Classes started last week and so there is no longer any denying that fall has arrived. And my emotions are all over the map. I am energized and yet weary, frustrated and yet optimistic, anxious and yet feeling like things are under control, counting down the days with excited anticipation and yet also with a sense of impending dread. And, as is obvious from the previous sentence, totally out of sorts.
The semester starting is the proximate cause. I love teaching and having students again and my routine and my colleagues back is energizing. I get an absurd adrenaline from my work. And yet all of that also brings a more demanding schedule and a new set of challenges. I worked hard all summer, but there were only 6 hours a week that I needed to wear real clothes or appear professional and most of my work could be done from home. And it was summer so the bar was lower on attire anyway. And the setup of my classroom was such that it worked perfectly well for me to spend most of class sitting on a table at the front of class. My fall classrooms are not as conducive to sitting down and there are also just a lot more hours of class time and so I alternate class between sitting/perching in awkward positions and feeling faint or in pain while standing up. Not to mention the fact that people are always stopping by my office now, so I need to present professionally there as well.
At the same time that I need to resume a more professional appearance, the pregnancy has reached the point where that is easier said than done. The veins in my left leg have been pretty hideous for months and months but have now gotten downright painful and really problematic. If I want to not be in pain, I have to keep my feet up most of the time. How exactly do you run 6 hours of class in a row with your feet up? Exactly. Not to mention the colleague who insists on making a crack every time he comes in my office to the effect that I am just lounging around relaxing. Seriously, I can type just as well with my feet up on a chair as down under the desk. But the last thing I need right now is people questioning my ability to work or my work ethic. Can I get a little credit for the fact that I continue to do about 100 times as much departmental service as he does WHILE growing a human being and never complaining or asking for an out?! Does it really hurt him if I put my feet up in my own office? (Insert gender rant here.)
The start of the semester has also ramped up my anxiety about when Cashew will arrive. I have this feeling she will be early and at this point I'm really just hoping it is no more than a week or so early. I have a plan in place for this semester that is going to be a difficult balancing act, but will work, as long as she isn't born before November. If she comes earlier or if I can no longer go into work at any point before that, the whole plan falls apart and comes crashing down. And it will crash down on the heads of so many people and I feel responsible for shielding everyone. And so I am really really really nervous about what will happen.
I had such a rough time when Nicholas was a newborn that I figured this time around I wouldn't be as eager to get to the end of the pregnancy, and that is mostly true but altered by a more difficult pregnancy. I remember looking at pregnant women in stores when Nicholas was a newborn and feeling so envious and thinking that they didn't know how lucky they were to still be pregnant. And so while I want to meet this little girl, I am not eager for her to be born because I am fearful of the first couple months. But in another 6 weeks I think I will be so sick of being pregnant that I will have changed my mind (I secretly suspect that is why God made the last trimester miserable--so you'd welcome sleepless nights and a crying newborn). I expected to be sick of it by now, given that I've been pregnant for basically a year already, but for the most part I was still doing okay until the last couple weeks. There have been some bumps and the exhaustion from anemia in July/August was difficult, but it wasn't until the last couple weeks that I have started to crack. The legs are what has really pushed me over the edge because I feel so incapacitated. I limp around the house and gchat Joe to do things like bring me water because just getting up and walking to the kitchen messes with my circulation. It's also a scary feeling to be able to both see and feel the blood rushing down your legs when you stand up and unnerves me a bunch. The list of things I'm supposed to avoid eating and drinking also seems to get longer all the time and makes me feel a little like I'm trapped in a cage. And even stupid things like the pills I'm taking are grating on me. I have to take the iron pills with orange juice and avoid calcium within two hours of taking them. But calcium-based products are basically all I eat/drink. And I have two of those plus a prenatal vitamin and they are supposed to be spread out throughout the day. And if I don't have the exact right about of food in my system with each, I feel sick or even throw up. In the grand scheme of things it isn't actually a big deal, but it goes with that feeling of being trapped by what I can and can't eat and drink because it feels like I have to so carefully map out my food/drink/pill plan for the day.
I am very well aware of how lucky I am. I have a job I love, the baby is healthy, and so far at least the pregnancy issues I have don't even rise to the level of the term "complications." I'm just feeling frazzled and tired and stressed out and so having some more trouble with perspective. The arrival of fall simultaneously changed our routine and triggered the "the baby is almost here" mental shift. And there are both positives and negatives to each of these. I'm just feeling so out of control of my life, which is not a place I am comfortable being.
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