The Amazing "No, She's Not Dead" Public Update

The last public LJ entry I made was the night before I got married. Needless to say, in the 27 weeks since then, lots of stuff has happened. For the sake of brevity, I shall list the bare-bones details for those of you who are wondering what the hell happened to me.



1) In a single 24 hour period, I went from being a 34 year-old carefree single girl to being a 34-year old wife, and stepmother of four frighteningly intelligent and athletic children, the youngest three of whom Mike and I have primary custody. Wes, who turns 18 next year, lives with his mom. Audrey (13), Cc (11) and Michael (8) live with Mike and me, and go to their mom's every other weekend.

Essentially, I went from working full time, to being a full time mom, and can now speak from experience to say that working full time is a lot easier, and the hours are better. But it's much less rewarding.

Still... one hell of an adjustment to make. @_@

2) About a month and a half after getting married, I ended up in the hospital for my very first, and hopefully last, kidney stone. When the ER doctors came back with the blood test results, they said, "Oh, by the way, you're about two weeks pregnant."

3) And there was much rejoicing -- at least until the morning sickness kicked in, and then there was about four months of nothing but puking. "Morning" sickness my ass. More like 24-hours-a-day sickness. For those four months, I actually lost weight when I was supposed to be gaining it. >_<

4) About two weeks into those four months, Audrey was in a really bad car accident. She was out on a church activity and was the front seat passenger when the car was hit by some idiot who didn't have his lights on. Thankfully, she was wearing her seatbelt, or it could have been tragic. As it was, she broke her right collar bone, and shattered the bones around her left eye when her face hit the dashboard. She has since fully recovered, and doesn't look like she was ever in an accident thanks to the miracles of modern medicine -- though she does have three plates and nine screws in her face that she'll have for the rest of her life.

It was a long, painful recovery for her, and since Mike, when he's worried sick, has the bedside manner of a rabid weasel (but a cute rabid weasel), I did most of the nursing. Sad as it sounds, I don't think the experience was quite as traumatic for me as it was for the rest of my new family, because, after my mom and my sister, I'm almost used to playing nursemaid to family members recovering from nasty hospital stays. Audrey endured my nursing well. It can't be easy to have someone taking care of you who has a perpetual case of morning sickness. ^^;

5) There were a few scary weeks when I was in danger of losing the baby and spent a lot of time lying down and still trying to take care of general mom stuff. Bleah, glad that's over and everything's okay.

5) July 3rd, I lost my beloved companion of 13 years, my cat Belle. Cried a lot that whole month. Still do, occasionally.

6) Beginning of August, rescued a kitten from the local shelter where I would go to look for Belle every other day. He's adorable. No replacement for Belle, but kitten therapy does wonders for taking the edge off the grief.

7) Middle of August, went to the doctor for an ultrasound. It's a girl. The doctor said she looks nice and healthy. ^_^ She's due December 24th. Merry Christmas to me.

8) Temperatures above 80 degrees F make me sick now, and I have the tendency to pass out if I get overheated. Yay pregnancy! :P

9) August 18th, my sister ended up in the hospital again with blood clots in three of the four chambers of her lungs. It was another close call, but she's out of the hospital now and doing much better.

10) Because of my rough pregnancy and tight finances, I'm currently missing AnimeFEST for the first time in six years. Majorly bummed over that, but better safe than sorry. Hopefully I can make it to AnimeFEST next year. Kind of weird to think that, if I do, I'll be going with an 8 month old baby girl in tow. Or, as Katsu put it, Krista Spawn.

11) Still playing Cloud, Tifa, Reeve, Cait Sith, and Jenova in the Final Fantasy RP that I joined last September, in spite of long lapses due to less than stellar health and general utter lack of free time. Still having a ridiculous amount of fun with it. (Links for the interested: Final Heaven LJ, Final Heaven Archives, Final Heaven OOC Community)

12) Haven't forgotten Utukki. Or Hearts of Ice. Or my other unfinished stuff. Yeah, you heard me.


There you have it, folks. The last 27 weeks in a nutshell. And now I'm off to finish laundry.