Following through

I almost forgot!

In my last post I promised to post a picture of my Halloween costume that I wore for the party this past weekend. So here it is:

I went as Buddha. 

I knew I wanted to incorporate my pregnant belly into my costume seeing as I may not have it for another Halloween depending on when I get pregnant with my future babies. So I thought of a lot of different round things before I settled on this one. 

Here's the breakdown of my costume:

- red chinese silk robe (already had this, found at Catholic Charities years ago)

- flowy brown maternity capris (inherited from sister-in-law)

- nude coloured t-shirt (this was the only thing I had to buy! Value Village for 5$)

- gold silky sash (bought at Catholic Charities a while ago as a scarf)

- beady necklace (from Reitmans)

- big wooden hoopy earrrings (gift from a friend so I have no idea where they're from)

A few of my other ideas were a disco ball, the death star from star wars, and an M&M. I think I made the right decision. What do you think??

Confessions of a Pregnant Girl, part III

I am quite overdue for an update!

• I hit the 33 week mark today. For those who don't speak in weeks, that's about 7 and a half months. 
• I am definitely showing, but strangers still don't ask or touch unless I say something. I am getting more and more uncomfortable as I fight for space with my tiny human. While it's scary to think I have so little time left, I can't wait for it to be over so I can have my body back. 
• I found my first stretch marks a little over a month ago. At first there were just a few faint pink marks under my belly, but they are multiplying in number and getting darker. Oi. I'm sure they'll get even better by the end. 
• I used to think baby brain wasn't a real thing and that it was just an excuse for pregnant women to be airheads, but OH MY GOSH. It is real and it is awful. I feel so stupid sometimes! The other day, Joe needed the car for work, so he gave me a ride. On the way there I realized (or at least I thought I realized) I forgot to grab my phone on the way out. So I put the number for the clinic in Joe's phone in case he needed to get a hold of me. Then, the next morning I remembered I still needed to find my phone, so I called it. And where did I find it? In my work bag!! I had it with me all along!! I've been forgetful in the past, but it's so bad these days that every single time I go into another room to do something, I have to stop and think to remember what it was I went in there for. 
• I'm going to a Halloween party tonight and I am so excited for my costume. It's something I can only pull off because I'm pregnant so I'm pretty stoked about it. For the sake of keeping it a surprise, I'll post a picture of my costume tomorrow, but trust me, it's pretty stinking clever. 
• I have mastered the art of peeing in a cup and I must say, it makes my doctor visits so much smoother. Except my last one. I went in to collect my sample and I totally forgot to do it. I just did my business and got out. So I chugged my water bottle and had to collect it 10 minutes later. The nurse wasn't even mad because apparently, it happens all the time. Pregnant ladies are pathetic! Gah! Stupid baby brain... 
• Living in a city where people are just barely starting to get to know me has been nice while being pregnant. I've had like, zero people fondle my belly since I've started showing. But last weekend I went home for Thanksgiving and hands were everywhere! Obviously my family all wanted to cop a feel, but then there was church where all the ladies who raised me wanted to feel too. It wasn't too bad actually. It was fun to have my little sister feel when the baby was moving because I don't think she's ever gotten to feel a baby move while it's still inside. 
• Speaking of feeling the baby move - at my last doctor's appointment she told me I needed to start counting kicks and that I should feel baby move at least 10 times in an hour. That has not been a problem for this child at all! Sometimes I can get 10 kicks in 5 minutes! This is definitely a squrimer. It's still pretty funny when I'm trying to get Joseph to feel or see it move because he always looks away at the wrong moment. Last night he poked my belly and told baby to "Move!" and for some reason, he immediately looked away right after he poked it and baby made a big movement the second his eyes were off. When he turned back to look, he poked again and could feel that baby had shifted positions, but he'd totally missed it happening. 

Cari

(prompt: Start a story with the line "Everyone whispered about _______, but no one had the courage to talk to her.")

Everyone whispered about Cari, but no one had the courage to talk to her. The poor dear had chosen to wear a pretty white dress of all things.

Nathan had noticed it first; she'd gotten up to sharpen her pencil and that's when he saw it. It was small at first, but by the second period it had grown to the size of her hand.

Of course Nathan was your typical immature, grade 7 boy and while the female body had become quite attractive to him, its functions remained a dirty joke. As soon as he saw the tiny red flag he immediately pointed it out to the two boys he sat with who gasped and made their own crude comments about the little accident.

Only 5 minutes of class remained at that point, but Nathan and his gang easily spread the word to two-thirds of their classmates. Cari sat at the back with the other special kids so it was easy for her to miss the heated whispers flying around the room.

I was in the other third of the class, but I sat next to Nathan in second period so it wasn't long before I, too, was informed. I had yet to receive my first "gift", so I had no idea what Cari was going through. I wouldn't get to experience that part of a woman's life until the next year in grade 8. Thankfully I didn't have any incidents happen that were made public to my entire grade.

I wish the "gifted" girls would have sympathized with Cari, but alas, middle schoolers are cruel. Besides, Cari was not the kind of girl you made friends with. She was the kind of girl you pitied and joked about behind her back - or to her face if you were one of those kids.

So in second period when I was informed of Cari's incident, I did nothing. I just kept looking back at her table like Nathan and his buddies, waiting to see what would happen.

I saw the moment when she found the spot. At that point it had grown, so she had to bundle the once-white fabric in her hand as she went to the front of the room to ask the teacher's permission to go to the bathroom. At first she was told, "No. Class just started, you should have gone during break." But Cari then whispered the situation to the teacher at which point she was allowed to leave.

As soon as Cari left the room, the kids in the room who knew all started to giggle and fill in the others about what was going on. I don't remember what we learned that day in science class, but I do remember the awful feeling I had as the day continued.

The next time we saw Cari, we were returning to home room after second period. She was in a new set of clothes and sat at the foot of her locker with her arms wrapped around her knees. As we came into the hallway she lowered her head to hide her tears. Everyone avoided her as we walked by in the hall.

By the end of the day the whole grade 7 wing knew about what happened to Cari. One creative group of girls replaced Cari's name in the Bloody Mary chant saying that if you spun 3 times in front of a mirror repeating "Bloody Cari", when you stopped and looked in the mirror you would get your period.

Since I was an eye witness to the events, I told my side of the story to the friends not in my class. Eventually the whole thing blew over, but if Cari had any chance of escaping the social rejects group, it died along with her white dress that day.

Every once in a while I think of Cari and wonder what happened to her. I always feel bad for the way she was treated and even though I never did or said anything to her, I feel shame that I didn't show her some kindness. I often wish I'd had to courage to be a friend to kids like Cari. I wish I wasn't so worried about what the cool kids thought of me and I wish I'd done the right thing more often.

So to all the Caris out there, I'm sorry. While I wasn't the one who actually bullied you, I didn't do anything to stop it which is just as bad. I'm sorry I didn't have the courage to do the right thing and I'm sorry that my cowardice didn't make your life any brighter. I promise to teach my children to be kind and more importantly to stand up for others. It may not change what happened to the Caris of my generation, but hopefully my future kid can make someone's life a little brighter by being a friend to them and doing the right thing instead of the cool thing.

24

Yesterday was the 24th anniversary of the day I escaped my mother's womb.

Yes, I am 24 now.

It doesn't seem too different from 23. Especially since I spent most of my 23rd year thinking I was 24 anyway.

Seriously, I'm pretty sure almost every time someone asked how old I was, "24" always wanted to be my first response. Then I would correct myself and say, "oh wait, no, I'm 23"

My day yesterday was pretty good. Joe had to get up at 6 for work, so he got me up about 10 minutes later so he could give me my present. Apparently his gift wasn't to let me sleep in, but he got me some awesome books instead.

One book is called "642 Things to Write" which will be quite useful in getting me to get back to blogging about more than being pregnant (not that I've done a ton of that anyway!). And the other is a Q&A journal where everyday it asks you a question and you have a few lines to answer that question. What Joe didn't realize was that this was a couples journal where we both get to answer the question. He's not big into journalling so this shall be an interesting experience, ha. I made him answer yesterday's question at the breakfast table since it was such an appropriate question for how I've been feeling lately. The question was, "Do you feel at home in your body?"

Now, had you asked me that question 7 months ago I would have said, "yes! I love my body!". But these days it's difficult to say you're at home in your body when you have to battle with a tiny human for control of your bladder. Or when picking up an object off the ground requires a wide, awkward squat instead of a simple bennnd and snap! 

Sorry, I've gotten off track. This post isn't about being pregnant, it's about my birthday.

My day at work was good. My co-workers gave me an ice cream cake and a card and this cake is the most delicious ice cream cake I have ever had the pleasure of eating. I don't normally like ice cream cakes because they usually come from Dairy Queen and have way too much vanilla ice cream and not enough chocolate ice cream and cookie stuff. But this ice cream cake is awesome. It's made of two layers of actual cake lovingly sandwiching a middle layer of ice cream. The ice cream to cake ratio is perfect! Plus the cake part is chocolate so that's great.

After work Joe and I went to a new restaurant in town called The Sawmill. Just a heads up, if you plan on going to the Sawmill for your birthday to get a free birthday dessert, this is not the place to go. It's a nice restaurant, but it was definitely not worth the price. Joe's plate cost 30 bucks and he was still hungry after finishing it. I couldn't finish my meal, but even though I didn't really have a lot left, I couldn't justify not packing it up because we were going to be paying so much for it anyway. As for the free dessert, you have to have a loyalty card to get one and even if we had opted to get one that night, we still couldn't have gotten a free dessert. I thought it was pretty stingy of them. I ended up getting dessert anyway just because I had saved room for it by not stuffing myself with the last remaining bites of my entrée so, dangit, I was going to have dessert! I opted for one of the cheaper dessert items since it wasn't going to be free and it was delicious. I had the lemon tart with cream and fresh berries on the side.

Even though the Sawmill was disappointing, I got to go to dinner with my favourite guy and I didn't have to make my own meal or wash my dishes at the end of the night, so I was happy.