Sometimes people comment on this blog about how patient I seem, which just goes to show that blogs are really a miniscule snapshot of reality. My family scoffs at this description of me. Among the Schlothan clan, the name “Sarah” is synonymous with “IMPATIENCE PERSONIFIED” (also: “ridiculously opinionated” and “really bad at remembering punchlines”) and my sister’s name is synonymous with “saint.”
So I basically cobbled together a spare change of clothes and slingshot my kid at my saint of a sister and then I climbed in the car and drove to the birth center, where I proceeded to spend an hour and a half talking about my medical history and how NO, REALLY, I don’t drink.
It’s that fuzzy feeling in my throat, you know? I hate that feeling. I didn’t even drink at my wedding because I wasn’t about to have that fuzzy feeling in my throat ruining a big day. No, siree! I toasted the day with apple juice.
In fact, if you LIKE drinking then I highly suggest you go out of your way to make friends with someone like me who does not. Hello! DESIGNATED DRIVER! Why do you think my husband married me?!
It occurs to me now that my name may also be synonymous with BORING AS HELL. But I digress.
So yesterday, I woke up and I nursed Charlotte and I worried about the baby. I prepared breakfast and I worried about the baby. I gave Charlotte a bath and I worried about the baby. I showered and dressed and I worried about the baby. We brushed our teeth and I worried about the baby.
I swept the living room and I worried about the baby. We had a picnic snack and I worried about the baby. I drove to the birth center and I worried about the baby. I talked about my medical history and I worried about the baby. I peed in a cup and I worried about the baby.
And then FINALLY, I was instructed to lay back on a bed and unzip my pants and that long-awaited moment came when a magic wand covered with jelly the temperature of ice in Siberia was placed on my belly and…WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH. Suddenly it was all worth it: the morning sickness, the weeks of fear, the months of waiting, the grief following our miscarriage, the incessant worry, everything.
Laying there, listening to the thunder of my child’s heartbeat, was perfect. Absolutely perfect.
]]>As it turned out, peeing on a stick was wholly unnecessary because four days later I woke up and smelled OXYGEN and began to heave. I tore off the covers, bolted out of bed, and weighed my options. The bathrooms had not yet been cleaned that week and because I am a prissy fool consumed by first-world luxury, I patently refuse to vomit into a toilet that has seen fecal matter more recently than it’s seen a sponge…so without really thinking about it, I ran outside.
I ran into the backyard, kneeled over a tomato plant, and just retched. I was amazed that there could still be food in my stomach after a night of sleep. Over and over my stomach clenched and any time something came up, I couldn’t help but be amazed at that fact.
When I was finished, I sat back on my legs and cried. My neighbor called at me through the fence to see if I was okay and I said yes, just ate something that didn’t agree with me, sorry he had to see that. And THAT made me cry harder because here I am throwing up all over myself and my half-dead tomato plant with bedhead and sweatpants and my neighbor is bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and tending a perfectly manicured garden.
Then, suddenly, there was a squawk as one of the chickens realized with glee that she had just stumbled upon a jackpot. A vomit-licious jackpot. Within seconds, our chickens had flocked to scene of the grossness from every corner of the yard and gobbled down every shred of proof that I’d ever been ill.
For the record, I’m not sure I will ever be able to look at another egg quite the same.
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Charlotte is and always has been a climber. She doesn’t run as quickly as other children her age, she cannot balance on a skateboard or ride a two-wheel bicycle without training wheels or catch a ball someone throws at her…but oh, my girl can climb.
Something tells me that this is going to be the year that we introduce her to one of our great loves: rock climbing. I hope she loves it as much as her father and I do. I think she will.
]]>You can read more about Jordin and what I am about to tell you by clicking through to the Jordin’s Journey website. Jordin’s Journey also has a Facebook page which you can find by clicking here. If you have time, I encourage you to look at both. And if you have an extra cent or two lying about, please consider looking at the donation page. Donations are pooled together to purchase an SES machine for the local children’s hospital.
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Donald and I first met Jordin and her family at a Halloween party hosted by mutual friends. Jordin is the youngest of three incredible children and she was feeling ill that evening. She clung to her mother for most of the night, sipping water and cuddling. “Jordin has sickle cell anemia,” her mother told me. “It’s hard on her.”
I had heard of sickle cell anemia, of course, and I think most people have – but to me it was a very abstract disease. Throughout the night, I just kept asking questions. How is sickle cell managed? Is she always in pain or ill? What are the gravest dangers? Were her other children carriers? Are carriers ever symptomatic?
It was another year before I saw Jordin and her mother again (at another Halloween party OF COURSE) and by then I had done my research. I learned about sickle cell anemia and so when her mother talked about a recent hospital stay, a lot more of the conversation made sense to me. The whole ride home, Donald and I talked about how incredibly attentive her parents are to her needs. Their children are lucky to have such strong advocates on their side.
That said, I have only met Jordin and her family a few times, always at our mutual friends’ home. I don’t know what Jordin’s favorite color is or what she wants to be when she grows up, but when I recently discovered (through the same mutual friends) that her family is trying to raise money to purchase a machine for the local children’s hospital…I knew immediately that I wanted to help.
What is the point of having a blog, after all, if you cannot – or do not – ever use it to help someone else?
The machine that Jordin’s family wants to purchase for the children’s hospital is called a Sebia Electrophoresis System and it is used to scan blood. Proximity is pretty key. The closest SES machine to my location is currently situated in northern California, which means that families of children with rare blood disorders (including sickle cell, anemia, and hemoglobin diseases) in southern California are forced to wait a week or longer to receive test results that can significantly affect the well-being of their child. While they spend a week waiting for a diagnosis, their child waits in limbo.
The SES machine ordinarily costs $58,000 but the company that manufactures it has agreed to sell the machine for $30,000. And that is what Jordin’s Journey is all about: educating the public about the need to place an SES machine in southern California so that more families can see their children diagnosed and treated in reasonable frames of time…and raising $30,000 to do just that. As of the moment that this post is going live, Jordin’s family has worked hard to raise $6,345. That’s about 1/5 of the total moneys needed.
I know that nobody likes to be preached at and begged for money when they come to a happy-go-lucky parent blog, but I am asking you: please humor me, just this once. If you have a little extra wiggle room in your budget, PLEASE consider donating to Jordin’s Journey to help make this machine a reality in southern California. And if you don’t, you can still help. You can post a link to Jordin’s Journey on your Facebook page or Twitter stream. If you live in southern California, you can plan to attend the Jordin’s Journey black-tie event at the TGIF’s at The Block in Orange on April 20th. If you have a blog, you can write about Jordin’s Journey or allow me to write a guest-post about it (in which case, I’ll link to it and beg people to click through, I promise). If you have a business with an Internet shop – a photography business or an Etsy shop, for example – you can agree to pledge a percentage of your profits to Jordin’s Journey over a specified period of time.
Over the next few weeks, I will be making a point to feature blogs and businesses that help spread the word or pledge profits to this cause. I already have a few lined up, but not many. If you want to participate, PLEASE send an e-mail to sarah@becomingsarah.com so that I can include you.
And in advance: THANK YOU. Thank you to each and every one of you who reads this for taking the time out of your day and thank you to anyone who has the inclination to help in whatever way they can. Thank you.
]]> - What do you want to be when you grow up?
- A big sister.
- A big sister, huh? Are you going to be a big sister to the baby in my belly?
- The baby is not in your belly, Momma! THAT IS SO SILLY! It is in your uterus.
- Okay. Do you want the baby in my uterus to be a boy or a girl?
- It should be a baby brother, yes. (pauses, thinks) Momma?
- Yes, darling?
- Is the baby not in your uterus?
- Yes, the baby is in my uterus.
- Did Daddy’s sperm not make the baby?
- Yes, Daddy’s sperm helped make the baby.
- Are Daddy’s sperm not living with the baby in your uterus?
- Hmmm. Well. Daddy’s sperm fertilized my egg and the sperm and the egg together turned into the baby. Sort of like how caterpillars turn into butterflies. You don’t see the egg or the sperm individually again after that; the single cell just slowly grew and transformed into the baby.
- Oh. Okay. And it should be a baby brother. And I will name him George.
THANK YOU to each and every one of you who smiled or cried or commented or e-mailed or sent warm wishes or gave us a thumbs up or prayed or…well, just thank you. It means so much to our family. This baby is already so lucky to be so welcomed and loved by so many people.
On that note, Lauren (who has the most adorable daughter Violet OH MY GOODNESS) at With Two Cats is putting up a casual q/a with me at some point in the day; I’m not sure when. The part where I mentioned the community forged by blog readers? I mean every word of that. If you ever doubt whether or not blogs create a community capable of great things, go to a post that announces something important: a birth or a death, a pregnancy or a miscarriage, a birthday or an engagement, a wedding or a divorce, a success or a failure. I guarantee that it it is in these posts that the comments tell you that this world is composed of good-hearted people. People who care, people who are worth listening to, people who share ideas and thoughts, people who can change the landscape of a blogger’s life, and people who will help you out without ever having met you face to face.
Again and always: thank you.
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We hit ten weeks yesterday. Our first appointment with our midwife is next Monday. We are due at the end of October or early November. Please keep your fingers crossed!
]]>It felt as though time stood still, as though every last molecule of oxygen had been sucked out of the air. My Chinese friend waited in silence for a moment and considered her answer. Then she told them calmly that she personally finds that term offensive and prefers to be called “Chinese” or “Asian.” She explained what about their statement upset her and apologized for making the conversation so uncomfortable.
I called her as soon as I got home that night to apologize for what had happened, and my friend told me something that I will never forget. “Sarah,” she said, “You shouldn’t be apologizing for them and what they did. You should be apologizing FOR YOU AND WHAT YOU DID.”
“What I did?!” I said bewildered. “But I didn’t do anything!”
“THAT’S MY POINT,” she responded. “You, as a white woman and as someone this other woman respects, had an opportunity to stand up and say NO, this is not okay. You had a chance to defend me, but instead you sat there like a coward. It is a luxury to be a white person in America and I don’t care if you don’t want to use that privilege to stand up for me because I can stand up for myself…but what about the people who can’t? Would you just sit there and twiddle your thumbs while discrimination ran under your nose? Would you just look in the other direction because you didn’t want to offend someone or get your hands dirty?”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Look,” she continued. “I can accept this about you if this is who you are. But in all the years that I’ve known you, through thick and thin, through all manner of stupid mistakes, this is the ONE TIME that I’ve been ashamed to say we’re friends. One day when I have a baby with my same slanted eyes, what are you going to say when someone taunts them in a store? Are you going to stand up for them so that they see that they’re worth standing up for and that racism should never be tolerated…or are you going to just let it slide?”
“BECAUSE THE PERSON WHO LETS IT SLIDE IS JUST AS WRONG AS THE PERSON WHO SAYS SOMETHING INAPPROPRIATE IN THE FIRST PLACE.”
Yesterday something happened that reminded me of this. Yesterday someone made a racist stereotype in my presence and I…let it slide.
Then last night I contacted my Chinese friend and I told her about it. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I feel so disappointed in myself. Someone from that ethnic group was sitting RIGHT NEXT TO ME and I just…I didn’t know what to say. I felt so uncomfortable and I didn’t want to make anyone upset, especially when I knew they didn’t mean it maliciously. But I don’t want this to repeat itself because you’re right, it isn’t okay. How do you deal with it? What do you say?”
I felt like I could hear my friend smiling through the phone. “It’s been five years, Sarah,” she said. “I was starting to wonder if you’d ever ask. I know you probably think I’m disappointed in you right now, but I’m not. I’ve never been prouder. So when do you want to get together and talk about it?”
Every now and then, I have a moment of clarity when it dawns on me how very lucky I am to have someone in my life. When I’m sick and Donald spends six hours making chicken soup from scratch. When I doubt myself and my daughter spontaneously approaches me with a kiss and an “I love you, Momma.“ When I walk down the road and my parents offer me food or a break or just conversation.
Or when I approach a friend with a really hard question, feeling very much like a failure, and they grin and pat my back and say “let’s do this thing.“
]]>I need to feel GOOD about my relationships – with Charlotte, with Donald, with my friends and family. I need to feel that my parenting choices are supported by my family and my friends and that my opinions are respected, if not always agreed upon. I need to feel that people in my life LIKE to and WANT to spend time with me, with my husband, and with my daughter. I need to feel like my family is progressing toward the life that we want.
I need to spend time outside, usually two or more hours each day. I need to feel productive and appreciated. I need to eat healthy food, do at least one thing to work up a sweat, and to feel positive about my overall health. I need my home to be clean and comfortable. I need to feel financially secure. I need to brush my teeth. I need to engage in regular conversations with other adults. I need my friends to have an awesome sense of humor – and I need our friendships to be easy and reliable. I need an hour or two of silence a week to just sit down and read a book.
They sound like obvious things, but it’s easy to neglect one and if I do, the whole circus show comes tumbling down. If I have a conflict with a friend or relative, my marriage suffers while I devote extra time to fixing whatever I fucked up. If I spend too much time indoors or my home makes me feel like a slob, I usually end up in tears. If I don’t have time to read, my quality of parenting suffers because all I can think about is getting away.
Yesterday was a particularly rough day because I was ill (I’m feeling much better today, but still not 100%). My nose was stuffed up, my stomach ached, and my head throbbed all.day.long.
I am probably the very worst sick person you have ever met. I’m one of those melodramatic, short-tempered, and generally-worth-avoiding types who thinks a migraine is akin to the apocalypse. It is always when I am ill – when I don’t get outside and maybe don’t brush my teeth, when I don’t feel productive or like a nurturing mother, when every shortcoming in my life (yesterday: the mess in the playroom) seems exaggerated tenfold – that I wonder if ALL THIS is really worth it.
Then I wake up a day or two later and I feel healthy again. My problems feel manageable and I feel empowered to make what I want in my life. I shower Charlotte with attention and we picnic in the sun. I call a friend or schedule a playdate. I shower and pick a thought-provoking book to read. And by the end of the day, I know that I am happy in this life and that the answer is yes.
Undeniably YES.
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We’re at the grocery and the clerk laughs when she sees my hands. I have the hands of an old woman. My fingers are small – so slender that jewelry stores must special order rings in my size – and my knuckles are pronounced. My hands are bony and my skin is dry.
I do not think about my hands very often, but sometimes my hands elicit comments from strangers. “I have old hands too,” the grocery clerk says laughing and she holds her hands out to show me. Charlotte is obsessed with my hands for days afterwards. “Are your hands too old?” she asks.
“No,” I tell her. “My hands have held you every day of your life. That makes them perfect.”
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A dinner guest looks at Charlotte and says “she’s getting a little chubby, isn’t she?” Our guest isn’t trying to be rude and it’s a term we use ourselves to compliment our daughter’s cheeks. But this time Charlotte is listening and Iooks bewildered. She isn’t accustomed to hearing people talk about her. She’s curious.
I politely disagree and change the subject, but the next day Charlotte hears a friend of mine bemoaning her muffin top on the grounds that it makes her “feel fat” and a few days later when I serve her strawberries, Charlotte looks distressed. “Do these strawberries make me chubby?” she asks. “Do these make me fat?”
“No,” I tell her. “You are SUPPOSED to have a little fat on your bones. What happens is that you store up a little bit of fat and then when you have a growth spurt, you burn it up. All that really matters is that your body is healthy and the way to make sure that your body is healthy is to treat it with respect: eat nutritious foods, play outside, make safe choices, and do what makes you happy.”
“Do you have fat?” she asks. “Of course I do!” I say. “You need a healthy amount of fat on your body to live. Fat is an important part of life! It keeps you warm and it helps your brain work and DID YOU KNOW WHAT? Breasts have a lot of fat and they make milk, right? That must mean fat is important, don’t you think?”
About a week later, she starts a growth spurt. She adds an extra two hours to her naps, her cheeks thin out, and her pants run short. I pull her over to the kitchen and measure her against the doorway. When she sees how much she grew, she smiles. “That is because I had enough fat to grow tall!“ she says proudly.
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When I look at her with the shirts, I can’t help but think that it’s the little moments like this that matter the most. She is two years old and already aware that people pass judgments based on physical traits. This seems unfair to me. I do my best to counter-act this, and to focus on the importance of other traits, but the messages are everywhere and I wonder how long I have before she starts to doubt what I tell her. I wonder how many years we have left before she stops asking us questions, stops feeling reassured when I do something so simple as tell her I like my hands.
“Wear the shirt that makes you happy, darling. You can wear whatever you want.”
She wears the shirt with the kissing fishes. She calls it perfect. It makes her happy all day long.
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On that note, Aurora’s pomegranate tree and Zachary’s apple tree are both alive and well. Aurora’s tree is out of it’s dormancy and I will post pictures next week so that you can see what a beautiful, hardy little thing it is. I also ordered this Momma necklace in the end. It was actually very difficult for me to purchase - not because I was an emotional wreck or anything, but because since Charlotte’s birth, I just…don’t…buy things for myself. Does anyone else feel a little guilty if they spend money on themselves instead of on their kid?
In other news, it is ladybug season again. The aphids descended upon our yard about a month ago and the ladybugs followed a couple weeks later. Everywhere you look, our yard is teeming with ladybugs by the dozens. It is Charlotte’s favorite season by far - and in a moment of absolute brilliance, do you know what she remembered without any prompting? She remembered that LAST YEAR we “played aphids.“
It took me awhile to figure out what she was talking about, but then I remembered. When the ladybugs came out last year, I talked to her about aphids and read books about them to her. Then we went outside and played a sort of makeshift tag where I was the ladybug and she was the aphid and it was my job to catch her and eat her up.
Every so often I meet someone who very strongly believes that filling up Charlotte’s days with fun is pointless. “It’s not like she’ll remember it,“ they say. I was about 2.5 years old at the time of my first memory (my dad woke me up at night and snuck me outside to see a frog by moonlight) and exactly 3 years old at the time of my second memory (I licked my birthday cake), so I’m pretty sure they’re right. In ten years, Charlotte won’t remember “playing aphids” before her second birthday.
But she remembers it now and that makes all the effort worth it to me.
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It happens every day and I finally got off my useless ass and started taking pictures of a few of them last week. Then yesterday I snapped a few of her in the act of putting her puppy down for a nap – and I couldn’t possibly NOT share.
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