"Feelers"

The lines on a pregnancy test can elicit a few different feelings. For us it was excitement as we were trying to get pregnant. After a couple days excitement turned into total fear. We found out early, so early I hadn't had the first typical sign of pregnancy; the missed period. I waited and waited despite that positive test.... And the numerous afterwards. When the time came and past my relief of the non-existent period turned into fear of a chemical pregnancy... Then into fear of miscarriage. After nearly two weeks I decided to embrace the days I have while being pregnant and to just be happy. If something was to "go wrong" at least I had enjoyed what I did have.

For 5 weeks after embracing my happiness and excitement, yet again, I got a whole new awesome set of symptoms. For weeks I had been receiving emails warning about moodiness and mood swings. I laughed because the reality was that I have felt good over all.  I have had only three bouts of nausea, no vomiting, some cramping, round ligament pain and fatigue. In reality, I have nothing to complain about, I've been perfectly healthy. Week 10 hit and out came the bitch. 

It started while picking up my prenatals and an antibiotic. 4 hours and three trips later after being told my prescriptions were ready... they still weren't. My phone was dead, I was late picking up my dogs from the groomer and I had no way of getting ahold of my husband to pick up the dogs before the groomers closed... In 5 mins. I opted, in my kindest possible way at that point, to come back the following day. I'm pretty sure despite my nice voice and murderous rage in my face after waiting 20 unnessesary mins in line (of course pissing off everyone behind me) the poor girl behind the glass could tell I was hanging my a thread.

And so the snow ball began to roll down the hill...

Working in mental health I try my best to be aware of myself and my reactions. I also know, as a woman, that estrogen makes me go bat shit crazy. My reality of this is that not only are my feelings of anger more than somewhat irrational (a 4 out of 10 makes me see red) the fact that I can't control it has begun to create anxiety within me, thus fueling the fire of a thousand hells. It's even worse because I think I'm a pretty patient person overall... Unless you feed me a bottle of wine and I'm sitting w close girlfriends- of course we vent. 

To give an example of the "cycle": Remember in Shrek when he says "I eat because I'm unhappy and I'm unhappy because I eat"? Yeah. "I'm anxious because I'm angry and I'm angry because anxious." The cycle is stupid and most of the time I am able to identify that I'm feeling a bit "butt hurt" and can move on. Nope. Now i ruminate on the irrational crap and I can't refocus quickly or bounce back. The prescription piece would upset anyone... But that's a specific, larger example. My dog coughing, my husband leaving a plate in the sink or my younger sister venting about her day ... Those are small, irrational examples for me to see red over. 

 I hear it gets better in the next couple weeks but in the meantime I can say that this is way worse than the fatigue. Quickly my family is learning, unfortunately, to not poke, touch or breath on or near the bear and I'm doing everything I can to keep it calm and rational.