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It's like this, and like that....

I started this blog in an effort to track my experiences with pregnancy and beyond. Writing is therapeutic. Kind of like talking to myself without the people in WalMart thinking I'm crazy. If you find some entertainment in this along the way, then even better!

This is one woman's journey through unfathomable hunger, vivid sex dreams and a bulging belly...from conception to birth in 9 months or less...

So far, I've got a dog but not a baby....

Thursday, March 18, 2010
Alright, let's get back to having our eyes on the prize here people...in less than a week (ok well the exact time is STILL undetermined but, we'll assume) this baby will be here. In my ARMS, relying 100% on me to care for her. I will be responsible for someone else's entire life, and that quite frankly it both exciting and terrifying.

Let's think about this from my point of view, remembering of course that I may be certifiably insane. The only other "life" I've ever been solely responsible for maintaining thus far is my little monkey Tuker. Ok, he's a dog but I call him monkey. And I can't say I've always been great at that. Forget for a moment that I revel in the fact that I can feed him for 3 months on only $100, or that on particularly lazy days I forgo walking him in exchange for yelling "go poop" from the porch and hoping he chooses to do it outside and not in. Forget that I throw bacon flavoured treats down the hall so I can sneak out unnoticed every morning, or that I lie CONSTANTLY by telling him I'll be "back in 5 minutes". We can forget that sometimes, I bring him along for the day on errands, so he can sit in the car, in hopes he again, won't poop inside. Also, let's forget that he has no only been saved 1 time from certain drowning death, but 4 different times, for different reasons and NONE of which I've done on my own. Forget all that, and let's look at some of the serious issues my Boston faces.

For one, the dog lacks a certain survival instinct that I can't help but wonder if I should have taught him. Seriously, if left unattended for more than 30 seconds, this dog would be dead. He sees large shiny objects, moving towards him on wheels and thinks he should go play with them. Roller bladers, skateboarders, cars, trucks, bikers, this dog will throw himself in the path of any rolling object, tongue out butt wagging, in hopes of some love. Ai ya. I've seen him put his entire face underwater, trying to get a ball (stick, rock, barnacle) and breath in. Eyes wide open, he dives under, and breathes as usual. And if he's not almost drowning that way, it's because he's jumped into a raging river and it's sweeping him out to sea. And if a bear wandered into my yard with her cubs right now, he's be licking them in the face faster than you can say "THE DOG!". One time, the hubs threw a GIANT piece of driftwood, but it slipped from his hand and instead of the dog moving from it, he watched it as it came at his head and clocked him so hard, he dropped and was actually paralyzed for a moment. He trusts everything and everybody (EXCEPT the sound of fireworks, which makes him put his head under the bed because, you know, if he can't see you he must have gone invisible) with a completely open heart. He loves everything in life, and I've not taught him to fear anything, even the scary stuff.

And beyond all these things, let's think about the fact that just this past January, my dog had the ENTIRE FRONT SET of his teeth REMOVED. Not 1 or 2 teeth, but 6; and the only reason there weren't MORE, is because he'd already lost most of them. How you ask? Well let's see, there are the times at the cabin where he drags giant driftwood 3x his size up the beach, and then proceeds to eat it. And there is his OBSESSION with tug of war, and my husbands obsession with doing parlour tricks with a dog lock jawed on the end of a rope toy - passing him through his legs and over his shoulder. There is also the simple fact that 2 grown adults and a tube of chicken flavoured toothpaste (which is perfectly disgusting by the way) cannot brush the 11 teeth of a 10 pound dog.

Anyway, I realize I will have a baby and not a dog, and that hopefully my child will grow up with a slightly more enhanced sense of reason and comprehension than my fartastic Boston, but it's what I've got for now. And while my dog is fundamentally healthy, overly loved and completely and utterly snuggled beyond all reason and necessity, I still leave him at home alone all the time and only worry he's eating the molding (which he does ALWAYS). While I've managed to keep him alive the last 6 years, I think I could probably have done a better job at raising him to be a good dog. Sure I have regrets about that, but at the end of the day he's a dog and he's cute, and I can always claim he's insane and not take responsibility. With a BABY, I am much more responsible for ensuring she grows up to be a well adjusted, respectful AND respectable little girl, young lady and WOMAN.

I'm being silly, I realize but in all honestly, my dog has been my baby all these years, and soon I'll have a real flesh baby, and I cannot use the things I've learned on him to raise her. Unless of course I want her to hump the arm of unsuspecting strangers and find it acceptable to eat from the garbage if it contains meat remnants (the answer to this is obviously no). I want my dog and baby to be the best of friends, but I need to figure out how to curb his incessant desire to mouth kiss....especially since he's got death breath. And most of all, I need to figure out how to make the dog know he's still my #1 little man, even when the baby is taking up every moment of every day from here on out. Bottom line is, my dog has been my baby so long, I just hope I can quickly make the transition to managing a helpless human, while still caring for him.

Ok seriously, this post just went all sorts of sideways. But it's late, and I've eaten too many peanut butter eggs to know what to do about it. I could go down and hit 'save now' and fix this into some sort of coherent non-sense tomorrow but instead, as a special treat, I'll let you have a sneak preview into my tired and overworked mind.

Enjoy...I suspect there is more insanity of this nature coming post-baby!

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6 comments to So far, I've got a dog but not a baby....:

jss said...

FINALLY!! Someone with a dog even more insane than mine! Years ago, my husband's friend took Jack to the vet for her shots. When they were finished, he emailed my husband and a few other friends and said that everything looked good with Jack, but that the vet believed she did have a case of Doggy Down Syndrome.

Everyone believed him.

Obviously, there is no such thing as Doggy Down Syndrome, but our dog is just such a dumb dog, it's perfectly believable that she'd have some sort of disability.

But she's sweet and she's loyal and she's very well behaved, and I can't WAIT for our pretty golden retriever to meet the baby and see what their interaction is like. I only hope since she's terrified of small dogs, that doesn't translate to small people...

Rebekah @ Mom-In-A-Million said...

The good news is that brushing a child's teeth is easier than rushing a dog's teeth (plus babies don't have teeth for a while). You just buy the toothpaste with Elmo on the package, rename it "Elmo juice", watch as your child joyfully accepts it into his Elmo obsessed little mouth and die inside when you realize you are *that* parent.

Amber Page Writes said...

Another plus? There are probably going to be other people involved in the raising of your child. So, if she picks up a bad habit, you can say, that's the day care lady's fault. Or she must have learned that at grandma's fault...

And their teeth are supposed to start falling out at age six...

Shell said...

Well, I've been known to throw snacks on the table so that I can make a mad dash downstairs by myself occasionally. ;)

Can't wait to see the pics of your little one!

janaARIES said...

I stumbled across your blog a few months ago and have so enjoyed reading about your journey of pregnancy and into motherhood. As someone who is just beginning my own journey into starting a family and also someone with an equally-as-insane pooch, I LOVED THIS POST!!

Thanks for sharing :)

Unknown said...

Well, TECHINCALLY you could always claim that (later on in life) your daughter is insane, right? It works for my mom ;)

(just kidding, by the way).

I have a cat and I totally CONSTANTLY forget to change her cat box and make sure she has food. Thank god for everyone else in this house lmao.

At least I remember to change and feed Nolan...there's that, right?

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