an unexpected poppy

This is a video I posted on my general family blog:

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It's my boy, waving and trying to sign at an airplane.

I just can't get over this signing bit with him. Even though I'm (little 'd') deaf, I don't sign much and wasn't doing a very good job of teaching him to sign much more than 'all done', 'shoes', stuff like that. Not more than any other child here in Stroller City learns (it's so in vogue to be baby signing).

Then when I was starting to digest Moxie's positive Ds diagnosis and heard about kids with Ds learning sign - and how important it is- I was all over us all getting a head start. Rented every*single baby signing video from netflix, every*single one from the library, to see which worked the best for us. Which, incidentally, turned out to be "Baby Signing Time". Micah's signing has SHOT OFF - he easily learned 15 or so words in a week - he took to it like the proverbial duck to water.

It's so funny to me that here we started to try and learn and sign mostly for Moxie, and lo! It's what Micah was evidently wanting us to do for him all along.

chin chucking

So there I was, giving a workshop to a bunch of college students. I had their full, complete attention because the workshop was on how to make the most of a career fair and the career fair was the next day.

I saw something white on my bosoms from the corner of my eye but immediately dismissed it. A second or so later, I had to glance down at my notes and lo! The underwire from my bra had come almost completely out and was out to about my chin!

I looked up, I still had everyone's attention. Yaaaay! Glad to know that my 'moments' don't go unnoticed....

This one was my very last decent bra. Now I'm down to zero. Every*single*other one has holes and missing clasps and underwire that hits me in the armpit (which might be better than my chin).

I'm going bra shopping. This weekend. Better believe it.

a book and balance

I stayed up super late last night and finished Road Map to Holland. I have mixed feelings about it - on one hand, I'm so glad she wrote it. I do *heart* her honesty. There are definitely pieces that echo my thoughts. That this is all my fault, my old eggs. If I'd just been content with an only child, I'd never have had any further worries. That I'm greedy, selfish, want more. And this is the price you may pay for such greed - when you aren't willing to have an abortion.

Sigh.

But I ended up still feeling like she was trying too hard. I don't know what it was - the way each segment had to be wrapped up and bound in some lyrical conclusion? I can't even articulate what about it made me distracted. I feel slightly embarrassed even admitting to feeling anything other than raging love for the book. She's a Mommy, she's trying, she did well to write it, and I'm sure her words have helped countless others.

Finished with it, I reached for my next book, The Year My Son and I Were Born. Holy shit! This one is knocking me flat. What a writer. What a writer..... I've cried my way through half of it already. I feel like she articulates for me how I've felt in trying to work my way through Ds. I've avoided developmental disability all of my life. The deep shame I do feel in having a child that will in all likelihood be 'less than perfect'. This, added to the depression that I already struggle with.

With her son, she had a lot of problems that I pray I won't. He was 10 weeks premature for starters, then had all kinds of eating and breathing issues. Hearing loss (I can't say I care so much about that though, to be honest - it would just be cheaper and easier if Moxie doesn't...). The flip side is that she'd already had 6 kids. I think of what a gift that is - her son having so many siblings. I worry about that with Moxie and Micah - that they'll need more support, more in the way of sibling cushions.

And her family is Mormon... one great thing about being Mormon is that the church stands by it's members. Her little boy will always have that. I feel like I need to get more of a support network in place for later. For me, for Micah, for Moxie. I'm not Christian though, and sometimes I feel like the Baha'i network is too flimsy for me to really rely on. Mikey doesn't want anything, doesn't feel it's necessary. I know I need more than the nothing I've got right now though...

Moving on, here's a slideshow I found of her baby on youtube (I'm crying again!):

dancing through depression

One of the rad Mommies from my babycenter group left a link to the Conny Wenk News Blog in response to my previous post on Moxie in a tutu. I'm totally crying. I have to get out that waterproof mascara again - I seem to be crying too often now for my ready-steady normal stuff.

I love that little dancing German girl. And how I want mine to be able to do her thing... I also love Conny Wenk's blog - what an amazing photographer! Her photos sing life.

I need that right now...I'm getting huge. I'm depressed because I feel like I can never get anything done. I have so much to do. Besides just figuring out a way to make money after I have her (so that I can go down to part-time), I need to finish the feng-shui'ing that I'm in the middle of, EXERCISE my body, chorework and to top it off, our apartment is now coming down with a flux of mildew. Yuck! It's freakin' nasty! Grosses me out. And guess what? Noone else is going to clean it except for me. On top of that, my sundae cherry, is that I'm tired, really really tired. I want to sleep and I don't feel that hot.

Oh boo hoo, meriah. Play that violin some more.

Or just play your playlist.

Yes, like most people, I have little soundtracks for most of my life instances. My soundtrack/playlist for happy times, for deep cheese. For pep. And for getting by. Mine for getting by is wearing thin these days... I'll try and figure out a way to share it with you though.

Sharing is caring.

And I care.

With that in mind, here's more of that gorgeous German dancer, copied from Conny Wenk's most awesome blog:

Tanzdialog from Thea Hartwig on Vimeo.

back on the road

I take back not liking Road Map to Holland. I can do that, right? Because I like it now. She's won me over with her honesty and she seems to have relaxed a bit after chapter 4 or 5.

I keep thinking about her description of her day as I move about mine (one of mine where I'm not working, that is). I'm like this huge exhausted slug, dragging from one thing-to-do to the next. Bleh. And I read her accounting of the bottles and feedings and the naps and playtime with her older son and I get tired just thinking about it all. Last night I actually fell asleep after reading an account - I was just like, 'whooooooooah!'; brain went into over processing mode and bam! I fell asleep. Just like that.

Did I tell you that Micah was a twin? I don't think I did, not on this blog. But yes, Micah was a twin. His sibling didn't make it past the 2nd trimester. Then I had my 13-week miscarriage, "ziggy" (yes, short for 'zygote'). And now, this little girl. I say she's #2 but she's actually #4.

Back to Road Map: when I read her day, I'm not so sad that Micah's twin didn't make it. I don't know how I could've handled two.

seeing things

You know how you never notice anything till it's a part of your life or what you're thinking about? Like, you never really notice cars - or pregnant people -until you are car shopping or pregnant yourself?

Well, it was like that for me with Ds and things related.

I work in the disability industry. I AM a person with a disability. 8 hours a day, my life relates all around disability - but never, ever with developmental disabilities. I've always been scared of developmental disability, done my best to keep away from it. So when I've received product catalogues for stuff related to developmental disability, I've always automatically put it in recycling. Not relevant for my population, and I wasn't at all curious.

Today... giant leaps was in my mailbox. I brought it to my desk... read it. And of course, started bawling. It's such a mixed bag of emotion, you know? On one hand, I'm keenly aware that things are better for me, easier for me and will be easier for Moxie because I get these catalogues delivered to me already. Because I know people who know people. Because I know this system. I'm grateful, I'm very grateful.

And then. I'm so desperately sad that I'm grateful. That I've got a need to be grateful for these things. That everything that I previously disregarded that was handed to me is now relevant and will be applied. That I won't skim over Training Resources to just the sections that relate to my program or myself.

Because it's all relevant now.

on the road map

I'm reading Road Map to Holland now. I feel like such a snob because I tend to get distracted when I feel like she's trying too hard to write well and/or when she gets repetitious in her writing patterns.

Like, to backtrack and explain something, she's got a tendency to start off with "when...". She likes splicing and dicing present and past (I guess to shake things up) but does it a little too fast. The combination of the both distract me.

Choosing Naia's author had similar tendencies to use the same ways to backtrack - he'd make some kind of a statement and then you just KNEW this hellaciously long-winded explanation was coming up. And boy did it ever- he'd start from the very origins of whatever (institutions, drugs, certain people's stories - you name it) and draw the whole thing out till you almost forgot you were reading a story about a little girl with Ds who was about to come into the world.

I feel kind of guilty writing about this at all since I myself am not a good writer. How dare I sit back on my high horse and get all critique-y with folk that write books that I'm glad were written?

Shame on you, meriah!

bc boarding

Back to Baby Center. I'm on like, 4 groups there - something like that... a cross of Ds and "regular" worlds.

I get it in a daily digest version - a summary of the titles of all the postings. I'll find my eye just wandering around reading, and then I'll draw back, surprised, when I read something like "help! terrified of stretch marks!'

HA! Ha! HAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!

Yes, I laughed as I typed that.

And I'm still laughing.

That's just sooooooooooooo funny!

I remember when that was around the extent of my worries. Stretch marks! Ha!

Starkly contrasting that board is the Ds Pregnancy postings - stuff ranging from dealing with guilt, grief, heart holes, when to start early intervention, adoption, death. Heavy, big, wrenching postings.

There aren't any postings about which sling to use or which stroller is best. That's for sure.

I'm glad I'm in both groups - they balance each other out. It feels so good to laugh over someone worrying about stretch marks, and super helpful to read about new slings out there or just you know, regular pregnancy stuff. And be able to learn a whole new world of acronyms on another group and cry over someone's wrenching loss, rejoice when their babies make it.

I don't know what women did before the internet...

a surreal trip

We visited an alternate universe yesterday, GreatManDoctorWorld. It was our first visit! Have you been? It's stunning there. Man doctors who are in the know! Kind! Clever! Skilled at what they were hired to do! With neat things to look at whilst on the table.

Our introduction to this alternate reality was led by Dr. Desai (pictured) who made me want to tuck him neatly up, put him in my pocket, and have him be my doctor for everything other than OB-stuff. He actually got me thinking of delivering Moxie in Hayward (previously unthinkable). We're scheduled for the hospital tour next Thursday.

And! Dr Desai examined every aspect of Moxie's little heart and says she's good to go! Yay! No problems at all. He said the only thing that could go wrong at this point is if something that should normally close at birth doesn't. But that it shouldn't be a big deal - it would be something pretty small.

I *heart* Dr. Desai. Not to mention how he won me over with his talk on Ds 'it's hard to believe but there are still people that make a big deal about it, even now... that's so 30 years ago', and then when I said we'd already been treated to doctors who did, he asked who, then asked "Walton?' I said 'oh yeah, he's awful!' and he cracked up. Then I said that in terms of just talking about Ds, Newton (or whatever his name is) really took the cake with his 'burden for life' talk. Dr. Desai looked incredulous. Me? I was mollified... and totally happy to hear that good doctors do exist.

shielding latches

I used a nipple shield for about 9 months with Micah. For those of you not in this particular 'know', this is affixing a piece of plastic over one's nipple so as to make it easier for the baby to latch on and nurse. It rates on the pleasure scale somewhere between cleaning grout and having a filling: definitely not something to look forward to, but bearable.

One of the (very small) reasons I wanted another baby in the first place was to enjoy things I didn't get to enjoy the first time around - like nipple shield-less nursing. I was - am! - hella determined for this baby to nurse, sans shield. Stick the boob in, that's that. Finito.

Wellllllllllllllllllllll...... there was a posting on the board today about a mama being thrilled her baby is finally nursing after 6 months. 6 MONTHS!!!!!!!!!! She has been pumping and bottle feeding her little man for 6 FREAKIN' MONTHS!!!!!!!!

Holy smokes. Talk about determination and perseverance! Besides being completely put to shame over my woes with nipple shielding (ha!), I'm now worried that Moxie might not latch and I'll be put to test to show that same kind of determination. Wince. Oh, so no fun.

But this baby MUST have breastmilk. The brain boost she'd get from it could, as someone else said, make the difference between her being a grocery store bagger or owning her own business.

iroiro

I have enormous, big, huge respect for the writing on all these momblogs by moms with kids with Ds... and learned of most of them through the Baby Center group that I belong to. This group means soooooooooooo much to me... and I'd be lost without it. Those women! They are fabulously real. And so strong.

Today someone posted a link to the Karen Gaffney Foundation, and I am once again an inspired ox-mama. My heart feels full when I read of people with Ds doing their thing, living happy, productive lives. Like Karen.

On a more personal level, I'm chock full of appointments this week. Today: therapist + OBGYN. Thursday: fetal echocardiogram. I'm nervous. Yes, last we checked, her heart hole had closed, but what if? I'm just nervous.

Deep breath.

I seem to be taking a lot of those these days.

flip flopping weird dreams

I wonder if this flip-flopping between being fine and then NOT continues till she's born? Is that how this works?

Sometimes I'm better than fine. I'm great. If she's got Down's, that's just not a problem. I'm strong. I'm confident. I'm resourceful. I love kids and I can handle having a kid for life.

Then it goes crash-bang-down and I'm crying and I just don't think I can. There is too much to deal with. I won't be able to. I'm horrible with sickness, I'm not a good mother, how can I think I can do this?

Flip. Flop. Up n' down. Round and round.

Deep breath.

I had another dream the other night. I was pregnant (Mikey says that I'll always be dreaming I'm pregnant because I'll probably want to be pregnant forever - what*ever). And Micah was tagging along with me. I saw a little blonde boy who looked as if he might have Ds - I commented on his obvious cuteness to his brother and his brother said, 'he's nothing to celebrate; he's got down's syndrome'.

I was taken aback. And said, 'oh but, he's so cute! and obviously smart!' . It went on and on, till his mother came over and joined the brother in downgrading any reason to be happy for the boy's existence. The little boy was SMART! He was singing Old MacDonald and was 15 months old, running around. I told him that my boy didn't start walking till he was 15 months old and wasn't even talking much at 20 mths, let along singing a whole song.

They poo-poo'd me. I finally walked away, confused and incredulous that they weren't appreciating their boy.

Weird dream, right?

my rainbow ovo

We had our first ever date night last night - 20 months after the birth of our boy, and 6 months into the growing of our girl. I wrote about it on our general family blog (http://www.doozeedad.blogspot.com/). I kept thinking of Moxie the whole way through. Perhaps inevitable given that she was thwacking me most of the time! Man, this girl is a kicker!

So I was sitting there absolutely relishing the show. The feel of my beloved's arm around my shoulder (he said it went numb from keeping it there so long). The beauty of the imagery. The music. And with her relentless whacking, I was thinking about her being on that stage, doing her thing. About the wealth of opportunities that I want for her.

I want brightness, colour. Joy. I want her to be expressive, and have outlets for expression that mean something to her. I want her to be able to do what she wants to do. I want her to wear a tutu and striped tights (if she wants, that is).

I finally called the Regional Center and set up a time to talk more with them. Coincidentally this morning, I talked to a co-worker that I hardly ever talk to and told her that Moxie's likely to have Ds. Turns out this co-worker used to work at the regional center as a case manager, with hundreds of people with developmental disabilities! How crazy is that!

I was pretty happy. She told me of a lot of good stories - excellent group homes. Highly independent women with Ds with brimming lives full of delight. And right here. In my own backyard.

I think there is a lot of hope to be had.

dreaming

I dreamed last night that Rainbow had died in me. But that I was pregnant already, with another baby - and her dead body was still in me.

In my dream, the doctors said not to worry because her body would dissolve and wouldn't cause a problem with the new baby growing. I asked them if they were sure - I mean, she's almost 6 months grown! - not that small. They said yes, yes. Not a problem.

It was altogether a weird dream.

After I woke up, I realized that my dream is probably true. My preconceptions - prejudices, really - of this baby are dying and a whole new baby is taking her place. But that those dead prejudices are still in me, along with the new and growing.

At least that's what I think. I really wish I was better at dream interpretations.

ready reading

I stayed in the bathtub till the water was completely cold last night, finishing 'Gifts'. Oh my.

Some of those stories... like the one whose baby girl died at two and half of leukemia... She wrote, "Cariana showed me that merely seeing an analysis of someone's chromosomes tells you next to nothing about the person herself, and that the most important questions can never be answered by a blood test. No test can tell us who are children will be, or what each child might bring into the world."

Those words pierce in their truth, don't they. And make me cry. Again.

In this reading list that I seem to be developing, Gifts is present. So is Expecting Adam. Choosing Naia can be left out (I think overall, that angle that it's written is just too depressing and the writing itself isn't very good).

And now... I don't have any more books! I'm all out. So I went on to the (free!) library website to see what books they have related to Ds, and lo! There is even one with a romance-tint!

Just Beyond the Clouds, a Christian love story! It says, "Cody, mourning his late wife, objects to his brother Carl's wish for independence, wanting to keep Carl, who has Down's Syndrome, close to home, but when Elle, Carl's teacher, champions his cause, Cody begins to develop unexpected feelings for her."

Oooooh, la la! I think that's just the ticket.

resolutioning

I finished Expecting Adam - what a great read! - and moved on to Gifts. This is a good one too. I was nervous that it would be "heartwarming" slop of the overworked Chicken Soup variety, but I was super pleasantly surprised. It's good (and yes, there are a few stories that made me cry).

The main threads that I am partial to:

- the mothers fall in love with their babies. Sometimes it takes them a while. But they do.
- the mothers talk about the 'saint' crap and how it's soooooooooooo far from their truth.
- there are pictures of the kids, and they really are pretty darn cute.

I am feeling better about it all. More comfortable with it. Less freaked out. Less scared - or rather than being scared shitless, I'm just scared.

I do remain overwhelmed. And feel isolated. That is one of my resolutions for this year: connect more with others. Do the mommy group thing. Get more support for myself.

The other thing that I need to get doing is figure out a way to augment the income. I don't want to have to worry about finances after she comes, and while I'm in my 2nd trimester, I still have some energy to take on more work, do more. Line the coffers some.

And the last thing I'm working on: just enjoying her. She's so active! Moves so much! It's fun to sit and feel her working her way all around my belly, and watch it vibrate with her kicks. I can't help but think how appropriate 'Moxie' is for her, this little Rainbow Tiger here.