The "V" Word

And no, I’m not talking vagina.  Vasectomy.  If you’re a guy, you’re probably wincing in imagined pain right now, and I feel you.  If you’re a woman that’s been through childbirth you’re probably thinking something along the lines of, “Hell yes.  Let him have a taste of the pain…” 

But I digress.

Vinny opted for this procedure since we are done having kids.  At least, we say we’re done having kids.  Vinny has always said we’ll have two and that’s it.  I’ve always said we’d take it on a case-by-case basis.  I never had a specific number of children in mind.  What if I had a baby and then decided I didn’t love being a mom as much as I thought I would, or if the baby was particularly demanding, or we didn’t have the money, or…  It never seemed right to put any kind of parameters on the potential size of our family.

Vinny’s stance has never changed.  As for me… it’s not as simple.

Almost immediately after Sophie’s birth I said, “I’m done.”  My children seem to have a harrowing (to me) way of arriving into this world, and there is a part of me that does not want to press my luck.  We’ve all come through unscathed so far and I am thankful each and every day that Eli, Sophie and myself came through those experiences in good health.

So there’s that.

Then there’s the part of me that longs to be younger and richer so we could have more kids.  At this point we’re comfortable with two so it seems a bit impractical to push things that way. 

And then there’s the matter of actually caring for these children.  They’re exhausting.  I already feel guilt on some days because I rarely get to spend any one-on-one time with each child and feel as though my attention is usually in ten different places.  I’ve had several people say to me, “After two kids it doesn’t matter, it’s all really the same,” but I can’t get behind that statement. 

When I think of my attention being divided further by another child I wonder how I would actually do it.  Check that.  I know I could do it, but whether or not I would do it happily is another question.

So there are all these reasons not to have another child.  And they are good, solid reasons.  To be honest, there is no further justification needed beyond Vinny not wanting more children because, really, we both need to be on board for a decision of that magnitude.

And yet…

When I think about not having that moment of learning I am pregnant again, I get sad.

When I think about not feeling a little babe kick/move/punch/roll around in my belly again, I get sad.

When I look at my maternity clothes and remember being pregnant with Eli and Sophie, I get sad (and nostalgic).

When I think about how awesome our kids are, how good we are at making kick-ass babies, and then realize we aren’t going to do it again, I get really, really sad.

For some crazy reason I like being pregnant and having babies.  Nevermind the insomnia, morning sickness, insane heartburn, carpal tunnel, massive weight gain, general aches and pains, etc.  I love it.  And I have to add that I do have easy pregnancies, despite those ailments.  Really.  I am lucky.

In spite of all these things I know the best decision for us is to not have more babies. 

It doesn’t mean I still can’t be sad about it.

I never anticipated being the one leaving the urologist’s office in tears (and for those of you that know Vinny, you will appreciate that statement to the fullest ... and for the record he did fine).  But there you go.  As we drove home from Vinny’s procedure last week I couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down my face.  It was a bittersweet moment for both of us.  Then Vinny managed to lighten it with a joke: “I’m not sure if I just did that because I don’t want more kids, or because of the ones we already have.” 

It didn’t stop my tears, but it did put a smile on my face.

Back To Square One

I still have twenty pounds to lose. 

There it is.  I thought this process went slowly after Eli, was irritated that I had to wear maternity clothes for two months after he was born.  I would scold myself, “Woman, you need to put those maternity jeans away.”  But they were just so comfortable.  And, the only pants that fit.

Now, I can’t believe that I managed to pack away the last of my maternity clothes two months after Eli was born.  It took me four months after Sophie was born to pack away the last of my maternity clothes, and honestly, I could have kept wearing many of them except for the fact that it was beginning to give me a major complex.

When I look at it from a rational standpoint it’s simple:  I had ten pounds left of Eli baby weight to lose when I got pregnant with Sophie, and now I’m down to the last ten pounds of Sophie baby weight.  That doesn’t sound so bad.  The problem occurs when I add those two numbers and see: 20.

To me that is a lot of weight.  Two years before Eli was born I wanted to lose ten pounds.  I’ve never been one to lose weight based on my diet.  For the most part I eat healthy, and even when I make a push to eat healthy all the time I never lose more than a pound, two at most.  And it must be pointed out: I like to eat.  A lot.  Thankfully most of my indulgences don’t involve fast food, processed food, or grease.  But sometimes they do.

No, for me to lose any weight I literally have to beat it off my body.  I have to sweat buckets to lose one pound.  So after a year of trying to lose weight, of exercising on a regular basis, I managed to lose seven whole pounds.  On the one hand, this was devastating.  Really?  Seven pounds in a year?  What kind of progress is that?  From a numbers standpoint it sounds like a terrific failure.

On the other hand, from a how-do-I-feel standpoint, it was perfect.  Although I would have preferred my final weight to have been five pounds less, I had to accept the fact that when I ate reasonably and exercised this was my body’s comfortable resting weight.  I could maintain this weight without depriving myself of any food, and by exercising a reasonable amount. 

More importantly, I felt good, fit, and didn’t find myself cringing in front of the mirror, or hiding when someone got out the camera (well, yeah, I still did that, but on the inside I was protesting less).

But now?  TWENTY pounds.  I feel like I am getting ready to climb Everest.

Here’s the thing:  I like working out.  I really, really do.  I like to go jogging.  I love riding my bike.  I like to lift weights when I have access to them.  Working out feels good, and has always been a huge stress reliever for me. 

The challenge is: how do I do these things when I never sleep, when Vinny works 70-80 hours a week, and when we are displaced from our normal surroundings (and my jogging stroller)?

The easy answer is: since I’m not sleeping I can find time somewhere, when Vinny is off on weekends I can get to the gym, and I’ve found some trails to take walks on with the kids.

This is going to take longer than I would like it to.  Getting to the gym (the only perk of living in an apartment complex again) once a week isn’t going to do it. 

But it’s a start.  After I work out I feel like my old self again.  I can barely jog a mile without feeling like I am going to toss my cookies, the amount of weight I am lifting is laughable, and seeing myself in the wall-to-wall mirrors does little for my self-esteem.

I don’t care.  It feels like I am starting over in every way.  In many ways, I am.  Having a baby takes a toll.  I had two in seventeen months.  Now I wish I could go back in time and shake my two-months-postpartum-with-Eli self and say, “Hey!  You!  You’re putting your maternity clothes away after two months?  Congratulations!  That’s awesome!   No, it really is.” 

My hope is there will come a point (again) when I look back at this time and say:  “You went to the gym after being up all night, running errands, doing housework and then spending the rest of the day with your family?  You didn’t collapse into bed and say ‘I’m too tired?’  That’s awesome!  No, it really is.”