Jun
16
Doctor: “You’ve gained 25 pounds.”
Me: “Since my last visit?”
Doctor: “No, over the course of your pregnancy.”
Me: (thinking) “Well, it seemed plausible. I feel like I’ve gained 25 pounds in four weeks. I look like it, too.”
Doctor: “If you continue to gain at your current rate, you can expect a 40 pound total weight gain for this pregnancy.”
Me: (completing an addition problem in my head)
Doctor: “You realize you only need about 300 calories per day above what you’d normally eat.”
Me: “Yes. I’m cool with that.”
Doctor: “Alright.”
Me: (thinking) “I meant with the 40 pound weight gain.”
And later…
Me: (crying)
Doctor: “Let’s talk about prescribing you some anti-depressants.”
So, pretty much, the appointment ROCKED.
I declined the drug offer. I’m much more stable than I seem.
Really.
The doctor looked at me the same way you’re looking at me right now. (Did you know I can see you through the screen? Heeelllooo! Now, go put a bra on.)
Jun
15
I’m Just a Little Black Rain Cloud
by Leslie
I get a little bummed out every time I see Sam as The Yellow Wiggle. It just doesn’t feel right. Greg is The Yellow Wiggle. Greg. Forever and always, in my heart. Sam just reminds me that Julia isn’t three anymore and Wiggles come and go, like so many other things in life. Then I start singing “Cat’s in the Cradle” and that song is nothing but a guilt vehicle, isn’t it?
“Teach Your Children Well” is much better. Even “Time in a Bottle” would do. At least those songs don’t make me feel like I need Xanax.
I’m outlawing “Cat’s in the Cradle.”
You see, I’ve been dreaming that Dave is dead or dying. Three nights ago, I was having him cremated and at the last minute decided I wanted to keep his wedding ring, but it was too late, he was gone. Last night, he had two weeks to live.
Dave is scared of me right now.
The irony is, during waking hours, I’m worried that I’m the one that will die – that I’m going to start bleeding when I have Phoebe and I’ll never see her or know her and all my girls will grow up without me.
Nothing in this world frightens me more than that.
Jun
10
My Favorite Kind of Days
by Leslie
nowhere to be, except home
and all together
Jun
8
I think there’s a law, we’ll just call it “Leslie’s Law of Parenting” that states: “Anything you can do wrong will happen in public.”
A week or two ago, I was squeezing a quick run to the grocery store in before I had to pick Julia up from school. When we came out of the store, Lucy refused to be loaded into her car seat. And by refused to be loaded, I mean she kicked and screamed and hit me in the face. So, I bribed her with a cupcake. And it worked! But recently, Lucy has discovered the amazing and destructive power of her hands. She can obliterate anything with an initial squeeze of death followed by furious finger tickles of annihilation. My feet have often encountered the shattered remains of a graham cracker or a banana or – forgive us, universe – a doughnut. But she was pleased to simply eat her cupcake and we made it to the school on time.
As I unbuckled her restraints to walk over and retrieve Julia, I considered taking the cupcake from her. But my fat lip was a throbbing reminder of why I didn’t want to do that. So, I let her carry her cupcake to the pick up area.
THIS WAS THE WRONG THING TO DO.
As the pick up mob reached it’s maximum capacity, right in the anxious moment between the bell ring and the appearance of the children out the door, Lucy demolished her cupcake. The Hostess kind. WITH FILLING INSIDE. There I stood, helpless with my chocolate-cupcake-crumb-faced kid and her gooey-filling hands, which she showed to everyone with a “Rooooarrrrr!” as Kindergarteners and First Graders ran through the debris field at my feet.
Someone pointed me toward the restroom. I could hear the shouts of, “What’s that?!?!” and “Ew, gross!’ and “She did it,” as I marched my growling mess-maker into the school. When we returned, the mess remained on the ground. Everyone was looking at us. I pointed it out to Julia and told her, “Look at what Lucy did.” And we proceeded to the car to grab my stash of napkins to clean it up. But when we got back to clean it up, only one adult was there. Only ONE PERSON saw me clean it up. So, not only was I the mom who bribed her two-year-old with a cupcake, I also looked like the rude mom who made the mess and walked away. And it’s been eating at my soul. I’ve had to restrain myself from shouting, “I cleaned it up! I cleaned it up!” every day at school pick up since.
But now, school is over. Hopefully summer will erase the memory of our mess from the minds of the masses. I can now focus my worry on the T-ball field where recently Lucy had an accidental collision with an older kid that resulted in a lollipop stick up the nose, after which I picked up my screaming, bleeding child to hear a woman chime in the from the sidelines with, “And that’s why I don’t let my kids run around with lollipops.”
Jun
5
You should never underestimate the importance of the condition of your underwear. You may fool yourself into thinking it doesn’t matter. You may tell youself, “I’m married and pregnant. The risk of a panty raid is nil. No one’s worried about my skivvies.” But you’d be wrong. And you’d know you were wrong when you find yourself cashing in that free prenatal massage you won at your Kindergartener’s Winter Carnvial and the massage therapist says, “Okay, so take everything off but your underwear.”
Sure, she said other things. She even left a sheet to cover me, but my brain froze on the word “underwear” because my underwear? They’re barely underwear at all. I’m all humongo pregnato, so the only underwear that fit me are the ones that have the elastic all stretched out and the ones that have the elastic all stretched out are old. They were once white. Now, they resemble parchment paper.
I know! Go ahead and think it. “Ew! Gross, Leslie.” But why buy underwear that you’ll only wear for a few months and you’ll likely ruin anyway because – spoiler alert coming here, childless friends – pregnancy is a condition in which you are 90% guaranteed to ruin your underwear at one point or another? Pregnancy is a beautiful, yet competely disgusting miracle of life that often leaves its mark in your britches.
So, I took everything off but my underwear and I fashioned a very complicated and tightly wrapped sort of diaper with the sheet she left in order to prevent her from possibly seeing my secret. Because you cannot help but judge someone with nasty underwear. Sure, we all have a pair, but no one in their right mind would ever admit it. Unless your massage therapist has seen them and you know it’s just a matter of time before the whole town knows the condition of your underwear so you figure you might as well tell the story from your own perspective anyway.
She returned and began my massage, which should have been an exquisite escape to a land of bliss, but instead was like a giant panic attack because at any moment my underwear could be revealed and then, I would die. She told me, “You’re very tense.” I just laughed. And laughed. I actually couldn’t stop laughing. Then I blamed it on all the computer work I’ve been doing and we started talking about my new website and then I discovered that she knows every person in the world that ever existed, which meant my underwear news could go worldwide.
So, I decided to distract her the only way I knew how: I talked. And talked. And I never stopped talking. I thought maybe she’d go blind from all the words hitting her in the face or something. Then she said, “Roll onto your side.” And suddenly, for the first time ever, I had nothing to say. I rolled onto my side and she moved from my neck and shoulders to my back. I stiffened. “Are you comfortable?” she asked.
“Oh yes, I’m comfortable,” I lied.
And then it happened. She went for the sheet. I felt the tug. I squeezed my legs together to hold the it in place and mentally screamed, “Ain’t no way you’re unwrapping this burrito!” But all she did was tuck a towel around the edge of the sheet, probably to protect it. And I’m pretty sure all she saw was waistband.
An eternity later, she said told me time was up. “Thirty minutes goes pretty fast, doesn’t it?” she asked.
I nodded as all the tension left my body and I felt complete and total relaxation.
“Do you feel relaxed?”
“Oh, yes!” And this time, I wasn’t lying.
Stuff I Do
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Stuff You Should Do
You know, Stuff.
