The In Between

Sometimes I feel like life that exists between events is kind of this gray area, this in between area, yet probably much of life is lived in the “in between”. What I mean is, we had Labor Day weekend with Polly’s wedding, and are now gearing up for a long weekend in Phoenix to see Grandma and Papa Miller, and right now is that time in between the two. However, this time around, the time in between events has gone anything but normally…

First, I worked on a holiday. Our nanny has been in New York with our second family of the share and our backup nanny was not able to watch Reese Tuesday or Wednesday last week. I couldn’t find anyone I trusted to watch her Tuesday so I decided to work on Monday, while Bryan was home with her, so that I could treat Tuesday as my holiday and spend a day with Reese. Monday night we ended with a dinner at Cactus in West Seattle and a walk along Alki Beach. On Tuesday, Reese and I had a good time, playing around the house, walking to Sarah’s to take care of “Kitty Kitty”, walking to Volunteer Park to play in the wading pool (to find out that they had drained it the day before), returning home to swim in our own kiddy pool, and have a family dinner. A perfect day midweek with my girl in glorious weather. But not normal.

Enter Wednesday. I wake up at 4 am with tummy troubles. First thought (that persisted for days) was that I was pregnant (I’m not). I tolerate it enough while getting myself ready, then Reese ready, then walking our neighbor-babysitter around to fill her in on how Reese’s day should go. I manage to drive myself amidst the traffic to Redmond, to get to work to put my things down and then head straight to the bathroom. I ended up working nearly a full day until I lost my stomach again around 3 pm and decided to head home. Feeling better, I decide to walk Reese to Sarah’s to watch “Kitty Kitty”. I get sick again. Daddy comes to the rescue to pick us up in the car where I headed home to lay down for the rest of the night. I tried to eat, a small amount, put Reese to bed and then immediately lost my stomach one more time.

Thursday morning I felt much the same but a little better. I still went to work and worked a very unproductive day more or less staring at the screen. Never lost my stomach though so I decide to take Baby Girl to FareStart and eat an actual meal. Bad idea! Felt fine while I was there but as soon as I got home and put her to bed I regretted every bite of that meal. It took awhile to get myself asleep with tummy pain. Friday through the weekend was a gradual progression of feeling better. I laid off of the coffee and sweets completely and tried to eat bland, solid food. I tried to keep hydrated as well. Little by little I started to feel better.

Saturday morning was Bryan’s weekend to be on call so he had to head down to Auburn in the morning. Reese and I visited “Kitty Kitty” again and went to the park. Feeling much better, I was able to make dinner. We watched football and the US Open. Unfortunately, Michigan looked awful and Texas looked good but lost to a good team. We then spent the night watching and listening to the thunderstorm that Seattle never gets. Especially a storm of this magnitude has never happened in our eight years of living in Seattle. It was magnificent and Reese wasn’t scared at all. She shouldn’t be as the storms here, even the bad ones, are very tame in comparison to both Michigan and Arizona.

Sunday morning I played soccer in the mist in Capitol Hill. We lost horribly but I was relieved I was well enough to finally get out and exercise. Bryan and Reese had bacon and pancakes ready for me when I got home! We spent another day watching football and visiting “Kitty Kitty”. Otherwise, it was a difficult day to get Reese outside to play thanks to the on and off showers. As it has been ever since. We have had some rain and dreary weather and makes me anxious and nervous about how we are going to handle the gloomy months in Seattle with a toddler.

As soon as I was back to business, Bryan got under the weather with my stomach bug. I feel bad, especially knowing what he was going through. Lottie has returned, as of today., reunited with her friend again. Bryan is feeling mostly normal by this point. He should be good to go by the time we head out to Phoenix tomorrow morning. It’s been an interesting past couple of weeks that have had moments of joyfulness and definite moments of wanting it to be over! So looking forward to heading to hot Phoenix for some days to spend time with the grandparents and maybe even do some swimming!

Chelsea