Yet Another Reason I'm Not A Fan of My Job

Warning: This is long and filled with TMI, most of which involves vomit. And some swearing.

Last Tuesday, I was stuck at work late, as I had been Monday. P called to say that Harry was throwing up at dinner. A lot. More than once. And kept throwing up while P tried to get him cleaned up, including on P, and kept throwing up once they were both stripped down, and kept throwing up in the tub. Once he fell asleep, though, he was fine. He threw up again when P was giving him breakfast on Wednesday (I had to be at work early, so I missed breakfast), so they both stayed home, as it was obvious at that point that it wasn't something he had eaten the day before. After breakfast, he seemed fine, though.

I got home from work at midnight or so on Wednesday and went to bed. I woke up at 3:30 with bad stomach pain. I convinced myself it was stress, but by 4:15 or so, it was obvious that I had caught Harry's stomach bug. By 5 or so, it was obvious P had too. We dropped Harry off at daycare (he hadn't thrown up in more than 24 hours and seemed fine), then P dropped me off at my 30 week OB appointment and went home to go back to bed. The midwife was concerned about dehydration leading to preterm labor and told me I had to come back the following morning for an IV evaluation if I still couldn't keep anything down. She also said to focus on liquids and not try to eat.

The reason P dropped me off and left? I *had* to work that day, as I had a brief that had to be filed. So I kept my trash can close to my desk (I feel really bad for the cleaning person -- I told her not to empty it, that I'd do it myself, but she came by when I was away from my desk for a minute and emptied it -- yuck) and kept my door closed all day, occasionally lying on the floor and moaning in agony and crying for much of the day. Meanwhile, both partners on the case hopped on a plane midafternoon to DC, asking me to fax them drafts to review in their hotels (not the same hotel, of course, because that would be too easy). And the only other associate on the case, a first year, blew me off all day, starting at 5 the task I asked her to have done by close of business. You know, by 5. Note that each of these people knew I was sick. I tried to spare them the details, but I think I was clear enough to indicate how sick I was. In the end, though, I didn't get home until almost midnight. It was honestly one of the least pleasant work days I've ever had. I cried *a lot*.

Thankfully, because the brief had been filed, I decided I would stay home on Friday and try to recuperate. Maybe nap. Catch up on a few things that desperately needed to be done around the house but never get done because there's never a time when we aren't watching Harry or at work or when Harry isn't sleeping and these things are too loud to do then. Start doing some of the Hypnobabies home study course that I told myself I'd start six weeks ago as I hope and prepare for a better birth experience this time around. Maybe watch a little TV.

Sadly, that was not to be. At 6-something on Friday morning, I heard Harry crying on the monitor, which pretty much never happens. P, of course, didn't move. So I got up and went to check on him. When I opened the door, it was like the last scene of season 4 of Dexter, but with vomit instead of blood. It covered every inch of his crib sheet. It was matted into his hair. And he was just sitting in it in his sleep sack, clutching his vomit-covered blankie, sobbing. Poor thing. So we all stayed home. And I didn't get a day of rest or productivity. Instead, I spent yet another hour crying from exhaustion and frustration and a sense of futility and just being *done* (after which I did pass out for an hour in a crumpled heap on the couch while P entertained Harry). Oh, and I got bitchy messages all day from work people wondering where I was (all of which I ignored), plus some nice ones from people who were worried (some of which I inadvertently ignored as well in my effort to ignore the others).

I hate being sick. I hate my job. I hate being sick and having a stressful week at the same time. And I hate it even more when pregnant and tired. And I hate that I received no thanks, no acknowledgment that I spent my day finalizing a brief while vomiting into my trash can, and that I did so while pregnant. Fuck you, job. FUCK YOU.

A Long Goodbye

Shifting gears entirely to another subject that leaves me feeling a little stressed and lacking in control, it looks like my father will not be selling the house I lived in during the latter part of my childhood and moving to another state afterall. As much as this is the way I would have preferred things to end up, the circumstances under which this change in plans has arisen are fully suck-tastic.

I always thought his now-wife was a tiny bit flaky, which struck me as a bit odd for a fairly high-powered professional, but I figured it was just a quirk of her personality. Apparently, this "quirk" grew increasingly worrisome and had been a subject of many unpleasant discussions between her and my dad over the past year-plus. He insisted she seemed flakier; she insisted he was being an ass. Possibly to placate him or possibly because she could no longer deny what he was insisting was a problem, she went to a neurologist. After much testing, multiple opinions, etc., she has been told that there is a 95% chance that she has early-onset Alzheimers. And there's really nothing good about that.

Let me begin by saying that the situation for her and for her (adult) kids is a nightmare. I can't imagine having to face it and am a bit ashamed of how glad I am that it's not my dad facing this horrendous diagnosis at such a (relatively) young age.

But it's not exactly awesome for my dad either, and I doubt anyone else is thinking about him and what this means for him right now. I feel like no matter what my dad does, it's the wrong thing to do. If he moves, he gives up the life he has where he lives now for, what, a couple of years, maybe more if they're lucky, with his wife before she no longer remembers who he is and goes to live in a nursing home? And then he's stuck there. She promised to help him ease the transition, introducing him to people and helping him establish himself socially, but is that realistic now? Or he stays where he is and rips a woman whose mind is already losing touch out of the one familiar setting it has. Or they stay where they are, living apart.

The current plan seems to be to continue to try to sell her house but not his, spending three weeks a month there, and one week in an apartment they'll rent near where she lives now so she can remain in contact with the people and places she knows. Is that really for better or for worse? It seems so incredibly selfish for him to do anything but move, but that sacrifice just seems astronomical now, with no real upside. He's was in his 60s when they met -- this isn't exactly the Notebook.

The reality is that he sensed something amiss months before they got married and talked to her about it numerous times, but she just kept saying that it was who she was. (He has since learned that she spoke to at least one of her oldest and dearest friends and voiced her own concerns during that same period, which I think really upsets my dad. I'd feel better saying he is upset because he feels sad that she didn't trust him but really he feels betrayed, feeling like she lied to him.) Part of me wonders if all his heel-dragging over the move (because, seriously, they got married 11 months ago and still don't live in the same state) was subconsciously related to his gut sense that something was wrong (ignoring the fact that the state of the economy hasn't exactly made it easy to contemplate selling either, much less both, of their houses, as they planned to move to a new shared place). There would be much less guilt and indecision if the move had already been made.

This may be the first time in my life when something bad was happening in my dad's life that didn't really affect me. I don't even know what to say to him. I can't even figure out how to think about the situation. I keep trying to step outside myself for a bit and think about what I'd want my dad to do if I were one of her kids, or if I were her, and I honestly don't know and I'm secretly and shamefully glad I don't have to.

Maybe I'll Be Staying Home With Harry After All

Something got fucked up at work today.

Someone senior to me said "Can we do X?" And I said sure. On its face, it seemed reasonable. For a reason neither of us thought of but which we were equally capable of recognizing, it turned out doing X was not a good plan. I fear that if a head must roll, it may be mine, even though it wasn't entirely my fault. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Fuck.

Oh, and it's 6:30 on a Friday night and I'm still here. This is the third night this week that I've missed Harry's dinner, and may be the first that I miss bedtime. I want to curl up in a corner right now.

F*cking Insurance Agency

I desperately need to vent or I might just run off screaming into the woods.

When we got home from work yesterday, we finally got our semi-held mail from our vacation ("semi-held" because three days of it was delivered while we were away for no discernible reason) and found within it two notices from the RMV alerting us to the fact that our car registrations would be cancelled two weeks from the date of the notice because our (as-far-as-we-knew fully-insured) cars were not insured. The notices came the day after we left. So the two week grace period ended before we got the notices. Apparently, when we added the new car to our insurance policy last month, the grossly incompetent insurance agent decided to cancel the insurance on both cars instead. And failed to notice or do anything about it. So the entire time we were away we were driving an uninsured vehicle. Had we been in an accident and hurt someone, we could have lost everything we have (and in turn would have sued the insurance agency for everything they have).

I spent my morning (post-my 34 week appointment, which was thoroughly uneventful -- urine sample, weight check, bp check, heartbeat check, fundal height measurement, position check (head down)) on the phone (read: on hold) at various points with the insurance agency, the RMV, and the insurer. I'd like to put it out there that I think the woman I spoke to at the insurance agency is a gigantic lying bitch-whore-wench. She said she spoke to the insurer, who said it was their fault, that they had sent the wrong thing to the RMV and would be correctly immediately. I knew this couldn't be true, since the insurance payment we made shortly before we left was refunded into my bank account while we were away, making clear that our insurance had in fact been cancelled (though of course I didn't discover this until we got home and got our awesome notice from the RMV). This was confirmed when the RMV said no correction had been made. Furthermore, the insurer said they hadn't spoken to anyone at the insurance agency and that the only person who could figure out what happened was at lunch and that they'd call me back. When it started to become apparent that no one from the insurer was planning to do so before the close of business, I called them and was told that she had gone home. Evidently the underwriting department closes at 4:30. I then called the insurance agency again, but no one answered, even though they are supposedly open until 6. No one has called me back. And finally I burst into tears.

Honestly, this wouldn't be such a huge f*cking problem were it not for the fact that I'm 8 months pregnant and tend to pass out when riding the bus in the morning. And now I have to take the bus to work since we don't have a registered, insured car in which P can drop me off on his way to his office, as he has for the past couple of months (I take the bus home -- I mainly seem to have fainting issues in the morning). And I can't even switch insurance companies (as I have every intention of doing, especially since I got a lower rate quote today) until this gets resolved since it will look as though I had a gap in coverage, raising the rate. If it isn't resolved by close of business tomorrow, we have to rent a car, since we have our hospital tour and meet the doctors extravaganza tomorrow night and I can't bear the thought of spending my evening on public transit trying to get there and back, especially since the only buses that run to our house start going to once an hour at 7:30.

I have felt tremendously on edge ever since the bad thing that happened on the way home from vacation on Sunday and this is seriously not helping. NOT HELPING AT ALL.

A update to yesterday's disturbing news item

Yale calls it a hoax. If you read the underlying Yale Daily News article, though, the school's position seems to be that because she didn't know that she was pregnant, they weren't miscarriages or abortions and that therefore the whole thing is false. This seems inaccurate to me, if for no other reason than because she also didn't know that she wasn't pregnant, so at most the truth or falsehood of calling it miscarriage or abortion is uncertain, which, according to her statements, was one of her myriad not-exactly-well-made points.

The school claims it wouldn't have sanctioned a project like the one she is claiming to have had its consent in undertaking and that the whole thing is in actuality a piece of performance art. The student denies that account wholesale. I would think, from having to get approval for my own thesis at a similar school (a thesis which was, in fact, rejected by the ethics board, until I wrote them a letter explaining, in a semi-polite way, that they were being obtuse), that there would be some record of what it was she proposed.

Ultimately, everything about the whole affair leaves me feeling upset and unsettled. I was surprised (or maybe not so surprised) to find myself agreeing with both the pro-life and pro-choice commentators to the Yahoo article -- the woman is callous and the project offensive. And I am disturbed by the whole thing.

I thought I had lost the capacity for true emotional shock

But apparently I was wrong.

For [Yale] senior, abortion a medium for art, political discourse

Setting aside any moral reaction, I nearly passed out when I read this from the emotional shock.

Okay, screw setting aside a reaction. Politically, I believe that the government shouldn't involve itself in people's medical decision-making (i.e. I am firmly pro-choice). Morally, though, I think this is truly f*cked up. Truly and completely. And I honestly can't imagine doing this, wanting to do this, or being capable of doing this.

I feel the need to take a shower now.