one lucky momma…

On May 24th 2001 we found out all of our hard work had paid off…  Never was I so thrilled to pee on my hand (now, 15 years later they make a more ‘user-friendly’ pregnancy test, go figure….).  I know what you’re thinking but trust me when I say – yes, 8 months of trying to get pregnant is hard work; around month 5 or 6 we wondered if we’d ever bump uglies just for fun again….

I walked outta the bathroom and said something along the lines of, “Happy 4th anniversary, we’re pregnant!  Which might explain my eating habits of late…” then I turned back into the bathroom and muttered, “…asshole.”  (did you honestly think news of even THIS magnitude would have any less Dan/Karenism about it?)

3(?), 4(?) days earlier we had gone out to dinner to celebrate the last of our pharmacy school exams and the impending graduation ceremony, on our way home I said, “geez I didn’t eat much but maybe that had something to do with the 6 pieces of cheese I scarfed down before we left.”  And Dan (who I might add… NEVER, N.E.V.E.R. mentions my eating, my weight, my pants size) chose this moment to say, “Ya know… you wonder why you are gaining weight.  You can’t drink one of those Tim Horton frozen drinks as much as you do and gorge yourself on cheese and then complain about your pants being tight.”  If you know Dan, you know that 100% of the time he will say the wrong thing at the wrong time with absolutely NO WAY of knowing it was the wrong time.

I guess, it really should come as no surprise he criticized my eating for the first (and only) time EVER when I was in the throes of pregnancy cravings…  Of course I didn’t know I was pregnant either but I did know Dan was gonna pay and PAY BIG for this transgression (to be honest – he was right! I complained constantly about my weight but never worked on fixing it… doesn’t matter – he called me fat when I was selflessly forming a life).  We didn’t speak for the next few days – it was in the midst of those days that we graduated from pharmacy school.  That’s right – we busted our asses getting that R.Ph. behind our names and we weren’t even speaking when we graduated – we have nary a picture of the 2 of us in our caps and gowns…  I should write a book.

That poor bastard…  anybody who knows him probably can’t believe he’d even make a comment like that, those same people are giving the “of course” nod in regard to the timing of that statement….

We eventually started talking again (hahaha this hasn’t always provided positive aftereffects for Dan) and began living our life as pharmacy school grads and parents-to-be.  The first order of business was our graduation party, during which we announced our good news to the world. My mom was over.the.moon. she rushed up to where we were standing, all tears and smiles and hugged us both with everything she had in her.  My father, on the other hand, walked up, looked at Dan’s extended hand and said, “You want me to shake your hand ’cause you fucked my daughter?”

touching

For the record we had been married for 4 years.  To this day we THINK he was just being dad, making a joke to hide his emotion… but there’s that little part of me that wonders if he wasn’t a titch disgusted by it all….

and then — there was Alex.

Cal was pretty uneventful.  He was a scheduled C-section – I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned Dan’s carrying on the morning of said C-section because we’d had a snow storm during the night and he had to go clear the driveway.  “Well… uh… I’m about to go have my stomach cut open and a person pulled out so, yeah… if you don’t mind clearing the driveway, that’d be great…” 3 hours later when Dan said, “It’s a boy!” I started bawling and he said, “are you happy?”  I was sobbing so hard I could barely choke out, “I was afraid I wouldn’t love it if it was a girl….” another shining Karen moment.

Abby tried to suck the life out of me from the get-go.  During her pregnancy I’d have a weird feeling in my lower back, Dan always wanted me to get it checked out – but how? it would happen randomly and without warning.  Anyway, fast forward to the morning of the C-section… as they were cutting our little Demon Spawn from my body, I got that lower back feeling and mentioned it to Dan; at the same moment we heard, “We’re losing her…  get the anesthesiologist!!!”  A tray of instruments hit the ground as a nurse sternly instructed another nurse to, “get the anesthesiologist NOW!” and my obstetrician shouted, “Her heart rate is at 33 WHERE IS THE ANESTHESIOLOGIST???”  I looked at Dan in my personal drugged up bit of heaven and said, “is it a boy or girl?”  Dan, with a sheer look of terror on his face, said, “I’m a little more concerned about you right now than what the sex of our baby is…”  (pretty sure the look of terror was less about losing me and more about being left alone with those 3 kids…).  A dose of epinephrine later  and we got to enjoy the news of another little girl joining our ranks… (I’ve made no secret of the fact I only wanted boys… I also make no secret of the fact I wouldn’t trade those 2 amazing girls for all the boys in China…)

I begged and begged and begged for my doctor to let me do #3 by natural means; he refused because of my 2 prior C-sections – he told us afterward she’d have never made it through a vaginal birth, her umbilical cord was exceptionally short and wrapped around her neck… (I was hoping to get through this entire blog without using any variation of the word vagina… sorry ’bout that).

The labor-intensive trip to our first pregnancy, the early-term miscarriage before Cal and the near-death experience of birthing Abby and Dan was out on the “let’s have our own baseball team” plan (he’s such a quitter).  I do agree with him that we are incredibly lucky to have 3 extraordinarily healthy kids and with each subsequent attempt we’d be upping our chances of ruining our streak… so we stopped at 3.

Today my kids (and husband) are celebrating me as ‘Mom’ – what they don’t know is… everyday, with every silly joke, every good grade, every time they step onto a field, a court, a gymnastics mat, every time they say “I love you,” every time they give me a hug, a smile, grab my hand, every time they ask me “how was your day momma?” every time they look into my eyes and tell me something about themselves, they are celebrating me.  I’ve been told I have an ‘odd’ parenting style – can’t really say whether that was a compliment or not…  I don’t sugar coat things with my kids – if they’re being assholes, I tell them they’re being assholes, if they are getting a little swell-headed, I bring them back down to earth…  I swear in front of them but don’t condone any kind of questionable language from them (“when can I say s-u-c-k mom?  my friends laugh at me because I can’t…”  “hahahaha well you’re supposed to say it with your friends and then lie and tell me you don’t…”).  I shout, “BRICK” when they throw up a mess of a shot in basketball and I repeatedly reassure them that I don’t really like them all that much (“mom can I have a friend over?” “WHAT? I don’t like other people’s kids, hell I don’t even like you guys…”).  Lucky for me, my kids see through me and seem to love me all the more for it…

I, like most moms, get a Mother’s Day gift everyday – many times a day, none of which are material in nature.  Don’t get me wrong – this here MacBook Air laptop thingy Dan just gave me this morning is a welcome material expression of his gratitude (after all, he put in about 97 seconds TOTAL for all 3 while I spent months making them and had to have them surgically removed…).

So far I’ve been showered with balloons and kid-made confetti, I’ve received a painting from Abby, a poem and chocolate chip pancakes from Alex and a solo trumpet performance of The Rocky fanfare from Cal, which he learned yesterday for this very occasion (Alex followed up with a bari-sax rendition of the opening song of Beauty and the Beast).  My kids are immersed in the arts!!!  My absolute negligible knowledge of music is overshadowed by my unabashed awe of my kids’ talent.  I sat here and cried listening to them play – I love watching my kids do anything!

All that’s left is the family trip to the track and a visit to the cemetery.  I’m not a cemetery kind of person.  I get ZERO comfort when I’m there; what I do get are mini panic attacks.  I go for special occasions and a rare trip here and there to give the kids a connection so that they will visit when they are older.  The first visit after the funeral was very emotional for me and I think it sorta upset the kids to see me crying, now when we get out and stand at the headstone they all just look at me, wide eyed and nervous – it’s, uh, completely awkward.  Of course, nothing will ever erase the memory of that first family visit…

There I stood, tears streaming down my face, my breath was quick and shallow and I was closing in on an ER-sized panic attack when Abby (5 at the time) looked at me and said, “Momma, is Lalee’s head in there with her body?”

She’s always had a way of changing the feel of a moment……….