week 37: schedules.

we're at week 37, Baby Girl, musicboy, and me.  that means, for those of you not marinated in all things pregnancy, that we are term. come what may, what may is coming.  (translation: nobody's stopping anything if something starts before the due date.)

that's exciting stuff right there.

so now i'm all "lah lah lah pregnancy worrying is over" which is quite lovely. i've actually not been worried about what's going on in my little uterine laboratory for a couple of weeks now. it's refreshing, really, after eight months of fretting over fetal movements and development and weight gain. 

now i'm realizing that i have NO IDEA WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN.  i mean, i know the logistics of delivery. i'm not even really talking about delivery. delivery seems fairly straightforward to me.

i mean, EVERYTHING ELSE THAT HAPPEN AFTER THAT.

hi, i'm going to be a mom.  and there's the whole feeding/caring/loving/nurturing/developing a schedule thing that is just weird.

i have no idea what's going to happen. i don't normally do well with that (read: i do not do well with that at all, as i am a planner and i like to have some idea of what's coming down the highway to smack me with its awesomeness.).  and yet there's NOT ONE THING i can do about it.

we're just going to have to figure it out. 

i feel like parenting is not something that you should feel like you can just wing.  flexibility, yes.  but just winging it?  that seems like a recipe for raising a child who other people want to throttle when you bring her out in public.

and yet...i have no idea what's going to happen. so, i guess we're heavy on the figuring it out and winging it until we know what the heck is going on. 

thank heavens my mom is coming.  if anything, she may just look at me and say "what do you think? you know best" and then i will realize that "winging it" actually is "following your instincts" and that's good.

in the meantime, it just seems weird.

--

so 9000 people have asked me if i'm taking maternity leave when the baby comes. 

the answer is no.

HOWEVER.

all of my classes are online, which gives me freedom and flexibility. it is the Godsend of modern collegiate education paired with childbirthing, and i am grateful for it every single day.

but i have had to make decisions, lately, about what i'm going to be doing once she gets here.  i had hoped to have a SUPER lighter load once spring ends, which won't be for at least a couple of weeks after Baby Girl is born.  i had requested one online class from local cc, and then got a request to teach a 5 week course at OIOHL that starts a week after my due date.

i hadn't yet heard from local cc, so i didn't do anything about the request from OIOHL (it's an entirely automated process, and i had weeks left to go, so i just thought about it).  it seemed like a really stupid idea, logically, but something about it kept nagging at me.

when i got the schedule from local cc, i learned why.

they had scheduled me for a hybrid class, beginning something like three weeks after my due date.  a hybrid class = you have to show up and teach for three hour blocks half of the time. now, granted, in a summer semester, that's only three times.  but...three hours? three weeks after MY DUE DATE?

i just...i didn't know what to do.

except i did, but it felt very selfish. 

i knew i couldn't do it. 

what you have to understand about me is that i am loathe to turn down classes. that's how i got into the 8 class semester--because people were giving me opportunities and as an adjunct i didn't feel like i could shut the door on anyone.  i wanted everyone to like me. and i wanted to make money. it wasn't greed--it was an intense desire to ensure that i was doing all i could to support our family in the ways that i could.

so it's REALLY hard for me to say no.  to say "thanks, but no thanks--i can't do that now" simply because I CAN'T DO IT. not that i can't, but that if i did, i would cause more havoc than necessary and possibly endanger what are more important goals.

like, you know, not dying.  or killing my milk supply from stress.

so i texted musicboy to see what he thought. and he said say no to local cc and yes to OIOHL. 

so i did.

and i feel good about that. it's less money, but not by much, and it's possible that i'll be able to take another 5 week class at some point over the summer to compensate.

and i also got two online classes at local cc for summer b.  this means that i may not need to work at collegetown u until fall. 

that's exceptionally exciting to me.  i would really like to stay home with my baby.  we could get to know each other. 

that would be a good thing.

--

i'm reading a book about sleep strategies and getting your baby on a feeding/sleeping schedule. i really like it. it makes so much sense to me.  (and i'm not telling you what it is because i don't want to know what your opinion is about it--don't take that the wrong way, just read on, but it's true.) but it flies in the face of a lot of what everyone around me says, and so when i read it, it's like i'm having a mental debate with other mothers who are doing things differently.

it's like i'm defending myself.

already.

as if it's anyone's business.

(because it's not, really, anyone's business except musicboy's, who i realized i didn't ever really ask about whether or not he liked it because it was mainly motivated by my desire to know how to do this whole breastfeeding AND working and hopefully sleeping thing and make it work in a way that works for our family and since they're my boobs, i went all philosophy commando and forgot to ask. whoops.  he sort of laughed at me and said he liked it too [i've told him about it] and that he agrees that it's how we want to raise her.  whew.)

but it's my little entrance into the big wide world of Different Parenting Philosophies and how everybody thinks that theirs is the best. 

and here's the thing: it actually might be. for their kid. 

but i somehow think that talking about it makes it open for discussion, just like talking about names and birth plans somehow invites commentary and opinions--even when it didn't.

so i don't talk about it anymore. i just...think about things and make plans.  and i do realize that those plans may get shredded once she gets there, but i feel like no plan is a bad plan.  i do not do well in Reaction Land. 

i'm living on Proactive Island for these last few weeks, and i'm pretty well camped out here. 

--

since i've been telling everyone who asks (and i think i got asked like ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY TIMES yesterday) what her name is now, because i disclosed it at the baby showers and it's just time and i'm over it and that's her name and we feel good about it, here you go:

she's named after her great grandmas, which you already know.  her name is margaret joan, and we will call her maggie.