Healing with women

For a stay-at-home housewife/mother, solitude can become a problem.  Of course we are surrounded (constantly, even in the bathroom) by the love and laughter of our children, but actual face-to-face grown up contact is a rarity.  At least it is for me.  My husband works two jobs back to back, and we only have one car.  There is very little adult face time in my everyday life.  The sense of cabin fever, and loneliness can sometimes become a very heavy feeling.

Add in a pile of family crises, and it becomes overwhelming.  To say that things have been chaotic for us of late would be a gross understatement.  If there is bad karma to be received, we are receiving it.  People have been sick.  People have died.  People have disappeared.  People have undergone major surgeries, or have major surgeries pending.  This has been a very, very strange couple of months.

Thankfully, and completely out of character, my husband and I have maintained.  The stress has not (yet) caused me to experience a toddler-grade meltdown, and he and I have managed not to take it out on each other.  In fact, he has been incredible.  And I believe that the composure between the two of us has helped make things seem a little easier.
What?  Behaving like reasonable, mature people who respect and love each other, makes stresses easier to handle?  Who knew?

So we're slow learners.  Being grown up is hard.

As wonderful and supportive as he has been, it still doesn't take the place of the support of a friend, immediately outside of your circle.  A person who loves, but is not "required" to love you.  A person who is there for you strictly of his or her own choosing,  and not because there is a marital, or a familial obligation to do so.  There is great strength in knowing that someone chooses to support you in a crisis, simply because they love you, and nothing more.

As a woman, there is sometimes nothing that can equal the support and laughter of other women.  A circle of ladies, sharing of themselves, and helping a person to feel supported, surrounded, and loved.  A coven of women, sharing their laughter and their sorrows, without judgement, and in kind, accepting yours.

My family received some strange and terribly sad news this week, and consequently there has been a chalky fog in my house, as we decide how to process this news.  The feeling of being swamped in isolation became nearly overwhelming as a result.  I wanted to hide, to sulk, to mope.

But, rather than canceling plans that were set into motion a month ago, I kept them.  And I filled my house with lovely women, old friends and new, and they brought with them their healing laughter, and unspoken support.  We shared wine and food, swear words and talk of aging bodies, husband and boyfriend stories, our woes and triumphs of parenting and marriage, and they refreshed me.  I am grateful.

I find it fascinating, the energy between women.

There is such relief and comfort in hearing another woman talk about a struggle or a burden that you're facing yourself.  There is power in knowing that we share the same struggles.  With our children.  Our husbands.  Our bodies.  It's soothing to know that we are not alone, even when we are certain that's the case.

It is entirely too easy for me to make a habit of staying isolated.  Socializing begins to take on a frightening form, and so I allow myself to withdraw from it, which creates a sort of vicious cycle, leaving me lonely, and socially hungry.  I am grateful to this recent circle of women, who came to pull me from the fog with their laughter.  I am grateful to myself for accepting their healing presence.  I am eager for the next gathering of women, and food, and wine.

I will embrace it as medicine.

The woman-strength thing.  Not the wine thing.
Although the wine was nice, too.

Feminine gore, and gratuitous use of the word "vagina."

Something's on my mind, and I want to talk about it.  It's girl-stuff related, and I don't know how in-depth and gory I will want to get, so just be forewarned that I will probably write about vagina things, and all that entails.  So you should read at your own risk.  And if you're my dad, or an easily grossed-out cousin or something, you should skip it.  Because I have a vagina.  And I'm about to talk about it.
Vagina.  


When we're young girls, approaching adolescence, getting our periods sounds like the coolest thing in the universe.  All those mysterious products reserved only for women.  And only for women of a certain age.  Pads and tampons and special washes and all sorts of fantastic and mystical things...it's like joining an awesome club, and getting a bag full of kickass party favors.  We can't wait.
And then it happens, and it's still pretty cool, I suppose.  For a while.  And then we start realizing that this monthly bleeding shit comes with cramping and depression and stained clothes and ruined swimming trips...and we start realizing that we're going to do this every month for the next forty years...and the "new" starts to wear off.  And then we're pretty pissed.
For me, it was days on end, lying in bed, doubled over in pain, and eating ibuprofen straight from the bottle like Smartees.  For me it was a thousand pairs of adorable underpants, tossed in the garbage (ok...eventually tossed in the garbage).  For me it was month after month of emotional outbursts, and irrational depression, and hoping against hope that it would all just go away.  "Menopause is going to be THA BEST EVAR."

And then, resignation.  We finally accept that this is reality, this is nature, this is womanhood.
And something else begins to take place.  We begin to finally see our places within the life cycle, and all of this somehow becomes ok.  We are able to accept the bleeding, accept the pain, accept the emotional imbalance, and know that this happens because it must.  Because nature needs this of us.  Nature asks this of us.  And so we do it.  Some of us even become thankful for it.

Of course, that's just my take on the situation.  That's how I felt as I navigated menstruation, and I assume that, at least on some level, it is similar for most women.

I became familiar with the idea of my cycle.  I became familiar with the idea that I would experience this grand and powerful thing monthly, and that eventually I would graduate into another mysterious club, for those women who have "survived" menses, and had moved up to the next level of womanly maturity.  I became familiar with the idea that menopause was my next step, and that I would go there when my body, and nature, were ready for me to do so.  I would receive my period-diploma in the form of hot-flashes, mood swings, and finally the secession of my menstrual cycle.  
For the last year, give or take, I have found myself deep within the appreciative stages of my cycles.  I celebrated what it meant to house a uterus.  I celebrated the children I had created inside of me.  I appreciated my body for the marvelous machine it is, blood, cramps, and all.  I began treating myself with love and tenderness during my moontime, taking care to give my body what it needed.  I sewed beautiful cloths for myself, and stopped using toxic bleached cotton to collect my menstruation.  I felt earthy, crunchy, and damn satisfied with myself.

My uterus.  She is a chicken.  

And then things got...weird.
Things got painful.
Things got lumpy.
Things got...too bloody. 
Becoming "in-tune" with my body gave me knowledge enough to know that something wasn't right in there.  I took my painful, bloody and lumpy self to the gynecologist (who I had not seen since she delivered my now seven-year-old daughter.  Oops.)

She pressed my belly.   She poked my uterus.  She sent me for ultrasounds.  She sent me for blood tests.  She patted my hand and told me not to worry, that she would find out what was troubling me.  I resisted the urge to cry in her arms, and went home to worry instead.

She found that I am free of cancer.  Which is an immediate relief.  She found that what ails me is not necessarily dangerous, nor will it become immediately dangerous.
This is good news.

What is not good news is that the "cure" for this series of shitty events, for these lumpy bits of fuck that have invaded my body, is not really a "cure" at all.

It's a hysterectomy.

It's the removal of this beautiful organ, whose value I have only begun to appreciate.  The removal of this beautiful organ, that gave life to my children.  The removal of the organ that has reminded me monthly for two decades that I am woman, I am powerful.

The removal of my femininity.

This is not true.  Femininity does not come from a uterus.  I know this.  Lovely women in my life are without their uteruses...er...uteri?  Women who have had surgeries to remove them.  Women who were born male, and identify mentally as female.  Young women and old women.  Lovely, beautiful women, who live their lives without that part of themselves.  They are feminine.  Without their wombs.

But I am struggling.

The gore, and the specifics:

I could have an ablation, which is essentially the removal of the lining of the uterus.  This is a temporary fix, however, and I would likely experience symptoms again within a few months, and have to have the hysterectomy anyhow.

I will be able to keep both ovaries, which should prevent menopause, and any hormonal horror-shows that tend to occur with a "complete" hysterectomy.

I will also be able to keep my cervix, which as I understand it, is something for which I (and anyone having sex with me) should be grateful.

The surgery will be performed with a DaVinci robot something-or-other, which enables the Dr. to make just a few small incisions, and operate remotely.  Like fucking Nintendo.
Which is cool, I guess.  It means they don't have to slice me open like a science-class frog, and yank my organs out with their bare hands.  I like that.  And I like Nintendo.  I'm good at Nintendo.  But no matter how many times I have rescued the princess, there is always that one time where I fuck up, somehow, and die.  There is always that one time where my brain says "jump" and my finger on the B-button says "lol, no," and I kill defenseless little Mario just inches away from victory.  The idea of my organ extraction resting on the video game skills of my surgeon is slightly horrifying.

And, because the incisions for this procedure are so tiny, my over-sized, tumorous uterus won't fit thru them.  The method of extraction then becomes horrifying.  The only way to get the severed uterus, and her tumorous friends out of me, is to grab it with what is essentially a tiny meat grinder, chop it up into bite-size bits, and pull it thru one of the incisions.
To treat such an incredible organ in this manner, is one of the main reasons I am hesitant to do this.  My babies came from there.  Because of this part of me, I have two sweet children, who lived inside of me, thrived inside of me, safe and surrounded by the comfort and warmth of my precious uterus.  And now, because it's being an asshole, I am going to sever it from my body, grind it into sausage links, and yank it out of me to be tossed into the medical waste bin with some guy's cancerous testicle, and some vain woman's liposuction refuse?  Now who's the asshole?

Babies are no longer a possibility for me.  After our daughter was born, I had the baby factory medically disabled, and we went about our merry way as a family of four.  So I realize that there was never the possibility of making a new one.  But my uterus was there, intact, and still reminding me monthly that it was there, keeping me female, and waiting patiently for its retirement.  I settled on that.  Me and my uterus were comfortable with that.

And now it has to go.  My expectations of twenty more years of monthly girl-dom have been shaken.
And my irrational fears have begun to take hold.

What if the Dr. misses, and stabs my intestines with her robot machine?
What if there's an earthquake while those things are inside me, and I'm razored to death from inside?
What if not having a uterus somehow magnifies my depression tenfold, and I end up a raving, bawling lunatic?
What if I am never able to enjoy orgasms again?
What if my vagina emerges from this surgery as a useless, dry cavern, and every sexual partner from now until forever decides, "uh, no thanks"?
What if I experience a severe escalation in migraines because of this?
What if I gain another fifty pounds, and become dependent on one of those Wal-Mart obesity scooters to get around my house?
What if my precious husband, whom I adore beyond measure, suddenly decides I am damaged, and unattractive without all my important parts, packs his bags, and abandons me without so much as a backward glance.

No, thanks.  I'd rather...anything else.  

Goddammit. 

The fear and the grief are normal.  I know, because I have searched every weird corner of the internet, looking for women who have felt likewise.  They all seem to have grieved, in one way or another.  And I am an asshole.  I have children.  I have a choice, and I don't have to decide immediately because cancer is eating my body.  I have time.  I have the ability to wait, if need be.  Until my body decides to forcibly expel this organ itself, or until I'm hospitalized for anemia, I can keep my decision on hold.  Some women are not so fortunate.  Some women are stranded, childless and cancerous, saddled to a decision that nature makes for them...hysterectomy or death.  I am fortunate.  Well, relatively speaking.

But there is fear, and there is grief.  If it makes me an asshole, then I'm an asshole.  I am afraid.  I am sad.

I like my uterus.  I like being a woman.  I even like having a period.  Ok, so if you ask me that while I am in the throes of brutal cramping and bloody vaginal gore, I will probably give you a different response.  But for now, in the twilight of my time with my uterus, I like having a period.  Losing it makes me sad.  Losing it in such a brutal, disrespectful manner makes me sad.

And now, this, because it made me lol...

My uterus.  She is a comedian.  

I'm grumpy.

Trees: Ohai guys! Listen, we are going to give you lovely fruits, flowers, and beautiful foliage! You can eat from us, you can seek shade under us, and you can enjoy all the sweet creatures who will make homes in our branches. We're also going to give you life-sustaining oxygen, because, let's be honest, we both know you can't live without it. We don't even want anything in return! How'bout it?

Us: LOL no thx we're just going to cut you down and make paper out of you, to smear on our asses after we shit. 

Conclusion. Trees are better people than people. 

Garumph.

Why Am I Awake at Shit-Thirty in the Morning?

It's almost 4 in the morning.  This will probably be jumbled, and sucky.
I am too tired to care.

**********


In the light of day, I was irritated.  I was angry, and wanted answers.
In the deep dark of night, however, I'm furious.  And frightened.  And I want answers.  And revenge. In the form of a bloody person limping toward a police car, with a defeated look on his face...

Last night, in the dead of our sleep, my family was ripped awake by someone slamming themselves into our front door.  Someone who must have thought it would be funny to break into our house.  Or someone who must have thought it was funny to try and scare an entire houseful of people.  Or someone who thought...whatever the fuck they thought.
My daughter was terrified.  I held her trembling body against me, as we sat in the dark, waiting for the police, and watching for the return of the creeps who invaded us.  We reassured her, as she voiced her fear of both the potential invasion, and the guns her father, brother and I were toting.  We reassured her that the police were on their way.  We reassured her that the assholes were long gone, and that we were safe.
And then a shower or rocks pelted our windows, and three nondescript people ran across our yard, disappearing into the dark.
Once the police arrived, questioned us, and set out to hunt for the door-busting, rock-tossing, running away-ing dickbags, my husband started out the door to check on our car.  He came immediately back inside, telling me to call the police again, because the people were hiding in the bushes across the street from our house, shouting obscenities at him.
What followed was three hours of hiding in the darkness, police surrounding our house, searchlights scalding the landscape, and trying to convince our daughter that it was safe to sleep again.

We think they caught one of them.  We listened to our police scanner as they searched the area, as they chased the group of them on foot, and apprehended one of them.  That person was later taken home by the police, so we are assuming it was a minor.
I don't care if he is a minor.  I sincerely want to pull his balls off, by way of his throat.

This is the second time this has happened.  I don't want to believe that it's the same group of people, and I don't want to believe that we're being singled out.  But I do.

And now, at ass-thirty in the morning, I'm awake, I'm afraid, and I'm furious.  The sleep I did get was peppered with nightmares, about flocks of people gathering in front of our house to do harm, and me trying to protect my family inside, as my gun malfunctioned.  As 911 malfunctioned.  As my goddamn mini-blinds malfunctioned.

Every noise I hear suddenly becomes a violent prowler.  The cat meandering lazily thru the kitchen becomes a murderous burglar, high on PCP, and hoping to gnaw the faces off of my whole family.

Ugh.

Our kids opted to sleep together last night.  Or tonight.  Or whatever the fuck "now" is.
They set up the big tent in our son's room, and hunkered down together in the relative safety and silence of our concrete basement.

My husband, who lived thru this ridiculous shit all the time as a kid growing up in a crappy neighborhood with crappy caretakers, finally dozed off about an hour ago.  About the time I started waking up from these asshole nightmares.

We are hoping to take a trip to the city this weekend, to visit a stray pitbull in need of a home,  in hopes of bringing home a dog, so he can patrol the house while we sleep.  Preferably while wearing a cape, and carrying a baseball bat.  Shut up.  He's my dog, and if I say he can carry a baseball bat, then by golly he can, and will carry a baseball bat.  Mother effers.

The whole thing has made me irrational.  The mother bear in me wants to protect her cubs.  Wants to find the scrotum sacs who did this, peel them like onions, and hang their skin from my fucking tree, to ward off other potential predators.
Part of me wants to pack up and move away.  To a secluded beach.  To Amish country.  To a crowded apartment complex.  To Jamaica.
Part of me wants to ignore it, and tell myself that it won't happen anymore, that we'll get answers from the police soon, and that our happy little lives will return to business as usual.

I want our daughter to feel safe inside her house again.
I want our son to be able to feel as if he can just be a kid again, rather than having to help us patrol our house like we're in some kind of goddamn apocalyptic movie.
I want my hard-working husband to rest peacefully at night, and not fear repeats of his wretched childhood invading his grown-up world.

And I want to sleep.  Without being awakened with fear and nightmares and paranoia.  Without feeling like a bad parent for sleeping, when there are lunatics on the loose, who hope to wreak havoc inside our house.


The way I understand it, once the official report is filed, and all the pencil pushing is finished, we will receive more information from the police, we will find out if we can press charges, and we will, I hope, have some answers.
In the meantime, I'm unsettled.  And I resent these motherfuckers for making me feel that way.  I resent them for the vengeful and upsetting thoughts I've thought in their favor.  I resent their parents for giving birth to ugly, inconsiderate dickheads.
Fuck those fucking fuckers.
Bah.  I'm tired.  :p

When I rule the world...

I've decided that I'm going to rule the world.  Don't panic.  I don't mean like an evil genius or a maniacal dictator or something.  Nothing sinister.
More like a party planner, who has realized the party is starting to fail, and decides to bust out a conga line to save the day.
I'll be a really just world leader.  I promise.  Here's how...


First, I'm doing away with "marriage."
Don't get excited.  You can still have your husbands and your wives, and all the happy little legal benefits that come with such a union.  And you can still have your religious ceremonies and whatnot, to appease whatever god you worship.  But the only "legal" paperwork involved will be the paperwork required to apply for those marital benefits.
You can have one spouse, or three or six.  I don't care.  You can have a wife and a husband at the same time.  I don't care.  It's not my business what kind of arrangement you enter into with another consenting adult.  Build a commune of swingers.  Spread the love.  Or don't.  It's your relationship, it's your life, and it's none of my business.
And before anyone goes off on the ignorant "beastiality, pedophile" rant  (you know the rant I mean.  The one that sounds like "so, if someone wants to marry their dog, should that be legal?  Or if someone wants to marry a 4 year old, should that be ok, too?"
To answer that moronic, and logically ridiculous question, no.  Those things should not be legal.  Anyone who engages in sexual activity with anything or anyone that can not give their informed consent is a dickbag, and shouldn't be allowed to have sex anyway.   And I realize a vibrator can't give its informed consent, however a vibrator does not have a brain, a pulse, or emotions.  Use your brain, and stop asking me stupid questions.  Moving on...


Next, I'm making clothing completely optional.  Everywhere.  Yeah, you can even shop for groceries naked.  And before anyone gets hysterical and says "that's unhygienic,"  what sorts of gross shit are you doing inside your clothing, that would make it any more unhygienic than a cough or a sneeze inside a store?  Common courtesy, of course, is going to apply.  You're not going to be permitted to just scratch your naked ass, and then grab things off the shelves.  But that's not really a naked rule, that's just common humanity.  We don't dig in our noses, and then reach out to select oranges.  Well, the majority of us don't do that.  There's always going to be some asshole who can't seem to figure out the rules of common courtesy and restraint.  There's really not a lot I can do about these inconsiderate pieces of work.  So just wash your fruit, ok?  Alleviate any nutsack-contamination fears by washing your apples before you consume.  Problem solved.
And if you choose to be nude, carry a towel.  Nothing fancy, just a towel big enough to spread under your bum when you sit.  That way, the non-nude among us can feel confident that they're not sitting in a chair that previously hosted someone's naked ass.


And now that everyone is naked, and buying lots of fruit, I'm going to make marijuana legal.  And none of those stupid stipulations like "well, it's legal, but only if you have cancer, and only with a doctor's recommendation, and only on Monday thru Tuesday between the hours of 4:00 and 4:30, and only on a full moon."
Everyone can smoke pot.  Your kids' school bus driver can smoke pot.  Your dentist can smoke pot.  And they don't even need a medical reason to do it.
Of course we have the no-brainer rules in place, just as we do with alcohol.  No smoking and driving, no smoking while doing brain surgery, no smoking while circumcising babies...
Now that you mention it, that's another brutal and barbaric tradition that needs to die.  Circumcising (aka genitally mutilating baby boys) needs to end.  But that's an entirely different rant, and kind of weird to include with the pot-smoking ordinance, so I will move on before I am so distracted that I can't remember what I was talking about...
We all have cannabinoid receptors in our bodies.  Parts of us that are specifically designed to receive THC.  Telling my body that providing it with what it's designed to accept makes about as much sense as telling me it's illegal for me to eat food.  Not to mention, marijuana is a plant.  Should we make peanuts illegal, too?  Peanuts fucking kill people.  I once babysat a kid with a severe peanut allergy, and it was much scarier than the time I babysat a pothead.  It was also less funny...
If we can justify alcohol (which poisons the body, leads to drunk-driving deaths, domestic violence, and general douche-baggery) and if we can justify cigarettes, (do I really need to list the awesome effects of smoking?) then we can certainly justify marijuana.  I realize this will put a huge dent in the paycheck Big Pharma is accustomed to receiving.  However, it has occurred to me that I don't give a shit if a group of heartless gazillionares go broke when they can no longer force people to rely on their poisonous concoctions to feel better.  No thanks, Vicodin.  I'll smoke a joint, instead.

And next, now that everyone is all full of dirty butt-fruit and pot smoke, I'm taking back control of my uterus.  And I'm giving every uterus on the planet the right to decide for themselves what happens to them.  Your birth control, your sexual activity, and yes, your abortions, are not my business.  They are no one's business but you, your doctor, and anyone you choose to involve in your uterine happenings.
Your religion forbids abortions?  Don't have one.
Your religion forbids birth control?  Don't use it.
But don't expect other people to conform to your beliefs.  What if someone invaded our country, and demanded that all the women begin wearing a burqa?  No bueno.  If their beliefs indicate that they cover their women, then let them have at it.   But if you don't want religious folks forcing their beliefs on you, then have the same courtesy for others.  If I don't pray with you before your meal, it has nothing to do with your relationship to your god.  And if I have an abortion, it has nothing to do with your relationship to your god.  You can tell me you don't like it, since you have the freedom of speech.  You can tell me that your god doesn't like it, since you have the freedom of religion.  And I can go have the abortion anyhow, because I have the right to both freedom *from* religion, *and* the right to what happens inside my uterus.
It's mine.  And I don't want your morals, your beliefs, and your god inside of it.
God isn't going to punish you for the things I do.  Move on.

You can attend church.  You can wear clothing.  You can abstain from marijuana and condoms and abortions.  You are allowed.
What you are not allowed to do is force your ideals upon the masses.  You are not allowed to use your morals and your beliefs and your religions to dictate the behavior of the rest of the world.  You are allowed to think that I am a heathen, and you are allowed to tell me so.  But making laws so that everyone is legally forced to conform to what you believe...how the hell does that even make sense?  Is god going to suddenly let me into heaven because I was legally forced to abstain from birth control?  Are you going to get some kind of heavenly medal because you kept me from legally taking a wife?
If I sit naked in my front yard, smoking pot and holding hands with my girlfriend, nothing changes for you.  If I marry said girlfriend in a backyard, full-moon, pagan ceremony, nothing changes for you.  If I have sex, using a condom that breaks, and then abort the baby, nothing changes for you.  You might not like it, and you don't have to.  But at the end of the day, your life is dramatically unaffected by this series of events, regardless of how much you disapprove.
And by all means, disapprove.  It is your right.

But the law needs to stay the fuck out of it.


And finally, Monday is chocolate cake day.

Cartoon Boobs

Dear Every Bra-Maker in the World, 


Fuck you.  
Let me explain.  


I don't enter into the "bra buying" business with hostility.  In fact, sometimes I am downright excited about it.  It's easy for a woman to be dazzled and reassured by the seemingly endless racks of frilly whatnots, lacy unmentionables, and delicate underthings.  With so many options, surely finding one for me will be a piece of cake.  It's like wandering into a candy store, for big girls.  With boobies.  


I typically start off by selecting several widths and cup sizes, to cover all the bases.  Everything from a C to a DDD, and in between.  Everything from a 38 to a 46, and in between.  If there is a bra on the rack that will fit me, I will find it.  And if I don't, it won't be for a lack of trying.  


Into the dressing room, and I disrobe.  Usually a glance or two at my naked ladies, and maybe a quick shake (because, let's be honest.  How great does that shit feel when you've been harnessed like an overweight mule all afternoon?)  And then, to the trying on.
My mood quickly begins to decline, and before I know it, I'm nearly seething with rage, thinking my body is deformed, and that no bra in the world is *supposed* to fit me, because I am a disgusting freak of nature, as far as breasts are concerned.
Well, fuck you, Every Bra-Maker in the World.  I am not the anomaly.  You are simply lacking in, well, everything you're supposed to provide.  


First of all, measurement is pretty universal, amirite?  Forty inches is forty inches, no matter how you slice it.  So why in the hell does one bra measuring 40 around the band fit perfectly, while another of the same measurement slices into me like a fucking fetish corset?  Get yourself some accurate measuring tapes.  Or fire your bra-band guy, because he's cross-eyed.  


Next, bra cups.  What.  The.  Fuck?  First of all, finding cups without six-inch-thick wires to encircle my tits is a goddamn impossibility.  I feel like my tits are getting ready to be shot out of a cannon or something.  There really is no need for that much wire.  My breasts might be a little wild, but they certainly don't need cages.  Secondly, who decided that my DDD boobs need padded cups?  What part of this makes sense?  Who looked at me and thought, "know what that girl needs?  Bigger knockers."  I don't.  Really.  Even on a bad day, I don't need bigger breasts.  It's really ok to make a bra for me that is just fabric.  And while we're on the subject, sometimes breasts sag.  It's not flattering, or something any woman likes to brag about, but they do.  Some of them a lot more than others.  And when they do, all that stiff fabric in our cups just goes unfilled.  A deflated breast inside of a padded, stiff, and let's be honest, humorless bra, just lays in there, looking deflated and weird.  Like we've flopped our saggy boobs up onto a table, in preparation for our fashion debut.  I do not want table tits.  In fact, I don't know of any woman who does.  


And let me drive this point home, as well...

No.  Just, no. 

The opposite of stiff cups, weirdly-filled cups, and birdcage cups is NOT torpedo cups.  It wasn't attractive in 1950, and it's certainly not attractive now.  I don't want to stick my boobs in a tube.  I don't want them stabbing up toward the sky like weirdly filled sausage skins.  I don't want dangerous breasts.  Madonna can pull it off.  I can not.  I just want a bra.  Not weapons of mass destruction.  


And furthermore, these contraptions do NOT need to cost upwards of $80.  There is just no sense in that, and no matter how many times you have the super-helpful sales girl assure me that it's a "good investment", I will not be swayed.  This is not a good investment.  It's underwear.  If I want to make a "good investment" I will talk to someone who can teach me about the stock market, or setting up some kind of savings plan.  I will not look to my underwear to secure my future.  Holy shit, this is annoying, and pretentious.  


Just make me a bra, for chrissake.  With a band that fits, and cups that are gentle and non-invasive enough to cradle my ladies in a way that keeps me from looking indecent and frightening.  Cups that will lift me gently, keep bouncing to a minimum, and show my breasts as actual size, versus novelty size.  A bra that does not feel like a form of punishment, but rather a delicate, girly piece of functional clothing.  
It's possible.  I swear.  I see women everywhere, even fat ones like me, looking lovely, and seemingly held gently and comfortably by their bras.  


I am not the only fat woman in the world.  I am not the only large-breasted woman in the world.  I am not the only woman in the world with breasts that tend to favor a southward view.  Make us a bra, dammit.  


And make it pretty, while you're at it.  I'm not 80 yet.  So I don't need underwear that says I am.  

Hey there, big fella...

Fuck you, Every Bra-Maker in the World, for ruining my afternoon, and making me feel as if I have the weirdest, most impossible breasts on the planet.  Fuck you for excluding me from Victoria's Secret and Frederick's of Hollywood.  Fuck you for taking my money repeatedly, and never, ever, EVER coming thru with your end of the bargain.  


And while we're at it, fuck you, Herminie Cadolle, for betraying your fellow womankind with your obnoxious and cruel contraption.  Traitor.  


This message is brought to you by my currently cartoon-size breasts, and probably bleeding ribcage.  Cacique, you are the devil.  


As you were.  

Simmer down, Uterus.

I've got a fever.  Not even "more cowbell" will cure it.

Our little family fits inside a nice, neat package.  The daddy goes off to work every morning.  The brother and sister go off to school together on the bus.  The mommy stays home and cleans the house, and waits for everyone to arrive home at the end of the day.  If you listen carefully, you can practically hear the "Leave it to Beaver" theme song playing in the background.

Ok, so realistically, the brother and sister are kind of grumpy in the morning, the daddy sleeps until 10:00 in the morning, because he works two jobs and is exhausted by the time he gets off work in the middle of the night, and the mommy doesn't cook and clean nearly as often as she ought to, and hardly ever gets out of her pajamas...

But we are still a little family who fits inside a nice, neat package.  "Balanced" is what Husband calls it.  Two boys, two girls, both parties equally represented.  We are whole.

So tell me why my uterus is all ablaze again, practically sobbing for another baby.
Whenever I see pictures of newborn babies, whenever I read pro-breastfeeding articles, I turn into Fat Bastard ... "GET IN MAH BELLY!"

It's irrational.  We're  broke.  We can't afford the two babies we have.  We can barely afford each other, honestly.  And not only is it irrational, it's next to impossible.  I'm turning 34 next week, and along with me, my uterus is turning 34 next week.  My eggs are turning 34 next week.  I would have to make a baby out of a 34 year old egg.

Oh.  And the fact that I've had a tubal ligation sort of puts a halt to all things reproductive...
I would say in that case it's a pretty fat chance that I'll end up pregnant again in the conventional way.  That whole "virgin Mary" thing was probably a once-in-a-lifetime deal.


I don't miss the indescribable exhaustion that comes both from pregnancy itself, the extreme toll giving birth takes on a woman's body, or the weeks and weeks of sleepless nights that a newborn brings along with it.  I don't miss the crippling postpartum depression that came along with both of my babies.  I don't miss the strange swelling sadness that crept over me every time one of them latched onto my breast, leaving me feeling like a freak of nature and a "bad" mommy.
I don't miss intrusive strangers touching my belly, or asking about my pregnancy progress.
I don't miss rock-hard breasts, the size of cantaloupes.
I don't miss leaky rock-hard breasts the size of cantaloupes.
I don't miss poop-Picassos smeared on the nursery wall, or calling Poison Control because one of my kids drank poison ivy medication...

But I do miss that round, globe-belly.  Laying in bed with my husband, quietly contemplating the person inside, as we both make lazy circles around my protruding belly button.  I miss reciting every name in the "baby name" book, trying to agree on the least awful-sounding name.
I miss feeling intensely satisfied with the indescribably amazing work happening within my body.
The feeling of being warmed from the inside, by the little person growing in my abdomen.

The smell of their little heads.  Nibbling their little toes.  Squeezing their little cheeks...

Motherhood and insanity are nearly interchangeable when you really think about it.

There is something out of this world about holding your baby to your breast, and feeling a connection so deep that it drills itself into your core.  My babies made the sweetest sounds when they nursed.  Sounds that they never made on any other occasion.  I shared that with them.  It is ours.

I am relatively rational when you get right down to it.  That's not to say that I always make rational choices in the end, but in my brain, I'm rational. 

A baby is not rational.

We are usually broke.  My uterus is damaged.  Between the financial and the medical, things are weird for us right now.  A baby is not rational.

But...

When I was 18, a baby was irrational.  We struggled financially, emotionally, and every way in between.  We were stupid and scared and unprepared.

When I was 26, a baby was irrational.  We struggled financially, I struggled emotionally, and every way in between.  We were surprised and scared.

Another eight years has come around again.  We still struggle financially.  I still struggle emotionally.  We still scrape and claw and fight to stay afloat, and keep our little family going...
But I don't feel scared, or unprepared...


It won't happen.  In the end, I know it won't happen.  I will deal with this "baby fever" as rationally as I know how, and I will move on.  In the end, I will feel warm and content with my "balanced" family, as we all grow up together.   I will satiate my uterus with memories, photographs, and baby books, and appreciate what I already have.  Which is a lot.  Which is incredible.  Which is more than many people are afforded.  I am grateful.

Nature is just nudging me in a big way at the moment.