Week 12 Grumbles

       I'm done with my first trimester! I feel good, like spring-break-driveway-car-wash good. Hey everyone, come see how good I feel! I'm going to vacuum the carpets today, and that's saying something. I'm even going to make a baking soda/essential oil carpet sprinkle so my house will smell like a minty wild orange rosemary phenomenon! I shall then cook a buffalo. I shall use every part I have, just like my ancestors. I'm thinking buffalo noodle casserole burgers and a pelt for the little one. I'll make yard art out of that squiggly bit nobody really knows what to do with.


       Okay, I kid I kid. I don't have a whole buffalo ready to slaughter in my back yard. However, I do have a portion of pre-slaughtered buffalo which I intend to cook and eat tonight.

       It's my favorite land animal to eat. I've never had it but I can already tell because I'm Texan and like most Texans who can trace their family history back 3 or 4 generations, I come from that Native Stock. I get all sacred feeling when I hear gut chants and hide drums, and my instinct tells me to dance in the rain and thank the earth for its stuff. So I'm certain I'll love this buffalo eating thing.


       Right, so off the novelty food subject and back to the pregnancy grumbles! I can definitely tell a difference in my belly now. At this point it just looks like I have a little pot belly under my clothes, which I'm enjoying since I saw pulp fiction when I was little girl and have romanticized the pot belly since then. From the side it's all mini baby bump-ish though.

(Sorry about the picture quality. My regular camera is lost and my phone is terribly uneducated.)

       Even Mars can tell the difference. I stepped out of the shower the other day and he excitedly proclaimed, "You look like a bowling pin!" 

       I gave him that look I give people when they say something so foot-in-mouthy that it's absolutely comical, even darling.
       He tries to save himself. "I mean, yunno, a bowling pin with boobs...."
       Now I'm fluently snickering, thinking a bowling pin with boobs...that is SUCH a keeper. 
       He should have given up then but instead he kept going...like he does. "What I mean to say is you look pregnant."
       I'm still laughing. "Yes, I realize."
       "And it's beautiful." He then exits the bathroom leaving me to go awwwww as I finish drying off.


       Other than physical appearance I'm feeling a lot less lethargic and sicky and haterish. We went to Mars's aunt's birthday party last night....we'll call her Auntie M. She and her husband are absolutely wonderful people. So kind and loving, open and honest, outgoing and social, intelligent and cheerful. The Irish have this wonderful saying that constant cheerfulness is a sign of wisdom, and this is what I think of when I think of them. We always have such a good time over there. That being said...good heavens is Auntie M affectionate, especially when she's been drinking. Her and her sister, Mars's other aunt who we don't see as often (let's call her AC), were constantly feeling me up. I went ahead and told my personal space bubble to float on, that'd I'd pick it back up on the way home. I mean my little belly was rubbed from the side, from the front, from the back, held, hugged, jiggled, and kissed. Out of the 6 hours we were there, I was being touched for 4 of them. I could take that, but I was about to speak out against the baby talking.


       I hate baby talking. It freaks me out. Babies are humans with language intelligence. Making noises at them is one thing, it's silly, but constantly talking to them like "a-buj-a-bee-bo lu-lu-lu a-di-ma-ni ahhhh" is stupid. I think too much of it makes babies stupid, especially when a baby voice is used when regular words come out of the adult baby speaker's mouth. What is with it?! Why oh why oh why? I'll certainly not dumb myself down for my baby. No, I'll probably even speak to it in an aristocratic British accent so I'll sound smarter. I'll speak to it in a Scots accent every time I drink scotch (or a pint of anything) and a French accent every time I take it apparel shopping. We'll use a Mexican accent when we buy meat and an Icelandic accent when we do crafts. No baby accents! I was only really annoyed because AC was constantly talking to me in the baby voice, making baby noises at me like...because I'm growing a baby, somehow that makes me a baby. After a couple of hours of it all I could think was please, for-the-love-of-GOD get out of my face, stop fondling me and talk to me like I'm the fully grown woman I am!


       But I didn't say that. I'm too nice. Instead I opted to spend an hour in the bathroom because all the belly rubbing moved my bowels too quickly so I ended up with a massive belly ache and explosive diarrhea. I told you this blog would be told in true TMI style.


     

Why Hormones, Why?

They have proven to be my biggest complaint thus far.
They are mean, MEAN, meaaaaaan.
They make me no likey my me.
Or my he.
Or....anybody.


       This pregnancy has been relatively easy on every other front thus far. I've only experienced a handful of nausea sessions, there hasn't been any bleeding, I've not fainted, I sleep well and often, my dreams are absolutely spectacular, my abdominal pain has been only so slight, and I finally am back to pooping regularly! (sidenote: that bump in the last post was definitely poo.)


       Okay, maybe I'm exaggerating. I just got a bit of heartburn and realized that my nipples do indeed feel like a maddened little sprite took a cheese grater to them in the night. I am also so very lazy....I only got out of bed to drink tea and eat cereal. I then moved to the couch, where I have been for the last couple of hours. Meanwhile, my mom is working her bum off in my garden pulling weeds and battling fire ants.


       "Hey Mom, I brought you some water."
       "Thanks."
       "Does it count that I intended to work out here with you today?"
       "Don't worry, just do what your body tells you to do. In a few months, it won't matter what your body wants....you'll wish you could store all the rest you're getting now."
       "Hm....I'll be on the couch."


       But I digress. Honestly, all the discomforts and fatigue absolutely pale in comparison to the demon hormones. I was on birth control for about 6 months once but had to quit it because it made me insane, like...well, a combination of these guys.

Whoa, Sandworms...

ARRRRAUGHHHH!!!!

       It was not something I was willing to live with. Come to find out, one of the reasons why birth control works is because it essentially tricks your body into believing it is pregnant. So fast forward six years, and here I am, BeetleBull again. Nothing escapes my wrath. No comment, disorder, misbehavior, stench, bad habit, bamboo stick, paint color speculation, gluten free cookie, speck of dirt on my toenail, tupperware, or misplaced item is safe from my irrational anger. Basically I can find something to hate about EVERYTHING, which is extremely annoying when I think of how counter-intuitive and pathetic it really is. I usually end up apologizing to anything in my distance with a mind and huddling in a little ball of shame. That is, until the next stitch of rage tears. 

       I've got to learn to calm down and not let things get to me. I want to be cool and have joy. To be productive and kind instead of an isolated ole meany head. It's truly not my real personality. I'm surprised Mars affords me as much patience as he does, granted most of it entails him avoiding me in the garage while I'm on the rampage....I guess it's better than running away though. 

       Seriously, I hear the hormonal shifts tone down after the first trimester, which will be over in 5 days (thank god!) But what if they don't? If there are any other mamas or preggos reading this, did you experience hormonal BeetleBullness? What happened? Did it calm down? What did you do?