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[Private]
I didn't know it was possible to the this nauseous. I swear, my toes feel nauseous. My fingers, my hair... It's a whole body experience, and it's not something I was prepared for. I know nausea, I know morning sickness. No problem, piece of cake. Or so I thought. Last week was a picnic compared to the last few days. Nausea, but things stayed down. Yeah, there was some dry heaving, and that's never really an enjoyable experience, but I could eat.
And it wouldn't bother me all that much if there wasn't all that much to throw up, but I'm starving, constantly, and it's probably related to the fact that nothing I eat has time to actually get into my system. And it's not even like I want anything I actually like. Last week grilled cheese, goldfish crackers, and bottled water stayed down and tasted good. This week, the mere thought of a grilled cheese sandwich sends me running for the nearest toilet.
I drive by a Kentucky Fried Chicken everyday on my way in. I've driven by it countless times without giving it a second thought. I don't eat fried chicken. I haven't eaten fried chicken since the first Bartlet campaign. So why is it that all I've been able to think about today is the colonel's extra crispy with rehydrated powdered mashed potatoes smothered in that brown substance they call gravy? And pregnant or not, there's no way I'm gorging myself on that, especially given that there's absolutely no way I won't be tasting it twice, and it's bad enough going down.
I'm surprised people around here don't think I'm dying, with the amount of time I've spent running out of meetings or cutting calls short over the last two days, and there's only so long I can claim food poisoning before someone thinks to suggest that I should change my diet. I look like hell. I feel like hell. I couldn't drag myself out of bed this morning until half an hour after I was supposed to be here, and for all that the Senator claims to understand and be supportive, it's only a matter of time before I'm gonna be sitting across a desk from her listening to her tell me that I've done great so far, but she really needs someone with her head fully in the game, do I have any suggestions for my replacement-- And I love this job. I haven't loved a job more than this one in years, maybe ever, and I was good at it, until last week.
Now I'm shoving half of my work onto Amy and farming out a fair amount of the rest of it, and there's nothing that makes me feel worse than walking in and seeing my staff already here and leaving hours before any of them have even thought about calling it a night. And it's not like I can explain it to anyone, because how the hell do I tell someone like Amy Gardner that I'm a shitty feminist, that guess what? Motherhood and the workplace? Really not compatible after all?
I was flipping channels Sunday night, and there was this show that I couldn't look away from-- this mother, changing her kid's diaper during a job interview. And that's gonna be me, a year from now. Dragging my kid to events and interviews, trying to pretend people aren't looking down at me for whipping out my tit for it to suck on in the middle of a meeting? (And I've got to say, the idea of anyone or anything coming anywhere near my tits right now makes me want to scream-- I want a shirt with the words 'off limits' plastered across my chest.) That, or spend my time sitting at home trying to entertain this-- this thing that can't speak a single word, much less a coherent sentence? Because I want this child desperately, but I just don't see how anyone could possibly find that stimulating.
None of this feels real yet, it's just a huge mess of hypotheticals, of what-ifs, and it could all be for nothing. And I've gotta say, if I've been drinking decaf and bonding with the toilet for nothing, I'm gonna be fucking pissed. I want to go to sleep and wake up sometime in the middle of my second trimester, when the miscarriage rate is lower, when, I hear, I'll actually feel good. I keep reading stories from women talking about how they have more energy, how their moodswings have disappeared, how they're having the best sex of their lives and if it's only a tenth as good as they say it is? Sign me up. I can't imagine ever feeling better, at this point. Can't imagine actually wanting to have sex ever again. I can't imagine that last part's true, anyway. Who the hell wants to have sex when they can't even button their jeans? Poor Sam, there's no way he could have known he was signing himself up to spend the rest of his life celibate.
And I have to pee. Again. I've been here four or five hours and between vomiting, dry heaving, and urinating, I've spent at least two or three of those hours in the bathroom. Fuck.
[/Private]
I didn't know it was possible to the this nauseous. I swear, my toes feel nauseous. My fingers, my hair... It's a whole body experience, and it's not something I was prepared for. I know nausea, I know morning sickness. No problem, piece of cake. Or so I thought. Last week was a picnic compared to the last few days. Nausea, but things stayed down. Yeah, there was some dry heaving, and that's never really an enjoyable experience, but I could eat.
And it wouldn't bother me all that much if there wasn't all that much to throw up, but I'm starving, constantly, and it's probably related to the fact that nothing I eat has time to actually get into my system. And it's not even like I want anything I actually like. Last week grilled cheese, goldfish crackers, and bottled water stayed down and tasted good. This week, the mere thought of a grilled cheese sandwich sends me running for the nearest toilet.
I drive by a Kentucky Fried Chicken everyday on my way in. I've driven by it countless times without giving it a second thought. I don't eat fried chicken. I haven't eaten fried chicken since the first Bartlet campaign. So why is it that all I've been able to think about today is the colonel's extra crispy with rehydrated powdered mashed potatoes smothered in that brown substance they call gravy? And pregnant or not, there's no way I'm gorging myself on that, especially given that there's absolutely no way I won't be tasting it twice, and it's bad enough going down.
I'm surprised people around here don't think I'm dying, with the amount of time I've spent running out of meetings or cutting calls short over the last two days, and there's only so long I can claim food poisoning before someone thinks to suggest that I should change my diet. I look like hell. I feel like hell. I couldn't drag myself out of bed this morning until half an hour after I was supposed to be here, and for all that the Senator claims to understand and be supportive, it's only a matter of time before I'm gonna be sitting across a desk from her listening to her tell me that I've done great so far, but she really needs someone with her head fully in the game, do I have any suggestions for my replacement-- And I love this job. I haven't loved a job more than this one in years, maybe ever, and I was good at it, until last week.
Now I'm shoving half of my work onto Amy and farming out a fair amount of the rest of it, and there's nothing that makes me feel worse than walking in and seeing my staff already here and leaving hours before any of them have even thought about calling it a night. And it's not like I can explain it to anyone, because how the hell do I tell someone like Amy Gardner that I'm a shitty feminist, that guess what? Motherhood and the workplace? Really not compatible after all?
I was flipping channels Sunday night, and there was this show that I couldn't look away from-- this mother, changing her kid's diaper during a job interview. And that's gonna be me, a year from now. Dragging my kid to events and interviews, trying to pretend people aren't looking down at me for whipping out my tit for it to suck on in the middle of a meeting? (And I've got to say, the idea of anyone or anything coming anywhere near my tits right now makes me want to scream-- I want a shirt with the words 'off limits' plastered across my chest.) That, or spend my time sitting at home trying to entertain this-- this thing that can't speak a single word, much less a coherent sentence? Because I want this child desperately, but I just don't see how anyone could possibly find that stimulating.
None of this feels real yet, it's just a huge mess of hypotheticals, of what-ifs, and it could all be for nothing. And I've gotta say, if I've been drinking decaf and bonding with the toilet for nothing, I'm gonna be fucking pissed. I want to go to sleep and wake up sometime in the middle of my second trimester, when the miscarriage rate is lower, when, I hear, I'll actually feel good. I keep reading stories from women talking about how they have more energy, how their moodswings have disappeared, how they're having the best sex of their lives and if it's only a tenth as good as they say it is? Sign me up. I can't imagine ever feeling better, at this point. Can't imagine actually wanting to have sex ever again. I can't imagine that last part's true, anyway. Who the hell wants to have sex when they can't even button their jeans? Poor Sam, there's no way he could have known he was signing himself up to spend the rest of his life celibate.
And I have to pee. Again. I've been here four or five hours and between vomiting, dry heaving, and urinating, I've spent at least two or three of those hours in the bathroom. Fuck.
[/Private]