Heart attack of the day

As we have all learned from watching Cops, trying to escape the police via high-speed car chase never, ever succeeds. So it is some small comfort to know that the jackhole who, in attempting to avoid being pulled over in his fancy automobile*, DROVE UP ONTO THE SIDEWALK FOUR FEET AWAY FROM MY CHILD**, will surely be rotting in jail tonight.

*Probably stolen. Or full of drugs. Either one.

**That is the last time I ever let her run ahead of me.*** My throat still hurts from screaming.

***At least the squad car in pursuit stopped long enough to let me run up and grab her before itself screeching off down the sidewalk, sirens blaring.

Grr.

I think I've mentioned before that I live in a fairly diverse area of Big City. There's a wide mix of socioeconomic and racial groups, and many of the families we encounter and hang out with are mixed-race, in every possible permutation. There are also lots of gay and lesbian parents, lots of families built through adoption--lots of different-looking families, in other words. Parents here tend to be of a progressive stripe--people who are really sincere about social justice, who try really hard to teach their kids about equality and getting along and all that jazz.

All of that to say that I don't encounter blatant racism all that often around here. Once some middle-school-age boys made ching-chong noises at me while I was walking down the street (and boy was I PISSED) but that's rare enough that it really sticks out in my memory. So my "responding to racism" muscles are weak, I guess.

Today we were at a birthday party for a little friend of Bat Girl's. It was a small gathering--I knew all the kids at least by sight from the playground, and most of the parents by name. I was the only non-white person there. It happens sometimes.

Someone had an older kid who had recently broken his foot, and we were talking about it, so the only parent there whom I did not know started talking about how he broke his foot once. He is a professional dancer, and he broke his foot while on tour in Seoul, South Korea. The doctors there wanted to put a pin in his foot, but he wanted to wait until he got back to Big City, so he endured an 18-hour trip home in total agony so that he could be seen and operated on by the orthopedic surgeon to the Big City Ballet.

Sounds reasonable, right? Except this is how he told the story: "So the doctors at the hospital in Seoul were like, [squints eyes and talks in singsongy ching-chong voice] 'We fix! We put pin in foot!' [normal voice] And I was like [speaks loudly and slowly in that "You don't speak English so you must be mentally challenged" voice] 'No way! I am going to the U-NI-TED STATES OF A-ME-RI-CA!'"

I was so stunned that I just kind of smiled and nodded. No one else reacted to it either, of course. And I didn't want to make waves at a social gathering. So I let it go by, even though I was seething inside.

And now I am furious with myself. I wish that I had said something. Ideally something that specifically called him out, like, "Dude, is the ching-chong voice really necessary?" But even something milder like, "Actually, the doctors in Seoul are quite excellent. My uncle is one of them." (Again, I think that it's perfectly reasonable for a professional dancer to want to have a foot injury treated by an American physician who specializes in treating dancer's injuries, instead of by doctors he doesn't know in another country. It's the WAY he told the story that was so offensive.)

If it were just me, I could forget about it. But Bat Girl was within earshot. Chances are, she didn't hear it and wasn't paying attention if she did. But it was an opportunity for me to model a response to racism for her, and to let her (and the other kids) know that that kind of behavior is unacceptable, right when she's at the age where she's absorbing everything I do. And I missed it. I don't want to bring it up now, because if she didn't hear or notice, I don't want to make a big deal about it. But I worry that she did hear and will take away the wrong lesson (that it's okay for someone to act like that, that it's okay not to say something).

On the other hand, maybe it was a good reminder that I've gotten too soft. I wasn't prepared for that moment because I've started assuming that something like that would never happen. But now I'll be prepared. And next time, I won't let it go by.

So tired...

Bat Girl is going through a particularly exploratory phase right now. This weekend, said impulse resulted in multiple "hey, that big white bowl full of water in the bathroom looks like a great place to splash and play!" events in a single day (yes, we should probably get a toilet lock, and no, I don't know why we don't have one). She is also going through a particularly rambunctious phase involving the jettisoning of all food from high chair to floor and refusal to eat anything that was previously acceptable. (I know I'm not supposed to make a big deal over the pickiness, and I wouldn't care so much if she didn't FLING the rejected food to the far reaches of the apartment. I keep finding dessicated peas in odd corners.) I have just instituted a rule of "food that goes on the floor gets taken away," but do you think that will just reinforce the message that throwing is the proper way to get rid of unwanted food?

Bedtime also a big struggle lately--she lies down and is almost asleep and then freaks out for no apparent reason, screaming and flailing (I have a fat lip this morning from being head-butted in the mouth last night--drew blood) and begging to be tucked in but then shrieking like the sheet is made of molten lava, that kind of thing. I think I spoke sharply to her more times this weekend than in her entire life previous. Also, she pooped in the tub. And then put her foot in it.

On the other hand, when things weren't stressful and covered in poop water, we also had a really nice weekend. Took her to the park Saturday to push her little doll stroller around, and she heard the elevated train rattling by in the distance. "Was'at?" she asked. "That's the train," I told her. "See choo-choo train! See choo-choo train!" she said excitedly. At first I told her no, we can't see the train from here, it's too far away. Then I thought, what the hell, we've got an hour or two to kill, why not? So I popped her in the stroller and we walked a ways until we could see the tracks, and then waited for a train to pass by. BG got very excited and yelled "More choo-choo train!" so we waited until another went by. Then I decided we had to go, because there was a creepy homeless woman giving us the eye and also possibly a drug-related transaction happening between two teenagers a few yards away. But it was worth it--BG still hasn't stopped talking about the choo-choo train. (Though yesterday evening she started saying solemnly, "Choo-choo train. Too noisy. Getchoo" which is her way of saying "I'm gonna get you!", which made me wonder if she had decided the train was going to come after her? She says the same thing about the vacuum cleaner.)

She was super snuggly (not normally a big hugger and kisser, but she was yesterday) and very giggly--my husband said at one point, "I'd like to think I was that happy as a child, before I got so cynical." And who needs fancy toys? My husband popped her in an empty diaper box (we buy by the case) and dragged her around in it like a sled--she was happy for over an hour, and then got out and dragged her teddy bears and other toys.

We did have the Olympics on for a lot of the weekend. Evidently her experience in hotel pools in Seattle made an impression, because every time a swimming/water polo/diving event was on, she ran over shouting, "Swimmin!" Clearly we have to find a pool to take this kid to.

Of course, the real reason I'm so tired is that I stayed up late every night this weekend watching Olympics, even though we have DVR. Last night was so worth it, though. My husband went to bed early and I made him get up and watch the men's relay on DVR this morning--and I still jumped up and down and squealed and clapped my hands, and watched every minute of every replay. I could barely drag myself out of bed this morning, but I know I'll stay up again and again and again.

Welcome to crazytown

Yesterday I saw a new therapist. I have been in therapy before, but it has been six or seven years since the last time I saw a shrink--before I got married, anyway. The purported reason for my seeing this new therapist was my complete lack of libido and its attendant negative effects on my marriage.

I know I've been promising to blog about the whole sex thing in detail but I've just never gotten around to it, so you'll have to make do with a quick summary: No sex allowed during entire pregnancy, and I was frankly too cranky about it to "take care" of my husband in other ways instead. After I was cleared for sex post-delivery, we tried a few times, but each time was very painful for me. My libido has also been non-existent. It has been close to a year since the last time we tried and while I miss sex, it is only in a theoretical kind of way. I am too tired, too sapped physically and mentally and emotionally, to feel anything approaching desire, and I also just don't feel very sexy or sexual these days. I recognize that this is not good for my relationship with my husband (who is increasingly frustrated with this state of affairs), and I even mentioned it to my OB at my most recent checkup--even asked for a hormone workup to make sure there was nothing physically wrong. She basically said, "You work full-time and you have a kid. Of course you don't want to have sex. If you DID want to have a lot of sex, that would be unusual."

At any rate, I finally got my shit together and managed to find a therapist who not only specializes in post-partum issues, she also specializes in infertility issues AND she takes my insurance. Our first session was yesterday.

I feel pretty confident that, while there are probably biological and post-partum components to my current sexless state, a lot of it stems from relationship issues (sorry, can't go into detail), and the relationship issues and lack of sex feed into each other in a vicious circle. So I arrived prepared to delve into that. I also recognize, intellectually at least, that the whole IF/tough pregnancy/breastfeeding clusterfuck probably left me with some lingering issues about my body and its capabilities. But, while I was certainly prepared to talk about those things, I generally feel on a day-to-day basis that I've bounced back pretty well from all that crap, and in fact I feel pretty proud that I've been able to let go of the horrible bitterness I once felt.

However, when I was giving the therapist a short summary of my backstory, by way of explaining how our sex life had gone south in the first place--two years infertility (which is so short in the grand scheme of things!), tough pregnancy, one trimester of bleeding, two trimesters of contractions, four months of bedrest, c-section, breastfeeding disaster--she kept making these shocked and sympathetic and wow-how-horrible noises. A therapist who specializes in seeing women with fucked-up reproductive histories was shocked and appalled by what I had been through. And the floodgates creaked open, and I started to cry, and I couldn't stop sobbing.

So I guess I'm not as healed as I thought I was. I'm going to have my work cut out for me.

Bad mommy

We were having a pretty good weekend, at first. Went to music class, where Bat Girl was her usual spunky, spirited self, and where another mom complimented me on how well-dressed BG is. Went to a first birthday party, where other parents remarked on BG's "cool personality" and on what an impressive walker she is and how energetic and inquisitive she is. So I was feeling like a pretty awesome mom, never mind the fact that none of these things is due to any excellence in parenting on my part. (Well, I guess I can take partial credit for how nicely I pair her hand-me-downs with Old Navy jeans.) That was Saturday.

Then on Sunday, I dropped Bat Girl on her head.

Okay, technically I merely dropped her, and her forehead HAPPENED to strike the top of the metal gate keeping her out of the kitchen, and then she HAPPENED to continue falling until she landed facedown on the floor with a sickening thud. And then there was that moment of silence before she started screaming when I thought, "Dear god, I killed my baby." And then the screaming, and the screaming, and the huge black and blue lump that immediately appeared on her forehead, and the attempted icing of said black and blue lump (do you know how hard it is to ice a toddler's forehead? we were only able to do it with the serious application of Blue's Clues*, and even then she kept trying to pull away and shove the icepack off because DAMMIT WOMAN I CAN'T SEE THE CLUES WITH THAT THING IN MY FACE!). And the googling of "baby concussion symptoms," and the flashbacks where I keep seeing her slip out of my arms, do a spiraling half-twist in the air, and plummet to the parquet.

But we're all fine now, really. The ice seems to have worked and the mark is hardly noticeable today. BG hasn't been vomiting or having seizures or walking funny or anything, and she was back to her regular cheerful (interspersed with screaming due to THE BOOK WON'T COME OFF THE SHELF FAST ENOUGH or THE SKWISH WON'T FIT INTO THIS BOX WHERE IT IS CLEARLY NOT DESIGNED TO FIT BUT I MUST MAKE IT FIT, because come on, she's a toddler) self pretty quickly. And I'm sure a head of white hair will look very stylish with my "World's Worst Mother" badge, right?

*Yes, she watches TV. Blue, and also the baby crack known as Yo Gabba Gabba. In fact, she will walk up to me, hand me the remote, and demand "Bwoo!" I'm telling ya, Mother of the Year over here.

Two?

I have said repeatedly in the past year that I do not want any more kids. I used to think I wanted two, maybe three (as did my husband), but the arrival of Bat Girl was such a hurricane in our world--not to mention the tsunami of bed rest and its related physical, mental, and emotional destruction--that we could not imagine doing it again. At least not any time soon.

I don't know if it's hormones, or springtime, or what, but the last couple of weeks I've felt a weird pull in the other direction. Don't get me wrong--I am not even considering THINKING about getting pregnant again. I resolved from the beginning that I'd wait until Bat Girl was close to 2 before going down that road again.

But consider, if you will:

Exhibit A: Two weekends ago, I happened to catch an episode of Jon and Kate Plus 8. Now I know, the proper response to this show of any sane person--especially an infertile--is to run screaming in the other direction. These people are, as they themselves admit, a "fertility nightmare," an example of what you do NOT want to happen when you head to your friendly neighborhood fertility clinic. But instead of horror, I was filled with...longing? What? What is WRONG with me? It was seeing all those cute part-Korean toddlers running around with their little lisps and squishy bodies. Bat Girl hasn't quite grown into that yet, but she's getting there, and it was cool to think about what she's going to be like at 2 or 3 or 4...and then a little wistful, thinking about how cool it might be to see another kid go through the same stages. Maybe a little boy. I don't know. I got my period two days later, so I'd like to chalk it up to that.

Exhibit B: This weekend, we were watching the kid of a neighbor of ours--he's 9 and has brother-and-sister twins, age nearly-3. (And yes, ART was involved with the twins, as you might guess.) When his mom picked him up, the little ones squealed with delight to see their older brother, ran up and threw their arms around him screaming his name. He acted embarrassed but you could tell he was thrilled to be worshipped so much. I looked at the mother's beaming face and thought, "This is why you have another."

Exhibit C: This morning, talking to a friend whose mom is going through a tough time, and who wished "for the first time in my life," she said, that she had a sibling, someone who could share this burden with her.

The thing is, having a sibling is no guarantee of companionship, worship, or a helping hand--heck, I'd consider my brother and I decently close and we only talk once a month. But I do wonder what we--all of us, Bat Girl included--might be missing.

On the other hand, last night we also caught Dennis Quaid and his wife on 60 Minutes, talking about the medical error that nearly killed their newborn twins. A friend of mine just gave birth to a baby who will have lifelong disabilities (undetected on any of her prenatal tests or scans). I think about all the things that can go wrong, not least because of my wonky ute, and wonder how anyone can have the audacity to have children at all, much less tempt fate by trying again after having one healthy baby.

*****

Thanks for all your comments and emails re: my plagio meltdown. It was especially helpful to hear from those of you who decided not to do anything about your kids' heads. (And from Ornery--hello, ORNERY!!! We miss you! Hope you and the babies are well!) I've decided to let it go and make my peace with Bat Girl's head shape. No one else notices it but me and my husband, and she'll grow hair soon (please? where is the hair?!?) and it won't be noticeable at all. I hope.

*****

Work (and taxes) is kicking my ass right now. But I do have a (now two weeks late) post about Bat Girl at 13 months in the works, and lots of other stuff on my mind. Remember how I said, way back when, that I was going to post about sex, or lack thereof? I have so much to say about that. Next week I hope I'll have more time to write...

Headbanging

I don't think I've ever mentioned this before, but Bat Girl has a flat head.

To be precise, she has mild positional plagiocephaly--the rear right quadrant of her skull is flattened and the rear left quadrant pushes out very slightly. We first noticed the flat spot when she was around three months old, but in retrospect it's likely she came out of the womb that way, given the cramped conditions and her breech positioning. (Her right ear was also smushed and folded almost double for the first few weeks of her life.) She has always favored turning her head to the right, so it's also possible that she had very mild torticollis, especially in light of her resistance to nursing on my right boob (i.e. turning her head to the left). If she did, it was very mild, as she has no problems with range of motion now.

At her four-month well baby visit, we pointed out the flat spot to the pediatrician. She was unconcerned and recommended that we do some repositioning (bolstering Bat Girl when she slept so she turned to the left, etc.), which we had already already doing, and we left it at that. However, by this point Bat Girl was already rolling over and mostly slept on her tummy or side. Everything I read about plagio said that mild cases usually resolved themselves once the child started rolling and crawling, so I wasn't worried and pretty much forgot about it. We made an effort to keep her off the flat spot when we remembered, but it wasn't an obsession or anything.

By the time Bat Girl was 9 months old, the plagio was definitely no better, and in fact I worried that it was getting worse. Was her head bulging out to the left? Were her ears still misaligned? (Earlier, her right ear was visibly set further forward on her head than the left.) I brought it up to the pediatrician again, who took another good look at Bat Girl and said, essentially, yes, she has a flat spot, but it's not that bad, she doesn't need a helmet, and once she grows some hair you won't even notice it.

But I kept obsessing about it, on and off. I'd go through periods where I thought, oh, it's not so bad, you can't even tell. Then I'd catch sight of the top of her head in a mirror and think, holy crap, and then spend two or three days googling pictures of pre-banded plagio babies' heads until I worked myself into a panic. But I thought it was probably too late to do anything about it, and to be honest, I really did not want Bat Girl to wear a helmet. I just didn't. So I stuck my head in the sand.

Over the last month or two, though, I've read about Statia's battle to get the Mini banded, and have emailed with her about her experience, and I started to think, why not just see a neurologist and get it checked out, just for peace of mind? So last week I prepared myself for battle and called the pediatrician. Who, of course, gave me no hassles at all about it and gave me the names of 4 pediatric neurologists. Only one of them accepts our insurance, so I called the office to make an appointment. Here is how it went:

Me: I'd like to make an appointment with Dr. Fancypants.
Bitchy Receptionist: What's the diagnosis?
Me: Plagiocephaly.
BR: And how old is the infant?
Me: Actually, she's a year old.
BR: Oh, Dr. Fancypants doesn't see plagio patients older than 10 months. Why are you just calling now?
Me: Our pediatrician felt it might get better on its own, but it hasn't really improved, so--
BR: Well, it's never going to improve. It's too late, her skull has hardened.

AARGH! Setting aside the fact that YOU, BITCHY RECEPTIONIST, ARE NOT A DOCTOR, AND IN FACT HAVE NO MEDICAL TRAINING WHATSOEVER, I have read of plenty of cases where children have been banded as late as 18 months and shown improvement--not as much as if they were banded before 9 months, true, but it's not totally unheard of. Also, WTF?!?!?!?!? Why not just tell me, "I'm sorry, Dr. Fancypants doesn't see plagio patients older than 10 months"? You could even add, "He feels that after 10 months is too late for treatment." There is no need for you, bitchy receptionist with no medical training, to editorialize and diagnose MY child over the phone. Ugh.

Unfortunately, my default reaction in cases such as these is to fall apart and start to cry, rather than opening up a can of whoop-ass as this woman so richly deserved. So instead of ripping BR a new one, I hung up and felt like the worst mother in the world. Why hadn't I pushed for a referral sooner? Was Bat Girl's head going to be fucked up for the rest of her life, and would she resent us forever for not fixing it?

I'm still debating whether to call around and see if one of the other neurologists our ped recommended will see Bat Girl. It will probably cost around $350 for the appointment (that's average for a non-insurance-covered office visit around here) and it seems likely that another doctor will tell us there isn't much they can do, given that BG has passed the optimal banding age. The money is definitely a factor--obviously if it would help BG, there's no amount of money I wouldn't spend, but if it's just to be told "Sorry," I don't know if it's worth it. The head shape looks bad from some angles, but other times it seems fine, and honestly I've been looking at it so much, I don't know what to think anymore. Her ears have definitely evened out, so maybe it's getting better.

My main concern is that it not cause other problems for her down the road, and it seems like long-term effects are usually in severe cases where there's facial asymmetry. BG doesn't have any facial asymmetry due to the plagio--back in September she was diagnosed with mild ptosis, but after the Bitchy Receptionist encounter I called the pediatric opthalmologist we saw back then (whom I LOVE, btw, if anyone needs a ped. opthalmologist in the Big City area) and he assured me that the ptosis was "100%" not caused by any head shape irregularities. (And I believe him, because I also have a slight asymmetry between my eyes, as does my dad.)

In the end, it comes down to the guilt, as always. Guilt for not noticing sooner, guilt for not being more aggressive with repositioning--we turned her so her head faced the other way when she was lying down, sure, but we could have also changed the way we held her during feedings, etc. etc. On the other hand...we did tons of tummy time, she spent no time in a car seat and very little in a bouncy seat or swing (was in-arms practically constantly her first three months of life), she rolled over and crawled early, so what else could we have done? Other than call a doctor and get her banded, of course.

At the very least, this is another fun thing we can blame on my stupid uterus. (Intrauterine crowding due to twinning, uterine anomalies, and/or breech positioning can lead to plagiocephaly. Too bad our pediatrician didn't know that, or didn't mention it when BG was two weeks old and I told her I had a UU and asked if there was anything we should watch out for in BG as a result--she said, "Nope, nothing!") And we like blaming things on my stupid uterus.

I don't know...forgive all the rambling. What would you do?

Further conversations with my UPS man

UPS man: [hefting large box containing 2 cases of diapers] You know, you should really potty train [Bat Girl], so I don't have to carry these boxes of diapers anymore.

Me: [silently] Fuck you, that's your JOB. [out loud] Well, she's only a year old, so I hate to tell you, you've got a couple more years of delivering diapers left.

UPS man: Just send her to my mother! She had our oldest potty trained at 14 months, the second one at a year, and the youngest one was trained by 10 months!

There you have it, ladies. You should send your babies to an Armenian grandmother so they can be potty trained at 10 months. My UPS man says so.

What a difference a year makes

Predictably, Bat Girl's cold (which finally seems to be getting better, thank goodness) and teething has meant a week of terrible sleep for all of us. Most nights this week, she has woken up every 1-2 hours screaming and cranky, I'm assuming due to a combination of not being able to breathe and mouth pain.

She seems to sleep best when we hold her upright or semi-upright, dozing comfortably when we rock her in the glider but flying awake (and sitting up, and screaming) the second we lay her down flat in her crib. So the past few nights I have ended up giving up around 4 a.m. and taking her into the living room, where I prop myself up on the couch with pillows and let her crash out on my chest. She sleeps until 7:30 or so while I drift in and out of slumber, always aware of the little snorts and snuffles of her breathing, the weight of her sweaty head pressed against my breast.

Those early-morning hours have reminded me so strongly of the early weeks of Bat Girl's life, just one year ago, when I'd get up with her for the first morning feed, and after the boob-bottle business was over, and she'd fallen back asleep, I'd doze on the couch with her curled up on my chest, a blanket wrapped around us both to ward off the February morning chill.

Except that now, instead of a tiny baby whose little butt, nestled in my hand, didn't even come down to my belly button, I have a sprawling toddler in pink fleecy pajamas whose feet stretch down to my mid-thigh, and who, when her eyes flutter open and meet mine, bares her budding teeth in a huge grin and reaches out a finger to touch the tip of my nose, then her own.

And I think, how far we have come.

PTBD sufferers, unite

So as I think I've mentioned here before, I buy super pricey organic formula for Bat Girl. Just a personal preference, though I sure will be glad when we can start transitioning to cow's milk in a few weeks. Anyway, since we go through the stuff like crazy, I order it by the case online (btw, if anyone ever needs a discount code, let me know!). Today the UPS man brought what I hope may be our very last shipment of formula--box torn, so the contents were clearly visible. I answered the door with Bat Girl in my arms, so he very kindly hauled the heavy box into our foyer for me.

(I should preface this by saying that we are quite fond of our UPS man--we know him by name and are very friendly with him.)

"Now, if you were breastfeeding, I wouldn't have to carry these heavy boxes of formula all the time," he joked to me.

Huh? But OK, fine, I replied in the same tone: "Believe me, I'd much rather be breastfeeding and not spending the money on this stuff."

"Eh, you moms today, you try for a few days and then give up and go to formula."

WTF?!? Not quite believing that I am defending my inability to breastfeed to my UPS delivery man, I say, "Well, I tried really hard."

"Oh, sure, I went through that with all three of my kids, we got the pump and everything, but then you know what? After a couple of days, formula." He says this very knowingly, like, yeah, my wife pussed out like you, too.

Still not quite believing I am having this conversation, I say, "Well, I tried to breastfeed her for four months, but we had to give up, it was too hard."

"For you or for her?" he asks.

"For both of us," I say, which is the only way I can sum up four months of low supply, bad latch, breast refusal, and pumping problems without just printing out my whole damn blog and handing it to him.

Then he looks me up and down and says, "Yeah, I figured." OH NO HE DIDN'T! Did my UPS man just LOOK AT MY BOOBS and basically call me flatchested and unable to sustain human life?!???

For the record, this is the FIRST person ever to say anything the slightest bit critical about my not breastfeeding. The UPS man. Damn.

*****

Before I got pregnant with Bat Girl, my husband and I always assumed we would have at least two children, assuming we could get pregnant (though we were open to adoption as well). Then came the, shall we say, less-than-ideal pregnancy, followed by postpartum misery, breastfeeding hell, a year of sleepless nights, a depleted bank account, a sex life shot to hell (ah yes, I promised to post about that too--all in good time, my dears), etc. etc. etc....

Anyone who spends five minutes reading my blog or talking to me in person knows that my daughter is the light of my life and a source of unbelievable joy. I do not regret anything I went through to have her. But having a baby has been hard, that's just the truth. Neither my husband nor I are ready to dive back in to the newborn phase again, nor do we feel, now that we're parents, that someone is missing from our family. (That was the advice a friend of mine was given when debating whether or not to have another: Do you feel like there's still someone missing from your family? In her case, the answer was yes.) That's assuming we could even afford it, which at this point--yes, technically we could afford another child, people have two kids on less money than I make all the time, but it would mean squeezing every remaining drop of luxury out of our lives, like vacations and books and cable TV and other things I am not willing to give up. (Not to mention the fact that to minimize the chances of conceiving multiples, in the future we would go straight to IVF with single embryo transfer, so factor in the cost of that, too.)

All of those things are valid reasons not to have another child, as is the fear of landing on bedrest again, only this time with a toddler to care for. But the truth is, the biggest reason I don't want to have another is that secretly, I am terrified of facing breastfeeding again. As I've mentioned before, I think I have a case of post-traumatic breastfeeding disorder (tm Eva. The thought of having to go through all of that--the low supply (because let's face it, even though anecdotally people get a better supply with each pregnancy, if I was only able to get to 11 ounces a day with serious pharmaceutical intervention, I'm unlikely to ever have a full supply), the struggling with latch, the tanking self esteem, and oh god, the pumping, the endless pumping--it makes my stomach clench up.

Now, a smart person would do as Pru does and say, to hell with the whole thing, why torture yourself like that again? Why I cannot be rational like this, I don't know. I suppose I am just stubborn enough to want to have another go at hurling myself headfirst into a brick wall. But I am rational enough to assiduously refill my birth control pill prescription every month. Because I cannot do that again. I. can. not.