No, I Suck at Friendship

I forget things. LOTS of things. I don't call or write. I cancel get-togethers at the last minute. I am late. I suck at hiding when I'm cranky, tired, or hungry, and those things turn me into a fairly inconsiderate and short-tempered person. I may actually be that inconsiderate and short-tempered person all of the time.

When I get depressed, which I have a history of doing, I close up like a miserly clam and hide in the sand, no pearl in the making. I am a terrible conversationalist, because I have nothing to talk about except my kids. The last time I read a book? Let's just say since Kella was born, me and literature aren't friends either.

I get offended. Not too easily, but sometimes. Though I try not to hold grudges, I also tend to avoid whoever I find offensive. Worse, when I've offended someone I tend to avoid them, too. I offend people often, since I am such a flexible person I can't seem to keep my foot OUT of my mouth.

I am unreliable. Because of the forgetfulness, but also because of the procrastination and occasionally because of the depression.

All of this and the normal human struggles of selfishness, greed, anger, sloth - how is it that anyone can stand spending time with me?

I would say I'm just looking at the dark side of things (and you might, too), but every single one of these things has bothered me about myself in the last week. Except the depression. Prozac and I are doing well together. And though I've tried my best not to be that lady, I have clearly failed.

Sorry world! And next time I get irritated with someone else, just remind me that I'm not such a peach either.

Shut Up, Helen Mirren

Unfatifying

LW, this is for you!

I've been working off the baby weight lately. I've tried a few different programs, and I'm still jumping around from thing to thing, but I've found a few favorite ways to burn calories using technology!

1. Wii Fit

You need a Wii and the Wii Fit program for this one. The only thing I use this for lately is tracking my weight and setting goals. The Wii Fit comes with a board that acts as a scale and balance sensor. It graphs my weight and BMI for each time I get on, and I can easily set goals. My first goal? Get that annoying thing to stop saying "That's overweight!" every time it measured me. Check. Next goal? 130.7 lbs. by February 15. That might be a little ambitious. Honestly, the value of the Wii Fit is knowing I have a good scale, setting goals, and having accountability for my gains and losses, even if it is to this guy:

Yeah. He has the audacity to question me, even though I am standing on his face. The workouts focus more on balance than calorie burning, so I don't see them being hugely effective as far as actually making you lose the weight. For that, I turn to my favorite household appliance . . .

2. Xbox Kinect

I think people thought that once Wii came out with motion controls, people would be more active while playing video games. Those people didn't know my friend's little brother, who would do all kinds of crazy dances while playing Sega games during the nineties. But since not everyone can do gymnastics while holding a controller and guiding a tiny man through a 2D sidescroller, the Xbox invented the Kinect, where you guide a 3D character through all kindsa' crap BY doing gymnastics WITHOUT a controller. Essentially. Besides the games listed below, there are plenty of others that get your body moving, but I haven't tried them, because they cost like $50-60 each.

A. Dance Central

 

Dance video games used to involve stomping on a mat like an idiot. Now they involve actually dancing like an idiot. Honestly though, Dance Central is one of my favorite games, and is great for getting a cardio workout. I have the first game, and it's awesome and fun, but hard to get a good burn on since songs only last a few minutes and then you have to stop and use the menu again. I've heard the sequel, Dance Central 2, has a workout mode that keeps you dancing non stop. It's on my Christmas wish list, since the dances are actually a fun whole-body workout, and if I can go non-stop for 30 minutes to an hour, I'll be set for the day!

B. EA Sports Active 2 (Also available for Wii)

This guy is not kidding. EA Sports Active 2 will really give you a workout. It tracks calories and heart rate, and has a boatload of different activities that will make you sweat. You'll be sore like you went to the gym, with none of the embarrassment of actually doing so. The reviewer says it's pricey, but we got it at a discount for the price of about 2 months at the gym. You may not be getting a bunch of equipment, but you get what is essentially an electronic personal trainer. I'm going to warn you, though: wear a sports bra. There is jumping and bouncing galore.

3. Hulu

The internet, with all of its horrors, actually has some perks now and then. If you haven't discovered Hulu for catching up on TV shows, you should at least take a look for the exercise videos. I have seen a ton of them, but recently I started working out with Kathy Smith. It's like buying a workout DVD, but it's FREE.

You can either hook up your computer to your TV or get a program like PlayOn running on your Xbox, which allows Hulu videos to be played on your TV through your computer and Xbox via network connection. Hulu Plus won't work, since a lot of videos can't be played on a TV (only a computer) because Hulu is run by the Internet Television Nazi Party. Anyway, this is the workout I did this afternoon. It was awesome, got me sweating, and involved my whole body. Besides a few 1:30 commercial breaks, it kept the burn going so I'm fairly sure I spent some calories as well.

DOOOO ITTTTTT!

I hate to brag about my kids to other moms, especially for things they will almost surely do (like roll over or walk), unless it's Finley and we're waiting months and months and working hard on physical therapy for him to do it. I mean really, if your kid had a big bad brain hemorrhage at birth and the neurologist told you that you just get to find out if he'll develop when he does it, all of that rolling over crap would be one hundred times more exciting.

Kella is right on track with her developmental milestones. She aces those cursed ASQ-3 questionnaires as if she knew what was on them and had been studying for months. Most babies do that. No big deal. It actually drives me a little crazy when moms post on Facebook that their kid scooted or something. It's one thing to treasure the special moment and share it with friends, but sometimes it feels like a big "haha! My kid is developing normally!" which is both unnecessary and a little unnerving to those of us with developmental concerns.

But I have to tell you all about Kella's rolling skills. Of course she rolls over, and it will always be miraculous. It is miraculous to me that she is alive and here with us and healthy and so, so beautiful. And she rolls from her front to her back, like most babies her age. But she is SO CLOSE to rolling onto her tummy from her back it drives me flippin' crazy. She gets her entire body except her shoulders and head onto the floor face down, reaches over with her top arm, but never gets past that 90 degree angle with her shoulders! She looks like she's just about to do it, and then FAKE OUT.

When she does do it, I'll say yay, remember the date, and squee to Tim and probably my mom. And then it will be no big deal to anyone but me, because I'm her mom. But you know what's way more talkaboutable? Her almost doing it.

Cheap Things

I generally don't participate in the Facebook birthday wall thing, but today I had three friends with the same birthday, and FB conveniently let me write on all of their walls right there from my homepage, so I figured it couldn't hurt. I wrote nice birthday wishes. They probably won't even read them. So what I could and maybe should have written was this:

Man, every year you do such a fantastic job of aging. It's almost like time goes by without any help from you. Give yourself a pat on the back. Go you.

I mean, if I'm not going to buy them anything, what's the difference?

I love getting mail, but sometimes when someone makes the effort to send me a card, they just sign it. No words. No money (not that it's necessary). It's just a piece of paper they bought, put their name on, wrapped in another piece of paper they bought, and put a sticky piece of paper they bought on top so someone would deliver it to my house. At best, it's a sentiment someone else wrote, or a trite message and a picture of a cat. At worst, it's actually a thank you card I sent to someone which then got returned because my address book is out of date. So if I neglected to send you a card for something at some point, don't be offended. I was mostly just avoiding disappointing you with my lack of both money and clever things to say. I'll send you a picture of the kids when Christmas comes around.

I Don't Think That Means What You Think It Means

When I tell people Kella's been staying up all night screaming, they often respond with a sympathetic head tilt and something like, "Oh, so she's got her nights and days mixed up? That happens a lot with newborns."

But the appropriate response would have been, "Oh, so you're losing your mind a little more with each passing hour of the day or night? That happens a lot with newborns."

That is all.

One

I slept last night better than I have in weeks. Has it been weeks? Four exactly in another 11 hours or so. And she's finally sleeping between feedings instead of fussing. So on my first night in a long time that included much sleeping at all, I dreamed.

I dreamed that when I looked at Kella, I saw two babies. When she wiggled around on her tummy, another baby wiggled beside her, just as beautiful and touchable and perfect as she is. Grown just as much from that tiny baby I delivered. And suddenly I would remember that Kella had no twin, and the phantom baby would simply disappear like a broken spell. The second time the phantom baby appeared, I called for Tim. I asked him to call the doctor, or someone, because I was delusional. My sub-un-conscious mind was thinking of postpartum psychosis, but couldn't say it. But instead of calling the doctor, dream Tim just sat fiddling with his hands.

When I woke up, I expected to be sad. Sad for twins that didn't happen, by death or by design. But I was relieved. There is only one baby, I thought to myself, and let out a breath. It was all I could do to keep this one baby, and there was no other baby to lose. No child I let down. No overfilled uterus that couldn't hold twice the joy. No overfilled heart with the sorrow of loss. Not this part of my heart. Not the part that belongs to her.

I hold Finley each night before laying him down to sleep, and squeeze him tight with gratitude and a sting of sorrow that where he is, there would have been another, too. The joy of each moment with him casts a shadow, negative space where Oliver would be. Some days the shadow is so short it can hide beneath the happiness. Some days the shadow is long, and the gratitude I have for a living son is overwhelmed with grief. It's like my love for my twin sons was twinned as well, and now my happiness and my pain grow together, communicating in the secret language twins sometimes have.

And then there is Kella. I love her as desperately as I do Finley, but it's a solitary love. She will grow up without a shadow that would have been growing up too, but isn't. And that part of my love for her that is about me—I would be lying if I said there weren't some part of my love for my children that is about me—is whole, and full of joy. One child's worth of joy, and no child's worth of sadness.

I would not go back and make Finley a singleton. Not if it meant never having Oliver. His momentary life was worth everything. But today, I woke up happy to have been blessed with just one.