Belly Shot: 24 Weeks

Hong Kong harbour from our room at the Grand Hyatt (mirrored windows on the outside) & belly silhouette.

Categories: Pregnancy

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Wildlife: Please Do Not Fondle

I'm not big on touching wildlife. I was saying to Turner that it seems to me wild animals don't want to be near people, so why would I want to make them touch me? Sure, domestic animals, fine. Anyone who knows my family knows our whole chinaman!gremlin!innocent face! approach to owning an animal, and I'm a product of that environment. My attitude toward dogs and cats is very much a you are here to entertain me, and in exchange I feed you thing. Very clear. So don't get me wrong: I'm not afraid of animals. I just don't want to touch wild animals. [Except birds. I want to feed birds and I want them to come sit on my finger.]

But one of the big things to do when you go to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary in Brisbane is to 'cuddle' a koala. This practice is illegal in many parts of Australia, but it's still permitted in Queensland. Me, I really didn't want to cuddle a koala. Wild animals are... well, they're dirty. And really, like I say, does a koala really want me holding it? I honestly don't think so. But Turner was in all our feeding-the-kangaroos photos, and he wanted me to be in the cuddling-the-koala photos.

So anyway, here's me with a koala bear. I call it, “The Koala Is Grabbing My Boob“.

Is grabbing a stranger's boob polite? I dunno. Personally, I think it's a cry for help. As in, “I don't want to be held by this stranger! I'm a wild animal, you know!“

There's more about our November 13th trip to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary archived under this date on www.planetsimpson.com.

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Whose feet are THOSE feet?

Still life chankles with Auckland ferry dock

Okay. So... those are apparently my feet. I don't recognize them. Really, if they weren't attached to my legs, and if that wasn't the colour of polish I chose at the pedicure just a few days ago, I'd swear someone was playing a really mean joke, labelling those elephant hooves as my feet.

I've never had my feet swell, before. I'd heard that it happened in pregnancy, but since I just seemed to be putting on inches in the stomach and boob areas, and my blood pressure has been fine, well - I dunno, I never thought it was something that was going to affect me. A dear friend of mine suffers from the indignity of swollen ankles. When she came to visit in India I remember her lamenting the torture of the plane ride over the Pacific and the balloons of flesh encasing her ankles before they'd even hit the International Date Line. Me: “Hmmmm. Hmmmm. Yeaaahhhh, that's too bad...” [Thinking: 'Hm! Glad my feet don't ever swell; what a freakshow! What is up with that, swelling feet...? Who, under the age of 70, has feet that swell...?'] On the flight to Hong Kong, I could see it happening, and I tried to prevent it en route; I elevated the feet, I did lymph drainage-type self massage, and on the stopover I plunged the feet into icy water - here in New Zealand I sat for half an hour in a cold bath, freezing my bean and so far nothing is helping.

But I must admit, I'm grotesquely fascinated by this, the newest development in the whole pregnancy experience. And this is intensely gross, what I'm about to say, so if you are squeamish, skip to the next paragraph. ... but I can push huge dents into the skin around my ankles. It's like sinking your fingertips into butter. (Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go throw up, even I'm completely bleched out by that last sentence, and they're my ankles.) What happens if they never go down? I can't put any of my shoes on anymore - I'm waddling around in Birkenstocks, and not by choice.

Oh, hubris. Pregnancy: a nine-month-long lesson in all sorts of things you never thought would happen to you. (ex. Heartburn: five months ago I wouldn't have known what the hell you were talking about. I always thought people were faking it, or just attention-seeking nervous-Nellie hypochondriacs. Ha. Ha ha ha, I say.)

Categories: Pregnancy

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Saturday ultrasound adventure...

The secret to a comfortable pregnancy ultrasound is to completely ignore the directions. Don't drink all that water. It's a sham. If you drink six glasses of water an hour ahead of the exam, I promise you pain on the table. I'm sure it has a sound basis in physics, the ultrasound waves having an easier time getting a clear picture going through the liquid in the bladder and blah blah blah. But I've followed the directions before, and been called back into the room after the exam, after I've gone to the washroom, and the radiologist has had another look - and people, I can't tell a difference in the quality of the image.

Sure, if the baby has something wrong with it, follow all directions. But if it's a routine ultrasound, and it's, like, your third one and they're just looking to cover a few bases, take my advice. It's a much nicer experience and you don't have all the discomfort of feeling like you're going to pee your pants the whole time.

But then, I have the balls to ignore medical directions for a few reasons: 1., my dad is a radiologist, and I go to his practice's clinics for my ultrasounds. So when I walk in there, I'm the boss' daughter. Nobody's going to tell me boo. 2., I've been really, really sick in my time. Hospitals, clinics, doctors, procedures, and staff don't scare me. I also know that most of the advice they give patients is for their own convenience, often not for the actual safety/efficacy of procedures, or for the comfort of patients. And 3., most importantly, I used to work at the front desk of a radiology clinic, and I saw many, many, many pregnant women come in for their ultrasounds. I watched them dance around the waiting room, dying to pee. I saw the situation behind the scenes, where techs and support staff and doctors did things on their own schedules, regardless of what was going on in the waiting room. And one time, I was there when a woman arrived with a full bladder and the staff made her wait and wait and wait. She ended up losing the baby in the clinic washroom because of the stress to her system. Every time I'm getting ready for an ultrasound I see that lady's face in my mind, the desperation in her eyes because she had to pee so badly.

Yesterday I was being squeezed into the schedule because I'd accidentally missed my Friday appointment, so I knew I might be waiting for a while. I decided to give a pass to the six glasses of water. And as you can see, the images came out just fine:  

The continuation of a fine Bristowe trait

Turner's comment: “Hm... Skeletor”

Categories: Pregnancy

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Pregnancy Reading List

I've been thinking about the January-February House Arrest. My plan for the penultimate two months of this pregnancy is to hole up at home and watch many movies and read many books, while eating many Breyer's fruit popcicles. This morning I'm looking for pregnancy stories to add to the reading list, and I'm finding that if you're not in the market for angsty accidental teenage-pregnancy young adult novels, there's not much out there. There's no shortage of hokey “Sooooooo... welcome to pregnancy!“ books that condascend to anedotes about gaining weight and clueless husbands. Um, they've been all well and good, but I'm looking more for narrative.

Thusfar in the pregnancy I've come across only two books from the genre I'm seeking: Playing House by Patricia Pearson, and Knocked Up by Rebecca Eckler... though I confess I'm thinking (and cringing) about procuring Belly Laughs by Jenny Garth McCarthy, clearly another such book. However, to date my only memorable encounter with this ex-Playmate & MTV vj (before totally forgetting about her for about five years there) was the lewd poster hanging in Brother John's university-era kitchen. So my impression is that the girl is a bit of a skank. Do I want to read her take on pregnancy? I dunno.

But it should be said that prior to reading Knocked Up I certainly participated in a number of conversations bashing Rebecca Eckler, and picked up the book mainly to have an informed opinion on it for the next bash session. Not that I regret those talks - the last time I saw the woman it was in the green room of CTV's Talk TV, where she was watching Turner on the studio monitor and obsessing about who he was: “Who is that? Who is that?” The woman beside her said, “I think he's a journalist... I think he might be a columnist for the Post...?”

To which Eckler stopped, turned, and countered, “No. He doesn't work for the Post. I work for the Post, and I know he's not with them. He's not a columnist for the Post. I would know, I'm a columnist for the Post...” Round and round, like that, for a surprisingly long while. You'd think no one knows she's got the best gig in Canadian newspapers. Okay, yes yes yes you work for the Post, shaddup already.

For myself, I didn't say anything - just sat there. After all, she didn't ask me who he was - although there were only three of us in the green room, I wasn't wearing enough Prada to be noticed.

But having said all this, the book's not bad. But I'm sure it's the pregnancy brain talking, there.

Categories: Pregnancy

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