everyday life and other joyful fiascos
I have struggled with anxiety for most of my life, as I realized when personal crisis brought it all to a head. I got a therapist, some medication, and a big toolbox of strategies for dealing with anxiety in my daily life.
How long can I get away with calling it “baby weight” until it’s just weight? Not that I have to “get away” with anything. I don’t owe anyone but myself an explanations about anything pertaining to my body.
Continue reading “When “Baby Weight” Overstays Its Welcome: New Me vs. Old Me”Two weeks before the miscarriage, the doctor showed us the lovely beating heart of our week seven fetus. Then she turned to me and said, “Gina, I’m concerned.” She said a lot of things after that about the size of the yolk sac relative to the other measurements and what this almost inevitably meant for the baby.
Miscarriage. Soon. But not yet.
My parenting anxieties are mercifully mild compared to my general social anxieties. Can’t worry about absolutely everything all the time, now can we? When it comes to being a mother, I’m pretty confidant that I am a solidly “good enough” mother. I don’t know all the answers and I mess up plenty, but I’m usually able to soldier on in spite of the certainty that I’m fucking my kids at least a little even though I’m doing my best.
But this morning, I think I got something right! Like, really right. It was my reaction to a challenge we’ve faced many times with my son (and usually had little success.) He’s just turned six and he’s too damn smart for us sometimes, so he often outwits us and himself when we try to help him calm down from his tendency to quick, hot, unrelenting rage strokes about relatively minor things.
Continue reading “I think I did a parenting thing right!”My six-year-old son has not had time to develop any of the insecurities about writing I’ve spent years perfecting. He just turned six and he’s only just learning to write, but I’m pretty sure he’s well ahead of me on the path to publication.
“Sweetie Bird” has been writing and illustrating his book, (not even his first book, but certainly his most serious effort to date,) for a week or so now and he’s definitely onto something. The story had been brewing in his young mind for a couple of years. As far as he knows, all it takes to be a writer is to write. Why didn’t I know that FFS?
So, I invested in a “Time In Toolkit” by Generation Mindful * back in December. The three people in our family who can talk need some help emoting intelligently, so I was very excited when it came in the mail.
Continue reading “Emotional Intelligence: Work in Progress…”I have a six-month-old. Well, six and a half, as of this writing. As her mother, I can tell you she is gorgeous and incredibly charming and we waited so long for her. I adore looking at her. It’s hard to tear my eyes away from her. It took three years to get her to stick and now that she’s here, she is growing so fast. Just so damn fast. I don’t remember my son growing so fast, although I’m sure he did. But I am older now, so perhaps my perceptions have changed.
When I look at my daughter, I think about my own mortality. I was once a baby like her – not nearly as mind-blowingly beautiful and sweet – all head and cheeks and eyes, everything round and bulging. That was so long ago, but in the blink of an eye, she could be having the same thoughts about her own child.
Continue reading “Till There Was You: Nostalgia & Mortality”My daughter had an ultrasound a couple days ago. Just as a precaution against possible gallstones that could be painful if they decided to make a break for it. The procedure was scheduled for 12:30 pm and stipulated no food after 8:30 am.
Four hours without food for a six month old is not such a big deal, and yet, anxiety. That persistent, full-body, frantic buzzing feeling that will last until the perceived potential “crisis” is over.
Continue reading “Knock, Knock! It’s me, Anxiety!”It’s a new year – new-ish, anyway. There’s a new, female-er, progressive-er, more representative congress, thank gods! New Mueller indictments are coming down the pipe. It’s a six-foot sewer pipe. Lewis CK is digging himself a deeper darker hole to crawl into and rot than we ever thought possible, and millions of women in India are standing up to demand gender equality for themselves and their daughters. RBG is mercifully still kickin’ it on the bench (even if she did miss oral arguments for surgery today for the first time in 25 years,) and a big beautiful freshWOman cohort has just been sworn into congress. Some things are looking promisingly good in 2019, after two long years of increasingly horrid OMGWTF moments. Also – Cyntonia Brown got clemency today and is going to be free soon! Fuck yeah!
Continue reading “New Year – I’m Quitting Fear”This post’s purpose is twofold. First, to share what was for me, a groundbreaking method to override my internal monologue and get to sleep or back to sleep. Second, to sing the praises of the men who make it possible every night: Ben Aaronovitch, writer of my favorite series and Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, narrator of the audio version of the books. It’s a kind of open love/thank you note to both of them. I owe them so many hours of blissful sleep, and should this missive ever reach them, I just want them to know how much they mean to me.
Continue reading “This is how I sleep at night: Anxiety & Insomnia”Long story short, my husband Fab and I had zero trouble conceiving our son, Sweetie Bird. Then we tried for our second child for almost three years. I had a devastating miscarriage in the middle of that period, but after lots and lots of expensive interventions, we got lucky. Our daughter, Baby Bird, is now four months old and we are thrilled beyond words to have her in our family.
I wish I had known more about infertility and loss before I was neck-deep in it. I hope that the following non-exhaustive list of infertility dos and don’ts will bring you some comfort in a trying time.
Continue reading “The DOs & DON’Ts of Infertility & Pregnancy Loss”