Waiting for Little A

It has happened - I have fallen in love.

The first time I held Alana, my feelings were more protective than joyful. I mean, I was sedated and nearly traumatized by the pain; that first night in the hospital, my acts of love were staying awake for her and holding her in a comfortable position so she could feed. I was so confused, and amazed, because I kept thinking that I didn’t know what to do - but my body responded differently, instinctively to my baby’s needs.

I don’t know when it happened that I was just overcome with emotion for her. After the instincts became part of nature, I suppose, I suddenly began to process feeling. Maybe it took two weeks - more or less. Maybe it was the task of dressing her up everyday in cute outfits, or waking up to find her in an odd position with a content look on her face, or even the ease of changing her diaper despite my previous dread. This is so very strange, but good!

Now here I am. I take pictures of her with the same facial expression over and over again. I am becoming a morning person, and I mean a 6 o’ clock in the morning person kind of morning person. My favorite smell is the smell of her hair and I am endlessly fascinated by her little nose, her little chin.

I am so excited for life! It’s so ridiculous how everything has turned out, but I’m so happy.

Today is a good day.

I’ve been meaning to update this blog since my daughter was born - God knows all the thoughts I’ve had and been meaning to write down - but I never got to it. Right now, though, I’m overwhelmed by a sense of calm that just needs to be acknowledged: today was a good day.

And the days have been good for almost 8 weeks now, almost two months. (Of course I still get cranky, and so does the baby, but those days passed.) I had this mantra when I was pregnant, “things get better little by Little A”. I had to change, deal with, and let go of so many things during that time - never easy, so there were days I didn’t believe it, but that mantra has proven true after all. Things are better; the keyword being “little”.

Honestly, motherhood feels different from a month ago. It wasn’t love at first sight - not to say there wasn’t love when I saw my baby for the first time, but I was honestly still miserable with the pain of childbirth. Now, though, almost 11 months since conception, I am finally beginning to see what makes all that worth it. (Yes, it’s taken this long. If it was sooner you can call me on talking bull.)

Next week, I’ll have a 2-month old baby. If you think about it - yeah I may have lost some things because of my reality, but I made a new friend, literally.

We deep fried a 14-pounder for Thanksgiving and dolled it up with an assortment of colorful fresh fruits for dinner. So this is how you Americans do it!

Among other things, I’m thankful my due date is before Christmas because I have been in a food coma since last night. Today is only Friday and this weekend is going to be filled with leftovers from that feast. I have no will to exercise at all. I can’t imagine what weight gain I would experience if I was pregnant during the holidays!

I had an awesome first Thanksgiving celebration, and I’m glad we decided to deep fry that birdie. It was all sorts of tasteful and juicy, mmm-hmm.

This is a good piece of journalism by Patricia Evangelista. Unfortunately for Andi Eigenmann she was public property and so many spreads made it easy to judge her. Here, however, we have a level-headed perspective to humanize showbiz Andi. I don’t agree with everything she said in the video, but really, good for her - keeping her baby and having the chance to be well-represented on her case.

I’ve only been (near-)sane because I set boundaries with regard to my situation. I decided not to owe anyone an explanation; if you didn’t find out from me, it’s because I didn’t think it was important whether you found out or not. In the course of this incident, I was very much prepared to lose people and make changes in my life. That’s just me, though. Who knows where peace of mind ends and defense mechanisms begin with my approach? We’ll see.

There are actually a lot of problems to tackle with the issue - engaging in pre-marital sex, having a baby out of wedlock, considering abortion, etc. - and I don’t have the energy to discuss it all and be right. In any case, it just isn’t as important to me to know what other people think. The most important thing to me right now is that I am healthy - in mind and body - so that I can become a mother. It’s important to me that I take care of my relationship with my family and to really choose my friends, because they’re going to make up the world that my baby will know. I may only be 22 and not be able to drink, smoke, stay up late, be stick thin, and dye my hair; but in 9 months I can make Life.

Never hesitate to trade your cow for a handful of magic beans.

- Tom Robbins

Would I want my daughter to go through the same thing? No, but if it happens, I know that her life isn’t ruined. Supposedly, I would have been married by now if I had aborted my baby. What I want her to know is that marriage isn’t about that. 

I want her to fall in love with someone who deserves her attention and her growth. I want her to learn to be responsible for herself and for the people that she loves. I want her to feel fulfilled in her ambitions and personal goals. I want her to understand that we can all recover from getting hurt.

After this week, anytime is safe to deliver. No premature status for Alana. She will be in her full-term stages of development!

(Spot Batman.)

Pregnancy Stats:

How Far Along: 36 weeks and 6 days

Size of baby: She weighs 5.8 lbs.! She has just enough time to get into the normal 6-pound zone.

Total Weight Gain: 27 lbs.

Gender: Girl

Movement: All good. She’s still doing her yoga poses. Maybe even advanced yoga.

Sleep: Last weekend, I slept comfortably. Oh. My. God. No backache in the morning and I felt fully rested. It was wonderful.

What I miss:

My dermatologist - I want a facial treatment. The odd sleeping hours and the weather is just terrible for my skin.
My psychiatrist - I haven’t felt anything really extreme lately and I think I’ve been doing a good job balancing my life so my emotions don’t get the best of me, but I miss our sessions and the assurance that, hey, you’re really okay.
Home service massage for P300 ($6) - My God. There are no words for this absent luxury.
Working - Well, I liked my job. I was writing, and fun stuff at that, and getting paid. The people I worked with were great, too! I’ve put off trying to work (even online) until I deliver and settle into a routine with the little one just so I don’t get fall short of any commitments. I also miss making money, hehe!

Cravings: I realized that I don’t really have cravings as much as I do have preferences. This week, the preference was Nutella brownies with a raspberry on top.

Symptoms: She has really dropped. It’s so heavy down there. Changing positions to do anything is hard. I suddenly started feeling Braxton Hicks late into this week when previously I had felt none at all.

Maternity Clothes: Oh, honey, I’m wearing this belly proud because in a couple of weeks I’m going to lose it!

Best Moment this week: I had another baby shower! It was so pretty and fun.

This is my first Tumblr GPOY (with my cousin and sister, the organizers and future godmothers to Alana)

Day Nineteen: who will be with you in the delivery room?

My sister, for sure. I don’t know who else I will feel comfortable with having inside when the time comes so we’ll be playing it by ear. I just want to be encouraged and supported, and not made nervous, so it depends on the dispositions of my usually crazy family members on the day itself.

Day Eighteen: do you plan on breastfeeding?

Absolutely!

(via cleavage)

Honestly, I don’t know what kind of help I’ll need. I think my best friend during labor will be an epidural! After delivery, I will primarily be breastfeeding and co-sleeping with my little monster. I expect to do all the diaper changing and bathing and dressing up myself. (Is it really bad that I think I can do this because I was able to take care of a dog? And I picked up his stinky poop, too, and that wasn’t even from my breast milk?) I’m actually looking forward to this momma thing and making our first month, first Christmas, my 23rd birthday (in January) all about me and her! Before Life gets in the way. I guess I need people to drive me around, feed me, and watch Alana for about 2 hours just so I can get some exercise and a nice warm shower every day.

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Today is November 13. My estimated due date is December 13. The only thing scarier than that is that I can actually give birth in as early as TWO WEEKS from now.

Pregnancy Stats:

How Far Along: 35 weeks and 5 days

Size of baby: I think she’s very big and very heavy. At least that’s what it feels like. I didn’t realize it was possible to still be growing so far along!

Total Weight Gain: 27 lbs.

Gender: Girl

Movement: I think she’s doing yoga in there. Sometimes I’ll feel a leg in my rib and a butt protruding on my navel while something pushes against my pelvis. All at the same time. Whatchadoing, Little A?! She’s been getting a lot of hiccups too lately, which is always weird and funny. I think I’m going to miss being pregnant.

I mean, I can’t wait to lose all this weight and sleep on my tummy and eat salmon sashimi and be able to bend without any discomfort and finally, finally, finally have a drink - because, damn, 2011 deserves a tall shot of something lethal! - but I know I’m going to miss this: waking up miserably to a backache, shifting to lie on my other side, then feeling a shuffle of movement in this humongous belly. My God, I am going to be a mother.

I don’t know why the Universe or Nature or Circumstance or God - whatever church you go to - has enabled the fate of motherhood to befall me now, at this time in my life. I did have plans of being a mom, but in a more conventional predicament. (Yes, after my teenage years of pseudo art, angst, and rebellion, I hoped to have a “conventional predicament”!) It is just ridiculous that I should be a mother seeing that I can’t determine when I was crazier: before when I was drinking, or now that I haven’t had a drop of alcohol for nearly 9 months!

These sober 9 months have allowed me to think though - Life isn’t just about me anymore. In the great scheme of things, my baby has to be born now, at this point of the world’s life, and it really isn’t all about me. This is a new life force, you know? In her little brain, new ideas will be formed. She’ll have influence, energy; the ability to create; the capacity to love… Literally and unfathomably all that jazz.

That’s what Alana and this pregnancy and all the changes are probably telling me right now.

Sleep: I’m lucky if I can have more than 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep. I wake up to pee, or drink water, or turn to the other side (which requires Herculean effort!), or because my body temperature just heated up. It’s something I want to do, but can’t. It’s a half-miserable experience.

What I miss: Wakeboarding. Muay Thai. Bending :( The past week was suddenly so tiring but so sadly not restful! Of course it made me miss all the physical activities I used to do with ease and now seem like acts of Olympic standards - like tying my shoe laces.

Cravings: I chose pepperoni Hot Pockets over strawberry Pop Tarts at the grocery this week!

Symptoms: Swelling in hands, mood swings, backaches, fatigue, peeing thrice in an hour, and the beginning of waddling :(

Maternity Clothes: Rubber shoes are a must! Nothing is comfortable anymore. I also wore some clothes I wore when I was four months pregnant. Back then I didn’t even look pregnant! And now it’s really like, bel-lehhh. Pregnancy is so weird on the body, man!!! I don’t think I’ve been as overwhelmed with changes as I have been with these last few weeks, though.

Best Moment this week: I’ve been putting off washing Alana’s clothes and other activities that have a sense of nesting to them for my 36th week of pregnancy. Then I realized, I am going to be 36 weeks into my pregnancy this week! I’ll be full term next week! Alana is going to get here so soon!!!

1. A lot of the stuff I got from the internet were mostly just basic tips that were later elaborated by my own mom and sister, but these blogs and websites have been so much help:

Project Baby - Kristin, the new mom to baby Tinsley, is gorgeous! I really love that she was able to look good while being pregnant, and look great so soon after too. I also really appreciate that she talks about God, that she was able to infuse her pregnancy experience with her faith and devotion to Christ without making her blog cheesy or preachy. It’s really easy to relate with what she writes and she makes young mommahood sound like so much fun!

Baby Center and What To Expect are both great resources for soon-to-be moms. I’m so happy there are websites with their archive of articles: easy to read, straight to the point, offering other links for further reading. I also bought the What To Expect pregnancy book, and app, having absolute fun with both. (Shameless plug: I actually wrote an article about pregnancy apps! Click here.) I found videos of child birth on Baby Center too! I’ve been so preoccupied with that lately.

2. My Mom and I don’t have the best relationship in the world. We didn’t talk for maybe 3 months after she found out I was pregnant, and we still disagree on a lot of things with regard to what I’m experiencing, what I’m planning. But her supportive advice, when she started giving it, has been invaluable. I mean, she did go through five unmedicated births.

She has reminded me that no matter what I’ve heard about labor and child birth, I’ll never be able to predict how mine will go. I’ve been holding on to that thought especially now that I’m so close to delivering a baby of my own. I’m definitely more athletic than she is (haha) so I think if she was able to get through her labor experiences, the physical preparations I’ve been making might help me. Mom has also taken care of so much of Alana’s clothes, the renovations to my room, and next year she’ll be my #1 consultant for the nanny issue.

3. My sister has been with me since I suspected I was pregnant and she has helped me learn a lot of things since that fateful day in April. From tough love to open communication, she’s helped me go through the different stages of working through the pregnancy.

She was one of the main reasons giving birth in LA became a feasible and appealing option, making me realize the long-term benefits for Alana’s future. She has two children of her own - Sam, 6, and Joaquin, 3.

(Sam is a little of an internet viral known as the “Say Frog Baby”.)

Most of my confidence as a soon-to-be young and single mom comes from her. She’s been able to assure me that I will know what to do when I have my baby, that I can trust myself to make the best decisions for Alana. It’s also been easy to talk to her about the symptoms I encounter as I progress into my pregnancy, especially since some things seem to be genetic.