A Year in Search Terms

I have a stats program installed on my blog that gives me some fun information on who is visiting my blog. Nothing too crazy of course, just typical stuff like I can see the IP address of commenters (not a big deal since my commenters are Alana and my mother about 90 percent of the time). Basically I check it out on occasion to see how many people viewed my blog on a certain day. My biggest day was, not surprisingly, the day I THOUGHT Holland was going to be born, August 27th. I had 99 views that day. Big time blogging! Anyway, my favorite thing about the program is how it shows me the specific terms people searched for on a search engine that made them land on my blog. Often it is just “itsybitsybaby” or “alexia lysandra” or something that shows that they were specifically trying to find me and it is someone I know. But what is really fun are the terms people search and randomly stumble upon me. Alana has been bugging me to write this blog since this summer. With 2008 ending tomorrow, I thought I would finally document it for all to see. So here we go:

My Top Ten Favorite 2008 Search Terms That Led to ME!

10. tillamook cheese and pregnancy (Oh Tillamook…you and your cheese curds are such a tease!)
9. baby clothe swear house (This one creeps me out. Is it a horror film?)
8. “i am barefoot” (hippy la la, is that you?)
7. future nordstrom leaders (This one freaked me out a little at first (Big Nordstrom Brother! Stop watching me!) until I realized I had mentioned being in FNL in a past blog. Phew)
6. styrofoam cubes for sale (Internet search engine user, you have come to the right place)
5. where in the netherlands can i have a 3d ultrasound (Again. Totally the right place)
4. vancouver living (Holland and I will be on the cover of the upcoming spring issue)
3. why does my baby’s forehead look big (Warning: your future son or daughter MAY have a complex if you make this an issue)

Number two is a tie: “slutty baby clothes” and “fleas in bassinet.” The discovery of this fun little combo back in August inspired this IM to Alana:

12:35 PM me: somebody found my blog by googling “slutty baby clothes”
12:36 PM between that and “fleas in bassinet” from earlier in the week, I pretty much feel like i can win the best parent ever award

While those were my two longstanding favorite terms, today someone used one that bumped them out of the number one spot. Drumroll please.

And my number one favorite search term that lead to my blog in 2008 IS…………..

1. feel like shit pregnant

Yeah, I’d say that pretty much summed up my year!

Farewell 2008! I won’t miss you in the slightest!

Four Month Update

Dear Holland,

Yesterday you turned four months old. I know! I can’t believe it either. You are getting so big. This month we had a lot of holiday festivities on our plate. We started things out with a visit to Santa at Pioneer Place. I didn’t even bother scanning your photo with santa like I was planning. Because I hated it. It didn’t even look like you!  But I guess that is about all I can expect from a mall santa and the 14 year old employees taking the pictures. I have taken better pictures of you with my phone. Like this one, for example:

That dress you have on? I bought that back in February, well before my 18 week ultrasound confirming that you were in fact a girl. I broke down and walked over to Gymboree one day at lunch, and found that dress on sale. I snatched it up, hoping I wasn’t jinxing myself. I envisioned you wearing it later in the year for Christmas, and like always, it still amazes me to see all my daydreams about you coming true.

That bow I put on your head for the picture lasted just about as long as I expected it to:

So…it got really cold this month. December 2008: Brought to you by…HATS!

And of course, who could forget ARCTIC BLAST 2008! Two weeks of the coldest, deepest, most annoying snow I have ever experienced in my life. We braved it a few times to get downtown to do some christmas shopping, but mostly stayed in where it was warm. Mostly.

One of the most exciting moments of the month was the day I discovered the Moby Wrap. After reading my update last month, full of complaints about how much you and I hate the Bjorn, my coworker Scott’s wife Annie pleaded with me to not give up on babywearing, and even let me borrow their Moby Wrap. I was a little nervous to try it at first, given our rocky history with babywearing, but when the snow kept falling and you and I needed a way to get around downtown without a stroller, I thought I would try it out. I figured it out after reading some simple instructions online, and carried you around happily for hours. We trudged through the snow, shopped, stood in line at Chipotle, and hung out with your uncle and your dad at Rockbottom. You happily looked around at the lights and activity, slept peacefully and even had a bottle, all snug in the Moby. It was amazing. As soon as I have a chance, I am getting us down to Bella Stella and buying us one of our very own.

Other milestones of the month…you have have been REALLY into your hands for a while, but have only very recently discovered your feet. I have a feeling it’s only going to be a matter of time before you manage to get them into your mouth (as your other main interest of SUCKING ON ANYTHING remains unchanged). You started drinking exclusively formula this month, as my attempts at keeping you on breastmilk have failed miserably since returning to work. I felt like a bit of a failure, but I did try my hardest. You have been much happier since I started you on formula, and jumped from 3 ounces per feeding to 8 ounces in less than two weeks. You attack each bottle like it’s the last you might ever see, and I think we have that to blame for the CHEEKS. Oh the cheeks.

We did try out solid food this month. My mom told me that she started me on solids when I was much younger than you are (I think you get your ravenous appetite from me…it doesn’t go away…sorry about that) so I figured it was worth a shot with you. You had about three bites and then lost interest. But we will keep trying. Because I hate the way formula smells. And really, sometimes you watch me while I eat and I just KNOW that you want a french fry.

And of course, who can forget about Christmas. You slept through most of it and got more presents than anyone.

We’ve (almost) made it through 2008, Holland, and I know 2009 is going to be a good year for us. You are a very busy girl and I can’t wait to see what else you have in store for me.

Love,

Mom

Birth Art

I signed up for the class because I thought it would help. I was pretty miserable. And alone. I googled “single moms,” “single pregnancy” and “single xyz baby very sad please help etc” on that day in April. I managed to find a “birthing class” for single moms, and promptly signed up for it. It was scheduled for July. And I was pumped. I was going to find new friends! New, pregnant, SINGLE friends! To replace the friends that had forgotten me! It was going to be amazing.

I should have known I was going to be in trouble when I read that this class was a “Birthing From Within” class. I had tried to read the book and knew it didn’t really “vibe” with me. I knew I wanted to try and have a natural birth, but wasn’t going to bet the farm on it.  (it’s a good thing you didn’t! Love, your epidural)

Flash forward July: We met at our teacher’s house in North Portland. It was very, very hot. I knew almost immediately that I wasn’t going to fit in. I was the ONLY girl there with a male doctor. Oh, and yeah, I was the only girl there WITH A DOCTOR. It was a lot of, “oh, you are letting a MALE into your birth? wow…” and “I am birthing in the water because the hospital is so evil” etc, etc, etc. Basically, a very open and welcoming place! They were all super judgey and I felt like I was in high school. Pregnant high school, with mean hippies. Oh, yeah, guess what?  I was the only girl there with health insurance. Or a full-time job!  Take that, bitches.

Our first class, the teacher told us to get on the floor (THE FLOOR!) with some paper and chalk and pastels to draw our “birth art.” I felt like I was in a bad dream, or at least fifth grade art class. I kneeled my eight months pregnant 200 pound ass onto the floor and “closed my eyes” and “thought about the thought that most represented how I wanted my birth to be.” BARF. When it was time to open our eyes and “draw the image we saw,” I did my best. As the other girls went around the room and shared theirs, I really knew I was in the wrong place. It was a lot of “this flower represents my vagina” and “this bird is flying over me in the field of my birth” and la la la, hippie hippie la la. When they got to me, I showed them my drawing:

 ”This is me. I am happy, because I have my baby, and I am not pregnant anymore. Everyone else is happy too. And the sun is shining.”

And that is exactly how it was!

The end!

Well, not really the end. I didn’t make any friends through that class, and later went on to have a VERY hospitalized birth, complete with induction, my water being broken, epidural and all…and I am totally okay with that. What I am not okay with is how much “natural birthing” was shoved down my throat when I was pregnant, and how rude the girls in my “birthing from within” class were to me. I hope they all had really painful, drug-free births. And mostly, I wish there was a genre for nice, hospital-birthing, single moms who want to make friends. Because I would love to meet them.

Change

December 17th, 2007

I woke up feeling like total crap. I had felt like shit for about a week. Really tired, no appetite and almost too tired to function. The week prior I had accidentally fallen asleep during a staff meeting at work, and was getting to a point where I could barely make it through the day. I was frequently forgetting to do things and getting really upset really easily. Friday night I had passed on going out, choosing instead to sit by myself on Emily’s couch, while she was on a date, eating an entire block of Parmesan cheese and falling asleep while watching TV. Things were a little bizarre. I thought my workload and the season were just getting to me. 

I stayed in bed for a while that Monday morning and debated calling in sick. I remembered the big projects I was trying to complete at work and knew I needed to go in, like it or not. I spent the day frantically trying to complete the holiday related projects being thrown at me left and right, taking a break only to take Emily to the airport midday. I made it through the day and ended up staying until about 8pm. For the last half-hour I was there, I sat at my computer, reading my new obsession: parenting blogs. My co-worker had sent me an email with some links of blogs to check out after I professed my love of everything in the “parenting humor” niche to him at our holiday party a week and a half earlier. How convenient and hilarious of me.

Sometimes, you know something deep down, but it is so deeply buried that you can go about your life pretending like it’s not there. I had known I was pregnant, I think, since the week it happened, truly, probably even the night it happened. But I still went about my life, acting like everything was okay, and not taking care of myself at all. I was sick, I was tired, I was miserable. And things were about to get a lot worse.

Sitting at my computer that night, the idea suddenly popped in my head that perhaps I should take a pregnancy test. My almost week late period suddenly seemed like a big, glaring, obvious sign, and a sudden sense of urgency took over. I left work and instead of going home, I drove to Vancouver to my mom’s house, stopping at Walgreen’s to pick up a pregnancy test. (Why did I go to Vancouver? Good question.) The girl behind the counter said to me, “If you don’t mind me asking, do you want to be pregnant?” I didn’t mind. I answered, “No. Very much no.”

I arrived at my mom’s house and took the test. Positive. Two pink lines. Just like that. Everything was over for me. I stuck the positive test into my purse, and walked to my mom’s bedroom. I wanted to tell her, but I didn’t know what to say. “Are you bringing the champagne for Christmas Eve?” she asked me. I just smiled and said yes, and then wandered back to the great room to get on the computer and stare blankly at the screen. I got a text on my phone from Emily. “I arrived safely!” it said. I wrote back, “Awesome. I am pregnant.” She was the first one to get the news.

I couldn’t talk to Emily in any form besides text, since she wasn’t getting very good cell reception in Iowa, so I called Chantelle, Eva and Eryn, and ended up staying up too late over at Eva’s apartment, talking with her about WHAT THE FUCK AM I GOING TO DO. I woke up in the morning and scheduled an abortion, and went over to the father’s house that night. I proceeded to tell him, some boy I had known for one month and two days, that I was pregnant, that I wasn’t planning on keeping it and that I didn’t expect to ever see or hear from him again. I went to sleep that night and dreamt about Holland, and I dreamt about her the next night too. Thursday night I came home from work and picked up the magazine my Catholic university sends out to alumni every month, opening it right to an article written about what happens to babies who die before they are born. Things I did the next day include, but are not limited to: buying a book on pregnancy, telling my mom, buying pre-natal vitamins, stopping drinking and smoking, and, of course, calling the Lovejoy Clinic to inform them that I wouldn’t be needing that appointment after all.