Nightmare Fuel

On Sunday night, I had a terrible night sleeping. I kept fitfully waking up, drifting in and out of the first real nightmare I've had in I-don't-know-long. What awful fantasy kept my pretty little head from resting peacefully?

I dreamed that someone stole my purse and every important piece of personal identification and financial information I owned.

(Whoooooooooo.....here comes the Scooby gang to get to the bottom of it.)

Now, I'm sure that this vivid imagery (it was a bamboo-handled, beige-seagrass purse, which actually could be cause for a nightmare itself) was a result of my drinking almost an entire bottle of Vouvray, eating SEVERAL handfuls of goldfish crackers and M&Ms (I'm sorry...was I bitching about not losing my baby weight???) and watching "I Heart Huckabees" with my husband.

If that's not a surefire combination for disturbring dreams, I don't know what is.

But what a lame-o nightmare! I mean, I know I'm a big freaking fuddy duddy most of the time, but the best my mind can come up with is identity theft? Where's the death? Where's the blood? Where are the monsters? The villains?

I suppose the good news is, I don't need to pay a shrink to figure out the symbolism. No Dali weirdness, no Homer Simpson-esque chili visions. Straight-forward worrywartism running like a stream from id to ego to superego.

(No wonder the fucking purse was beige. Guess I'm still in that figurative missionary position.)

Here in Higglytown

I know I'm not supposed to let my toddler watch any TV, but sometimes Petunia is super cranky and extra whiny. I find that about 15-20 minutes of well-timed television can yield an instant improvement in her disposition.

Now, if you thought there was some crappy children's music out there, try watching kids' TV. Seriously, the DoodleBops make me want to stick my head in an oven. And have you seen "Boohbah"? (With no disrespect to dooce and the good things that show has done for her sex life, I think that show was designed for acid-tripping college students, not toddlers.)

But some of the shows are tolerable, and a few of the shows are even good. This morning, I realized how great "Higglytown Heroes" really is.

Higglytown is a quaint little slice of animated Americana, where everyone is a nesting doll. (It's really handy to hide things inside yourself with just a flip of the upper body. Great for suprises!) The kids in the town (one girl, three boys) and their buddy Fran the squirrel (voiced by the secretary from "Ferris Bueller's Day Off") go about their daily lives and often encounter problems they can't solve on their own. When that happens, they sing,

"Someone special, who could it be?
This job's too big for you and me.
We need some help, but never fear-o!
It looks like a job for a Higglytown Hero!"

Then, the hero is featured amidst firecrackers and sings,

"I'm a Higglytown Hero, brave and true.
I help my town with the things I do.
Work real hard and you will see,
you can be a hero just like me."

The kick is, the hero is always an everyday Joe. This morning, it was a bus driver. (The kids were so happy they didn't have to walk the miles and miles to Fricky Frack Ferris Wheel!) I've seen a telephone operator (who helped the kids find a phone number), a sanitation worker (who took away all the leaves they raked), a librarian (who helped them research the caterpillar they found) and a weather person (who helped them know the best time to plan their outside Acorn Day party).

I love it! The characters are great (Twinkle's favorite phrase is "Oh, pickles!" and Pizza Guy appears in every episode), and it shows how much society relies on public employees, service industry workers and skilled tradesmen. It's always cute and never feels hokey.

Also, it apparently is very trendy. Aside from the fact that They Might Be Giants perform the theme song, it has become a cool Hollywood resume note to be a guest voice on HH. I'm not normally a link whore, but you've got to check out some of these names.

My only complaint about the show is that it's on at 8 am, as we're getting ready to go out the door. If someone at Playhouse Disney could figure out how to drop a safe on the DoodleBops and move the Higglytown kids into the prime 7:30 am slot, she'd be a hero to me!

A Baby by Any Other Name Would Smell as Sweet

It is officially breeding season. A friend in South Dakota welcomed a daughter a few weeks ago. This weekend, I found out a friend at church delivered her baby (a son) on Saturday night, AND I went to a shower for a good friend expecting in August. And today, some friends/coworkers/fellow daycare parents are welcoming their second son. I'm also waiting for word from San Francisco, where a friend from high school could deliver any day now.

And while I love babies...the sweet smell, the super-soft skin, the little pink waving fists, the big dark eyes...what I love more is baby names.

Ever since my husband asked me to marry him, I have been playing The Name Game incessantly. Every long car ride and many a quiet moment has been interrupted with "What do you think of..." When I found out I was pregnant, we already had a short list, thanks to this crazy fixation of mine. We had my daughter's name picked out before I even started my third trimester.

I've noticed it's a really touchy subject. When I eagerly ask expecting parents if they have a name (or names, if they don't know the sex) for their new little one, I get mixed reactions. One friend bluntly told me that yes, they had some names but they weren't sharing because they didn't want to hear other people's opinions. Other friends have had a name chosen but kept the selection a secret until the baby arrived. Many friends have said they have a short list but were going to make a selection in the delivery room when they met their new family member face-to-face. And I have a few friends (like me) who settled on a name during the pregnancy and shared it with anyone who asked.

When you think about it, choosing a name is really a big deal. This kid is going to have to live with the choice for the rest of his/her life! And, I personally think that names can play a big role in the kind of personality a child develops and/or how he/she is treated by peers.

(Could Buffy be taken seriously by her AP teachers? Would Butch ever be considered for first chair in the school orchestra? Will Milton ever make the football team?)

I mean, it's possible to shake off the associations that come with a name, but someone's name can make a pretty big first impression. Growing up, my name was familiar but not particularly common. People still can't seem to spell it right half the time, but a lot of people tell me how pretty it is.

My daughter's name is the same way, familiar but not particularly common (though it's more common in Latino culture). It has kind of that old lady vibe, which I love for little girls. We get a lot of compliments on our choice (and the Latin ladies at Petunia's daycare LOVE it).

So, as all these babies arrive, I wait for the phone call or email with news of the name. Who is this little person going to be? So far this year, I've met or been made aware of the arrival of Grant, Piper, Miles, Cassidy and John. Last year, we welcomed Jackson, Clara, Sophia, Robert, Sophie, Anna, Beckett, Ethan and Claire to our world.

It's interesting to see how babies' names fit their parents' style. Even when the names are not necessarily my cup of tea (I'm definitely into old classic names, as well as family names), they always seems to be perfect for the little ones to whom they have been given.

Healthy Progress

I've devoted quite a bit of my corner of cyberspace to my efforts to get back in shape and lose the baby weight (which isn't really 'baby' weight anymore considering the fact that my Petunia is 19 months old!). I've been feeling gross and - possibly far worse - looking flabby for far too long now. The infamous beach trip is six and a half weeks away, and the pool in our new neighborhood opens in just two weeks.

EEEEEEEKKKKKkkk!!!!! (in the words of Cathy)

But really, a huge part of my motivation has been making sure that I am in good shape, at low risk for weight-related health problems.

Awhile ago, I catalogued what it means for me to feel happy. And in the long-term decision arena, 'appearance' and 'fitness level' were two separate things.

Three years ago, I was contemplating getting pregnant and took a long hard look at the scale. I had been doing some reading about the concept of body mass index (BMI) and how different BMIs factored into health risks. I sat down with a calculator and computed my BMI. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. It was 29.9, just a tenth of a point away from being in the 'obese' category.

It was a turning point in my life. I thought, How can I possibly get pregnant and gain 20-30 pounds (at least) on top of a body that is already so strained? Well, the answer was, I couldn't. So I set about changing my lifestyle and getting into shape in the process.

I followed the 'Everyday Challenge' that my favorite local health columnist published around that time, adding one positive change (eating 5 servings of fruits/veggies, eating whole grains, etc) to my lifestyle each week. By the end of the eight weeks, I was well on my way to a healthier body. And during that time, I did a lot of reading on nutrition, exercise and overall health. And I got really active on a weight loss board on iVillage that forced me to be accountable to my online compadres about what I was eating and when I was exercising.

Over the course of about nine months, I lost about 35 pounds and got my BMI down to about 24.75, inside the boundaries of the 'healthy' category. When I got pregnant, I was in terrific shape. I had a body fat percentage of about 25% and was working out pretty intensely about 4-5 times per week.

Well, a lot has changed since then. My BMI these days is hovering around 27, and while I haven't been calipered in a while, my best guess is that my body fat has to be more like 30-35%. And I have been kind of beating myself up for being in such bad shape, for putting myself at risk for type 2 diabetes, heart disease, etc. With the idea of getting pregnant next summer/fall kind of floating around, I'm starting to feel a little like I did back in 2002.

The good news is, this week I have read some interesting things about BMI as an indicator of health risk. Turns out that maybe things aren't as cut and dry as they were portrayed several years ago. My favorite health columnist reported this week that for BMIs in the 'overweight' category of 25-29.9, you also need to take into account waist circumference. For overweight women, if the waist is over 35 inches, you should be a little worried.

I had my measurements taken about five weeks ago for a bridesmaid gown, and my waist was 35.5 inches. My guess is that I have shaved about an inch off since then because my pants are fitting better! So, the upshot (of this very meandering post) is that perhaps I'm not going to keel over as quickly as I thought I might. Losing 5-10 pounds and concentrating on toning up by building muscle seems to be all that is needed for getting me back in the 'healthy' category.

What a relief.

New Normalcy

This weekend, we didn't have an agenda. For the first time in months, there were no home improvements to make, no open houses to visit, no calls to the realtor, no stuff to pack up. We spent about two hours tackling the final frontier of unpacked boxes (the garage), but that was really the only thing on the "to-do" list.

I used the undirected time this weekend to do things that felt good to my soul.

First, I cooked. In my spacious new kitchen. I made a terrific curried brown rice salad (with halved red grapes, toasted cashews and fresh mint) that made a nice Monday lunch for me and Basil. And I put my own spin on an old Martha Stewart recipe I found (No dried cherries in the store? No Amaretto in the liquor cabinet? Pshaw.) and, for the first time, made biscotti.

Partly, I felt this urge to get all homebody and wifely in my new house. I thought about baking in my heels and pearls, but then I remembered that I don't own pearls.

But also, I really wanted to get off the train of pre-made, packaged, processed food that has become way too prevalent in the past several months.

(A small part of my motivation was having something yummy on hand for when my mother-in-law and her best friend come to visit. Holiday meals at my mother-in-law's house are like the climax of the movie Big Night, and she always has fresh baked goods lying around when we come. So I wanted to return the favor AND show my kitchen stripes a little bit. The cranberry-almond biscotti turned out really well, and have proved tasty with coffee, tea or milk.)

In addition to making good food from scratch, I tried to get back on the exercise wagon. I took some great walks, including a total bun-buster last night with my friend K, and dusted off my QuickFix exercise DVDs.

Maybe it's the 'ohm' experience of exploring holistic medicine, but I really feel like I need to start taking better care of myself. The whole rollercoaster ride of buying and selling houses, coupled with the stress of moving, has really taken a toll on my body. Not to mention my mind and spirit.

If I had the time, money and energy, I could totally see myself making a pilgrimmage to the organic market for bulk grains and dried beans. I feel like I should take up yoga. Or meditation. Or both.

Can somebody tell me where my chakras are? Or how the glycemic index on tortillas compares to potatoes?

Okay, just kidding. I'm not getting into the raw foods movement or giving my TV to Goodwill. But now that I have some time to just live life again without a lot of projects hanging over my head, I plan to be a little more conscious about how I'm living. After all, if moving into a new house isn't a good time to turn over a new leaf (or pick up an old one again), when is?

Spinal Map

Apparently, my L3 and L4 vertebrae are out of alignment, as are several of my cervical vertebrae. Which is contributing to my frequent shoulder, neck and jaw pain and - most likely - my increasingly frequent and intense headaches.

This week, in addition to visiting a real certified physician (okay, physician's assistant) about my migraines, I also saw my first chiropractor.

I felt like it was an important step, trying to do something to decrease the frequency and intensity of my headaches, as the two factors together have reached a point where I can pretty much count on having a throbbing, pounding ache in my head, neck, jaw and shoulders for about 3-6 days a month. (Um, yeah, that's gotten kind of disruptive to my life.) Even with over-the-counter meds and self-treatment at home (hot showers, lying down, massages from dear Basil, stretching, using pressure points), I have been struggling to keep my usual frenetic pace of life when I get tackled by a migraine.

As it turns out, I not only get migraines but also get tension headaches. And because chiropractic treatment actually has a good rep for treating tension headaches, I sought a recommendation from a coworker for her chiropractor.

I really liked this woman. Even though she was surrounded by baskets of organic tea and magazines about natural water birth, I didn't find her to be a crazy hippie. No, she wore professional clothes and a had a nice office (something between a traditional doctor's office and a spa) and spent a lot of time with me going over my medical history. She also showed me how the spine can get out of alignment and how little adjustments can relieve tons of pressure in the body.

Then she put me on this crazy, space age table that rotates 90 degrees from standing up to lying prone and proceeded to measure my legs. The right one was 3 mm shorter. Who knew???

(Note to self, if I ever get a penis, make sure that people use my LEFT leg as the indicator of my unit's size.)

Actually, my leg isn't shorter, but because of small misalignments in my spine, my right hip sits a little higher.

Anyway, Dr. Chiro then proceeded to use an Activator on me. It looks kind of like a cross between a bicycle pump and an illustration of the female reproductive system. She fires the action like a syringe and it 'taps' the vertebrae where the doctor points it.

I had to have about 5-6 taps for different vertebrae, including the base of my skull and my jaw. It didn't really hurt, but all day long I have been feeling the subtle effects of her work. She also gave me a killer, concentrated massage on the ever-tense parts of my neck and head and shoulders. (In college, this girl in our dorm who was a total massage whore used to call me 'cement back' because it was so stiff all the time.)

At the end of our visit, Dr. Chiro said that I should come back twice a week for a few weeks for adjustments and massage, which would hopefully address a lot of the spinal and muscle problems that may be contributing to my headaches. Then we could cut down to once a week, and hopefully after a month or two, I'd see some improvements. If not, she said acupuncture might be effective. (I guess looking like Hellraiser for an hour now and then would be alright if it helps cut out these damn headaches.)

In the meantime, I have a more traditional means of assistance on hand if I get a migraine anytime soon: some free samples of and a prescription for Relpax, the newest wonder triptan on the market from our friendly neighborhood Pfizer. I took one the other day on the tail end of my migraine, and wowwy wow - it worked!

But I've got another appointment with Dr. Chiro next week, so I'm hoping to start seeing some of those cumulative benefits that chiropractic fans rave about. For now, I'm raising a recycled paper cup of organic earl gray to my spinal health!

Under the Shade of a Coolibah Tree

My daughter continues her love of children's music, especially the new CDs we got her after the old ones were driving us crazy. In fact, she is starting to sing.

Her little voice is still timid, and she won't sing on demand. It's like she gets shy about it. But she is starting to join in when we sing to her sometimes, and occasionally we will overhear her singing to herself while playing.

Her new favorite song is 'Waltzing Matilda.' It's on one of her Disney CDs, and I have always loved it. So when listening to that CD in the car, I would belt out the chorus with the gusto I think it deserves. Was I ever surprised when Petunia starting singing along!

"...altzin' tilda, altzin' tilda..."

That's all she knows, and she joins in on the chorus most of the time now. But she recognizes the verses of the song and gets excited when they come on, so I set out to learn all the lyrics.

It's kind of a weird song, and like so many 'children's' songs it doesn't really seem entirely appropriate when you listen to the story:

• A hobo is sitting by a river, cooking something to eat
• A small wild animal shows up, and the hobo grabs the animal and stuffs it into his pack
• The landowner shows up with the police and demands the return of the animal
• The hobo says 'You'll never catch me alive' and throws himself in the river to drown, rather than be taken in by the police

It's kind of a sad tale, but thankfully its fun quotient is buttressed by goofy-sounding words like 'swagman,' 'jumbuck,' 'billabong,' and 'tuckerbag.'

I think my next goal is going to be to learn to play 'Matilda' on the piano. I've almost met my New Year's resolution goal of learning Debussy's Clair de Lune (though some of the arpeggios still trip me up, and it's not quite up to tempo yet), and this would be a fun change of pace.

Nicene Creed, Hippocratic Oath

I visited a new medical practice today when I had my first physical in nearly three years and finally sought some prescription help for my worsening migraines. It was a family practice, composed of two doctors and two assistants. I met one of the PAs, who was very nice. She spent a lot of time with me and gave me some samples of Relpax, which I'm hoping will do the trick for the headaches.

Because I was a new patient, I had to fill out and sign a stack of requisite forms: contact info, insurance info, medical history, family history, office financial policy, privacy notice, primary physician's decision not to prescribe any artificial methods of contraception.

WHAT?!?!

Yup, there was a note tucked in all the forms from one of the doctors stating that after prayerful consideration, she could no longer in good conscience prescribe any kind of birth control (pills, patch or shots), recommend any patient for medical sterilization or refer any patient for an abortion.

There was also a small crucifix hanging above the door of the exam room where I was seen.

I recently read about pharmacists who have decided to stop dispensing birth control pills because of their religious beliefs, but I guess I had never thought I might encounter the same attitude in my doctor's office. It's good that the office is up front about the policy, but it did make me a touch uncomfortable.

I consider myself to be a religious person, happily attending church most weeks and participating in the many good activities my parish offers. But I'm not a big evangelist. (I migrated from the Southern Baptist Church to the Episcopalian Church for many reasons, less emphasis on 'witnessing' being a major one.) Someone else's religious beliefs reaching into my life in such a personal way is more than annoying; it's practically offensive. (I can take care of my own soul, thanks.)

Thankfully, I go to a terrific OB-GYN practice that happily gives me the birth control I need. The doctors and nurses there have offered some medical advice about tricky issues like child spacing, in terms of what close pregnancies can do to your body, and the pros and cons of various types of contraception. But they've never said anything about their own beliefs or thoughts about birth control. And I prefer my doctor-patient relationship that way.

I'll keep going to this new practice. I need a new primary care physician. I really appreciated the fact that the office fit me in so quickly when I called for an appointment, and I liked the attitude of the PA who saw me. Not to mention, they're close to home and they take my insurance.

But I probably will steer clear of Dr. Catholic for most appointments. I plan to keep taking my little magic period pills for quite awhile, and I don't need to feel like my doctor is judging me for that choice.

If I decide that I need some moral or religious counseling about family planning, I'll call my priest.

That Which Doesn't Kill Us, Kicks Our Ass

My God, I have never been so tired.

Okay, I probably have been this tired...when my daughter was a newborn, when I would pull crazy all-nighters in college, when I had mononucleosis, when I had meningitis.

But my point is that I am pretty much on a Starbucks feeding tube these days, fuzzily squinting through the day and collapsing into a drooling heap at night.

The move went fine. Everything that we owned migrated to the new place in four and a half hours. The problem has been twofold: (1) we have been packing and (now) unpacking each night after Petunia has gone to bed, thus pushing our own bedtimes into the dark hours of night and (2) our little girl has had a hard time transitioning in all of this, resulting in her sleeping pitifully - if at all - many of the last 14 nights.

I wake up tired. I work a full day. I split childcare/dinner duties with my husband in the evening. I help put my daughter to bed. I relax for a few precious moments (or maybe not), and then I take a deep breath and fly into unpacking/organizing/cleaning mode until I start to get a headache and realize that I am ten minutes away from curling up in a ball right where I am standing. I fall into bed, praying 'Please God, let her sleep all night.' About half the time, my prayers are answered. The other half of the time, I am awakened at some unholy hour by the screaming cry (or a crying scream) of a little girl who doesn't quite know where she is and has been having a rough couple of days (persistent cold/allergies, some bad bumps/bruises). The alarm goes off in the morning and I think, 'You have GOT to be kidding me.'

I'm hoping to turn a corner soon.

The good news is that we love our house. We LOVE it. We love every inch of it. (Okay, maybe not the bathroom vanities that HAVE NO DRAWERS.) But our family is settling into having lots of new living space, we're enjoying our friendly new neighbors, and I smile every time I look into the giant pantry.

And every night, we add more empty boxes to the bonfire pile. Which means fewer boxes to unpack. Which means we are more settled in. Which means life should find its 'new normal' very soon, and I can get back to getting some sleep at night.