Another tough day

First off- thanks to everyone for all of the awesome energy, goodness and sympathetic posts about my ups and downs with impending mommyhood. It really helps. I'm trying my best not to be a crazy wreck of hormones combined with a bizarre cocktail of joy, excitement, fear and intimidation, but I think I'm failing a bit.

Today I had to be up at 4:30 a.m. for the monthly release event for a publication I manage here at work. No, I haven't told them yet, as I'm waiting until I've gone through my first doc's exam (this Friday). Once I do break the news, I am going to ask my co-workers to help ease the stress by having a few of them fill in for me once in a while so I don't have to pull one crazy early day per month.

Regardless of that craziness, I AM working on slowing life down during this process. I swears! I'm really proud of myself because today I finally made the call on a Kallisti gig I was waffling about. We were offered a really fun gig (unpaid) in Baltimore that just happened to coincide with the weekend that my friend, Christal, is getting married in New York. Originally, I had figured that if we could make sure the gig was done before 9 p.m. I'd be able to swing going, doing the gig, then hopping in the car and jetting up to NY, arriving there around 2-3 a.m. or so.

However, my new state of mommyhood has left me so exhausted lately that I've found myself thinking of this gig constantly and going, "yeah, that would be SO AWESOME... but... but... I think it would kill me." I kept trying to figure out ways to make it work in my brain, tried to justify to myself that I could do it, but then I'm finding myself being really in need of down time. I have the self-preservation voice that says, "no. This is something the Brooke-that's-not-a-mommy would do and it would destroy her/make her a zombie all weekend. You are not that girl, anymore."

It's a simple phrase, but it's true. I'm not that girl, anymore.

I think that's why you get treated differently... because you do change and kind of quickly. Your vision shifts from ME with maybe a bit of the SIGNIFICANT OTHER thrown in, to ME, MY FAMILY, MY BODY. It's a shift that has to occur, because there's so much going on in your body that feels like you're a plane that went on auto pilot that you can either fight and be miserable about or give in to and flow with. And right now, I've got to flow. I can't fight. Fighting is making me miserable.

I'm proud of myself for making the call, though it makes me sad to miss a gig. I really haven't missed gigs with Kallisti in the past.. (can't remember one, though I know there HAS to be one), so it feels like I'm ditching out on my dance family. But I can't put them first before my body and my health, I know that and they do, too. It's just hard, since dance has been such a primary focus for me in the past and I've done a lot of sacrificing for it (worn myself ragged, spent a ton o cash, spent tons of time trying to be The Best Dancer I Can Be). Getting knocked up is awesome in the family department, but hard to reconcile for the Lyra part of me. I don't want to give up time with Kallisti or turn down gigs, but I know that I have to shift my priorities. It's just... gggggrrrrrrrrr hard.

This whole mommy business is so awesome, but also a really hard thing to get used to. I know I'll get it down at some point, but right now I feel like I'm swamped.

And, sadly, I can't do the main thing I love to do to relax, which is have a hot bath. As, GET THIS... you can't take em when you're knocked up. Can you believe that? 100 degrees is the MAX for a bath when you're preg-o, due to worries about elevating body temperature (leading to birth defects, miscarriages, etc.)... let me tell y'all what THAT is like. Luke Warm Baby Pool.

I swear, when I have this kid, it's champagne and a hot tub for me!

Anyways, I'm leaving soon to go home, take a nap and pray that the weather holds out so I can make rehearsal.