Musings - Mama Kat's Workshop (16th June 2010)

Barefoot and hormonal…describe an incident that upset you when you were pregnant, but now looking back makes you laugh.

When I was pregnant I was never particularly hormonal. I never ranted or raved or found myself in fits of anger / tears / craziness. In some ways it was a bit of a disappointment but on the whole it was whoo hoo with relief.

But there was one incident, back when I first found out that I was pregnant... I sort of freaked out. Let me set the scene...

I had spent 42 months failing to get pregnant. I had been through tablets, laparoscopy, injections, the indignity of 'THAT' internal scan chair, egg retrieval, insemination, that awful week of waiting, failing to be pregnant, having my heart broken.

So the month after that, when I started to feel pregnant, I didnt belive it. There were so many signs but when you have been waiting 42 months you don't take them serious.

Then when my period was five weeks late I took a test.
I WAS PREGNANT!

Cue freak out!

What if this was just the artifical hormones talking?
What if I am pregnant and things are now growing in the wrong place?
What if something is wrong because I so recently had treatment?
What if I have to wait until the 12 week scan to answer my questions?
What if due to the hormones I have ten of them growing in there?

WHAT IF? WHAT IF?! WHAT IF???!!!

Cue hysterical and overly dramatic sobbing.

Luckily Assisted Conception whipped me in for a six week scan and I got to see my baby, the size of a grain of rice, growing nicely (on her own and in the right place). Phew.

Looking back, now I get to the point of this post, I realise that the crying and the frantic questioning was most likely due to the influx of baby hormones coupled with not being prepared to be pregnant. Ridiculous, I know, I had nearly four years to get used to the idea. Daft blonde!

Which is what makes me laugh, I had spent all that time trying to distance myself and be as shoulder shrugging as possible and the second reality hit I went nuts.

Worth it though. Plus its another story to tell the kid...  Even if she is likely to pull the attached expressions at me. :)

Musings (and photo) - Wowser...

So I have been sorting out some photographs so that I can start an album for Katharine. I love digital cameras and all but we never end up printing of the photos, they just live on the hard drive. I decided that Katharine would have an album of all her pictures (there are soooooooo many already), that way we can show her how she came in to the world and, hmm, the silly outfits we put her in before she could tell us no.

Anyway, I found this one!

It was taken on the 3rd of April, the day before I was induced and the few days before Katharine arrived on the 6th.

I was huge!!!!!!!

I don't think I was able to fully appreciate the size of that bump until I was able to look back and reflect.

Like now, as I type and look at it, I can not believe that my body was able to stretch like that. In fact to build a human being at all.

But mostly I look at it and think...

How the heck did I not topple over?!

Musings - Day time TV...

I love my house. It has its foibles, its leaks and its typically Yorkshire set out... but when it's silent, well, it's eerie. It creaks and moans, you can hear the neighbours, sometimes the traffic but it is usually worse when you hear nothing at all. The worse thing is 110 years of history speaking silently at you through the uneven walls and narrow servant-like staircase.

So in order to avoid the eerie, and not because I am now a temporary stay at home Mum, I have taken to having the television on. And yes, day time TV is appalling. But then I came across E4 with a morning schedule that allowed me to pay little attention but at the same time not annoy me with its background buzz.

So once the husband has left for work here is what Mother, Daughter and Pooch have to watch....

8:00 - Wildfire - a strange little programme about young people, horses and tangled story lines that while tangled are so easy to follow it is almost comical.
9:00 - One Tree Hill - Basketball and babes, apparently.
9:55 - Friends - Classic old school with all the gang, currently showing the last series (I think).
10:20 - Gilmore Girls - Whoop whoop. The very show our daughter was named after. Lorelai and Luke are currently shaky while the usual craziness is going on around them.
11:20 - Desperate Housewives - Really? This is American Suburbia? How ridiculous yet... addictive!

Then at noon everything starts to repeat itself. This is when I start to introduce the 5 week old, impressionable Chicky, to the world of our DVD collection.

That however is a whole other post... :) xx

Photo - My New Daughter!

I would like to introduce the new addition to the Redmond household...

Katharine Lorelai Redmond

6th April 2011 @ The Stroke of Midnight

7lbs 7oz

Observation - On The Inside

While I am somewhat impressed that the baby bulging inside me knows Kung Fu / all the dance moves to Step Up 2 / cabin crew directional instructions... my pelvic bone and fragile bladder do not agree. :) xx

Photo - Nursery, A Sneaky Peak

Here are a few pictures of what we have in store to entertain the Wee Redmond

when it arrives (hopefully next week).

 

Obviously we will be appreciating the decor much more than a new born, ha ha xx

Photo - Rohan and the Bump...

I am beginning to think that Rohan believes she needs to help me

hatch the baby like an egg. :) xx

Photo - Finishing Touches

I am finally getting around to the finishing touches of the Nursery.

Staining the shelves is so boring that I have been putting it off and off... and off.

But now I have started which means that once they are done and put up I can do the fun stuff. Like decide the Zeddy and Parsnip canvas prints are going. :) xx

Musings - M.I.A... again

The weeks are flying scarily by!
At the end of 2010 I promised myself that I would set out some blogging time... i failed.
My excuse as you know... growing a person. :)
Here is a photograph of my progress so far.
I have 6 weeks to go exactly. I am huge and it is only now that the real growing begins ha ha.
Still don't know if we have a Blue baby or a Pink baby (as the niece calls it) but I guess we don't have that long to wait now.
And then I definitely will have no time to be blogging anything!
Tut!
:)

Here I am again...

I doubt that anyone has noticed but I haven’t been around for a while, I have been in a strange place.
I have looked at my laptop and felt no pull at all, I have held my notebooks and felt no inspirational jolt or flutter.
I know the reason and for the time being I don’t mind that it has rendered me mute.

You see…

I’M PREGNANT!!!!

After all the ‘woe is me’ in July, after our failed IVF treatment, I got pregnant and actually in July. Clearly while the treatment didn’t work in the active sense it did give my body a shake up as in my very next fertile segment my husband knocked me up. I finally have a bun in my oven, my temporary tenant has made its home, I am getting fat.

So my absence hasn’t been because I don’t love my blog, I DO, I just had so much to tell but couldn’t share it quite yet. And sharing it is a big step for me. I am still in the not quite believing it yet stage even though I am 15 weeks and 4 days into my pregnancy. I also don’t want my blog to become all about cravings and the like, though obviously if they are hilarious I will mention them.

So I hope you can wish me well and welcome me back into the arms of the blogging world. I have missed it and you. :)
xxx

Poem - No Breath, No Baby

I never expected this? I’m aching, on my knees,

Cant you see it? I’m drowning, dying inside my skin,
All I hoped; shattered? I’m hapless, forsaken of dreams,
Nobody hears it? I’m screaming, so loud I make no sound,
Tiny pieces, too small? I’m broken; no glue can fix this,

Barren? Barren? I’m lost, my direction faded; unchartered,
Rage gnaws, never relenting? I’m angry, it crawls like ink through veins,
Empty? I’m filled with nothing; nothing creeps in every corner,
Alone with grief? I’m so alone with this grief, I greave,
Treachery in my smile? I’m masking it, look deeper; see my awful truth,
Help me, please? I’m asking, out loud, please; I’m never going to get over this,
Even now… even now? I can’t breathe…

Diary - June 25th to July 1st 2010

Diary – 25th June to 1st July

This week has been about three things…
1. In with the Embryos
2. Waiting, waiting!, WAITING!!!
3. Wondering if my best friend ever cared at all?

I genuinely have no idea what I have done this week. IVF does that to you I think.

Friday we went to Seacroft for our Embryo Transfer. I was to have a full bladder and this was to be my downfall ha ha. We had to be there at 11am and I decided to drink half my 2 litre bottle on the way there. Big mistake. By the time be arrived in Leeds at an early 10.30 I literally had to run for the loo too panicked about wetting myself to think about keeping my bladder full! Urinating never felt so special. Then I panicked about the full bladder thing so set to downing half of the remaining litre. By 11am I was ready, I couldn’t sit down, I was dancing around the waiting room but not from excitement… I needed to pee again. So after a quick word with the nurse I went but then nervously finished my bottle of Buxton. Unfortunately I didn’t go down to theatre until 11.40 so for the third time that morning I thought I was going to burst!

The procedure itself, performed by the lovely Mr Tang, was like a slightly finicky smear test. On my back, legs in the air (strapped in) and in the two little fellas went; meaning my embryos and not Mr T and his assistant. When it was all over I sped to the bathroom under the assurance that I would not be able to dislodge my new nestling (hopefully) friends with my rapid flow. All done. Now the waiting begins.

The waiting has been the worst part! I have no idea where my mind has been other than in a nervous state of insanity waiting to see if my period appeared before my pregnancy test. I don’t think I am mentally equipped to deal with it not working. Alas. Will this break me?

Thursday another one of my friends informed me that they were pregnant and due in January. This means they were trying for a very short period of time before they got lucky. Now ,I love that my friends are getting pregnant and having babies, its fantastic… but the ease with which they do… the lack of effort it takes when I have spent the last three and a half years dealing with no luck… it breaks my heart. I can’t help it, I can’t help the sobbing that comes forth uncontrolled. Not because they are happy, I would never begrudge them that; I just can’t help but feel that there will never me any babies left for me. Pathetic, huh? Soul destroying? Yes.

Next week… more waiting and possibly some painting.

Diary - May 14th to 20th 2010

Diary – 14th to 20th May

This diary entry is my 100th post. Never thought I would keep this blog up long enough but slightly, and may be oddly, proud that I have.

So anyway…

This week has been about three things…
1. Getting used to the settling in nerves,
2. Turning back the clock and jiving with The Andrews Sisters,
3. Having a vivid dream every night of the week and not wanted to look too deeply into any of them.

I added some pictures earlier in the week but this is where I get to tell you about 1940s at Haworth. I love it; it’s the geek in me that feels humbled and happy to be joining in with the ridiculous. Haworth, the village, has a yearly schedule of strange little happening which you will no doubt read about here as the year goes by. 1940s is my favourite as, let’s admit it, who doesn’t love a man in uniform. The amount of people joining in is amazing as is the high level of memorabilia that people bring for the weekend. Tanks, land rovers, rations, newspapers, singing, dancing, a visit from a Winston Churchill, Brass Bands, bagpipes and even a flyover from a Hurricane. This years celebrations, like the ones before it, did not disappoint.

Old men smiled as memories flowed and young men listened intently knowing that in a few more years these memories will be legendary tales once heard but now through the cruelty of age forced to be spoken only by the next generation. Will Britain, now only ever be glorious in remembrance?

Sunday was a day of vegetation, which involved a Sunday roast at my parent’s house, followed by far too many sweets and a rerun of Baby Boom. I always feel that Sunday should be family day and once I have children I intend to fully instate it. Until they hit teenage years of course, I remember myself what a bind it was when there was a boy to be chasing and adventures to be had. Oh the memories, ha ha.

I watched two films of note this week. The first was ‘All About Steve’, a silly instalment from Sandra Bullock which was exceptionally good fun despite the storyline being amusingly ridiculous. The other was ‘Sherlock Holmes’ and unfortunately I fell asleep so I can’t really tell you much about it; other than Robert Downey Jr has been working out and I still cant stand Jude Law no matter what role he is playing. I will have my prejudices, alas.

I finally got to see pictures of the baby that my first love had, or rather his girlfriend had, he might be a doctor but I don’t think he is involved with any scientific miracles just yet. And he is adorable, much like his father. He will make the pair of them proud and I wish their family unit well.

Other than that the week flew by in dull fashion. The nerves are kicking in about the twenty-eighth!

Next week… it’s going to be scorching so I envisage a layer of Factor 30.

Diary - April 23rd to 29th 2010

Diary – 23rd to 29th Apr

This week has been about three things…
1. Knights and Dragons and all that jazz,
2. Another addition arriving and wow his hands are big,
3. Stress.

As I mentioned last week I was ‘forced’ to move desks on Friday. I boxed up my things, again, and made an effort to be positive about moving to a desk with such a tiny amount of space around it that, which ever way I turn in my chair, I hit my arm / knee / head on something. It will be nice to have more people to talk to but at the same time I will miss my morning ritual of Sassy Curmudgeon and Heatworld. I will also miss the window and that certain person I could lock eyes on through it. The boss that I also got, the NASA one, left after three days. Shocker. Sarcasm.

I forgot to mention last week that I sent an email to the author Ian Sansom, enquiring about whether or not he was planning to publish more novels in his Mobile Library series. I never expected a reply, it was fun just to send it, but Friday morning I checked my emails and he had replied! A lovely reply too! With my email I had ‘made his day’ and because of it if I ever found myself in Belfast he ‘owed me a pint of Guinness’. This email amused me for days and as my week was horrific it has been my life line.

Saturday again saw my new ritual of Sun, coffee and a book. It also saw me with a hair cut and an amused expression as I came across the St. George’s Fun Day. I have posted photographs earlier in my blog. It was all a bit naff but fun all that same. I swear my town gets more like Stars Hollow as the years go by. Or maybe as the time goes by I, with increased age and amusement, view everything in a whole new cynically bemused light?

My bridesmaid, Rachel, had her little boy this week (24th) and they have decided to call him Thomas. No middle name, always a shame really but their choice I suppose. He was a dinky 5lbs 11oz so not so much the chubba after all. I have seen a couple of photographs so far, not the boy in the flesh, and he looks very cute and very quiet with the biggest hands I have ever seen on a new born. He’ll grow into them I’m sure… either that or he is destined to play Piano. I will report back when I have first hand knowledge of our latest boy. I was thinking about it actually; out of my group of friends and our siblings we have so far produced four offspring and they are all boys! Louis, Oscar, George and Thomas. I figure it is up to me and Samantha (Sam) to level it out with a couple of chicks.

I also had my first exam for my technical certificate and it was a lot harder than I had expected. Forty multiple choice questions which sounds easy but when each question has two answers that are perfect it gets a little difficult. I should get my results next week, I honestly have no idea how it went. Usually I know but not this time; plus I had forgotten to wear my lucky socks so that is making me nervous to start with ha ha.

The theme of this week has been ‘Stacy is a Pawn lets mess her about’ but I am still too upset / tired / bewildered to talk about it fully. Let me just say I am not impressed.

Next week… actually I daren’t even think about next week, how awful is that? :(

Diary - April 9th to 15th 2010

Diary - 9th to 15th Apr

This week has been about three things…
1. Consenting to the next chapter in my life
2. Showering an unborn baby with books
3. Being productive on a Saturday (this is rare – usually it’s the pub and then American Idol repeats)

Saturday saw sun, shearing and supervising. While the husband and the father tried to pull out the old starter motor to install the new I supervised my mother while she weeded my garden. Don’t feel sorry for her, she loves it. Weeding my garden while I stand and watch is how it has always been and how it shall always come to pass. The sun was finally out, hinting at a little spring, which cleansed the soul somewhat. Late afternoon we took Rohan to get a hair cut, 3 hours worth, and while we waited the mother and I wandered around the garden centre where she conned me into letting her buy me a handbag. It’s beautiful, green as always.

The working week started with our visit to the Assisted Conception Unit, ACE for short. We spent over an hour and a half signing form after form, consenting to all the various stages that come with having your offspring mixed in a pot. It’s all very exciting. Not too sure about the injection induced menopause but I figure whatever they throw at me now is going to be nothing compared to actual labour. Strangely I find this comforting… remind me I said that (hopefully) in a years time. I now have a vague timetable of what will be happening when and what I need to do. I might even start another blog segment about it, if only to keep me sane.

Also, one of my close friends is due to have her baby in two weeks, if she doesn’t explode before hand as she is huge, so we had a surprise baby shower. All very American but it was nice to have a get together. The mother of the one about to be a mother had the lovely idea that we all bring our childhood favourite book as a gift. It went down a storm! Chubba, the yet to be seen addition (I do hope that name doesn’t stick), now has enough books to last 0 through to 5 years. My choice was “Where’s Spot?” as “Phoebe and the Hot Water Bottles” is out of print. I do fear that having over 900 books myself means that my children are going to inherit my reading / collecting bug. Worse things I suppose, ha ha, they could inherit the big hair and buck teeth. Thank heaven for straighteners and braces. :)

Next week… it will be all I can do not to yawn.