexas@yahoo.com and tell me a little bit about yourself.

Thanks for reading and giving me an outlet for sharing my thoughts.

With fondness,
NSP

9/21

Dear Huggies Manufacturers,

My name is Zac. I can't talk, type, or walk yet, so my Mom is writing this for me. Even though I may or may not be developmentally behind other bebes, I am exceptionally good at one thing: making a mess. I make the messes in our household and my Mom cleans them up. Most times, she does a good job. Some days are better than others, you know?

However, she recently purchased a jumbo pack of size 4 Huggies with an apparent defect. The tab on the right side won't adhere to the part of the diaper covering my jo-jo. No matter how hard she stretches, pushes down, or curses at it, the tab keeps springing back open, with disasterous consequences. A couple of days ago, the diaper opened in my sleep and got my ENTIRE crib wet. It was like she had put me to bed wearing nothing at all! I was as free as the day I was born, able to piss about as I pleased, but she didn't seem to like it very much.

Now, while I think this is lots of fun, I'm starting to feel bad for my Mom. I love making HUGE messes by pooping and peeing around the house. My Mom, doesn't really like it. It doesn't give her a fighting chance to keep the place clean in my wake. When she gets frustrated, she's prone to drastic action. By drastic, I mean duct tape. A lot of it.

Fortunately, I don't seem to mind.


I'm just happy that she let me play with her cell phone.

I was hoping that you could stop making such suckie diapers, at least for my Mom's sake. She has her faults, but last night she stayed up with me for two hours while I cried in pain from sharp molars trying to poke through my gums. I mean, really, with all of that going on, does she really have to deal with diapers that won't stay closed?

I didn't think so.

Sincerely,

Bebe of Not-so-Pregnant-in-Texas, Zachary

8/28

Thank you for the comments on the last post and for everyone that took the time to e-mail me. I really appreciate it. It was inspirational to me to learn about all the single Moms, soon-to-be empty nesters, and never been pregnant women that read my blog. If I didn't read strangers' blogs myself, I would say something along the lines of, "I can't believe you read the crap that I write," but then I remember that I would be lost without my daily reads.

In honor of all of the love that I got over the weekend, I thought that I would share some.

Before I had Zac, I read every parenting book that I could get my hands on. The overriding themes of these books seem to say, "Don't worry about the dishes, the laundry, or showering, just enjoy the special moments with you and your new baby!!" This theory might actually work if you have someone (or a whole team of someones) to do the dishes and laundry for you and to watch your baby while you shower. It also might work if you can stop freaking out long enough to recognize that your baby loves you unconditionally and that you are exactly what your baby wants and needs. Oh, and you're also supposed to fall instantly, madly in love with the creature that lived inside your uterus for nine months.

For me, it didn't work like that. I was so afraid that I didn't know what I was doing that I was numb to Zac's beauty and the love I felt for him. I couldn't appreciate his perfect fingers and little nose, his blond hair and the snoring sounds he made when he fell asleep while nursing. I was little more than ambivalent to him, especially after three months of waking up every hour-and-a-half to nurse him. I would get scared when I thought he needed me. Certainly I couldn't be the mother, the woman, the caretaker he needed, I thought. It was easier to let someone else pick him up and comfort him, even though I was wracked with guilt. I felt like I knew what motherhood was supposed to feel like. I should be enamored with him! I should never want to leave him!!!

Then he and I moved into our own apartment and there was no one else there.

It was just us.

and I fell in love with him.

I love the way he stands up in his crib, shaking the bars, crying, holding his arms out for me to come and pick him up. I love the way he dances, rocking back and forth, while his toy turtle plays little snipets of songs. He laughs and wants to be around me - all the time. I still struggle to enjoy those moments, especially when I would rather e-mail in peace, yet there is a sense of calmness about it.

I can now imagine loving him for the rest of my life. Watching him grow into the man that I see inside him. I can imagine going to parent-teacher nights and being with him the first time he rides a bike all by himself. I can imagine high school homecoming games and waiting up for him to come home from a school dance. The panicky feelings are still there, but they are more subdued, more tempered by the fact that I can see my future intertwined with his.

One day, hopefully after I'm dead, when Zac reads this blog, I hope that he can see that this is the period where I let go of my fear and opened my heart to him completely.

I love you, Peanut.

6/28

Dear Peanut,

Life here on the outside world is great! We like it so much and I really think that you would like it a lot more out here. Out here there is me, Grandpa and Grandma, Aunt Jen, and a whole host of friends that are waiting to see your beautiful face. In fact, all of those people have taken to checking in with your Mommy periodically to see if you are still inside me (you are).

Mommy has also been doing some research on circumcision. People get very, very upset when you start talking about this subject, but I have to make the best decision for you that I can. I figure that at the very least, I should read more about it for your sake. Basically, baby, in some parts of the US circumcision rates are still around 80%. That means that if you were in the locker room with 10 boys, only 2 of them would have "turtleneck". Mommy appreciates the irony in that statement because she just saw your "turtle" in the last ultrasound (hee, hee).

Now, I know that you aren't thinking about this right now, and hopefully you won't until your 18 or so, but almost every straight woman that I've talked to likes the way that a circumcised penis looks. My research on the preferences of gay men is lacking, and I'm sorry about that. If you are ostracize in the gay community because of your penis, let me know. I'll start protesting at every pride parade and in every gay magazine that I can get my hands on. Or if some European or Canadian girl decides not to be with you because you don't have a foreskin, you just remind her that American girls like you just the way you are. And then give me the bitch's phone number....

So, you aren't going to remember what having a foreskin was like or even that someone removed it, but I'm going to promise you that I will be by your side and force them to give you enough anesthesia. When you are old enough to have kids, we'll talk about this again and I'll support whatever decision you make then. Medically or socially, the practice and attitudes towards circumcision might be different when you're ready to have kids. As for now, the scientific evidence is a little shaky, but your little turtle is going to be easier to clean and have less urinary tract infections.

Please come out soon. I love you,

Mommy

3/24

Today is the third big ultrasound day. I would be lying if I said that I wasn't excited to see Peanut in all of his naked, soon-to-be-born in three months, glory. I can't help but worry that there is something wrong with him, though. Besides being huge and breech, I mean.

I am a perpetual worrier, thinly disguised with a laid-back veneer. Motherhood has only exaggerated this trait in me. I worry about everything now. I worry that there is something wrong with his spine and that's why he wouldn't turn over in the last ultrasound. I worry that he will have life-long genetic problems because the FOB and I were drinking on the night he was conceived and I continued to drink until I found out that I was pregnant. I worry that everytime I see a beer commercial I think, "Oh, sweet beer. How I miss your cold goodness," and that now everyone on the internet thinks that I'm a raging alchie (Good news: I'm not. Although I think that pregnancy might be a little easier if we could all have a couple of beers now and then).

I worry about taking care of Peanut. So far I've put a lot of stock into the "naturalness" of motherhood, as in: "I won't worry that I don't know how or how often to breastfeed. I'm sure the kid will figure it out when he gets close to the nipple. It's natural, right?" This is what I tell myself at 3am, at least. I've been reading books and articles on-line, yet my Dad turned to me last night and asked: "At what age can a baby hold its head up on its own?" Ummmm....The theme music to Jeopardy was playing in the background, mocking my ignorance. "What is, 'Whenever it wants to? Alex." Why is my father, the man that raised two girls into women, asking me this? Is he testing me to see if I've read "What to Expect in the First Year" because I haven't? I haven't even finished "What to Expect When You're Expecting" let alone moved on to the first year of childhood.

So, Peanut, this is what you should expect at birth: a neurotic, loving mother, a fantastic Aunt that can help you install your computer or answer any question that you might have from car brakes to genetic research (in fact, we will be keeping Aunt Jen's number on speed dial for a while. At least during your formative years because, let's be honest, I don't know where electricity comes from), two doting and unbelievably excited grandparents that promise to teach you how to pee standing up and later become a honest, good man, and a whole, wacky group of Mommy's friends that can't wait to meet you. Daddy might be around for a little bit, too and hopefully, you will get to meet Daddy's parents, your other grandparents. All and all, kid, that's not too bad. I can't wait to see you today. Make sure you wave so Grandma can see you and try not use Mommy's bladder as a trampoline.

Love,
Mommy
a.k.a. Pregnant in Texas
24 weeks pregnant

3/08-3

Sorry for the delay in posting Peanut's ultrasound pictures. I found some time to scan in his pictures this morning so I can share them all with you. The pictures make sense to me, but it's probably the same way that a mother of sextuplets can tell the difference between all of them. Don't worry if all you see are a couple of gray and black blobs. Trust me, there is a baby there.

Speaking of babies, I've either had some gas to end all gas or the little one has been remodeling my uterus. I feel a lot of little.....hmmm....this is hard to explain, little "somethings" from deep down inside. It's kind of like the feeling you get when you have diarrhea (I'm a former Peace Corps Volunteer. I can talk about diarrhea until I'm blue in the face and until you are throughly disgusted.) and your intenstines keep rumbling until you feel like you are going to explode. It's a little like that. Maybe he's kicking. Maybe he's setting up a wet bar and a basketball hoop. Maybe I'm eating too much corn. Who knows?

I should hear back from the non-profit by Thursday. I found out some disturbing news about government programs for pregnant women. Here is my letter in response to the news:

"Dear Uncle Sam:
I'm tired of hearing you wax on and on about 'family values' when you make it almost impossible to raise a family. Your government insurance plans consider pregnancy a pre-existing condition and refuse to cover prenatal and delivery costs. Come on, now. You can do better than that! If I didn't have private health care right now, I would have to learn off of the Internet how to deliver a baby at home and hope for the best. Our infant mortality rates continue to climb as you consistently undercut female health care. How about some subsidized child care? How about some paternal or family maternity leave? Just some things for you to think about.

Sincerely,
Pregnant in Texas