I feel bad and beautiful

I check LJ almost daily, to see what friends are posting... if friends are posting, but I haven't been posting myself because everytime I start to write something I think, "This is garbage, no one cares about my whinging" and then I delete.

So to catch up - Several months ago I started offering to knit things for money because I was hoping to raise a little bit of cash for a friend of mine that is hoping to be able to adopt a child in the next year or so. Apparently, adoptions cost upwards of $30,000 which is... well, it's crazy really. However, selling custom knitted crap has gone about as well as one would expect, which is to say I've made $20 so far, and half of that went toward yarn so. See, my stuff is good enough for people to ask for me to make them things when it's free, but if I want $15 for a pair of baby booties that look like tiny combat boots (military spouses EVERYWHERE here) then I'm apparently just talking crazy. Winter hats that look like Elsa or Anna's hair? Totes adorable, unless I want to be paid for them, in which case they're not really what people expected, you know?

ANYWAY, so that hasn't taken off, which is both a relief and a disappointment. I'm not sure I'm ready to be a responsible adult, and if I'm spending all my non-toddler taming time knitting then I don't have time to play World of Warcraft, which is a thing I've started doing because it's something Captain and I can do together.

After the Demon Spawn goes to bed most nights, we sit at the breakfast counter on our laptops and run around smacking things with our pandas or the future Mitzi Deathbringer the giggling gnome Death Knight (I'm just waiting for the right moment to create her, she will be awesome and possibly have pink hair). Because nerds.

In the rest of the Responsible Adult news, I will be having a pair of ultrasounds of my heart, a treadmill stress test (again for the heart), and a thirty day heart monitor applied. All on Monday. Because I am, apparently, at risk for a heart attack and I'm not even forty yet and I have just really, really, really been having a difficult time processing how some minor tachycardia issues that my doctors have been pish-poshing for over a decade are suddenly potentially life threatening.

Although, I think I did sort of know something was up when the random episode went from once a month or two to once or twice a week back in October. I insisted that Captain and I finally sat down with a lawyer and had our wills done to reflect that we've got an heir now, set up a guardianship for Demon Spawn should we both die, and to update the living wills and POAs, even though we've been putting all that off for over two years.

Still... I'm scared to death because vaguely ominous feelings are strangely less scary than the thought of having something very wrong confirmed. Does that make sense?

And now I've depressed myself so it's time to get back to figuring out how to knit a thumb on a mitten.

The cooties, they spread.

Although mine are probably allergies.

Still, Miah's scratchy throat and itchy eyes and very much bad headaches plus snuffly baby equals Captain on baby duty this weekend and Miah eating some Edie's Mint Cookie ice cream.

Also, WTF is this new LJ posting interface mess? Usually I use Semagic for my blog posting needs, but I felt lazy this morning and my goodness this is horrible looking. Unnecessary buttons, stuff over on the side for no reason I can come up with other than they had empty space there. Bleh. They did this ages ago, didn't they? And I'm just really behind, aren't I?

I need a nap.

The Demon Spawn has his first cold.

Probably.

There is a chance that it's not actually a cold and is, instead, the beginning of a lifetime of torture known as hayfever that he probably inherited from both his mother and father (I don't even know if it's possible to inherit pollen allergies, but it sounds nice and ominous, yes?), in which case... oops.

Anyway, I have an amazingly good natured and cheerful child because he's all smiles and giggles for me in between the sneezing, coughing, running nose, snot suctioning (he's not terribly fond of that), puffy eyes and general difficulty breathing and eating. I know I get miserable as heck when I'm sick, and Captain is worse, so I have no idea where the Demon Spawn gets it from.

Someone remind me of this five years from now when I am lamenting how I have to tie the child to a chair and force cold meds into him because he won't stop crying/screaming.

Anywho, there is much I want/need to do today, and instead I think I'll be cuddling the sick one and catching cat naps whenever he passes out and can be put back in his PnP for a bit. We don't nap on the big bed together because I am super paranoid about everything about squishing the baby.

My heart won't stop pounding today.

Pick up the kid, get dizzy, lean against a wall until the world stabilizes, then take care of the kid. Lather, rinse, repeat.

I suspect this is a sign that I need to start remembering not to skip my meds anymore. Even though one of them (and I haven't figured out which one yet) is making me sicker than a sick thing consistently, being barfy is better than feeling like I'm having a mini-heart attack every time I try to do anything more complex than sitting.

In other news - the Great Pre-Move House Purge has commenced again. So far I've cleared my bathroom of everything that I do not need/want to move with us, as well as all of my shoes (but not the boots yet, because the boots live in the closet and I haven't made it to the closet yet), the nightstand and all three Unmentionables' drawers. In other words, I haven't really gone too far, only one garbage bag full so far.

However, I did finally convince myself that if an article of clothing has elastic so old that it cracks when you pull it? Then I don't need it.

I'm being brutal this Purge. Normally I'm very much a "Might need this at some point in the future, I should keep it, just in case" sort of gal. Add that to my husband who is a complete lazy pack rat (he keeps things, not just because they might be useful, but also because the trash can is in the other room and it's just easier to shove that empty bill envelope in his desk drawer), subtract my out of control insistence on having areas of the house that are ALWAYS PRESENTABLE and that everything has a place and should be put away when we're done with it... and you get some nice company ready rooms and some over-stuffed private rooms full of clutter (and twelve year old sports bras, apparently). So, brutal. If I haven't seen it in use since we moved to Georgia and/or it isn't a legal document/part of Captain's work issued paraphernalia/something we're waiting for the Demon Spawn to grow into, then it's going in the garbage or I'm trying to give it away to a new home.

Unless it's worth actual money, in which case we may keep it if we can't sell it, and then try to sell it in Colorado. Case in point, I own a wooden clarinet that is apparently fifty years (or more) old. Can't just toss that in the trash with a clear mind, can I? Probably can't sell it right now, either, because it's lived in a garage for ten years and needs an overhaul (new pads, taken apart and reshined, etc), so it will probably travel with us until I have more time to devote to seeing if it's worth fixing it up for resale.

Anywho, need to get back to today's to-do list.

Am out of the hospital, got out rather late last night after promising to be a good girl and stay home and rest and to not get excited or to do anything more strenuous than picking up my son for the next week or two. My OB (who technically should no longer be my caregiver but who told me to cancel my appointment to see my primary care doctor at two weeks postpartum and to see her instead because she had suspicions about my health because I'm pretty sure she's friggin' psychic or something) wrote Captain a doctor's note for his commanding officer telling them that she recommends he have the next two weeks off because I need a baby sitter and apparently can not be trusted to take care of myself or my child if left alone. We're waiting to see if his leave will be approved or not, but for now he was told not to come in tomorrow morning.

So, once again, that's awesome.

We did discover that the headaches I've been having since the Demon Spawn was born are not just annoying headaches but migraines and the reason the Tylenol hasn't been helping much is because Tylenol does NOTHING for migraines (for me, at least), apparently. Neither does percocet. Although percocet does help me clear out my stomach rather effectively, but then again, so does a migraine after its had a chance to set in for several hours without any ibuprofen (which they wouldn't give me at the hospital because I wasn't allowed to eat and ibuprofen on an empty tummy is a bad thing).

We're not sure if the migraines were contributing to the dangerously high blood pressure or if the dangerously high blood pressure was contributing to the migraines.

I did get some lovely new meds to treat the migraine, but much like the magnesium sulfate IV, the new meds mean I can not breastfeed my son. Because I am a stubborn cow, I refused to take the migraine meds today until I was able to pump one last time in an effort to provide some breast milk for the little bugger because I'm already feeling like a complete failure as a mother as it is.

Captain called in someone from the office he's assigned to on base (his current boss actually) to come babysit me and the kid today while he went to the store. That wasn't embarrassing at all.

Looking to the bright side, in the future, when the Demon Spawn is in his twenties and married and getting ready to have a kiddo of his own, I can totally remind him of how he tried to kill me from the womb. That should be worth some extra guilt induced grandparently cuddling/spoiling rights or something.

Finally, since it was make jokes or cry a lot during the latest hospital stay, I kept trying to smile and be funny and I most of the nurses joked along with me, but the day nurse on Saturday... I don't think she got my sense of humor. She definitely did not get it when I held up one of my socks as I got dressed to get discharged and said, "Dobby is a free elf!" and then made Captain take a picture.

So I'm back in the hospital. Again.

The preeclampsia that caused my emergency induction at thirty-seven weeks has not improved as hoped, and my OB is concerned that my elevated blood pressure and constant headaches could be leading up to seizures and neurological damage.

So yay for that.

Anyway, I'm currently hooked up to an IV and a catheter and drugged up to the gills and very carefully typing this into my phone with my thumb. It is taking me ages to write this post.

Also, thanks to the drugs I can't even take care of my baby. Can't breastfeed. Can't change him. Can"t even hold him without close supervision in case I drop him.

I am so sick of hospitals.

First things first - I signed up for the sshg_exchange at the last minute, because I am a sucker and I love me some Exchange gifts (mine, someone else's, whatever I don't care, post a gift, I enjoy). I shamelessly reused most of my prompts from last time because I am lazy, but the new one I spent all day (when I wasn't napping) coming up with amuses me greatly so yay for that. And one of the reused ones has actually sparked a plot bunny of my own, but that one can't be worked on until I finish the Exchange Bingo fic that I owe someone, so I'll have to wait for that.

Secondly, I ended up in the ER Saturday night for baby related issues. One of the perks - you know, other than ending up with a baby at the end, I guess - of pregnancy was the thought that I wouldn't have to deal with menstrual cramps for nine months. Turns out that's not one hundred percent accurate, apparently. See, there is this thing called round-ligament syndrome (or something similar, again, I'm lazy and I don't want to bother looking it up) and that feels almost exactly like... yep, you guessed it, menstrual cramps.

Except that no one really bothers to warn you about that ahead of time. Consider this your early warning potential baby makers on my flist, just a public service announcement from me to you.

Also, cramping in that area is an early warning sign for all sorts of things that are considered Bad during pregnancy, so if you know about the warning signs but aren't terribly aware of what round-ligament syndrome pain is going to feel like and you suddenly develop waves of menstrual cramps that go from mild to OMG SOMEONE HAS PUT MY GIRLY INNARDS IN A CUISINART and then back to mild on and off for three days, you might panic and end up at the ER.

Where the idiots live.

So, I spent three hours there only to end up with a diagnosis of - and I am seriously not making this up, I have the paperwork in front of me and everything - pelvic pain and intrauterine pregnancy. Yes, that's right, three hours after I showed up they discharged me with a diagnosis of "you hurt and also you are pregnant". No explanation for the cramping (which is STILL happening).

ALSO, they insisted I needed an IV (which I agreed was highly probable since even I could tell I was probably dehydrated) but the nurse who first came in to do it did not believe me when I told him I was a difficult stick and that he would probably need a small needle. It was all "Oh, no, Doc wants an IV so I need a bigger needle, I'm good at this, it will be fine." HAHAHA, no. So two attempts from him, including blowing out my one good arm vein, and then he called in the other nurse. She was sweet and nice and blew a vein in my hand, but at least she felt bad about it. She called in the current on call "expert", a very polite and understanding lady who kept trying to make me feel better because I was crying by the time she made attempts four and five (the side of my wrist and then back up to near the blown good vein), and told me how much she appreciated that I wasn't screaming or cursing or trying to hit her by that point (Apparently there are people even worse than me when it comes to IVs, who knew?) before she gave up. I bravely asked who was next, and then the Doc apparently gave the order that I really didn't need an IV, I just needed to drink some water.

While I appreciated the end of the poking torture, it seems to me that if I was dehydrated enough that no one could get an IV into my, admittedly difficult on a good day, veins, then perhaps I really did need the IV after all, but I gave up and started chugging water because I am not a medical professional. Honestly, at that point I just wanted a diagnosis and to be reassured that the baby was fine and that my cramping was not the beginning of a miscarriage. Captain stood by my side (or at my feet during some of the IV shenanigans) constantly in tactile contact to make me feel better during the worst of it, and kept reminding me that no matter what happened, if we lost the baby it was not my fault. Which I appreciated.

Also, there was barf bag hand puppet theater when we were in between nurses and doctors.

Anyway, after two and a bit hours, there was a pelvic exam where I was told I might have an infection - I didn't - and then an ultrasound given by a Doctor who couldn't even figure out how to plug the machine in for ten minutes. I am not kidding. Still, squirming baby and a heartbeat so that helped to reassure me. Then we were told to sit and wait for the tests to come back so we could get an antibiotic for the non-existent infection, and then thirty minutes later the discharge nurse popped in to tell me I was pregnant and send me home. I asked about the antibiotic, she confirmed there was no infection (HA, I knew it) and no one had an explanation about the cramping, but I was told to come back if there was bleeding and that was it.

Luckily, the ladies on my Facebook are not as clueless as the ER peeps and several of them recognized the pain as probably round-ligament syndrome. I can live with the annoying pain as long as I know that it's normal to a pregnancy and it's not going to kill the baby or me. Also, a bit of reassurance from the ER would have gone a long way, versus the whole "we don't know, but we don't think it's serious" crap I got.

So, moral of the story, my innards are stretching and OMG it's like my period all over again and I thought I was done with that for nine months and also the base ER is full of the stupids.

Yesterday I did something that I swore that I would never, ever, ever in a million years do ... I brought a scale into the house.

It is no secret that I have food issues. I'm a comfort eater (I know, huge shocker, right?) and I know it, but I am also aware that if I start analyzing the food that goes into my mouth in more than a half-arsed "oh, yeah, diabetic so veggies good, carbs bad, protein ok, lets try to avoid having flat out sugar every single day" way then I will start obsessing about calories and carb conversions and then I'll get self conscious about eating in front of people and it will be a repeat of that year in college where I didn't eat a single meal in front of another person and ended up taking every single meal home in a to-go box when I went out with friends.

Yeah ... I freely admit I'm neurotic.

Anyway, I am fat and I know that and I don't particularly feel the need to know the exact amount of fat that I am in poundage thanks, the general gist is enough for me. I knew I was losing weight because my pants needed a belt and I couldn't wear my wedding ring to bed anymore because it kept falling off. Again, didn't need to know the exact weight loss, didn't care. Weight coming off equals good for health reasons and also for getting annoying doctor off my back so that was good enough for me.

However, it turns out that you're supposed to monitor your weight super close during a pregnancy (or so I've been lead to believe) and those weekly (and sometimes twice weekly) weigh-ins at the hospital have started to take their insidious toll upon my psyche and suddenly I'm keeping track of weight loss and gain in the tenths of a pound increments and that annoys the hell out of me because now I have to stare at everything on my plate and think "Is this too carby? Will I get enough vitamins for the kid? Am I getting enough calories? Should I eat this piece of whole wheat bread because bread is a carb and carbs are bad but also the baby needs whole wheaty things and screw it all I want a Swiss Cake Roll."

Do not even get me started on the fiasco that was my last discussion with my OB in which she added "if you think you're going to have a heavier or carb filled meal, just inject some more insulin" to the list of CAN THIS GET ANY MORE CONFUSING?

So, that's why there's an evil scale in my bathroom that I already hate and that seems to be insisting that I weight five pounds more than I did last week at the doctor's office (which was about four pounds more than a week and a half before that, but I keep telling myself that my thick soled heavy sandals are at least three pounds of that, damnit), which wouldn't be so bad if I could just see it as a number that means nothing on its own and is only to be used to gauge losses and gains. Except the scale lies to me and keeps changing its mind by a few pounds every time I step on it, so I have no idea if I'm going up or down or staying even, and I'm seriously considering tossing it in the trash after only a day.

In happier news, there are now Swiss Cake Rolls in the house.

In less happy news, my thighs are covered in red marks and bruises that are mostly faded to yellow thanks to my insulin shots. Also, the kid is still dead set on its campaign to cripple me and has upped the ante to include making it nearly impossible to sit through a two and a half hour movie and still be able to stand up after and setting my thigh muscles on fire randomly as I sleep.

I am pretty sure I'm going to give birth to some slightly milder version of Rosemary's baby.

Tenth wedding anniversary is coming up in a few short weeks, and then near the end of July I am planning to make my first plane trip since high school to head back to Kansas for a week to visit friends and family (if everything works out, still in the planning stages of that one). Also, I have a fic that is SUPER overdue, and I need to decide if I'm going to sign up for the sshg_exchange, which I really want to do but I'm also looking at the next few months of my life and wondering how much time I'll have to write between doctors visits and homicidal fetus attacks and insulin issues. I've got until the 21st (I think) to decide, so I've got a few days still before I have to commit one way or the other.

First off, Loki either has a cold or allergies because he has been sneezing all week and it is driving me nuts. Other than the sneezing, he seems perfectly fine, so I'm not really worried yet, but if this keeps up it will probably mean a truly traumatic vet visit (for the cat and for Captain and I).

Second, yesterday was another doctor's visit, and what should have been a thirty minute visit tops turned into over two hours. Also, it involved me pointing out that I was pretty sure I'd managed to get another infection and the doctor being all "how do you know" and then I actually pointed to the infection and then the doctor was all "yep, you're right" because I'm not a flaming idiot.

And that led to discovering that what started out as a minor skin infection turned into an abscess and then into yet another case of cellulitus in under five days so I'm back on antibiotics AND I got to have the area drained which meant a shot to numb it and all sorts of things I didn't even look at once. It also means I got Percocet (boo) and Captain gets to change my bandages and stuff the wound with gauze a few times a day, which pretty much makes me hyperventilate and threaten to pass out.

So... yay for all of that.

AND I have to go back to the doctor today to check on the infection and I'm pretty sure someone is going to get thrown up on before the day is through.

Awake at two am, feeling barfy. Fabulous.

Can I just curl up and die now?