Obligatory holiday post

Merry Christmas, y'all! Hope your day was full of loveliness and delightful surprises.

I have been dealing with some hormones the last few days, so my holidays have been about 93% delightful and 7% feeling overwhemed/crying/did you seriously just say that to me? So that's been pretty cool.

This crying shit is new, by the way. Made it to almost 15 weeks without crying overtaking me (besides relieved tears at the ultrasound), and then twice in the last two days, I seriously felt unable to stop myself from crying. Yesterday, Andy had to work so I had to do all of the last-minute Christmas stuff with the baby, while exhausted, and even when he got out of work he was only home for about half an hour before he had to leave to get ready for music at church. Usually this would have been "less than ideal, but nothing I can't handle!" but the hormones had me convinced it was ALL TOO MUCH and the poor guy walked in to find me wrapping presents and crying. I even was lucid enough to explain that really, I understood that my face was doing ridiculous things and that it was fine and the baby and I would be at church in our fancy clothes and all the last-minute stuff was seconds away from completion, but my face just would not quit with the tears.

Of course everything worked out fine, and we were there in our fanciest clothes, and his drumming and singing were awesome, as always. I actually love that he drums at church for Christmas Eve, since we don't even attend except Christmas and Easter. I think it's sweet, and I love that he has a real reason to drum for a while, since he was in a band when we met and our life right now wouldn't make that a great idea.

Today we had a really awesome slow morning, and the baby had a great time. Her favorite things to play with, in order: the box I used to wrap a belt for for Andy; the gum from Andy's stocking; the fancy-ass handmade wooden train set we got her; a jingling dog toy we've had longer than we've had her.

We spent the early afternoon with my family, and the late afternoon with Andy's. There was some nonsense from Andy's mom and sister, directed at me, that made it pretty clear that I'm still considered an outsider. I know the hormones are making it into a bigger deal than it might otherwise be, but I also know that in the past year I've worked hard at refusing to let people treat me poorly, so I'm trying hard to decide how to deal with this. (This was responsible for today's crying. Andy backs me up when he knows what's going on, but it's not always easy to relate a particular tone of voice or attitude, so it often seems like I'm making a fuss over nothing, I'm sure. He will support me fully in however I decide to handle this, which is very reassuring.)

So! I suppose NewBaby wanted to make itself known for the holidays as well. I've really enjoyed that other 93%, though, and I hope you all had less crying and more eggnog. I've got to work tomorrow so my version of unwinding right now will be some hot chocolate and a Christmas movie. If it weren't for NewBaby, the hot chocolate would have a serious dollop of Bailey's in there.

It's the holiday season!

I don't know if I've mentioned this, but we do some baby sign with our girl, and her two favorite signs are "tree" and "light," so the holiday season is blowing her little mind and making her arms very tired. She signs those to us constantly with absolute delight. Having a kid for the holidays is as awesome as those sappy ABC Family movies tell you it is.

The baby's birthday was this week, and it was pretty great. She was the first baby in the infant room at her daycare all those months ago, so they all adore her and have seen her grow the same way we have. They got her an organic cake to have a little party, which was very sweet and considerate of them. We had our folks over for dinner and presents and she had a blast. We had a doll custom-made to look like her and she LOVES it. (It's this exact doll, actually, so I'm not thrilled about paying extra for customization, or it being called one-of-a-kind, since she's selling a duplicate of the one we designed. Other than that the craftsmanship is incredible and the doll is just what we wanted. It seems the seller calls all her girl dolls "Camille" but we've just been calling it Dolly.)

The day after her birthday the baby had her one-year checkup and she's grown two inches and gained three pounds in three months! Her dad showed up 45 minutes late and the second he walked in she went from playing happily to sobbing. But this baby has some serious moxie, so she toddled past her bio-dad over to Andy, who was sitting next to her dad, climbed up on Andy's lap, and sat there snuggling Andy while glaring at her dad. This kid, you guys.

We're in the middle of a flare-up of the baby's eczema, almost certainly related to the weather getting colder and drier. The stuff we had been using on her, Aveeno's baby eczema stuff, wasn't working well anymore, and since we didn't love that the Aveeno stuff is made with petroleum byproducts anyway (really, Aveeno?), I took advantage of some of my second-trimester energy to make homemade whipped shea butter to use as a lotion for her. (It's super easy to make and really cheap, drop me a line or leave a comment if you want the recipe.) While I was making it, I reflected on how I used to spend significant amounts of my time dying my hair blue and going to punk shows. My life is different than I expected it would be.

I'm thisclose to done with my Christmas shopping. The only people left to buy for are my friends who are coming home from Brooklyn. They're hard to buy for because they have a small New York apartment and we don't know what they use and love in their daily life. My brain is still on pregnancy hiatus so Andy's in charge of thinking of something awesome.

How's your holiday planning going? All done shopping yet, or haven't started?

It's a Tuesday.

I hate coming up with titles for blog posts. Basically all I post anymore is updates about the baby's case and my developing fetus, but "Update about the baby's case and my developing fetus, part the fifty-second" just doesn't have a nice ring to it.

A. Baby's case first:
1. Last week the worker told the baby's dad that in January they'd be starting to compile the paperwork to terminate his rights. He was very emotional about this and talked about stepping up his efforts to get custody of the baby. He was supposed to have a visit today, but didn't bother to show up on time, so the visit was canceled. He was very unhappy that they wouldn't un-cancel the visit since he was only five minutes late, but he's been late consistently so they're back on the system where he has to be in the building an hour and fifteen minutes before the visit starts, and if he's not, it's automatically canceled. I don't think anyone pointed out that he's on that system again because of his habitual lateness, so no, they weren't going to give him any leeway on being late. He has the option of another visit tomorrow, so we'll see if that happens.

2. Last week the baby's mom started the process of doing what she needs to do to have a visit - the first visit she'd have had since March. It would have happened to fall on the baby's first birthday, and the worker got permission from her boss and the baby's mom to have me attend, to make it easier for the baby. I was actually really looking forward to getting to interact with the mom with the baby there (and outside a court waiting room) and giving her the chance to ask us anything she wanted about the baby's life. However, as you might have guessed from my use of the conditional perfect tense,* it looks like the visit won't be happening. The baby's mom had been staying with the grandma and as of yesterday, that is no longer the case. The mom told the worker today that she didn't finish the process she'd have needed to in order for the visit to happen, plus the worker said the mom's phone doesn't have any minutes so there's no reliable way to contact her. I'm actually more disappointed by this than I expected. I know it won't be easy for the mom to deal with her baby's birthday and the holiday season and I thought the visit might have been good for her.

B. Our new baby! Depending on which source you go by, I'm officially in my second trimester either today, or sometime over the next week, or next Tuesday. Andy stopped on his way home to get me a "second-trimester flower" - an orchid, my favorite! - and "second-trimester dessert" - peanut M&Ms, which I'm eating right now. I'm getting a bit more energy and have managed to stay awake until almost 10 pm two whole nights in a row. We're telling friends as we see them and planning to call far-away relatives this weekend. I'm announcing it at work next Monday, which is awesome because it's the first day of an annual tradition called Feast Week, wherein everyone brings in awesome delicious things on their designated day. Being the pregnant lady means that I get to cut in line and also I get to break out the maternity pants early and be supremely comfortable while I overeat.


*Yeah, I had to look that up.

Relief

Yesterday morning we had our first trimester screen. This is a blood test combined with an ultrasound to give an indication of your odds of your baby having certain issues, including Downs syndrome, a rare but serious chromosomal abnormality called trisomy 18, or heart defects. We decided with the first pregnancy not to do the tests, since the outcome isn't going to cause us to terminate the pregnancy (there are a lot of false positives) or probably even pursue further testing, because the follow-up tests for the chromosome problems, amniocentesis and CVS (where they take a teeny piece of your placenta), carry risks of miscarriage. This time, we did the test because it meant another ultrasound.

The baby's doing fine. I cannot possibly tell you how much that sentence means to me. I realized as we were sitting in the waiting room that I fully expected to be told that I'd had another miscarriage. Every single thought about this pregnancy, for the last three months, has been tempered by the fear slash firm belief that I was going to miscarry again. Even though we saw the heartbeat at six weeks, I couldn't relax and let myself think things would be okay.

I think that really changed yesterday. The whole pregnancy is real to me in a way it hadn't been yet. We got to see the baby, who is measuring exactly on track, and it was amazing. It moved around and rolled and waved its little arms. The ultrasound as part of the first trimester screen is to measure a spot on the back of the baby's neck - a measurement above 3 millimeters is considered suspicious, and our baby's measured 1.2 mm. The blood results won't be in until later in the week, but they didn't see anything that immediately indicated any concern.

I had my twelve-week appointment with my own doctor today (the stuff yesterday was at a different place) and got to hear the heartbeat again. Not too proud to tell you I cried. Yesterday and today. I also finally remembered to ask my doctor about recommending physical therapy for my back, which has been sore already. I go in for my first appointment next week.

Awesome stuff all around!

Do you have any questions? I had a million the first time my sister was knocked up, so I'll happily answer them if I can.

A brief review of our post-holiday week.

On Saturday Andy and my mom and I all got food poisoning. That was not cool. I mention my mom getting it because she's our go-to babysitter but she was out of commission too, so the poor baby spent a lot of time hanging out in her playpen. She was recovering from several very busy days, so she was okay with that - she mostly played by herself and chattered at us happily. The worst part of having food poisoning, besides the part where I barfed ten times in twelve hours (not that I was counting), was the part where my sister and I were scheduled for massages Saturday afternoon and had to cancel. Heartbreaking. I'm rescheduling mine, duh.

Before we realized that it was food poisoning and not something contagious, my sister and her family decided to split back for Maryland before it hit them, so that sucks too. And by the time they got home, my goddaughter was totally miserable and when they took her to urgent care she was diagnosed with a double ear infection. Cool stuff all around.

We are now back to normal and things are going fine. As of yesterday I was eleven weeks pregnant. I started to miscarry right before that last time, and I realized last night that I honestly had just been waiting to get to the same date and to have another miscarriage. That's a pretty shitty thing to be carrying around with me for two months. Today, for the first time, I ordered some super-sale maternity clothes, because I can finally let myself think about what it will be like to be visibly pregnant. I'm still worried all the time and can't wait for the ultrasound on Monday, but it feels good to be able to start to plan for this being real. Having passed the date I miscarried last time feels like I've sort of moved out of that sincere belief that it would happen again.

The baby's dad didn't call to confirm his visit yesterday but did today. Then he showed up 25 minutes late and told the worker he had been pulled over on the way to the visit and gotten a ticket. After the visit the worker followed him to his car to get a copy of the ticket for her records, and he mysteriously couldn't produce it. He searched his car while the worker stood in the freezing cold for five minutes, until she gave up and told him to bring it next time. He won't, of course, but all of this goes in her file and the file goes to the judge.

How was your holiday and post-holiday week?

Obligatory holiday post

We had her up late last night, so the baby is still asleep right now, and Andy and I just enjoyed a leisurely piece of breakfast pie together. In a few minutes, I'm going to start working on the next round of pies - pecan, made without corn syrup - and Andy's going to start working on his fancy-pants sweet potatoes. Then we'll head over to my folks' to spend some extra time with my sister and her family. Today is not too shabby, you guys.

This is the traditional time for us to reflect on what we're grateful for, and I have to say, there's a whole lot on my list. My life is pretty spectacular, really. I'll try to keep this somewhat brief and also not too sappy, but here's a sampling of what I'm giving thanks for this year:

• My awesome husband and our wonderful marriage. Honestly, I'm legitimately thrilled that I get to hang out with this guy every day. He does little things all the time to make sure I feel loved and cared about. He has volunteered to take on SO MUCH lately so I can sit on the couch and feel queasy. He never tells me to stop being silly when I worry nonstop. He had a dream last night in which we had our baby, she was a healthy girl, and we had given her a really awesome name.

• Our life as parents. This baby is really awesome, and parenting her has been mostly a lot of fun. She is funny and charming and she likes to snuggle my face with hers, which she doesn't do with anyone else in the world. We call her Baby Girl a lot, and she has started calling herself Baba Gull. She also sometimes calls herself Baba Yaya, where "Yaya" is a hilariously mangled version of part of her name. We are so lucky to get to be her parents, even if it's not forever.

• The people we choose to surround ourselves with. Really, the only drama in our life comes from the foster care system and the baby's bio-family. We have many solid friendships with people who are genuinely awesome and sincere.

• Related to the above post, I'm really grateful for how kind everyone was to us after the miscarriage. It was the hardest thing I have ever gone through, and I learned that our friends immediately step up in situations like that. My parents, too, were amazing, and made sure we had food in the house, and took the baby to play and snuggle and hang out so we could just be alone together. The behavior of people close to us in a really shitty time made me okay with telling (some) people about this pregnancy, because I know I will need them again if anything goes wrong.

• This is going to sound weird, but I'm thankful for feeling shitty. I felt totally fine throughout the last pregnancy, so feeling crappy this time makes me feel like things are different. Don't get me wrong, I'm still totally a whiny baby about feeling queasy, but I am supremely grateful that there are indications this time that things are going okay in there. Also, for the first time, Andy and I can feel a bump now. We didn't feel one last time at all, and okay maybe I'm crying a little now.

I can hear the baby starting to wiggle around and it's Pie-Making Time, but I also want to say that I'm thankful for having this platform to work through stuff. I know many of my readers aren't foster parents, so thanks for asking questions and reading even when it's not relevant to your life. I have never had a single trolling comment on here (because I have like 12 readers and you're all awesome) so my little corner of the internet feels like a pretty cool place. I hope you are having a really awesome holiday and that you get breakfast pie as often as you want.

Sometimes foster care is hard.

If you read any other blogs by foster parents, you've probably seen at least a few posts about how visits suck. That, friends, is because visits suck.

The baby's dad is still attending visits, but not with any regularity. The baby cries - screams - for most of the visit, then passes out from exhaustion. The dad didn't come to either visit last week, and today the baby cried so hard she puked all over herself and him. (I can't pretend the "and him" wasn't the tiniest bit satisfying.)

Her dad has been told that it's bad for the baby to see him only sporadically. She has not developed any sort of a relationship with him, because she's still not comfortable with him. The baby sees the worker with us at least once a month, when the worker comes for home visits, so she trusts the worker and tries to cling to her throughout the visits, still sobbing. Hearing all of this kills me. I asked the worker today if there's ever a point when they can ask the judge to change how this is going, on the basis of it being actively damaging for the baby, and the worker said, basically, that she's only ever seen the courts go for no visits in cases of sexual abuse. If the parents want visits, they get them, even if they only bother to show up occasionally. Our next hearing isn't until February, so this will probably continue at least until then, and nothing will happen at that hearing, so it will continue through April, when they can begin the process of filing for termination of parental rights (if things keep going the way they are), but then the judge can give an extension if he's feeling generous and so I can't really foresee a time when my baby girl won't be regularly subjected to hysterical sobbing on her dad's whim.

The evening after a visit the poor kid is all out of sorts. She doesn't want to be put down, but she is super whiny even when we're holding her. She holds on to us like she's scared of being put down. It's heartbreaking. Today is one of the days when being a foster parent is fucking hard.

Subject change! In other non-news, as far as we know things are still going fine with NewBaby. I'm ten weeks pregnant now and still worrying pretty much constantly, which is exhausting. We have an ultrasound scheduled for December 3, which feels like FOREVER far away. I am still totally exhausted - like I'm staying up late to write this and it's only 8:39 right now - and I get waves of nausea, which I find incredibly reassuring since I didn't feel crappy for most of the last pregnancy. I told NewBaby that it is welcome to make me feel as crappy as it wants, even if it means I can't eat a single bite on Thanksgiving, as long as things are going okay in there.

I've got two Tollhouse Cookie Pies in the oven right now, but honest, for the first time in my life I am too tired to stay up for pie. This is crazy. Tollhouse Pie is my very favorite and we're bringing one to Andy's cousin's Third Annual Night-Before-Thanksgiving Pie Party tomorrow, so I made an extra for me.

What's your very favorite Thanksgiving dessert?