Tattoo And Scar

A few years ago, I decided to go for my 3rd tattoo and I wanted it to be, just like the other 2 I had already, meaningful. I wanted something that wasn't hype back then, I wanted a henna design, but made with real ink, and one with a special meaning. 

I said it before, I'll say it again, Internet has yet to fail me and I looked for a design I actually liked and investigated the meaning it had. And I found one, one that women normally had applied on their feet, on their wedding day, in order to celebrate their new married woman "condition". Not too sure if I'm being very clear but in a fewer simpler words, it means: I'm married or better, I'm getting married, woohoo, let's celebrate.

Since I was newly single after 12 years of being in 3 long relationships back to back, I thought that yeah, that was a nice way of celebrating my new "condition",not as a married woman but as a single one. Yeah, I know it may sound paradoxical to use that particular design for the complete opposite of what it's supposed to be meaning but 

a) i do what i want, 

b) unless i tell people, nobody knows what that design means (not in my circle of friends anyway!) 

and c) as i said, I do what the fuck i want.

Since I wasn't gonna do it on the foot ... I'll be honest here, I currently have close to a dozen tattoos and there is no way on earth I'll have one on one of my feet. I'm a wuss, I know it'll hurt like motherfucking hell and there is no way I'll do it there. Period. So since I wasn't gonna do it on my foot, I've decided for a more, let's say, private area: my pelvis. I thought that hey, I'm celebrating my condition as a single woman, might as well put it in a place close to a very private woman area. I don't know if I'm making myself understood but I know what I mean. I'm twisted. I have weird ideas. What can i say?

Anyway, being a wuss on the foot area ... well, should I have known better. Waxing is already a bitch pain-wise, tattooing your pelvic area, yeah, well, bad idea. It's painful like you have no idea. During the entire hour I had it done, I kept on thinking: what the heck was I THINKING?

But the result exceeded my expectations:

Fast forward a decade later almost and I'm pregnant and about to give birth. Except that I ended up having a c-section. And even though it's a surgery and you're under anaesthesia, it's only half your body which is numb hence you can actually chat with the surgeon. Not that you really want to (especially since I was struggling to stay awake and that, well, he has to get the baby out of you being careful not to bleed you to death).

Anyway, the surgeon told me in a "I'm-so-sorry" voice that he had to cut right in the middle of the tattoo. Above would be too high and under would be too low. I told him not to worry since I honestly couldn't care less at that point but he apologized a few times after that.

When he came visit the following day, he apologized again about having to cut my tat right in the middle and said: you can ask your tattoo artist to retouch it once it's healed. And I thought, yeah, well, nope, not happening. Not only does that particular body part hurt like hell to tattoo but my tattoo artist is in Mexico and also, tattooing a scar can be tricky. A lot of tattooers won't accept doing it: the skin's a different texture, the ink might not stick and I don't even want to think about the feeling.

Since pretty much every hospital staff who came check my c-section scar mentioned about the tattoo retouching, I realized a few things.

First of all, yeah, my beloved tattoo would be altered by a scar and I honestly didn't care. It's not that I had that scar made for nothing, it was to deliver my baby and I would have "pay" a way higher price would have I needed to.

But the biggest reason why I will not have it retouched is because this particular tattoo was initially a celebration of my new "condition" as a single woman. It's a girl power tattoo. In my eyes at least. And now it's been modified by a c-section scar. It's yet another condition as a woman who has now become a mother. What cooler way of adding meaning to it? There is no way I'll ever have it redone. 

EVER.

And honestly, the surgeon did one hell of an awesome job!

Why would I want to retouch it? It's PERFECT now. Just as it was perfect on day one.

Stuff No One Told Me

Or maybe they did tell me and I didn't listen. Or hear. Or pay attention. Or maybe I was stupid enough to think they exaggerated!

If I might allow myself with a little piece of advice for every first-time-mom-to-be: IT'S TRUE! Pretty much everything people tell you you'll eventually endure after giving birth is true. I agree on the fact that every pregnancy is different. As every woman's experience about giving birth is different. So I won't pretend to hold the holy answers about them all but in my experience, these are some of the few things i've heard at some point but probably decided to take them lightly. Big mistake.

- If you breathe properly, contraction's pain can be "controlled".

No. It can't. You'll feel that your body is about to burst open. And that you want it all to end. And you'll wonder why on earth did you get yourself into this in the first place. And can I get an epidural already?

- An epidural doesn't hurt.

Trust me, it does. And i'm not the sensitive to pain kind of person, i'd even say i'm pretty tough when pain is involved but an epidural hurts like motherfucking HELL. Picture a needle going into your spine for crying out loud. How can that not hurt?

It's supposed to numb the pain of the contractions but your legs don't answer your commands anymore and you might as well pee or poop right there, you wouldn't know, you don't feel shit. 

- A C-section is not a real childbirth and it doesn't hurt as bad as a natural birth.

The next person to say one of these 2 things will get hit in the face. With a hammer.

I wish a c-section on NOBODY. First of all because it is, in my opinion, the worse way of giving birth. The dad can't be there because it's surgery. You, as a mom, are completely passive and you're just enduring the birth of your child feeling completely useless.

Second of all, you don't see what's going on obviously (i don't think you'd enjoy watching the surgeon cutting you open and pulling your baby out ...) but since I asked because I wanted to know ... Once the cut is made, the surgeon put his hand inside of you to pull the baby's head towards the new exit door. Then (and i felt it even though I had an anaesthesia) he kneads your belly to pop the baby out, just like you'd do to pop a zit. Then again for the placenta. Then he'll vaccuum your insides and stitches/stapples you up.

- You'll get sick and you'll most likely puke.

You haven't eaten in AGES, you have asked for an epidural, if the birth doesn't present itself well, you'll get a rachianaesthesia on top (same as an epidural but stronger), you're tired, you're in pain and since the ob/gyn will knead your belly, you'll want to puke. Except that you can't feel your stomach contract. Except that you don't have anything in to puke. So it's like at the dentist when they tell you to spit and you can't. You're lying on your back, you can only turn your head on the side. You'll drool/vomit in your neck. It's disgusting/nasty/gross/all of the above.

- You'll lose all your dignity.

I can't tell about a natural birth but as far as I've heard, it's the same. In my case, since i had to go through recovery, I didn't get to see my baby straight away. But you're in those hospital robes, with a tube in to drain your bladder, you're bleeding from down there, you obviously haven't waxed in ages (too painful) nor shaved (first because my beautician would kill me and second because you haven't been able to reach your ladyparts in quite some time!), you can't stand so you have to pee in a bedpan, you need the help of 2 nurses to try to stand a mere 12 hours after surgery, you take a shower sitting on a stool with the door open and a nurse in your room in case you fall, you'll feel like a hundred years old walking all folded up to ease the pain and you'll let the nurse check your bleeding on the gigantic pads the hospital gives you (oh, and the net underwear you get ... glamour at its peak!)

- You'll get contractions.

You thought you were done with it? NOPE. You'll still get some AFTERWARDS. I mean seriously. Isn't it enough as it is? They're less painful than the one BEFORE but still. Contractions! For crying out loud!

- You'll produce milk.

You can take all the meds you want to cut it (if you don't want to breastfeed your baby), you might thing that you're gonna get through without enduring this but no. You're in for some kick ass pain. Your boobs, all of the sudden, are three sizes bigger than usual, they're hard as stone, they're painful as hell and they leak. Yep. It feels like you have implants good enough for shooting a porn video but they're dripping milk. You feel like a cow. Honestly. And just looking at them is painful.

However (it worked for me), putting cabbage in your bra can help decongest them and cut the milk production. Not to scare you though but i read that a woman who gave birth recently is naturally programmed to produce milk and HEARING a baby scream can stimulate the production. Being in a maternity ward, i let you imagine!

- Last but not least, you'll get tired. And stressed up but mostly tired.

And by tired, I mean EXHAUSTED. You feed your baby every 3 hours, and in between two feeds, you also have to change him/her, wait for the burp and try to get some rest as well. Needless to say that whether you're at home or still at the hospital, sleeping in slices of a couple of hours is not enough. The slightest thing to do becomes an insurmountable task, you'll cry a tremendous lot because you're desperate for some sleep and some rest, you'll lose your temper, you'll feel guilty like hell about it, you'll want the baby to go to hell for a few hours just so you can rest, you'll feel guilty about having such thoughts. And you'll stress up and worry about everything. Is the baby hot? cold? hungry? is the diaper full? is it the right color? is she eating enough? too much? is a burp not out and hurting her tummy? is she tired? how can i get rid of her hick-up? why is she squeaking? does she need a pacifyer? can she breathe properly? how do i clean her nose? can she finally fall asleep so i can sleep as well?

I'll finish up with just one more thing: it's worth it. It's totally worth is. It's normal to feel helpless and oh so tired. But seeing your baby smile and make faces, grab your finger in her tiny hands, open her eyes wide to see and discover the world around her or simply watching your baby sleep makes it all worth it.

Don't hesitate to talk to friends who had babies, to ask stupid questions, to reach out for help with the simplest things. Leave the baby with the dad or the grand-parents for a little while, even if it's just for 20 minutes and go for a walk, or take a bath or make yourself a nice cup of your favorite coffee, read a book in front of the fireplace or take a quick nap. It'll make a world of a difference in your day. 

Thousands and thousands of moms around you have been through this. You can do it.

Pregnancy and Childbirth From Hell

So how are you? How did it go? Everything went well?

NO.

Not in the slightest way my delivery or even my pregnancy went well. 

The look on people's face when you answer a big fat no to "did the delivery go well?" ... Priceless.

Why on earth is that everybody assumes that because your baby is finally here and that you're finally back home that everything went well. Honestly, NOTHING went well. Nothing at all.

And no, it's not because i am indeed finally home with my beautiful baby girl that I'm gonna forget all the bad things that happened to me prior. Hell no I'm not gonna forget. I'll move on, yes, but I won't forget. And there is a very good reason to this: this is how my daughter's life started. 

My pregnancy got cut short. And thank god it did. It's been a very difficult first trimester, not because i was sick or nauseous or any of the classic inconveniences you can face at the beginning of a pregnancy but simply because I had that massive black cloud of my miscarriage hovering above me. During the second trimester, we were told that the baby was too small for its age, so there were the plethora of exams and check-ups and this and that. I was going to the hospital at least once a week.

And for the icing on the cake ... Last trimester ... Baby still small, i should get an ultrasound a week as well as two monitorings a week. By week 33 (which for us, was week 31 and a half but let's not dwell on that), i got told that they'll most likely induce labor between week 34 and week 36.

Since the baby was doing just fine (no kidding), they decided to wait just a few days short of week 37. 

It was a Thursday afternoon. Since the baby was small (estimated weight of 2kg then), they decided to go through all 4 steps of "smooth" labor: 

- the balloon first (inserted inside in order to detach the water sack from the cervix), set for 24h

- the "plug" - looks like a tampon that diffuses hormones in order to accelerate labor and trigger contractions ... Another 24h.

- an hormonal gel (same job as the tampon) ... 6h

- and last but not least, in the delivery room, with an IV to stimulate the contractions hence accelerating the distention of the cervix.

I went in the delivery room at 3pm on the Sunday. My man slept on the floor on Friday night and on our inflatable mattress on Saturday night. Needless to say, he was pretty much in the same state of exhaustion than i was. 

11pm or so, on Sunday, i got the epidural. It was a disaster. The anaesthetist was scaring me, the nurse was a bitch. I was losing it. I was exhausted, i was scared, Bruno couldn't be with me, tears were rolling down my eyes uncontrolably, I was shaking so bad from all the tension that was packing on for the past 4 days that it took for freaking ever. Or so it seemed.

Except that nothing went as planned after that. At around 1am, as they were increasing the dose i was getting in the IV, the baby's heart rate dropped. As the midwife said, talking about the baby: "she just made the decision for us".

She couldn't take it anymore. I was gonna get a c-section.

I couldn't stop crying.

After all we'd been through, i would be a lone spectator at my delivery. Bruno wouldn't be able to be there since i was going for surgery. I wasn't gonna participate nor see anything since they cut you open and it all happens behind a curtain.

I was struggling not to fall asleep. I wanted to puke so bad. I couldn't feel my right arm. I was scared. I wanted to be over with. I wanted to sleep.

I got to see my baby for a split second before they took her to the pediatrician. All i saw of her was that she had hair. I stayed on the table for another 15 minutes or so, just for them to get the placenta out, vaccuum my insides and close me up. 

The surgeon apologized a few time that he had to cut right in the middle of my pelvis tattoo. I couldn't care less to be honest. But i thought it was nice of him to feel sorry about ruining my tat'. 14 stapples later (and who knows how many stitches inside), i went to the recovery room for 3 never-ending hours, dying to be with my baby and my man. 

Best moment of it all: when i got to have her on my chest. I could have stayed like that for ages. But all good things have an end ...

I spent another week in the hospital. It was hard, i cried a lot since again, i was pretty much on my own most of the time (Bruno spent all the time he could with me but he had to go back to work and since the hospital is not very arranging for the new dads ...). And the nerves got the best of me ... After all i endured, i just couldn't take much more any more. The nursery nurses offered to take my baby for the night so i could rest. I cried my eyes out in guilt but truly appreciated to get a 7hrs straight night. 

Long story short, we're finally back home. All together like the family we now are. We do as we see fit for our baby girl. Maternal instinct kicked in and with a baby, you just know what is best for her. She's a very good baby. Quiet. Calm. And to all the people who keep on telling us "it won't last", i tell them: SCREW YOU. After all we've been through, we deserve to have some peace of mind and a quiet baby. You might have had a terrible few months with yours but you most likely didn't have to endure what we had to. So instead of being jealous of what we enjoy now, wish us the best instead!

So after a total of 14 ultrasounds, 27 monitorings, 72 hours of labor inducing techniques, 9 hours in the delivery room, it's by c-section that our beautiful baby girl Lucie was born, on Halloween.

I Contradicted A Doc

I don't know if you fathom the extend of such a sentence and act. I actually told a doctor that i disagreed with his diagnosis!

To be clearer, i disagree with my gynecologist's start date of my pregnancy hence my supposed due date and therefore, that my baby is not in the norm size-wise.

Needless to say that in order to actually speak out and tell him/her that you think (s)he actually made a mistake, you have to use a massive amount of tact. Medical staff don't like regular folks like myself telling them: sorry, not sorry, i don't agree with that.

As i mentionned it in an earlier post, my still in-utero baby is small. She's growing well so far but she's under the regular line of growth. Docs are estimating that she's between 10 and 15 days late. It's nothing you'll say, just like i thought as well, except that on a span of 9 months, it's quite a fair amount of time. Except that i disagree with them all on the starting of the pregnancy date. MY date being at least a week later than their. Actually between 7 and 10 days later than what they calculated. 

Obviously, pregnancy, conception times and due dates are not exact science unless you've had an IVF which wasn't my case. 

I mentionned it a few times to the many docs i've seen so far but i never felt heard. So i was like, yeah, well, whatever, i know they're off by at least a week, i'm not gonna worried about this all "too small" thing.

Except that i am tired. I'm exhausted. I could sleep pretty much all day and having to go back and forth to the hospital for monitoring the baby and ultrasound at least once if not twice a week is draining the little energy i have left out of me.

So when i saw my ob/gyn last Monday, i told myself, i HAVE to tell him that i disagree with him, i HAVE to get that load off of my shoulder and maybe, just maybe, he'll realize that yes, my baby is indeed a tiny baby but she's in between the regular growth lines and just fine.

Deep breath.

I used all my ingenuity and tact to tell him just that. I was actually pretty happy with the way it came out. And i was even happier with the way he reacted. He listened to me, double checked his measures and calculation, entered the measurements he did that day along with MY estimated date (8 days later than his) and printed the growth graph. 

And guess what?

It changed nothing. 

NOTHING.

DAMN IT.

The baby is still smaller than what she'd expected to be at the age she has. Whether she's 30 or 31 weeks old, she's still too small.

Which means that i'll still get monitored most likely every week until the end of my pregnancy, that i'll still get to see a ob/gyn every other week and even with all these precautions, i'll still most likely get a tiny baby. 

What worries me now? That she actually stops growing and that they have to trigger the birth a lot earlier than planned. Which might happen actually. 

Or she's just a happy go lucky tiny baby who has her mom already worrying for nothing!

End of it all, you should always say what you have weighing on your heart. It might not change the outcome of the situation but in my case, it surely eased my concerns that the hospital might do with me and my baby something that is not necessary. As i said, in my situation, it doesn't change much. But at least i've unloaded this off of my shoulders.

And it felt good.

No, No and No

I'm pregnant. Scratch that. I'm very pregnant. And by very pregnant i mean that i am finishing my 6th month of pregnancy so needless to say, i can't pretend no more that i'm not. It shows. It bloody well shows. Politician belly, porn star boobs, the balance of a new born calf and the swollen limbs of a hippopotamus. Sexiness in all its glory.

Maybe it looks beautiful on the outside but the feeling ain't beautiful whatsoever. I feel bloated, i huff and puff after climbing up a flight of stairs, it takes me an hour to recover from vacuuming my bedroom, i can't find a decent position to sleep, my gums are bleeding every time i brush my teeth, my belly button is about to pop out (gasp) and my bladder is the size of a nut. On the plus side, so is my stomach (the size of a nut) so i'm extremely quickly satiated. Extremely quickly hungry again but oh well.

I'm not gonna go through the entire load of details that my pregnancy has been so far. My baby isn't in the norm size-wise so needless to say i had to endure quite a fair amount of extra exams to make sure it's normal (physically and genetically) and growing. Long story short, it's a little girl and she's just that: little. A perfectly healthy tiny little baby girl. 

What the doctors at both hospitals i'm followed up at don't know because they don't want to listen is that their supposed conception date is wrong. It's a least a week off. 

Estimated conception time: February 27th.

Nope.

I can tell you it's definitely not that day that our little shrimp was made. 

Nope.

100% sure of that.

But anyways. Norms, norms and more norms. Get out of them and there are protocols to be followed and there i was with blood testing and amniocentesis and ultrasound every 2 weeks and so on.

She's fine. My baby's fine. She's alive and kicking. Oh yeah. She is so very much kicking all the time. That's one thing i actually like about pregnancy. When you feel the baby kicking.

But the point of that post today was about my belly. Read that again. I wrote MY belly. I didn't write "the" belly, i didn't write "a" belly, i wrote MY belly. Because it is just that. It's mine. And mine only. 

WHY ON FREAKING EARTH is that people think that because you're pregnant, your belly becomes public domain. Why is that when people greet you, they think it's appropriate to rub your belly? Do you rub the belly of a guy? Do you rub someone's anything apart from a pregnant belly? 

No you don't.

For crying out loud it is so freaking intrusive. I HATE IT.

Oh hi, how is the baby? Bam, belly rub. The baby is not gonna answer you, not now, not for another few years actually and less of it all when it's still inside the womb. Why don't you rub my man's package while you're at it? It did half the job after all!

I asked the question to several of my friends who've had children already and they all experienced the same thing. Some of them told me stuff that are plain dreadful! I swear i will never touch the belly of a pregnant woman unless invited to do so (and even though, i still think it's a weird thing to do), just like i won't ask people why don't they have kids yet (you never know what they might have been through) and personal stuff like these.

People have no concept of private space.

I might be getting a tad paranoid but every time i meet someone, i hold my hands in front of my stomach. When they try to do the belly rub but find my hands instead, it's like instant back off. It's like my hands are burning them. And it's awesome because that's exactly what i'm trying to do: to make them back off of me without actually being rude. 

If you have any other tips to prevent that from happening, considering it's still blazing hot so we're all only wearing a few items of clothing, i'm all ears!

Oh My

It's been so long it's embarrassing. The reason behind it is quite simple it's mainly laziness. OK, it's purely laziness. It's not like nothing happens to me that isn't worth writing about but i don't know, it's a massive struggle for me. I have to do violence to myself to do whatever requires an effort. Even if it's something i actually enjoy. Writing is something i truly enjoy but just the thought of connecting to my blog, writing something and publishing it, oh my, massive amount of laziness.

I wish i had the self-discipline a friend of mine has writing in her blog twice a week every single week of the year. The same self-discipline my man shows to exercise every day of the week. I wish i had that will power but let's be honest, at almost 40 years old, it's most likely not gonna change any time soon.

So here it is for the little apologetic post. And off i am to writing a few more!

See the reason behind it all? SEE?

My Rainbow Friends

I have gay friends. It's actually an understatement, i have tons of gay friends. When i was living in Mexico, most of my closest friends were gay. I wasn't making an effort for this, I don't know, i seem to naturally attract gay people. And the reason behind this is that it probably shows that whether you're gay or straight, or Black, or White, or Latino, a girl, a boy, tall, short, fat, skinny or riding a unicorn, i couldn't give a bigger fuck. I mean that has GOT to show somehow. 

In Mexico, and in Puerto Vallarta in particular (gayest Mexican destination apparently), people don't seem to mind gay people. At least, it didn't seem that way to me. I remember on my last job, two of my colleagues came out to me (separately) and i guess my answer to both was "ok, and?". I mean, really, does you being gay change something to the story you're telling me right now? Because a) i knew already and b) it doesn't make any difference. Not to me anyway. If i liked you before, chances are i'm still going to like you afterwards.

Same when a French friend of mine i found out on FB after years without any news from him wrote me back with a rather aggressive tone (or so it seemed in his mail) that he was gay and there, i had it. So i answered him in what i hope was a nice way by saying that he could very well be and do whatever the hell he wanted, i was just happy to have news from him and that was all my message was about. I wasn't fishing for intimate details of his personal life. I think it kinda shock him a bit. I mean, me being so accepting.

That's only when i got back to France and talked about it with my man that i realized (or was made to realize) that not everybody is like me, oh dear, far from it, and that in France in general, it is still quite a taboo. Something people try to avoid mentioning and if they really have to, always do so reluctantly and/or despisingly. 

Well to me, this behavior is shocking.

End of it all, gays are just human beings. Sometimes, yes, they do fall into the stereotypes of the drama queen and the truck driver but seriously, seeing a guy (OK a drag) wearing 25cm heels and dancing in them better than i can ever do with flats should put everybody in their rightful place.

I love my gay friends (as much as i love my straight friends). I remember one day, one of them told me that it was so relaxing for him to chat with me cuz i wasn't making judgements on anything he'd ever say. As i told him, well, if you ask my opinion about something, i will give it to you even if i know it's not what you'd like to hear. But i believe that's what friends are for. You'll always find tons of people ready to criticize your every move, so for me, being a friend is to stand by you. Period. I'm not saying that you should blissfully agree on everything your friends do or say, sometimes, everybody needs a little reality check, but your sexual orientation will never have anything to do with how i feel about you.

And i believe that as long as what your neighbor does with his/her life doesn't affect your life, your liberty and your safety/health, then why the heck should you care about it?

I understand that it must be so hard for people to come out. And i'm sorry to say that my homecountry of France is no exception to this. It shouldn't be that way. You don't decide one morning that oh, nice weather, let's be gay today. No. It's like your eyes color or your skin tone. You're born that way (no pun intented and no Lady Gaga quote either even if the song is stuck in my head now ...) It broke my heart last year when, at a friend's gathering (class of ... kinda reunion, 15 years without seing eachother for the most of us), my previously mentioned gay friend was never asked how his life was going. I mean we all knew he's gay. It's not a disease, it's not contagious. I was the only one sitting with him and asking him, so how's life going for you? Your travels, your job, your love life, you're seeing someone? Oh, you mean that guy i always see yourself pictured with is not your man but a friend, ok, cool. Sorry you had your heart broken last year, the right guy will come up, just like for the rest of us ;) Everybody wants to be accepted. And asking him the same questions i asked my girl friend some time prior was a natural for me. And i can say that he was only too pleased to answer me.

sorry couldn't help 3:) jijiji

Kunkush the Iraqi Cat

This morning, i read about the story of an Iraqi refugee family who took their beloved cat as they fled their home country. They had to cross several countries, take several boats and somewhere on the way, the cat got scared and they got separated. At that point of the story, my stomach constricted. I honestly only read the story because the title of the article was saying something like "happy ending for a refugee cat". I can't take violence, pain, suffering or heart-breaking stories when it comes to animals. 

I can't even begin to imagine how it must have felt for them. Well long story short, some vets/association in Greece actually found the cat and i don't know how, managed to find who its family was and tracked it down all the way up to Norway.

Poor cat was the center of attention obviously as all the medias were there to capture that moment, with flashes and mics and cameras and shit. He looked terrified but as soon as he got in the arms of his owner (who was in tears by the way, and at that point, so was I!), he seemed to relax and be at peace with the world. 

Happy ending.

Tears of joy.

Life is good.

This cat truly reminded me of my own cat Yeti. Not only because he's white also but because he's holding on to mommy dearest. It also reminded me how it felt when i dropped my 3 cats at the airport, worrying like crazy on how they'd do during that endless flight from Mexico to Paris. I also recalled the moment i stepped foot on French grounds only thinking about getting my cats back. I honestly couldn't have care less about my luggage at that point. I just wanted to see my cats. And we're talking hours. This family didn't know anything about their cats for MONTHS.

I was told I'd get them on the bulky luggage's carousel and i rushed there like a maniac. I heard them meowing from what seemed miles away but astonishingly, the second they saw me, they stopped. We were finally reunited, i hadn't abandoned them and it was good. Life was good.

After reading this story this morning, i looked at all my 3 stray Mexican cats and made the same pinky promise i did 3 years ago: i will never leave them behind. 

EVER.

Psycha

Yeti

Nina

47 Hours 39 Minutes

That would be the amount of time (sorry, i didn't check the seconds) that I've been without a computer. And I believe me knowing the exact amount of time I've been without speaks for itself. I haven't been without an Internet connection since we live in a world of medias and cellphones. I can access Internet with my cellphone and/or my man's computer but it's not quite the same thing as on my personal laptop.

Apart from being my way of connecting to the outside world, my laptop is, with my camera, my most precious belonging. Because I'd say my entire life is on it. I have pictures of a long gone time, pictures I know for sure I'm the only one having since I've never shared them with anybody, i have years of work paperwork, texts I've written, tons of music, a few videos and well, you know, stuff i care about. And a few days ago, the tragedy, my laptop is on but not on. I mean it all acts and sounds like it's on and running except that well, it's not: black screen and all. And i can't turn it off.

I took it to the computer's hospital yesterday, some guy's company judiciously called S.O.S. 16 (France is divided in states called "départements" and they each have a number related to how they place alphabetically). The surgeon took it and told me he'd let me know. If my laptop is dead, well, so be it, but i truly want my data back.

I'm not foreseeing the worse. I will get an external hard-drive to stock all my shit on as soon as i get it back and then i promise I'll take better care of my next computer, or this very same laptop when/if i get it back alive and kicking, trying not to eat and/or drink too close not to drop anything on it, I'll carry it in a proper case (not in my handbag) and well, give it the reverence it truly deserves.

On a side note, it's amazing how much time you have and how much things you can actually do when you're not glued to your screen. I've read two books, did some gardening, completed several sudoku and actually took time to write a few texts the old fashion way: with a pen and a paper. I think i might actually be a computer/Internet addict.

Gasp.

Scar? What Scar?

Just saying ...

This is what my hand looks like 6 months later ... You can't even tell. 
Massive thanks to the hand surgeon who did that amazing job. 

The Day I Should Have Become A Mother

I took me a while to convince myself this was the right thing to do. Because it was a very challenging ordeal and honestly, i feel that I've had quite my shares of those already. 

There's no soft way of saying this so i'm gonna throw it on there just like it was, just the way it felt when i understood what was happening: i had a miscarriage. 6 months ago, i lost a baby that was so very much desired and wanted and today was my supposed due date.

Tough.

I've heard and read that losing a child is the worse possible ordeal a parent can go through. I've seen my parents going through hell and 3 years later, i'm not even sure they're back from it. Life goes on though. I might say, maybe out of spite, maybe to reassure myself, that it was probably better to lose the baby (for lack of a better word since i don't feel like calling it a fetus, i saw its beating heart) 10 weeks into the pregnancy than having to abort it because of a malformation or having a still born but still. 10 weeks into a pregnancy, 1 week shy of my first trimester's ultrasound, trust me, we already had quite some time to get around the idea that it had finally worked out and we were going to welcome 2016 in style, with a baby. 

Not so fast.

I'd be lying if i said i wasn't affected by it. Or that my man wasn't affected by it. We cried our eyes out, for days, and even months later, there are moments that are hard. Since i miscarried, i heard about 6 pregnancies, amongst which my sister in law's who told us a mere 3 weeks after we had lost ours. And hearing her telling us lightly that it was an accident, i honestly could have crucified her. Sorry if i'm not over the moon with the announcement, we lost ours 3 weeks ago, i had to go through a clinical abortion to clean my uterus of any residual baby stuff so not quite my happy little self right now.

Needless to say i called my mom right after i heard that news and crucified her on the phone. And again, my mother, amidst all the flaws that she might have, said something wise that brought me some kind of peace of mind.

She told me that my sister in law might be the biggest bitch walking this planet, she is absolutely NOT responsible in any way of what happened to me. And she was right. It's nobody's fault. My man used to work in Quality Management and used a sentence that was spot on: faulty piece, destruction mode on.

One out of 5 pregnancies ends in a miscarriage. Odds are the same each time you're pregnant. Meaning that it's not because you lost a child before the pregnancy term that you're safe for the next 4. It doesn't make it any easier but it kinda help put things into perspective. 

We talked about it with friends and we were shocked to see how many of them came out with similar stories. Whereas it happened to them directly, to a sibling, a cousin or a close friend, not a single one of them haven't experience a miscarriage. Why is it still such a taboo? No idea.

I guess a miscarriage is, in some ways, like giving birth. Nobody ever tells you all the gory details about it. So here i am for just this!

10 weeks into my pregnancy, i started bleeding one evening, called French 911 panicking, decided to wait up until the following morning and woke my man up at 6am to ask him to take me to the ER. Waited there 4 hours crying my eyes out after an intern had examined me but couldn't tell me anything cuz you know, he's just an intern. Then the OB/GYN who had been called on an emergency c-section confirmed my biggest fear, i had lost it. Not my mind, but the baby (even though i was very close to lose my mind as well). Honestly, he was awesome. We arranged, between rivers of tears, an appointment for the surgery for the following week, i had to take pills to start the job (it's pills you take when you want to abort), bled for an entire week like I've never bled before (grossest periods ever), got under anesthesia, got the procedure done and was out of the hospital the same day. The pads they gave you in the hospital are almost as thick as adult diapers. Never in my entire life had i bled that much. It was like my body was catching up on the 2 months i hadn't had my periods and making me pay interests on this as well. Jeez. I had a 3 WEEKS long periods. 

A month later, everything was back to normal with my cycle.

I'm not writing all of this to get sympathy. This is so not my thing. I'm writing this to get closure. The cycle of it all is done. I got pregnant, miscarried and then my due date came and went. End of story.

We keep on trying. Every month. It's hard not to think about it, not to focus on what date is supposedly good, not to fuck with the sole purpose of reproducing. It's hard. We know it works. And as my man said, if we can't have one on our own, there are many options that can work for us. But we'll be parents one day. Some bad ass parents with a 8th wonder of the world of our own...