Babies plural will probably do me in

I had a horrific dream last night. Thankfully, it was an absurd horrific dream, not a realistic horrific dream, so it was easy to shake once I was awake (unlike the ten or so times I've dreamed James has died in a car accident or shooting or whatever). I still woke up sobbing. I dreamed Grace had Alzheimer's. Which is really stupid, of course, but I dreamed I watched my baby lose her mind, and it cast a bit of a pall over much of my day. I kept watching her play so sweetly and thinking, "If she turns out to be a drug addict, I'll remember her at this age, and how horrible will that be?"

Yay for crazy pregnant ladies.

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I know I haven't been around much lately, either reading or writing. The Child has shorter and shorter naps, and when she is awake, she is more and more demanding of my time and attention, so I just don't feel like being on here when she is asleep. Lame explanation, I know, but napping is one of the most important things in my life right now, when I can manage to fall asleep.

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I did manage to start V, finally. I've been meaning to watch it since it premiered, but kept napping instead. So far, so good. I love seeing all these old Firefly cast members. Speaking of which, if anyone watches Castle, how awesome was the Halloween episode with all the Buffy and Firefly references?

Anyway, V was pretty awesome, and I like seeing the lady who plays Juliet (Lost) in a less annoying, less smirky role. Also, I have a girl crush on Inara (can't remember real life name). She's so pretty.

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Doctor's appointment yesterday. Nothing exciting. Finally got to see my favorite doctor of the bunch, Dr. M. And I completely forgot to ask him his opinion on a VBAC. All of the other three have expressed pretty varied opinions (I like this; I realize doctor's offices have to have set policies on certain things, but I also like that they're individuals with their own opinions, not a hive mind), so I very much wanted his. Oh well. Next appointment, perhaps.

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2.0 is hyperactive. She is awake and kicking all the time. Grace was more prone to sporadic (yet violent) outbursts. This one just does lazy somersaults all day.

Speaking of Grace, she has now learned a new word. "Block." Only, it comes out "bop," and she applies it to all smallish toy-like objects, including my spice jars. She may also have "up" and "hi" and "bye," but the verdict is still out on that. Those teeny little one-syllable words are so hard to distinguish from pure coincidence. Throw in our own conviction that she's the most intelligent child on Earth, and it's pretty much impossible to figure out.

Her sleep is still unreliable, but it's no longer beating me relentlessly into an endless gray fog of hopelessness (sounds melodramatic, but that is exactly how I start to feel after just a few days of interrupted sleep). She'll go two to three days at a time now without incident, which allows me to catch up a little on sleep. I'm still a little dull in the head, which I think also contributes to my not writing. But! It seems things are getting better. And I hope I haven't jinxed it all just now.

The other night, she woke up at 5:30 in the morning. I brought her some water, and she downed about four ounces in one go. Then she snuggled up to me against the crib rails, and I started singing to her. Halfway through "You Are My Sunshine," she pulled away, looked up, put her hand on my cheek, and said, "Mama." Devious child got at least five extra minutes of cuddling just for that--after I picked my dead body up off the floor. I am such a sucker.

James is also "mama" now, by the way, which is endlessly amusing to me. If I exclaim, "Daddy's home!" or ask, "Where's Dada?" she goes completely nuts with excitement, though, so it's not as if she doesn't know his name. When he's in the room, I pretty much cease to exist. This bothers me less than you might think. If we were both away from her all day, it would probably hurt, but I enjoy the break.

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I'm still swimming, hurray! It's getting harder. Most of the time, when you exercise regularly, things get easier, right? Well, not so much when your drag coefficient increases exponentially by the day. I do a lot of kicking, not so much actual swimming. It is very hard to keep my midsection afloat. I would think I'd become more buoyant, what with most of this weight being fat and water, but that's apparently not the way it works. Pregnant ladies get more awkward both on land and in water. Awesome!

The best part is getting out of the pool at the end of a workout. "Beached whale" has become a cliche because it is so true. I refuse to use a ladder. This is stupid. But still, I refuse. So I thrash my way up onto the edge of the pool and then struggle to my feet. It's not the weight so much as it is tired muscles and terrible balance on slippery tile. (actually, I'm still -3 lbs for weight gain) Still, I look like a beached whale. A beached whale trying to climb a ladder. A rope ladder. With missing rungs.

Also, I don't have a maternity suit, so I just look like I have the most bizarre body shape known to mankind. When your torso is the length of a postage stamp, that skinnier space between the bosoms and the belly is essential. Well, with a regular old suit, that space is webbed over in lycra. I look like a pumpkin stuck with four toothpicks and a cantaloupe out the top. We won't even get into how idiotic I look in a swim cap to begin with.

This is okay, though. I'm already feeling better about myself, even if the swimming itself isn't getting any easier. I sleep better, and I have more energy when I'm awake. It's a glorious feeling, this being able to function like a normal human kind of thing. Almost forgot what it felt like.