Believe in the Flowers.

Jaundice, among all of the potential side-effects of delivering early, really isn't the most life-threatening. I was supposedly jaundiced when I was born. Lots of people were - and everybody I know has been okay. But for first-time parents, it was excruciating to be told to leave our beautiful baby boy in a box, to let him cry because it was better to have him in that box crying than it was to take him out and risk damaging any of his organs.

Husband took to singing "Yellow" by Coldplay to The Kid when he was crying and there was nothing either of us could do. It was an appropriate song, although I don't think either of us really thought his skin had that signature yellow tint to it that jaundiced babies tend to get. In retrospect it should be relatively amusing - Husband had the common sense to sing a song that was appropriate for the situation - but the lyrics themselves seemed to hone in on a deeper emotion that we were getting to experience for the first time. 

When I say that I've had a bad day, I mean that today really wasn't all that awful up until, for some reason, the point when Husband went to work after I came home. I spent nearly all of those four hours he was gone sobbing uncontrollably, and after he left to go to Sunday night game, it began again. I have only just stopped crying within the last 45 minutes or go, an accomplishment I'd be more willing to flaunt if I understood better why I put myself through so many hours of mental anguish just for the sake of bawling my eyes out. It's even upsetting #2, Little Kid, who is defiantly kicking the shit out of me in retribution for all the loud, crying-type noises I've been torturing him with.

I guess every once in a while we just need to get it all out, to find some kind of release for the pent-up anger and frustration and sadness that we box away day after day. I never was good at dealing with individual emotions, and so I think I find it easier to let them stew until I can't stand it anymore. A good cry unfortunately doesn't always do the trick, but more often than not it will help enough that I can sufficiently continue on with life without feeling like some kind of crazed sociopath. Tonight, however, the reasons for my crying leave me wanting to do little more than cuddle up with my two-year-old and be thankful that while I admit to having problems that are more than I alone can deal with, I am not fucked up enough that I would willingly and thoughtlessly starve and beat my baby boy, then leave him to die. There is a picture fresh in my mind of a gorgeous, blonde-haired little boy who met such a fate, a picture of him smiling and happy and looking as though his world is wonderful and perfect, and it tears my heart to absolute shreds to know that he is no longer alive and died at the same age as my beautiful baby boy.

I may have problems, but at least I am not a monster even on my worst days.

Meanwhile, the house is a no - rent would be jacked up to $500 total, which far exceeds our payment abilities. Back to the drawing board. It is, however, good to have a solid answer, to not wonder any longer. In this sort of situation, it is dangerous for us to have too much hope about one single option, hope that keeps us from persuing other choices because we are too hung up on the potentials - and now that this option is no more, we will move on and continue looking for other places to live. 

The new layout has a link to it on the right-hand bar, and for anyone looking for free (or cheap) layouts that vary seasonally, I highly suggest checking them out.

Until tomorrow - for now, I'm going to go pee one last time (until I have to get up again to do so in two hours) and head to bed so I can curl up with The Kid and wonder about things.

People can charge a lot for plus-sized clothing.

People DO charge a lot for plus-sized clothing.

I will be spending $50 easily on one good nursing bra. ONE.

To me, this seems ungodly. The idea of spending more on one bra that I MIGHT get to use for a year and that may not fit me once #3 rolls around than I would spend on three pairs of jeans is ludacris. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem I'll be given much of a choice. Forcing a regular bra to work as a nursing bra is difficult at best given my size, and completely tearing one apart to attempt to make it into a nursing bra is a feat that is not for the lighthearted (a group that I am certainly a member of, if not maybe VP). The thought of trying to breastfeed, especially in public, and still manage some level of modesty, seems far-fetched given the circumstances I'm facing. I can't bring myself to justify spending that much money on one bra that I'll have to special-order, a bra that may not fit me in the first place and a bra that I may have to spend money on to ship - meaning if I spend a total of $60 on one bra, plus shipping, one way, I will still be out $20 once I've shipped the damn thing back after I found it didn't fit. Then I have to wait for the refund. And then I'd have to start the process again. If one bra doesn't fit, I will lose a THIRD of my investment into it (or thereabouts) attempting to get it, then give it back.

In lighter news, our living arrangements have not yet changed. A full day's worth of rain (with another day of heavy rain being promised to us by the local meteorologists) means we're still struggling with leaks on the wall by Husband's desk, and on the other side of the wall directly behind a bookcase I'm struggling to empty out. I keep meaning to work on packing, but at this point it's a bigger deal to keep the house halfway clean. My new doula, a wonderful woman I found via DONA, will be visiting in the next two weeks or so to come talk to us. I'm excited, but I'm worried at the same time - we are notorious pack rats, and have a LOT of stuff sitting around. Mostly toys. Making all of this stuff look like it's halfway organized always turns out to be a struggle of several days, and even then it's back to normal within a week. Partially because we're lazy. And partially because ... Well, keeping up a home with a two-year-old in tow is difficult. Just ask us.

We have a place in mind we're considering, and need to continue our search for other arrangements, but so far I think we've both come to terms with the entire situation. It sucks on levels I cannot begin to explain, but at this rate we aren't being given much of a choice. We can either deal with it now, or wait until the last minute and end up homeless. I'm not a fan of the second option, so #1 is all we've got for now. I keep reminding myself that one way or the other, everything will work out as it's supposed to, and as long as we're all doing okay and have a roof over our heads and food to eat, and of course jobs to go to, we're doing a hell of a lot better than we've been able to claim in the past. We will manage, we will survive, and if it means a struggle, it's nothing we haven't done before.

As a sidenote, Husband has issued a challenge to other bloggers, and to himself: a 30-day Blog-a-Thon. He intends to blog every day for 30 days straight. I accepted his challenge on what he considered to be Day 1 for him - April 13th - and promptly did not follow through. In fact, I failed by five days, if you ignore the fact that I began this post before midnight. Husband has done quite well, only missing a couple of times. I think, though, that this says a lot about us.

We're young, we have things to work on. We'll manage. Always do.

Here's wishing everyone a warm weekend and a drier Sunday than we're going to have.

We still haven't heard back from our landlady about the status of the house we were going to rent-to-own. At this point, I realize fully that I should call her myself and find out exactly what's going on. The problem is, of course, that I'm absolutely done with this entire situation. It seems unlikely at this point that we're going to get the house, and while I'm tempted to pursue it with some sort of unrealistic optimism, it doesn't seem worth all the hassle anymore. I'm painfully aware of how dire of a situation this is, but at the same time I can't begin to explain how draining it is to go through all of this at once. I had never thought that in this economy we would have to struggle so violently to WANT to pay someone money every month for living someplace! The worst part is that thanks to our combined credit histories, we have no chance of buying in the immediate future - leaving us open to the housing crisis. I worry daily about whether or not we'll be one of the world's homeless in a month or two.

We have options, of course, limited as they are. I'm single-handedly attempting to explore them all, but my expectations are depressingly low. I suppose I'm tiring of all of this drama; I'm not a fan of soap operas for a reason, and the idea of dealing with finding housing for all of us and trying, at the same time, to figure out how we will make ends meet and when we'll pay bills is becoming a strain. I usually open and deal with all of the bills we get - electric and phone go straight to me, and I deal with them alone nine times out of ten. Rent is open season but I feel I'm usually the one that remembers it needs to be paid and arranges for us to take those few extra minutes in order to do so. The car bills always go straight to Husband's desk, because they're in his name, but most of the time I'm again the one that brings up when they're due. GMAC no longer calls him first, they call my phone instead; the problem is that they can't actually share or discuss account information with me because the car is entirely in his name, so all they're ever calling to do is talk to him, or have him call them back. I pass on the message, but he rarely calls them unless I harp on him for days prior just to get him to let them know that yes, we remember they exist and we haven't forgotten that we owe them money, too.

Thankfully, though we've been denied our food stamp benefits for now (a long story in and of itself), I have an appointment to reapply for WIC next Thursday. Because we're on the medical card for the state and I'm currently pregnant, we SHOULD qualify without question, but we're still required to bring proof of our income - I'm sure you can see why this makes me nervous, considering that we should qualify no matter how much we make as long as I'm pregnant and we're on the state medical program, but they still require income verification. This is our only hope at affording some semblance of groceries on our own, and I can only hope we're approved. It's really, really embarassing to use, but at the same time I'm so thankful for the assistance WIC provides.

Keep your thoughts with us while we figure out how to deal with all of this. I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow morning, and will be speaking with my OB about seeing a therapist and potentially starting the medication I should've been on years ago.

We were informed last week that our landlady would (hopefully) let us know today whether or not the actual owner of the house would let us rent-to-own without an increase in rent. Unfortunately, the way she worded the situation last I spoke to her indicated that she had no control over whether or not the rent would increase, and there was a good possibility that it would. She said she would hopefully find out by today, but I kind of felt that even if she doesn't find out today, she still needs a yes or no on the house. This leaves us with a couple of situations; three, to be exact, since the fourth isn't an option. To give you an idea of where we stand, here are the options:

* We go ahead and rent the house while it's still on the market, leaving us open to having the house sold from underneath us while we're still living there at any point in time (this is the one that isn't an option for us).

* We tell her we'll take the house anyway, without an answer about the rent increase, and then attempt to deal with the increase if and when it happens (also not an option, because IF the rent goes up, we can't afford it).

* We find out the rent is going to increase for sure, which is also a no, but it's a potential option.

* We find out the rent WON'T go up, and thus can give her a yes on the house and stop worrying about all of this.

Obviously, out of all of those situations, the last one is the best for us. Anything else is a no, and means that we're back to the drawing board on our living situation, with even less time to try to find some kind of solution. There are numerous plus sides to the house; not only is it a guarantee of not having to deal with any stairs, but it means too that we'll have a full building to ourselves and a yard that's just our's. It isn't a perfect situation, but it's as much as we can hope for right now, considering our options.

Of course, we're also dealing with other typical life problems, namely money. That stuff is evil, although I'll avoid the cliché that it's somehow necessary in our lives. Tack on to our issues that we've suddenly been denied renewal of the LINK card this month, leaving us unable to even buy our own groceries, and it seems like everything is piling up on itself. Husband has stated multiple times that we will be okay and things will work out, and I do agree with that, but sometimes it's so difficult to actually see things in that positive light. Thus far, someone has been watching out for us - we've been lucky and fortunate enough to have that big miracle happen right when we needed it. But right now, we're in desperate need of that miracle - instead of it being us, all of our friends are finding their windfalls and we're yet again behind and struggling for the things that we NEED, and going without the few things that we want. This is rather typical for us, but it still seems grossly unfair; we've done our best to bust our asses for what we want, and for some reason we're still the ones that are being denied our few basic requests - like food, safe housing, and a little financial help here and there. I keep waiting for the state medical card to be withdrawn; we don't make enough for that to happen, and I know it, but I can't help worrying.

Today I'll likely be going out to request a housing form from Country Club Heights, a local income-based rental complex. They're almost always booked, though, and there's a waiting list that has no concern for immediate need. 

Last Friday we receieved notice from our landlady, via a phone call, that the bank that owns this property will not be renewing any leases here, or at the building immediately next door. They've decided that, considering the increase in tenants in their own bank building across the street, it would be far more economical to tear down both of these houses and instead provide extra parking - thus ensuring that the bank can offer more rental space in their own building, and that the tenants they already have will not be as jammed into their parking spaces. As it is, two new cars have been introduced; one parks atop a rather large sinkhole that formed at some point in the parking lot's life, and which could easily destroy a portion of a car should the poor woman back her low-set SUV-type-thing out improperly, and the other parks beside us in what is, technically, parking reserved for apartment tenants of our building and the one next door. Speaking from a strictly financial standpoint, I can see why this makes sense: rent payments from the tenants of a couple of old houses that are in constant need of upkeep and repair will never meet or exceed the amount that the bank will take in via renting out the remainder of their internal office space. Even filling one tiny office will provide more than our paltry (in comparison) $350 a month, an amount that I can't imagine would be exceeded by any degree by including an upstairs tenant in this building (we don't believe there is one) and a tenant in the house next door.

This, of course, poses a problem. Not one full year ago, as of this July, we moved into this apartment. Of the places we have lived, it has seemed the most homey, although it has recently started to show its age via a persistent leak near Husband's computer desk whenever it rains, a troubled cold water knob in the shower coupled with leakage problems around the tub that have left the bathroom floor soaked in a two-foot diameter spreading away from the tub, and a mouse that has spread itself from occasionally scaring the living shit out of us on the floor to making irritating night noises by eating through the drop ceiling tiles while we sleep. All of these things would, hypothetically, be fixable, although their price ranges for doing so would vary considerably: I imagine that "fixing" the mouse would cost no more than a few dollars, but the drainage and leaking problems could well add up into the hundreds, depending on the severity. Since I'm no home improvement specialist, my assumption is that these things are expensive, and thus will not be fixed within the three months we have left in which we're allowed to live here - so, while it goes mostly against our better judgement of actually informing our landlady that we have problems here, we're avoiding it anyway in lieu of being told that none of these things are worth the bank spending its money on.

Anyway, I've gotten off topic. The problem is that our beloved little apartment, someplace we had originally intended on staying for at least a little while, will be gone within the next four or five months, and our lease expires before then. This opened us up to the question of whether or not we had the option of buying a house for ourselves; this was quickly answered after a visit to a loan specialist, who bluntly but helpfully informed us that our credit scores hovered in the low 520 range, but that there were some things we could do in order to help ourselves. It was a short, bittersweet conversation - we had gone into the process hoping for a miracle but knowing that we would be denied - but it answered the question that would determine the process we would use to continue our search for other living arrangements. So we steered away from the faraway concept of ownership and instead looked over the pathetic excuse for an apartment listing that was provided to us via the bank (along with the promise from our landlady that, as we were "dear to [her] heart" we would be given first choice of all open rentals with the bank). Most of the places were far smaller than what we started out with two years ago at our Broadway apartment, and the majority were within areas that we considered beyond unsafe to live in. We struggled with the idea of renting one of their also-for-sale four bedroom homes with a married couple we know, though that idea was quickly shot down as they own two cats and some four or five ferrets; we already illegally have our cats here with us and would hate to see the fees that would be incurred by asking for that many more pets, if they were allowed at all. Our only other feasible option was a tiny, two bedroom house with yard and basement. It was determined, after some measuring and considering, that our bed would only barely fit into the biggest bedroom, and even then it would be a struggle to get it into the room, much less positioned. The living room would barely contain all that our current living room does: a couch, an old console TV (we can't afford an HDTV), and two computer desks complete with computers. The blue rocking chair currently in our living room would have to be moved elsewhere. The basement is dirty and somewhat inaccessible for someone as unsteady as me, the storage space is questionable at best, and we would completely lose our game/dining room. One of the doors would need to be replaced, and a portion of the foundation on either side of the basement is caving in (this is bad enough on one side that they have put in wooden supports in an attempt to take some of the weight off of the original crumbling rock). Husband's biggest problem: the stove would be electric, not gas.

The exchanges were questionable. There is no dedicated parking, leaving others to park in front of the house or out behind it in the yard. There is, however, a yard - that in and of itself is a huge improvement over our ten foot by eight foot gravel pit. There's a fairly secure deck that leads off of the house, it's in a relatively decent neighborhood, there's a baseball field just across the rarely-used street, and all of the windows are new. There are laundry hookups that are easily accessible from every corner of the house, meaning that we can finally begin doing our own laundry again at home (this is a brilliant concept to me, as I have wanted for some time to get into some form of cloth diapering for Kid #2) and thus stop using so much gas just for me to go over to Mom's house to do laundry there. The biggest caveat was that, if we rented the house, we would have the entire building to ourselves. It's a novel concept for a couple of people that have been renting this entire time; we're used to sharing a building with at least one other tenant, and thus having to be careful that we're not too loud at night, that nothing gets slammed, or that we aren't coming in at all hours and disrupting the others that live there. It has meant, too, that we've been subjected to the loud late-night music of college students and the bad parking jobs of their peers. We've had to wonder who else in the building is getting our mail, and why we're still getting mail for people that, to the best of our knowledge, don't even live in the building anymore. We would be privvy, too, to the wonders of a dishwasher, to brand-new carpeting and linoleum, and to walls that are no longer a disturbing tanned flesh tone.

The point of contention was that the price increase would be some $100 a month. Not bad, when all things are considered, for a house in exchange for an apartment, but Husband wisely indicated that we would be better off by looking around and considering our other options, even if it meant giving up the dependable services of our landlady's maintenance crew and her overwhelming desire to make sure that their buildings are safe and well taken care of. My mother swore she'd be willing to personally take care of this price increase in our stead, much the same way she originally promised to pay half of our car payment every month. We went to look, we argued, we considered, we found every possible problem with the house that we could, including the substancial decrease in space. We were kindly provided with the key for the weekend, and took a trip back to stay for two hours in which we did our best to talk ourselves out of the house. We wouldn't want to buy it, we argued, as the number of expensive-to-fix problems far outweighed any potential benefit the home would provide. It wasn't a long-term option, thanks to the crumbling foundation, which would mean that we'd still have to find a new place to live in the next year or two, whether or not we liked the house or wanted to stay. There are only two phone jacks in the entire house, neither of which is actually functional and only one of which is in the proper place to allow us internet access without wireless cards in our computers - another potential problem for a couple of junkies. We'd never be able to comfortably fit our belongings into the place, and if we moved in, the entire house would look incredibly crowded - especially with the addition of another child.

Only, well, maybe we could use this portion of the basement for storage moreso than the rest. We could always clean up the yard; that would leave us with a bit of a better feeling about the whole place. If we put the TV here, and the desks here, and maybe if I switched out from a rather large table to a smaller, more reasonably sized computer desk, we had a chance of fitting things in. If we're willing to live with the few inconveniences that the size provides, we'd have a chance of living comfortably. And the table that currently takes up most of the space in the game/dining room could fit, leaves down, in the middle of the kitchen, given a chance.

I'm sure you can see where this is going.

So yesterday I called our landlady and let her know that yes, we would take the house, if she would agree to a walk-through with her at some point this week. She gladly agreed. Now we again begin the long process of cleaning up, decluttering, and packing for yet another move. Wish us luck.

Otherwise we're still doing quite well. I had some mild health problems recently that have involved coming very close to fainting. I've been told that my blood pressure is all right, though, and that it's nothing more than a sudden drop in pressure brought on by extreme temperature changes. I have a feeling there's more to it, but my doctor says otherwise - so until something strange happens I'm willing to call it good for now. Health-wise, things have been great. I still have suffered less this time around than I did with The Kid, and am thankful for it. I feel relatively good, all things considered, although I still have a huge aversion to cleaning that I've had, um, ... All my life. Never mind, I guess I can't blame that on pregnancy. 

Speaking of cleaning, I suppose I really ought to get on that, hmm?

I've been up since 4:45 AM. I made the casual, understandible mistake that all pregnant women do, and got up to go pee only a couple of hours before a rather important and nerve-wracking event. Today is our "big" ultrasound, and it's scheduled for 9 AM on the dot (from what I can remember). I know I should try desperately to remind myself that kid #2 may not even be in a position to flash the goods, and that we may not even get to find out today, but it's hard to think about that when all I want to do is find out whether or not my assumptions for the last five-ish months have been correct. I want to make sure that there's nothing wrong, that the powers-that-be have been kind in their assigment of working-order pieces to this creature (which I've seen is approximately the size of a large heirloom tomato, now - leaving me thinking that I probably have an actual tomato in there, as opposed to a baby). I want continual affirmation that as a larger woman (who am I kidding, I'm huge!), I have the ability to produce healthy children who aren't automatically littered with weight or health problems. This will only be my second ultrasound (the first was necessary because the LMP date and the measuring date, due to this kid being a product of a second ovulation for NO REASON that I couldn't remember exactly when it was, were off by several weeks), so I feel some odd sense of entitlement to check on this kid once more before I go back to life as I know it.

The funny thing is that thus far, I've often had to remind myself I'm pregnant. I've had the off pain here and there, nothing dangerous, but otherwise I have been relatively lucky in that my symptoms have been few and far between. I haven't suffered with this kid like I did with #1, and I try to remind myself that I am of a numbered few who goes those first three or four months without throwing up once due to pregnancy. I haven't gained weight at all that I'm aware of; I started out at about 330 pounds with clothes on and have remained there, hovering between 329.4 and 329.9 consistently in the doctor's office. I'm proud of that accomplishment, as I've done little to change my diet beyond not allowing myself to fall into the age-old trap of eating for two. I still wear the same size pants, and am only finally starting to worry about my shirts. Pants that were too big for me pre-pregnancy are still too big, and I couldn't be more lucky. I guess there are some plus sides to being plus-sized.

That being said, I'm now at a mental fork in the road. I can stay up and likely do unconstructive things, then realize at 7:15 AM (when I only have about 15 minutes to go back to sleep) that I am exhausted, or I can go back to bed now while I'm still not sleepy and put my very cold feet on Husband's nice, warm legs. The problem then, of course, would be that if I don't pass back out, I'm kind of SOL - past a certain point in the morning, if you so much as think about moving, The Kid will automatically realize that there is some vague possibility that YOU ARE AWAKE, and he probably should be too. This has held true as early as 5 AM, so at 5:50 AM I am already taking my chances as it is. Ah, decisions, decisions.