House of drexin

Yep. We're drexin. I don't know if this is the correct spelling of the word, or if it is another of my maternal family's lexicon of "unreal words," but there it is. Drexin. As in N and I are drexin around the house because some nasty virus has decided to use us as hosts.

Mine began Sunday night, and while I'm not feeling good or even great, I'm getting REAL sick of being sickly, so that is a sign of recovery. N, on the other hand, is just starting her foray into this illness tempest, so I've written off the whole week for us both. My to do list says: Keep the sleeper sofa pulled out, Noggin on all day, wear the same clothes until at least Saturday.

So thinking of "drexin" makes me think of all the other funny phrases or words that I know from my mother (and her side of the tree).

Some other words for looking sickly....puny, peaked, punky. Feeling punky. I still use this one, except I just call N that sometimes. "Hey punky, how are you today?" I guess somehow this lingo morphed with my childhood fascination with Soleil Moon Frye's child stardom.

Then there is Blind Fish, which is French toast. When I was a kid, my parents were having some friends in from New Jersey with whom my dad had been in the service. M had long poked fun of mom for calling French toast "blind fish." Fortunately, just prior to their visit, I got the opportunity to go fishing at the lake with a friend. I can't remember who got the privilege of popping out that fish's eyeballs, but you know M's eyes were wide open when he saw it sitting on his plate the first morning of his visit.

Another is Crime in Italy, which I think is supposed to be Criminy? My mother would get disgusted or flabbergasted about something and say this.

Oh yes, and Crouch as in crotch. When I was in college I worked for a man named Mr. Crouch, and I remember thinking, "What an awful name!" Finally, upon stating to my best friend K that I hate it when jeans ride up in my crouch, she informed me that I was mispronouncing it.

I suppose my ability to mangle or misappropriate the English language is a skill passed down from the generations before me. I know books have been written about mis-singing song lyrics, but I am especially proud of botching U2's "Bullet the Blue Sky." Bono actually says, "Driving nails into the souls on the tree of pain." Na-uh Bono, me lad. The nails were being driven into the souls of the "chia pet." D, who loves U2 nearly as much as he loves me, almost didn't forgive me for that one.

Up and down

No baby this month, and so, I am a little blue.

Immediately, I go into cognitive behavioral mode to halt the dominos of negative thoughts. I guess the upside is that it makes me eager to spend that much more time with N because she is my one and only, maybe forever.

I know that if I don't have any more (and I realize this is premature because it is only month 3 of unsuccess), I will go on. I will have a good life. But there will always be a tinge of disappointment.

Like a record player, the wonderings that are generally filled with fear and not a true sense of wonder keep revolving:
"Maybe my meds are keeping me from conceiving?"
"Maybe N was truly a miracle baby because she happened so quickly when I would say I was at my mentally healthiest."
"Maybe God knows I shouldn't have more kids."
"Maybe this cyst on my ovary is keeping me from conceiving?"

In many ways I felt some of N's babyhood was stolen from me because I suffered from the anxiety/depression untreated or undertreated for so long. I see pictures of her between the ages of 8 months and 18-months, and I want to jump into the frame and relive it...well relive it without the feelings of sadness and irritability that accompanied me the first time around.

My nephew was born 3 days ago on Thanksgiving. And so I am envious as well. My experiences are never just filled with 1 emotion; they are usually burbling and gurgling, and just nearly boiling over with at least one deep-seated, better left hidden, unpleasant feeling.

When we went off birth control before N, my attitude was "If it happens, great. If it doesn't, we travel and have lots of fun." And true, I don't know how I would have felt if it had taken me awhile or a long time to conceive. Maybe that would have been the lever that hoisted me into the world of mental disorder?

But now, I understand what it is to have a wonderful child. Being a mom is hard...not physically so much as emotionally and psychologically. Worrying about her now, her future, her development, her psyche. Being vigilant that I am doing what I need to do to help her, to be a solid presence in her life.

But despite the hard, the being "on" most of the time, she is my miracle. Sometimes I still can't believe I gave birth to her because I remember it so clearly, and yet it seems like a surreal dream. Maybe it was someone else, and I was just standing in the room? She is what makes me know there is a "something" greater than myself....whatever that "something" is called makes no difference.

And once you experience a miracle, it's like a drug, and you want to do it again. Or at least I do.

Sick day

Fortunately I missed the big event last night. N was acting weird after her nap...unusually clingy and quiet so I suspected something was up. And it was, in daddy's lap and on the basement couch. Up-chuck. Throw-up. I had managed to head to the library and grocery store. By the time I arrived back home, D had bathed her and gotten her ready for bed.

But today was my day of fun. Staying in all day...just vegging. Prior to being a mom, I used to think hell would likely consist of me ironing in pantyhose. Now I think it is being stuck in the house with a semi-sick toddler. N didn't take a long nap, despite waking up a good hour and a half earlier than her normal waking time. She wasn't well enough to play by herself and be really active and fun, but she wasn't sick enough to just lay on the couch and be quiet. She kept wanting me to pretend to be "grandma." One day last week I took on a grandma persona just to be cute, rocking in the rocker and talking as if my dentures needed adjusting. Now I've got a 38-inch "grandma groupie" following me around begging to see my schtick.

And D is feeling sickly. Something has happened with his allergies this year, I guess, but they have been worse than ever. So he has that pathetic look about him...drexin around as if he has the world's worst case of....stuffy nose or post-nasal drip. It is really difficult for me to drum up alot of sympathy for him. I had tubes at least 3 times, my adenoids removed, and a hole repaired in my eardrum before I was 10. I have seen so many ENTs I can't even name them all. I have tonsils the size of small South Pacific islands and have taken allergy shots for nearly half my life. Beat that!

Anyway, I just hope both of them start turning it around because with Thanksgiving being this week it means I will be, for all intents and purposes, stuck in the house with both of them. I suspect I will be thankful we have 2 unopened bottles of wine in the rack.

Prevention primarily, but some other thoughts thrown in there

My MIL has been giving us a subscription to Prevention magazine for years as a Christmas gift. At first, I loved getting it. I have long been pretty fascinated with biology and health-related topics, and before my OCD became a "problem," I read through it seemingly unharmed.

When my OCD became unruly, I found that getting the mag in the mailbox nearly brought on fits of panic. Prevention became a direct indictment of me as a person, an unfit lump of margarine kind of person. A diseased, "this close to death" person. Despite meds and therapy, I still have a hard time reading it especially with articles like, "The Superbugs Are Here." God, how many more vats of hand sanitizer can I fit in the back of my SUV? I know how the superbugs are going to enter my bloodstream....FROM ALL THE ABRASIONS I'VE MADE IN MY SKIN FROM WASHING MY HANDS TOO MUCH AS A MEANS OF KEEPING THE SUPERBUGS AT BAY.

Reading Prevention is a blow to my self-esteem. Why? Because I didn't get my 25 mg of fiber or eat 9 servings of green leafy vegetables. Because I haven't exercised 5 times this week for at least 30 minutes each time. Of course sometimes reality checks in and I think about the lady I used to work with who ate at 1Potato2 nearly everyday and who's skin was a pallid yellow, and who's arm fat hung down a good three inches whenever she'd stretch her arm out to hand me journals. This makes me feel a little better.

I do have to say that I did find one small nugget of info in the recent Prevention that made me feel a little better. According to a Penn State study, crabbiness can be a sign of intelligence, at least in people ages 60+. People with above-average intelligence tend to be the very disagreeable. Now a lot of people wouldn't think I'm disagreeable, but I just keep it to myself. Maybe if I can keep working on it, I'll be in really good shape by the time I'm a senior.

Enough about Prevention. I walked on the treadmill today, ate wheat chex & blueberries for breakfast, a salad for lunch, and then blew it all to hell with 2 pieces of chocolate satin pie for tonight's dessert.

Speaking of biology and other health-related topics: I never used to dislike the 3rd week of the month, but alas, my "expected period date" is looming, so my brain is starting to....you know...go there.
Do I feel any different? (See the sparkle of hope)
I don't think I'm as irritable as normal (Another sparkle)
Are my breasts starting to develop those darkened veins? (Maybe, maybe)
Oh crap, look that that giant zit on my thigh. That is typical PMS (See hope fading fast)
For the life of me I can't remember how I felt around the same time when I was pregnant with N. Probably because I was toodling around Iceland...talk about distraction.
I am trying to just say, whenever I start on this circular train of thought, "You can't control this," and somehow, at least right now, this week, this moment, it all falls like icicles.

Addendum to I wish I lived in a village....

So I had moved on to working on my Xmas cards when the voices of "those people" popped into my head.

Everyone has a "those people" voice. Mine works overtime. Those people are the ones who disagree with me, or are seemingly superior to me in every form and fashion. They are the perfect imaginary people who pooh-pooh my Carrie thoughts and feelings. They are all the child experts and the marriage experts and the scientists and the authority figures I've read about who tell all of us dumb-ole flounderers how we should make better choices in life. They are the "no tv for children under 2" people and the "eliminate all white foods because they raise blood sugar levels too high, too fast" people and the "stay in the BMI range of 20-24 or you'll develop pre-diabetes" people and the "don't waste fossil fuels, Carrie, by running to the store too often" people.

As I'm minding my own card-making business, "those people" in my head, in their haughty way said, "How can you possibly be bored?"

Today my answer to those people is: I am bored just because I am (and btw, f*** you imaginary people).

I wish I lived in a village...

Sometimes.

There are certain benefits to living in a small village, in huts, without streets. For one, there are always other women around...bathing their children in buckets, smacking their laundry on rocks, cooking their rice over the fire. There is always noise and activity. There is always distraction.

Of course, the disadvantages of village living asI imagine it, namely malaria, lack of sanitation, abject poverty. I don't think I could get used to those.

When N is napping is when I am at my worst, although I so desperately need my "down time." As I'm getting her settled for nap my body is achingly saying, "It's almost mommy rest time." But once I have the time, I find myself putzing around the house. Or spending entirely too much time doing MOMS Club junk or, now, writing whiney posts like this.

I guess I'm not whining; this would be stating facts. I think this is just me. I've always been this way. Daggonit, I like to be entertained by other people. My brother was the type of kid who could play in his room for days with his Legos. I was the type of kid who loved when my nearly crippled grandma came over because since she could barely walk, she had no choice but to play dolls with me or let me play beauty salon and fix her hair.

Yes, I could turn on the tv, but that doesn't cut it (unless it is Battlestar Gallactica, and I have to wait for D because he likes that too). I could read a book, but I only like to read my books before bed. I could work on my holiday cards, but I don't really want to. I could practice my guitar, but again....don't wanna.

Oh Geez, my own blog is boring me. I am posting about being bored...and yet, I'm not willing to do anything to resolve it. I'm just over-analyzing the boredom.

Why am I doing this????

So why have I decided to start a blog? A couple of reasons.

First and foremost, I like to read what I think. Perhaps it is the mood disorder, but I vacillate between feeling tremendously insecure and nearly falling down under the weight of my bloated ego, which is always accompanied by Freddie Mercury chanting, "You are the champion, my friend."

Secondly, my friend G has a blog, and she is hilarious and witty and wise, and I want to be like that too. Of course, this is a free service, so I daresay the hilarity, wit and wisdom are natural to her, not special gifts granted by this blog site.

There is no thirdly.

Unfortunately, any of my friends who is bored enough to read this will determine that there is likely a special ring of hell for people as boring as me who start a blog and bore their friends.

So what is new with me????

Trying to have another baby, which is proving highly anxiety-provoking. Not so good for a person with Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Now I have Specified Anxiety Disorder....specifically about getting pregnant.

Cyst on my left ovary. A little uncomfortable physically. It, too, is proving to be highly anxiety-provoking.

Dealing with a nearly 3-year-old. Can you guess what type of emotion this provokes?

There is a theme to my life. You don't have to be an analytical wiz to figure it out.