Here is my song, for the asking...

Last night I spoke to Appa and Amma, just to let them know that the latest doctors appointment had...

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 10:59:21 -0500

Last night I spoke to Appa and Amma, just to let them know that the latest doctors appointment had been uneventful and to try and hammer out dates and airlines with them.

More importantly it was the first time they were seeing my belly, now that it’s reached the undeniably pregnant stage and they were both a little (too) awestruck. My father even had to ask if I hadn’t gained too much weight. The soul of tactfulness, Malayalee parents are.

Ro and I can’t sleep at night because once the lights are off we talk about the kind of parents we think we’re going to be (wonderful, FYI, thank you very much) but more obsessively about the kind of person we think Aditi is going to be. Will she be shy and stubborn like the both of us were when we were kids? Will she hijack some outlying genes and turn out to be a friendly and outgoing baby? We both think that it’s unlikely but stranger things have happened. Will she be a tomboy, a bookworm, a girly girl, an antisocial element?

Will she be a girl at all? A friend told us that her doctor told her she was going to have a girl at 16 weeks but by 6 months said, oops you’re having a boy. Dr. K was very definite about us having a girl, pointing out some definitive lady bits so we’re not worried really but I hate hearing stories like this.

I’m having quite a hard time thinking about buying baby stuff. I already have a huge bag of hand me downs from friends and some gender neutral toys bought while we were in Chile but there has been no progress beyond that point. It’s strange.

Amazingly awesome. I promise.

Fri, 13 Feb 2009 12:27:37 -0500

Amazingly awesome. I promise.

More peeks at my imaginary future home

Wed, 11 Feb 2009 12:43:12 -0500

There are a couple of things that I am really lusting after despite the fact that they have kept showing up in every other design blog post.

The first is the more classic and that’s the Sapien bookcase.

I think it’s beautiful and I love the idea of stacking books in big piles. I would love to have this as my bedside table since invariably that’s all I ever have on my side of the bed.

The other thing that I want is the Keep Calm and Carry on poster. Until recently I’ve just been surfing through the sneak peeks and House Tours on design*sponge and Apartment Therapy without reading the comments. Now that I have started reading comments I find as ubiquitous as this poster is, people also seem pretty sick of them. Hopefully I do not know of these decorating snobs personally because I love this poster. It reminds me of my sister-in-law, it’s pretty much her unspoken motto and something that I aspire to.

I like the classic red but all the colours are pretty juicy. I think I would also resize the matting so there’s more of a border around the top and bottom.

odds and ends

Tue, 10 Feb 2009 19:38:00 -0500

Today was my monthly doctors appointment and unlike the last appointment where Ro and I were so excited to see the ultrasound we didn’t ask any questions, we managed to clear some basic things with her like how much weight I should gain over the next 18 weeks (15 pounds) and if there’s any food I should absolutely not eat (swordfish). We also found out that barring any complications there would not be any more ultrasounds thanks to the limitations of my insurance, so as Dr. K pointed out I really don’t want to see another ultrasound of Aditi. It was a little disappointing but on the other hand we got to hear her heartbeat for the first time and that was awesome.

Today was also uncharacteristically warm - 18 degrees centigrade - fabulous! It’s supposed to snow on the weekend since this is Indiana and the weather is famously schizophrenic here. However since I hardly left the house in January and had to do little or no walking outside the house, I have to say I miss the blanket of snow covering the ground. It made everything seem so mysterious, cosy yet menacing. I also liked to make the analogy that like me, the earth was waiting to burst forth and bloom ; )

This bit of the pregnancy is getting to be a little anti climatic…there’s no more morning sickness, which disgusting as it is provides a focus for your emotions, you’re just waiting for it to be over and in the coming months there is nothing much that will change. I will get bigger and bigger and sleeping will continue to get more and more uncomfortable. I don’t know, the warm weather has stirred up some longing that it’s June already and Aditi is here.

I’ve also heard some good and bad news, someone I know is pregnant (yay!) and someone I know just had a miscarriage. This is maybe the second or third time that things haven’t gone right for this person and I just don’t know what to say. It’s sometimes so hard to commiserate long distance, in person one doesn’t depend solely on words. I know when I speak to her she’ll sound brave and upbeat but I also know it’s a front and I don’t know know what to do with that.

Peeves

Fri, 06 Feb 2009 14:34:11 -0500

I have finally begun showing, or rather I am slowly coming to terms with the fact that I am showing. Although my rational mind knows that I am pregnant and not fat, there is a part of me that is reading up on diet tips a little too eagerly. Although I am not a dieter or an exerciser by nature, my changing body seems to have triggered this response in my mind that I need to lose weight. I think I am afraid that after having a baby I will be destined to be fat (or fatter to be honest). This is such a concern for me that I am shocked by my own vanity. I love clothes and dressing up and looking hot as much as the next woman but because I was so thin till I turned 23 or 24 I was never bothered by the weight I’d gained after getting married. I think I’d always assumed I could lose it when I wanted and it was a relief not having people trying to feed me up.

However the last two years have been challenging for me because I finally realised that I wasn’t magically becoming slimmer and in fact my weight was creeping up way part pleasantly rounded/healthy and into the dreaded overweight category. Not that I was unduly bothered by it but I did make an effort to make it to the gym as much as I could to try and least be active and healthy, if not thin. I was just sick of the word thin, it’s so abused in the media and now to me thin connotes anorexic/sick.

Now my weight has become one of my underlying anxieties about my pregnancy (along with labour and hemorrhoids). I am not inclined in the least to diet but I worry that I may have put on more weight than is ideal. I’m afraid that I won’t lose the weight and just become more and more matronly until I become invisible as a woman and am just another mom. Nearly all my friends who are mothers still carry around a goodly percentage of the weight they gained while pregnant and complain of how hard it is to lose it when you don’t have the time to spend on yourself.They talk about this almost obssesively - and this more than the never ending anecdotes about their children is one of the things I find boring about motherhood.

and I am obviously well on my way there.

I'm a slave to public opinion.

Wed, 04 Feb 2009 10:07:18 -0500

I’m listening to the Killers cover of Romeo & Juliet but somehow their cover doesn’t make me tear up spontaneously like the original one does. I wonder if I’d heard this version first whether it would have made it to the erratic & eclectic list of my favourite songs. I don’t think so.

Is it sad that this is the bed I currently love the most? It’s like a pale imitation of the bed I sleep on at my parent’s home. My great grandmother apparently once gave birth or almost gave birth in it. It’s ok, I have a new mattress.

This is the other bed/headboard I’m craving. Do you think if I used just the regular bed metal bedframe and a bedskirt (or whatever they’re called) it would look bad with the headboard or not in keeping with it’s “Eastern” character?

What do you think? Option A or B? Wooden bedframe or metal with a box? Should I make a surveymoneky poll the next time I solicit your opinion?

Shopping

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 09:26:00 -0500

Yesterday Am. & I went to Michigan City to the outlet mall there. There are insane sales going on, but since I am pregnant something stopped me from going nuts over everything although Am. pointed out that I wouldn’t be pregnant forever. [Something called Rohit who met us there later, just in time to stop me from buying the cutest pair of shoes in Banana Republic by pointing out that my feet are likely to swell anytime now.]

I did manage to get a couple of shirts and a pair of maternity jeans. I am trying to work out a capsule wardrobe. So now I have a couple of casual/semi formal blouse/tees, a cardigan, a cute little black dress and a dressy shirt plus of course my first pair of maternity jeans and a pair of hand-me-down black trousers. I think this should work out quite well. I want to get a couple of accessories like a statement necklace and maybe a big chunky bracelet and a couple of flats when the weather warms up [and presumably when my feet are done swelling].

I do want Amma to bring me a couple of caftans from Anokhi. I love their prints and they do them in a really soft mul-mul that makes them ultra-comfortable.

I have been dreaming about what the baby is going to need, as well as how I’m going to do up the house. The saddest part about the whole thing is that I am sure that something is going to screw up. We get Ro’s relocation bonus around the same time that I am due. This means that we will rent a house/apartment only after I have a baby and then I am going to organize all the stuff we need from scratch while dealing with sleepless nights et al.

I know my parents are going to be there and I am depending on them to keep me sane but at the same time I don’t know how much they can do or how much I want to delegate. Currently the scenario I am working involves them staying at home while Ro and I do the actual shopping. I don’t know though. My mom likes to shop and it would be cruel and unusual to make her sit at home even if it’s with her first grandchild.

Whenever I talk to Ro he keeps telling me that it’s all going to be ok without making it clear to me how he sees it working out. This makes me pretty pissed off and then we fight and then we make up because this is the best trimester ever! I do believe it is going to be ok though. It’s all a question of how I present my questions to Ro. Requests should sound manageable – what is the timeline you envision for moving house for example has elicited a more specific response than how are we going to move and have a baby and shop, although I am in fact asking the same thing.

Anyway, apart from Ikea what are your favourite resources for doing up your house? Something affordable being the most important criterion although I am willing to relax this somewhat for unusual & gorgeous? hmm…? Help anone?

A nice long ramble ...

Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:03:42 -0500

There are so many things to be said about being pregnant, but somewhere after leaving Kottayam I feel like I lost my voice. It’s so hard to blog about stuff that you feel strongly about. I know this seems incredibly weird as more and more people get out there sharing more and more of what is important to them but more and more I feel like making the odd cryptic utterance and then deal with trying to decipher what I meant later.

Stuff like boobs stomach race bigger first. Ultimate winner stomach. Ok, there was nothing very cryptic about that. Seriously though - my body is not freaking me out as much as I thought it would. Maybe later when I can actually see her moving around in there but so far my body is reassuringly still familiar. I am clearly pregnant now. Although this season doesn’t do much in the way of enabling me to flaunt my body publicly ( you know, for parking etc), when I am at home, it’s amazingly wonderful to me to look down at my belly and know that my child, my baby, my Aditi kuttoose is in there.

My boobs on the other hand are just amazing. I’ve become used to not having any at all to having something there, thanks to an all round weight gain that I could have happily done without, but now I have bazonga boobs that are just out of control. Seriously not a week goes by without them expanding into a new zip code. I am a little scared of these boobs now. It’s like they’ve been hibernating till now but now they have awakened to their lifes purpose and they are on a mission now. A mission to feed those octuplets that were born recently.

I’ve heard that breast feeding can be hard, not from my mom though, who acts as though we fell painlessly from her womb and latched on without a fuss and only later became the demons that she recalls us to be. I think about all these things - like breast feeding and labour and will Ro still love me or will he love the baby more. Ro occasionally counters with will I still love him or will I love the baby more and depending on where my hormone level is, I worry about that too - not, if will I no longer love him but will he be jealous of the baby? Luckily for me, this is the best trimester and I know its all going to be ok. Thank god it didn’t occur to me when I was the hot mess in my first trimester in Chile who wept all the time because I couldn’t go out anywhere because it was smoky and everyone else was getting drunk just to make me feel left out.

What else do I have to say about being pregnant - it’s kind of sucky and wonderful all at the same time. I’m frequently constipated, always have the sniffles, can’t sleep at night and all this is considered pretty normal and I’m lucky I don’t have it worse. Then you go online and look at http://www.lennartnilsson.com/ and you realise to bitch about all this is just petty. I am growing a human person inside me and creepy as that it, its also so freakishly awesome.

My big problem is that I can’t figure out if I can feel the baby kicking or not. There is a...

Mon, 26 Jan 2009 15:43:46 -0500

My big problem is that I can’t figure out if I can feel the baby kicking or not. There is a more or less constant rumble in the area previously occupied by my stomach but I fear mistaking gas for baby movements. A lot of people say it feels like butterflies but whatever I’m experiencing is a lot more ungenteel than that. Actually I’m pretty sure I can feel her, but how much am I supposed to be feeling? Should I be able to count X no. of movements in a hour?

Last night I couldn’t sleep, nothing new and the new mattress is really soft so it’s twice as hard to fall asleep. Anyway, last night I couldn’t fall asleep and every time I’d move from one side to another, I swear I could feel her kick me,

In the morning, I was all, Ro! Aditi was kicking me and he was all, was she kicking or was she kicking you? I was like, she was Kicking me, so then Ro goes, Aditi don’t kick your mother, and I knew in that moment this was just a preview.

I’ve spent the whole day with a splitting headache. An afternoon nap and 2 Crocin later I am...

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 18:18:09 -0500

I’ve spent the whole day with a splitting headache. An afternoon nap and 2 Crocin later I am none the better. I just discovered Ro’s stash of Vicks in the bathroom and have slathered my face in it hoping that the burning sensation would provide a few precious minutes of distracton from the pounding in my head. So far it’s working, so let me share whatever bloggable news I have. (There is no unbloggable news but it sounds better)

Ro and I finally decided that we are going to have the baby in South Bend. In the end although I would have preferred to move to Chicago at least a couple of weeks before the baby and before Ro starts work, it just works out better to have the baby here and make my mother make the tough decisions of whether or not to throw away the fake butterflies I have been hoarding from a baby shower I threw months ago or are those sheets too faded and will I ever wear those pants again?

I am simeltaneously dreading and not able to bear the wait for my mom to come. She’s going to be here for 2 or 3 months telling me the best way to do everything. I love my mom, I do, I swear! but I know I am going to have at least one big fight with her. Then after she leaves my mother in law gets here. I know I’m not going to fight with her but that’s really no credit to me. And then; my sister in law has offered to come. Of all the offers I have this is the least certain and I think the one with the least pressure. Hopefully I won’t have to be alone with Baby Aditi until she’s at least 9 months old. She should be crawling by then.

Thank God for loving (and bossy) Indian families.

Names

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 12:26:23 -0500

Every time I sit down to write something about my pregnancy I look out the window and, “It’s still snowing??!!” Bam! I’m distracted. There is something about this much snow that makes everything seem surreal. I can’t stop looking out at it, the way it carpets everything, the way colours are muted into black and white, the way it makes some colours pop. The story of Snow White comes to mind. “Oh, how I wish that I had a daughter that had skin white as snow, lips red as blood, and hair black as ebony!”

and then just like that I am free of the spell. My daughter will never be Snow White. The name we’ve chosen for her, its story is irrevocably Indian. An Indian goddess but never a Germanic princess. Now, it sounds so dramatic and it’s really such a common Indian name - Aditi.

Aditi - boundless, free, an infinite and shoreless expanse. The celestial virgin and mother of every existing form and being, the synthesis of all things. In one of the most mystic aspects, Aditi is divine wisdom. Aditi is the goddess of space, consciousness, the past, the future, and fertility. As the womb of space, she is a feminized form of Brahma. The line in the Rig Veda, “Daksha sprang from Aditi and Aditi from Daksha” (RV 10.72.4) has reference to “the eternal cyclic re-birth of the same divine essence” (I’m quoting selectively from that most authoritative of sources - Wikipedia).

But who knew Aditi meant something so beautiful?

My mamma she loves me

Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:18:29 -0500

Being back in South Bend is so nice. I’m not sure what the appeal is - it can’t be the winter wonderland or the wonderful variety of food (mmm…Chipotle) or even my friends (the friend thing because I just saw them over the holidays and I can’t have started missing them). Like I’d said in my previous post, when I was in Chile the only thing I wanted to do was to go back home, home to Chennai and/or Kottayam but now I feel like I can wait and wait and then wait some more till my mom comes and starts cooking ~~on demand~~, um upon polite request. Maybe it’s just some of those wonderful second trimester hormones kicking in. Whatever it is, I am feeling glowy and happy.

In South Bend it’s so cold and snowy I can’t believe that less than a week ago I was in...

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:11:55 -0500

In South Bend it’s so cold and snowy I can’t believe that less than a week ago I was in Guatemala, where the sea was warmer than the pool.

In South Bend it’s snowing today at the rate of an inch per hour. In the morning the flakes were fat and heavy and you could see the wind driving them, moving them along. Now the flakes are so fine it’s like we’re being dusted with icing sugar.

Today the nurse called me and said that the quad screen came back fine and everything is ok. I knew that we weren’t at risk for Down’s Syndrome but taking a test, any test can be pretty nerve racking. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do if the baby had Down’s Syndrome - I didn’t want to have an abortion but I’m not sure I can handle the challenge of raising a child with problems. Of course, it could still happen but as of now, for the time being I will not have to contemplate the failings of my personality.

So Ro and I have a tentative name for the baby, but ever since we found out it’s a girl we’ve been going over our list of names again and again. It’s almost like finding out you’re pregnant again. I know its so nuts but in the ultrasound I swear I think the baby looks like me :)

The last month has been peaceful. My pregnancy has been going by the book, nothing unusual. I’m so glad to be at home with all my stuff. I’d been thinking of going down to India but now I don’t think so. I wish I could be with family and friends but I think they would all prefer to see me post baby. I’m waiting for Amma to come of course but the ways thing are and expected to be this trimester I’m going to be fine and then of course it’s too late to travel.

So I’m back in the Bend. And drumroll please…. I’m having a girl.

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 15:37:07 -0500

So I’m back in the Bend.

And drumroll please….

I’m having a girl.

16 weeks

Thu, 25 Dec 2008 22:58:28 -0500

I am 16 weeks today. Merry Christmas to all of you, those of you who are reading. I feel I need to get back into the swing of things, finding new blogs, leaving comments on old ones. In the end though, I’ve decided I don’t care as much as I used to. If you’re reading this excellent, if no one’s reading this, shucks!

16 weeks, it’s all going by so fast. Next thing I know, they’re going away to college and I’m wondering what to do with all my free time.

Only a week left in Santiago

Tue, 23 Dec 2008 14:26:00 -0500

I know its been a long, long time since I’ve updated but seriously pregnancy wise nothing much has been going on. If anything I feel a little worried exactly because there’s nothing going on - I feel good, there’s next to no nausea, my energy levels are back to normal, it’s like I’m not pregnant. On the other hand, my stomach has become taut and even when I lie down I can see a small bump and I do have a stuffy nose which is apparently super common.

Non pregnancy wise, of course we’ve been doing a lot of stuff. Ro finished class a couple of weeks ago and we drove up to La Serena, which is a small seaside town up north with a couple of swimmable beaches. From La Serena, we took a day trip to Isla Damas, which is one of three islands that make up a marine nature preserve. Isla Damas is the only island you can disembark on. The other two islands have all the flora and fauna going on.

The boat ride out to the islands was so fantastic because apart from the islands themselves there are also a lot of dolphins around and there was a small pod of dolphins that followed the boat and were just playing around. We tried to get pictures but in most of the pictures they look like they might as well be sharks.

My favourite part of the park though were the Humboldt Penguins. No suprise really since the park’s full name is the Reserva Nacional Pinguino de Humboldt. They’re apparently the second smallest species of penguins in the world and they were so adorable. The island is like one gigantic rock and you should have seen them waddling around and jumping up from one rock to another. Ro and I now refer to our unborn child as Baby Humboldt.

The next day Ro and I drove to the Elqui Valley, not least because Ro had heard that the “good vibrations” from the Himalayas had shifted to Elqui Valley after the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. It was in fact very peaceful and relaxed. The stars in the night sky were amazing. We’d wanted to go to an obervatory but we didn’t have the time. I’m not sure we needed to though because in my life I have never seen a sky that clear. I saw several shooting stars and it was one of the simplest bare bones places I’ve ever seen. I loved it. Ro reports though that he thinks the Himalayas still have their appeal intact for him.

I’ll post pictures later since they’re on Ro’s computer. We also went to Pucon which was awesome and I’ll post about that later too.

So, one of my biggest problems is that I don’t feel pregnant. Yes, I know I look pretty...

Mon, 08 Dec 2008 14:27:00 -0500

So, one of my biggest problems is that I don’t feel pregnant. Yes, I know I look pretty pregnant but trust me, it’s not different from the way I usually look. Anyway month 4 has kicked in with a new pregnancy symptom - dizziness. If I sit up too fast, there are a couple of moments in which I kind of black out. Luckily my doctor has warned me about this, so the first time it happened, I had a big grin on my face - like whoo! I’m pregnant! Unfortunately Ro sw my big grin and now I get no sympathy…The Book also let me know that I could start experiencing pregnancy brain, aka as being forgetful. I’m pretty scatter brained already so now I’m just going to start blaming everything on being pregnant. Ha! Unforeseen advantages.

UPDATE: I was only dizzy that one day so I am not sure what it was. I’ve been fine since.

The last three months have been on average less horrifying than hearsay led me to believe. I...

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 20:38:53 -0500

The last three months have been on average less horrifying than hearsay led me to believe. I expected a ton of throwing up, never ending nausea that would lead me to scornfully say things like, the person who named it morning sickness must have been a man! but I didn’t have any of that. What I experienced instead was a bone deep weariness. I could sleep all night, wake up, barely stay awake to eat breakfast, cat nap, wake for lunch, properly nap, wake up & potter around and then crash as hard as if I’d been partying like it was 1999 by 9.00 pm. Luckily for me, the Book (What to expect when you’re expecting) tells you that the pregnant body is working harder than a non pregnant body does climbing a mountain. Sure, it sounds like hyperbole to you but I assure you I believe it whole heartedly. Sometimes, a very few times I would feel a little nauseous but it was more my newly heightened sense of smell kicking in than actual morning sickness.

The other thing I do is cry. I cried when Obama won, that’s ok you say, lots of people cried when Obama won but here’s the question did they cry when Homer made Lisa a crossword puzzle to apologise for being a bad dad? Did they? Other times I cried - when the Universidad de Chile football team came on to the field, when Ro made egg curry at home, when Ro said I looked like a mom etc, etc. I also cried almost uncontrollably for several days watching the news from Bombay but that can’t be blamed on being pregnant.

So far, while it hasn’t been the most comfortable I’ve been in my life, it’s not been the stuff of legend. I’m looking forward to the next three months which are supposedly even better and not so much to the last three months which I can’t imagine being anything but horridly uncomfortable.

Anyway I’ll keep you posted. It’s why I started this blog!

So today marks exactly 12 weeks. This is a picture of my belly...

Thu, 04 Dec 2008 08:51:00 -0500

So today marks exactly 12 weeks. This is a picture of my belly but as I told my mother in law, I can’t really make out if it’s my paunch or something more significant, And! and I’m sticking it out, so really I am not as pregnant as I look. (Hoo boy, do I sound defensive or what?)

Hello

Wed, 03 Dec 2008 15:04:36 -0500

So, I feel like I’m embarking on this whole new phase in my life and I’ve decided that I need a new blog to go along with it.