Things I Don't Understand

• Who decides the rules for how shit is written?  Someone recently told me that you aren't supposed to put 2 spaces after your periods anymore, only 1 space. What?  Who decides this?  My thumbs are absolutely trained to stab that space bar twice after every period, and I'm not sure I'll ever be able to stop it.  
• Speaking of this, twice in the last 7 years the rules for commas have changed.  From the time I learned to write, it was all "apples COMMA oranges COMMA and bananas"...then I had this job where they were all "nono, now it's apples COMMA oranges and bananas" and that was really hard to me to change but I did.  And then 2 years ago, someone scolded me that it was back to the first way.  WTF punctuation, make up your damn mind.
• Why is it that sometimes hot dog buns sometimes can hang out in my pantry for a seemingly endless amount of time without molding and sometimes they mold within 15 seconds of coming home from the grocery store?
• Why doesn't the toaster toast the bread equally on each side?  And why can't I remember which side gets hotter when I put bagels in there?
• Why hasn't someone come up with a genius diaper genie where you can use grocery bags instead of those SUPER EXPENSIVE diaper genie refills?  I hate those things.  Paying nearly $6 for the refills pains me in my cheap little heart.  

A new kind of belly story

Last Wednesday, I turned 32.  Nothing particularly exciting about that year, no real landmark event.  However, I grew up in a family that always went apeshit for birthdays, so I was happy to get so much love and well wishes from everyone.  The beauty of Facebook, right? 

This is going to be a pretty incredible year for me because I'm going to be getting pregnant.  With someone else's baby(ies).  Huh?  Yeah.  I'm going to be a gestational surrogate. 

Deep breath.

That's right.  In about 2 months, doctors are going to transfer 2 embryos with the hopes of twins for a lovely couple. Whoooaaaaa, right?  I have to say, I'm pretty much absolutely stoked about this. 

Okay, so I'll go ahead and answer the questions I always get:

FAQ 1:
How did you ever think to do something like this?
8 years ago, my best friend was diagnosed with breast cancer (at age 24).  Because of the aggressive chemo and radiation that was in her future, they recommended that she freeze her eggs.  She always joked, "Well, if I can't get pregnant, you'll carry my babies, right?"  "Yes, yes, yes," I always said.  Well, she's happy and healthy 8 years later, but still not ready for kids.  But that seed was planted.  Over the last couple of years, it's been a nagging little itch in my head.  Mike was pretty adamant about getting the snip-snip only weeks after we'd had Will....and although I was definitely fine with the no-more-kids part, I was ridiculously sad about the no-more-pregnancy part.  That's bizarre, right?  I can't really explain it, but I just loved being pregnant.  Even though I had pretty terrible morning all day sickness with both of our boys, I just find the whole thing to be magical and amazing - especially birth.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not some zen master momma who breathed through labor without pain meds - no way, I was epidural'ed up with both.  (After what I felt was a commendable many, many hours med-free).  It's just so fucking amazing, you know?  Anyway, so over the last several months, the prospect of surrogacy kept popping up in my life - I'd read a blog, or a news article, or someone would bring it up.  And so finally, I started researching and then took the plunge of applying to an agency.  It feels so right and like something I am completely meant to do.

FAQ 2:
What does your husband think about this?
The night that I finally told him that I'd been looking at different agencies and I really wanted to apply, he said "Yeah, this doesn't surprise me at all," calm as can be.  That's SO Mike.  Calm as can be.  He is so totally supportive and even a little excited for us to jump in to this adventure.

FAQ 3:
How are you going to talk to your kids about this?
This is something I'm actually really excited about doing, but we haven't done it yet.  Will (2 years old) isn't really going to understand much, but Finn (5) is going to be well aware that I'm pregnant, and what the typical outcome of pregnancy is. We bought a book called The Kangaroo Pouch and it's about a kangaroo mama who carries a baby for a couple who can't...and it's the whole family's job to care and love for the baby until it's all grown so they can give it to it's family.  It's simplistic (of course) but I have a feeling that my sweet and aware little guys are going to get a lot out of this experience. We are going to wait to tell them until I'm actually pregnant since several months can seem like several years for the preschool brain, so I think it'll be better to share it when it's actually happening. 

FAQ 4:
Isn't is going to be hard to give the baby away after you carry it for 9 months?
No.  Not even a little bit.  Because it's not my baby. The couple is using an egg donor and their sperm (oh, did I mention it's a gay couple?  Fuck, yeah). So it's not mine in any way, I'm just doing the growing part.  Mike and I are so insanely blessed with our boys and also insanely DONE having kids, so the idea of helping another couple with their dream of having kids is pretty freakin fantastic.  Although you never really know until you're there, I don't think it's going to be hard at all - and the agency and past surrogates I've spoken to all say that it's harder to say goodbye to the intended parents than to the baby because you've spent the past year developing a relationship with them. 

FAQ 5:

A gay couple, huh?
Yes, two guys.  There is pretty much no better way to shout from the rooftops my absolute belief in equal rights for all.  I'm so happy to help them become dads. 

FAQ 6:
Did you say two embryos?  So you might carry twins?  Are you crazy?
Yes, yes I am. 

Honestly, I get about 100 more questions, but these are the ones that I get over and over.  Given my track record of blogging, I probably shouldn't make any grandiose statements, but I want to chronicle this crazy journey here.  This is a going to be seriously awesome belly story :)

Dusty fingers

Oh man. I hate that I'm going to do this. But...I'm going to do this. I'm going to be that blogger who stops posting for a long time and then comes back and then disappears AGAIN (urrrmmm right around 13 months to be sort of exact) and then comes back all "OMG I'm back!" But...OMG I'm back!

Okay, so what's been happening the last year? So glad you asked. To follow up from my last post, the universe did indeed NOT give me what I asked for. My husband didn't get that job or the 3 others he interviewed for after that. As the months passed by, all of my very worst traits came blazing out as I harped on him for not applying for enough jobs in the right way in the right time. I would send him 20 jobs a week and basically just harp on him and be annoying and impatient and ridiculous. And I would say to myself "stop being so annoying and impatient and ridiculous" and yet. So, it makes total sense that he ended up getting the job that he found on his own despite (and obviously not because of) my bullshit. He's been working at this new company for nearly 6 weeks and I'm not exaggerating when I say that it's been pretty magical. Because:

1. He's home in the evenings and on the weekends now as opposed to working most nights and EVERY weekend. This is beyond a game changer for us.
2. He likes what he does - what a concept, eh? He feels challenged and engaged and is surrounded by like minded people.
3. There's not really a third thing, but two things seem too little for as huge of a deal that this is.

Okay, so then there's the kids. Nothing real new per se, but they are just really fucking amazing and I sort of have to pinch myself that these little creatures are mine. Finn turns 5 on Wednesday and Will turned 2 in November. They are at this really magical spot where they can communicate and play and I even find the fighting sort of endearing. Okay, not really. But they are just really cool and it's exciting to watch Finn come home from school talking about ecosystems and ant hierarchy and shit (seriously, did we learn about that stuff when we were 4/5?) and Will following him around like he's a god.

Then there's my job, which continues to be sort of a dream come true. My boss is the bomb, I'm challenged, and I love what I do. Not sure what else to say about that, except to just say that although I've learned my lesson that I'm not irreplaceable, I really think this gig is going to last a long time for me.

So then there's this other sorta crazy big news that I want to start writing about really soon. It's the reason that I've come wandering back to this blog. I need a place to talk about what's going on. So, that's coming really soon. I just need to get my bearings a little bit. Allow me to dust off my rusty blogging fingers and I'll dive in soon.

The Light

As I mentioned yesterday, my husband graduated college after many, many, many years and sidetracks, and giving ups, and life getting in the way of life. Also for those many, many, many years, he has held the same job as a manager of a national chain grocery store. This has offered a decent salary and pretty great benefits...but it's also offered the crappiest schedule ever for a family who actually wants to hang out with each other. He has two days off during the week. On the bright side, has allowed him to watch the kids and become a pretty fantastic and confident dad. On the other hand, this means that we almost never get to have an entire day off together. He also often works shifts in the evening. This means a lot of solo days/nights of solo parenting for me. And not too much couple togetherness for us.

So now that he's a fancy new grad, he has started the official job hunt. Last week, he was brought in to take an exam for a company to see if they'd even let him interview. He passed, and had his first interview today. It went great. This is more and more seeming like one of those dreamy dream jobs that comes along once in a lifetime where they pay good, amazing benefits, a bajillion days off a year, and they will meticulously train him in his exact chosen field for a frakkin year before they expect him to be able to do things by himself. For a 30-something dude who is starting out fresh after working 20 years in customer service, this is pretty amazing stuff. He wants this job so so so so so so bad and holy god, if he doesn't get it, it's gonna get all kinds of ugly up in our house. I have that motherly holding my breath *omg i want this to work out SO bad* thing going on....and not just for the changes it will bring to my life, but for all the things it will do to/for him....his self-esteem, getting to experience a REAL job, working with NORMAL non-16 year old people. Have you ever really looked at the people working in grocery stores? Around 94% of them are...off.

I've been putting out some serious vibes to the universe, begging and pleading to the powers that be. C'mon, universe. We need this one.

Recap

So, it's January now. Okay, then.

How did NaNoWriMo go, you wonder? I got about 463 words in before I realized I was most definitely not having fun. I wasn't enjoying any part of the process, and checking the word count after each sentence, as if it was going to be 50,000 words after a couple of days. It reminded me of writing papers in college and the entire time, the voice inside my head is grumbling about all the other things I'd rather be doing, including cleaning the kitchen. I think when I'd rather be scrubbing the grout in my floor tile, that I should reevaluate the project that I'm doing for fun. Plus, I read this article that said even though some things may seem obvious (i like to write, i write for my job, i'm okay at it, so I should write a book...) sometimes it just takes you down a path (...but what i really like is telling a story, but not through the written word) and you realize that a series of events in leading you down a different path to what you really love. So, I'm working on flushing that out.

Also in November, my baby turned one. And my husband graduated college after taking classes for 20 (twenty) (yes, i know) years.

And then this funny thing happened. I realized I LOVE my job. Prior to this, when a friend would ask how I'm liking it, I would say "It's good. A solid job. Cool people" and that was about it. "Sooo, you don't like it?" they would ask. "No, no! It's good." Then, they would do that "MMMkay" thing with their eyebrows and we'd move on to the next subject. But all of a sudden, I think all that residual anger over being laid off from my last job finally went away and I realized "Oh, holy shit! This job is freaking awesome." Seriously - a great salary, a flexible schedule, an interesting work load, an amazing smart boss who wants me to move up and make more money and always has my back, cool coworkers who I get along with wonderfully, and (recent development) my own office.

It's becoming more and more obvious how ridiculously lucky that I am.

A start

At lunch the other day, my mom and I were reminiscing about some of my more ridiculous teenage behavior. She brought up the time that I glued 100 pennies to the windowsill in my room and how I was utterly perplexed at her displeasure.

I laughed and said, "You were very tolerant."

She laughed, but then stopped, looked me in the eyes and said, "Well, so were you, so we are even."

We looked at each order, both of our mouths turning up into slightly awkward smiles and our brains each conjuring up different alcohol infused memories. Although she had apologized when I visited her in rehab over 3 years ago, this was the first time she had ever made a statement like that. In that moment, my heart itched - not comfortable, but not bad either. I guess that's what healing feels like.

7 Days Away

{ Elisa Nelissen }

The bell chimes announcing the tram is arriving. It pulls up and the doors slide open on the opposite side, letting the passengers out. Tears prick my eyes because I want to be arriving, not leaving. I only have two more days, but my homesickness is at it's peak and I'm having a hard time keeping it together. The last 5 days were intense; 18 hour days in front of clients, most of those hours on my feet and with a smile plastered on my face. I had to be on at all times- helpful, knowledgeable, "can-do".

I step off the tram onto my terminal and detour into the bathroom. I pick a stall far from the door and pull the breast pump out of my luggage. It's jammed into my carry-on, taking up most of the room, not leaving much space for clothes. I waste time on my phone while sitting on the toilet, pumping. Will is going to be one soon, but I'm desperate to breastfeed exclusively like I did with Finn. I don't get much milk, only 3 ounces and I feel frustrated. So much work and I'm barely keeping up. Such a theme of my life right now. Running nonstop, yet achieving so little beyond the daily tasks. I want to take pictures and make videos and write. But by the time the kids are asleep and the dishes are dry, sleep is the only thing that sounds good.

My pants are slightly wet near the pocket after I leave the bathroom. My fingers rub over the spot again and again. I trace the outline and think about my life. I drag my nail against the denim, and I can see the fibers fray.

Chasing

{the trial}

I will start doing the things that scare me. I will take the chances that I know I am ready for. I will accept the amazing things that are being offered to me.

I am going to do NaNoWriMo, so excuse me if my next few posts are endlessly random, as I am trying to push myself to write. I have an idea for a book. I've HAD an idea for a book for months now, but have done nothing with it. So, fuck it. I'm going to get it out.