Ear status: Still frakking clogged.
No, I am not kidding. The doctor gave me amoxicillin, the weakest of the antibiotics, so I hear (HA), and so far I have experienced zero relief. She said it might take up to 3 weeks. Once in a while if I perform the Valsalva Maneuver (which I did not know had a crazy name! until last week), I can get a nice crackle and pop on the right side, and hear a little better out of that one for 30 minutes. But it doesn't last and isn't worth the possibility of blowing brains out my eyes when I do it, so I don't, very often.
Aren't I lovely? I'm really over this.
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We have exciting news in our family -- BIL and SIL are having a baby! They just announced it officially last night, but we have secretly known for a few weeks and been saying some prayers since they miscarried a few years back. I actually didn't think they would try again, but they did, and she's now at 12 weeks. I'm going to be an AUNT! I thought maybe I never would, officially, although I do have some sweet little cousins-once-removed who have called me Auntie Lee-Lee in the past.
We hung up the phone last night with them, and DH said, "She sounded nervous." OH, do I ever remember that feeling, when you're first starting to tell people! It's SUCH a secret, and if it's your first baby, you've never told anyone a secret like this before. And it's personal besides, letting everyone including your in-laws know what you've been DOING! Shock! So it's uncomfortable in so many ways. I don't blame her for feeling nervous.
Besides all that, SIL never really talks to us on the phone - the brothers talk, but not us girls so much. Maybe I'll have to remedy that and become more attentive to her as she begins to experience motherhood. I've wanted to be close to this SIL -- she doesn't have a sister of her own, only brothers -- but I'm so NOT a phone person anymore, and we don't live in the same city, and she's not really (from what I can tell) an email person -- so that all makes it hard.
We do share quite a bit in common. Both like to read, and cook, both go to sleep early (her, intentionally, me, by accident most nights), both try to workout regularly (she has more success than I do), both quiet, for the most part. I like her very much and I know I'm lucky in that.
But even last night, I felt like my brain clammed up and I didn't quite know what to say. I kept saying, "That is so great, we are so happy for you...." and I truly meant those things, but I couldn't think what else you're supposed to offer at this stage. Is that weird? I didn't want to say the WRONG thing, and of course I asked her how she'd been feeling and her due date, but... isn't that it, at this point? Oh, right, and "are you going to find out if it's a boy or a girl?" I think they volunteered that info (they are). I don't know. I hope I haven't forgotten everything about being pregnant, and that I can think of all the right things to say if she asks me for any advice (which I hope she does). I feel like I HAVE forgotten. (Thank God, right?) I'm going to email her right now and hopefully sound sincere in offering whatever I can do.
An Aunt! And DH an UNCLE!!
3 comments:
i have two stories that are too long for comments that i feel compelled to share anyway. sorry!
a) when my good friend called me to say she had had a surprise baby (as in, her water broke one day when SHE HAD NO IDEA SHE WAS PREGNANT) i kept thinking it was some kind of weird trick she was trying to play on me - i WORKED with her, and had seen her every day for the previous 7 months, obviously she didn't just GIVE BIRTH - so i was SO WEIRD on that call. once i did finally start to believe her, *i* was still so much in shock at that point that it took me like 10 mins to remember to say "congratulations" (and even then i was like "uh.. right? is this... good?"). i still feel bad about not being all woo-girl excited on that call with her.
b) when my sister was about 12, my bf and i convinced her that skin divers learned to store pockets of air in their ear canals to use as backup air while they were underwater for so long. to "prove" this, we had her pinch her nose closed then breathe out hard (this valsalva maneuver, yes?) which obviously - and painfully - popped both her ears. she still has not forgiven either of us. (the exbf and i still crack up every time it comes up.)
Exciting. Congratulations to them and to aunt and uncle. ;) I'm sure you said all the right things, and hopefully she will want to confide in you along the way. You'll be a fabulous aunt!
My good friend and across-the-street neighbor has been trying to have a baby for years and she's finally pregnant. But I find there is little to say about it, other than just to be excited and always ask her how she's feeling. Any further questions about all her fertility treatments that didn't work seems as if they require a glass of wine and a long evening together to discuss, and questions about the future seem a little negative or at least too early. Well, I just thought of some things I might ask her at the next extended chat. Thanks for the thinking space!
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