Disheartened

There has been no word from the landlord at the second place, that Kelly and I most want.  It’s been 2 days since Ellen and Mark viewed the apartment.  After looking at the pictures some more and talking it over with Kelly, we really wanted the place!  I wish the owner would at least contact me to say that she has given it to someone else or something.  Very disheartening.

Probable Future Apartment

Details: This place is the bottom story of a small two-story house (the top story houses a studio with a woman in her 40s who goes to theological school). It’s got a private entrance with a wide (5 or 6 feet) covered porch. You walk directly into the living room, and straight ahead you see the dining room through an arched doorway and the kitchen beyond that. The wall to the left is the outer wall to the house and has windows. The dining room has a bowed window. The kitchen is of a good size, with room for a large island or a small table and chairs. There is a stacked washer/dryer unit which may also fit into the kitchen. In the living room the door to a small bedroom or office space is on your right. Off the dining room is a door to a larger bedroom, a pair of mirror-front doors which enclose a very shallow storage space, and the door to the bathroom. The bathroom has a full tub. The apartment is carpeted throughout with a low-pile gray carpet. The kitchen and bathroom have linoleum tile, I think.  There is a very tiny backyard with a fence.

Location: This place is located on a quiet residential street between two quiet residential streets in the South Wedge neighborhood in Rochester. It’s a walkable .08 mi from the Highland Public Library, 3 blocks from the Cinema Theater and other shops and restaurants on South Clinton Ave, half a mile from Highland Park (designed by Frederick Law Olmsted), and .07 mi from the weekly farmer’s market on Alexander Street. It’s 2 miles from Strong Memorial Hospital, where Kelly will be working, 3.5 miles from Kelly’s parents’ house, and 5 miles to the JCC. It’s within 4 miles of two different Reform temples, with two more within 10 miles.

Downsides/Compromises: The apartment has on-street parking, and it may be hard to find in the neighborhood. It means we’ll have to dig our car out in the winter again, and deal with moving the car every 48 hours due to Rochester’s horrible parking regs. The apartment also has oil (not gas) heating, so we have to buy the oil to fill the tank and monitor to make sure we don’t run out. It has carpeting rather than hardwood flooring, which means we need to buy a new vacuum. I am thinking roomba?  The owner of the property is currently out of town so her niece is showing the place and will sign the lease (is that legal?).  Which means, we don’t have a clue about what our actual landlord will be like in terms of niceness, responsiveness, etc. when she returns.  The house is an older building and the owner purchased it 3 years ago.  During the walk-through, the inspector found signs of mice, but the foundation has since been sealed and the niece is not aware of any complaints about mice from the tenants.  When I asked how she would respond in case of pests, she was like, “it’s an older building…I can’t help that.”  What’s the right answer there?  We have seen no pictures of the inside or outside of the apartment, but it has not been described to us as cute.  There is almost no storage space and only a few very small closets.

Upsides: The rent is $550/month and because it’s a smaller apartment than others we have been looking at, utilities might not be as high as other places (less space to heat).  The apartment will be painted and cleaned and the carpets will be steam cleaned before new tenants move in.  It gets good light.

Remaining Questions:

- What are the dimensions of the rooms, especially the two bedrooms?
- Is there a second exit from the building other than the front door or could a window be used as egress in case of fire?  Are there working smoke and carbon monoxide detectors?
- Can all the windows be open and shut or are any painted shut?  Do the windows all have screens and storm windows?
- Are the baseboards tight to the walls and floor or are there cracks or warped boards?
- Is there good hot and cold water pressure from all the sinks and the bath?  Does the toilet have a strong flush?  Does the shower have a detachable head?
- Do all the oven burners function?
- Is there a thermostat to control the heat?  Is the heat a central furnace with floor/wall vents?

Gentle Readers,

What do you think?  Should we snap this up, knowing that it is not perfect but it is very cheap and in a great location?  Or, for those with children, do you think we need more space?  Rochester readers, what do you think about the price/location?  I think we’re going for it – I’ve asked for an application already.  But nothing has been signed yet!

The hunger strikes

At lunch today, I was starving and shaky by the time I got home.  I ate 2 big burritos, the leftover gumbo from last night’s dinner, and even fished Kelly’s half-eaten cookie out of the garbage (still in the package).  Whoa.  I had no idea I could be so hungry.

Happy Birthday, Mommy!

Monday was my birthday, and it was the best I could have asked for. I worked overtime Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at the Board of Trustees weekend and Commencement, and then took Monday off to relax. I got a host of good wishes and nice phone calls from my entire family, spoke to Hannah in Botswana (who is going to Victoria Falls this week!), and had long conversations with Rachel and Adrianne. Then in the evening, Adrianne and Jurvis had Kelly and I over for a wonderful birthday dinner of pasta, salad, and garlic bread. The salad had hearts of palm in it, something they discovered in Costa Rica, and it was the first time I had tried them. They were very good – as Adrianne said, the flavor is very mild and similar to artichoke. We watched an episode of Quantum Leap with them, and then went home. Although I haven’t yet had the chance to open any presents, apparently a number of presents are heading my direction in the mail.

Kelly and I went out to a nice birthday lunch at Kashish Indian Cuisine on Sunday. It was a very romantic weekend for us, with lots of closeness.

I spent a few hours yesterday doing some work thinking about registering for baby stuff for this summer’s showers. It is overwhelming how many options there are out there for even a single item. Especially surrounding diapers. But I am learning a lot!

Growing belly

This pic was taken tonight.  See…I am bigger!

Hypnosis

Kelly and I went to the first class in the hypnobirthing series last night. Our instructor seems pretty flaky, and also pretty on-board with what appears to be a for-profit venture to market hypnotherapy techniques. You know, “HypnoBirthing(R) – The Mongan Method.” But despite the HypnoBirthing(R) Institute’s moneymaking aspect – certifying legions of official HypnoBirthing(R) labor companions, doulas, childbirth education trainers, and fertility therapists to spread the gospel of the HypnoBirthing(R) system – it does seem to be grounded in actual science.

I didn’t know much about hypnosis before reading Hypnosis for a Joyful Pregnancy and Pain-Free Labor and Delivery, but it seemed pretty bunk-like to me.  My previous exposure comes from the middle school party games I used to play at sleepovers, like “light as a feather stiff as a board” and “bloody Mary.”  A memorable experience was at Rachel’s birthday party one year.  We took turns relaxing on a couch and being led into a trance state by a friend slowly counting backwards from 100, pausing every few numbers to suggest deeper relaxation.  I was self-conscious so it didn’t work on me, but Rachel was very able to get into a trance, and we ended up asking her where she was and what she saw (a castle with a red flag).  Then, when she woke up, she didn’t remember what she had seen – she was embarrassed that it had worked.  But the game I played most often was one you could do on a playground.  You stood behind someone and chanted while they closed their eyes and relaxed.

Part of the chant went like this:

Concentrate, concentrate on what I’m saying.  People are dying, babies are crying.  Concentrate, concentrate on what I’m saying.  Crack an egg on your head, let the yolk run down, the yolk run down, the yolk run down.  Crack an egg on your head, let the yolk run down, the yolk run down, the yolk run down.  Stab a knife in your back and let the blood drip down, the blood drip down, the blood drip down.  Stab a knife in your back and let the blood drip down, the blood drip down, the blood drip down.  Spiders crawling up your back, spiders crawling down your back.  Spiders crawling up your back, spiders crawling down your back.  A pinch, a squeeze, cool breeze.

The point of that one was to give someone the chills and creep them out.  For each part of the chant, there is a corresponding action with light touch, and with the final words you blow on the back of their neck.

There was another one where you would stand behind someone and lead them through a guided meditation up the stairs of a skyscraper until they stood completely relaxed on the roof.  Then you would have them look over the edge and you would give them a sharp shove in the back to throw them off their balance and jerk them out of their trance.  When they turned to look at you, you would ask them what color they saw as they fell.   I usually saw red or green.

The point of all this is, I spent a considerable amount of time as a tween conditioning myself not to relax during hypnosis!  As we all know from watching movies, as soon as you are completely relaxed, something horrible and ominous happens.  For instance, if you take a relaxing, long, hot shower, you might end up either stabbed (Psycho) or with your girlfriend torn apart by semi-trucks (The Hitcher).  If you enter a trance and symbolically re-live a calming memory, you might find yourself cutting into a birthday cake filled with blood (Alias).

In the hypnobirthing class yesterday, the teacher led the class through a script that involved standing in a familiar kitchen, visualizing a lemon, picking up a big kitchen knife, cutting the lemon in half, and taking a bite.  The point of the script was to illustrate the mind-body connection, because if you really spend time imagining eating a lemon, you begin to salivate and possibly even feel that sharp twang in each side of your jaw you get from eating very acidic foods.  But to begin in a comforting, familiar place and then pick up a giant kitchen knife!  I just felt like that was tapping right into the horror movie archetype.

Anyway, more than the class itself, it was the book I linked to above that introduced me to the idea that hypnosis is a legitimate method used to relieve pain in many different medical and clinical settings.  It involves a trance-like state (called both focused concentration and deep relaxation) characterized by a high degree of suggestibility.  Hypnosis can be used to introduce suggestions to a willing participant, and is effective enough that it can reduce or eliminate the need for anesthesia in surgery.  In childbirth, the purpose of hypnosis is twofold.  First, a first-time mother is often tense and afraid, and her tension and fear can prevent the labor from progressing until she is physically exhausted and needs intervention.  Hypnotic suggestions to induce feelings of relaxation and well-being can speed the progress of labor while making it a more pleasurable experience.  Second, a state of hypnosis can allow you to reduce your brain’s reaction to pain stimulus using a technique called glove anesthesia, which allows you to temporarily transfer a feeling of numbness to any part of your body.  Using hypnosis takes practice, and it has some pitfalls.  If you work with a professional hypnotherapist, you can often re-create the trace state later, once you know what it’s like.  As an individual working with books, tapes, and a HypnoBirthing(R) trainer, it will probably be more difficult.  Also, you can screw yourself up if you, for instance, forget to turn off the numbness to a part of your body, or if you are in a suggestible state and people tell you to do things without realizing your greater vulnerability.

Overall, I think that with relaxation, meditation, and hypnosis, as well as facing my fears about giving birth and being a parent, and with the bellydancing movements, and doing art and reading a lot, and having a tub to relax in during labor, if everything goes well I will end up with a drug-free, intervention-free childbirth.  Yay.

Fears and worries

Well, things are suddenly getting a lot more real. I have been able to mostly put far-off events out of my mind up ’til now, but with the quickening all of a sudden I am like, THERE IS A BABY IN THERE. AND SOON IT WILL BE O-U-T. Crazy!

I suddenly thought of the bris the other day. Kelly and I aren’t going to find out if it is a girl or a boy until I give birth, but if it is a boy then we want to have a bris (circumcision ceremony on the eighth day of the child’s life). Which means my family might have to fly in, and they may be on vacation in Hawaii, depending on when I give birth! I can’t imagine my dad missing the bris of his grandson, though – I am sure it will all work out. On the other hand, it could be a girl, in which case no worries…you know, other than a lifetime of sexism and sex role socialization.

I am also thinking about the birth more – I spoke to my doula for the first time yesterday, and she seems nice. And I was looking up Hypnobirthing classes and I realized that I better start taking classes soon! I am already in the 5th month, and even though my due date is August 5, July is really the 9th month. That’s so soon!

A lot of decisions have gotten put on hold because Kelly and I still don’t know whether we’ll be living in Boston next year, or Rochester (at this point, the location with the most positive response – his interview is next weekend), or Seattle. We don’t want to buy the tons of stuff you apparently need for a baby (car seat, carrier, stroller, bottles, diapers, sleeping area, etc.) if we are about to move because then we have to ship it all. On the other hand, at this point I am definitely giving birth here in Boston (our insurance doesn’t cover much else), so we will need at least some of that stuff before we move. We may end up getting a folding crib-slash-changing table as a temporary measure. I added more books to my Amazon wish list, too – all of a sudden, I want to be reading more!

I started reading the books I already have, and one of them (Birthing From Within) suggested that ‘the work of pregnancy is to worry’ and that if you don’t face your fears directly and deal with them, you won’t be as prepared for the birth. So yesterday I started worrying. But today I think I will set my worries aside for a while again – I’ll worry in spurts. Things are going well right now, and I don’t think I need to derail that by freaking out. 

The last thing I have been facing lately is the idea that major changes are coming – not just in the next year, but in life. I don’t see a way I can finish my degree, since I was already feeling overwhelmed and maxed out juggling a full-time job and taking classes. The remaining classes all involve more time due to the increased requirements of doing research and a thesis. Even without a baby, I would probably need to work less in order to finish the degree. Of course, I can’t do that, because what allows me to afford the classes at all is the discounted tuition I receive as a result of working full time. With a newborn in the mix, I just don’t think it’s possible for me to work full-time and take classes that involve major independent research. Especially if we move, the chances that I could finish this degree go from slim to none. I have been questioning lately if I am even in the right degree program, and I think that probably I am not – on the other hand, any degree is better than no degree. If I do end up dropping out of the program (pretty much a certainty), I can always transfer some of the credits to a new degree somewhere else, and doing more career-oriented study. Kelly and I have agreed that one of our big priorities right now is to move into our chosen career paths. The stumbling blocks for us are different: I need to choose a path, and if it requires additional education I need to figure out how we will pay for that. Kelly has a plan and he has the education, but the path is still not clearly laid out. Anyway, the point is that it’s not just having a baby and getting a new job and moving that will change, but going from graduate student to non-student and becoming a parent and living a new lifestyle.

Fortunately, I have the most wonderful, hottest, most loving partner in the world, and that makes me feel a lot more flexible and prepared for change than I would otherwise. I have faith that we will come through all the changes together. Joining Temple Sinai has helped me feel more grounded, too – if there’s one thing I am going to miss, it’s belonging to a temple where I really belong. Unless we end up in Seattle, in which case we’ll probably just join Temple Beth Am. Easy peasy!

Oh, and I started the Flagyl today.

I can’t believe it…I am a picky eater!

Okay, okay, I know. Some of you are like “Of course you are picky, you are vegan!!” But the truth is, I am willing to eat almost everything in the plant-based world. I am even eating ginger now a little bit (something I have always hated). The only food I really don’t like is cilantro/coriander, but I am willing to pick it out of my food if I can.

But pour oil on my food? Gross! Use iodized salt? Nah! Vegetable smoothie with ice? Wha?

I appreciate the suggestions that people have been giving me, and your gentle nudges have made me realize that I need a total diet makeover. I mean, I “hear” from the ambient noise that is the media that fats and sweets and salts are bad for you and should be used sparingly. But it turns out that you actually need some of those things – like iodized salt so you don’t get a goiter. So my healthy diet – while still healthier than the average American diet – is lacking in some of the things it probably should have, especially in the fats category.

What I need is not a new dish I can add to my current diet. What I need is a new way to cook and prepare food that is less processed, includes greater variety of grains and beans/legumes, is higher in protein, includes more yellow and green vegetables, and contains some essential supplements needed for a vegan diet (like B12 from nutritional yeast and omega-3 fatty acids from walnuts, flax, and algae).

This isn’t just a diet modification, it’s a lifestyle change – I need to spend more time cooking (an increase from zero minutes a week), and I need to learn how to freeze foods (as opposed to the Weisman family tradition: “the freezer is the place that food goes to die”).  And I need to buy some decent glass or pyrex containers to freeze and microwave stuff in, because reheating stuff in plastic containers is gross.  Kelly had this idea a year ago that we spend Sunday afternoons cooking for the week.  We may need to try that out.

I know Suya used to do that.  Does anyone else cook for the week, or cook to freeze a meal?  Do you bake 2 casseroles instead of one and freeze one?  Do you freeze the whole thing together, or do you cut it into servings?  Or is your freezer a purgatory between edible food and the garbage?

15 weeks, 1 day

I can’t comfortably button my pants anymore, although I can still wear them for now.  I am expanding a bit, and I think it is even visible when I am naked.  (Ask Kelly.)

My nausea is less, but not gone.  But it is less!  It is better than it has been since before I found out I was pregnant.  I have stopped barfing for the moment, although I am wary of saying it won’t happen again.  And I am getting a little bit hungrier.

For the first time in a while, I have some energy and want to move around.  I think I will try my Buff Moms To Be video again, and take up walking when the weather doesn’t completely suck.  Unfortunately, the weather looks like it is going to mostly suck.  I was thinking for a while that I would do some kind of dance class (Country Western Line Dancing, for instance), but then I read that I am not supposed to do anything with bouncing or that gets my heartrate up too high.  So I am going to ask my midwife about it tomorrow when I see her.

I got these ultrasounds a few weeks ago that were supposed to be part of the “ultrascreening” process – in combination with a blood test, they would determine the odds of having a child with chromosomal abnormalities or neural tube defects.  The ultrasounds have to be done by the end of the 13th week, and I went twice but neither time the fetus was cooperating so I couldn’t get the test done.  After all that, missing work and all, I found out that what Kelly and I are actually interested in testing for (neural tube defects because I was not taking folic acid in preparation for pregnancy) does not require ultrascreening at all, but is testing for as part of a standard blood workup around the 18th week.  I wish my midwife had let me know that there were multiple testing options and what each one tested for before sending me off on that wild goose chase.  On the other hand, that was the bad midwife who I am not seeing any more.

But Kelly and I did get to see the images on the ultrasound, which was pretty special.  The technician kept referring to the fetus as “he” rather than “it” or alternating between he and she.  I was worried that the tech could tell the sex of the child and was sort of letting us know indirectly, but the internet tells me it would be very hard to determine the sex at 13 weeks, and also the fetus was turned away from the “camera” (wand?) most of the time, which was the whole problem, so it seems like it would have been hard for them to see.   I don’t want to know the sex of the baby.  It seems like just another thing to stress about.  By not knowing, I can reserve thinking about what it means to have a girl or a boy until reality becomes apparent.

I am going to try to cook something new tonight from The Vegetarian Mother’s Cookbook by Cathe Olson.  There are a lot of good-looking recipes.

I  am taking the day off from work tomorrow, but the weather is supposed to SUUUUCK.  In other news, I finally bought a laptop and it should arrive by Friday.  Rock!  Thanks, parents!!