Dear baby or, as I’m fond of calling you lately, Little Turd,
Your father doesn’t like my new nickname for you. In fact, I think he finds it downright cruel. Perhaps it is, but for the past four days I have barely been able to get off the couch to dry wretch in the toilet, so you are currently Little Turd until proven otherwise.
I blame myself for briefly entertaining the idea that I was getting through the early pregnancy without too much illness. Sure, a little nausea is OK – I always get a little nausea. The onslaught that has been the last four days is ridiculous. This morning I was reduced to tears as I lay on the bathroom floor, willing the nausea to stop for long enough for me to brush my teeth. Yes, Little Turd, I am blaming you for this! Fortunately, I looked it up and you can’t hear me for another nine weeks. Hopefully by then I’ll be whispering loving platitudes to you.
Fortunately your father has been doing wonderful things like making me tea, and cooking pikelets (for the first time!) when I have a craving. I think he’s trying to do what he can to make me well. It makes me feel completely useless. I can’t even face putting my clothes in the dirty clothes basket – life is just that hard with this nausea!
The hardest thing about the nausea is working. I find myself just wanting to tell my boss so I can beg off work sick. However, I’m determined to last beyond 12 weeks before telling work. You see, I just got promoted and I’m not sure how me telling them I’m going to be taking a year off to care for my baby is going to go down. It’s all very tricky! I have no idea what I’m going to be like once I have you, but at the moment my career is very, very important to me. In fact, I’d say it’s a big part of who I am.
I’m thinking I might tell A at work soon. A is the other person in my team. She edits the website and I edit and manage our print publications. I feel like I need someone to know. But then again, I really don’t want anyone to treat me any differently. It sounds ridiculous, right? I hope that by the time you’re having kids (or not, no pressure) that it’s not such a big deal for people to leave work to have kids, that it doesn’t feel like a career-breaker. I hope that it’s OK for you to have flexible work hours so you can see your kids more. I hope that childcare is more affordable and that parental leave is more than minimum wage. In 2014 it feels like we’re beginning to get close to acknowledging that men and women should be able to equally share the parenting load, but not every workplace subscribes to it, or supports it. For example, your Dad and I want to share the load. We both want to work four days a week when I start back at work. But, your Dad doesn’t think his work will allow it. And, to be honest, I’m not convinced I’ll be allowed to work four days either. It makes life difficult. So, right now, I’m going to say I’m sorry if I worked too much. If I have to work full time until I can find something more flexible, I will. I hope it doesn’t come to that, baby. I’d hate to think of you in childcare every day. But, at the end of the day, I will do everything I can to make sure you have a secure life, where you don’t have to worry about money and where you don’t watch the people around you struggle.
musingmummablog 