Positioned and ready to go!

Today at my (now weekly) doctor's appointment I had a chance to get a quick look at the Short Stranger's head on the doc's small ultrasound machine--or more specifically, the top and back of his head...because the little guy is head down, back out, and ready for his Halloween due date.

No breech worries for this baby boy.

Huzzah!

Gerhard Richter overpaints his kids

If artist Gerhard Richter were going to paint his kids, what would they look like (complete abstract smears? blurry photo-realistic? a painted mirror? other?). Well, as it turns out, he did them as overpainted photographs, of which Gerhard did 566 in total (not just of his children). But DaddyTypes found the ones in this series of his kids . . . kind of cool. I always kind of like Richter's work, but this personal touch is nice, and kind of cute. And I think I like these overpainted photos a lot, too. Here are some that DaddyTypes found out of the 566 from this series:

Couvade syndrome, or pulling on the rope a little

OK, your first question is probably "What the heck is Couvade syndrome?" Well, good ole' reliable Wikipedia defines it as follows:

"a psychosomatic condition in which an individual close to an expectant mother, commonly her partner, experiences some of the same symptoms and behavior as the mother near the time of labor. These can include pains, aches, depression, food cravings and restrictions, insomnia, and exhaustion."

So am I experiencing any such "symptoms"? Well, not completely, but I have had this back ache that has been driving me crazy (and my back pain has been worse than Bryna's, believe it or not). And overall anxiety about the to-do list, the nursery, childbirth classes, health, cleaning, rightful increased share of housework, finances, friends, family, work, and health insurance has certainly increased the amount of stress that I'm experiencing as an expectant father. As Almost-A-Dad states in his "8 Reasons Why Pregnancy Makes Fathers Tired," stress works in a a tricky way. First, it makes your mind run like a Kenyan marathoner so it's not always easy to wind down at the end of the day. Second, stress causes a release of cortisol in your body that not only helps pack on a few pounds by messing with your blood sugars, over time it will make you feel depressed and anxious. But it's only a warm-up for the stress and anxiety of having a new baby, so I'll just convince myself that this is anthropologically/biologically-driven preparation for being a new father.

Your second question is "What does pulling on rope have anything to do with this?" Well, leave it to art to bring a new perspective to any issue in life. The quaint randomness of the blogosphere recently directed me toward the Huichol Indian tribe of Mexico and their ritual for ensuring that men share in the pains of childbirth. Apparently, the woman in labor would lay down in a hut, and her husband would sit in the rafters above her with a rope tied around his testicles ... and, when the woman had a contraction, she'd pull on the rope (all men reading this just cringed ... and all the women just snickered). Here's a work of art from the collection of the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco that depicts this interesting custom:
Next time a man asks what labor pain feels like, I'd just tell him about this ... end of conversation.

OK, so I don't feel any better now -- esp. since I've now added a new anxiety to my long list (take another look at the image above in case you don't know what I'm talking about). But at least I could vent a bit about pre-natal father anxiety and stress -- of course, always only a small fraction of the stress and physical discomfort of the actual mother-to-be (I do realize that I cannot even try to compare).

33 days to go until the projected due date! [blood pressure increasing]

35 Week Bump

In the hubbub of finishing up my oral defense, coupled with a week of rain and gloom, we completely missed last week's bumpage post. So to make it up to you, we thought it would be fun to do a little compare and contrast of 12 weeks of growth. Especially for those of you on the East Coast who last saw me in early July.

On the LEFT: me at 23 weeks, during our 4th of July trip to Shenandoah.
On the RIGHT: me today, at 35+ weeks.

The good news about this comparison: the weather here in St. Louis is now very much like that pleasant afternoon in the mountains.
The funny news: I can still (sort of) fit into that T-shirt.
And the not-at-all-surprising bad news: there's no way I could hike those 5 miles anymore!

35 weeks

Question for the week: is a honeydew melon bigger than a cantaloupe? Apparently so, but what about those homegrown cantaloupe's that my grandmother used to grow...?

In any case, I'm now 35 weeks, and the Short Stranger's over 5 pounds. And I can tell that the not-so-little guy is (probably) turned in the right direction, because when he kicks, he's literally bumping up against my chest. He's seriously on my rib cage. This can be quite uncomfortable when I hunch, like right now, as I lean over to write this!

In some respects we're ready to greet this pumpkin baby and welcome him into our world, but in other ways we've now reached the point of panic. Mainly because like so many parents we know (and you know who you are!), we decided that the last trimester would be the perfect time to make over nearly the entire house! So while our living room is a lovely new shade of slate blue, it is also empty--which means our adjacent dining room is now a storage room. Ditto goes for the upstairs, where we had to move all of our old junky bedroom furniture into an office to make way for a new bed and dresser set. The bedroom looks fab, Mike's office--not so much. Our whole house has become a kind of rubik's cube: once we get one room into place, we find that the others are far worse than when we started. And did I mention that we badly need to fix a leak in the basement?

But since it's not yet October, and since we still have a least a couple of week's until I'm considered "term," we haven't started hyperventilating...yet. Besides, don't I know a few of you out there who survived just fine in the first few weeks with partially done nurseries...or floors...or bathrooms? ;)

This week, there's little new news on the Short Stranger front, since our pumpkin baby's almost ready for the world. According to babycenter.com:

Your baby doesn't have much room to maneuver now that he's over 18 inches long and tips the scales at 5 1/4 pounds (pick up a honeydew melon). Because it's so snug in your womb, he isn't likely to be doing somersaults anymore, but the number of times he kicks should remain about the same. His kidneys are fully developed now, and his liver can process some waste products. Most of his basic physical development is now complete — he'll spend the next few weeks putting on weight.

The shower that disguised itself as a party

If the first shower was a classic Iowa bbq, and the second a sophisticated brunch, then the final one last Saturday can best be described as a shindig! Our dear friends Chris and Imran hosted what Mike has started calling the "unshower," because it was the kind of event that a stranger could stumble into and not know the ocassion for hours. That said, it did feature some tried-and-true "baby shower" themes, including a fabulous cake that the grandma-to-be brought, and the ceremonial opening of presents. The other fun aspect of this particular party (I mean shower), was the diverse array of guests--from the parentals and their friends, to employees at SLAM, to dear old college friends, to a dog named Willow.

We have so many great pictures from the event that I thought in only best to present the details in pictorial form:

The scrumptious food spread that Chris and Imran prepared. Suprisingly, one of the big hits were the vegetarian bacon-basil-tomato sandwiches. At least a couple of guests couldn't believe the bacon was vegetarian.





Above it the cake--a chocolate flavored teddy bear with vanilla cupcakes.

And here's Mike's mom cutting the cake. According to her, the best way to cut this Teddy Bear in blue was to decapitate it.

I think we can agree that she'll be one hardcore grandma!





Mike enjoying the company of the host Chris, and me with Katie.

Present time! The Baby Bjorn was definitely the most popular gift-giving item. We've now received 3 of them! Our friends and family definitely know us well.

And last but not least...

Willow! The canine vacuum cleaner.

and the name is...

... well, while we do have a couple names picked out, I'm not going to tell you what it might be. However, I can tell you what it is NOT going to be.

In the first category are names from recent babies that people have seen at local hospital nurseries. One baby was named "Gorgess," but my favorite worst name so far from a local newborn was "Lil'Smokey." And you'd probably think these names are coming from parents who don't even take the time or consideration to think about these poor kids and how their names will impact their lives (full of bullying and jokes). You'd think these names come from teenage parents or something -- nobody important or famous. Well, I'm not so sure. Proceed to category 2 -->

In the second category of terrible baby names are those from celebrities. I will never figure out what gives Hollywood parents the right to come up with the most off-the-wall names (or, really non-names). But here is a list of the the 33 Worst Celebrity Baby Names. My favorites are:

Tu Morrow (Rob Morrow's kid) -- just plain wrong.

Seven (Erykah Badu's child) -- OK, so someone else saw that episode of Seinfeld, but missed the joke, I guess.

Kyd (David Duchovny and Tea Leoni's) -- as Babble.com aptly quips, "Doesn't this just invite people to speculate that you, as parents, a) just didn't care enough to actually name your kid, and b) can't spell?"

Pictured to the right is Sylvester Stallone with Sophia Rose (that's actually nice), Sistine and Scarlet (OK, still perfectly respectable) -- not pictured are Rambo's sons Sage Moonblood and Seargeoh (what?!?!?!).

And finally, one of my all-time favorite celebrity baby names ...

Blanket (the late MJ's son, aka Prince Michael II) -- and it just gets worse when Michael explains why he named his son Blanket. On the other hand, I'm kinda a fan of his real name . . . Prince Michael . . . has a nice ring ; )

I hope Gorgess and Lil'Smokey ready this one day -- I think they are probably going to feel a lot better about their own names.

34 Weeks

Okay, so I'm a couple days behind on my weekly post. Due to a whirlwind of nesting, baby showers, regular doctors trips, and birthing classes, I've ironically slacked on posting about all of it. This past week, which is starting to feel like a blur, included a little of all of this: a baby shower last Saturday (see previous post) and another yesterday (we'll post on this later), a bi-weekly doctor's appt. where all was well, and a birthing class where we learned, gulp, what happens when things don't go as planned.

Yes, you know the instructor is about to deliver some ugly news when she starts by asking us to "tell her some good stories we've heard about birth"--you know, where all went well. After a few of us tepidly offered up our friends' and families' stories of blessedly brief labors, she proceeded to introduce us to what I'll call inductions, suctions, and sections. I'll let you all figure out the details on this one. At least now we've seen the diagrams and videos and know what could happen if the Short Stranger decides to be ornery. Only two more classes to go, and we're officially "educated" for birth! On this note, to complement Mike's continued musings on his impending role as a father, someday soon I'll muster up the time to try to put into words what it feel likes to be on the other side, as a mom-to-be. Which includes trying to wrangle with the myriad biological issues that have put me in a very different position than Mike.

On the baby front, we're now moving into the melon family in the Short Stranger's world!:

Your baby now weighs about 4 3/4 pounds (like your average cantaloupe) and is almost 18 inches long. His fat layers — which will help regulate his body temperature once he's born — are filling him out, making him rounder. His skin is also smoother than ever. His central nervous system is maturing and his lungs are continuing to mature as well. If you've been nervous about preterm labor, you'll be happy to know that babies born between 34 and 37 weeks who have no other health problems generally do fine. They may need a short stay in the neonatal nursery and may have a few short-term health issues, but in the long run, they usually do as well as full-term babies.

the increasingly complicated role of the father-parent

OK, so it's been quite some time since I dipped into the "gender rant" realm, but here goes another small dose from the mind of Mike. Sorry for these rambling, random thoughts and links. I'd enjoy any comments.

With Short Stranger on his way pretty soon, the mom-to-be and myself have certainly been having more and more conversations about what roles we'd like to have as parents, and how to really be involved in a much more equal way--and what that really means given the restrictions of our lives (that happen to currently fall into somewhat gendered categories). How does the 9-5 working parent share in the tasks of raising a child as much as the parent working/research/writing from home? Outside of leave time and flexible schedules, what might this really be like?

I'm not going to swallow a bug here, so I'm not going to get in-depth on my own thoughts on this topic too much right now (I don't think there is any way for me to write a complete post here without getting a strong backlash from someone or other -- trust me, I've typed and deleted several paragraphs already). But I will say that fathers too often tend to serve a much more distanced or removed parenting role than mothers. And I'm not even just talking previous generations, but I mean now. Not everyone of course (I can think of a few examples of fathers who really have stepped up to the plate to be fully knighted as parents -- you know who you are). And I'm not certain most guys consciously do this at all, but somehow this is how the chips fall. On the flip side of the coin is the mother who thinks her husband should stay far away from any real parenting-like things. That seemed more conscious with earlier generations, but I think today society is playing its dirty role of pressuring mothers into being "good mothers" and taking on everything (full-time mom roles, full household work, professional working roles, etc. etc. etc.).
I'm going to give my hats off to Backpacking Dad for his recent post that discusses fathers in the role of "Immersed Parent." I'm not sure I agree with everything he writes here (I might be a tad more radical than him), but he's totally on the right track here with his "Feminism and the Immersed Parent":

"One of [the] roles men must accept, the most important and the most foundational, is the role of Immersed Parent. Anecdotally and historically fathers have not been Immersed Parents as a rule.... Fathers today are being asked, and are asking, to be immersed just as, classically, mothers have been. Not every father is being asked to become a primary caregiver, an at-home dad, or even to come up with a complicated scheme to ensure that the parenting responsibilities are divided utterly equitably. But I think every father is being asked, now, to be Immersed in his fatherhood. Because with this immersion comes a respect for a role that women have traditionally maintained, and a different perspective on the social and economic conditions affecting that role."

As a feminist myself, I really enjoyed reading another father's thoughts on these issues (it's rather rare to find another father quite as honest about these things as this guy). And considering how my own role as an Immersed Parent (or co-parent) reflects my own respect for the role women have played is also a good thought. Here's another interesting statement from Backpacking Dad (why backpacking, I'm not sure)-- discuss amongst yourselves:

"... just as the workplace does not need to be structured solely according to male needs and input, neither does parenthood need to be defined according to what mom would do."

Finally, in my reading of blog comments and other links, I also came across the blog Daddy Dialectic, who about a year ago posted his own responses to the "10 Questions on Feminist Fatherhood." Again, not sure I agree with all of his thoughts, but at least he pushing buttons on this issue. I think he's working on a book called "Twenty-First Century Dad" (in press, I think).
And I'll leave you with one last link and provocation. The always controversial Linda Hirshman wrote a little diddy in the American Prospect a couple years ago that pushes against men rather hard, arguing that men are likely to adopt more equal parenting roles only if they need to sacrifice nothing to do so (ouch!). Here's a an interesting blurb from her 2007 article "What a Load":

"... experts estimate that men's relative contribution to routine indoor housework is now about half that of women's, and fathers are available to their children about three-fourths as much as mothers, interacting about two-thirds as often on weekdays." There we go: women are working twice as hard on the household scut work and one-third again as hard on childcare. Forty-four years after the publication of The Feminine Mystique, you've come a long way, baby."

As the role of parent gets closer and closer, I'm going to get more and more interested in what role I will play in this new stage of our lives (co-parent? Immersed Parent? just plain dad?), and how we both will navigate the very complex matrix of gender, society, parenting, grandparent-handling, diaper-debates, breastfeeding, daycareland, and the all-important star of this adventure .. Mr. Short Stranger, himself.

Baby Shower #2!

This weekend our friends Anna and Elissa hosted the second of our three baby showers, my Art History Dept. shower, where much fun was had by all. It was a lovely brunch event that included my primary pregnancy food craving, pumpkin, of course (in the form of muffins). And not only did pumpkin play a part in the menu, but in the gifts: we received our first of what I hope will be many seasonal outfits, pumpkin beer (for our Short Stranger celebration, yum yum), as well as some adorably cuddly winter outfits, warm blankets, booties, and even fab leg warmers. And now that it's finally starting to feel autumnal, we can finally start to picture the little guy all cuddled up in cozy wear.

Some pics from the event:

33 week bump

Got a little behind on the bump pictures since my exam was last week,
but now we're caught up. Here's week 33.
There will undoubtedly be more pics up shortly...from the second of our baby showers, tomorrow!

33 Weeks

Eek gads, the heft of a pineapple! Oy vey. Look at how small that quarter looks in comparison. That's how small the Short Stranger was at around 9 weeks, in late March. So so long ago...

So this week, first, I have to do a little cyber happy dance in honor of my finished comp exam taken on Tuesday. I had to go to the bathroom 3 times during that 3-hour exam, but I made it! And although I still have an oral follow up portion to go, I feel d*mn good about my finished work. Enough so to finally relax a bit and really take in what comes next. Unfortunately for me though, my body has decided to do what it does everytime I have a big school project and succumb to an illness--this time, thankfully, a cold. I shouldn't complain--at least it consistently has the decency to wait until I'm done with my work. This does, however, make the increasingly persistent last-trimester pregnancy symptoms all the more annoying. Acid-refux and scratchy throat all at once? Wonderful.

In other fun news, the dad-to-be and I got to tour the labor and delivery rooms last night during our birthing class. Being the art dorks that we are, we of course focused mainly on the interior decorating. Soothing decor? Check. Ambient lighting? Check. No nasty hospital white? Check and double check. And...happy little babies in the nursery! (The cutest part of the tour, of course).

On the Short Stranger front, which basically consists of fattening up and strengthening those lungs and muscles at this point in the game, babycenter.com has this to say:

This week your baby weighs a little over 4 pounds (heft a pineapple) and has passed the 17-inch mark. He's rapidly losing that wrinkled, alien look and his skeleton is hardening. The bones in his skull aren't fused together, which allows them to move and slightly overlap, thus making it easier for him to fit through the birth canal. (The pressure on the head during birth is so intense that many babies are born with a conehead-like appearance.) These bones don't entirely fuse until early adulthood, so they can grow as his brain and other tissue expands during infancy and childhood.

By the way, babycenter.com claims that I might "find myself waddling" at this point in the pregnancy. Hmpf. For the record, *I* don't think I waddle yet, but then again, how would I know?

getting the Iowa out of the car

You've perhaps heard the saying "You can get the girl out of Iowa, but you can't get the Iowa out of the girl" . . . well, it's the same with cars. This past weekend, Bryna's parents brought down one of their farm cars (formerly William's Chicago car) to St. Louis -- allowing us to have 2 cars for the impending life change in October/November. First of all, yes, we now have 2 cars (we decided it's just not worth it trying to make it with only 2 cars and 3 people in our family). Luckily, Bryna's parents had this one available, so we jumped at the chance (and are very appreciative).

OK, so we got the car out of Iowa, but now we're tasked with getting the "Iowa" out of the car -- esp. the trunk of the car. Today, I called the "A-Team," a car detailing service here in St. Louis, and they came out to do their best. Mr. T ripped the lining out of the trunk to help remove some of the farm-like grossness, and then they shampooed the entire car from top to bottom. It looks pretty good (after all, the car is in decent shape, for a 1996 that has spent some time in both south city Chicago and central farm Iowa), but we're going to have to wait and see about that trunk smell. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed that the "A-Team" knew their stuff and did the trick, but only time will tell. I drive it to work tomorrow, so we'll see what it smells like then.

Oh, I almost forgot . . . hence forward, the car will be called "Blue Lightening." Here is your first pic:

32 Weeks

Um, yeah, a jicama...as though I have any familiarity with this vegetable...

While this week had its fair share of adventures, including my bi-weekly trip to the doctor with the dad-to-be in tow, the big news around here is that I'm taking my comp exam next Tuesday. Which in other words means that this post will remain abbreviated. It's also been a crazy week for Mr. Mike, whose been busy dazzling the public in two talks at the St. Louis Art Museum. So we both promise some blog entries in near the future, when our careers in art can take a momentary backseat.

But for now, although I am 7/9 done, the Short Stranger is apparently only half way there (in terms of size, that is). Here's what babycenter.com has to say on the subject:

By now, your baby weighs 3.75 pounds (pick up a large jicama) and is about 16.7 inches long, taking up a lot of space in your uterus. You're gaining about a pound a week and roughly half of that goes right to your baby. In fact, he'll gain a third to half of his birth weight during the next 7 weeks as he fattens up for survival outside the womb. He now has toenails, fingernails, and real hair (or at least respectable peach fuzz). His skin is becoming soft and smooth as he plumps up in preparation for birth.

school supplies

On my first day of classes last week at Wash U. I found myself bringing an unusual array of added school supplies that only a woman pregnant or once pregnant could truly appreciate. In addition to the security blanket known as my laptop computer, as well as the pens, notebooks, and such that I drag about with me in my bag, I brought the following:
-An extra pair of shoes in case my feet swelled
-Craisins, to dull the hunger pangs
-Crystallized ginger, a natural remedy for acid refux and heartburn--because that baby in there just loves to crowd out my esophagus
- Tums, in case the ginger didn't work
-And a blanket and pillow: the required "supplies" for the birthing class I attended after I TA'd

And what did I actually use? The craisins and the shoes. Surprisingly, no blanket or pillow (they had us sit on a bean bag, which is the subject of an entry on its own...you try getting out of one of those at 7 months pregnant!) Sadly, I don't think anyone even noticed the new (uncomfortable) sandals I had worn in the morning, so I gave up on them by noon. But yay for not needing the tums!

The next goal is to pack some sort of semblance of a hospital bag, to throw in the car. Just...in...case...