We’re not professional painters.  After our paint job this weekend, we might as well be.  Okay, so we we’re dorky parents-to-be toting pink and yellow paint cans around Lowe’s.  But I feel like a home-improvement God and Goddess after all our work!

Priming Saturday night…

Priming and showing off my 31 week belly.  Getting bigger!  

Success!  Greyson dubbed it the “pink lemonade” room for now.  But, seriously we loved how the color came out. Happy, sweet colors without being too much.  

Look at that line between the two colors!  That could only be the work of the home improvement God and Goddess.  Imagine if we had high odor paint.  We’d be too high to make lines that perfect.  

It’ll be ready for our girl soon, assuming no one gets electrocuted as we decorate.  

This is how exciting it gets here at Somebody’s Parents…I have an update on my nerve pain!  Woo Hoo!  Pull up a doughnut pillow and stay awhile.  (I have a story involving a thong, it’s coming later in the post. Does that interest anyone?) If you missed it, here’s our first installment, “This baby is getting on my nerve”.  It’s short, I promise.

My doctor replacement The Internet did in fact fail me.  It was probably good that I went in to the office.  The real doctor said the baby was pressing on my sciatic nerve but it wasn’t really sciatica because the pain didn’t go all the way down my leg.  It has now shifted to my tail bone or coccyx bone.  He, he, coccyx!  (Don’t act like you don’t laugh at that word.)  

I’m pretty sure I fractured this funny sounding bone back in college.  Let’s go back in time.  (I’m hearing Wayne and Garth going “Do-da-li-do, do-da-li-do,” and making wavy fingers.) It was 2001 or 2002.  I was a Junior or Senior in college.

Senior year of college.  (I’m second from the right.)  

l-r Sara (I believe you’ve met her), Cootie (Michelle, but “Cootie” to us.), Melissa, Me, and Chrissy

The fraternities and sororities at our school were invited to the local minor league hockey game to play broomball between periods.  This ridiculous game involves wearing sneakers on ice.  Are you seeing the impending fracture?  Five of my sorority sisters and I went downstairs in the arena between periods.  (At this point in my life I had no idea hockey was played in 3 periods as I had not met my husband.)  We met the opposing team, a sorority from another nearby University.  These girls had to be former Olympic softball players. What we lacked in size compared to them, we more than lacked in broomball experience.  These girls were suited up in helmets and had their sticks ready to go.  Meanwhile, my friend Stephanie was upset because her helmet had been used and “smelled like a sweaty boy.”

I remember heading out on the ice, laughing about how slippery it was and how I had no idea what I was doing.  I remember a loud buzzer.  I remember I took two steps.  Then BOOM!  Down I went.  I remember the stars in my eyes.  I remember the black spots.  I remember not being able to breathe.  Mostly, I remember how freaking bad it hurt!  I crawled off the ice.  I remember the guy in charge of fan games for the coliseum trying to give me water from one of the players water bottles.  I said, “Are you kidding?  No, a gross guy drank out of that!”  He rolled his eyes, assured I was okay, and helped me to the EMT booth.

(Okay, here comes the thong part.) A male and female EMT helped me on the table laying on my belly.  The man left.  The female EMT explained that I had fallen on my tail bone and that I should probably get an x-ray.  She complained that “You young girls wear your jeans too tight and I can’t fit an icepack down your pants!”  She asked me to undo my pants.  I did.  She saw the thong, and my butt cheeks.  She said, “Good Lord!  The underwear you girls wear!”  I thanked her for her professionalism.  That’s when the male EMT walked back in and saw my whole backside in all it’s glory.

My friends made fun of me the rest of the night.  One or two took pity on the little doughnut pillow I sat on for the next week.  I was a college kid, so needless to say I never got that x-ray.  I just nursed it by re-freezing the same icepack over and over, and drinking a Miller Lite.

I think of this silly story every time my baby hurts my tail bone.  That isn’t often since the doc suggested a body pillow and some exercises.  Even though it hurts, it makes me smile.  I was young, foolish, and I was having a great time.  I never thought that day would replay in my mind as I expect my first child.  Life is funny, almost as funny as stories about ice and thongs.

Me and Katie Junior year.  Look how young I look!  Look how long my hair is!  (Am I wearing the same shirt in both these pictures?  Ha!  I totally am!)  

We had our first childbirth class this weekend.  We joined six other couples anxious to be first time parents.  I did call the teacher the day before to suck up make sure we were going to the right place, so I knew what to forget bring, etc.  Naturally, Greyson and I were the most disruptive students in the class.

We arrive, late, toting our Starbucks cups.  We didn’t bring enough to share with the whole class.  We sign in and take our seats.  Greyson leans over and whispers to me, “They’re already going to think you’re a bad mom because you’ve got coffee.”  I said, “At least they don’t know about the Kahlua in it.”  We snickered.

We all had to introduce ourselves.  We all had babies due in October, one couple in November.  (Overachievers!  Look at you already in childbirth class in mid-August!  La-ti-da!)  I was actually really excited to see my friend Laura in the class and get to meet her husband Dan.  She and I know each through work and are due about 3 weeks apart.

I didn’t really know what to expect.  We’ve all seen the Lamaze-like classes with heavy breathing portrayed in countless movies.  We had a straight-shooting OB/GYN nurse teaching the class.  I anticipated two things. One, a birthing ball would be demonstrated.  After all, it is in all the movies. Two, we’d have to watch an extremely awkward video.  I was not disappointed on either count.

We were the worst students in the class because….

1.  We sold our exercise ball in our recent yard sale to get ready for our baby. Oops.

2.  This video featured couples telling their stories of natural delivery.  There was plenty of Mayo-Clinic-like graphics with diagrams of uteruses over new age music.   When it got to the part about your water breaking the graphic read like this…

Color
Odor
Amount
Time

You’re supposed to remember those things when you call the Doctor and tell them your water broke.  Maybe it was all the vagina talk, but Greyson leans over to me and says, “I think TACO would be easier to remember.”  I could not stifle my giggles, thus getting evil looks from my classmates.

3.  I whispered to Greyson that the woman in the video looked like a fat Molly Ringwald.  More laughing, more looks.

4.  I spilled coffee all over my shirt and jeans in front of everyone in the middle of the video.  I stunk like soured latte the remainder of the morning.

5.  Greyson buried his head in his hands when I asked if they could wash off the baby after it is born so I don’t have to hold her with all the afterbirth on her.  The teacher explained we could put that in our birth plan to give to the nurses at the hospital.  (I can see it now. #43 of my birth demands.  “I must have a perfectly clean baby.”)

6.  The teacher went on to explain how changing pads that come in your diaper bag are worthless and to use puppy training pads instead.  Makes sense.  Greyson leans over to me and says, “That’s good, then the baby will know where to go pee in the house.”  That was it.  The stifled giggles were over.  This was a full-on belly laugh right in the middle of everything.  The teacher made us share our little joke.   Luckily everyone else laughed too.

Thankfully we don’t get graded and no one will tell our parents about our poor conduct in class.  Next week we should probably bring an apple for the teacher, or a taco.  Maybe I’ll bring a puppy pad in case I spill my coffee.

I have heard of this faux pas from other pregnant women, and any other woman who has ever gestated.  I had been doing alright avoiding this awkward social situation so far.  30 weeks and no real stranger danger.  That was until Friday when I was working…

For our purposes we’ll call it a business meeting.  Some important people were there.  I was discussing a business matter with a grown man.  He was probably in his 50’s, an absolutely massive human-being, possibly a linebacker in his younger years.  It was after the meeting.  I was standing with some colleagues.  Me:  “So, sir, I just want to double check.  It was 1999 when your group won their class action lawsuit?”

I’m not quite sure what it was about that statement that prompted his next actions.  Maybe it was the fact we were wearing business attire and I was sifting through notes.  Surely a woman sifting through notes would want to discuss her fertility at that time.  This man, whom I had just met, reached out his great bear paw and RUBBED MY BELLY!  Him: “Oh, so cute!  I just can’t help myself.”

Ummm…surely you can help yourself at that moment.  I just sort of backed away in the awkwardness, determined NOT to be the one embarrassed in this situation.  I just gave him a strange look, said thank you, and repeated my question.  (I could see a colleague out of the corner of my eye with his jaw on the floor.)  The man then realized how inappropriate he was really being as he sputtered an answer.  I hung back for a second after the group dispersed to give him a chance to maybe apologize.  Nothing.

What on earth would make this man think that it was okay to do that?  My husband, the doctor, family and friends who ask first…that really about covers it in my book for people who can rub my belly.  I guess since his wife-daughter-niece-sister-friend has been pregnant and he touched her belly, it was okay to touch mine?  Absolutely not!  Oh, a reminder, that is a woman’s uterus you’re touching!  Yep, a stranger’s uterus!

I found an etiquette article addressing this issue. (They are nicer than me.)  I may even join this Facebook group.

PREGNANT LADIES, IT IS TIME FOR US TO STAND TOGETHER IN SOLIDARITY TO RID THE WORLD OF THIS BARBARIC BEHAVIOR!  So, the next time it happens, I’m rubbing his belly back.  He looked like he was about 37 weeks along.  A man carrying a baby to full term surely deserves a pat of congratulations.

I love having things to look forward to.  Obviously, I have a big one.  But, I mean things in the short term, things that get you through the coming days and weeks.  I’ve gotten a little heavy in recent posts.  Let’s lighten it up, shall we?  Indulge my silliness…

To explore paint options…