Have You Passed Gas? (that should be fun for Google)

Childbirth was less than pleasant, but worth every moment as I was wheeled into the special care nursery to hold the most beautiful miniature humans I had ever seen. It’s supposed to be that way right? To keep us going as a race? How quickly we forget the worst experience EVER as it fades away and melts into the best celebration of our lives.

Hormones must be magical, because as I look back on pictures when the girls were minutes old, I realize in my current hormone-stable (barely) state, they really were not all that cute, but actually looked like plucked see-through chickens. Seriously, they were almost 20’ long and five freaking pounds. 

But they were my chickens.

There are moments after their birth I try to forget.

Like apparently when you have a C-section, they ‘manipulate’ your bowels and the nurse’s really want to know if you have passed gas post-op. No, I mean like it is there one and only mission to log a fart on your medical chart. A sweet young nurse walked into the room as Dylan and I were visiting and asked loudly,

“Have you passed gas yet?”

Umm, can you please lower your voice? He can hear you ya know.

We were newly weds…the fart boundary had not yet been crossed and here she was announcing it to the world. Dude, I really cannot remember his middle name right now, can we not talk about farting? I’m just a blushing bride and need to be all impressing him and shit still.

Well, low and behold as I got out of bed I suddenly realized why it was so important to let one rip. I tried to shoo Dylan away as I bent over the bed.

Get out man! Run for cover! Save yourself!

He didn’t head my warning and with that we entered into a new phase of our marriage. And never looked back. Game on bitches!

There are other moments that still stand out for me. Like my roommate that spoke very little English and turned on every light in the room to calm her crying baby in the middle of the night as she sat on the toilet passing her own all important gas whilst singing at the top of her lungs

“It’s ok baby. La-la-la-la. La-la-la-la. It’s ok. It’s ok, la-la-la-la baby”

FYI, it was not soothing to the screaming baby. Or me. La-la-la-la.

Then there were Dylan’s own gas issues after treating himself to an Italian meal before coming to see us. Trust me on this one, bruschetta does not smell all that appealing the second time around and it hurts like a bitch to laugh the day after a C-section. I also recall being jealous for the fist time in my life that someone else's GI track.

It was like he was fart bragging. Jackass.

I remember my panic at their first bath and how I was sure I would drop those slippery little sausages onto the cold concrete floor. I remember my feet swelling so badly that my dad had to leave the room, as he was sure my piggy’s were going to explode foot guts all over the room from the building pressure. 

I was super hot ya’ll.

I remember when the milk fairy came to visit and the shock at how my boobs could possibly be this big and taut. Holy stripper boobs batman. I would do it all again just for the awesome rack.

But mostly I remember being scared. I had read every parenting book ever published and had gone to school to help parents be better parents, but as we settled into home and reality hit me like a ton of bricks, it was at that moment I realized I knew nothing.

Absolutely NOTHING.

It dawned on me that in fact all the books I had read, that the girls had NOT been studying them in the womb along with me. They did not have theories, parenting methods and applications memorized. They couldn’t have cared less that I had researched the very best diapers and had completely safety proofed the house with all the newest gadgets AND that I knew how to make them sleep through the night before they even took there first breath of air. No worries ladies, mommy’s got this.

But really I didn’t.

I stared at them for a very long time and felt afraid…very afraid and overwhelmed. Ok, scared shitless. I began to cry and hyperventilate as I realized that this was for at least the next eighteen freaking years. Ok more realistically like twenty-five years. Oh shit...it was forever!!!

What had I done?? What on earth was I thinking…I couldn’t do this. Okay, I admit there may have been a few little hormones flying around my body. I frantically looked in the bags to see if the hospital had sent home an instruction manual, return policy or at the very least a 1-800 number for troubleshooting. Nope, the bag was empty. Did I keep my baby receipt? Crap I probably threw that away while I was nesting. Damn type A personality. I couldn’t even ask where the return line was without a receipt. I asked myself if five days post partum was too early to start drinking.

Sadly it was…

But I also remember being so madly in love, and knowing, just knowing we were going be ok.

I look at them now after 13 years and I have never been so proud. I am proud of who they are and what they are becoming.

And I am still so very much in love.

Xo J

Birth Story

The basement trolls are officially teenagers.

Lot’s of mom’s blog their ‘birth stories’. Truly lovely stories, that make me close my eyes and imagine balloons falling from the sky as harp playing angels sing Happy Birthday.

Mine…not so much.

Bear with me as I reminisce. Grab a coffee. Or wine.

I assure you there were no balloons. 

I was 36 weeks and 5 days pregnant (read about how much my pregnancy rocked here). At my last OB appointment I was covered with a rash; something called PUPP.  It was awesome. NOT. The doctor looked at me and said he could induce right away, but told me to be prepared they may need some medical attention. Bring it on bitch. Get them OUT!!

First mother fail duly noted.

January 23^rd, 2000

6:30pm: At hospital for pre-induction. I hope my last attempt at landscaping was ok. I’m not sure if it looks like a drunk with scissors attacked me or if I resemble a 70’s porn star.

7:00pm: Doctor arrives to ‘rim’ me. This sounds dirty. Should we ask Dylan to leave? Holy shit! Dude, what are you doing?? I have never been so aware of my cervix in my entire life.

7:15pm: Doctor inserts some sort of gel. I never want to hear the words ‘froggy legs’ or ‘scootch down’ ever again. They tell me I can go home and wait.  Good, I’m hungry.

7:30pm: Let’s get Taco Bell!! Yummy.

8:30pm: Wow, I really need to go to the bathroom.

8:32pm: Hmm, I guess I didn’t need to go. But man, I feel like I could shit my pants. I would definitely not trust a fart right now.

8:39pm: Yup, I really need to use the bathroom.

8:41pm: Weird, I guess not. Oh, well. Weeee, look a left-over burrito…I love me some cold Taco Bell.

8:48pm: Holy shit, I really need to use the washroom. These cramps are hardcore.

9:50pm: Another false alarm. How frustrating. I wonder why Dylan is on the phone to the hospital? Why are you getting my bag in the car? I am NOT in labor. I just need to poop. Every 7 minutes.

10:30pm:  Arrive at hospital and ask for an epidural in the waiting room. The nurse laughs at me. Bitch. If I had my way I would have had that needle in my back when I peed on the stick 7 months ago.

10:50pm: Waiting in assessment room for a real room. I hope the nurse will blame the hovering sour gas and rotten egg smell on Dylan.

Note to self: Do not eat Taco Bell before giving birth. Bad choosing.

11:00pm: Dylan asks me to look at a zit on his forehead. He thinks it’s a tumor and keeps complaining how much it hurts. He tells me he is going to ask the doctor to look at it when he comes back.

I hate him.

11:30pm: Umm, ouch. These contraction things hurt. Perhaps in hindsight I should have attended one of those useless birthing classes. Is there a book I can have a quick skim through? I ask if I can I have an epidural now. They say I have to be more than my current two centimeters dilated. Assholes.

Now I hate my cervix.

12:00am: Dylan is playing with the doctor’s chair, he bends over and turns a dial and the damn thing pops up and hit his head…right on his zit. Great, now he is crying like a baby. Umm, hello?  I have two humans trying to go all Shawshank Redemption from my uterus through my VAGINA!!!!

I question what I ever saw in him. How drunk was I?

12:10am: While bending over to try and fix aforementioned chair, Dylan rips his pants right down the backside. Fatty. He has to call my sister to bring him a new pair of pants. 

I ask the nurse if there is a divorce lawyer on call.

12:30am: Dylan is asleep on the floor. Snoring. Poor muffin must be ever so tired. 

I bet there is something sharp in one of these drawers I could stab him in the eye with.

1:00am: A lovely nurse guides me to a hot shower. In all my naked glory, I sit on a giant exercise ball under the hot water as she rubs my lower back. I ask her to marry me. I assure her it’s legal here. Or it will be soon; we’re a progressive country.

1:30am: I fall off the ball after the nurse leaves and have to press the call button for help. I am now laying on the shower floor begging for the epidural, promising the nurse one of my first-born.

I guarantee her first pick of the litter.  I think she has gone to call child welfare.

1:45am: Back in the room. Dylan is now asleep on my bed. I punch him in the balls and ask him if he is ever panning on having sex with me again. He gets out and apologizes, telling me how much better he feels after a rest.

Jokes on him…I already know the answer to the sex question.

6:00am: Finally admitted to a real room. The doctor arrives to break my water and insert an internal monitor on Baby A’s head. I question how he will get this device on baby’s head as said baby is still inside of me. Did this guy even finish school? And why does he have a knitting needle in his hands? I really don’t think now is the time to finish off your homemade sweater for grandma.

6:10am: Oh I see, so you don’t knit after all and you don’t give a rat’s ass you have to reach through my Fort Knox cervix. With your hand. Monster.

Now I hate him too.

Dylan makes a smart-ass comment about how he hopes the doctor is gentler with his own wife. Oh, he is so funny. I am such a lucky girl. I love him so much.

No, I don’t. I am going to kill him. I’m sure they have epidurals in prison.

8:00am: Here comes the Angel of God, A.K.A: Dr. Epidural. He is so beautiful. I love him and his needle full of gold. Oh sweet relief. I think I peed my pants.

I ask him to marry me.

8:15am: Nurse hooks up some drippy thing to my arm. She tells me it will increase contractions. Meh…whatever. Do what ya gotta do. I can’t feel my ribs. Sleep.

12:00pm: Student doctors come in and ask if they can watch the birth. I wasn’t aware I should be selling circus tickets. I tell them to run as fast as they can and I will even give them a head start. They saunter out the door. Appears I’m not as fast as I used to be.

6:00pm: Doctor tells me I am not dilating and explains sometimes a twin uterus is like overstretched elastic band and just can’t contract properly.

Great, my doctor just called me fat.

Jackass.

7:30pm: I am in line for a C-section. Having then come out of the sunroof does not upset me. I never really thought the words ‘stitches’ and ‘perineum’ should be used in the same sentence anyway. My lady bits get to stay the way they are. Woot! Woot!

Just get them out.

After all, I have cute jeans to put on ASAP.

11:45pm: Wheeled into OR room. The room is so full it appears they have been selling these so-called circus tickets without my consent. I better get some of the profit.

We have wait until after midnight as the doctor wants them born on the same day. Don’t mind me spread out like Christmas dinner on the ice-cold stainless steel table with 500 people staring at my nakedness. These florescent lights are always so flattering.  I’m good. I lost my dignity at 'froggy legs'.

Am I peeing again?

January 25^th, 2000

12:09am: Welcome to the world Olivia Rose.

12:10am: Welcome to the world Peyton Isabelle.

I have never been so in love. There are no words. My heart is bursting.

Happy Birthday Olivia and Peyton.

To be continued….

Xo J

Cheesy Uterus and Dairy Ass

One of my favorite things to look at on my blog statistics is the search terms used to find this blog. Most of them have to do with ‘mom on strike’ or simply my name, but every so often a gem pops up that actually makes me pee my pants laughing.

These are the ones I post on my Facebook fan page for shits and giggles.

Umm…you would already know this if you had given me likey love by clicking the blue button to your right. Just sayin’.

Anyway, this week the term that left me smelling like a hamster cage from laughing too hard was: “shooting dairy out of my ass video”

Yup, that’s right. Google somehow directed the person looking for footage of ice cream ass explosions for whatever reason, (I am not one to judge) to my blog.

And they clicked the link.

Ok, I am judging a bit.

I hope they found what they were looking for, but I can assure you that no matter how hard you search through each and every one of my posts there is NO video of me shooting dairy out of my ass.

You're welcome by the way.

Odd right? Well not as odd as a conversation that ensued afterwards via text with one of my besties.

Friend: I googled the search term and you really are the first dairy ass search return

Me: WTH?? I feel so confused. It doesn’t even make sense.

Friend: I thought I would get animal porn for sure, but nope, its all you.

Me: Google hates me. I really am one step away from porn.

Friend: OMG! Type in ‘My uterus went on strike and decided to make cheese’.

Friend: Number one bitches!

Me: I do love being number one.

Friend: ‘Redneck uterus made cheese for trolls.’ Sadly, you are fourth. But that’s still awesome.

ME: Fourth?? WTH? Assholes.

ME: Also, I’m stuck on why you are obsessed with my uterus making cheese?

Friend: Because it’s funny to type cheese.

Me: Fair enough. And this is why we are friends.

Friend: You are the best google search ever. Try ‘T-Rex stole cheesy uterus for wine trolls’. Weeeeeee!

Me: Are you drink?

Me: Drink?

Me: Damn. DRINK?

Me: Guck

Me: D R U N K.

Me: Eggnog auto correct phone.

Me: Grrrr. I don’t even like eggnog.

Friend: Can eggnog be our safe word?

Me: No. It cannot.

Lessons learned:

1)   I clearly need to evaluate the use of the words ‘cheese’ and ‘uterus’ on my blog.

2)   My friends are AWESOME!!!

Xo J

What’s that? You want to hear more of my odd search terms? Well…go hit the Facebook like button then.

Blackmail for search term laughter. I’m ok with that.

Only good things can happen when you are wearing cowboy hats.
Eggnog.

Book of Romance

I have been a bad blogger. Shame on me. This week has been crazy with four basketball practices, three soccer practices, six basketball games, one soccer game and one basketball tryout session. Plus a foster babe and a full time job. This parenting thing is really putting a damper on my social life, writing and wine drinking.

I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.

I have mentioned Dylan here and there in this blog, but haven’t really shared in-depth with you some of the funniest moments in my life with the man I share my life with.

Truth be told, I have not ‘gone there yet’ for one reason.

It’s not that I am worried about displaying or mocking Dylan and our marriage to the world. Come on now, it’s me. I’m not the kinda gal whose afraid to serve it up on a silver platter to you with all the glorious details.

It’s because our marriage could be a freaking blog of its own.

I don’t know where to start.

I am not going to make fun of Dylan today, rather turn it on myself after a thought provoking conversation we had the other night. Yes, over a bottle of wine. I get super smartical and deep when I am one glass in. I could solve the world’s problems. If only I could remember the next day what we talked about. I should learn to write that shit down. Oooh…in a list. I’m totally adding that to my to-do list.

The hot topic de jour was about chivalry and romance. Is the art of chivalry dead and what impact has the feminist movement had on men’s perception of women?

I know, deep right?

Anyways it was very boring and truth be told I lost interest very quickly.  I started to think about other things as I nodded my head and stopped paying attention. I began imagining T-Rex’s trying to do the Macarena and if…..ah hell, now I can’t  remember. I didn’t write it down.

But our conversation did make me think about romance, or lack thereof in our marriage. Let me be clear, this is in no way on Dylan’s part. It’s me. I suck at being soft and fuzzy and I do not have a romantic bone in my body.

Dylan is über romantic. Some say I am lucky. Usually it makes me roll my eyes and gag.

Dylan brought me two dozen roses when the girls were born. One dozen to mark each of their births. I got mad at the waste of money and questioned how ludicrous the price must have been in freaking January. Dude, those things just die and go in the garbage.

Trash is not romantic.

I have learned not to send Dylan to the corner store for ANTHING. Seriously, the man could fill a grocery cart at a gas station. Once I asked him to pick up some cough drops; he came home with one of each kind in stock. As he presented them to me like a chest of jewels, he explained that he didn’t know what kind I wanted, so he bought one of each. He was so proud of himself. You can imagine how annoyed I was.

There are things Dylan does for me that I do adore and I do not think these acts of love takes the giant strides of feminism back 100 years. He does not make me feel like less of a person because I own a vagina, but rather keeps the art of chivalry alive and well in our relationship.

Dylan brings me a cup of coffee in bed every morning.  If there is not enough cream for two cups in the morning, he will give it to me without a blink of an eye. He will warm up my blanket in the dryer before I get into bed on cold nights. My man orders nachos when we eat out, even though he doesn’t like them but knows they are my favorite pub food. He gives me his jacket when it’s cold, fills my car with gas before I have to leave for work and my heart skips a beat whenever I see a little blue box with a white ribbon.

He has also learned that vacuuming is foreplay.

It’s the little things. He makes me feel special.

Dylan has a fictitious ‘romantic log book’ he keeps to record the miraculous moments in our marriage when I shock the shit out of him and do something, well romantic.

The book is 13 years old.

He is on page one.

1) Jessica layered my sauce and spaghetti tonight. That was nice. She even added cheese.

2) Jessica called me “honey” today. And she didn’t mean bee vomit.

3) Jessica gave me a spontaneous hug today in the kitchen. I wondered if she was about to give me bad news or had bought a new car.

4) Jessica popped my zit tonight. Even though I didn’t want her to and I screamed like a schoolgirl, she claimed she was ‘helping’ me and insisted I should consider this an act of romance and write it down.

Yup…that’s it.

I had a friend urge me to ‘push my own envelope’ and do something romantic. One of the suggestions was to write love notes on the bathroom mirror. My first question was,  “Umm, whose gonna clean that up?”

I decided one morning to give it a go.

I noticed whiskers in the sink as I was brushing my teeth, so I took an old eyeliner and wrote on the mirror:

Confucius Say: Man who leaves whiskers in the sink makes for angry wife and lonely nights.

Then I sent a text message asking him to clean the mirror.

I told my friend about my great-big-giant romantic gesture. She shook her head and told me I missed the point.

Whatever. I owned it! Check and Mate!

I do keep a memory box of all the letters and cards Dylan has given me over the years as well as the movie tickets from our first date and other random mementos. Umm…hello, that right there makes me romantic right? Usually I would just throw that shit out. Clutter. I must really love him to be that mushy.

Put that in your book jackass!

The most romantic thing Dylan does? He fills my wine glass. That’s right, I have myself a wine bitch.

That’s true love. I am one lucky girl.

xo J

Behold the miracle, we are holding hands:)