Purses and sunglasses!
I am always complimented on my purse or my sunglasses. I have this little knack for picking out cute purses. Since Phoebe was born, I don’t have a lot of opportunities to carry a purse since I hate carrying a purse AND a diaper bag.
But I LOVE purses.
And since I am near-sighted, I really need glasses to drive. Since I mostly drive during the day, I’m always sure to have a pair of cute prescription sunglasses in the car.
I’m not much of a clothing hound – mostly sticking with my “Manda suit” of black pants and some top… but I love my purses and my sunglasses.
Another tough one.. and this one, I have no idea.
There are plenty of people that I need to forgive (see day 4) but I can’t really seeing myself completely letting them go. Afterall, they ARE family, whether they acknowledge me or not.
Maybe I do need to let them go. Maybe when I can finally forgive them for what they did to me, I can just let them go.
It’s something to think about…
This was a difficult topic for me.. mainly because I’m the one who drifted.
I don’t keep up with old friends nearly as well as I should.
I have realized that I’m one of those people who will think of people and want to talk to them but always figure they have better things to do than to listen to me ramble.
Folks tell me all the time “call me if you want to talk” and I almost never do. It’s not that I don’t want to talk, I do. The problem is that I don’t want to bother people. I don’t want to call them when they are walking out the door, or having company, or taking a rest, or having dinner, or whatever.
I know this probably sounds stupid. And it is. It means that by the time I finally get up the nerve to call someone, it’s been WEEKS or MONTHS since I last talked to them and tons has happened and it takes a while to catch up!
I RESOLVE to do better…
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If you want to play along with this list, here’s the list of topics:
Day 1: Something you hate about yourself
Day 2: Something you love about yourself
Day 3:Something you have to forgive yourself for
Day 4: Something you have to forgive someone else for
Day 5: Something you hope to do in your life
Day 6: Something you hope you never have to do
Day 7: Someone who has made your life worth living
Day 8: Someone who has made your life hell or treated you badly
Day 9: Someone you didn't want to let go, but who drifted
Day 10: Someone you need to let go, or wish you didn't know
Day 11: Something people seem to compliment you the most on
Day 12: Something you never get compliments on
Day 13: A band or artist that has gotten you through some tough times
Day 14: A hero that has let you down
Day 15: Something or someone you couldn't live without
Day 16: Something or someone you could definitely live without
Day 17: A book you've read that changed your view on something
Day 18: Your views on gay marriage
Day 19: What is your opinion of religion?
Day 20: Your views on drugs and alcohol.
Day 21: (Scenario) Your best friend is in a car accident and you got into a fight a couple of hours before. What do you do?
Day 22: Something you wish you hadn't done in your life
Day 23: Something you wish you had done in your life
Day 24: Make a playlist to someone and explain why you chose those songs
Day 25: The reason you believe you're still alive today
Day 26: Have you ever thought about giving up on life?
Day 27: What's the best thing you've got going for you right now?
Day 28: What would you do if you got pregnant (or got someone pregnant) right now?
Day 29: Something you hope to change about yourself
Day 30: A letter to yourself
I could refer back to day 4, but I decided that that I didn’t want to give them any more energy.
This going to sound stupid.. but there was this girl in middle school and high school…
I was never a really popular kid. Oh I had plenty of friends, but I wasn’t in “The In Group” of pretty, popular girls with designer jeans and makeup – none of which I was allowed by my parents to partake of. I had friends in the group but I wasn’t part of the group… know what I mean?
This particular girl was probably one of the most popular members of the group and I admired her for her perfect hair – it was the early 80’s and everyone had big hair. There was more than one occasion when I went out to back to school shopping when I tried to find an outfit similar to one that popular girl wore. But at the time, it was almost impossible for a chubby girl shopping at Sears or JC Penney to look like a skinny girl who shopped at a fancy department store.
We chugged along merrily until one day in the 8th grade when I passed her in the hall, dressed in my knock-off designer duds, when popular girl decided to point out to everyone within hearing distance that I had bought my entire outfit at KMart.
Now, I can look back and realize that she could only know what outfits were possible from a discount store if she’d actually shopped there herself.. but at the time, I was mortified beyond belief.
This was at the beginning of the school year and I had almost every class with popular girl and she seemed to take great delight in tormenting me about my clothing and hair for the remainder of the school year. One of her mean girl friends liked to do this too, but the sting was really from popular girl.
High school came and I got busy and she and I were in very few classes together but the comments really didn’t stop. They got more infrequent but they didn’t hurt any less.
It’s been almost 30 years and the sting is still there.
My daughter has brought so much joy to my life.
She came to us after several years of bad mojo and after actively pursuing pregnancy.
From the day she was born, she has been a complete joy.
Before she was born, or even before I was pregnant, I was entering a phase in my life where I just didn’t know what to do. I was in a job I wasn’t particularly happy in, that I didn’t get a great deal of satisfaction from. I was at a point where I either had to suck it up and stick with where I was or quit and go do something else.
But then I got pregnant and I knew I wanted to be a mom.
I’m going to say that my daughter made my life worth living, but rather that she helped me find the direction I wanted to go in…
I never want to live without my husband.
He has been with me through some of the most painful moments of my life and has stuck with me like GLUE.
I have given him so many chances to get away from me and my drama but he has stuck with me.
How do you express how much you love another human being without sounding hokey?
I don’t love to breathe, but I can’t live without it. So I have nothing to compare it with.
I love everything about this man. EVERY SINGLE THING.
I love him so much that it absolutely frightens me sometimes.
The thought of ever living without him is my greatest nightmare.
I eventually want to go back to school for my master’s degree and possibly one day a PhD.
In what you ask?
Either history or religious studies. Yep, I said that.
I have no idea what I want to do with this education. I am not real sure what you can do with with a master’s degree in history besides get into education…
Here’s the list of topics again if you are interested:
Day 1: Something you hate about yourself
Day 2: Something you love about yourself
Day 3:Something you have to forgive yourself for
Day 4: Something you have to forgive someone else for
Day 5: Something you hope to do in your life
Day 6: Something you hope you never have to do
Day 7: Someone who has made your life worth living
Day 8: Someone who has made your life hell or treated you badly
Day 9: Someone you didn't want to let go, but who drifted
Day 10: Someone you need to let go, or wish you didn't know
Day 11: Something people seem to compliment you the most on
Day 12: Something you never get compliments on
Day 13: A band or artist that has gotten you through some tough times
Day 14: A hero that has let you down
Day 15: Something or someone you couldn't live without
Day 16: Something or someone you could definitely live without
Day 17: A book you've read that changed your view on something
Day 18: Your views on gay marriage
Day 19: What is your opinion of religion?
Day 20: Your views on drugs and alcohol.
Day 21: (Scenario) Your best friend is in a car accident and you got into a fight a couple of hours before. What do you do?
Day 22: Something you wish you hadn't done in your life
Day 23: Something you wish you had done in your life
Day 24: Make a playlist to someone and explain why you chose those songs
Day 25: The reason you believe you're still alive today
Day 26: Have you ever thought about giving up on life?
Day 27: What's the best thing you've got going for you right now?
Day 28: What would you do if you got pregnant (or got someone pregnant) right now?
Day 29: Something you hope to change about yourself
Day 30: A letter to yourself
So yesterday, at 22 weeks, 6 days pregnant, I found out the gender of my unborn child.
The afternoon started with a trip to my OBGYN and a meeting with midwife April. She’s a sweet thing. She was very informative, immediately found the baby’s heart beat and noted that I have consistently been losing weight since starting my care with this pregnancy. This led to a discussion of diet and gestational diabetes.
Friends, my glucose readings suck. HARD. Fasting goal is 70-95. I haven’t been below 112 since I started taking readings a few weeks ago.
We also discussed c-sections again and she said that a GD (gestational diabetes) diagnosis makes it more likely that we’ll schedule at 38 weeks instead of 39. Basically, as soon as we get a good amniocentesis, the OB’s are gonna wanna get Nugget out of there.
It was a good visit with great blood pressure readings (118/60) and I came away feeling pretty good.
Then I had an hour before my next appointment. Since both offices are in the same building and are, in fact, on the same floor, I went to the car and lay down for 45 minutes. It was quite refreshing.
10 minutes before my next appointment time, I go to the perinatologist’s office and plunk down cash for my co-pay. They do not have change, so I have to go down to the first floor pharmacy to break a $20. They will not make change unless you buy something, so I buy a bottle of water. A $2.00 bottle of water. This is not making me happy.
So I go back up, settle my account and wait. 10 minutes later, a very sweet young lady comes to get me. She gets my weight and sits me down for a blood pressure reading. This time, it’s 122/72 – still perfect.
She asks me about my foot. I explained that I had surgery and give them a list of the pain medication that I’m still taking and the cream I’m putting on it nightly. No comments about the pain pill, but they want to look up the cream.
Then it’s off to the ultrasound room for the BIG SCAN. The SCAN that tells you everything from if the heart looks good to if your baby has kidneys.
The tech has some trouble with baby. Baby is butt down but facing my back and not interested in turning around. It emphatically waves it’s arms and kicks when she uses a giant vibrator to see if we can get it to move. I get up, sit back down, turn onto both sides trying to get the little booger to move a little bit so we can see it’s face.
Nugget is not having any of it.
It’s noted that my amniotic fluid is low. Not dangerously low, but low enough that they want me to be sure that I DRINK A GALLON OF WATER EVERY DAY. Yes, I said gallon. I’m also supposed to rest, but not bedrest. Just rest. I’m also supposed to lay on my left side as much as possible instead of my right to give the Nugget as much flow as possible.
And then, they showed me the goodies. My child’s goodies that is. Nugget was in just the right position after I turned over 23 times that we could clearly see the gender.
Y’all, I am having a BOY. A boy! Me! Soon to be mother to a BOY!
What in the world am I going to do with a boy? Besides the fact that everything I have is pink or a pretty shade of purple, I’ve only got about 4 things that would be suitable.
Luckily, I hit a yard sale that one of my friends in my Mom’s Club a couple weeks ago and got a good number of gender neutral things. So the kid won’t be completely naked.
BUT IT’S GOT A WOO WOO! NOT A HOO-HA. I know how hoo-ha’s work. I don’t know how woo-woo’s work.
Oh, and did you know that little boys regularly get erections while in utero? And that their little penises (penii?) float?
Floating weiners maybe something you know about, but it was completely new information to me.
When my father passed away a few years ago, I was basically disowned by his whole family.
I won’t go into details because I don’t know all of them, I only know my side. As far as I can tell, my offense was disagreeing with them. Being his daughter, they should have expected me to ask questions. Being his daughter, they should have expected me to raise doubts and want more information.
The result is that they cut the ties with me. The result is that they are not part of my life or my daughter’s life.
In some ways, I have been hurt beyond anything you can imagine.
And I need to let it go and forgive.
My faith tells me that hurt like this can eat you alive. I pray regularly to forgive. I pray to receive peace about this.
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