being pregnant is...

pretty lame so far.

so when i thought i might be pregnant, i stopped drinking alcohol... which isn't a huge deal, but when you've had a long day, it's nice to sit back with a glass of wine, or go to a mexican restaurant and drink a margarita with your vat of cheese sauce (or a vat of margarita with your cheese, either way). but that is all over for the next, oh, year or so.

then i became exhausted all the time, i'm tired, i ache all over, some days i feel like my joints are coming unhinged (and apparently, thanks to one of the hormones, they kind of are! in preparation of baby-havin'). this problem is complicated by the fact that i no longer consume caffeine, if possible, so that morning espresso is no help in shakin' these tired blues.

after confirmation of the pregnancy, came the nausea and food restrictions. many things i LOVE and base my diet on are no-no's for pregnancy. to name a few: soft, unpasteurized cheeses, sushi, steak any pinker than well done, deli meats, and certain types of fish. oh, but what can i eat? pre-natal vitamins, which in and of themselves will make you wanna hurl. even without these magical baby-producing-vomit-inducing pills, most of the foods i eat left me with an unpleasant feeling in my tummy. and don't even get me started on smells! ugh! even things i liked before like my own perfume, or febreeze send me running for the door! (who knew your sense of smell was so heightened during pregnancy.)

now, i am enjoying the world of full-on morning (or afternoon, or evening, or all day) sickness with my first actual hurling episode yesterday morning before work. let's just say that i no longer want to see v8 in any of its forms, and i'm pretty sure that vitamin didn't get "fully absorbed". i'll take some saltines and ginger ale please. andrew brought me some at work, where i still managed to be the first one there, even after my porcelain prayer session.

work is a whole nother list of "don'ts" - don't play in cat poop (kind of hard when it's one of the major aspects of your job), don't take x-rays, don't be around iso, don't touch that drug, or that one, or that one... wash your hands after touching that, oh that cat has toxoplasmosis! dont' pick up that dog, don't stand on that ladder to get that bag of food that's too heavy for you to carry all of a sudden, and on and on ad nauseum (man a lot of pregnancy is about nausea)...

i guess the only good thing is that people tend to feel bad for you when you ask them if they will take your shifts (so you're not in overtime again while feeling like poop), and i did get to take today off thanks to amy deciding to work for me today.

i am sure that some day soon, there will be a more encouraging positive benefit to all this negativity i'm feeling about my current "condition" - for now, this is your non-shiny-happy emily, signing off.