Two lines on a stick.  A plus sign.  The word “Pregnant”.

This is where it all starts.  For the next nine months, every choice you make is no longer about you.  From the trivial to the significant, from whether or not to have a soda to deciding on names.  For nine long months, everything you eat, drink, smell, see and do is geared toward another human being.

Then that newborn baby arrives.  She is snuggled in your arms, completely dependent on you to sustain her tiny, new life.  You eat after she eats.  You sleep when she sleeps.  The basics of the human experience are, for you, laid open.  Eat.  Sleep.  Poop.  You control nothing in your universe.

And your heart loves every moment of it.  You revel in feeding, snuggling your sweet baby, and taking in that sweet scent of the top of her head.  You marvel at tiny little fingers as they grasp your finger.  You look into little eyes, waiting for the moment that you know they are really looking back.  You watch that tiny little mouth, waiting for that first smile that isn’t simply gas.

One day you turn around and your baby is no longer a baby.  Overnight, someone kidnapped her and in her place stands a toddler.  One that walks.  One that talks.  One whose favorite phrase is “I try.” Each step.  Each word.  Each new task learned is one step closer to independence.  You watch with fierce pride, it squeezing your heart so tight.  You are torn between wanting the progress to stop, so she can stay your baby forever, and cheering her on as she masters the simple act of putting on her shoes.

Inevitably that first day of school arrives.  Neither of you quite sure you are ready for it.  You nervously walk your child down the path, hoping that she will make friends.  You hope her journey isn’t fraught with bullies, instead surrounded by encouragement and love. You let go of her hand, whispering to her that it will be ok.  That she will be ok.  Sometimes with more confidence than you feel.  But you hope.  And you walk away.  Another thread in the cord that binds you unraveling.

From there the years fly past.  Elementary school, junior high, high school.  More threads slowly coming unwound and falling away.  Every one weakening that cord.  Dating, cell phones, outings with friends, the first time alone in the car. Each step for her is, for you, a process of letting go.

Your heart and your mind spend 18 years putting her needs before your own.  Eighteen years of fighting monsters, real and imaginary, doing anything to keep your child safe.  You child proof your house, you instruct her how to cross the street, teach her about strangers, show her how to drive a car.  Then?  You are expected to let her go.  Motherhood.  Parenthood.  A constant study in opposition.  How are we supposed to just turn off that instinct to protect?  To hold tight the thing we hold most dear, but in a different way.  Not as closely.  From a distance now.

We let go, somehow.  Hoping that they will always need us, or at the very least, still want us.  We watch them grow and have families of their own.  And one day.  One day they will have families of their own.  And they will understand all that we did.  How hard it was for us.  And they will understand.  How hard it is to let go.

Last week while clicking through my list of favorite blogs, I read a post that started the wheels turning in my head.   Becky spoke at BlogHer and her topic or at least part of it was about what obligations bloggers have to one another.

Now, I’m not a big blogger.  I don’t get thousands of page hits.  Sometimes I think it would scare the shit out of me if I did.

I float in and out of various social media outlets.  I lurk on the edges most days, not feeling my words are important enough to put out there.  Not secure enough in myself to insert my opinions into the conversation.

Some days?  I spend the whole day only talking to my three best friends.  Ironically enough, all of whom I met through a social media outlet.

To those three people? I have obligations.  Ones born out of love.  Ones born out of late night emails…text messages of support….cards and packages in the mail that make me smile.

Those three people?  I expect will treat me kindly, and with respect.  Never have they done otherwise.  They are close enough to me to tell me when I’m being stupid, or a jackass.  They love me enough to tell me the truth.  I love them enough to let them see my truth, even when that truth is ugly.

The rest of the people I “know” online?  Some are friends.  Most are acquaintances.  People to whom you would say hello to if you happened to meet in a crowded restaurant.  You might share a joke, or a sarcastic comment.  Maybe even the promise of good wishes or prayers if asked for or needed.  You empathize when they have a bad day, or smile when some good fortune comes their way.

But beyond kindness and common courtesy?  What does one really owe these people?

In this age of “instant” connectivity with other human beings, it’s easy to say “Oh, I know {insert name here}”.  But you don’t really.   The new follower I picked up on Twitter?  I know nothing about you other than your Twitter handle.  I have no obligation to follow you back.  I have no obligation to allow you to continue following me.

The followers that I remove?  I have that right.  It’s my Twitter stream.  I don’t HAVE to let anyone read it, if I don’t wish.  At the end of the day, no one should become upset because a random stranger no longer lets you read their 140 character drivel.

I have obligations to my family and close friends.  Offline and online.

To people I don’t know?  People I wouldn’t recognize if they walked right up to me?  I have no obligations, other than to not treat someone with disrespect.

I do not believe that choosing not to read someone’s  blog, or twitter stream, especially that of a virtual stranger counts as disrespect.  Anymore than not purchasing an author’s book constitutes disrespect to that author.

My words are just that, my words.  I own them.  They belong to me.  I have the right to control who hears or sees them.  I do not expect that I have the right to read anyone’s words.  I am grateful, however when I have that privilege.

**Disclaimer:  I am writing this post in the throes of self righteous indignation and all around general flaming pissed off-ness

I stopped at the grocery store on my way home tonight to pickup a few various items we needed.  I came out of the grocery store and was placing my items in my trunk when something caught my eye.  My Obama 08 bumper sticker didn’t look quite right.  And the reason for that?  Some redneck motherfucking asshole took a ball point pen to it and penned in the letter “N” so that it would read NObama.

Classy, eh?

So to this asshole, let me tell you this.

You are a coward.  You can’t tell someone to their face that you disagree with their opinion.  Nooooooo…not you.  And disagreeing isn’t good enough, is it?  You have to shove  your opinion down everyone else’s throat.  I bet you are really popular at family gatherings, aren’t you?

At best what you did was stupid and narrow minded.  At worst?  It was vandalism.  You took a pen to MY PROPERTY.  You wrote on MY PROPERTY.  I was proud of that sticker.  I kept it up there as proof that we have made progress as a nation.  That we were moving toward looking at a man for his character, not the color of his skin.

I wanted to point to that sticker one day and share the story with my daughter of how I cried, no, sobbed the night we elected our first African American president.  I wanted to always remember that I was a part of that historical and momentous event.

You don’t like the way I voted?  Too fucking bad.  Get over it.  Maybe I don’t like the way you voted.  I don’t run around town defacing McCain/Palin stickers and signs.

That sticker will have to be relegated to the trash.  However, I still have a box full of newspapers. I have a bag full of yard signs, buttons and posters.  I have vivid memories of that night.

You and your ugliness and your ball point pen can’t take those away from me.

If you and I ever have a chance to meet face to face?  I will only have one thing to say to you:

One of the things I will never understand is why women judge each other to the extent we do.

If you have a vaginal birth with your baby, a c-section mom will chortle and say, “boy I am glad I didn’t do that, I got the zipper”

If you have a c-section,  some vaginal birth mom will say “Oh, you’ve never really experienced child birth”

If you have drugs during labor, the natural advocates will say “Oh, but no drugs is better for you and the baby”

If you don’t have drugs, someone will tell you “You suffered needlessly, the epidural was a god send”

As women, we just can’t win.

Before you have children you will constantly hear “Oh, just wait till you have one”

And it never stops.

After you have a child, there will be a multitude of people around to constantly remind you that you are, after all, only a first time mother, and therefore, couldn’t possibly know a god-damned thing about this child you’ve brought into the world, or how to raise her.  After all, you’re JUST a first time mom.

I”m so fucking sick of hearing that phrase.  I’m so fucking sick of being judged about my parenting skills because this is my first.  I’ve been this child’s mother for 2 years now.  We’ve been through a lot and so far, we’re all still standing.

Weren’t we all first time parents at one point?  Kids don’t come with an instruction book.  And what worked for your kid, or yours?  May not work with mine.  And vice versa.

I’m not saying I could never use help or advice.  Shit, I ask my best friends for ideas constantly.  They never preface it with “Oh, that’s right you’re the FIRST TIME mother”.

At what point do I have enough experience that people will stop using that as an excuse to be condescending?  Two kids?  Three?  Five?

I know women with five kids who are still asking for help, because each kid that comes along is different from the rest.  Nobody faults her or belittles her parenting skills.

This shit is why women become stereotyped as catty. Petty.  Because we can be that way.

Maybe we need to stop patting ourselves on the back for being perfect and start helping each other in genuine ways.

Maybe we need not ask how many kids a mom has had before we cease judging whether or not she has a clue.

Every baby, with every illness, with every issue is a first time for someone.

Let’s help.  Not judge.

Monday brought about a plague on our house.  The husband had been ill over the weekend, but up until Monday, TheCakester and I had been dodging the bullet.

And then TheCakester woke up with a fever.  A high one.  Her doctor was booked, so we whisked her into urgent care.  That was mistake number one.

Our urgent care clinic is a crap shoot.  You might get a really good doctor.  You might get a really bad doctor.  If you’re really lucky, you’ll get a physician’s assistant, who doesn’t know his asshole from his elbow.  Guess which one we got? DING, DING, DING!  We’ve got a winner!

After assessing her he determined that she *might* have a UTI.  There was talk of catheterizing her.  They didn’t have the right size tube (thank GOD), so they put on a U-Bag.  For the uninitiated, a U bag is a tiny little plastic bag, with a U-shaped adhesive area at the top, to place over the u-whoo area of the child.  Theory being when the child pees, the bag will collect the urine.  So we were sent home with one attached to TheCakester, and 3 more in a bag, along with sterile wipes, and told to keep going until we got pee in a bag.  Unless by morning, we were unsuccessful in operation “pee in a bag”.  Then we were instructed to go to the ER, where they would have the right size tubes to cath her.  No meds, just instructions to alternate Tylenol and Motrin, and to go to ER if she got worse.

So we head home, have some dinner, etc.  Change her diaper before bedtime, and check  U-bag.  U Bag empty, diaper full.  Bag fail.  Oookay then.  We clean her up, put on another, and off to be she goes.  Next morning we get her up and say prayers, cross fingers and do a “please let there be pee in the bag so we don’t have to shove a tube up our daughter’s wahoo” dance.  Success.  A small bit of urine in the bag.  Yay!  We take it back down to the clinic’s lab, where paperwork was supposed to have been submitted for the testing.

Key word in that last sentence?  SUPPOSED to.  It was not done.  And because the lab opens before the doctors drag their golf weary asses out of bed, there was nothing they could do until a doctor came in an put in the order.  So we wait.  And by mid afternoon, I still had not heard anything, so I call.  I’m told, in very clear terms “No UTI”.  Was told that she probably has the same bug that we have, if she gets worse, symptoms change, yada yada.

So since Monday I’ve been walking around thinking she’s ok, just got a little respiritory thing that the rest of us have.

Then yesterday I have a voice mail from the clinic asking me to call back about Ava. I came really close to not bothering.  It was after 5pm when I got the message.   I was thinking I probably wouldn’t get anyone.  Plus, what could they be calling about?  I already got an answer, right?  RIGHT?

Wrong.

They ran two tests.  A urinalysis,  and a culture.  Cultures take 48 hours to come back.  Apparently NOBODY at this clinic determined it was important for me to know that TWO tests had been ordered.  And that maybe, just maybe, there is a chance that she’s going to need medication.

So my baby girl has been walking around all week with an untreated UTI.

We have antibiotics now.  She’s being treated.

However.  I?  Am pissed off.  Flaming, smoke from ears pissed off.

If the culture was started on Monday, why did it take until Thursday night for me to get a call back?

Why wasn’t I told what tests were being run?

Why was I ASSURED on Monday that she’s fine, when all results hadn’t come back yet?

What if I hadn’t decided to make that return phone call?

Somebody dropped the ball here.  Epic fail on the part of this clinic.

I’m going to find out who.  And then I want an apology.  And after that?  Probably her medical records.  If I can’t trust these people to do their jobs, it’s time to look for care elsewhere.

This isn’t a simple thing to fix.  This is a child’s health.  This is MY child’s health.  God help ANYONE who fucks with that.

I just realized the last time I posted was in June.  JUNE, people!  Holy shit, how did that happen? Well, I’ll tell you.  My mother visited for a week, and our home office doubles as a guest room, leaving me with no place to do my ranting.  Then a bunch of other crap happened, like I decided I was going to start a blog design business.  And then I relentlessly stalked offered my services to Katie when she wanted a new design.

And then, just when I finally started having free time again, I found I had nothing to write about.  Well, nothing interesting, anyway.  Not like this post is going to win a Pulitzer, but hey, you don’t read this expecting to come away enlightened and educated anyway, right?

Then over the weekend, I though, ok, maybe now.  And then?  The husband got sick.  Then my baby girl got sick. And I got sick.  Flurry of late night temperature readings, trips to Urgent Care,  smothering mothering my sick baby all made for a busy time.

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I still don’t have a design done for my business site.  Which you think I’d have done first thing, but what can I say, I’m a rebel like that.  I like to do things backwards.  However, the upside is that I do have something to put on the “Portfolio” page if and when I ever get around to creating it.

I am more timely on getting projects done for clients.  It’s just like the plumber who always has a leaky pipe, or the doctor who ignores his own symptoms.  I always seem to put me last.

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BlogHer is coming up in a couple of weeks.  I’m not going.  I bought a ticket when they went on sale last year and then some personal stuff happened and I decided not to go.  I ended up giving my ticket away so that someone awesome could go, and I’m glad I did.  While there are a bunch of people I would love to meet and hang out with, there are quite a few I’d have to spend 4 days avoiding, for fear of that awkward “yeah, I know we don’t like you anymore but we’ll pretend to play nice in public” moment.  Maybe next year will be my year.  If it’s west coast.  If not?  I’ll probably skip that one as well.

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I’m amazed at the lack of hypocrisy I read online some days.  Either some folks just don’t get just how shoddily they’ve treated some people, or they are in absolute denial.  I don’t know which it is and frankly, I don’t care anymore.  I’m learning to let it all go.

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I have gone back to Twitter, kind of.  I mostly spend my time there chatting with my BFFs and the occasional convo with someone I was close with before.  But some douchebag stole appropriated my name when I left before and nobody knows who I am now.  I suppose I could make a big deal out of it and go on a “hey, it’s me” rampage, but meh.  Why bother.  I know a lot of people are probably rolling their eyes and thinking “I knew she’d be back”.  Whatever.  If the last year has taught me anything, its definitely who my REAL friends are.  As long as I have them, all is right with the world.

So, what’s been going on with you?

And yeah, I just realized it’s not Monday.  But when you were home sick Monday and Tuesday?  Wednesday feels like Monday.  Jeez, now aren’t you glad I’m blogging again?

I’ve spent the last week on vacation, basking in the glory of my child, and dealing with the insanity that is my mother. I spent most of my time offline and frankly, I enjoyed it. Other than emailing or texting with my BFFs, I was unconnected from the world. It was amazing how stress releasing that was. I enjoy blogging and to an extent I enjoy social media. For the most part these days, though, I only use it to talk with my close friends.

It seems that the internet and drama go hand in hand. I deal with enough drama in my personal life that I have no desire to be in the middle of it online as well. I try to avoid it, but every so often I get sucked in again, sometimes of my own making. Sometimes because a friend is need of help. Either way, coming back down to reality today is making me ponder what I’ve been “missing” in the last week.

1. People living in glass houses hurling stones furiously at others. 2. Tweet of Mysterious Origin.  You know the ones.  Like “”I never will understand some people” ….seconds after you get done emailing with them. 3. People who would keep following me on Twitter or being my “friend” on Facebook, but never speak to me. Dude, just fucking remove me already if you don’t want to talk to me any  longer. 4. People who seem to think I owe them something. Or expect more from me than they were ever willing to give me. 5.  People who like to dictate to others what to do with their own little space in the blogosphere.  You don’t like what you read here?  Fine.  That’s your prerogative.  Click the little red X and close out the window.  But don’t sit back and bitch about the content. What possible purpose does it serve? Blogs, like every other form of writing, are subjective.    There are millions of other blogs out there that may suit you.  Keep reading till you find one you do like.

So yeah, is it any wonder I didn’t really miss the interwebz this week?

Today’s lesson is how to be a good drama whore on the internet.  Maybe you’re new to being a drama whore.  Maybe you’re a drama whore who is new to the interwebz.  Either way?  After 10 plus years of observing  this species in it’s natural habitat, I can certainly offer up some pointers to anyone thinking of starting a career in internet drama whoring.  It’s not all that different from real life, but there are some subtle differences.  We’ll be covering those as we go along.

Step 1:  Find some drama.  It doesn’t matter if it’s about you.  It doesn’t matter if it’s about a friend of yours.  Hell, it can even be about complete strangers or subjects you’ve never even heard of.  Just sniff out something that looks and sounds controversial and take a side.

Step 2. Start talking about this situation.  Talk to to your friends on Facebook.  Talk to your friends on Twitter.  You are on both of those things, right?  If not, you must sign up IMMEDIATELY.  Nothing can make an issue go viral like social media.  Not even the town gossip with 4 phones lines and the entire town on speed dial can spread rumors, gossip and innuendo faster than Facebook and Twitter.

Step 3.  Continue to engage.  If your friends won’t discuss this with you, start tweeting at random strangers.  Comment on blog posts and MAKE YOUR POINT, DAMMIT.  Who cares if it contains any logic, by the way.  Logic?  Is for pussies.

Step 4.  Once you have found someone who has risen to the bait?  Whatever you do, DO NOT BACK DOWN.  Keep replying, escalating your responses each time as to upset or anger the individual you are engaged with.  This is crucial.  There is a fine line here, so be careful.  You have to attack enough so that the person will have to defend themselves, but if you start using terms like “cock juggling thunder cunt”?  You probably crossed over that line.  (**cough**)

Step 5.  If the person you have been “conversing” with stops lobbing comebacks, don’t despair.  Keep talking.  Keeping the discussion going is ABSOLUTELY VITAL to the Drama Whore’s Code.  Even after every one else has moved on?  Keep talking.  After all, you are super important, and people should listen to you, dammit.

And last but not least:  Step 6.  If you can’t find drama?  CREATE IT.  It’s really easy. You just find something that takes a stand and you take it personally.  You whine about being attacked.  You create a blog and fabricate a back-story and content.  You make people feel sorry for you.  Don’t be above using your kids as drama fodder.  Everyone loves babies. But don’t say a dingo ate it.  That’s been done already.

Remember, the bigger the story?  The bigger the drama.

I hope you have gleaned some valuable lessons here for future drama whoring.  Stay tuned for my next internet guide:  How to be An Asshole in 140 Characters or Less.

I held back on posting a lot of things on my old blog, mainly because a lot of my family read it.  That is not the case here.  No, I didn’t start this blog to bash my in-laws or my husband.  But I just wanted a space that was mine and free of obligations to censor myself for fear of hurting feelings.

I never talked politics.  I rarely discussed religion.

A prime example of why blew up in my face last night.  A friend on Facebook posted about people in general being shitheads.  Lying, stealing, etc.  She went on to rant about Obama, hoping his four year stint would be over soon.  Someone else posted there and discussed the hope that someone would “get rid of him”.  She also suggested that he hates America, is a Marxist (let me know when you’ve stopped laughing about that one, because I haven’t been able to stop yet) and wants to rule the entire world.

Oooohkay then.  I’ve been pretty quiet in the last couple of  years regarding politics, knowing that politics and friends or family do not make good bedfellows.  But yeserday was just the final straw for me.  I responded.  I asked for clarification.  I got none from the party I was addressing, but boy did I get an earful from my “friend”.  Who proceeded to tell me what an asshole Obama is.

I told her that I certainly welcomed a discussion of issues and differing opinions, but if we can’t be respectful of the office of president, then we can’t continue to be friends.  I spent 8 years listening to  her spout off about how wonderful Bush was.  I kept my mouth shut, because I didn’t share that opinion.  Whatever I may have thought of him (and let me tell you folks, it wasn’t much) I didn’t say it in public, because for me, it is about simple respect.  If you keep telling me that the person I voted for, the person I chose to entrust with the running of the nation is an asshole?  You’re telling me I’m an asshole for supporting him.  I simply wanted her to take a step back, and look at how she was acting.

What I got?  Was a good bye note and telling me she had removed me at “my request”.  At no point did I ever ask her to remove me as her friend.  At no point did I insinuate that we were done, period.  I asked her for simple respect, IF we are to continue being friends.  Apparently?  I got my answer.

I spent some time being upset by it.  But then I looked at the situation again and realized, if this is someone who can’t give me the simple respect I afforded her?  Then I really didn’t lose much.