My Miscarriage

One thing I’ve always wanted in life was to be a mother.  It’s been hard for me to define what that means.  As a feminist when I hear my friends say they don’t want to get married or have kids & wonder if that’s wrong or selfish I stand up for them.  If a woman doesn’t want to be a mother or get married there are many things (unselfish things) she can do with her life to feel fulfilled.  As a woman who’s spent a lot of time defending a woman’s right to decide how she wants to live her life & with whom she wants to do that with (or not) people were surprised to find that I wanted to be a mother — such a traditional idea of the world.  But it’s ok for me to want that it’s all part of feminism — deciding how we want to live our own life.  But I often got “You know how you don’t want kids right?” and I’d respond “I do want kids, I’ve never said I don’t want kids.  I’ve always wanted kids”  To which most people apologize profusely & say they just assumed due to my strong feminist opinions that I never wanted to be a mother.  But I feel a strong maternal desire & I’ve embraced it proudly

Now I also have endometriosis, probably from the time I was 11 years old but I was surgically diagnosed at the age of 21.  Many, many, many doctors said that there wasn’t even a chance I’d get pregnant especially if I waited until after 30 years of age.  Just to be clear endometriosis can affect fertility, once you are pregnant it does nothing to affect the gestation of the fetus positively or negatively.  So thoughts about the possibility of me not getting pregnant entered my head.  Those doctors were wrong, by the way, while endometriosis can affect fertility there are many women with endometriosis who can get pregnant the “old fashioned way” & some women with endometriosis require some form of fertility treatment or even IVF.  Like many other women, women with endometriosis have the same struggles with conceiving. So in my head I knew conceiving was a very real possibility.  My husband & I discussed it & while it would disappoint us we both came to the conclusion or desire to be parents could come in a different form if we didn’t have biological children.  We could adopt, we could volunteer, we could even be paternal to our pets.  Whatever it was we had means in our society to fulfill that feeling we had in our hearts.  And through reflection we were ok with this.  That didn’t mean we couldn’t try to have kids the “old fashioned” way.  I mean after all the “old fashioned” way is a lot of fun *wink wink*.  So I took myself off of birth control shortly after turning 31years old & my husband & I proceeded to have fun.

I won’t lie it got frustrating & occasionally I got upset over the possibility it could never happen.  In January 2015 I was telling my husband about my upset & like the good man he is, he said “we’ll just keep having fun trying & in the mean time we will continue to live our lives like we always have”.  So we did, we made plans, continued living, & had fun.  Just before Valentine’s Day that year I came home from work & stopped at Walmart on the way home.  My monthly visit from Aunt Flo was late but due to how my body worked wasn’t completely unusual.  I bought the cheapest pregnancy test I could find & I was on my way home.  I took the test & just sat there in the bathroom expecting the test to come out negative as it had many months before.  But it didn’t this time it was positive.  There was a second test in the box & since I thought the test was wrong I drank half a litre of water & took the test again.  Positive! I started crying & called Eddie to immediately come home from work.  He picked up another more expensive pregnancy test on his way home.  This one was digital & could not only say I was pregnant but approximately how far along I was.  This one told me 1-2weeks along.  We were scared & excited at this change.  I told my boss the next day — due to where I work there are solvents & other things that can affect neural tube development so in addition to being able to tell someone else who could share in my excitement.  I also told my supervisor & at the end of the week when my parents returned home from their vacation I told them.  It was great news.  Weeks went on & I finally got into see my doctor, she ordered blood work & an ultrasound.  In the meantime I told close family members & a few close friends.  I was starting to feel the side affects of pregnancy: fatigue & nausea so I wanted those people to understand me not going out tonight was for a good reason.  The first week of March was my first ultrasound.  The technician told me I was six weeks along & the baby had a heart beat.  I was set to be due Oct23rd.  She gave me a printout of the first ultrasound & the tiny pea sitting there somewhere inside my uterus.  I did everything I was supposed to do & more just to ensure this baby had a good start to life.  Eddie, my husband, joked about a wave pool & would gently jiggle the area around my uterus with his hands.

I had the ultrasound on Tuesday & that Friday (March 6th 2015) my doctor called with devastating news.  She said the heart beat was only 100 bpm & they expected a 6 week old fetus to have a heart beat of 140 bpm, she said in her experience this is a sign of a miscarriage & that there was a slim possibility the fetus could live.  That was 11am when I hung up & ran out to my car from work to cry.  I called Eddie & my Dad to tell them what happened.  I contemplated finishing the day off at work & carrying on like nothing happened but I couldn’t stop crying.  My kind boss told me to go home.  The second ultrasound was scheduled for that Monday, my doctor told me she hoped she was wrong & this second ultrasound would tell us.  By Wednesday of that week we were informed that the fetus no longer had a heart beat.  I was in my doctor’s office when she told me & she gave me a room in the back of her practice to cry it out.  She told me to wait for my body to pass the fetus, she would call me by Friday that week & ordered me to take the next two weeks off of work to recover.  By Friday I had come to accept it but my body hadn’t so my doctor called my home & told me we had to induce me.  She prescribed drugs that are often given to women at the end of their pregnancy to induce labour.  Misoprostol, a terrible drug that’s horribly octagonally shaped for vaginal insertion.  Over the phone she told me to only take tylenol 3’s as any other pain killer would interfere with the process & we wanted to avoid a D&C as that could cause complications causing difficulty in trying to have a baby again later.

My doctor officially diagnosed me with fetal demise & missed miscarriage.  She told me the fetus had passed away due to a random chromosomal error that could have come from either Eddie’s or my sex gametes.  There’s no way of knowing who’s & in nature every human being has these random errors.  There’s no way of knowing which of your sperms or eggs have them & since getting pregnant is random already it’s hard to predict how often it’ll happen & if it’ll happen.  It’s just a thing that happens to normal boring healthy people.  So Friday night before bed I took the four octagonally shaped pills, very uncomfortably.  I swallowed one T3 & two gravols & grabbed a heating pad & tried to sleep.  We didn’t get any sleep that night.  I was in so much pain around 3am I cried to my husband that I couldn’t do it anymore the pain was too much.  However, I was stuck unable to move & for lack of a gross description I needed to sit on the toilet while holding a bucket.  More T3’s & gravol I was able to sleep during the day.  Saturday night we finished the last round of misoprostol & Sunday afternoon after a large contraction I passed the miscarriage almost completely.

It was the weirdest feeling passing the miscarriage.  I had felt pregnant still up until that point that the fetus & all the placenta passed through me.  My breasts still ached & were swollen & my uterus area was very bloated feeling like there was something in there growing.  Then I felt a feeling like I had to pee so I went to the bathroom & while I was in there a huge pain I couldn’t stand up & then a contraction & a push that I wasn’t controlling.  I didn’t look, I couldn’t look.

The last week I was off work was the hardest.  The pain wasn’t as bad as it was when I was going through the “labour” of losing my pregnancy but there is so much emotional stress & upset that society doesn’t seem to understand.  On the Tuesday before I went back to work my doctor sent me for a third ultrasound to ensure that the miscarriage was complete.  That was the worst day, the clinic that does the ultrasounds was understaffed & overbooked.  I had to hold 1L of water (no peeing) for almost 2hours.  At least I’m not 80years old.  Secondly, there was a woman who had her first pregnancy ultrasound & she was excitedly showing people in the waiting room.  Her & her husband were hugging & smiling with giddy glee.  I am not a violent or bad person but I wanted so badly to punch them both in their happy, happy faces for rubbing it in.  And as dumb & illogical as this sounds it wasn’t fair that they were pregnant & I was there to make sure I was finished losing my pregnancy.  I started crying in front of everyone in the waiting room, I was all by myself.  Now I was embarrassed about crying, in pain with my bladder being so full, so I just turned my back to everyone in that room.  The staff at the clinic called me in way before they were ready for me in the room because at this point everyone was just staring at me & I was a blubbering mess — while I examined the very white corner of the waiting room.  They put me in this tiny half a closet of a room to change & I just stood there, half naked with a robe on waiting for the technician to come get me.  The lady herself was the kindest woman I’ve ever met.  She had a great sense of humour that was perfectly timed, a bubbly cheery personality that wasn’t overbearing & when I told her why I was there she told me about her miscarriage (on a golf course in front of all her friends during a round of golf) & she touched my arm.

As I’ve told people I’ve come to learn that miscarriage is something that happens all the time.  You will know someone & possibly multiple someones who have had a miscarriage.  It happens so much you might start to question how our human population is as big as it is today (I joke).  But miscarriage isn’t something we talk that often.  I tell someone that I’ve had a miscarriage & their voice gets low & quiet “I’m sorry”.  I tell them I’m ok & I explain it was a random chromosomal error that could happen to anyone who is healthy & my doctor predicts I have a 25% chance of this happening again the next time I get pregnant. The next time (maybe later that day or week) I run into them they have a story to tell me about someone they knew who had a miscarriage.

It is such a touchy, sensitive subject & I’m not over the miscarriage myself.  Every time I see a pregnant woman or a new born I work really hard to hold back the crying cause who wants the awkwardness of a random woman staring at your pregnant belly or new born & bawling her eyes out.  That’s really awkward but it’s what I want to do.  I still think about the plans we made, the work we did on our house to prepare a room for our little gummy bear.  All that work is left the way it was, half done & not ready yet.  I’m seeking counselling & have my first appointment soon & after searching deep into the depths of the internet I found two books, which happened to be on Amazon, that are guides to miscarriage & trying to get pregnant after it’s happened.  They are ordered & on their way this week.  My body isn’t fully recovered either & is still doing weird post pregnancy hormonal stuff.  My doctor predicted after a month I’d be normal again.  The fact that my body isn’t fully recovered isn’t helping me put it all behind me & move on.  It is like my body constantly reminds me multiple times a day about this horrible memory I just want to move forward from & get to the next phase or step of my life.  It’s also hard because I’m 31years old (almost 32years old) & there are times when I do feel old & wonder if I’ll ever have a baby before 35years of age or 40years of age.  I try to calculate how old I’ll be when the kid is 20years old so I can figure out if I’ll be around to be a grandparent or at least around long enough to watch them grow up — I know more worries.

Why am I sharing all of this?  Many reasons, writing it down is therapeutic for me, my words have always been more easily expressed on page than verbally.  I’m not ashamed of it & it isn’t something I want to hide.  I’ve also learned that this is a taboo subject that shouldn’t be.  Discussing this loss is something women should do & not be ashamed of it but be able to deal with the grief.  The internet has very little useful information there are three books out there & one is a very preachy religious book that would only work for a small amount of people in the population.  I also found forums of sad & confused women who were trying to figure out if their bodies were going through normal things & how to get over the grief of their loss.  We don’t have many mechanisms in society to help people get over it.  We don’t have a ritual for us to go through.  I once read a comment in a forum by a woman who hit the nail on the head when it came to early term miscarriages she said that we haven’t had a chance to get to know them (the fetus) we don’t know if they’re a boy or a girl, we don’t know their personality yet & we often don’t get a body to bury or say good bye to.  Can’t we have a ritual to go through, can’t we talk about it more & have more scientific information out there on it.  Make support groups easier to find for women & let people know that not only is this pretty common but the grief attached to it is very normal.  Which is the second reason I’m sharing this if I want it to be less taboo then I have to share my story as do other women.  As an introvert sharing something like this goes against my nature.  I didn’t go out & tell everyone what happened I just told people who asked why I was off sick.  But here I am almost shouting it from the rooftops because I want change to help people like me survive & come out of it.  Lastly, I haven’t told everyone who supported me during the three weeks I had off of work.  Those people offered hugs & kind words via Facebook without questioning what was going on.  You were there to listen if I felt like telling you & you were ok with blindly offering love, prayers & support when I needed it.  So really I feel like I owe you all an explanation but also thanks for your love & support.

Will Eddie & I try again?  You bet! Even with the risk of it happening again.  I have learned that I can get pregnant & that Eddie & I want this & that we’ll be awesome parents.

An Essay Revisited 14 years later

When I was in Grade 11 in English class we studied Romeo and Juliet.  For the record this is my least favourite Shakespeare play.  Regardless, it’s standard to teach it in high school.  As an exercise the teacher asked us to write about a time we disobeyed our parents.  For those of you that don’t remember or somehow got out of reading that play Romeo and Juliet disobeyed their parents by their courtship and eventual marriage.  The teacher wanted us to relate to the characters.  She wanted us to write an essay about this topic and answer something along the lines of these questions:

(1) What did we do?

(2) Why did we do it?

(3) How did we feel about it before, during and after?

(4) How did our parents feel about it?

So I’m going to re-write this essay through the eyes of 30year old me, mostly because I can’t find the essay (it’s probably stuffed in a drawer at my parent’s house somewhere cause my mom loved the essay so much) but also it might be interesting to see what comes out of my head almost 14years later.  So here are my answers below not really in proper essay format but I’m not in English class and nobody is grading me. The few people of the internet who will read this will just judge me and I don’t care (well I do a little but only if you judge in a good way…lol)

What did I do?  The simple answer: I attempted to run away from home to my Nonna’s house.  But here’s the background.  The time of the running away I must’ve been 5 or 6 years old.  So very young and impulsive.  I don’t remember the initial offence, I want to say I was always a very bright child and probably had said something witty, smart-ass like comment that both annoyed and impressed my Mom but I probably did something less than smart like push my brother or boss him around — hey we learn and grow and I’m a smart-ass now so that’s gotta count for something right?  Anyways, for whatever offence I had committed my Mom sent me to my room.

We all remember what it was like to be in trouble as a child we never focused on what it was we did wrong we just fantasized about something that would totally devastate our parents like in “A Christmas Story” where the boy fantasized about going blind from soap poisoning.   On the surface it sounds twisted but what human being, especially a child, sits and reflects on what they did wrong?  Who wants to sit in their room and feel bad about themselves?  Mom and Dad were going to come in at any minute and do that for me — point out what I did, why it was wrong and make me apologize perhaps take away TV privileges for a week or something along those lines.  My parents are great people and they were/are great parents.  They used to sit with us whenever we were in trouble and talk to us about it, teach us about the consequences of our actions and to be responsible for what we did.  When you’re a kid you sit and pretend that what they’re saying sounds like “Blah, blah blah” but it does go in, it sinks in and I think I’m a pretty decent contributing member of society because of it.  However, when I first went into my room I immediately began planning how I would make my Mom suffer for the injustice of being sent to my room.  Under normal circumstances I would hide amongst the dolls in the corner of my room and sit perfectly still.  In my fantasy my Mom would walk in and start calling my name “Cara? Cara? Where are you?”  I would be still, one with the dolls.  My Mom would panic and cry head in hands “Oh dear god my daughter has disappeared! If only I didn’t send her to her room! We would never have this disaster on our hands now!”  But every time my parents found me and my plan was foiled.  They were good at figuring out the alive child from the plastic dolls must be some sort of super parent vision I didn’t have yet.  So on this particular occasion for some reason hiding amongst the dolls didn’t seem good enough.  Who could punish my Mom the way she had punished me? Who? A stroke of genius…my Mom’s mom or as I called her Nonna.  Now I was never in trouble with Nonna.  All I’d need is to see her, give her those big crocodile tears and she’d give me a cookie and scold my Mom for ever dreaming of doing what Mom’s are supposed to do.  Genius, Cara you’re a freaking genius.  Somehow I became a ninja out the bedroom door, down the stairs through the front door and down the street I went.  Nonna wasn’t that far from my parents house.  I cut through the park to get a head start.  I was so close I could see it just one more corner to turn and her house would be there.  But then I heard it on the other end of the street…that devastating sound.

We had one car as a family and it was a 1986 Full sized two tone brown (like two different kinds of poop really) chevy van.  It made all kinds of sounds and you knew it was coming.  When I heard the “roar” of the engine at the other end of the street I knew my fate was sealed.  I was doomed and I was so close to freedom! In my memory smoke bellowed from the car (it may as well have) like a fiery demon from hell.  The van pulled up next to me and the window on the passenger side almost rolled down all the way — it was just enough to see my Mother.  I seem to remember this happening early in the morning too.  I’m sure she didn’t have her morning coffee at this point cause she was terrifying.  My Mom is a beautiful woman so I don’t want to insult her by any means but in my memory of her on that day she had horns and smoke was coming out of her nostrils, she possibly had claws for hands as she said nothing but beckoned me to get in the van.

I don’t remember what she said or what my eventual punishment was for this incident.  The lesson had sunk in about how much she loved me and how worried and scared she was that I was gone.  The horns did eventually shrink away, her claws turned back into hands she was no longer producing smoke from her nostrils and she hugged me.  Even though I had fantasized about it I definitely didn’t want to make my parents worried or scared about losing me I loved them.  That was the last time I attempted to run away to Nonna’s house (and I went back to trying to hide amongst the dolls.  I still haven’t fooled them with that one.)

When we talk about this incident my Mom loves the original essay I wrote and loved that the teacher inserted comments like “Yay for Nonna”.  Nonna’s are cool and so is my Mom for putting up with me and raising me to be a pretty awesome adult.  I also can’t wait for the day when I have my own kid and s/he attempts to run away to Nonna’s house.  I sadly don’t have a 1986 full size chevy van being held together by duct tape but to my child I’ll probably grow horns and claws and smoke will bellow out of my nostrils.  I know I’ll handle it as well as my mom did too and the smoke will clear, the horns and claws will go away and I’ll be able to be a great mother cause I had two great parents of my own.

So to my Mom and Dad and all the Mom’s and Dad’s out there.  I am sorry I worried you and made you scared.  I love you and I want to thank you for being pretty awesome parents.  And I’m not sorry for the idea of running away to Nonna’s, I mean you really have to admit the idea was genius if executed it would have been a masterpiece. I’m kidding I love you and thanks!

The Three Rules of Barbie and Wolverine

When I was a kid my brother and I played Barbie’s together.  And for the longest time I thought the way we played was normal.  I remember we both loved the 90s cartoon version of X-Men and religiously watched it every Saturday morning over our Lucky Charms.  My brother’s favourite character was Wolverine and mine was Rogue.  I don’t remember when or why my brother came into possession of a 12″ Wolverine action figure but he soon became good friends with all of my Barbies.   When we played Barbie’s, Wolverine was always around.  Sometimes we’d look through the Barbie dolls and choose the ones that looked most like each member of the X-Men team.  Then we’d pretend they were going on adventures and fighting Magneto or Sabretooth.

Once I had a Barbie Camper and it was a pretty cool gadget.  You could put Barbie in the driver’s seat and it would look like this huge pink RV.  Then you would magically unfold the back part into an open concept RV complete with a single bed, a small kitchen and shower (no toilet even though  Barbie ate she didn’t go to the bathroom).  And part of the camper was an open deck so she could enjoy the wilderness.  Now in both of our heads (mine and my brothers) we thought when you camped you had to get food the old fashioned way: hunting and gathering.  Now in the wild forests of my bedroom the only animals that existed were my teddy bears so basically whenever we took Barbie and her good friend Wolverine camping, Barbie would ask Wolverine to stay behind and guard the camp sight while she would go out and wrestle a bear with her bare hands.  Then she’d drag it back to the camper and cook it for her and her good friend Wolverine to enjoy.

Once I was set up on a play date with a girl my age, her brother was already friends with my brother so the parents thought it was a good idea for me to tag along and make a new friend too.  The young girl asked me to bring some Barbie dolls so we could play with them together.  I was so excited finally a girl my age wanting to go on cool adventures with Barbie! I wonder what cool stuff they do? Do they fight bears too?  Maybe she doesn’t make them pretend to be X-Men maybe she likes to pretend they’re helping Batman or Spiderman.  Oh how cool! I’m so excited.  I got there Barbie in hand so excited! She said “Did you bring any clothes for her to change into?”  I replied “No she’s wearing a pretty cool outfit now she’s fine”.  She sighed “Well I suppose you can use some of my Barbie outfits for now.”  Turns out all she wanted to do was play fashion show and dress the Barbie dolls in different outfits and make them walk an imaginary catwalk.

Now as an adult I don’t really find this to be a thrilling way to play Barbie dolls but if my future child wants to do this I don’t have any strong moral objections and I’ll smile and encourage her/his imagination.  Afterall, it could lead to fashion design, photography and who knows what other creative outlets (or maybe nothing in that area at all it doesn’t matter play should be fun for kids)  I digress too much here.  My point is even as a kid I found what she wanted to do so boring and I didn’t want to play with her anymore.  Since I was frequently bullied in school and had no friends I pretended to be having a great time but I never brought my Barbie dolls over again.  No way I would subject my superhero doll to such torture again.

The whole incident alarmed me though.  I could never figure out why I was bullied so much or why I couldn’t make very many friends.  I definitely thought there was something wrong with me.  The inquisitive scientific mind I had came up with the hypothesis that it could be the way I played with my Barbie dolls.  I asked the other girls at school what sorts of games, imaginary stuff did they do with their Barbie dolls.  “Create a wedding with church guests, a groom, priest and beautiful dress” was the most common response.  So I thought in order to be normal I had to do this.  I had a few pretty wedding dresses that could fit on Barbie (they were made for a different counterfeit Barbie but they’d do).  I asked my brother to help, he was my playmate and he was a very happy-go-lucky guy who just enjoyed playing with me so when I asked he agreed.  We got busy setting up a little wedding scenario.  Since Barbie didn’t spend much time romancing with Ken in my bedroom we had to get her to agree to marrying the first Ken we grabbed and fast.  She wasn’t very happy about it but in order to be normal we had to do it.  She agreed and put on the slightly too big for her wedding dress from counterfeit Barbie doll wedding dress line & headed to the altar.  My brother held up Ken and the priest and began reciting whatever we thought a wedding should sound like (probably based off of the many TV weddings we had seen).  I held up Barbie and tried desperately to keep her dress from falling off.  Almost done…the priest asked Barbie if she would take Ken to be her lawfully wedded husband and I couldn’t help myself.  She said “No! I want to go camping and wrestle bears!”  Off came her dress and she ran out of church naked! My brother was laughing on the floor now enjoying the thought of a bride screaming no in the middle of a boring wedding and running out of the church naked.  He was totally entertained!  He ran to grab Wolverine (he wasn’t invited to the wedding).  And we redressed Barbie in her bear wrestling outfit and went back to what we loved.

Now you’re probably trying to figure out the point of this story and how I got my three rules of Barbie and Wolverine from it.  First off, my whole life I never thought about getting married being a necessity.  It didn’t matter to me either way if I spent my life single or married.  I was and could after all be a whole and complete person without being married.  As an “annoying” feminist I knew no woman needed a man in her life to complete her she was capable on her own and could achieve whatever she dreamed.  I also knew if I did get married it should be because I wanted to not because the world told me I should.  When I met the man that is now my husband he totally agreed with me.  He was after all a whole and complete person on his own too.  Our relationship blossomed into a wonderful friendship and romance.  We decided to make the commitment to be together for the rest of our lives.  Working on being together and committed to one another can be hard but being two complete beings we’re bound to clash and have arguments.  We’ve discovered the key to any human relationship is communication and respect — even if we don’t always agree this is important.  I’ve only been married for 5years now so I’m sure pearls of wisdom on marriage will come forth as we continue to grow in our relationship with one another.

The second part is quite obvious too.  I didn’t fit into the stereotypical girl outline.  But, when you become an adult you realize no one fits the stereotype completely.  While I do like shoes, action movies, pretty dresses and sparkly stuff.  I detest romantic movies, the colour pink and playing sports (PE class was a nightmare for me.  I wish they taught nothing but Yoga.  Always getting picked last for any sport is both humiliating and does not encourage one to do better at a sport).  But, I used to think cos-play was stupid and a waste of time too.  I came to realize how much fun it is to have a hobby and do something you love.  It relieves stress and makes you a more well rounded person.  Also, if you’re not hurting anyone why does it matter.  In my 30years on this planet even if I could never find the patience or time to do something one of my friends was doing I was totally interested in hearing them talk about it.  They were excited about it and while I may be annoying being the one who knows nothing about it I bet my questions about what things were or how they did it made them feel good that someone at least cared about their passion.  I guess we don’t have to fit into any one category and we can always change and grow.  The second point of my story is in the end it’s ok to not be normal.  Things will get better, you will meet people who have the same passions you do and if not you at least have a clueless friend like me who will listen to your excitement with equal enthusiasm cause your passion is what makes you cool and awesome to be around.

My third point is I thought life was supposed to be this grand adventure that you went on with family and friends.  Maybe not to fight Magneto or wrestle a bear but just an adventure.  My husband asked me if I thought we were adventurous.  And I truly think we are.  We may have boring day-to-day things like housekeeping, bills and brushing our teeth but that comes with the territory of being a human.  The in between parts are the best, the experiences we (my husband and I) have shared.  The memories we made are just awesome.  Having a mutual experience is so great for growing relationships and we have had many great mutual experiences.  We’ve had some pretty grand experiences.  I got to pet a crocodile’s tail last weekend.  My husband and I went to Australia two years ago and we watched seals mate and feed their young on a beach, we fed kangaroos at a rescue centre (they have surprising strength but are gentle — I was pulled to the ground by them they wanted me to feed them at ground level).  We’ve had some small adventures too like hiking trails around our home, going out to watch movies together, even driving out to the mall to buy a BoosterJuice or a cup of tea from David’s Tea are adventures.  Sometimes we don’t even have to leave home for an adventure.  Last Monday our dog at a small chicken bone and two days later he pooped it out whole — we were so excited to see his poop that day!

I guess as corny as it sounds playing with Barbie Dolls (and a 12″ Wolverine action figure) with my brother all those years ago taught me about life.

(1) You can be complete without getting married and you should only get married because you want to not because society tells you to

(2) It’s ok that you’re not normal, nobody is.  We don’t need to be normal.  Our passions make us who we are and are what makes us attractive companions to others.  We need to celebrate our diversity and even if we have some normal likes that fit into a stereotype (like shoes so many shoes!) we don’t need to be ashamed of them we are entitled to enjoying life when we can there’s too much suffering in the in between parts.

(3) Life is about having adventures.  Adventure doesn’t mean grand large scale stuff but it can be and that’s pretty cool too.  But we are allowed to define an adventure as celebrating a dog passing a bone through his digestive tract too.

My final thoughts on this little essay?  I’m not sure.  I’m not even sure if this is a complete list of rules I live by and one day I may change my mind and think this is all a dumb way to live life.  For now they’re pretty good solid rules.