Stabby

A friend used the word "stabby" to describe her own behavior today. Immediately, I was like, "YES! Oh my God, yes! That is completely how I feel right now: STABBY."

I have reached that point of pregnancy where nothing fits anymore and I am constantly uncomfortable for one reason or another. Just breathing is a chore right now. This kid is so high that there is no room for my stomach to expand and I have perpetual heartburn. There is simply not enough sleep in the world to meet my needs. Pretty much all I want to do is lay on my left side and anything that interferes with that makes me feel stabby.

   LEFT: Me tonight (35w).                                    RIGHT: Me at 36w pregnant with Ada.

So, essentially everything makes me feel stabby.

At least Tim is a grown-up man. He can reason his way around his pregnant, stabby wife and knows that it will pass. Poor Ada must wonder what in the hell is going on with her mother who can't pick her up at all anymore and whose lap is completely absent now. I'm sure my limited patience isn't good for her either. This morning she said, "Mom, you're killing me!" and I realize how frequently my patience wears thread-bare thin these days. Don't even get me started on the Allied Van Lines guy who didn't show up today for the in-home estimate. He may want to wait a few days before coming around here.

So what's a super-pregnant girl to do? I came up with a list because even I need a little something to reference:

1. Eat easily digestible food. If it hangs around too long I just spend hours and hours burping it up and that's just gross.
2. Ask for help. The nanny comes one day a week now for a few hours and it saves me. I've been putting a lot more in Tim's court too. Poor guy is stressed out as it is but sometimes by the end of the day I really have reached my physical limit.
3. Say no and mean it. And don't feel bad about it. I realize now that I may have done myself a disservice by making "doing-it-all" look effortless.
4. Sleep whenever possible. A bedtime of 8:30? Sleeping in until the last possible moment? Taking a nap? Yes. Yes. and Yes.
5. Take the bus more often. Seriously. It's a pride thing but man, walking up the hills to get back to our house is enough of a deterrent that I don't get Ada out to the playground nearly as often as I should. That's not good for either of us. 
6. Quiet Activities - I bought a bag of beads for $7.99 at Michael's and she has spent about 4 hours over the past week stringing new necklaces one after the other. This was so worth eight clams. I need ore stuff like this. She paints, plays with her ponies, 'reads' books to herself, plays with playdough, does puzzles, etc and is presently obsessed with her new doll house that was a birthday present from her grandparents. I need more stuff like this and by 'this' I mean stuff that doesn't involve me bending over or doing anything else remotely physical. 

I'm happy to hear anything anyone else did late in pregnancy to make keeping up with their toddler more manageable. Parking her in front of the TV is not my favorite option.