House Arrest

There's this hurricane coming through town today, you may have heard of it. 

Photo from George Takei/Facebook

It's FRANKENSTORM!!!!

Which, by the way, is the dumbest name ever.  Who comes up with this crap???

Of course, before the storm even arrived, school had already been cancelled for two days, Federal Government workers were ordered to stay home, mass transit shut down, and most shockingly, my husband's office is closed.  If corporate lawyers aren't showing up for work, you know it's serious. 

48 Hours of Pregnancy

It was almost an afterthought that I bought the pregnancy test.  I was at CVS, letting the boys run up and down the aisles, when Casey ran into the "Family Planning" section.  As I bent down to pick him up, my nose nearly hit the "First Response" box.  It was then that I thought to myself, Hmmm, my period is a bit late, isn't it?  Without really thinking, I grabbed the box and purchased it along with two matchbox cars. 

Later that afternoon the water was boiling on the stove when I escaped for a rare moment to myself in the bathroom.  I unwrapped the box, did the deed, and left the test to sit for a bit while I finished making pasta.  A half hour later I went to check it and my knees nearly buckled. 

Positive. 

Positive. 

Positive. 

Apart from the huge implications that this had,  I have to say I was a bit satisfied.  After all, who likes to fail a test?  Even when you really want to fail a test?  Yes, the Type A part of me was very pleased. 

Two

Two legs, two arms, two eyes, two ears (ten fingers, ten toes).

Two proud, sleepy parents. 

The High Road

I've been working really hard lately on taking the high road.  You know, when someone angers me or I feel a grave injustice has been done to me, I am trying to react calmly.  Maturely.  I am trying to weigh the proper way to respond or consider if any response is even necessary.  The latter is the hardest - not responding. 

I think I've been pretty successful at this, thank you very much.  I've kept my mouth shut a LOT.  I've tried to be a better person and not take things personally.  I've tried to remind myself that everyone has trials and hardships, so if someone takes the low road and lashes out at me or about me, it may not really be about me at all. 

But sometimes?  SOMETIMES IT WOULD FEEL SO FREAKING GOOD TO TAKE THE LOW ROAD.   

Yesterday Braden came home from school and told me that one of his friends told him to "go away."  I prodded about the details surrounding this banishment, and got none.  Braden usually shrugs this stuff off (as he did with the park incident last week), but this time he looked legitimately sad.  Which made me sad.  I decided this was a parenting moment.  I needed to advise him on how to respond. 

High road - Braden, if your friend ever says that to you again, you tell him that it's not nice and that it hurts your feelings. 

Low road- Braden, if your friend ever says that to you again, you tell him to shut the fuck up and that you can and will play wherever the hell you like. 

Braden is 4, so I went with the high road. 

But isn't the low road so much more satisfying?

A Personal Therapy History (And why I want to invite my therapist over for dinner)

You'd think that because both of my parents are therapists that I always would have been open to the idea of going to therapy.  But I wasn't. 

It wasn't that I was against it per se, it was just that I saw it as an emergency measure.  I went to my first therapist when I was in law school.  I was having random panic attacks in the middle of class for no apparent reason.  Nothing I would ever let on to anyone else, but that feeling of your face going white, your heart racing, and the walls caving in - standard anxiety stuff.  After a few weeks of this I ended up in some twenty-something's office at student health begging for xanax.  Instead, she recommended some SSRI's and weekly therapy sessions.  I never took the pills, and I never went back. 

Fast forward three years and I found myself in another therapist's office on the twentieth floor of a high rise in Central Park West.  I was working at Skadden at the time, and was in such a state of flux that by 10am I was on the phone searching for someone, anyone, who would see me that day - the sooner the better.  By 2pm I was in this random therapist's office crying about how stressed I was and how I just couldn't finish this brief - I just couldn't.  I still remember his words:  "Fuck the brief."  But I didn't.  I went back to work and finished it.  It was my 28th birthday.  I never went back to him again. 

I Lost My Shit Yesterday

Let me first set the stage. 

It's gray out. 

It's chilly.

It's muddy. 

It's not good park weather. 

But it is the second consecutive day that Braden has not had school and the three of us are going a bit crazy in the house. 

"Do you all want to go to a park?"

YES!  YES!  PARK!  PARK!  PARK!

We went to a park. 

It looks like other people had the same idea I did, because the park was packed with obnoxious rambunctious kids everywhere. 

Speaking of obnoxious rambunctious, I quickly noticed a group of 4 or 5 little boys - probably around 7 or 8- who were screaming, jumping, pushing, running, basically channelling a a balloon rapidly deflating - all over the place, unpredictable, loud.   

I made a mental note to steer clear.

In the Washington Post!

So this little blog of mine, as well as Montage, the company I'm working with (see post below), are mentioned in the Washington Post today. 

Which I think is pretty awesome! 

Special thanks to Janice D'Arcy, who writes the Washington Post blog "On Parenting", for the shout out. 

You can read the article here.

Happy Monday, everyone!

Linked Out

So due to this new endeavor of mine, I joined Linked In last week.  I figured it would be good for networking, getting the word out about my new job, and I don't know, just what I should do.  Isn't that what professional people do? 

I didn't really get Linked In at first (and still kind of don't).  Is it like Facebook for professionals?  Minus the drunk pictures and wall posts and birthday announcements?  I started out with zero connections, and it was daunting.  So I started off by  "friending," or "linking," my husband, and going through all of his connections to see who I knew.

Turns out, I knew a lot of people, mostly from law school.  And then, instead of building my own Linked In account, I got caught in the wormhole of looking at all of my former classmates' profiles.  Like Facebook spying, only looking at resumes instead of baby photos. 

Let me tell you, I am humbled.  Hugely. 

A Break

When you are with your kids 24/7, every day, the idea of having a full weekend without them sounds enticing. 

Is that awful to say?  It's true. 

While I huff and puff about how much I will miss them, the fact is that whenever I pull out of the driveway bound for a weekend away, I breathe a huge sigh of relief.  No diapers to change.  No meals to prepare.  No one to wake me up in the morning or chase around or put in time out or entertain.  It's a freedom I once had but didn't fully appreciate.  So yes, I look forward to it.  A lot. 

This past weekend I went away with my husband for his law firm's bi-annual family retreat.  This year's venue was the Greenbrier in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia.  I didn't know quite what to expect, since I had missed the previous two (pregnancies #1 and #2), but I knew it would involve good food, flowing wine, and a massage.  A MASSAGE.  There seems no better contrast to the nightly 7pm witching hour than a massage.