10 Days Until Baby

It's scary to think that you're going to be responsible for another human being for the rest of your life.  As if my life hasn't already changed dramatically, in ten days it's about to get real.  I'm sure he'll be a cool baby and that, once the initial fear wears off, it won't be that complicated and not very different than spending summers with Jacob or hanging out with Levi, except for it being 24/7, 365 days a year. But that calm and collected attitude is not my most worn game face these days.  In fact, friends, I have never ever been so scared in my entire life. And, I mean, I've been through some crap in my time. But Debbie's wrath, Corey's lectures, moving to a foreign country on my own, and my most feared horror movie all seem a bit easier and more inviting than the thought of being sliced open in ten days, even if it is to give birth. 

Pip doesn't scare me and death doesn't scare me. To be honest, I've always considered myself being okay with dying at any moment. I always believed I lived a good life and when your time is up then there isn't much you can do about it. I've always thought of it as an old friend waiting to have a nice long chat and catch up with me. With that being said, Pip dying scares me and Pip growing up without his mama scares me. Now, there's still so much that I want to do. Now, I want to control when my time is up. I want to see this baby that I've been growing and housing for the last nine months.  Also, if I am not around who will make sure that he gets my taste in music and not his father's? If the fact that Pip might grow up thinking 80's music is fantastic doesn't scare you then you need to get your courage cloned for me, for reals. 

And, I mean, there is really no reason, other than the doctors admitting they have no idea what to do with me, for me to think that I wouldn't survive. With lawsuits and bad press these days, I have to believe that if the doctors really believed that they couldn't get me through this successfully that they would wash their hands of me to avoid a death on their record.   I'm morbid, I know. 

The thing is that I've been a science project for so long, my whole life actually. It's all I know.  I've grown accustomed to, and quite fond of the response, "I don't know," from doctors that it's kind of what I expect at all times.  But lately, I'm not okay with being a science project. I would love to just have ten days of normalcy and go about this like every other expecting  mom and be excited about this baby getting out of my belly and being able to have my body back, but excited is just not there. Fear is.  Anxiety is. Doubt is. Excited must have hitched a ride to someone else's due date. 

I met with the anesthesiologist two weeks ago and he's quite confident that the team at Moses Taylor are competent enough to make this work and the doctor assisting my OB during the section is actually the head of the department (because I am a medical mystery? In the name of science? Or coincidence?) so that's comforting. But there is also the reality that they may not have any idea of what they're getting themselves into, like when I hopped on a plane to England two years ago. They could be thinking that they're going to have a barrel of monkeys on the 12th and it could end  up to be a cage full of hungry tigers! 

So I have my "Just In Cases" ready to go. Of course, I try to be as humorous as possible when telling my mother that she better not have my funeral in west side and if they decide to cremate me to at least play "Girl on Fire" while it's happening. I have an utterly adorable notebook to write silly, unnecessary things/wishes in - it's called my "Just In Cases" book. I will get around to writing stuff in there, I also purchased fancy colored Sharpie pens to add some pizazz should people have to actually read through it.  Thoughtful, I know. 

But, then I start to think of after.  This is always a blurred line for me because I don't believe in a lot of mumbo jumbo. (Science project, remember?) This is where I contradict myself the most and where I am probably the biggest hypocrite going.  I believe in good and evil. I think I believe in some sort of Divine Being, maybe it's just the Universe that really has a bigger plan set up for everyone but then I get annoyed because I am not cool with something or someone controlling my life. I don't think I believe in a God that the Bible speaks of. Maybe because too many fools take it and analyze it and push it down other people's throats, I can't be sure.  I do not believe in Hell, or maybe that people actually go there, but I do believe that there is such thing as a Devil and that is because of all of the evil I see in the world.  However, there is much good in the world so surely there should be an equal and opposite entity to balance all of this crap out. The  Universe is big and maybe I'm a bit more for recycling than I originally thought but who's to say where we go from here?  Surely it would be easier to send our souls to another place than to just have them linger around here. But, then again, I don't really believe in ghosts (I say this as my feet must be covered so that I am protected from any ghost that may want to drag me under the bed) and, as we all know, the body is what takes up the space not our souls. So what happens next?  My great grandma always told me that I would be rewarded in Heaven for the seemingly hard life that she knew I'd have but I didn't yet understand.  I was young, like four or five, but I think even then I thought it was a load of bull. Heaven doesn't help me now. But then again if Heaven is for eternity, surely this temporary home is the worst of the two. And I'll take the challenges now rather than prance around in Heaven with all of this crap holding me down.  

Now, Heaven that is what I really think about often. If it exists at all, what it is like?  Does it change for everyone? How does that work when you meet up with old friends and family members who passed away before you? Surely there is someone up there who thinks a forever filled with 80's music is a great way to go about it and that would absolutely stink for me!  Dann's Heaven would probably be full of Star Wars, Marvel/DC and superiffic geek-like things, and I'm just too cool for that so what happens then? This is surely where Heaven can get tricky. Don't even get me started on the whole idea of what happens if your spouse dies and then you remarry. You have two partners in Heaven then? I'd be furious if I spent 56 years waiting for my husband to get to Heaven only to learn he married some chick after I croaked and I have to share him for eternity.

But if there is a Heaven I can tell you what I think it's like. Dann and I talk about it often. Obviously, if there is such a place, Heaven would be like Candy Land. Yes, the board game.  Not the new version either, that stuff is too politically correct for my liking. I'm talking about Candy Land pre-2000s when you still had to worry about getting tossed back down to Plumpy and his sugar plums, but I always thought he was a nice looking guy. If anyone is going to meet you at the gates of Heaven, why not that happy looking green guy? Imagine how fun it would be to just prance around in candy for eternity.  I'd hardly mind being sent down to Plumpy because I'd get to go on those rainbow slides, which is probably made of  regenerating Skittles anyway.  The only beef I might have is with Lord Licorice. I never really enjoyed licorice before because I have a terrible underbite which prevents me from chewing many things, and licorice tastes like butt.  But maybe in Heaven I wouldn't have an underbite and licorice would not taste like butt.  Who knows?! Anyway, I'd definitely enjoy that Peppermint section. I googled the characters and apparently he's called Mr. Mint, I can't recall if that is what he was called back in the day.   Debbie probably still has our VHS hanging around somewhere. I'll let you know if I find it. But, Mr. Mint, reminds me of Christmastime and that is always joyous.  We have Grandma Nutt who would always be waiting with hot chocolate.  Gloppy would eventually give up the molasses deal and let all of that be chocolate which is just delicious. Queen Frostine and King Kandy would also be nice to hangout with from time to time. But I'll fill you in, I'm too much of a feminist to prance around with a king and Frostine always seemed too prissy for me.  All in all, I think my idea of Heaven is an okay idea. I could be wrong (and right at the same time) and once I croak that's the end of the story but at least I have it out there that I'm not nervous about the death part or what comes after because it's only Candy Land anyway. And let's face it I'll end up spending a good chunk of time waiting for Princess Lolly to get there anyway so I'll wait around there for her to arrive, in another hundred years :) 

So that's what I tell myself, "It's Candy Land anyway."  Sure I don't want Pip to not know me but if the last nine months have taught me anything they've taught me this: Some things are just out of my hands.  He will be taken care of. He has people on both sides of the world who love him already. And since he's my son, he might inherit my sense of humor which will help him bunches, along with my sense of adventure and determination which I hope he gets. 

Some people sleep at night, other people are rudely awakened by little feet kicking on their bladders. I'm one of those people and this blog was brought to you in part by the letter P.