Holy SMOKES.

So "uncomfortable" is putting it mildly.

Thankfully, I am blessed with a FREAKING AMAZING HUSBAND who has been helping out SO MUCH the past week or two. Work is absolutely draining me. When I get home, I got nuthin'. NUTHIN'. And there's a 2 year old Bug who doesn't really get that. So I'm so glad Matt has been helping out and letting me lay down so I can find enough energy to somehow put together some dinner and make it until 9 for bed.

Which, of course, then consists of me laying there and tossing and turning for a few hours. Gotta love the way the body preps you for what's about to come, right? I'm lucky if I'm getting 5 hours of sleep now.

The good news is that Bean is still SMALLER than BUG. Yay! But don't get too excited. It's still big. Just not ginormous. Bean is approximately 7 1/2 pounds (give or take--these tend to be off at the end) which puts s/he somewhere in the range of 9 pounds at 40 weeks on my due date. Bug would have been over 10. Still better...but still large. What is it with me and large kids? Good thing I'm tall-ish....

Got a somewhat alarming call today on my voicemail--the doctor's office said there was "something with my ultrasound" and to "call them right away." Yeah. THAT'S a great way to have me hyperventilate and freak out in my classroom. Turns out it's that there's more fluid than normal up in thrrrrr, so, that means every week I get to go in for some fetal monitoring and stuff before my appointments. She swears up and down everything else is fine and this is just routine. So I'm trying to relax. Still hoping for this to be a natural start to labor, but obviously, Bean's health comes first. I should know more tomorrow.

On a somewhat related note, I've been having slight panics lately over the fact that (are you ready for this?) I'm about to have 2 kids.

Yes. TWO kids. Because I've had NINE MONTHS TO THINK ABOUT IT, but it's finally hitting me now. And I'm really scared.

Part of me feels like I am just getting the hang of one. What on earth am I doing adding another one?!?! (Those of you with 3, 4, or 18 kids, feel free to laugh) If you've been along for the ride for a while, you know this is standard operating procedure for me. Yes, my name is TriSaraTops, and I AM A WORRIER. I like to think of it as my tragic flaw. I'm getting better, though. I swear. ;)

Anyway...so, yeah. Two. How will I do two? Will I still be able to juggle everything? Teaching full-time? Being an athlete? And I'm reminded that I have felt this all before...that this, most definitely, is normal...ESPECIALLY for me. Whenever Negative Nellies like to tell me how "impossible" going from one to two is and how "you'll never have ANY time to yourself again" (yes, those are actual comments made to me in the past 2 weeks), it's a little intimidating. But that's them.

I'm not them.

I must consider the source.

My source handled things before, and damn well, if I do say so myself. Not that it wasn't hard from time to time. I definitely had my moments. But looking back at how scared I was for that first baby now, I realize how much I had in me in that moment and the moments after that I didn't even know back then.

So I'm hoping it will be the same this time around. Hereby granting myself wiggle room, in every aspect of life, though. But I did this once, and it made me and everything around me even better.

I can only hope for so much this time around, too. And in approximately 20 days, I'll find out.

Good news. Really.

So last night we got some good news.

Now, I don't speak Doctor, so this is totally unscientific and I might be screwing it up. But you'll get the basic idea.

Matt's mom is about to have her 3rd round (out of 6) of chemo. They did some bloodwork and found that whatever counts of bad cells (? see. I'm screwing this up already) there were related to the cancer in her blood are going down. WAY down. The doctor was very excited. I guess before she started the chemo, her counts were over 1,000. Now they are under 200. 35 is considered normal.

SO--this means that it appears her body is responding well to the chemo. Which is HUGE. And awesome.

Prayers and thoughts are working. Thank you, to those who have sent any up on account of us.

Three weeks from today will be my last day of work. It's so hard for me to go from complete work mode, where I'm veryveryveryfocused to STOP. Sometimes I feel that without me in room 221, then room 221 falls apart and THE! WORLD! ENDS! which is very silly but just how I roll. Kind of like how I feel about not doing any structured workouts, a nice hard track run, hard 400s in the pool, or a tempo ride. You know. I got over that, eventually, and when I get to do it again it's nice and new and all exciting all over. Usually the same is said for work, too.

Matt and I have the nursery all ready--little bitty yellow and green onesies and gowns ready to go, bouncy seat out (which, by the way, my 33 pound toddler still thinks he can get into--and it's hilarious), dog totally knows something is up and is NOT happy (so we're giving him lots of extra treats), and I am in full nesting mode with making stews and soups and food and trying to freeze what I can.

And I'm TIRED, yo. Seriously tired. I am having a rough time sleeping--MAJOR heartburn (maybe that means a full head of hair on this little bean again?), and lots of tossing and turning. But that all comes with the territory. Oh, and I probably shouldn't watch 24 right before I go to bed. Unless I want nightmares about Russian hit men coming to shoot me in the head.

So things are getting a little better...the pinky has healed nicely and although it's still quite angular, at least it's kind of almost back to normal. I can type with it, at least!

Been overwhelmed with the support of good friends these last 2 weeks...thanks to all, both on the interwebs here and my "real life" friends who have been checking on us, praying for us, and just being good people. You guys rock.

Tomorrow will be another swim with my Preggy Pals. Operation Can I Still Do Flip Turns at Almost 37 weeks is ON. Maybe I'll even try to get some video. Because that would just be good quality entertainment.

Good news, good news...good stuff.

Confessions

So, I have a confession to make.

2010 has not been kind to me so far. And it has very little to do with me chopping off my own pinky finger. Although I must admit that added to the situation.

I just heard even more bad news this evening, which makes last night's bad news even more emotional. And the news from the week before is still fresh in my mind. It's one of those weeks where I am literally afraid to even answer the phone, or now check my email. And I definitely can't look at the news right now.

I'm not much into talking about stuff here like this. I have been doing a very good job putting on the happy face at work over the past 2 weeks, so the kids don't know what's going on. But it's harder to put the happy face on here, since...well...you don't see my face. It's just my words and thoughts here. And I have a rough time not showing you those.

Last week, we found out about our good friend's brother who was killed in a car accident. Hit by a driver who was texting while driving. He lost control on an icy patch and slammed into the median. 25 years old. He was just starting to turn his life around, and his girlfriend is due with their child next week.

Last night, I found out we have another battle with cancer to wage in our family...one that we all thought was over. That we had won. Now the hard battle will be picked up again, but it's going to be very, very hard.

And just now I found out that a running and triathlon friend's wife passed away yesterday from a heart attack.

This, all on top of Matt's mom bravely fighting her cancer and in her third round of chemo.

Right now, I'm having a hard time accepting why bad things happen to good people. I don't understand it, but I do understand that I'm not supposed to. I need to make peace with that. Just when I feel like no one's there and I just want to go from my bedroom, to my classroom, and back home again, not talking to anyone that I am not required to talk to, several of my friends (who don't even know what's going on) have been calling and emailing me "just to check on me." I'm taking that as a reminder that someone does care up there. And I need to trust that everything will work out somehow.

The trouble is, since I'm 9 months pregnant I'm not sleeping well. I'm up often. And last night when I got up, I just thought about the horrible news we got yesterday, and I just kept crying. So, I'm really, really tired. All the time.

(Now would be a good time to remind me NOT to use my mandolin slicer, lest in my tired state I sever another digit. ;)

I'm not sure how much I'll want to talk here the next few weeks. Maybe I'll decide that writing here is a good thing. But I might disappear for a bit. I just don't know. I thought I'd explain what was going on, just in case I temporarily vanish.

The good news is that everything is fine with the baby, so I didn't want anyone to worry about that. But it's pretty much everything else around me that seems to be crashing in.

It's right about now that I wish I could go for a good, hard tempo run. With some Pantera. Or a 3 hour ride by myself. But I can't do any of those things.

So I'm focusing on yoga a lot, and hopefully will be swimming with my preggy pal JenC tomorrow morning. That should help. I can't go hard, but at least she can make me smile.

Somehow, someway, everything will work out.

What other stuff?

I was going to talk about some other stuff today, but all I can think about is Haiti.

I know I'm a little emotional being 9 months pregnant and all, but...wow.

I've definitely had my fair share of bad news these past few weeks, but it kind of all goes right out the window thinking about the sheer suffering happening there.

So for now, I'm sending all my thoughts and prayers in that direction.

I'm a planet.

I really love the movie Juno. Just last night I was telling Matt, "remember way back when we could go see movies in the theater?" Sigh. I do like movies, but with us trying to save money for baby we have resorted to reserving whatever happens to be available at the library.

And just like that my parents called today to see if we wanted to sneak out for a matinee of Invictus.

SUPER. excited.

We're heading out in just a few, and it will be nice to see a movie in the theater that I've really wanted to see.

On the training front...what training? What is this "working out" thing? MANNNNNN. I have been SOOOOOOOOOOOO tired after work that it's all I can do to sit in a chair with Bug and play play-doh, or, if I'm feeling really crap-tastic, I lay on the couch and we watch Elmo. I know. Not the best example, right? I keep telling myself this is temporary and if the weather wasn't so cold we'd be at the park at least. Sometimes I'll take him up to the library so he can play and I can sit, but it's been a rough week. I'm hoping I can hold on here the next 4 weeks of work. I have some serious AP grading to do this weekend and plan on timing that up with Bug's nap tomorrow. Those kids don't exactly get patient with their test grades, if you know what I mean! They're basically like a room full of me's. Very type-A. Very not understanding of what 9 months pregnant with a toddler means. (Which is good. Because they are 16.) So, I'm doing my best to keep up.

Today, however, was my return to the pool, in a ridiculously inappropriately miscast Baywatch red suit. I was so afraid I'd see someone I knew at the pool, besides my awesome preggy friends JenC and Bridget of course! They came all the way to my side of town to swim again, which was really nice of them. I was a little worried about what a month-hiatus or so, plus massive extra poundage would do. My upper body was all, "HUH?!" for the first 300 yards or so, and I had a really rough time catching my breath, but other than that it felt great! We did about 1200 yards which was all fine by me. And then, we hit the Original House of Pancakes again for PANCAKES. MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM PANCAKES.

I know, I know--no pics = it didn't happen. But I'm sorry. I AM SO NOT GOING THERE. There will be NO documentation of me in this suit going on 9 months pregnant.

I am happy to report I was still able to flip turn! It wasn't pretty of course, but I could do it. Boo-ya!

Okay, off to a movie for the first time in maybe 6 months or so--yahoo! On tap this week will be prenatal yoga, some dreadmill walking, and trying not to fall asleep at my desk again during lunch.

23 Lesson Plans, and 1 Missing Pinky Tip

Last night, I decided to try out my fancy pants new mandolin slicer to make some yummy sweet potato chips. This is really the sole reason I wanted the slicer. I can never seem to slice sweet potatoes thinly enough, and I thought it would be a fun gadget.

It was. Until I sliced off the top of my pinky.

Safe to say I was in a bit of shock. My main concerns included turning the oven off, putting away the garlic, and telling Bug that Mommy was okay, Mommy was okay. All the while I tried not to look at the missing piece of my finger and pay little attention to the fact that blood was gushing all over the place.

Matt's Dad came over to watch Bug and Matt and I got in the car. Then I just let loose. F bombs galore, lots of tears, and ridiculous statements about how "I can't even carry Bug anymore, can't even carry the laundry up the stairs, and now I can't even make a nice dinner." I was, moreover, furious with myself for being so freaking stupid and not paying attention to what I was doing. It was serious enough that I was really scared. I actually wondered if I could still play the piano as well.

Thankfully, I didn't hit bones or any nerves. I was in and out of the ER in about 30 minutes--I guess it pays to be a bleeder! I should be okay in 7-10 days, and I'm getting pretty good at typing with 9 fingers and becoming a de facto lefty for a few days.

I've been doing a pretty good job taking things day by day lately. In some ways, this pregnancy is so much easier that way. I know now that I won't be two tons forever, that the races will be there when I'm ready, and that I might even get faster. But believe me...I have my moments.

Like when the nurse accidentally told me my weight last week. Despite the huge "DO NOT TELL" warning on my file. They might as well put, "ABSOLUTE FREAKING HEADCASE--SERIOUSLY, DON'T GO THERE" on it. But she did. And I heard.

And I freaked.

Pretty much the same as before. Which, after a few tears and yes, a few f-bombs alone in my car, makes sense. My body is just going to do what it needs to do. I. have. little. control. over. that.

Let.

go.

already.

It doesn't mean I'm doing things wrong. It just means I'm doing what I need to do. Sometimes that means being creative. Although, true creativity doesn't involve missing pinkies usually, but whatever.

Luckily, I got most of my school work done pre-pinky incident, so I can relax and enjoy this last day off here. I also planned most of my lessons until Friday, February 12th, which will be the last day if I don't go early (which it looks like I will definitely avoid a 39-week induction--YAY!). With a week of midterm exams and a teacher work day in there, that left me with--at MOST--23 days of lessons.

23 days. I can handle that.

Then it's off for 12 weeks, and finishing off a few weeks at the end doing my favorite lessons of the year anyway.

I can do this. Even if I screw up, I can do this.

And hopefully my screw-ups won't involve any more missing digits.