Do Your Best

I called my blog Micro-Affections because I thought I would write all these smallish posts about things that make me feel good or might make others feel good. But I also have a tendency to be a bit of a pessimist. So maybe it was wishful thinking?

I haven’t written much lately because the thing at the forefront of my thoughts is my body and the ways it feels like it’s falling apart and the fact that it will be taxed and strained even more, for a couple more months, before it can get better. Every day, I am in pain. I don’t know how to describe this pain to my OB or my chiropractor. I don’t know how to get any real relief aside from no longer being pregnant. I wonder, often, if they knew what I’m really dealing with, if there would be some more direction for me, some better answers. I appreciate the way pregnancy grounds me in the physical, makes me more aware of my body. Unlike my first pregnancy, though, this time I feel bogged down by it. I want a little less body connection and a little more daydreamy pregnancy bliss.

I don’t think I’ve accepted that I’m going to actually have two babies at the end of this. I don’t know if I really can accept that before it happens.

In the last few days, I’ve found myself more enamored than usual with my son. He has been playing word games and coming up with his own stories, his own little rules. Sometimes, as the evening winds down, I’ve thought, Let him stay up. Don’t stop this. I’ve worried — of course I’ve worried — that the twins will command too much attention. I’ve worried he might shrink up into himself, or turn away from me harder than I can take. I’ve worried that his beautiful personality will fade. These last few days have nearly broken my heart, in both good and bad ways. When loved ones say, “He will be a good brother,” I want to say, “He doesn’t have to be. He can just be himself. He is good no matter what.” I don’t want him to feel pressured, to internalize these sentiments as an indication of his worth — that it’s now tied to his sisters. I want him to be allowed to be exactly who he is, because who he is is so lovely.

We just had a beautiful baby shower with many friends and loved ones. The company was great. The weather was gorgeous. We received some really touching gifts and written sentiments. I thought the shower would help me accept what’s coming. Instead, I think, There is so much left to do, buy, arrange. I could check 100 items off a list and still feel unprepared.

Yesterday, my son started asking me if the things he was doing were perfect, or if what he’d made was perfect. Today it was how he was filling a bucket with sand to make a sand castle. I said, “That looks great!” Then, “You don’t have to be perfect. You should just try to do your best.” But he cried and wailed, “I do have to be perfect!” He disagrees with us on everything, in just this way, so I tried not to read too much into his exact words. But I quickly ran through the things I may have said recently, either to him directly or when he was present, to figure out if I am creating anxiety in my two-and-a-half-year-old. Sometimes, I think to myself, I do have to be perfect. I don’t want that for him. I don’t want it for myself, either.

During the baby shower, I got a rejection for something I wrote. I didn’t really mind. I can’t decide if that’s good or bad.

I still don’t exactly want twins. But I would be devastated to lose them now.

One of the hawks that lives behind my house has a messed up wing. It still flies just fine, but it is missing several feathers toward the tip of the wing. I always hear it before I see because it screeches a lot. I’m sure it knows what it’s doing, but sometimes I wonder if it scares away potential prey because it can’t keep quiet. Maybe it is just reveling in flight, though. Maybe it just likes how a piercing squawk sends all the little neighborhood creatures ducking for cover.

Sometimes, that’s how I want to use my voice, too.