Ms. Shelley, I have tried. But enough is enough, and I’ve definitely had enough.

I read your biography (which was really pretty good) so that I would understand why you wrote like you did. And I butted my head through your dark words for as long as I could. But Victor has recovered from his mania and abandoned his science project, and I just can’t handle what’s coming next. You know, what with all the brooding, the revenge, the chasing, the harrowing regret. I’ve had about all I can take, so I will come back to you later.

I’ve got enough on my plate. The year ahead seems so stinking big and hard to chew. I’m looking at school, co-op, busy extracurricular schedules, the impending little person, and a possible big move to who knows where – all staring me down at once. I’m just barely hanging on as it is. So, Mary, you will have to go sit on the shelf for a while. No hard feelings.

Instead, I think I will hang out with Mr. Cuppy for a while. That guy is always good for a laugh.

There are days when I am reminded why I go to a midwife. Those would be any day I go to an OB.

See, the military health plan doesn’t cover certified midwives. To which we say, “Well, gee willikers, we don’t need this two grand anyway!” and pay out of pocket. Because, when it comes to anything to do with women’s health, the general medical community is just plain wacked out. I mean, I went to see my (female!) PA for a thyroid check, and she told me within 15 minutes that I may need a hysterectomy. I kid. you. not.

But my midwife can’t do ultrasounds; for that I have to go to the military hospital. And of course they won’t just give me the ultrasound if I simply walk in all round and pregnant and ask for one. I have to play the game and go to the OB every month until I get scanned, and then I’m done. (I don’t tell them I’m also seeing my midwife, since the last person who did that was told by the doctor that she was killing her baby.) But our little pink womb monkey was so active during the sonogram that they couldn’t get all the measurements they needed, and would I please come back in a few weeks?

That meant one more trip to the doc. Sigh.

The magazine in the lobby that said childbirth is “trauma to the body” should have been a clue to what was coming. (Uh, no. Shrapnel is trauma to the body. Birth, I’m built for.)

Then, in the ten full minutes I spent with the doctor (who I had never met before), he managed to snicker about a woman being named Geph, made a sarcastic comment about what male name we would call our baby girl (which happened to be exactly what we plan on calling her), and then adamantly tried to convince me that I should go for a scheduled induction. Despite the fact that I have had two very healthy, complication-free pregnancies in the past. The man was a complete asshat.

I know that tons of women go to an OB and deliver in a hospital, and they wouldn’t have it any other way. But not me. Anyone who makes me feel like I have to put armor on my ovaries before I visit them is not catching my baby.

A sign that your three year old is paying attention to what you say, even if he doesn’t always act accordingly:

When he tells you, in his most exasperated voice, “Mama, you are driving me nuts! I am trying my very best to concentrate!”

Yikes.

Which is not the same as wearing your boxers on your head.

It’s horrible. It’s like laughing at a really bad pun. But I just can’t help myself – I love the new video from the fruit guys. It’s like Weird Al wrestling with Coldplay. In their underwear, of course. (*shudder*)

“The world embraced my slate blue underpants.” I love it.