I think Anthony's decided he's anti- antenatal classes. He went to his first one last night and didn't sleep very well afterwards.
It probably didn't help that last night was the night for watching 'that' DVD. Apart from the graphic imagery of the type one would normally associate with an adult content movie, it completely shattered his image of labour as being me restrained in a bed while he held my hand and patted my head till a baby popped out. The idea that I would be allowed to roam free and might indiscrimatinantly lean on him and make strange grunting noises at any given moment was an alarming one indeed.
I was more disturbed by the pelvises and dolls being passed around and the obvious impossibility of one being able to pass through the other without some serious rearranging of physics.
The woman sitting next to me lived on a farm, was an old hand at lambing, and treated the whole childbirth thing like it was a perfectly normal natural process that any old woman of child-bearing age could survive.
We're talking drugs next week - I'll be taking notes.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
The bolt cutters and the damage done...
If ever there was a symbol of the passing of my vibrant carefree days as a city girl, then the removal of my navel piercing as a heavily pregnant woman now living in countryVictoria was it.
I don’t even remember exactly what year it was now when I had it put in, though I think it was the Easter holidays, and it was a slightly dodgy tattoo parlour in Merimbula. Actually it probably wasn’t that dodgy – there’s just something about tattoo parlours themselves that makes me think they’re slightly dodgy. There wasn’t any precise reason for getting my belly button pierced other than I wanted to prove to myself that I was brave enough to do it. Some people go bungy jumping, I went the piercing. The pain was sudden and brutal but it was over in a flash.
Now that it is gone I’m having a hard time even looking at my navel because it looks so wrong without the ring there. I have some vague recollection of a Twilight Zone episode where a woman’s mouth or nose or something disappeared right from her face, and this is what my belly looks like to me now – just a couple of little holes where something vital used to be.
By around 26 weeks of pregnancy, my belly stretched just so far where having a ring in the middle of it all was starting to place some rather uncomfortable constraints on my skin. Taking it out became my priority and an unexpected problem. Anthony helpfully suggested that a pair of bolt cutters would do the job. Yeah right.
I went to my beauty therapist first because my eyes were quite shut when I had the thing put in and I had no idea how it opened to get it out again. I was told pliers would be required which their piercer carried with him and he would not be back in the shop for another few days. It was a simple matter, they explained, of loosening up the ball and unscrewing it on its thread till enough of a gap opened up to be able to pull the ring out. I was a bit dubious about this as I had already had a go at unscrewing the ball and was pretty sure that it was spinning quite freely without actually revealing anything like a gap. I had a doctor’s appointment that afternoon and he concurred that the ball was spinning without unscrewing but was unable to offer any other suggestions as to how I could get it out. I went to another beauty therapist but they had nothing but raised eyebrows for me.
It seemed that after so many years, the thread had either worn smooth or had filled up with gunk. Either way, I was now a desperate woman.
I went home, took a deep breath, and picked up the phone. ‘Honey, could you please bring the bolt cutters home?’
Faced with the prospect of actually having to deliver on what had originally been a harmless joke, Anthony began to feel nervous. The bolt cutters were a little over a metre in length, and were rusty as at the business end of things. In some vague attempt at sterilisation I boiled the tips in a saucepan on the stove. I tried to hold the ring still while Anthony got a grip, but any vague movement of the metal against my skin was absolute agony and made me make noises that made both him feel even more nervous. When I finally let him squeeze the blades, the ball popped off mercifully easily along with a small section of ring and we were able to pull it out.
The feeling afterwards, was not quite the relief I had expected, but rather like when I first had it put in. I felt an acute awareness of a hole through my skin, a complete intolerance to clothing against my belly, and yes, an undeniable need to have a little lie down.
I have a photo to remember it by though. To remind me that I was young, silly and flat-ish stomached once, and as leverage for my future teenage son or daughter when they decide to take their own seaside holiday trip to the local tattoo parlour.
I don’t even remember exactly what year it was now when I had it put in, though I think it was the Easter holidays, and it was a slightly dodgy tattoo parlour in Merimbula. Actually it probably wasn’t that dodgy – there’s just something about tattoo parlours themselves that makes me think they’re slightly dodgy. There wasn’t any precise reason for getting my belly button pierced other than I wanted to prove to myself that I was brave enough to do it. Some people go bungy jumping, I went the piercing. The pain was sudden and brutal but it was over in a flash.
Now that it is gone I’m having a hard time even looking at my navel because it looks so wrong without the ring there. I have some vague recollection of a Twilight Zone episode where a woman’s mouth or nose or something disappeared right from her face, and this is what my belly looks like to me now – just a couple of little holes where something vital used to be.
By around 26 weeks of pregnancy, my belly stretched just so far where having a ring in the middle of it all was starting to place some rather uncomfortable constraints on my skin. Taking it out became my priority and an unexpected problem. Anthony helpfully suggested that a pair of bolt cutters would do the job. Yeah right.
I went to my beauty therapist first because my eyes were quite shut when I had the thing put in and I had no idea how it opened to get it out again. I was told pliers would be required which their piercer carried with him and he would not be back in the shop for another few days. It was a simple matter, they explained, of loosening up the ball and unscrewing it on its thread till enough of a gap opened up to be able to pull the ring out. I was a bit dubious about this as I had already had a go at unscrewing the ball and was pretty sure that it was spinning quite freely without actually revealing anything like a gap. I had a doctor’s appointment that afternoon and he concurred that the ball was spinning without unscrewing but was unable to offer any other suggestions as to how I could get it out. I went to another beauty therapist but they had nothing but raised eyebrows for me.
It seemed that after so many years, the thread had either worn smooth or had filled up with gunk. Either way, I was now a desperate woman.
I went home, took a deep breath, and picked up the phone. ‘Honey, could you please bring the bolt cutters home?’
Faced with the prospect of actually having to deliver on what had originally been a harmless joke, Anthony began to feel nervous. The bolt cutters were a little over a metre in length, and were rusty as at the business end of things. In some vague attempt at sterilisation I boiled the tips in a saucepan on the stove. I tried to hold the ring still while Anthony got a grip, but any vague movement of the metal against my skin was absolute agony and made me make noises that made both him feel even more nervous. When I finally let him squeeze the blades, the ball popped off mercifully easily along with a small section of ring and we were able to pull it out.
The feeling afterwards, was not quite the relief I had expected, but rather like when I first had it put in. I felt an acute awareness of a hole through my skin, a complete intolerance to clothing against my belly, and yes, an undeniable need to have a little lie down.
I have a photo to remember it by though. To remind me that I was young, silly and flat-ish stomached once, and as leverage for my future teenage son or daughter when they decide to take their own seaside holiday trip to the local tattoo parlour.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Kicking out the jam
According to my various pregnancy references, I am now at a stage where, they say, the baby’s hearing is now sufficiently developed to recognise voices and to respond to music.
They also suggest that now is the time I should start playing soothing music to the baby so that when it is finally born, the same piece of music can be used for settling.
From my reading, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons seems to be regarded as the piece of choice for unborn babies, with varying levels of kicking supposedly becoming apparent during each of the four movements.
While I think we may even have this particular piece of music in our collection, I’m afraid we’re tenaciously clinging to the kind of music that reminds us of our glory undergraduate days of the early 1990s. In other words, a lot of indie pop and other guitar-laden expressions of other peoples’ youths. Or, in other words, nothing the pregnancy books would find even remotely appropriate.
I do remember as a child thinking my mum’s Janis Ian tape was pretty hot, so I’m taking that as proof that it is possible to brainwash your children for at least a certain period of time. I am fully aware that by the time Pedro is old enough to tune the car radio into Triple J he’ll be old enough to openly deride our CD collection. It is after all, the natural order of things.
Anyway, we’re doing what we can while we still can. On Wednesday night we trekked down to Melbourne for Pedro’s first gig – Wilco at the Palais. Again, hard to tell whether kicking indicates happiness or a keen desire to get as far away from the source of noise as possible, but there was a lot of it. More during the guitar solos than the singing bits it has to be said, at which moments it felt like Pedro doing a fairly extreme air drum solo right across my belly. Fortunately for his mother he piped down by about the half way mark, only waking again for the encore performance of California Stars.
It’s been a while since either of us have been to a concert and it was nice to know I could still go out and do normal adult things in the big city even though I'm a six-month pregnant hephalump.
The only difference being that I was exceedingly grateful for the allocated seating (although the crowd collectively rebelled and stood for the three encores), I didn’t get to indulge in the overpriced Crown Lagers, and I don’t think I can remember ever doing pelvic floor exercises in time to the music before.
(apologies for that last piece of too much information)
They also suggest that now is the time I should start playing soothing music to the baby so that when it is finally born, the same piece of music can be used for settling.
From my reading, Vivaldi’s Four Seasons seems to be regarded as the piece of choice for unborn babies, with varying levels of kicking supposedly becoming apparent during each of the four movements.
While I think we may even have this particular piece of music in our collection, I’m afraid we’re tenaciously clinging to the kind of music that reminds us of our glory undergraduate days of the early 1990s. In other words, a lot of indie pop and other guitar-laden expressions of other peoples’ youths. Or, in other words, nothing the pregnancy books would find even remotely appropriate.
I do remember as a child thinking my mum’s Janis Ian tape was pretty hot, so I’m taking that as proof that it is possible to brainwash your children for at least a certain period of time. I am fully aware that by the time Pedro is old enough to tune the car radio into Triple J he’ll be old enough to openly deride our CD collection. It is after all, the natural order of things.
Anyway, we’re doing what we can while we still can. On Wednesday night we trekked down to Melbourne for Pedro’s first gig – Wilco at the Palais. Again, hard to tell whether kicking indicates happiness or a keen desire to get as far away from the source of noise as possible, but there was a lot of it. More during the guitar solos than the singing bits it has to be said, at which moments it felt like Pedro doing a fairly extreme air drum solo right across my belly. Fortunately for his mother he piped down by about the half way mark, only waking again for the encore performance of California Stars.
It’s been a while since either of us have been to a concert and it was nice to know I could still go out and do normal adult things in the big city even though I'm a six-month pregnant hephalump.
The only difference being that I was exceedingly grateful for the allocated seating (although the crowd collectively rebelled and stood for the three encores), I didn’t get to indulge in the overpriced Crown Lagers, and I don’t think I can remember ever doing pelvic floor exercises in time to the music before.
(apologies for that last piece of too much information)
Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Tellytubby camping
Well our camping trip to Tassie ended up as it often does, with a wet tent to pack up on the final day. Not such a problem when you're going straight home, but Anthony had another week down there with work and there was no way I was lugging a 20kg tent home on my own. 20kg when dry, that is. Fortunately it wasn't raining in Hobart so we drove up to a high point where some poor bugger was trying to sleep in his car and draped the fly over the car to dry. The wind was pretty fierce at times which made it a bit of a battle to hold on to (and created a lovely racket for our soon awake neigbour) but it did mean it dried off in less than five minutes.
The 6 man tent is a new addition to our family, having been acquired through a fertiliser loyalty scheme (don't have those in the city, do you?) and is enormous. It has two separate rooms and is so high Anthony can stand up in it with room to spare.
To the right you'll see me displaying the interior luxury of said tent, reclining atop swag, three stacked thermarests, sheets, sleeping bags, doona and fire rug (well it did get down to 2 degrees at night). You'll also see me displaying Cradle Mountain and my tellytubby tummy for all of you keen to see just how fat I'm getting. People tell me it's easy camping with small babies but I think this may have been our last camping trip for at least the next six months.
The 6 man tent is a new addition to our family, having been acquired through a fertiliser loyalty scheme (don't have those in the city, do you?) and is enormous. It has two separate rooms and is so high Anthony can stand up in it with room to spare.
To the right you'll see me displaying the interior luxury of said tent, reclining atop swag, three stacked thermarests, sheets, sleeping bags, doona and fire rug (well it did get down to 2 degrees at night). You'll also see me displaying Cradle Mountain and my tellytubby tummy for all of you keen to see just how fat I'm getting. People tell me it's easy camping with small babies but I think this may have been our last camping trip for at least the next six months.
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