Friend, please don’t give me evils when your boyfriend looks at me. When people talk it’s considered polite to look in, at least, the general direction of the person you’re addressing.

On one hand, I’m extremely grateful you said something to me. On the other, I dunno. Get over it?

Yes, he is attractive. But you know what? So is TBU. And so are you.

All I’ve got going for me is my personality. It’s a finely tuned tool and it has never* failed me. For the most part, people like me. And I like that they like me, so try not to make me feel bad about it. When people like each other, they sometimes interact. That’s the way it goes.

I’m clearly not trying to do anything. I mean fuck, I’ve gained 10 pounds since starting nursing school. I could try really, really hard and still look like I’m not trying. I’m happy TBU still wants to fuck me, I don’t have the energy to care if anyone else wants to fuck me. And if they do, it’s through no effort of my own. Even so, I’m sure that’s not what’s happening in this case.

Maybe you haven’t known me long enough to know that I would never do anything with anyone’s SO. Maybe you haven’t known TBU and I long enough to know that we would never do anything to jeopardize our relationship. Even in those moments I fantasize about hitting him in the balls, I love him dearly.

So, Friend, rest easy.

*OK, so it’s not perfect but it’s a fairly successful thing I’ve got going on in my head and outward expressions

So I was pregnant for about 8 weeks in July/August.

There was a considerable amount of weirdness happening below the belly button and, on a whim, I took a pregnancy test. A peculiar second line appeared. Figuring the device was not kept in a cool dry place as instructed, I took another and another. After six tests, all with this strange second line, I screamed “TBU!!” He ran over, looked at my collection of pee sticks, the shot glass full of my fresh pee and then at an empty pee stick wrapper. “So that means you’re pregnant!” He attempted to hug me but I punched him, “How are you not freaked out?!?!”

Still in a happy fog of denial the next day, I brought two tests to work so my friend slash co-worker could put the matter to rest. I had her take both tests, fully expecting that there would again be the second line, erasing all doubt that these were indeed, a faulty batch. She duly brought her fresh tests to my desk in silence, WHERE THE FUCK WAS THE SECOND LINE?! My eyes bugged out as I looked at her, she walked away and we ESP’d that we would discuss this matter at a later, more appropriate time.

Then I called my doctor. At an appointment the same day, it was confirmed. I called TBU and finally started getting excited. I was entirely, completely and totally freaked the fuck out since I was finally, after three fucking years of working towards it, about to start nursing school, but nonetheless excited.

We started making plans. Like where to live, since it seems quasi abusive to raise a child in what essentially amounts to a storage space with plumbing. So we signed a lease on a house. I contacted my nursing program and inquired about what plans needed to be made for giving birth during a rigorous, top ranked nursing program. I changed my financial aid status to reflect the addition, requiring all kinds of faxing of paperwork, tax documents and signed affidavits. I spoke with my boss and human resources rep about working a specific amount of hours during school to be able to afford the new place and a baby. All this was done in the span of two weeks, because we wanted to get our shit together before we left for our epic two week trip of epicness to Canada. We wanted to be moved into the new place before school started and before I became a super pregger. We did everything, it was all ready to go.

Canada was excellent. Everyone was excited about the baby. They named it and talked to it and referred to it in casual conversation. It was already part of the family. It was fun, but the whole time I was losing my shit. I was panicking about school. There was no conceivable way of pulling this off. Not with clinicals, work and school. I was nervous.

We spent our last day in Canada walking around Toronto. We bought a custom black onesie with a purple octopus, our only purchase not food or booze related of the whole trip.

Then in the airport I started bleeding. It wasn’t too much, I knew enough to know that it wasn’t entirely uncommon. I didn’t panic. When we got home late that night after a tiring day of traveling I went to the bathroom and the blood was brighter and more voluminous.

I began to panic. But not for the reason you might assume. I wasn’t scared to lose the baby, I’ve never dreamed of being a mom, we had no immediate plans to have a baby, so losing something that was just handed to me didn’t seem like that big of a loss. I just didn’t want to disappoint people, my mom, TBU’s family, where it would have been the first great-grandchild, TBU’s parents and all the people TBU decided to tell. It was a daunting thought to have to go back and tell all these people, that no, no there was not going to be a baby.

The next day, when the bleeding didn’t stop, I called my doctor and got an emergency ultrasound. TBU went with me. It was clear from the ultrasound tech’s demeanor that she wasn’t about to share what she knew. There was no heartbeat, and we all knew it. This just confirmed what I instinctually already knew. My doctor called me back to inform me that the baby had simply stopped growing and gave me the science behind it. She was overly sympathetic, while I was very matter of fact. I wasn’t upset at the loss of the baby. I was upset at having to now go and deal with everyone else about it.

I called TBU and I got upset with him for telling so many people. The only tears out of the whole thing came from me being angry at him for telling half of Canada and his refusal to be sorry for it. So far the physical pain was comparable to being on my period, not bad.

Then things got real. Two days after the diagnosis, chunks of what I can only assume were to be the placenta, started coming out, preceded by some of the worst abdominal pain I can remember. I kept going to work, only because I needed the money, but I was basically living off of ibuprofen and half hour trips to the bathroom. I was going through tampons and pads every goddamn hour. Without being overly graphic, it was gruesome.

***Fair warning: bathroom and a miscarriage, you do the math and decide if you want to read on***

Then, on a Friday, three days after the diagnosis, the oddest and most exhilarating thing happened. I went to the bathroom at work, there were the usual chunks of premature placenta and breath stopping pain, then it all subsided for one strange, ultra lucid moment when I felt something small and soft slide out and make the most perfect ‘plop’ noise as it hit the water. I knew what it was before I saw it. I cleaned myself up and stared at this floating, clear sac maybe one inch in diameter.

I stared at it like I’ve stared at specimens under the microscope and without much thinking, sunk my hand into the bloody water and scooped it up. It conformed to the shape of my hand and had a somewhat firmer consistency than that of raw egg whites in a durable, clear sac. I held the blob and let it roll around as I tilted my hand to get a feel for it’s salient features. I washed off all the blood to get a better look. I could see what would have been the baby in there, the size of two pencil dots and the exact color of my skin. I could see where it was connected to the sac and where the sac was connected to the uterus, there was a cluster of lifeless arteries on one side. I could see it in there but it wasn’t enough. I tore the sac, it was surprisingly strong, and the fluid inside was surprisingly solid. I saw the pencil dots and could see it’s form in 3-D, there was nothing human like about it. But knowing that it was the start of a human was infinitely fascinating. I could not stop staring.

I got my fill of my tiny scientist and let it go.

After that, there wasn’t much pain, there was still a lot of blood and I was exhausted, but the thrill of what I saw was literally unlike anything else. I don’t know why I felt the urge to stick my hand in bloody toilet water to hold my gestational sac and inspect the hell out of it, but it was – I don’t know exactly what it was, but it was something. It was like science that my own body had made, and it was awesome.

The strangest part of this wasn’t the physicality of it or even my own emotion towards it all, it was, as I mentioned, dealing with other people’s reactions to the news. So far everybody has had an immediate and immovable reaction towards sympathy, but not even just like, “Oh, I’m so sorry.” It goes beyond that almost every single time. When I say that I am fine, that it truly was for the best and that we are excited to be able to try when I am done with school, people just don’t hear it. They hear something like, “I wanted this baby so bad and now it’s gone, how am I going to surviiiiiiive?!” They want to get into some deep conversation about how this must be so hard for me. I spend most of the time telling them that really, seriously, things are fine.

I am mostly convinced that some persons assumed my anger at them in the past couple of months was just a manifestation of “this difficult time.” Which is just patronizing, like when someone asks if you’re on your period when you call them on their shit. They used my circumstance to downplay their actions and not take responsibility. So you know, whatevs.

One of my co-workers had the absolute best reaction when I told her about the miscarriage. She found out about the pregnancy by accident in a round about random coincidence. When I had to inform people that there wouldn’t be a baby in 7 months but that I was totally OK with it, she responded by saying, “I’m really sorry you have to deal with everyone and their personal response to what you’re going through. I’m really happy you’re doing well.” She was THE ONLY ONE who accepted, without any convincing, that I was fine, relieved even, at how events had transpired. She was such a bright spot in the whole thing and in the end I was happy she unintentionally found out, otherwise I wouldn’t have had that moment to be grateful for, in a sea of awkward updates about the status of my uterine contents.

All in all, I would call this a positive experience. What I saw was beautiful and I will never forget it. I fucking know what babies look like up in there, it’s crazy awesome! I got to learn something about the people I told through their response to the news, and that is invaluable fucking information. In some instances it was irritating to find out peoples views on a woman’s right to control what happens inside her body and other people had really insightful words. It was all enlightening though, I had an experience I never thought I’d have and learned a lot.

And now I am in nursing school and able to focus solely on that, which is totally necessary. It’s non-stop. I am loving it though, but that’s a whole other post.

Peace, love and tiny scientists!

I just read Mimi Smartypants’ latest post and I was like ugh, it’s true, to break a blogging break you just have to plow through a post and get it over with. It took me ten minutes to get this far, I was all emo and unable to remember any grammar and punctuation rules. I’ll give you all the dirty dish on the wedding, but first, more real time tales of getting these words to your eyes.

TBU was asleep taking his night nap and I wanted him to wake up but I didn’t want to actually wake him up. So I figured I’d write a post. Because what inevitably happens is that I try to write a post and just when I’m all into it he wakes up and demands attention, like a child or a cat or something else that aggressively vies for your attention. Have I told you how I mostly write posts while the teebs sleeps? It’s the easiest time to get thoughts out and whip my fingers into a frenzy of flow. But before I started writing I thought, hey you know what self? Yes self? I think I should have some ice cream! Some really delicious, full fat, creamy ice cream. That sounds like a great idea self. It’s Friday, it’s ok to not have your usual dessert of frozen berries in a glass of soy milk. I rationalized that I started a bootcamp class and I was sufficiently sore, indicating that I had worked out at a pretty severe level and therefore deserved ice cream. So up I got to get my reward when guess who woke up? Yup that’s right, the cat. Who then woke TBU up. Now I’m typing this and he is all, whatchoo doin? He’s fixing his sound system so he can play his XBox and one of the cables isn’t working and he is narrating every thought to me. Knowing fulling well that I don’t give a shit about his game playing experience. Maybe it’s this cable. Oh. Wait. Now it’s working. No it’s not. Oh! It WAS this cable! I don’t care!

ANYWAY!

So there has been major wedding planning drama. It all started about 16 years ago when TBU’s parents divorced. Fast forward to last Monday when we met with the wedding planner that TBU’s dad wanted us to meet with. We went knowing full well that she is a crazy ass rich person’s wedding planner and that we could never afford her. But we were playing his game. The game he plays when he is dangling money in front of your face. After looking at the planner’s portfolio and drooling over these amazing weddings we found out that it was juuuuust out of reach. It turned out to be a much more reasonable number we were looking at.

Let me clarify something right here. I don’t need a crazy ass rich person’s wedding. I don’t need lighting effects, to be paraded in on an elephant or for doves to be released. I was, and still am, mostly concerned with everyone having a great time. What I found most appealing in a wedding planner was that someone else would deal with all the shit that goes into putting a wedding together. You know, someone to decorate, to clean up and to generally make sure everything goes as it should. That’s all I wanted. Really.

Ok, so now we’re looking at a much more manageable number with a planner but we’re still short just a bit. And we’re thinking, hey maybe throwing this party doesn’t have to be a huge chore, maybe we can hire someone to do the hard parts for us, leaving us more time to drink and get ready. So we go back to his dad and tell him the planner told us the bill would be no more than $1. And his dad is like, great! I am comfortable with that. He does some math and, in addition to what we’re going to contribute, he decides that he will give us $0.35 if AND ONLY IF, TBU’s mom will also contribute $0.35. He mentions the alimony he had to pay her for 15 years and how his resources are not unlimited but that she has resources and money money money. Then he asks how much my family is contributing (a far larger percentage of their annual salary than you are, thankyouverymuch). Mind you this is a man of means, significant means.

So, we take this news back to TBU’s mom, we haven’t even asked her for more money (she has already commited to about $0.25 at this point, a generous and appreciated sum). We just get to the part in the story about how we liked the wedding planner’s portfolio and how, if it were possible, we’d like to have her do the wedding. THAT’S ALL WE’VE SAID when she starts bawling and screaming that from this point forward she is no longer involved in the wedding at all and that she will absolutely not give any money to a wedding planner. She said she would go to the wedding and support us and whatever but she would remove herself from any pre-wedding activities. And we are like WHAT. THE. FUCK. just happened?

She’s crying and telling us that her ex-husband is trying to control her (it’s probably true) and that he’s dicking everyone around with his moeny (again, true). Her current husband starts yelling at us, asking why we would even want a fucking wedding planner. Uuuuummm I dunno, how about not having to do any manual labor before my fucking wedding day? And then he drops the bomb (it was a bomb for me at least, others were far less affected). He says that it’s ridiculous that a groom’s mom should have to pay any money for the wedding. I immediately feel ashamed (that’s not accurate, but I don’t know how to accurately describe the exact feeling I had, however, it was terrible). So I start crying. I’m upset because the underlying theme of both of these conversations is that these people are giving money for a wedding they shouldn’t even have to pay for because my family doesn’t have the money to do it themselves. So here I am, this poor kid sitting on the patio of an extremely large house that resides on a man-made lake, where you have to pass through security gates to even get on the man made island. And not just a security gate where you enter a password, no, you have to talk to guards and they have to check your name on a list, like it’s the fucking Warner Bros lot or something. Now I’m crying and TBU’s mom thinks I’m crying because she won’t give us anymore of her money. Which is not the case. Truly, not the case. I am crying for two reasons 1. she is crying and I have a difficult time dealing with my and other people’s emotions and 2. I am being yelled at by a rich New York Jew about how my family should be paying for this and how I have to make a decision to settle things.

Oh yeah, did I mention that? That TBU’s step-dad started yelling at me to make a decision? No? Because he did. And that didn’t help me regain composure, not even a little. So I sit there silently, with tears rolling down my face, my lips quivering and trying desperately to regulate my breathing while TBU and his mom are screaming at each other and step dad is berating us for even thinking about getting a wedding planner and how I have to make a decision. Well it was pretty obvious that the decision had been made when TBU’s mom started screaming that she wasn’t giving any money if there was a wedding planner involved. They get up and walk to the end of their yard that meets with their dock, where their boat is waiting for them, bobbing up and down in the man-made lake they live on, so they can go on their nightly boat ride. We leave on our trip back to San Diego.

TBU calls his dad and says his mom won’t match his dad’s $0.35. Dad says that’s too bad and that is that. Now, I’m not upset with TBU’s dad because he won’t give us as much money as we’d need to hire the wedding planner. No, it’s his money, he worked for it and I see no reason that he should just give it away. But I am upset with him because he used our wedding as a way to control a situation with his money. He used our wedding to piss TBU’s mom off. He was being an asshole when I thought he would be excited for us. It’s complete bullshit that we know he could afford the whole cost of the wedding and has in fact offered to pay for a significant portion of it, only if TBU’s mom matched him. The only thing he was ever excited about was the opportunity to wield his bank account, probably because that’s the only thing he could wield that would cause a reaction. Fuck him. I guess (obviously) I was being naive when I thought he could rally and just be happy that his son was marrying the person he loved and who loved him back. Nope, this man is as creepy* in his head as he is on the outside. I never really liked him, but now I’m just going to avoid him. At this point I really don’t want his money, it would just make things mucky and gross. Like really, he won’t give a measly $0.35 when he was comfortable with $2 beforehand? You’ve played your cards dude now the only thing you’re doing is confirming that you’re an asshole. Congratulations! No one fucking likes you! There are more infuriating details but that is enough for now.

*One of many, many creepy things (including repeatedly commenting on my looks and staring at me like a pedophile) he’s done happened the day before this all went down. He came in from the pool in his speedo and sat down on the arm of a chair so that I was eye level with his geriatric junk. Then after a series of unfortunate inquiries on TBU’s part he went out to the street STILL IN HIS SPEEDO and put on a helmet, wrist guards and a fanny pack (we still don’t know why the fanny pack) and proceeded to demonstrate this device for us:

So please imagine a 70-ish man, in a speedo, a helmet, wristguards and a fucking fanny pack doing that in a rather upscale neighborhood. I could not make this stuff up I am not nearly creative or high enough. This man is a fucking loon.

Oh yeah and the wedding theme is Dirty Dancing. No joke, the best movie ever is the theme of my wedding, we have invites and shot glasses and everything. It’s going to be awesome, a little low budget, but awesome.

First dance to this? Or this? I love the chola clowns in the second one. You don’t really think this one do you? You fucking purist, although it is a good one. If Swayze dies before the wedding I swear I’ll include this one