The Friendly Pedant by Mrs. Odie

I wrote this almost exactly two years ago when things in my life were drastically different. Pringles was waiting to be born, and I was naively following adoption of orphans drama. Recently, I was made aware that my advocating for “pre-selected” “orphans” in certain foreign countries was and IS illegal. It is a factor in the ban on US adoptions of Russian children (not me PERSONALLY doing it, but it being done). Hence, I deleted all of my posts soliciting money for pre-selected orphans. I very much believe that the blogger who got me started on it had/has her heart in the right place. She continues to devote much of her blog theme to fundraising for orphans. I wish for  children in this world to be safe and loved. It afflicts me that it isn’t even remotely true.

Today, on Mother’s Day, I was on a hormonal/serotonin rollercoaster dealing with the end of lactational amenorrhea and the end of my Zoloft prescription. I’ll explain more, I promise. In the meantime, Happy Mother’s Day to all of you mommy-type chicks, to the moms of my dearly beloved childfree by choice buds, and the wives of my two male readers especially.

(Originally posted June 23, 2011)

I’m thirty-nine weeks pregnant if I go by the date of my last menstrual period, but only thirty-eight if I go by the first measurement of my fetus. I think, and have always thought, that measurement was off. When you have a two year-old who shares your bed (as we did back in October) and you’ve been with someone for seven years (married for four), you don’t have so much sexytimes that you cannot imagine WHEN you conceived. Odie and I went to a wedding in Colorado that week, and it was a good week for romance. I know exactly when the possible dates of conception were, with no need to allow for margin of error.

So, I made it to the end of Odie’s school year! The stress hanging around this house lately has been nearly as thick as the layer of dog and cat hair on the unvacuumed carpet. Me, on bed rest (which could more accurately be described as “couch rest”) gulping water until I felt I was being hazed by a Mormon sorority, and Odie working at a high school until 3, then picking up our daughter and coming home to his second job: nurse/single-parent.

The water gulping and rest have worked. My amniotic fluid was at 7.8 cm, which is slightly below the 8cm minimum the doctors are comfortable with. After a weekend of inactivity and fluid consumption, it was up to 9.1 on Monday. The technician who does my non-stress tests congratulated me and sent me back home to bed (couch).

How does one fill the time? When I was working and coming home to be a mom, I longed for bed rest. I imagined that I would watch TV and read all day. The problem is, all of my favorite shows have wrapped up for the season, and the summer stuff doesn’t start up for a while. Therefore, I have had to watch some really bad reality television. I know, I know, the sacrifices I have to make. But I did it.

I also watched season 3 of “Breaking Bad” in three days. It’s worth it to miss a season of a show that I love so  I can binge watch the whole thing on DVD without waiting the tortuous week between cliffhangers. Delaying gratification is NOT my thing.

I’m between books right now, having a hard time deciding what to choose next. In the meantime, I have been following various blogs. Dooce is in Bangladesh with Christy Turlington. Curious to see how that turned out. I’m sure that we will be in for a detailed description of what her poop was like while she was there. Lucky us.

I must confess, I enjoyed a bit of blog drama. This is a fault of mine I freely admit: I love drama. Usually, I am able to get my fix by following celebrity gossip and all of the arguing and name-calling that happens in the comments sections of those blogs. You may remember back in December (when each separate dying ember threw its shadow on the floor) that I blogged about an orphan named [redacted] who needed to be adopted (to find a family forevermore). The blog community showed up for this little girl and thousands of dollars were raised. Shortly thereafter, a family claimed her and I breathed a huge sigh of relief that she would not be going to a mental institution for the rest of her life due to the fact that she was born with Down Syndrome.

And then nothing seemed to happen. From my limited point of view, at least. I followed the blog her new family kept, and read about how fundraiser after fundraiser failed to bring in the money necessary to complete the process. It started to sound like a big scam to me. I wondered, do these countries take advantage of American sentimentality, post photographs of children allegedly available for adoption and then pull some grifter shit on them until they spend thousands of dollars on mystery “paperwork” and “dossiers” and fees until the family is broke and gives up? It is certainly possible. I know I’ve seen plots like this on various TV dramas.

The other day, I caught up on [redacted]’s family’s blog, and boy howdy, was the author letting us HAVE IT over our speculations about why [redacted] is still in an orphanage (presumably) in her country and not safe and sound here. She was PISSED. And she had every right to be. I guess there was much talking behind her back (which isn’t really behind your back if someone publishes it on the internet) about her ability to care for and afford this child. I am guilty of this because I emailed another blogger and expressed my concern over the whole thing. I think that’s only natural. Everything she lamented people had said about her, I had certainly thought. People had written to me about these exact concerns on my blog. Of course, I didn’t publish any of them, so while it FELT like she was talking about me, she couldn’t have been. I thought about blogging on the topic, and now I’m glad I didn’t, after seeing how upsetting it was for her. No matter what my frustrations are that [redacted] isn’t home with her adoptive family, THEY are a thousand times more frustrated. And I’m glad that this family is still pursuing [redacted]’s adoption, despite the huge obstacles.

The money we raised for them on Reece’s Rainbow cannot be touched for now. It has to be spent on very specific things. So [redacted]’s family still needs $3000 more dollars. The website is [redacted] if you want to donate. Personally, I think it’s ridiculous how much this process costs. And I do think that corrupt people are pocketing money and making a profit off of it. Call me cynical. Nevertheless, I believe in this family’s sincerity and I wish them all the best.