April Fools: Will The True Story Please Step Forward?

(Updated on 4/2 - scroll down to find out if you were right!)

As part of an April Fool's contest on the Blog Exchange, one of the following stories is true; the other, of course, is false.  Can you tell which is which?  Place your vote today!

Story # 1:  The Epidural

“What?!  Why didn’t you have an epidural?  You should definitely get one next time.  They’re great.  When I was in labor, we played cards the whole time.” 

“Wow,” I thought, “cards.  I definitely was not playing cards during labor.”

After I had my first child, I heard variations on this theme from every single friend I have.  In others words, “What were you thinking, girlfriend?  Join our pain-free club.”

So when baby #2 came along, I really considered it.  “Let’s see how it goes,” I thought. “I’ll try it without, but never say never.”  But once again, I missed out on the card playing, and—courtesy of a little Nubain—I made it through a second birth without an epidural.  This time I really heard it.  “Uuuuuh, what are you, slow?” was my friends’ basic response. 

So the third time around (how does this keep happening?), I decided to brush up on my research.  Everything I read convinced me, yet again, to try to go without the epidural.  But my guard was down, my friends’ gloriously pain-free descriptions were echoing in my head, and the female OB-GYN on call proclaimed, “I had one and it was great.  You should get it now, before it’s too late.”  And so I did.

But ten, fifteen, twenty minutes later, there was no change.  My pain was increasing by the second. 

“Hasn’t it started working yet?” the nurse asked, a bit perplexed.

“Not unless I’m giving birth out of my right leg,” came my terse reply. 

And friends, this did not change.  For the duration of my labor I was totally free of feeling in my right leg and the much-hailed epidural did nothing for the rest of me, which was desperate for relief.

I never even got to play cards.

Story # 2: Vanity Gone Awry

It always started with a compliment.  “New glasses?  They’re so cute,” said my friends.  Then came the quick follow up.  “Have you ever thought about LASIK.  I had it, and it was great.  I love not having to clean my contacts or find my glasses.  You should think about it.” 

And I did.  I loved the idea of looking out the window and actually seeing leaves, rather than just a blur of green that I knew would turn to leaves if I put my glasses on.  I dreamed of coming home from a late night out with the girls, and dropping my tired self into bed without having to peel the contacts off of my corneas first.  I asked and asked and everyone loved their LASIK. 

And so I went.  Yes, I signed the waiver, yes I knew about the “potential” drawbacks, but everyone loves LASIK, and the doctor assured me that any difficulties were fairly rare, so I knew it would be fine.

But it isn’t.  And now that it isn’t, all of the other stories have come trickling out, and I have discovered that not everyone loves LASIK after all.  When my surgery was finished, my sight was blurry and I was assured that it would return to normal.  It hasn’t, not exactly.  I now have the privilege of sore, dry eyes and occasional random blurriness.  I see an odd, glowing ring around streetlights and the moon that I’m certain isn’t a heavenly sign. 

And suddenly, peeling those contacts out at 1 AM doesn’t seem like such a chore.  

I really miss my glasses.

-Kirsetin

Read the other April Fool's contest participants stories at The Mummy Chronicles,  Mayberry Mom, &  my life as it is.

* Updated April 2:  If you voted for the LASIK story, you were very close.  Although I have considered LASIK for years, I have not taken the plunge, mostly because if you look long enough, you, too will find that these kinds of stories abound.  In fact, Abby Ellin recently published LASIK, When the Fine Print Applies to You in the NYTimes, in which she spells out the downside pretty clearly.  But if you voted for the botched epidural, you nailed it!  If you can believe it, they add insult to injury by not even giving you a discount when this happens - you pay full price for the epidural, effective or not.  Thanks for voting!

I Wish I Would Have Known...

Before I had kids, I read every book about birth and parenting I could get my hands on.  I knew that I would be tired, that life would never be the same, and that having a baby would change our family dynamic in an unalterable way. 

I knew these things, but I didn’t really know them.

I knew, for example, that I’d be tired but I didn’t know how hard being utterly exhausted would be.  When my first baby was new, I remember desperately wanting a little more sleep, and feeling incredibly, unforgivably selfish because of it.  I wish that someone had told me I might feel this way, and that it was okay.

I also knew that life would never be the same, but I had no idea what “not really the same” meant.  I didn’t understand that my world would shift so completely from a self-centered focus to a what’s-best-for-my-child focus.  I wish that someone would have shared that at times that shift would seem completely logical, and at others, it would be incredible difficult.

I knew that babies cry and toddlers throw tantrums and five-year olds test independence.  But I didn’t know that I’d be really good at handling some of these, and not so good at others.  I wish someone had told me that every phase is only that: a phase that will pass before you know it.

I knew that there would be more laundry.  And there is.

Everyone did tell me, of course, that time would fly.  But in the midst of diapers and baby food, I couldn’t really comprehend it.  Now there are no more diapers and no more high chairs.  Those cute overalls have been replaced by Hollister t-shirts and ripped up jeans.  I feel like the film is on fast-forward, and sometimes I can’t find the pause button.  I hope someone will help me figure out where it is.

-Kirsetin

Kirsetin wrote this post to participate in the Blog Blast on the Blog Exchange, which is sponsored this week by Discovery Health and their new series "Deliver Me."  

Old-Fashioned Fun

When I was a girl, I used to spend a couple of weeks each summer with my grandparents. Most mornings, after making me breakfast, my grandmother sent me outside to play while she began her daily chores. It seemed like she was forever folding laundry and vacuuming her living room floor. There weren’t many other children in the village where she lived, so I spent long hours figuring out how to amuse myself. One of my favorite activities, on a hot summer afternoon, was to gather my books from the library and read in the shade beneath the giant oak tree at the entrance to her neighborhood. I loved to watch the cars go by; I remember wondering who all of those people were and where they were all going. Did they wonder about me, too? Thirty years later those memories are strong: I can still feel the cool grass under my bare little legs and see the sun peeking through the thick leaves above.

By the time my children came along, kids’ summers were filled with camps of every sort. Basketball camp, swim club camp, any-activity-you-can-name camp. What startled me about all of these choices wasn’t really that they existed, but how many children were enrolled in them from the youngest of ages. At first I resisted the peer pressure, partly because in addition to my three-year old, I also had an infant; partly because these camps cost a lot of money; and partly because it just didn’t seem right to book my three-year old son’s summer chock full of organized activities. Didn’t he get enough of that during the pre-school year?

But slowly, and surely, I started down the slippery slope of enrollment. “Oh, what’s one little camp,” I thought. “His friends are all doing it; he’ll love it.” And he did. But one camp turned to two, then two kids turned to three, and before I knew what hit me I found myself living out of a mini-van and shuttling three boys from ocean camp to soccer camp to crime-science investigation camp. A mini-van was most definitely not where I wanted to spend my summer.

And so I decided: our summers will be different. They will be slow. My children will be bored. They will have to learn to play b-o-r-e-d games with one another, even though the youngest can’t add yet and the oldest insists on proper rules. And I will have to practice patience, again and again, while explaining once more why they aren’t enrolled in the Greatest Camps on Earth. But the trade-off is that they get to enjoy summers like I did: figuring out fun for themselves. They get to take long walks in the woods, check out hundreds of books from the library, and gorge themselves on s’mores roasted over the firepit during our summertime outside movie extravaganza.

And I, most thankfully, do not have to spend my summer in a mini-van.

-Kirsetin

Kirsetin wrote this post to participate in the Blog Blast on the Blog Exchange. Highlights Magazine, which was also around when she was a kid (and is a magazine her kids love), is coming out with a new publication for kids from ages 2 - 6, High Five: check it out here.