am i out of the loop?

my keyboard is working now so i'd like to post at least once a week again and get back some of my readers and supporters.
these days i'm incredibly anxious. yesterday i took three klonopin to get through the rest of the day plus the two at night.
anyway i don't know if i should change my blog as elvis is dead and i already had my child so i'm not pregnant and can't recount elvis' life only be sad about his death.
is anyone out there still reading my blog?
any suggestions about how to get back in the loop with other bloggers, especially the bipolar blogosphere..???
anxiety is worse than depression as it feels so horrible in the body...

Missing Elvis

elvis died on june 8 2009;i miss him terribly.

my keyboard is broken so i will post more after i get it fixed as it makes it hard wrt ite without everything getting erased which has happened three times as i try to write this.

new year's resolutions, new news and new episode!

hello all, so much for blogging more frequently. i've stopped using my mac almost completely as it's not hooked up to the internet and in a bad place for watching baby girl at same time. i think i'll start calling her lola just so she has a name here but it's not her real name. i don't want to regret writing about her in this context and as my name in here is fake anyway, as is denzel's and elvis' hers needs to be too.

anyway i will try to hook up my scanner and start doing comix again. i really strayed from the whole point of my "notes from underground" which was to post comix frequently about my bipolar adventures, as practice for the graphic novel i've been blocked about doing for about 9 years now. i'm on page 26 or so. today i'm going to a fun party where i will find some great old comic books and get reinspired. my friend whose party it is, a great friend of denzel and an "uncle" (not biological but more of an uncle than her "real" ones) to lola, set aside a bunch of wonder woman and other related comics by and about women.

anyway i will try to figure out a way back to comix. i haven't come up with the right drawing of myself but i have been doing some drawings that i think will help get to it.

this post should probably be divided into several posts. january news was that i got very depressed and then started a new medication towards end of jan.
abilify!!!
i had talked to the doc about changing to something more as the seroquel was not enough to manage my episodes or at least to prevent frequent severe ones. at beg. of jan. as you see from last posts i was kind of in a mixed state. the angry depression at end of january lasted only a few days. as soon as i started a low dose of abilify it went bye bye.
i know abilify can stimulate in low doses when it is helping your antidepressent work better. i think it did cause some hypomania...

anyway more about abilify. where have you been all my life? all those years of depakote, feeling sluggish and needing about 9 hours sleep a day at least, unable to wake up early etc etc. it did not affect my creativity though, so depakote takers out there, if it works for you, great! i also did not keep up with getting my blood checked and hate needles so abilify is great for that. no need for the blood levels i had to do for about 10 years of lithium followed by years of depakote.

more in next post.

the "vatta" temperament

i don't know if you have heard of the ayervedic classifications of "dosha". anyway my friend who is studying it in depth did a consultation with me and it reinforced what i already knew, that i am very "vatta", air, nervous system imbalances, easily spiritual, disorganized, unable to do anything consistently, make friends easily with like minded people- trusting, moody, then the physical stuff: dry skin, fast metabolism, small bones etc. she said i was the most vatta person she'd come across, as most people are a bit of a mix.
anyway all this to say that my blog does not escape my vatta nature. i do it in an intense and genuine soulful way, but cannot keep it up in a disciplined consistent way at all. in fact due to this very nature, she did not give me a lot of instructions about diet, habits exercise etc. as she knew i would not be able to follow them. she sort of gave some gentle suggestions about ways to try to ground myself. we vattas are very much air, in our heads, need warm food, even oily heavy food to get us down to the ground. also even meals are inconsistent. some days i eat regular meals, other days i snack all day, other days i forget to eat, and some days i eat really only salty and sugary foods. it turns out ice cream for breakfast is not so bad for me.
that's what i like about this ancient system, it is all about how to balance one's intrinsic physical/spiritual/mental/emotional nature...
anyway so here i am, i guess it's about two months and a week later.

quick report:
two weeks ago i noticed the very moment my brain switched over adn went to manic mode, shortly followed by "mixed state", anxiety, paranoia, fear of getting psychotic etc. i took care of it pretty quickly with a heavier dose of seroquel, leaving three messages with my psychiatrist and of course telling denzel. it was very intense but i'm getting used to knowing that for now i am in a sort of "episode" or kind of fragile imbalance state where i take a more klonopin during day and sometiems extra seroquel in day and more seroquel at night too. the depression peeks its head through all this too so i'm continuing wellbutrin...
it has been mixed with baby. moments of delight and connecting with her and enjoying her laugh and smile, lots of physical contact and full of love for her. then also horrible moments of feeling resentful, bad, wanting not to have her around, or feeling kind of like a zombie or whatever the word is for feeling totally cut off and not responding to her at all and feeling bad about it but somehow locked off and incapable. other worse moments of bad thoughts that are too hard to write about. but feeling a little proud of myself that i'm livng through it and surviving...
a lot of this was triggered by our wonderful nanny having to leave due to the hours no longer suiting her for her family life. we now have a new nanny, but it was a terrible shock and loss. i still miss the old nanny. so does denzel. this ending somehow went to my nervous systema and triggered all kinds of abandonment stuff that went to my brain and started the bipolar imbalance going...
that's about all for now. i'm still quite paranoid around the new nanny, and a little paranoid in general. i should be asleep as i took my meds and usually make myself go to sleep earlier than this. bad sign. i'll take an extra seroquel now.
still attending the postpartem depression mother's group with baby. it's helpful but as it is a drop in group i find myself missing one of the mothers who left. she shared so much and then she was gone and now there are new moms there. i am such a creature of attachment and staying with people in my life that i am too sensitive to changes and people leaving... i hope the people who read my blog will come back... ok. i really will go take another seroquel...

thanksgiving and new comic strip yet again

this is getting very frustrating. i've written this post a a few times and it keeps going weird on me. anyway long story short mommy is on zyprexa still plus wellbutrin and seroquel but thankful for growing baby, been depressed and difficult coming out of the psychotic episode, got down to earth and off crazy planet quick but it's a difficult landing on earth and recovering from the damage
. anyway no more boobie milk it's all contaminated with drugs/meds. very sad, thus the new comic strip which was fun to do. having a gquiet thanksgiving at home with dog baby and baby daddy denzel. went to a great yoga class. here's the comic strip:

More Confessions...

the bigger confession I should have drawn a comic strip of was an earlier sin I committed today. (funny how as a jewish superstitious atheist i freely employ all this dramatic wording from other religions, esp. these days, the catholics with "confessions" and "sin"... one thing i've gotten even more comfortable with due to pregnancy is all my inconsistencies and total contradictions...)

anyway earlier today i purchase a pair of designer sunglasses on sale, still at a high cost though they were more than half price. there was no need for them. even if i eventually have money to turn them into prescription sunglasses and wear them as regular ones until them, i do not need them. but they were ultra cool looking and i enlisted a friend who has kids herself and is trying not to spend extra money to tell me they looked great on me and stand there while i bought them.

this is not a purchase to be making with only weeks left before baby girl arrives, when i am in debt and will need extra money in the first couple of months of motherhood. on the other hand i'm sure the baby will be happy to see me stroll her down the street in her new lightweight stroller wearing those sunglasses and the sandals i got a few weeks ago in bright colors to match her stroller. she will be delighted and thinking, this was a very necessary purchase. i was there when you made it and got a nice rush of excessive spending high from you, thanks mom... of course this is not something i will be doing when she is here outside my belly.

also getting ready to get rid of another major sin very soon. the tv! i grew up with no tv and we both want to get rid of our tv and bring up baby without tv. i'll stil want a screen of some sort to watch movies on as i do not consider my film interests to be bad influence on baby and they are easier to keep away from her. i returned my baby einstein dvd after reading that article that came out and realizing it's best of all to just read to her and have denzel play music and sing to her...

otherwise going through all kinds of ups and downs and emotions. yesterday i passed the vet elvis goes to and saw a vet tech walking a little cute doggie with one of those plastic shades on her head and practically burst into tears. not sure if it was seeing the elizabethan collar on the dog or somehow missing elvis' baby days or some kind of reminder of times elvis has been in the vet or sick. almost cried on the subway tonight after intense therapy session...

having weird dreams again like i did in the beginnign of being pregnant...

the long block finally ended...

not feeling too well. stressed out and kind of dizzy, but i wanted to post these before lying down...

depressed

depressed and unmotivated. have not had any work so i've been napping and sitting on the couch eating crackers. the most i did was to take elvis for short walks. can't seem to do anything or bother with anything. have not been able to visit other blogs. feeling crappy.

Top 10 Most Challenging Life Experiences...

i decided to try a list of them, the ones i've actually experienced so far, so having a baby can't be on the list yet...

1. death of a loved one
2. serious illness of a loved one
3. first time experience of psychosis and hospitalization
4. being pregnant with no medications for bipolar
5. bipolar "disorder" and all that comes with it, including dealing with its effect on one's loved ones
6. moving
7. dealing with anger and disapointment, conflict and confrontation from others
8. taking care of a dog coming out of anasthesia
9. high school and living through it
10. ages 13 through 28 and living through them

i am sure there are others that are worse that i have repressed, such as witnessing cruelty, violence and abuse, being mugged and some other things i probably "forgot" as i would not want to list them here...
if anyone else feels like making such a list, let me know and i'll check it out!

block

for some reason, maybe i just have no energy. i have been unable to get back to doing my comic strip for this blog. it really annoys me as i enjoyed posting the comic strip and expressing something original about myself and my experiences and especially bringing elvis to life.

for one thing my desk is stilled piled high with stuff. even my scanner that i would need to use to scan the comics has a stuffed elephant mom and baby that i found recently and had to buy. they stand on top of my scanner to remind me of the side of me that is a potential good mommy.

i'm still anxious and unmotivated to do anythign in the apartment. but i'm definitely feeling more stable than the last weeks of may, so that's a good thing.

elvis is getting his teeth done next friday. i'm terrified. trying not to think about it now. focusing on how puppylike and energetic he's been and how he's walking fine even running. the glucosamine did not work out as the beef pill pockets that i was going to eventually put the pills in started to give him beginnings of diarhea so i and the vet agreed to forgo the beef pockets and glucosamine. poor elvis. he really liked those beef treats. now he has to go back to waiting once a month for beef flavor in his anti-heartworm pill treat instead of getting a pillpocket twice a day. it was fun giving them to him as he really enjoyed them. but not worth messing up his fragile little digestive system.

he's so wonderful i continue to marvel at his beautiful being. seeing him trot down the street so excited to be outside on nyc's dirty garbagefilled sidewalks and sniffing all kinds of stuff, is better than any medication to remind me that i'm already so blessed by having him in my life for the past fourteen years or so. i think dogs are injected with extra godliness divinity at birth as they stay that way all their life. as opposed to us humans who turn into, well, humans. it's no wonder that dog is god spelled forwards and god is dog spelled backwards!

tag, i'm it... very late in the game...

ok. better late than never. thanks to nicole for tagging me. i hope i know how to insert the right codes for this. i'll of course tag people who visit me often. sorry if you've been tagged already. i guess you don't have to do this twice!

well ok. i realize what the problem is. I am using safari on a mac so i will have to just list the website addresses as they don't seem to give me options for making links within this post. sorry.

INSTRUCTIONS: Remove the blog in the top spot from the following list and bump everyone up one place. Then add your blog to the bottom slot, like so.

1)Baby Moxie
2)Kicking You From The Inside
3)Third Time Lucky?
4) Just Crazy Enough To Try
5) bipolar notes from underground (off meds)

Next select five people to tag: (if you haven’t done it already) i have to just list the web address as i am not capable of linking directly. sorry
1) This Side of Reason; http://mydisplaced.blogspot.com/
2) Coming out of the Dark; http://bipolarmadness.blogspot.com/
3) Bipolar in the CIty; http://bipolarinthecity.blogspot.com/
4) Kill the Goat; http://saintvodkaofthemartini.blogspot.com/
5) The Wife of a Schizophrenic; http://the-wife-of-a-schizophrenic.blogspot.com/

What were you doing ten years ago?
may of 1997. i was probably dealing with a depressive episode and avoiding getting involved with anyone romanticwise...

What were you doing one year ago?
may of 2006. dealing with having just gone off meds to get pregnant. i was about two months into no meds and having a lot of sex. probably also worrying about my dog as he had diarrhea a lot around that time and needed special medications... maybe i had already started this blog. can't remember. dealing with anxiety for sure...

Five snacks you enjoy:
1. ice cream, ice cream, and more ice cream, often with peanut butter
2. potato chips, (the ruffles kind, salt and vinegar, the expensive kind with exotic flavors) with whipped chive cream cheese on them
3. really creamy hummous on rice cakes or pita
4. chocolate, dark or white, preferably with peanut butter
5. pickles of course...

Five songs to which you know all the lyrics:
1. when i'm 64, the beatles
2. denzel's special song for our unborn baby all about her name
3. jingle bells
4. michelle ma belle, the beatles
5. other beatles songs too numerous to list
(basically i'm terrible at singing and have a bad memory but the beatles were part of my childhood.)

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire:
1. get a huge new place, like a brownstone or building in our current neighborhood with a great baby room, lots of storage, a studio for me that's ideal, a great studio/workroom/music room for denzel, an outdoor space for doggie and us and a wonderful roof top and great basement!!!
2. pay off all my debts immediately and invest some of the money wisely...
3. plan a wonderful trip (maybe a short two week one for now before baby last minute and one for when she is around 8 months old to take her with us) and find the perfect caretaker for elvis who will take extra good care of him and have a lot of vet knowledge while we are away to housesit as well in the above mentioned mansion!
the trip would probably include a visit to japan
4. help out some starving artist friends with money, not purely a gift, but as an investment in their projects to help them get the projects off the ground...
5. buy land and build a really cool country house that denzel would design!

Five bad habits:
1. laziness, procrastination and disorganization, they all go together for me
2. eating too much ice cream and unbalanced diet, even and especially while pregnant
3. not putting things away, general slobbiness
4. self hatred
5. complaining and worrying

Five things you like doing:
1. being with my dog
2. drawing and painting
3. nothing (literally, i like sitting and doing nothing, staring into space and not moving)
4. camping with denzel
5. watching the food network channel

nightmare during sleep and stress during awake...

hi again and thanks for everyone's wonderful support. i plan to catch up on all your blogs after doing this post.

i'm doing better since last post but the past few days have been still difficult and my mood is still shaky. yesterday was quite stressful for various reasons. and we did not sleep much last night, denzel and i. we were supposed to go to the country with elvis to visit a friend but this morning we we're too tired and stressed out from yesterday. yesterday was difficult but good for our relationship as i was able to be there for denzel dealing with some difficult issues with people in his life.

anyway last night was not good for sleep and i had a horrible dream about having the baby and the surgery. the baby did not appear in the dream but it was leading up to getting the c section. i won't describe the dream but it was not restful sleep.

then when i woke up early and took little elvis out i noticed he was walking strangely. we had taken him out at about 4am when we were not sleeping and he had been fine. he seemed to be limping by a few hours later. then we decided not to go away anyway and i got very anxious about whether to take elvis on an emergency appontment to the vet or wait and see how he was doing. i called two of his vet offices and talked to a nurse at one. from what she said it did not sound terrible to wait and see how he is in the next few days. he is eating normally and just as excited to go out on his walks. he doesn't make any noise of any kind of pain and his front leg that seems to be limping does not seem abnormal or swollen. he puts weight on it when walking and peeing. he's been resting most of the day and doing his usual stuff so i decided not to panic and stress him out by rushing to the vet and having to pay an extra 100$ plus the visit as they had no regular appointments left.

i just took him out again and he was happy to be out. he even will run a little on some of his walks depending whether he has just got up from a nap or not. so i'm hoping he just pulled a muscle or something like that. right now he is sitting reclining near my chair totally relaxed so i'm trying not to worry too much. i made an appointment with his regular vet for tues. morning so i might take him in then if he is still walking strangely...

the irony is that we ended up bringing him to the vet yesterday to have the technician put the flea and tick liquid on him as i was too neurotic to do it myself and was worried about the chemicals being pregnant. i also did not want to put it on wrong and have a bad effect on him. i never take him to the country these days so i had thought i needed to get him a collar but it turns out the vets all recommend this liquid stuff that goes into the skin as being more effective. it lasts for a month so i guess it's good he has it in case we go somewhere another time. but he was fine yesterday when i took him for that. they were very nice and did not charge anything to do that for him...

needless to say today i was too stressed out and sort of depressed to do much. i'm still feeling the mood but i'm trying to relax and not worry about catching up on any of the things i need to do. after all everyone else is vacationing and doing nothing and we would have been in the country. i admit i'm relieved we did not end up going as taking elvis would have been stressful for me, worrying about him being ok on the trip and in a strange environment.

he's my real baby. i think i must have been a dog in another life. these days when i walk around outside and see people with a stroller and a dog, my maternal instincts go out to the dog. looking at the baby in the stroller does not bring out any desire to hold the baby or coo over him or her. in fact i'm kind of scared of babies and toddlers these days. but dogs just make me smile.

i hope to do a comic strip soon as this blog was supposed to be mostly comic strip form but my mood and mixed state have made it hard to get to it...

red dress and the drawing i posted...

hi everyone! thanks for all your words of support. i've been sitting here catching up on your blogs and eating a lot of peanut butter and honey on rice cakes. the best is if you have bananas to put slices on the peanut butter and honey. i remember once reading that a movie star ate a lot of peanut butter when she had to get fat for a role. i ate it all the time when i wasn't pregnant and it didn't make me fat. at this point, i've given in to just trying to be ok with the body stuff. i'm going to a wedding on saturday (i'll get to be not just the pregnant lady guest but the pregnant lady with her boyfriend living in sin and having a baby out of wedlock! fun.) and i just might wear the tight red dress i met my boyfriend in years ago. i tried it on last night and he recognized it right away and said all the good boyfriend pregnant daddy stuff like how hot i looked in it. then i neurotically tried to find out if i looked that different, like i wanted him to say "it's the same you just with bigger boobs and a belly." he then said he was only going to give me a few comments every time i put on clothing and bug him about my looks, which was probably a good idea. anyway the point is i think i'll try to go to the party in a clingy red dress and just flaunt my big belly and pregnant body, more for myself to feel good. it's a fun nontraditional wedding so it's the place to wear a red dress!

anyway about the drawing i posted. i was going to do a comic strip but then i suddenly could not think of anything and i had recently made this drawing and showed it to my therapist. he thought and i agreed, that the baby looked very happy and carefree and i looked happy and protective as the elephant mommy. i felt very happy and motherly while making the drawing and it was nice to show the therapist a happy picture as i mostly focus on my own inner conflicts and dark side in there with him... he also noticed that it looked like i was watering the tree with my trunk and that it seemed to be about growth which i agreed with.

i welcome your comments on the drawing even if you see totally different things in it. i debated whether to talk about what it meant for me as i like hearing what you all think just from looking at my pictures without explanation from me, but i felt like writing about some positive stuff about the pregnancy as i am very good at complaining. and there has been a lot of good positive stuff. it feels good to share the joyful part of connecting with her, the baby!

by the way we are past the 5 month mark!!!

separation anxiety!!!

tomorrow i'm dropping elvis off with my parents and training them to give him his morning and evening medications. denzel and i are leaving early friday morning for new mexico. i will have to endure a lovely vacation of one week without my precious elvis.

i will miss him sooo much. i need a vacation extremely badly but i wish it did not involve separation from my most special best in the world little doggie.

my dad gives him excellent walks and he will be fed and looked after. i just get very anxious when i can't see his cute little face everyday.

it's like a catch 22. vacation. opportunity to go to a place i've been fantasizing about for years. and at the same time separation from my special dog who is like my first baby. the baby will be the second baby really.

send elvis extra amounts of love and health and safety so he will be ok while i'm gone. he gets a little droopy when i go away.

he just got his second part of his spring haircut last sunday and he looks extra adorable and ten years younger than his age of 14 and a half years!

so i will miss blogging too for about a week. i'll check in tomorrow as we leave early friday morning... maybe i'll even be able to post from new mexico.

head still in the trash...

my head is still in the trash, metaphorically speaking.
i was going to do a comic strip today. i had some ideas and denzel even had a funny idea based on a self-deprecating remark i made about how i'd even lose if i was a contestant in the depression olympics.
i managed to make it to yoga class but then spent the day napping on the couch.
then later tonight could not get to sleep of course, so now it's even later than last time i posted. it's 2:45 in the morning.

meanwhile the more often i post the less i feel like people read my blog. thanks to the few who do comment, i really do appreciate your support. i feel like ever since i've been pregnant and depressed and whiny, the men who used to visit and make comments have gotten sick of or bored with my blog. so i'm also trashing myself for not being popular and not doing a good enough blog...

i should just do a comic strip now but i have no creative energy.
just getting through each day, doing as little as possible as things i need to be doing pile up and everything gets messier and messier and more and more disorganized.

but i'm just trying to follow my psychiatrist's backup's advice to take it easy on myself and lower my stress. seems to involve doing very little whatsoever. i guess elvis is lucky he's getting his walks and my teeth are lucky i'm still brushing them.

i don't know what to call this...

i don't know what to call this post or what to call what goes on in my mind. what a strange day, at least the end of it. at the end of the shower i threw for a very pregnant friend, i randomly opened this book i have, frederick frank's "art as a way" to show someone about his method of art and zen and came across these old lost peices of paper i had ripped out of the book and written on during my first manic episode about almost 19 years ago. i didn't look too closely as it was really creepy and crazy stuff, though there was a nice photo of me i had ripped out of my high school yearbook, a friend at the party gave me a lovely compliment by saying i hardly look any different. i may be more sane now but i'm also more vain!
anyway i just looked at the pages and read them and they brought me back to how super psycho beyond just mania i had gotten at that time. i probably wrote that stuff the day before or day i ended up in the hospital.

well the weird thing was after the party i forgot about the pages in the book and eventually went off to see a movie by myself, "little children". i was not prepared for it. i like kate winslett, i'm a big fan and go to all her movies. i just thought it was a typical movie about a dissatisfied lonely mother who has a suburban affair. instead, i was transported into the world of the minor character who pervades the movie, ronnie, the mentally ill guy recently release from jail who is a child molester. ( i think in the book it's more spelled out that he molested someone and in the movie they suggest he flashed a minor but they don't get too specific although he's obviously done some creepy things.) so there i am expecting to just be watching a modern day madame bovary but instead the intense part of the movie involves this guy. i wont' give it away in terms of what happens, but his character is well written, to the point where i really felt for this lost lonely alienated guy who lives with his mother and can't be a "normal" person. after seeing the movie, i was so disturbed by what happens to him that i started to feel "crazy" myself. i just started getting this familiar feeling of feeling like i'd been doing a great performance pretending to be a functioning adult and suddenly felt like i did when i was crazy. it's hard to describe. i managed to call denzel and get home and talked to a good friend who had read the book and understands a lot about my bipolar stuff.

now i'm feeling a little more grounded but was weirded out when i remembered seeing those pages from the past and took them out before writing this post. among all the disturbing psychotic stuff on the pages there are some funny things i wrote like" TRY TO BE MORE CONFUSING THAN I AM" . it's all written in capital letters. on one page i glued a picture of janis joplin who was my idol at the time and wrote some weird stuff about her becoming part of me after she died. it's too embarrassing to quote the stuff in these pages. i can't throw them out though. somehow they feel quite poignant, a reminder of a former self who still resides somewhere in me.

i just wonder what will happen one day if my child sees that stuff. i'll certainly keep it hidden so the child would only see it many years hence when i'm dead and s/he's reading my old journals and seeing how crazy his/her mom really was...

truly it is hard to convey the extreme intensity of what i felt after seeing that movie. it's happened before, like with the movie "a beautiful mind". objectively i did not like how the movie avoided some real things about the man and kind of sugar coated things that were too "difficult" like his bisexuality. but the scene at the end when he talks about the price of sanity for him being that he has to ignore and not engage with or listen to his "delusions" the private friends in his mind that he'd been so close to for so many years of his life, that got to me a lot. it seemed to really express the aspect of loss that occurs with trying to be sane. to be continued. i thought if i wrote about this i'd feel less crazy...

lazy lazy lazy pregnant lady...

hi everyone,
thanks for all the great comments. i can't believe i've been so out of it and unable to keep things going that it's been a total of 12 days since my last post...
i even finally did a comic strip a few days ago but i've been too lazy to scan and upload it,
so i thought i better get something up here now before people give up on visiting this blog. i seem to be more paranoid, or at least caught up in fantasizing that people are thinking things about me, a sort of sign of grand ol' narcisissm...
elvis told me to get off my pregnant ass and post. he's in fine form, actually sleeping soundly at the moment as is denzel. it's almost 1 am and i have the end of my 12 weeks insomnia can't get to sleep at night thing going on. same thing happened last night. i chose to lie on the couch and watch "little miss sunshine" again while finishing a baby blanket for a friend.

ok, so that's my big excuse! i organized a small baby shower for a friend that's happening tomorrow and then of course this evening got depressed and annoyed at myself as i had no energy or motivation to clean up the place and get it ready for tomorrow. all my ambitions of making fun decorations and welcoming posters went down the drain but i managed to clean up a little.
i'm excited to wear my new dress, green with apples all over it, a recent impulsive ebay purchase, but not so bad as it's worth over $100 and i got it for 25$. can still fit into most of my clothes...

so some updates on the pregnancy:
almost at week 13! that means the first trimester almost over and the fun best one begins! i hope i'll have more energy. the indigestion has subsided a lot. i've been lucky to have no morning sickness at all, just my regular awful excema and IBS that i had before anyway.
so far no mania, just a bunch of ups and downs with anxiety and irritability, grouchiness, mild dips in mood that don't last long and some nice sunny happy feelings and lots of good days, i am grateful for.
plus the big news i'm grateful for is that the CVS test came out fine. no genetic abnormalities, and since i got it out of the way about a week ago, i won't need to have an amnio!!! super good news for me as i'm super squeamish.
the CVS was stressful but i wont bore you with the details. highlights were dealing with an overly full bladder, having it done with a needle in the abdomen, and getting to see the little one moving lots beforehand...

i'll post the comic soon and you can read about my fascinating cravings. pickles and mint chocolate cookie (ben and jerry's of course) ice cream are the very latest. i love ice cream anyway but the baby is definitely into the mint flavors which i do not normally go for. i tend to go for chocolatey flavors but the baby has not been wanting any of that...

the newest odd thing is feeling like my belly is really expanding. at times i am kind of delusional and think it feels and looks gigantic already. then sometimes i look in the mirror and see that it's not that much bigger and most people who don't know me would have no idea i'm pregnant. it, the belly, feels much different though. it's a bizarre sensation, i'll try to describe it in a comic strip soon. it's also funny at times i want to tell total strangers that i'm pregnant, most of the time i refrain. there's a weird back and forth between wanting it to be obvious and feeling like it's too early to look really pregnant and wanting it to be a secret that isn't physically obvious and only my friends, family and blogfriends know about it...

also, we just found out the gender because the CVS test shows all the chromosomes. but i'll wait to do a comic strip about it and keep you in suspense to make sure you have reason to come back soon!
sorry for the text. i know the pictures and color are more exciting and a quick read.
elvis will be back soon in full form. his spring grooming is coming up in a week, so that will be big news...