See...

... it's not just me.

Although I've been firmly pro-natural childbirth since my teens it was Your Best Birth and The Business of Being Born that sealed the deal in the months before Gaia was born. Seriously. If you're pregnant or may ever (EVER) be pregnant in the future please at least consider alternatives beyond the induce/epidural/vaccum-my-baby-out-of-me route. I did it au natural and it was awesome.

Need a little more encouragement? A friend was blogging through labour yesterday and posted this quote on her Facebook: "There is a secret in our culture. It is not that childbirth is painful, it is that women are strong." -- Linda Stavoe Harm

Postcards From the Edge

I met Jaydeen working as a counsellor at a summer camp when I was fifteen. We bonded over our mutual love for men, babies and questionable situations. When I got pregnant she was among the first people I told, mainly because she always knows the right thing to say, but also because she was my boss and I needed to know if I was going to have to resign from ships. In the nine weeks between the time I found out about the pregnancy and finally found a job I had a lot of time on my hands to harass her at work via email. Below are some of my favourite conversations.

July 30, 2008 (5 Weeks Pregnant)

Jaydeen – OK, so I am reading a book and there is a character named Venice because that's where she was conceived. So I was thinking... Celona?

Me – Haha! I was actually pondering Estrella as the middle name regardless of gender. That would be the infamous Barcelona "street beer" we got smashed on pre and post-coital. Tacky? It means star. We'll see what Jose thinks of that. I think the name conversation will take months.

Jaydeen – Estrella for a girl, awesome. I don't think Estrella will fly for a guy's middle name. Too feminine, especially with the "ella" at the end. Jose won't go for it... you might as well name your future son "Fairy". Dear future baby - If she goes with Estrella, I tried to help.

Me – Keep in mind though Jay... it's Spanish right so the double 'l' is pronounced as a 'y'. I think it makes it a million times less feminine. Besides... it's a middle name. No one cares about the middle name. It's true. Plus, if it's a boy he's going to be WAY more attractive than all the other little boys anyway so having a girly middle name can only serve to give him perspective.

Jaydeen – I speak español, I know the pronunciation... just throwing it out there. I do agree a boy would be beautiful, as long as he doesn't get Jose's ginormous head. Man Risa, I'm so excited. I already love this baby so much!

Me – I know you speak español... I was just reminding you lest you forget. Jose's head really isn't that big... I don't think. What about Rambla or Ramblas for the boy middle name? I don't think it's nearly as cool but the significance stands. Just keep your fingers crossed that all your little God babies don't get named after characters from Nacho Libre. If it was up to Jose we'd have little Chancho, Nacho and Ramses. Think on that. We shouldn't get too excited though Jay... I haven't even gotten my first ultrasound and gotten a viable heartbeat yet. Anything could happen at this stage. Anyway... now that I've been an official Debbie Downer I think I'm going to go eat some Mac and Cheese.

Jaydeen – You made me laugh so hard! In Barcelona for the next two days so I’ll have to be careful of roaming sperm attempting to impregnate me. And I understand the point that you're at with the pregnancy. Most people don't share news until three months so I am with you this whole way!

Me – Watch out... Barcelona is tricky. I think not having sex with your Latin boyfriend while you're secretly ovulating might help. We were asking for trouble really. Just keep those legs crossed.

August 28, 2008 (9 Weeks Pregnant)

Good Morning!! I just wanted to let you know that since we talked about two and a half hours ago I've thrown up no less than three times. The last one was the best... I didn't notice the chunk of regurgitated apple pie in my hair until it hit me in the face when I tried to get back in bed. Whoever said pregnancy was magical must have also been on meth.

September 1, 2008 (10 Weeks Pregnant)

Hopefully I'm not speaking too soon BUT... I DIDN'T THROW UP TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!! Just so you understand the magnitude this is the first day since early July I haven't barfed at least once. I'm telling you Jay... this pregnancy thing blows hard. Does that make me a horrible person? Seriously though... don't do it.

September 7, 2008 (11 Weeks Pregnant)

Me – So I've been watching old episodes of ANTM and Project Runway so the baby comes out FIERCE. I know... I'm brilliant.

Jaydeen - That is oh so clever. Did you see the brand new one that started last week?

Me - Yes I did. That episode was great because it'll teach the baby tolerance should he or she ever decide they're transgendered or have to stand up for someone who is. Oh ANTM... it should be on TLC (the LEARNING channel) really.

PS. Did I tell you I`ve started calling the baby UBER-FETUS because it's already far superior to other spawn??

Jaydeen - Are you keeping a diary of this shit? Honestly.

September 24, 2008 (13 Weeks Pregnant)

I'm freaking out. I didn't know that this happened once the baby starts kicking. It's like an alien trying to escape. It doesn't look pleasant. EEK. Not pleasant. Seriously... why don't people tell you your baby is going to try and escape through your tummy prior to birth?


Finally, just for kicks, and because I`m enjoying this little stroll down memory lane, here`s a favourite from the week leading up to Gaia’s birth.

March 10, 2009 (38 Weeks Pregnant – 2 Days to Delivery)

Me – I took the day off today because I'm exhaustamified and now that I'm all napped out and bored I just wanted to remind you that you'll be here in FOUR DAYS.... Woot! Woot! You better be excited bitches! I may be gigantic and tired and boring and living in a house with only two chairs BUT we're gonna have good times!! Oh and I made some cupcakes that look suspiciously like boobs... I didn't realise until it was too late. Whoops. If you're lucky there may be some boob-cakes left when you arrive.

Jaydeen – Save me a BOOB-CAKE! Or half a boob-cake. I am OK with half because I am majorly dieting. I have this image of me coming back to work and telling everyone that I didn't go to Saskatchewan, but in fact went to fat camp.

Me – I hate you tell you this Jay... but I think visiting your pregnant friend is the exact opposite of going to fat camp. Today for lunch I had a protein smoothie, three boob-cakes, numerous scoops of icing and an entire box of Kraft dinner (extra creamy). Oh, and I added some cheddar to the KD.... and by some I mean two handfuls. When I got your email I was seriously considering getting off my ass for the fudgcicles in the freezer. Seriously.

Between Womb and World

Baby G is officially two months old today. Last night as I crawled into bed I couldn’t help thinking that only two months ago I was still pregnant. Sometimes it’s hard for me to look at Gaia and believe that she used to live inside me. I find the whole thing completely surreal. Anyway, in honour of our anniversary and because I’ve been promising it to people for so long, here it is... our birth story.

The day before Gaia was born I had my last appointment with my OBGYN. Everything was good, except for my blood pressure, which, normally very low, had spiked since my last visit prompting him to finally insist I stop working. Anyone who knows me knows I hated being pregnant. I spent the first three months sleeping next to the toilet as my days became a blur. I was so sick I actually lost five pounds. When the sickness finally dissipated I spent the next six months growing at a rapid rate. I stopped sleeping and struggled every morning to turn my normal wardrobe into maternity gear (if you’re pregnant and feel horrified at the thought of maternity clothes the Bella Band is your new best friend... I wore it until the day Gaia was born... and about a month afterwards). By my last month I was so uncomfortable I couldn’t sit for more than five minutes without wanting to cry and standing wasn't much better. If I hadn’t been distracted by working every day at a job I loved I would have gone crazy. Work and prenatal yoga made me feel like a human being and not just a baby factory. Thank God. Still, my labour was awesome. If I had the choice I’d give birth over and over if it meant I’d never have to be pregnant again. Unfortunately the two go hand-in-hand. But I digress.

After a standard night of fitful pregnancy sleeping I woke up around 7:00am on Thursday, March 12th with what felt like mild cramps. I lied in bed for awhile trying to get back to sleep and noticing the cramps were coming at fairly regular intervals, about fifteen to twenty minutes apart. Since it was still ten days before my due date I was pretty sure the cramps were Braxton Hicks. I even managed to get a little excited about the thought of my body finally “practicing” for the arrival of Baby G. After about an hour had passed and I realised I wasn’t going to get back to sleep I got out of bed and set to work on the gigantic pre-baby checklist I’d made. I cleaned the house, washed baby clothes and finally opened the Pack n Play I’d bought for Gaia to sleep in. As the cramps continued I casually thought they might be the early stages of labour, but I was still relatively unconvinced. I even remember mentioning to my Dad that I might be in labour but not to worry about it since I was probably overreacting. All I kept thinking was if I was in labour I’d be in a lot more pain than this... wouldn’t I? At about 2:00pm I made a trip to Wal-Mart. I still find it amusing that my priorities lay with buying a door hanger so I could finally organise my scarves. By the time I got to Wal-Mart I found myself having to stop and focus on my breathing every five to ten minutes as the cramping got stronger. At this point you would think I’d realise what was going on, but no. I stopped at McDonald’s for a McNugget meal. Just a note to all pregnant women out there, if you have any inkling you might be in labour, don’t eat McDonald’s for lunch. In fact, I’d give it up about month seven, just to be on the safe side. Regurgitated nuggets swimming in a pink milkshake sauce are not what you want to see in the hours before your baby makes their entrance. Trust me. I got home around 3:30pm and took a break from ‘nesting’ to talk to my husband on Skype. Not wanting to alarm him, since, and I can’t stress this enough, I was POSITIVE I wasn’t in labour, I didn’t mention anything about the cramps or the way that the tightening sensation had travelled to my lower back and was, if not painful, getting increasingly uncomfortable. By the time we said goodbye the cramping was much stronger and coming pretty regularly every five minutes or so. My plan was to have a bath and then finish the rest of my checklist and call it a night. By this point I think subconsciously I must have known what was going on. Consciously I was still in denial. I called Labour and Delivery at the General Hospital just to be on the safe side. The conversation went something like this:

Me: Hi. So sorry to bother you. I’m 38 weeks pregnant and... ummm... how would I know if I was in labour?
Nurse: Are you having contractions?
Me: Oh... well... umm... some cramps I guess. But I’m sure they’re nothing. I’m probably just being silly.
Nurse: Did your water break?
Me: Oh... well no. So it’s probably nothing right. I’m sorry I bothered you. It’s probably nothing. I’m just being ridiculous.
Nurse: Well we’d be happy to check you if you want to come in.
Me: No. No. I’m sorry. You’re probably really busy. I’m fine. I’m really sorry to have bothered you.
Nurse: Are you sure? Why don’t I take your name a number and give you a call to check on you in a few hours?
Me: Oh God no! I’m fine. I’m probably not in labour. I’m fine. OK. Ummm... right. I’m going to go now. Thank you. Oh and so sorry, again, to have bothered you.

Then I hung up.

I assume the nurse thought I was a nutcase. Now, I feel I should explain something here. I was a huge hypochondriac when I was a child. I pitched a fit over even the smallest scratch. As such, as an adult I’ve developed a pretty stiff upper lip when it comes to instances of medical need. My worst pregnancy nightmare would be arriving at the hospital only to be sent home for thinking indigestion was advanced labour. Oh the shame. Still, I think I might have taken my fear of judgement it too far. By the time I called my doula at 5:30pm, I was having trouble standing and walking and I finally admitted to myself that maybe I should start packing my hospital bag. My doula and I played the same phone game I’d played with the Labour and Delivery nurse, although she seemed far less convinced by my attempts at being nonchalant. After calling me every ten minutes to check-in, I finally agreed to track my contractions with an online tracker. After a half hour I was finally coming around to the idea that contractions less than three minutes apart and lasting about a minute might actually be labour... maybe. At 6:30pm I called my Dad. Anyone who knows me and my Dad can imagine how the next fifteen minutes went.

Me: Um... Dad... can you help me pack my bag? I think I might be in labour.
Dad: Oh. Yes. Um... do you want to go to the hospital?
Me: Um... well. I’m not sure. Should I go to the hospital?
Dad: Do you want to?
Me: I don’t know. Should I? I just timed my contractions online. They’re pretty close together, but my water hasn’t broken. So maybe not? I don’t know.
Dad: You timed your contractions online. What do you mean?
Me: It’s this program... it’s really cool... you just press the space bar and... (pause for contraction)....
Dad: Are you OK?
Me: Yeah... that’s what I’m talking about though. It happens every three minutes. Weird right?

We carried on like this for awhile. We were like the blind leading the blind. Eventually he packed my bag for me while I sat on the toilet leaking what I can only assume was amniotic fluid and periodically throwing up into my garbage can. I kid you not, I was still sure I was overreacting and I’d be sent home once we got to the hospital.

Now, for those of you who don’t know, I prepped for the labour with Hypnobirthing classes taught by Marie Berwald. The basic idea behind Hypnobirthing is that our bodies are made to give birth and that painful, stressful births are a product of fear which causes you to work against your body. The point is to learn to trust your body, and your baby, and relax through the birth process by practicing self-hypnosis. The goal is a healthy, natural (ie. drug-free), pain-free birth. Initially I was a sceptic but the classes made sense to me so I thought I’d give it a go. I completely credit Hypnobirthing with my calmness throughout the day and through the birth that was to come. The erratic screaming and mass panic of movie births had no place in my day and I managed to get through each contraction, even in the latest stages, by quietly and calmly focussing on my breath and my body. If you’re pregnant and looking to have a natural birth I highly recommend you look into it.

We got to the hospital at about 7:00pm and I finally made it up to Labour and Delivery by 7:30pm. My doula met me there and we waited at the door to be officially admitted. My nurse, an absolutely amazing woman named Linda, went over my admitting sheet with me and I gave her my prenatal records and carefully thought out birth plan. Then she led me to a bed in the assessment room. At this point I’d told my Dad not to bother parking since “I’ll only be a minute” so he quietly milled around the waiting room, assuming I’d be right back out to let him know if I was staying or not. After a quick pee-in-a-cup I stripped down and hopped up on the bed where Linda checked me and calmly announced I was fully dilated. All I could think was that maybe I missed it when my water broke. And then my water broke. Trust me... you’ll know when it happens. Frankly it’s almost comical. I felt like I should push pretty much immediately so I focussed on my breathing and bore down. In the walk from assessment to my delivery room I periodically stopped mid stride to squat and push. This was probably the first indication that all privacy and poise goes out the window in labour. By the time I got onto the bed it was close to 9:00pm. Linda started monitoring the baby’s heart rate which was extremely low. Throughout the pregnancy it had been consistently around one hundred and fifty... during labour it was closer to fifty. I should have been worried but I wasn’t. By this point I really felt like me and the baby were a team and I swear I knew we’d be OK. Linda called in a resident to get an internal heart rate monitor in place (which is not in the least bit as uncomfortable as you’d think) and calmly told me I had to push, as hard as I could, as fast as I could, to get the baby out as quickly as possible. I briefly thought about how contrary to Hypnobirthing philosophy her instructions were, I think I even said “no pushing, I’m just going to bear down and let my body birth my baby” but frankly, I’m a do-er and pushing felt right. So I did it. I tried with every bit of my being to keep breathing while I pushed, which worked about half the time, and before I knew it my doctor had arrived and I was crowning.

Just a note on childbirth... I have what I would consider a regular threshold for pain and there was no point where I felt like I couldn’t handle it. If anything I was exhausted (punctuated by the moment I declared “I’m too tired, I can’t do it anymore” and was promptly told that wasn’t an option). Labour is absolutely hard work, but pain isn’t the right word for it at all. I don’t judge anyone who’s had an epidural or plans to and I feel like everyone is completely entitled to be proud of whatever birth experience they have. I’m just saying if you’re pregnant and interested in a natural birth it is one hundred percent possible. Exhaustion? Yes! Pressure? Absolutely! Pain? Not so much. Oh but if you’re one of those people who’s in labour for days get an epidural and get some sleep. Seriously. Moving on...

Once the doctor announced I was crowning I gave one strong push and the head was out. The mystery of her low heart rate was solved when he announced the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck and asked if he could cut it before we continued (I had made a huge deal about wanting delayed cord clamping/cutting but in this case I feel medical need dictated otherwise). Focussing on holding the baby halfway between world and womb while the cord was cut was not entirely desirable but before I knew it I was being told I could finish the job and with one final, monster push Gaia came into the world. It was 9:30pm.

Because she had been in distress I wasn’t able to hold her immediately after birth. Luckily the nurse from the NICU unit came to the delivery room so I could watch as they checked her vitals and made sure she was breathing regularly. I watched her as I delivered the placenta (which made me think of jellyfish) and stitched me up (I had some minor tearing, probably due to the rate at which I pushed her out). About ten minutes after she was born I finally got to hold her. The speed of the delivery caused me to go into shock, so I was wrapped in warm blankets and if you ask me that was the perfect way to spend my first moments with Gaia. Warm, with my new baby on my chest and distantly reminded of the days when I used to come home from swimming lessons to be wrapped in towels fresh from the dryer by my Mom. My doula, who was amazing through the entire experience and who I could not have done it without, snuck out to tell my Dad what had happened. Presumably he was still waiting to see if he should go park the car. Somewhere in the hour and a half I was in active labour my Mom and brother had also arrived and they all came to the delivery room to meet Gaia. As soon as I could I called Jose, who was asleep, and told him about the baby. Needless to say he was shocked (maybe I should have given him some indication when we were chatting in the afternoon, but when you’re pregnant and your husband has no option to be with you, you do what you can not to worry him).

Before I knew it I was wheeled to the Mom and Baby unit. I said goodbye to my entourage, made a few more phone calls and spent the night with Gaia beside me, too much in awe of her sleeping face to get much sleep myself. The next morning Jose called me to tell me about a dream he’d had. “Baby,” he said “I had a dream that you had our little chanchita last night... so maybe she is coming soon?” I laughed as I told him it was real. That's what I get for trying to tell him news that big while he was sleeping. Then I told him about her perfect face... perfect eyes... perfect little feet that looked just like his. Two months later I think Jose had it right. Sometimes I feel like it was a dream. One morning I woke up pregnant and the next morning I woke up next to Gaia. The time in between is just details.

A Rose by Any Other Name...

At the risk of sounding like a complete freak I’m going to share something about myself here. As a child, I had imaginary children. Now, I know a lot of kids have imaginary friends but I was the six-year-old who had imaginary pregnancies, imaginary births and a whole houseful of imaginary spawn. At one point it got so bad that my favourite pastime was to pour over old catalogues until I found models that could possibly be my future children and collage them into family portraits and eventually timelines that stretched across our living room floor and scanned over fifty years of births, deaths, weddings and graduations. My imaginary children had personalities, hopes and dreams and, always a stickler for realism I’d throw in the odd genetic disease or stint in rehab just to keep them on their toes. More important then their imagined life though was their imaginary names. I even went so far as to name my imaginary husbands and practice the potential surname choices (should I use a hyphen, take his name, or, as became common practice when I hit grade three, abandon the whole husband concept and go the route of immaculate conception ending up a functioning single mother of ten / paediatrician / artist?). I found the concept of naming children fascinating. The power! The influence! The sheer fun of combing through baby name books! It was like a drug and I was hooked.

Fast forward to today and the thought of naming a baby has become the bane of my existence. Of course, I had my favourite names long since chosen and had always assumed they would just be given out in some methodical order as spawn actually starting shooting from my loins. Somehow though, the minute I found out I was pregnant, I became panicky about having to actually give the baby inside of me a name months down the road. I mean, what right did I have anyway? Thus began a long existential debate about entitlement and imposing my personality and choices on a baby who might become someone completely different then I imagined. I went in circles. I had nightmares about birth certificates and baby announcements. What if I unknowingly saddled the kid with a horrible name? What if I didn’t realise possible associations or rhyming words? What if I offered up a smart kid name and ended up birthing a jock? The possibilities for disaster were endless. Then I realised, before I got too far ahead of myself I should probably talk to Jose.

In one of the many naïve assumptions I have made throughout my life, I assumed Jose wouldn’t care what we named the baby. However, after presenting my top girl and boy name choices and waiting for the expected casual agreement, I was shocked to hear the utter disgust in his voice. It became clear immediately that this was going to be tougher then I thought. At my twenty-week ultrasound the doctor surmised that the uber-fetus was most likely a girl. Not seeing any “boy parts” he promised me confirmation at my thirty-two week ultrasound and sent me on my way. Again naively, Jose and I spent all of our time focussing on names for our little chanchita (the thought of a chanchito now firmly out of our minds). After literally going name by name through a thousand page baby book and looking at no end of online sites we finally settled on a name he put forward the first night I arrived while we were walking along the beach in Punta Hermosa. I’m not gonna lie, I don’t love the name, but I got sucked in by his accent and the way he smiled every time he called the baby by it when he talked to my belly. Plus, the name we finally chose matches the picture I have in my head of the baby. It’s not what I’d always imagined, but somehow, it fits the baby we made together… I think.

Of course, the end of January hit and I went in for my final ultrasound and the response to my eager insistence on gender confirmation was a chuckle and the response “the baby is being shy today”. So of course, it was back to the drawing board. As tough as choosing a girl name had been, choosing a name for a boy is certifiably impossible. Thankfully, throughout all the baby name drama, we both agreed that the name should be short and unique (no Jose Miguel juniors here). However, beyond that, Jose and I couldn’t have more different opinions. You can blame a difference in culture, since it is true that a surprising amount of the names I came up with sound like dirty words en español, or the difficulties of long distance, but the truth is we’re just different. As it stands today, if the uber-fetus does end up with an uber-penis, he will not have a name and yes, this stresses me out. Unfortunately, the choosing of a boy name happens to be coinciding with my ultra-sensitive-emotional phase so that’s just the way it goes. Worse case scenario I might have to pull out my old timelines and gaze into the eyes of my imaginary children until a name jumps out at me. Until then, I stand firm in my assertion that if nothing else my son will not be named Thor. Jose may have been half joking when he suggested it, but don’t pretend you’re not all on my side now. Ahem.

PS. The Baby Name Bible by Pamela Redmond Satran and Linda Rozenkrantz is amazing. Go buy it. Now.

Buddha Belly

Last night while I was waiting for my Chinese takeout a toddler cautiously approached me while her mother paid their bill. After staring at me for a solid minute she giggled, pointed at my belly and then waddled over to the Buddha statue in the corner and pointed to his. Anonymous toddler 1, Risa 0.

Chaos, Chance & Change

As I was checking my email at work last week and I was suddenly struck by the date. I’ve been twenty-seven for a whole month! Granted, it’s not that twenty-seven is a particularly important age, but rather that, for me, my birthday always seems to mark the official end of the year. It’s always on my birthday that I take the time to reflect on what’s passed and look towards the future. To determine the bad habits I’d like to give up and bask in the hope of new beginnings. Plus, I’ve always gotten the feeling that the days between December 26th and 31st were just ‘filler’ anyway. Yet somehow this year, amidst walks on the beach, llamas and inca kola, 2008 seemed to slip into 2009 without much thought. Which is funny, because let’s be honest, if there was ever a year fit for reflection, it was 2008.

The result of this realisation? I’m starting a blog. Do I fear that blogging about my life is terribly self-indulgent? Yes, but c’est la vie. Judge me if you must. If nothing else perhaps I can blame it on the boredom. Besides, thousands of people can’t be wrong. Right? To celebrate the very first post on my very first blog, I present to you, esteemed creepers with nothing better to do…

365 Days of Chaos, Chance & Change: The Five Fabulous Facts of My Life (Mi Vida) in 2008

#1. Trains, Planes, Taxis and Ships ~ In January, a mere month after signing on the Navigator of the Seas I was presented with the option of an unlimited extension on my sign off flight ticket out of Rome and back to the Great White North. Yes, I was making a decision for my five-months-into-the-future-self with no real fix on that self’s financial, mental or physical state after almost seven months of Adventure Ocean chaos, but riddle me this… what would you have done? After pushing the limits with the illustrious Royal Caribbean Adventure Ocean scheduler I picked an arbitrary date and committed to a (unplanned) European vacation of a lifetime. All I knew for sure was that I’d be kicked off the boat in Rome on June 19th and I had seventeen days to kill before my flight home on July 5th. I spent the next five months half-heartedly planning. A random email to a friend who might want to join me here, a brief perusal of flight tickets and hotel accommodations there and before I knew it I was three days away from sign off with no plans, no partner-in-crime and on the verge of a fairly significant panic attack. The night before I signed off, with more than a little prodding and considerable amounts of calming down from Jose, I booked a room in Rome for the coming three nights. Yes, I still had fourteen days to fill. Yes, travelling alone seemed daunting. Yes, I hadn’t even finished packing. Yet somehow, it all made sense. I think it had something to do with reading of Eat, Pray, Love. Thank you Elizabeth Gilbert.

The next morning passed in a frantic rush, as sign off mornings do. I stashed the majority of my stuff in Jose’s cabin, stuffed my remaining suitcase with everything I could carry, put all my sign off cash in my wallet and I was off. To make a long story short (something I’m not known to do), travelling alone in Europe for those seventeen days was the best decision I could have made. When all was said and done I’d been to Italy, England, Spain, Greece, Croatia and the airport in Brussels (where I justified counting Belgium as country number six on my official vacation tally). I’d seen the sights and checked off every must in the tourist handbook. Along the way I caught up with a great friend, got one more night with mi amour (which, as you’ll see in Fabulous Fact #2 turned out to be quite significant) and finally got to enjoy my “voyage to adventure” on board a cruise ship I was not employed on. More than all of that, what made the vacation warrant a spot on this list was the experience of travelling on my own. There’s nothing like the knowledge that all that talk of independence and adventure weren’t just bullshit and realising, in a way that a university degree, countless hours of employment, budgets and bills never taught me... I was all grown up. Shockingly, when you’re eating gelato on the edge of the Trevi Fountain, being a grown up seems pretty sweet.

#2. The Uber-Fetus and the Art of Making an Entrance ~ I don’t think I’ve ever been as sick as I was the morning I woke up for Rachelorette 2008. Sitting on the side of my bed, shaking after vomiting up breakfast I casually laughed it off when Roberge suggested I might be pregnant. To be fair, playing it safe was not mine and Jose’s strong suit, but if the doctor gave you a less the 2% chance of conceiving naturally wouldn’t you have been tempted to play the odds a little? It was hours later, after much bachelorette frivolity, standing in the liquor store thinking the greatest challenge for the day might be the choice between vodka or beer, when it hit me that taking a test, just to ease my mind, might not be such a bad thing. Of course, next thing you know I’m locked in the hotel bathroom, three positive pee sticks later and suddenly frantic about the reality of the ‘situation’ that would come to be known as the Uber-Fetus. In hindsight it really does seem like fate, but at that moment all I could think about was the fact that I had no home, no car, and soon, no job (ship life and pregnancy don’t mix) and I’d just maxed my VISA on some, admittedly fantastic, 7-inch heels. Did I panic? Hells ya. I guess for me it really was a case of ‘be careful what you wish for’. Anyone who knows me knows I’ve been a little baby-crazy since birth, even evoking genuine concern from fellow Adventure Ocean staff with my multiple adorable European baby-napping plots, but the reality of the situation was a very different from any fairy tale I’d dreamt up in the past twenty six years.

Of course as I write this now, about seven and a half months pregnant, I feel silly for feeling like this baby was anything other than a blessing. Against all odds, with one night in Barcelona, fate seemed to set the stage for my entire life to change. I don’t know where I’d be now if not for the baby, but regardless I know I wouldn’t be nearly as happy. My parents always called me a “surprise” but I think if the Uber-Fetus ever does question the shady circumstances surrounding its conception I’ll just have to tell the truth. Unplanned? Obviously. But then again, aren’t the best things in life those you never saw coming? I like to think that even my tremendous imagination couldn’t have come up with a ‘situation’ as beautiful fate dropped into my lap. Plus, you’ve got to admit, even in utero this baby knows how to make an entrance.

#3. Life in the Land of the Living Skies ~ As I packed “the dirty bitch” (RIP) after my years abroad and drove west to start at UBC it never occurred to me that someday I might end up back in Saskatchewan. In fact, if anything I’d made a secret pact with myself to never let that happen. That was almost eight years ago now and, like most decisions I made when I was nineteen, I’m not entirely sure what the big deal was. Faced with a burgeoning belly, a baby-daddy stuck on a ship in the middle of the Mediterranean and less than $20 to my name, Saskatchewan wasn’t looking too bad. The truth is. I like it here. It’s nice being in a place that has seasons beyond damp, rainy, really rainy and flooding. I missed the snow. I missed the fields. I missed my family.

I officially moved back in August and somehow my Dad and I concocted a scheme to turn his basement into a self-contained three bedroom apartment. I got a job at the MacKenzie Art Gallery, as the Education Program Assistant, finally doing something I really wanted and learning from a woman who’s been in her position for over twenty years. The lack of shopping options and entertainment has been a blessing in disguise, leaving me more fiscally responsible then I have ever been. Plus, I love leaving the house fifteen minutes before I have to be somewhere, instead of an hour. I guess no matter where I’d lived when I was an angsty teenager it probably would have seemed like hell on earth, but I feel bad for knocking Saskatchewan for so long. I played the big city girl for awhile but it’s just like Dorothy said... “there’s no place like home” and I’m glad to be back. Well... for now.

#4. “Si Accepto” ~ I was talking to a friend on the phone today and he pretty much summed it up... “Dude... you’re married”... Yeah.

Now, I’m not the most romantic person in the world, but the truth is, I love Jose more than anything. After what can only be described as pure and unadulterated drama onboard the Grandeur of the Seas and six months of read-between-the-lines emails, when he finally got to the Navigator and we finally got it together, I’ve never been so happy. One of my favourite days in Europe was our disastrous trip to Florence where, with only an hour in the city after misjudging the train journey, we almost got married in a park beside the train station. Logic got the better of us then, but somewhere between the arrival of the uber-fetus and the repeated rejection from the government of Canada the idea of marriage came up again. Now, anyone who knows me knows I’m not the marrying kind and I can assure you, neither is Jose. We kept finding excuses to push the thought out of our minds. Excuses like our repeated periods of separation, the fact we’d only had a life together onboard a cruise ship and the cold, hard truth that, well, isn’t a shotgun wedding a little tacky? Still, the minute I finally saw him in the crowd at the airport in Lima, I knew I wanted to be with him forever.

I absolutely loved our wedding. I loved finding our silver rings in Lima and laugh at their cost (about $15 each). I love that we both wore black and that I’d bought my dress on sale at ‘Le Crapeau’ just in case I needed something nice that fit over my belly to wear while I was away. I loved walking the two blocks through Punta Hermosa from Jose’s house to city hall and that his brother preformed the ceremony. I love that everything was said in Spanish and that we signed our marriage licence with our fingerprints and that, as Jessica King so eloquently put it, we ate “street meat” at our reception. I always thought I wanted Tiffany’s platinum, bouquets of orchids and a tower of cupcakes. I even worried, right up until the day, that I would forever regret not having a ‘real’ wedding. Like everything this year, I was shocked at how wrong I was. I think in the past I’d been fixated on all those things, not just because that’s what everyone else had, but because up until then I’d been missing the most important piece of the wedding puzzle... the groom. I loved our wedding because I was marrying Jose and that meant that everything was perfection. I can’t imagine needing anything more to feel like my wedding was more beautiful than any I’ve ever been to. Plus, say what you will about a shotgun wedding but I kind of liked having the uber-fetus there with us. More than a marriage, on our wedding day the three of us became a real family and I’ll always be able to tell our spawn about the look on her father’s face when (s)he kicked him during our first dance as Mr. and Mrs. Chancho.

#5. Inner Peace eh? ~ I’ll be the first to admit I’m a little hard to handle. I like to think of myself as one of those people you have to learn to love. High strung? Check! Controlling? Check! Judgemental? Insensitive? Bitchy? Check! Check! Check! But somehow, amidst the pure chaos that might have sent me into a shameful downward spiral only a year ago, I managed to stay, dare I say it? Zen. Yes me. Zen. I’m not sure when it happened, or how, but the evidence is irrefutable. I can’t see a cloud without waxing poetic about its silver lining. I’ve taken every obstacle as it came, dealt with it and moved on. I’ve been doing yoga and meditating and giving up prime parking spots in the dead of winter. Some might say it was love that finally did it, others the baby. I’m pretty sure ship people are convinced it’s the lack of hard liquor. Sometimes I wonder if I wasn’t like a computer on the verge of breakdown that somehow got re-booted just in time. A coping mechanism I developed in the eye of the storm like some aspect of Darwin’s survival of the fittest. Truth be told, I think there was always a peace-loving hippy alive and well inside me. If I ever let you in enough to know me well, you usually found her in the squishy parts beneath my cultivated thick skin.