The Road to Baby As Told Through Bad Reality TV

I am your average binge-worthy tv show-aholic. Among my conquests are Weeds, House of Cards, Orange Is The New Black, Mad Men, and Downton Abbey. The spouse not so much, aside from The Wire of course which had stellar writing, acting, and was set in our beloved city. She would rather spend her free time reading, playing Mario Kart, or listening to records. Now what I’ve learned about the spouse over the past 8 years is she is a sucker for really bad reality TV. The campier the better (we spent an entire weekend watching a Jersey Shore marathon once after all). 

I realized that our conception and pregnancy journey can be captured by the bad reality TV we have consumed along the way.

Last summer the crushing blows of bfn’s were really getting us down. The remedy? The Real L Word. I had come home from a late night at work to find the spouse was already four episodes in one of the later seasons, completely engrossed in the story line of the couple trying to conceive. Luckily she had bared the brunt of watching the miscarriage episode without me; not so sure I would have been able to handle that. We had an unexplainable free month of Shotime that mysteriously disappeared as soon as we had watched the entire series. Maybe the universe knew that the magical healing powers of dysfunctional, lesbian drama was the only cure for the baby blues?

Then slightly after we got pregnant we discovered Couple’s Therapy on VH1. Mainly because Whitney and Sara were on and it had been a lonely couple of months without all of our bffs from The Real L Word. Being a therapist myself I do have a guilty pleasure for shows that depict “therapy.” Especially when it’s z-list celebrity “patients” being booked by their agents for one last 15 minutes of fame before fading off into obscurity. We were dealing with a lot of grief (well still are) early in the pregnancy. Couple’s Therapy helped us tune out and lose a few brain cells each week.

I was on and off couch rest most of the late winter into spring. My dad bought us matching TV trays on sale at Big Lots and we parked ourselves on the couch every night eating a combination of take out, meals generously cooked by family and friends, or over cooked meat courtesy of a very paranoid, vegetarian spouse who was convinced more protein was the answer to stopping my bleeds. No blood since, maybe she was right. The only thing that seemed fitting during this time was the one-two punch of My 600-lb Life and Hoarding: Buried Alive. Sometimes the original Hoarders, slipped in there, gotta love that Dr. Zasio. This truly was the only way to feel better about life.

Times have gotten much better at the end of the pregnancy, and the TV is reflecting that. We’ve become obsessed with The Dog Whisperer, and the spouse even mounted a small TV in the bedroom for us to stream episodes to. I only make it halfway into the first segment before falling asleep because at 37 weeks pregnant I’m always exhausted. The dog loves Caesar, but she does not respond to our calm, assertive energy.

The best part of the final stretch of course is Honey Boo Boo is back. She’s pretty much been a constant through this process. There has to have been at least 3 seasons since we started TTC-ing last March. It’s comforting to have our favorite boisterous, burping, farting, and sneezing family back in our living room. Plus they make me feel a little bit better about how gross I have become this pregnancy.

Moving Along

We are heading into our 35th week of pregnancy and the 9th month is right around the corner. I’d say it went fast, but I don’t know if I fully believe that. Every day I get the play by play from co-workers and clients about how much bigger I am than the day/week before, what a big boy I’m having, and that I’m going to pop soon. People just can’t contain themselves around a pregnant lady. Another girl in my office is pregnant and just starting to show, so I’m more than happy to pass along the torch to her. 

So much going on in the final two months. We had our baby shower, which was an awesome beach theme since it’s the closest we will get getting to the beach for a year. We got so. many. onesies. My parents are waiting on a count because they made bets, but as I told them, it’s too many to count. Let’s just say we won’t have to do laundry until Soul Baby is six months old at least. 

Speaking of Soul Baby, the spouse picked up a Temptations record on our last weekend outing and he totally dug it. I love this baby, I don’t know what it is about the Temps, but he grooves like its nobodies business. He is really bored by all the white bread crap I listen to in the car; I had to add the Soul Town channel to my preset just to appease him. 

We also got a mystery gift. Someone purchased the sleep and play rocker off our registry, but it was shipped in the original box without a packing slip or card. Dun dun duuuunnnnn! The spouse and I got different answers from customer service reps about if it’s possible to track down the mystery shopper’s identity. To make matters more confusing, the relative I thought had sent it, just sent a present for us to my parents house. Time to make a new suspect line up. 

Baby preparations are going well. The spouse (who keeps reminding me that father’s day is coming up and she has added some things to her amazon wish list– subtle) has been testing out her dad skills by setting up all of the baby gear. The pack n play almost did her in, but she rocked out installation of the car seat and assembling that rock and play. The other win for the week for her is finding a good deal on a glider on Craiglist. 

On my end I’ve been preparing mentally for birth. We met with the doula one last time to go over the birth plan and talk about the big day. She gave me some hypnobabies CDs to practice relaxation and focused concentration. I have the relaxation piece down pat because the past two nights I’ve practiced I wake up suddenly and realize I have been asleep for the past half hour. Now I just need to get that focused concentration bit down; not so sure I’ll be able to pass out during active labor.