Oh hey. Today is my shitty sister’s birthday. Happy birthday psycho-Sissy. May your 49th birthday be nicer than your disgusting self actually deserves.

Sigh.

I told Noah recently that part of my problem is that I can list off all the ways I am a failure as a wife and mother with great fluency but I really don’t understand what ways in which I am successful. I don’t feel like I’m doing much of anything right.

He told me a few things he appreciated and of course my brain abruptly dropped those words out of my memory banks because nice things are so easy to forget. But I did latch on to one thing: a happy family.

Noah pointed out that this is his first chance getting to be part of a happy family too. It’s not that we get along 100% of the time or that everything is sunshine and roses every day. But taken as a whole… we are a very happy family. We wake up to snuggles every day. We say with great sincerity every morning, “I am so happy I get to see you again.” We give hugs and kisses whenever anyone leaves the house because you never know what could happen and we want to make sure that no matter what we will have no regrets about how we left one another behind.

We encourage one another. We are supportive of everyone getting to have whatever big feelings the person needs to have. (With strong guidelines about Outside Voices Belong Outside.) Having the feeling is always ok. Let’s talk about ok and not ok ways of dealing with our feelings.

It’s ok to be angry. It’s ok to be so angry you feel like you are going to explode. Ok. Now how do we handle these big feelings in a healthy way?

It’s funny to notice that part of my problem at this point is how much guilt and shame I feel for my moodiness while pregnant. PMDD means I have shitty moods every month. I have suicidal periods just about like clockwork. But I can check my phone and look at the Clue application and see that my mood is about my hormonal cycle and not just because I’m a horrible person. When I’m pregnant… it just drags on and on and it isn’t about this day in the month and it feels like these feelings will never end. It feels like I feel like this because I am just a shitty ungrateful person.

I spent six fucking years crying for this baby. How dare I spend the pregnancy depressed and feeling like I should die.

I feel really ashamed of myself. I should be ecstatic. I should embrace the discomforts and inconveniences of pregnancy with relative good cheer. I owe that to Noah and the kids because they all agreed to having this baby.

But I can’t. I’m a petty small pathetic asshole and I feel like fucking shit and I’m so sad and I feel like I don’t deserve anything good in this world.

My friend’s mom offered to be a labor support person. She has helped her daughters and her nieces. It’s such a sweet offer. And every time I consider it I want to burst into tears because I’ve spent my whole life getting by on the dregs of parenting that other people have left over from the people who actually matter to them–their kids. I know that is appropriate and fair and how it should be. But I am so sad my mama has never been able/wanted to be there for me like that.

I’m so terrified of labor again. I had a conversation with Noah about it. I don’t think we are very clear about what I want from a labor support person. He thinks that what I want/need is someone to be between me and the doctors/nurses advocating for me. Given that I am fully able to scream coherent directions in the middle of pushing… That’s not the part I worry about. I can yell at people for myself. I’m really good at that. And when midwives/OBs say that you know you are in “real labor” when you can’t talk anymore… I laugh at them. I have done a lot of training myself for a lot of years to be able to process and communicate no matter how much pain I’m in. A number of bdsm presenters have told me I’m their favorite demo model because I am always able to be articulate about what I am experiencing no matter how overwhelming it is.

I’m afraid of the fact that I don’t believe in me much. I want to be a quitter. I believe I am going to fail. Again. As usual.

Despite lots of evidence that I don’t fail at everything and I have in fact gone through this process twice before.

I want something a lot closer to blacksheep doing the marathon with me and coaxing me through and believing in me when I can’t believe in myself. She was so breathtakingly wonderful during the race. “You can run for a minute. I know you can. I’ll set my timer. You don’t have to run longer than that. You can do it.” She got me through. I’m pretty sure I would have failed at the marathon if she hadn’t been beside me telling me I could do it.

And I don’t actually trust my friend’s mom like that. If she tells me that I can do it I will get angry and scream at her that she doesn’t even really know me so how the fuck does she know what I’m capable of. It worked with blacksheep in large part because she has known me for a long time and she can cite chapter on verse on things where I didn’t fail. It’s not like she’s a sycophantic constant part of my life… I only see her intermittently every few years. But she knows me. She can remind me of things I forget about myself. She had full standing to say, “You trained for this and your body can do this.”

I feel so stupidly grateful for how my chiropractor is jazzing me up at every appointment. He lists off all the ways in which my body is doing very well all things considering. Yes, pregnancy is hard… but I’m really strong this time. He keeps stressing that he has never seen a pregnant person sit up casually on their own from laying down in their ninth month before. This bodes well for me. My hips are still adjusting super easily. Really, all of me is adjusting super well and if I would fucking type less (I’m escaping from my depression on forums… that’s a lot of why I’m not recording more of it here…) I would be in extraordinary shape.

I am thinking about asking Noah to hide my computer and phone most of the time for a while. I have no self control and I am seriously hurting myself. I will keep a note pad out to write down the things I actually need to do on a computer and I could probably get it all done in an hour or two a day.

I installed one carseat yesterday. The second one is being a pain in the ass and putting it together before installation is… more complicated than I anticipated. I now understand the incredible luxury of buying Britax and having that shit arrive in one piece. But I needed something more narrow for the Prius because I’m going to need to get a carseat and a low back booster in the back seat with room for another butt.

Looking back in the van and seeing just a low back booster… I AM SO FUCKING CRAZY. I WAS INCHES AWAY FROM BEING OUT OF CAR SEATS ENTIRELY. I AM AN IDIOT.

But god I want this baby. Even though I don’t feel deserving. Even though I feel like my existence is a horrible thing that shouldn’t be inflicted on the world. I am selfish and bad and I want this baby.

I want to love this person and dote on them and encourage them and find out what flavor of asshole they are. Because they are going to be an asshole sometimes. Just like everyone else.

Speaking of assholes… time to go yell at my kids and throw them into the backyard at 7:30 in the morning.