Alright, vast majority of public nation/whoever reads this site, I need your input.
As it would be, Aaron and I have gone back and forth and back and forth on a female name for this baby, we have a male name set in stone and although we have a list of maybe’s we can’t seem to put our finger on “the one”. I’m a tad bit aggravated by this. I want a name for a girl so I can stop thinking about girl names 24/7 and wondering if we’ll name it “baby schaap” until she’s 4 months old and we finally decide on something. I don’t want a “baby schaap”. I want a named child. Boy or girl. and right now, all I’ve got is boy.
So please, muster all your courage and POST a suggestion. Sometime in January, if any of you won, you’ll know (if we have a girl) and if we have a boy, then fun for you … maybe next one’ll be a girl and we’ll keep it a secret until then.
Guidelines:
I’m seriously asking for suggestions … If I get someone telling me I should name my kid Thelma/Dorothy/Patsy Schaap … I’ll hurt you. So be nice, and honest.
OR if you don’t want to give up your name choices in hopes that someday you’ll too have this dilemma, then give me suggestions about good sites to visit, etc.
Now happy commenting, I’m waiting.
posted on September 29, 2004| 2:26 PM EST
In my entire “womanly” adulthood, I think I’m safe to say that I never suffered from the dramatic mood swings. Depression, yes. Mood swings, not so much. And I think I finally know what they are.
After having been experiencing them, unbeknownst to me, for the past month or so … I just put my finger on them this morning.
There are alot of things that bother me. People, situations, my hair … any number of things on any given day and I can go from jolly lil’ pregnant person to steaming, inwardly plotting and hating, adrenaline pumping pregnant ‘watch out’.
These past few mornings I’ve noticed the difference after waking up. Some mornings I am just ready to go, get my list-o-things done and be able to relax with Aaron when he comes home. Other days I wake up still steaming over something that happened the day before, whether or not I knew it affected me then … I know it now.
And then I spend the ENTIRE morning having silent conversations in my head with the people involved or myself alone, depending on what happened. Or I conduct a play of what I think would have been a better solution to whatever it is that’s bothering me. And then I write about it - not here, but I put it in words.
I write the conversation down, or whatever the case may be; and then I continue to yell and scream all the words I want on this paper and I feel better.
Some of these conversations I do have to have in person, because well … they bother me that much. But most of the time I can get by with writing it out and no one is the wiser. Now, granted, I will be more willing to stand my ground and let whoever or whatever know what I’m thinking/feeling the next time something should happen because I’ve rehearsed the conversation and I know what I need /want to say. But until that happens, and hopefully it won’t, I feel better.
The key to the pregnant ladies mood swings, ATTENTION ALL HUSBANDS OR FRIENDS OF PREGNANT WOMEN, is ANYTHING TO WRITE ON OR RECORD IN.
Journal, laptop computer, scrap paper in the car, lots of pens all over the house and car and even in purse or pocket … and sometimes the occasional tape recording machine, because our fingers are fat and it’s easier to talk then to write.
I mentioned having pens around, everywhere, because so far in this house there are no pens anywhere, ever. And when we’re dealing with the hormonal pregnant me with a mood swing and I can’t a find a pen where a pen SHOULD BE, that just makes me swing my mood towards the pen. And lets face it here, the pen is my friend. He’s helping me get my pent up frustration out. There is no need to hate the messenger.
posted on September 24, 2004| 10:41 AM EST
Yesterday I watched Oprah. Thats right. I. Watched. Oprah.
And she had Greg Behrendt as a guest, he’s one of the authors of “He’s just not that into you”.
Now this book caught my eye, the whole show was really interesting because this Greg guy is super nice and made every woman in that audience feel like she’s worth it all. They featured a small panel of dating men who gave away their secrets too and, in all, it was just really interesting.
Now you see - today, the DAY AFTER the Oprah show aired … I check it out on amazon to see what normal people and other readers are saying about it. And already in the remarks there are women mentioning the Oprah show … from YESTERDAY.
This, my friends, amazes me. So I’ve come to the conclusion that if I ever decide to write a book - say on being pregnant (because we need more of those) or raising kids or something, anything really … I need to get on the Oprah show. Holy Moly. I’m just blown away.
posted on September 23, 2004| 9:47 AM EST
According to today’s literature that society pours onto expecting parents, we’re supposed to talk to the baby as much as possible. This not only get’s it acquainted with our voice and the influxes of the language we use, it also allows for bonding.
We’re also prompted to play music for the baby, through earphones or stereo and this is supposed to allow for some of their brain development to somehow be uber efficient. They apparently feel they’ve given us the formula to a genius and that we’re bad parents/people if we even think about ignoring the instructions.
Aaron and I haven’t really read into alot of this mumbo jumbo, as we feel it is. We talk to the baby, I do more often when it’s kicking me incessantly and I have to pee for, no kidding, the 7th time in 30 minutes. Granted I’m not telling it how much I love it at that moment … but you can see where I’m coming from.
We broke down and played music for the belly last night, as an experiment. That’s right - we’re EXPERIMENTING with this pregnancy. Who would have thought, people have been doing this for thousands of years and yet we still feel the need to read book after book after book on how to do this whole parenting thing the “right” way.
I usually have music on in the house when I’m home, but these past few nights have been, how do I say it, awful. I haven’t slept a whole night in almost a week. Not only am I being introduced to the many-a-trip to the potty every night, I’m also being woken up, every 2 hours at least, by the kicking … there is so much kicking in my belly.
Not only all of that, I know - it’s horrible, but there is no comfortable sleeping position to begin with. I’m a stomach sleeper, and as soon as I found out about being pregnant I immediately began sleeping on my side and back to get ready for what was to come - this marathon I put myself on, was worthless.
I missed out on the last 3 months I could have been sleeping on my stomach for the obvious and apparently undeniable suffering of the last half of the second tri-mester to the entire third tri-mester. Oh glee.
Up to this point, we tried everything. Aaron would rub my stomach until I would fall asleep, only to wake up an hour later to the kicking and the summersaults and the back pain. Aaron tried talking the belly to sleep, calming this baby with soothing, low sounds. I tried 32 different pillow positions with 32 different pillows scattered over the bed and to no avail.
Last night we finally unpacked the ear phones, plugged them in to the portable CD player and put lullabies on the belly. I’m here to tell you, it worked. The first 5 minutes were calm, no moving, an apparently sleeping baby inside me. But then it resumed its gymnastics only to calm down again within minutes and be still for the music. OH how I love the wonderful baby Bach lullaby CD. Uber efficient baby brain waves, here we come.
posted on September 21, 2004| 3:04 PM EST
Remeber when I said I didn’t mind people I knew touching my belly … ??? I made that comment in “I swallowed a Watermelon” entry - and let me just rephrase that for the record.
I don’t mind people I know touching my belly IF:
You’re female and I touched your belly when you were pregnant
Your name is my mom or sisters
You were in my wedding
You are Aaron.
Other wise, and this is mostly for the gentlemen I don’t know and elderly women in grocery stores … do not touch me, at all.
This morning in church I had TWO males come up from behind and extend their hands around me to touch MY stomach. (Did I mention they were behind me, like standing in a movie line and the grose couple in front of you can’t keep their hands off of eachother when he reaches around her to hold her mid section or cuddle … sick).
I knew these males, not well mind you. I knew there names and have hung out with them in crowds before … but that doesn’t mean it’s ok to touch me, at all, anywhere.
And it wasn’t just a touch, either … it was the full on rub n’ pat. Thats right - and let me just say a I have a problem with that. A slightly large problem with that. Don’t be touching my belly you male people - thats weird, and it freaks me out. alot.
posted on September 19, 2004| 2:31 PM EST