Progress ain't Perfection

I have a wonderful family and friends.

I have a good job.

I have love in my life.

It took a while to realize this.

Feelings are difficult to reconcile. It's rough feeling abandoned or unloved, but somehow days keep flying by, and the only thing to do is keep on your toes, dancing around the mental and emotional disasters. Eventually, sadness and disappointment go away.

The amazing part is that although these emotions suck, having them means that there is excitement in your life. You know that you deserve amazing things that will produce the opposite autoimmune responses: joy and awesomeness.

I should be a millionaire by now, 

...but that has not quite happened.

I guess I'll have to work for it.

Mental things can be overcome. What is worse is not having what you want materially, nor a means to get it.


For example, right now. There are a number of things on my agenda:


1. Start the divorce process

This should not be difficult, however the times my soon-to-be ex has designated to chat about the process haven't worked out. Apparently, in Venezuela the power is cut by Hugo Chavez whenever there is a pertinent question to asked.  Therefore, I cannot seem to catch him over Skype. I figure he could have the foresight to buy a phone card. However, this is not the case.

Anyway, a friend of mine who was a divorce lawyer at one point has volunteered to guide me through the process, with or without the help of my (tentative) ex-husband.

But I guess I can't blame the guy. If I were him, I wouldn't want to lose me either; smart, quick-witted, amazingly attractive women who happen to be the mother of your daughter don't come around often. I guess he should have thought about that before he started believing that hollow words without action constitute honesty.


2. Stay "not fired" at my job

So last week I took a large box and wrote "Free Kittens" on it. Then I put it outside in the parking lot during a snowstorm. Apparently, it wasn't funny to someone.

But really, "Listen Sarah, you are doing a great job here, but the box of kittens was not appropriate for the workplace."
"There were no kittens."
"The box that said 'kittens.'"
"The box also said 'Tupperware.'"

-or-

"Listen Sarah, you are doing a great job here, but the box of kittens was not appropriate for the workplace."
"No kidding. We better call the humane society about that box. While you do that, I am going to pursue my vocation of baby seal clubbing. Didn't you run a background check before you hired me?"

-or-

"Listen Sarah, you are doing a great job here, but the box of kittens was not appropriate for the workplace."
"You think I would put a box of kittens outside during a snowstorm? That's f'd up. You are a sick individual, boss."

I need to keep my job for the benefits and the paychecks. Other than that...


3. Get a home loan

Saving money has never been a talent of mine, and I blame capitalism and the media for that. I love new things, the only catch is after a week, they are no longer new. The only way around that is to buy more new things...and the cycle repeats itself.

In addition, Minnesotans must have two separate wardrobes: arctic winter tundra and sultry summer attires. A main problem for me is that in the middle of summer, I forget why I have sweaters lining my closet and take them all up to the Goodwill. Then, as time passes, it gets cold again and my broke-ass goes to the Goodwill and buys all my sweaters back again.

So although there are plenty of "first time homeowner" programs out there to help with my down-payment, getting the additional funds together is a constant moral battle I fight.


4. Be an entrepreneur

So I have this business plan packaged up and ready to roll, but I lack the funds (see item #3) to start. I figure entrepreneurship could be supplemental income to make my mortgage payments and to buy more frivolous things which add to the contentment of my daughter and myself. Currently, I am considering being published, but any blog member can see that my entries have not been as consistent as they were. There are simply not enough hours in the day.


4. Maintain relationships

A great skill I have developed is keeping the people I love close to me. The caliber of my friends and acquaintances has been increasing. They amaze me. If you put me and my friends into the most boring of places, I guarantee we would have the collective ingenuity to either MacGyver or Rube Goldberg something amazing by the sheer forces of our combined wit. We would be (and are) irreconcilable forces.

5. Find a wonderful man
For goodness sakes! I am (still) a married woman.

Eventually, I want a poker buddy who will sit across the table from me. We shall indicate to one another intuitively when to raise and when to fold our hands, in a metaphorical yet very real sense.

Abandoned Ship.

When I was younger, I imagined that when I was married, I would live with my husband in a house with our child. These were things I believed to be true.

My values and beliefs were smashed.

I was married, however, I was living at home with my parents.
I was married, although my husband left us.
I had a child, although her father had skipped the country.

Fine then. I am an unemployed single-mother. I stayed married because he told me he would send money to help with the financial burdens of raising a child. He has sent me $500 in two years, $100 of that was syphoned out of my daughters savings account.

That's like .55 per day. I need to tell him to send that money to a starving child in Africa. Maybe then it could be appreciated.

I am married today still, just because I can't seem to get the damn paperwork in order, in addition to the fees associated with filing for an international divorce. I am kicking myself and can't figure out why I should have to pay for this divorce in addition to diapers and the daily stuff I have to keep on hand in order to maintain my daughter's healthy life.

I have to pay for it. Otherwise, I will end up being married to him forever by default. Dead weight on a sinking ship has to be thrown overboard, whether it has value or not. I'd throw bars of gold in addition to the carcasses of every ex (and future ex) boyfriend/ husband off of the S.S. Sarah in order to stay buoyant.

So there I was, buoyant but barely making it. I was living with my parents, and sharing the responsibilities of raising my daughter. At first, this was welcome. How wonderful to have live-in baby-sitters!

As time drew on, the situation became more difficult. My parents are seasoned veterans in this "child-rearing" bologna that I was feeling out for the first time. I am the oldest of, like seven kids. My parents loved raising kids. My parents loved each other.

What a magical experience that must be.

To see them raise my daughter; to see her stop crying as they hug her is a devastating experience. My daughter will scream for what seems like hours and will not respond to me. I hug her, I sing (actually, that makes sense), I do everything in my power to help her feel better. Then, grandma or grandpa swoop in and hug her a little, and she stops having the fit.

Much like the doppler radar, it's freakin' witchcraft.

I love when my parents go out of town for small periods at a time. I love when my daughter and I are together, without interruption. Sure, it is pretty lame that I can't go out dancing or partying with my friends, but I am nearly 30 years old, and I know at the end of the day, I was the one who took care of my princess.

Just me.

Not her father (obviously) nor her grandparents. She stayed healthy and happy and she learned new things all because of me.

Today may have been the day where she began to make memories for herself. Maybe she will tell me in five years that she remembers when we went to Bob's Java Hut and met that crazy character, or when we went to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and met that even crazier character.

Maybe.

So I am now assuming the responsibilities of creating memories for my child. Good ones; ones without the bitchy rhetoric that I sometimes possess. I know what I need to do.

I became employed once again in August and am making a decent living. I am working to provide a home for my daughter and myself so we can have our own lives and can create a new set of our own collective values and beliefs.

I have trashed the ideals of what I thought a family should be and accepted the uniqueness of my family. My daughter and I are at the center and my family are nearby. Her father is non-existent at this point.

This new concept of family may not be typical, but it's value; comprised of both strengths and weaknesses is creating a tactile and physical value that I can feel in my soul.

Now what?

Reality had finally smashed my dreams. It plummeted like a giant bird poo released from heaven...I could see it up in the air; a tiny spec falling, and I watched, as it came closer and closer. For some reason, I anticipated the poo to fall on someone else.

It was accompanied by that sound, the high pitched whistling from the escapades of Wile E. Coyote, right before the anvil drops on him.

Much like Mr. Coyote, I accepted the fact that I either had to get out of the way or play the shoddy chance that a miracle, (like the Taliban hijacking an airplane in order to avert disaster) would save me from the shit that was about to pour.

My daughter was worth playing those odds, but it was not long before that it hit me square in the face accompanied by the clunk of an anvil. There was no way I wanted a reality that smelled like that, even if it was bestowed upon me by heaven.

-----

It was time to stick with a decision. I was in the US, he was in Venezuela. I had a daughter, completely dependent upon the decisions I made. The actions I took would form the woman she would become. So, after having a spiritual awakening, I decided to change the things I could while accepting the things which were unchangeable, irreparable.

Her father (at this point he was legally my husband) would continue telling me things like, "I will help" or "I will send money" or "I will get a visa to see her".

Keep in mind, my Spanish is not perfect. I must have missed the class teaching that direct translation of spanish phrases is exactly the opposite of what I hear and understand. I will chalk that one up to "communication issues". These "communication issues" were something that I couldn't change. I had heard them over and over again. They will never change.

What I could change was the level of responsibility I had over my daughters life and my own. I began submitting resumes and more resumes, doing volunteer work and praying for the future to brighten up a bit.

It did.

The US Census took me aboard as a temporary employee. I was sent to latino neighborhoods and got to practice my Spanish. It was strange because they clearly understood me and I understood everything they said. The conclusion: my husband's Spanish must have a thicker accent. I was paid very well for this job. I was financially recovering from the thousands of dollars spent on visas and traveling for a pervious goal of a husband and a child making me a family. My core self came back.

I decided to pursue vocational activities, such as re-becoming a member of a nonprofit organization I had frequented in the past. As it turned out, they have childcare and I had been completely unaware! My soul began to fill with life and love once again.

Since everybody knows physical fitness is important, why not join the YMCA? Hank Hill says "The Y has got something for everyone". Thank you, Hank. It is true. Some folks learn to swim, but since I am about as buoyant as a French Bulldog I didn't swim much. My daughter and I splashed in the shallow end of the pool and had wonderful times.

I found some my self-esteem behind a locker room door at the Y. I picked it up and hugged my daughter as we ran away with it, like a couple of girl-scouts on a devious mission. I am finding pieces of it still, in the most random of places!

I decided to get a hobby and signed up for community education salsa dancing classes. I learned the basics of the dances which had mystified me in Latin America. I could do it! To hone my skills further, I joined a dance studio which I still attend on a regular basis. Happiness came back and I remembered what life is supposed to be.

Accepting the immovable variables in my life was difficult, until I met Courage for dinner. He went on and on about this other guy I used to know, Self-Confidence. Courage insisted on picking up the tab, so I graciously took him for all he had. We sat together for hours. Finally, Self-Confidence ended up walking by our table, along with his friend Self-Esteem. We laughed, we cried, we reunited, and they became a part of my life. 

We all agreed someone was missing in our company that night...

My daughter.

She keeps growing. She is no longer a baby. She is more beautiful and developing a feisty personality.

I thought that being a parent meant that your child was supposed to engulf your entire being, and they were supposed to grow through you. Turns out, that is not the case for me.

Call me exuberant. This is my new life.


I started my life over: traded the motorcycle for a Taurus with a 5-star safety rating, put down my feet in the USA, and moved into a stable environment while I cleared away my financial burdens.


My daughter.


She is my life yet she grows not through me, but at my side as long as I have my new bedfellow, serenity (Self-Confidence introduced us) available at all times.






Why didn't the Coyote ever stop chasing the Roadrunner? What a jackass.

Planes, trains and automobiles.

The best analogy I have:

A young woman is driving her car. She is quite excited to get to her destination. She has never been there but she is sure, from what she has been told, that it will be amazing. Based solely on the advice of others, she tentatively calls this location her "happy place".

For the sake of imagery, let's imagine her traversing long peaceful country roads, during a quiet snow, just a bit after dusk. Her car is silent and she is lost in her thoughts about her amazing expectations of this "happy place". It appears she will arrive at her destination on time. Ahead, she sees blinking red lights then the cross-arm of the train tracks lowering as she hears a faintly familiar train whistle resounding.

She eventually arrives at the cross-arm and the steam engine passes her in all of it's Polar-Expressive splendor. She is struck by the deep resounding intensity and decibels of the rhythmatic train engine as it passes her idling car. Soon after, she becomes annoyed by the number of train cars that accompany the engine. She counts...two, three, four...when she gets to the double digits, she gets bothered. 

My child's father had just stepped off the plane from Venezuela, and the first day we spent together, much like the commanding train engine, was novel and exciting.  After the engine passed, I held on to the belief that this novelty was true happiness as the train brought by it's innumerous cars. 

The excessive cars this train brought through my path quickly killed it's novelty and I found myself scavenging like a train-hopping, dirty punk rocker for the happiness of which, I had once caught a glimpse. I scavenged and found myself fighting tooth and nail for it, and once again found console in the abuse and misuse of alcohol.

I was once again slowly killing myself, while I sat and waited for this train to pass, to find my happy place on the other side, but it's train cars stretched to infinity with no caboose in sight.

I wanted to be happy with him and our family to thrive. After all, he is a ridiculously smart, incredibly kind and understanding man. However, bless his kind soul, this blog is not about him.

Back to our main character: 

Eventually, the seemingly never-ending train ends. The woman crosses the tracks and proceeds to her "happy place". About an hour later she arrives and assures herself the annoyance of that train will disappear. She had waited for an eternity for it to pass. She was now late and her make-up and hair were in complete disarray. 

Fresh in her mind, she remembers the majestic steam engine that brought these train cars across her path and laughs. It was beautiful and proud, however these excessive train cars made the whole situation ridiculous. Then she realizes the irony of expecting a train to not be accompanied by cars! Ha.

Still in the parking lot, she looks around. Her "happy place" is not as amazing as she had pictured it to be. She convinces herself that it is for the better, considering her hair had lost it's curl anyway. She daintily steps out of her warm car, and she is shocked by the winter cold.

As she walks in to her location, she smells something and looks to her right. Through the darkness of night and glistening snowflakes, she can faintly decipher the image of that damn train that ruined her hair. It is stopped and she realizes that all the cars were carrying nothing but loads of shit.

This is not what she expected to find in her "happy place". She probably shouldn't have listened to her family and friends regarding what would make her happy. Nonetheless, she enters her destination in order to say that she made it there. In order to get them off her back.

I married him in December of 2009, but can't remember the exact date. It was get married or he'd be deported. We went to a Justice of the Peace over her lunch hour while she was working at a volunteer agency.

Much like when I wrote down my daughter's name on her birth certificate, the importance of this signature did not completely register with me. My mind was clouded with expectation of others and irrationality and insecurity coupled with the repercussions of three months of chemical abuse. 

I signed the paper. We were married. 

Next, he had an appointment at immigration, but in February he left the US to go home to Venezuela a day before he could have become a naturalized citizen. This was because of a pending charge against him brought on by an extended family member who was extorting his mother (it's complicated). I understood. I still do. 

We had met with lawyers in the US prior to his departure and they advised us to file for yet another type of Visa. So I began the Visa process once again to allow him to re-enter the US from Venezuela as my "husband"...until the lawyers asked for another $300 in filing fees. As I wrote the check, I realized that this was the third Visa I had sponsored for him. Tearing up the check, I realized that I was over $10,000 in the hole.

Game over.

Hop on a plane, a train or an automobile, get to Caracas and get your own Visa. You can't ride this camel anymore cause you broke it's back.

Three's a crowd.

Making a decision and sticking with it is difficult. The human condition is an amazing thing; it is a blessing and a curse, emotions that were once so steadfast and unwavering always fade in due time. I had at one point decided that the relationship with my baby's father would not work. Now, I believed that it would.

Back in the US, romanticizing the relationship that I had with him, I found myself in the exact same state of mind as when I was pregnant. I would be happy if I was with him. I was connected to him via Skype all day every day.

The only difference now was that his pending fiancee visa to get into the US was approved. He would be coming to the US momentarily. My dreams changed from having a farm in the Andes Mountains to having a condo in a hip urban area with my soon-to-be husband and our daughter. Life would be good.

He was supposed to arrive on a Monday, and I waited for his call to pick him up at the airport in Minneapolis. I waited until Tuesday, when he called, informing me that immigration would not let him through because of a legal process in which he was involved, so he had returned to Merida from Caracas. He was unable to call me for some reason, which is understandable considering the frequent power outages and system failures in Venezuela. Traveling from Merida to Caracas is difficult, and he had gone by bus.

I don't know if you've ever traveled by Greyhound, but bus trips are not fun. In Venezuela, the busses are double deckers and have the anatomy of two trays of ice, with wheels. There is always someone annoying sitting next to you and a guy snoring because of some undiagnosed sleep apnea behind you. There are always riley teenagers yelling about something because the muffled treble of reggaetone music coming from their headphones compromises their ability to control the volume of their voice. The bathrooms are disgusting, but functional (most of the time).

The ride itself is long and the road coils itself around mountains and valleys.  About half of the time, the bus breaks down halfway through the journey, and a backup bus is sent after a cold, desolate and uncomfortable wait.

Although it seemed incredibly inconsiderate, I get that he couldn't call. Tired of disappointment, I told him to not bother calling me unless he had good news for our family.

He was back in Merida with his family and working with his lawyer in order to be sure he could get through immigration on his second trip to the Caracas airport. Eventually, it happened. Our communication was so sparse at this point in time, I didn't know what his travel plans were.

I got a call in the middle of the Maury Povich show to come pick him up at the airport in Minneapolis. I never did get to find out who Shaniqua's baby's daddy was, but I didn't care. My dreams of having my family together in the US just became a reality. I was convinced that this was good news.

I picked him up at the airport and to my surprise, had the same feelings as when my baby and I met him in Caracas: I was too tired to feel happy or affectionate, or anything for that matter. Exhausted, nearly to my home in the US. I was simply spent. He had picked up flowers (which was sweet) and gave me a kiss, which ended up being quick because I couldn't stand it. I felt nothing. Nothing.


We got his suitcase in the car and went out to eat. It felt amazing to be able to introduce him to the US. For the first time he experienced things like traffic laws and order,  guaranteed electricity and water, and restaurants inspected by the Department of Health.


It was September, and according the the rules of the fiancee visa, we were to be married within 90 days or he would be deported. This was day one. I was happy as a tour-guide, sharing parts of my life which I often take for granted. I faintly remembered my doubts regarding our relationship and my decision to raise my daughter as a single-parent. 


Would being happy as his tour-guide translate into being happy as his wife?

The Mad Hatter

Since I found out of my pregnancy, I had been attempting to wear a number of different types of hats; happy ones, patient ones, loving ones, and understanding ones. Turns out, the frustrations of never having any hat fit properly made me bitter and quite dishonest with myself.

"This hat is comfortable" meant "Thank goodness! When I wear this hat, I cannot see how hideous it looks on me unless I take an honest look into a mirror."

 -or-

"This hat is beautiful" meant "The pain in wearing this hat is unbearable, but it looks good. As long as I don't cringe, nobody will know how this doesn't fit me."

Daily, I dealt with similar anecdotes. Finally, I realized this process was ugly and getting uglier the more I tried to force it to work: I was not happy being with the father of my child. Although it was fun being in another country with a completely different culture, there was no true happiness for me in Venezuela.

It was only after being miserable; sick and tired of being sick and tired, that I knew something had to change. What I was doing was not working.

So, after a few more weeks of asking God and the universe for guidance, my daughter and I got on a plane to come home to the United States, and things began to change; to feel "right" for the very first time.

Whenever I come back to the US from abroad, I believe that nothing will be difficult. Put quite simply, the folks in the US literally speak my language. There is no looming fear that I am misunderstanding what people are trying to communicate to me. I love the feeling of security and the prospect of having deep and meaningful conversations with those who have my familiar lexicon.

However, that is never the case. Although I can communicate ideas and intentions clearly, English speakers tend to use their familiarity with socially constructed norms of the 1960's to formulate any conversations. It is unfortunate, because when I chose to return to the US, I wanted people to support my decision to be a single mother.

Nobody did. How frustrating it was to be asked about the relationships in Venezuela I was attempting to momentarily quell. I was stuck in a quagmire of intricate social issues and questions which single-parents face daily:

"Don't you love him? He is her father! You should try harder to make it work!"

The part that made answering these questions extra difficult was that I hadn't spoken English in months! Translating all of my beliefs and feelings from my recent trip abroad from Spanish to English without adding personal editorials was really difficult. After all, I was not upset with the father of my child. He is a good man. Everybody made it clear that they believed in the father of my child, not me.

I should have responded simply and eloquently, "I tried to be with him. No dice. You can shove your ideas and opinions about my decisions up your ass," but instead I began to romanticize the idea of being with her father, living on a little farm in the Andes Mountains once again.

So, here I was in the USA once again. I unpacked my suitcases and found all of my metaphorical, uncomfortable yet pretty hats once again. I dusted them off and put them on...nothing had actually changed. I was still weak.

It will be better tomorrow

It was tomorrow, and a new day should always bring new hope, especially in an exciting tumultuous foreign land. My little family had been reunited, but why was I the one still waking up all hours of the night to breast-feed? Why was I the one who was burdened by responsibility, while everyone surrounding me was engulfed by my baby's novelty like a new toy?

Nothing was working out as I had imagined. My dreams of being a happy family, living on a farm on the top of a mountain were disappearing with every shriek of my child, and every exclamation that she wanted to suck my tits. I became more desolate and isolated than I had been while living in the US.

I could not believe that my dreams were not coming true! I had arrived. I was with the father of my child and an adoring family. Why was I being so ungrateful? Finally, I figured out that it must have been something in my control that was not functioning properly. Maybe I just needed to let go and give my baby to the adoring family. Maybe I should go and live like I used to, without responsibilities and burdens. Deciding to go out to the clubs and party it up with the Venezuelans was my only reprieve.

All or nothing. Since I felt like this baby was draining me of my life, I quickly rationalized that living without responsibilities for brief periods of time would provide me a glimpse of what my life was like before the pregnancy.

I could party and keep going until the next day. In fact, I did; on numerous occasions. The hangovers were never pretty and every morning, I swore off drinking. My apologies were sincere, every morning after. It worked for a while. Drunkness for me means that I have no responsibility to others, even if they are my newborn daughter. I become selfish, self-centered, and a complete ass-hole. The "new friends" I met never called me nor cared about my emotional struggles. So, in order to gain attention, I broke bottles, started fights, threw around the prized possessions of others, and walked the streets of violent areas in a drunken stupor.

That'll show them how much my life sucks. Pity me.

Nobody cared.

When the baby's father and his family spoke, I chose not to listen nor participate in conversation. Spanish is hard with a hangover. They could have been saying really nice things which would have switched my mood-meter from irritable discontent to happy, joyous and free; as I imagined in my mountain-top-farm-living-fantasy.

I had to quit partying like an 18 year old (18 is the legal age to drink down there). So I had to do a 180 degree turn. My drinking and partying had replaced my maternal responsibilities as the reason I was unhappy in Venezuela. So I searched for people who didn't drink, and I found them. They were familiar with places in the US (like Akron) and they grew to love me and tolerate my poor Spanish.

We went out for coffee and to the theater once or twice. It was a decent distraction.

One night we went to watch some professional dancers from across South America perform Argentine Tango. It was an amazing evening and I fell in love with professional dancing then and there. Tango has three different types, characterized by the posture of the dancers and the beautiful yet ungodly angles to which they contort their joints across their bodies. The end of the performance was beautiful, as an older, distinguished addressed the audience:

"Tango is a secret art of Latin America. Now you have seen and can appreciate it's beauty. The rest of the world may understand, but will never touch the soul of Latin American Tango as you have tonight."

Well spoken, kind sir...but your secret is out. What an amazing evening!

These people kept me sober for long enough to realize that I couldn't stay sober with the father of my child while living in Venezuela. He saw me as the same person he knew when he met me: a carefree, fearless risk-taker. He insisted that my stubbornness and self will could change my habits and poor behavior.

But things had changed. No longer a reckless pre-felon, I was a mother and struggling to find some sort of tranquility between the Andes Mountains. Partying did not give me sanity, yet neither did staying sober.

I was looking for tranquility as if it was a material thing that somebody should have delivered to me in a nicely wrapped gift box, because after all, I deserved it.

I was entitled to happiness. So, I changed the date of my return flight to wait for my package of tranquility to arrive in the mail. Tomorrow would be a better day. It had to be.

Quiere tete...

So after the expedition to Merida, Venezuela I was exhausted. My baby was exhausted and so was her father. No matter, the rest of the Venezuelan family showed up.

It was so great to see them all. The aunts, the uncles, the cousins, the neighbors, the friends, the aunts and uncles of friends, in-laws, the great aunts and uncles, their cousins, and some Mary Kay saleswoman. I cried on numerous occasions. It was pure jubilation to feel so welcome to a place I had inherited as a second home by default. I was treated like a princess, offered soup and food and the interrogation began.

Personal note here: sometimes, just leave me alone. I am very extroverted and love attention and people and the experiences that come along with those things. However, there are times in a person's life that being surronded by people is not a comfortable thing. After my daughter's birth, my entire family wanted to meet my daughter. They came. I was so ill that I could not be myself. My father spoke to my grandparents who wanted to come to the house and visit. I heard this conversation and screamed "No. I don't want to see them."

I hurt their feelings horribly. It was unreasonable for me to think that everyone in my family would give me recovery time when their first niece or great grandchild enticed them with excitement. Everyone forgot about me and imposed themselves in my sphere of sickness and recovery in order to to visit and chat and hold my daughter.

There must be healthy balance, a way to make known what I want while still catering to the needs of loved ones. As far as this new baby was concerned, all bets were off.

So, here I was back in Merida, Venezuela getting pecked with words and phrases that I hadn't heard in a very long time. I did not understand anything. I was polite, but dear lord, I did not want to be.

Then my daughter cried. "Ooooh. Quiere tete!" exclaimed the mob.

"Disculpa?" Excuse me, did you just make a refrence to my tits? Because it sounded like you said titty.

"Tiene hambre. Darla tete." Quiere tete means "She is hungry"

Quit talking about my tits. I hardly know you people. After taking my daughter from the arms of a stranger (probably the uncle of the Mary Kay saleswoman), I went to feed my child. The conversations I heard consisted of "The baby is so beautiful" and "She is sucking tits now."

Would I really be able to make the cultural shift? My outlook was doubtful, but I reminded myself that I was irrational due to typical strains of traveling.  Tomorrow would be a better day.

My baby did not have a crib in Venezuela at this point so she slept between her father and me. She woke up every couple of hours and I fed her. Her father tried to share his company with us, but he eventually became too exhausted and slept like a rock.

Tomorrow would be a better day.

It had to be.

I did not realize that at three a.m, tomorrow had already arrived.

Baby's Daddy or Bust!

Just arriving home from Chicago passported and ready to rock, my baby slept as I packed. My travel necessities have always been light: a toothbrush, basic diabetic insulin pump materials, a book or two (none that I actually read) a couple of shirts and some jeans, underwear and a few pairs of awesome shoes.

I used all of the baby clothing to line the walls of my suitcase, to ensure that none of my toiletries would get smashed during the many layovers between Minneapolis, Maimi, Caracas, El Vigia, then finally Merida, Venezuela. I needed to use caution while packing, my baby was outgrowing clothing already...I needed to be sure that she would have clothing that would protect her from the outdoor elements of the Andes Mountains and fit her for the duration of our indefinite stay.

After packing my stuff, I realized that I had forgotten to include the pads for the breastfeeding bras, formula for the baby (just in case), toys that they probably didn't have in a third world country, and the gigantic A/C powered breastpump, which was the size and shape of an outdated, boxy HP office computer at an overworked US Government workers' desk.

In addition to my stuffed suitcase, I brought another, equivalent in size, full of the t-shirts and motorcycle tank pads and stickers and car decals I had created for my company which had fallen to the wayside through my pregnancy and traveling. I wanted to sell them all in Venezuela. The website is still there, but I don't maintain nor sell anything anymore. TankGirlArmy.com

I packed a large diaper bag with diapers and wipes and toys in addition to my Dakine backpack which held my outdated and burdensome laptop computer, an extra toothbrush and soap for quick clean-ups between flights, a book about some kid named "Owen Meany"which had been traveling with me to Venezuela since my first expedition and a number of other small, unorganized things. Also, my purse with my blood-test meter, glucose tablets, and necessary cosmetics that any woman traveling should have.

So, I traveled with two large suitcases, a diaper bag, my backpack, and purse. That was a lot to carry, so of course I packed a stroller and fit the baby in with my belongings as well. We checked the suitcases, and headed to our departure gate. I judged all of humanity on this short commute: nobody, but nobody had things so bad yet so good as me.

Have you ever looked at humanity and realized it's gaucheness? Disgusting. That is all I can think on an airplane. Breathing other peoples' air that has circulated full well through every orifice of their bodies and pretending to feel okay with it is nothing I enjoy doing.

Yet, here I was: hormonal, exhausted and pulling out my engorged breasts at any given moment to relieve the abhorrent pressure of my tits, which sprayed milk at any given moment, sopping my shirt. How annoying and embarrassing. My baby did not cry on the flight from Minneapolis to Miami, but from Miami to Caracas she had an outburst that wouldn't quit.

A Latina woman approached me and asked me (in Spanish) if I spoke Spanish. I said "no" hoping she would leave me and my screaming baby alone (I call that "pulling' a Mexican"). Instead of retreating, she piped up in broken English. "Your baby is crying!" I agreed with her. I said that babies cry. "No," the woman said. "She sound like she has pain. Your baby has lot of pain!"

I don't remember what I said to this woman. If I didn't have my baby with me, I would have ripped this woman's eyes out, pointed them back at her and advised her to mind her own business and watch herself.

My baby finally went to sleep and we arrived in steamy Caracas in the middle of the night. I picked up my two suitcases (always thankful to receive my luggage in tact from Caracas) and walked through customs and the two security checkpoints.

My baby had woken up once again, and was overtired and screaming, vomiting and pooping. The Venezuelan officers helped me a bit, which was nice.

Finally, my baby and I headed out to the airport's exit which is always littered with police, taxi drivers, porters, military officers with sawed off shotguns, and money launderers.

I knew her father was in that mix. I saw him, walked directly over, and handed him his child over the gate. With one arm free, I walked victoriously to the exit gate to meet them on the other side.

Surely, he was excited to meet his daughter but I was too tired to feel happy or affectionate, or anything for that matter. Exhausted, yet not nearly to my Venezuelan home in the foothills of the Andes Mountains. Simply spent.

 Our next flight to Merida left in five hours, so instead of camping out at the arrival gate where I am consistantly questioned about exchanging currency, we went up an escalator to the second floor of the airport and camped outside of a closed sandwich shop. I met a retired New York Yankee up there and gave him one of the t-shirts from my TankGirlArmy suitcase as a gift.

He thought I wanted an autograph or something, but I said "No te preocupes, no voy a recordar quien eres ni me importa biesbol." which means, "Don't worry about it. I won't remember who you are anyway. I don't like baseball." He was shocked. Apparently, he is really famous, but I thought he deserved a break. He had been signing autographs for the porters all night. Everybody deserves a break sometimes: I was still waiting for mine.

The baby would not stop crying. She was exhausted and not willing to sleep. Only a couple of weeks old, and just as stubborn as her mother. I left my baby with her father and left to get coffee with an old drunken vagabond. I gave him a couple of dollar bills as a gift for spending time with me. He was more  interesting and less taxing on my nerves than my baby's father, who was very getting tired and cranky. I could not empathize with him. I told him to suck it up.

After camping out hours in the hot humid annoying Caracas international airport, it was time to board our next flight. We made the short commute to the national airport on foot. It was more difficult to navigate with all of my luggage now that I had to explain my methods and rely on her father.

We checked my suitcases once again and waited at the door of the airport. A bus would drive us to our airplane from there. The people boarding these domestic flights are always brutal.

I imagine that it is much like leaving a Superbowl game: there are so many people attempting to leave at the same time, you are forced along a path that will eventually get you out, but you have to be sure not to get trampled. I took solace in the fact that the crowd pushed me through. I had no more energy to hold myself up.

We got on the plane to El Vigia. I may have slept on this ride, but don't remember exactly. When we arrived my host mother (my baby's fathers' aunt) met us along with the alcalde of his immediate family. She had just bought a new SUV and I thought to myself, oh God, we are all going to die.

In Venezuela babies don't get car seats, nor are they assured a seat in the back. They are held by whomever seems to love them the most. Obviously, that was me. I sat in the back clutching my child with white knuckles while we were driven at breakneck speeds through the Andes Mountain range down the highway while land slides fell from above into the endless abyss below.

We made it to Merida after about an hour and a half of driving and more praying than I had done for the duration of my adult life. My baby's father, his mother, his aunt, a four year old kid, and I drove to our home, as the father fall asleep. I elbowed him. "Crees que estas cansado ahora? Espera..."

I asked him, unbelievingly, "You think you're tired now?"

Baby's First Plane Ride

I finally realized that although my baby's father could not come to the US, I could go to him and share this new "parenting" experience (that I seemed to hate). I was going to Venezuela, but first, my two week old daughter needed a passport.

Getting the photo taken was difficult. She could not support her head so I tried to hold it up with my fingers not intruding the picture. In addition, I remember seeing that on "America's Next Top Model" vaseline makes skin appear to glow in photos and I just happened to have it in my baby-bag, so I threw some of that on her face too.

Her passport photo is expressionless. Instead of highlighting facial structure (like Tyra said) the strategically placed vaseline made her face look like that of a overworked truck driver at risk for type 2 diabetes.

Finally, I had two passport photos of my daughter, her social security card, and birth certificate in my possession. In addition, I had a plane tickets to Miami to Caracas to Merida, Venezuela. I flew to the US Department of State in Chicago for an "expedited" appointment which I had booked online. The flight itself went well, since the plane at left at 5am, she slept the entire plane ride.

Once we arrived I had little time to get my bearings and find the Department of State. My daughter and I jumped onto a cab. Her father called me while we were riding in the cab, and I remember thinking "I wonder if he knows how hard I am trying to make this work." I was overjoyed that I finally had a purpose to my days, other than coddling and trying to love this demanding ball of flesh that happened to be my baby. I had a goal to aspire to: getting to Venezuela to be with father of our little family.

The State Department is in the middle of downtown Chicago. The skyline was beautiful and I remember thinking how amazing it would be living there. On that same token, I remember the information given by the cab driver: it is expensive to live in nice areas of Chicago, and overall, the cultural aspects weren't that great, overall.

My daughter and I walked through the metal detectors and security in this swanky skyscraper and found our way to the 13th floor, where our appointment was at. I showed the security my confirmation ticket and they told me to fall into the line...and pointed down the infinitely long, straight, sterile hallway littered with a popuri of black, white, yellow, orange, grey, and brown cultures with their corresponding scents and attire packed onto line, shoulder to shoulder.

My baby was the topic of conversation among many strangers I met in queue. "She's so beautiful, what's her name, how old is she, can I hold her? Oh lookit! The baby is doing... something." My arms burned from carrying this 8 pounds around with me nonstop for hours in addition to a diaper bag. My breasts felt like lead, but I wasn't comfortable feeding her in this saturated hallway.

"Yup, she's great." I said, surprising myself. It is unbelievable how mothers feel obligated to respond in such a manner.  I didn't actually think having my baby was great. It was a lot of work.  Here's the thing that non-parents don't get about the "hard work" that parents have to do: it NEVER ends; never. It's not like loading heavy cargo into semis for hours straight (which I had done).

Raising a baby is a test of endurance that never ends. Every breath you take is for the child. Non-parents can try this: when you wake up in the morning, count the number of breathes you take. Count them all day. It never ends, until you die. If you forget to count your breaths, stop breathing because you have failed your given task. That is what parenting felt like to me, a constantly annoying rapping on the door of my soul.


I was getting better from the complications of the delivery, but I was far from healthy. Disregarding my health, I took the steps that I knew that mother's should do. My doctors were amazed. They couldn't believe that I was walking, let alone breastfeeding all hours of the day.

Babies don't love and cuddle like a puppy. 

I was exhausted and this ball of flesh did not acknowledge nor appreciate that although I almost died upon her birth,  I was crazily over exerting myself for the good of our family. I wanted to feel appreciated by somebody, but nobody could understand what I had been dealing with.

Thank God for Marcos, a friend of mine to whom I mentioned my trip. He lives in Chicago and called me as I was breast feeding in a bathroom stall. He found me on the top of the skyscraper eventually, after almost getting removed from the premises by security (who made sure that everyone knew that they were federal, not state police officers). Marcos and I waited for a few minutes and magically, my baby's passport was finally ready.

We went outside and roamed downtown. The river was still a little green from a St. Patrick's Day Celebration, the bums in Chicago put on shows and preformed acoustics while wearing outlandish costumes. They are definitely a step up from bums in my town who simply hold signs with a hand out. We went to the Apple Store which was seemingly enchanted, but had no customer service. We walked past Oprah's headquarters (I can't remember if that is KSTP or something else). It rained lightly so we found solace in a Thai restaurant.

I don't remember what I had, just that my child was having a fit and I had nowhere to put her but on my shoulder. The pubic stared at me and made me feel horrible. In hindsight, nobody was bothered by us. Young babies hardly make a sound when they cry anyway! My child created a gaze and people wanted to see her.

I called my airline carrier three times to change my departure from Chicago so I could spend more time with Marcos. He is an awesome guy. We went to the Museum of Modern Art and I ended up breast feeding on the third floor in the front row facing an artsy video about...art. That was strange. Nobody else had babies, let alone children with them. After an hour, we left to find the subway which would take me back to the airport.

We passed many people and I kept thinking I saw a mutual friend of ours.

"Marcos! Look, it's Jack!"

"No, Sarah." he responded giggling like a 6'2 Columbian schoolgirl with a hormonal imbalance. "There are many fat, black man in Chicago. I doubt that was Jack."

Marcos helped me carry the baby on the subway. It was nice to get a break. I still remember when he offered to hold her the first time, I couldn't give her away; although I didn't really like her, I needed her. Eventually, as I was falling in and out of sleep on the subway, I asked for help and Marcos was more than happy to provide it.

He got off the subway a couple of stops before mine. I was alone with the baby again, but felt energized after my wonderful afternoon. Throwing my purse and baby bag through the metal detectors with my right hand was easy as my left held the baby above my head, like a waiter who is so sure that his profession is the same as his vocation.

I skipped through the airport and found my gate. While getting ready to feed my child, a woman officer approached me and said she had been watching me since I entered the airport. She asked me if I knew about the soft spots on baby's heads and that one is not supposed to shake a baby.

"Yes, I know that one is not supposed to shake a baby." I replied jokingly.

Well, as it turns out, those kind of jokes aren't funny. Situational humor is not funny with a baby, and not surprisingly, neither are dead baby jokes.

We got on the plane to Minneapolis. We were heading to Caracas, Venezuela the next day.

Home

Finally, we arrived at my parent's home where I had been staying for the past six months. I hated my living situation and hardly asked for help while pregnant to make a point that I was self sufficient. Furthermore, it was important to inconvenience my parents and those in my life as little as possible. It was not their fault my life had taken a drastic turn and I didn't want to inconvenience anyone.

My father was a little crazy and overbearing as I tried to be a mother. He was afraid that my dogs were going to eat the baby, so they were kept outside or in a kennel. He kept reciting stories about babies who were eaten by household pets in graphic detail. He also said that interrupting a baby's crying patterns would impede speech development. This had apparently happened to his brother. This made me quite bitter.

I quit talking to father. Ignoring him, I focused on the relationship I thought I was sustaining with the father of my child. Once again, I was on Skype with live video camera rolling through all hours of the day and night. "One day soon, we will be together, and this will all be easier and we will love each other intensely," he told me...and I believed it. I kept on believing it as I woke up all hours of the night to breast feed my new baby. I believed it when I woke up, I believed it all hours of the day.

Hardly a moment went by that I didn't think of how great my life would be with this new baby, her father, and myself living comfortably in a small cottage in the Andes Mountains with goats, chickens and other assorted barnyard friends. What bliss! My life would change. In these fantasies, I didn't have such a run down car, I had a better motorcycle, and a happy little family.

This fantasy kept me as content as I could have been and I thank God for my stubborn optimism during this difficult time. Breast feeding in itself is an impossible chore. I loved that for the first (and last) time in my life I had tits, but the throbbing, saturated pain was not something I would wish on anybody. The paranoia of owning a new baby was quite intense for me. What if I dropped her and her oversized head snapped backward violently and she suffered from "Shaken Baby Syndrome" or what if she choked or what if she went to sleep and just stopped breathing?

In moments of fear, I often imagined my life without my newborn baby. What if she just disappeared? Life would surely become easier. Maybe if she stopped breathing it would have been God's will and completely out of my control. It sounds like pure evil, but sometimes I hoped that maybe God would help me out with this one.

Of course, if anything tragic did befall my daughter, nothing would have been gained. My life would not have returned to the way it was before. It never does. I would simply have had to deal with a more difficult and devastating set of circumstances. I don't know anyone who wouldn't have lost their mind. I struggled with acceptance and serenity. Holy shit, life was difficult.

Living with my parents provided me with luxuries. They spoiled my daughter. Every time they went out they returned with a new baby toy. Once in a while, I was able to hand her off to them. As I saw joy well up in their faces, I envied them. I wanted joy, but I was too tired. My parents both worked during the week, so it was just the baby and I from eight in the morning until about five in the evening.

I watched daytime television...a lot. Maury Povich, then Judges Judy, Alex, and Joe Brown, then Cash Cab, then finally Malcolm in the Middle. I was stuck somewhere in the middle myself. I was far from the characters that appeared on Maury since I knew who the baby's father actually was and I was far from having my own stable immediate family like Malcolm, Dewey, Francis, and Reese did.

I could not identify with anyone, whether it was in real life or on television and continued to fantasize about the functional and healthy life I would have, if only I was with my daughter's father. Surely, he was the missing piece of my life. Communicating with him ten hour per day online was not enough. I told myself it was simply the physical intimacy and companionship I was missing. If I was physically with him, I would surely feel that "love" that new mothers have that I read about.

He was that piece. He was the clutch in my manual transmission. It felt like I was revving up my RPMs in first gear. I needed him to give me the power to shift and advance to second, then together could get to third, fourth, and then we could cruise the highway to happy destiny together. That is how we would roll.

My baby did not do much at this point. She was a ball of flesh that ate, slept, wet herself, and cried. That was it. How do people do this? It is a paralyzing amount of work. I believed that I needed her father and I took steps to make that happen.

The Afterbirth

After the nurse staff showed me my daughter, I passed out and woke up in a dimly lit hospital room alone, except for a nurse whose profile glowed with iridescence from the outdated bulky computer screen to which she was glued. I tried to gain her attention, as I felt I was of more importance than keeping up with charts or Facebook or whatever she may have been attending to. Her chair swiveled to meet me, and it's occupant met me with blank eyes. The zombie nurse mechanically removed her wiry fingers from the keyboard and placed them in her lap and rose to greet me, or so I thought.

Without saying a word, she lifted my gown and took her cold, bloodless fingers and pressed against the stiching that held my guts inside. The drugs had worn off and I felt pain once again. Terrified by this wench, I swung with my right, then my left, punching her in the face, twice.

Everyone has heard pregnancy horror stories, and that is not what I want to completely convey.

My daughter was taken to the Intensive Care Nursery as I was introduced to a breast pump, a  deceitfully titled mechanism used to extract breast milk. The movie "Austin Powers" made pumps for body parts seem novel and exciting, however this was neither of those things.

My daughter was not ill, but because of the possible complications of my type 1 diabetes, she was monitored for blood sugar levels and overall stability for two days.

In order to meet her for the first time (while not heavily sedated) I had to mount a wheelchair while remaining attached to a small number of IVs hooked to my arms, the oxygen meter on my finger, and somehow accommodate my laptop computer comfortable set in my lap against my serrated body. Her father sat calmly, watching my every move from his Skype window.

Out of my hospital room it was a right; a long hallway, then a left; another long hallway, a right and another right to get to the elevator. I punched the button much like I had punched the nurse, frustrated and confused. Still wondering if this entire scenario was a strange nightmare of some sort, I got into the elevator alone with my arsenal of supplies.

When I got to the Intensive Care Nursery, the internet on my computer died and I lost contact with her father. It was better off. Babies in Intensive Care Nurseries are indeed intense. He probably couldn't have handled it. These newborns were kept in clear heated boxes which made me feel like I was looking through a microscope, and their fragility, innocence, and strength were all being magnified through the clear looking glass. My child, nameless, new, and novel was in a heated clear box as well.

In the brief seconds after my daughter was born, I had asked my doctors,"Are you sure she's mine?" She was nothing like I expected. However, in the nursery I recognized her immediately. She was bigger than her premie baby-neighbors and had a lot of black hair. Still, I checked with the nurses to make sure the baby was indeed mine. After all, nobody wants to steal mother's baby. Those bitches are crazy.

Wheeling my broken self through the maternity ward where all of the happy parents were giggling and cooing over their new bundles of joy made me quite enraged. Thinking of the raising divorce rates, I cynically congratulated them on their new lives together.

My daughter was novel to me. I was still unsure of how to feel about her. It was now confirmed. None of this experience was a nightmare at all. This was the thing that was growing in my stomach for the past 37 weeks. She was the reason I questioned my values and changed my life. She was the reason I attended an unreasonable amount of doctors appointments weekly since I arrived in the US. I made her. I made a life. That, in itself was an amazing thing.

The giggling parents started to anger me less as I realized that I was only jealous of the relationships they were harboring. I started to use the breast pump less and actually breast fed my baby. I did not feel any maternal connection while doing this, my life did not become complete as some mothers had explained to me. It was simply something I needed to do, like breathing.

But breathing started to become difficult. I felt my lungs shrinking as I hobbled in my wheel chair to and from the IC Nursery. A doctor passed me in the hallway and asked how I was feeling. I said I felt great, I was breast feeding, after all, and she billed that to the insurance company as a consult.

Apparently I had lost gallons of extra blood during the c-section. The blood loss caused my hemoglobin (oxygen levels) to be less than half of what they should have been, but I persisted and spent more and more time with my daughter. On the second night after her delivery, it was decided that I needed a blood transfusion in order to get my hemoglobin up. A blood transfusion does not seem like a big deal, unless you are receiving one. The nurse snuck into my room in the middle of the night with bags of blood from an undisclosed donator, and shot it into my veins.

I felt better, but not much. In the morning, I couldn't breathe and almost died pushing the nurse call button. I almost died. Someone unable to help finally came, and she notified a team of specialists who put me on an oxygen tank and rushed me to an x-ray. I had fluid filling my lungs now. They inserted a long needle between my ribs and pulled out liters of greenish fluid.
Mellow Yellow
-Ish.

My daughter was discharged from the Intensive Care Nursery and she joined me in the Intensive Care Unit for adults. The irony here is apparent. Happy new-mother feelings ebbed and flowed in accordance to my health. I felt a maternal euphoria that was quickly smashed by my inability to breathe or move due to the number of medical devices to which I was attached. Identifying emotions was difficult.

I named my child after about a week of personal debate. I wrote her name on a piece of paper, and sent it to reception. She then became Marla Alejandra. That was it. I just wrote it down with a blue bic pen and she became a little, but very real person.

After three more days in intensive care, I was able to walk without fainting and was discharged from the hospital. My parents (who had been with me throughout most of this process) helped me gather my personal belongings and the baby stuff and the baby. We put her in the car seat and I was afraid she was going to choke. I was afraid of trees, I was afraid of other cars on the road, I was afraid of everything, but for the first time these fears were not for me, they were for my daughter.

I think I began loving her then.

Marla Alejandra and a very tired new mother were on their way home, finally.

My Daughter's Birth

So I finally got into the hospital after dealing with the difficult security guard at the entrance. I walked myself up to the maternity ward with my parents bouncing off the walls like manic marbles tossed against, well; an elongated, sterile, bland hospital hallway. I was probably also quite skiddish, but can't recall vividly. I blame, yet thank the hormones.

I settled into my room as my father pulled out his video camera and started recording the walls and view from the window. Quite displeased, I shouted at him to stop being so annoying. He left the room hurt, and I   would have apologized, but wasn't quite in the mood for it. I continued to not be in the apologetic mood for three days.

"You're almost there!" the nurses would say after shoving something somewhere I hadn't seen in about three months. I wanted to do a natural birth because, quite honestly, I have problems with drugs. They have never served me well.

After the third day and an ungodly amount of contractions, I asked for the epidural. They shoved something inside my spine and it felt as if everything under my belly-button had vanished. It was surreal and terrifying.

The nurse gave me a red button to push that I could hold in the palm of my hand. "Push this button when you're in pain," she said.

 Three days of labor made me ready for lots of button pushing. But I was so exhausted that pushing the button was too much work. Instead I held the button down.

"The machine is calibrated so that it can't overdose you," said the nurse tritely.

Well, I took that challenge and I think I did OD,
but just a little bit
a few times.

So the third night was painful but I was drugged enough not to care. On the fourth morning, a new attending doctor came in and asked me how I was doing. "Well, I have needed to poop for the past three days, but they tell me that is because there is something mechanical inside of me that makes me feel like a doughnut with too much creme inside which surprisingly makes me hungry, because I love doughnuts but, your staff says I can't eat nor drink. So, I guess I am hungry."

"Goodness," she said, looking at my paper charts. She then examined my organic chart and decided that even Alice, after drinking the shrinking potion twice, could not fit through my door. I just wished Alice could be on her way so I could get my Cheshire Cat back.

"Clear an operating room, we need a cesarian here!" she yelled over her shoulder to the lobby. Once again, I lost it. I lost my mind. It didn't matter that I was drugged out of it. I screamed and panicked and and begged them to not slice open my stomach to pull out whatever was growing in there. There is just something a bit too convenient about a C-Section.

My stomach had the outward appearance of a round ripened watermelon and slicing through it just seemed too crude and brutal.
Horrifying.
Just the thought of it brings me to tears, for example right now.

They may have needed to strap my arms and legs to the bed as they rolled me down the hall. If memory serves me correct, there were no straightjackets for pregnant women in the maternity ward so they improvised with gauze. Much after that became a blur.

I woke up under white surgical lights, spread eagle, legs fastened to a table manufactured to deliver babies. Thank you capitalism, I thought to myself. F-you socialism and Venezuela.

 I didn't feel them slice open my stomach. They had a curtain preventing me from being able to see exactly what was happening. I had never been so thirsty in my life. I was probably dehydrated from crying those water-weighted tears and I, once again quite literally, cried for water.

A kind and empathetic nurse gave me an ice cube. I was so thankful until I started literally puking my guts out on the operating table. This operation is complicated, but should not take over 10 minutes, I believe.

It felt like over 10 minutes and I could hear the doctors saying, "Oh, here she comes!" Was I supposed to be excited for this? Did they have any idea the personal hell I had been living through to get this parasite out of my body? These doctors were so excited for my baby that I almost gave her to them.

Then I saw her face. She wasn't the most beautiful thing I had ever seen nor did I love her at first sight. I thought she was a boy because of her swollen baby parts. I thought she had too much hair and looked identical to her father. I was actually disappointed.

My Pregnancy

My pregnancy was not fun. In addition to the emotional distress I had provided myself because of worries about family, friends, ex-boyfriends, and society's expectations, I also had a number of simple medical complications which made it a necessity to visit at least one doctor on a weekly basis in order to ensure a healthy pregnancy.

I made it to my classes at the University of Minnesota every day. I did my homework while speaking to my baby's father over Skype. I woke up and went to sleep with the computer next to me and the video camera rolling. Every moment of my day was followed around by my laptop computer and the live image of my baby's father in the framed video projection. I felt that being able to see the man who made me pregnant and sharing my feelings would make pregnancy easier. This was not the case.

For goodness sakes, he spoke Spanish! My Spanish skills were constantly improving, but there was a point at which I could not use words to convey how I truly felt during such an emotional engagement, especially in a second language.

I graduated from the University in December of 2008. Thank goodness for that. After graduation, however, I found myself isolated with a stomach growing larger and larger with a new parasitic life. When I went in public, people asked me if I was in pain because I appeared so discontent.

I had applied for Travel Visas which would allow the baby's father to leave Venezuela and come to the US to be present for the birth, however the first one was denied because there was a second one pending. I cried. A lot.

More than just crying, I was wailing and could feel the walls around me shaking and bearing down on me as I laid on the floor in a puddle of water-weighted tears. It was January and I wished for death, but felt conflicted because the baby was due to be born in March. I could not take my life for her sake. There seemed to be no way to get the father of my child to the US to be present for the end of our sexual experience together (the end result of sex is reproduction).

The second Visa I had applied for was a Fiancee Visa which would allow the father to come to the US for three months, when we would get married or he'd be deported. Although I wasn't sure about the whole marriage and husband situation, I figured it was our best option. I wanted him to help with our baby and be a part of her life as soon as she was born. I wanted to make our little family work...and I was willing to sacrifice anything to make it work.

I thought I had made it clear that this Fiancee Visa was one of convenience, much like couples who wed for tax breaks and such things. I told him I would try to love him. If I put in the footwork and wore the hats, if I said "I love you" enough while filing the proper paperwork and fees, I would surely grow to love him. I could create a normal happy family.

The Visa process is not easy. "Hurry up and wait" is the best way to think about it. "Hurry up and wait a long, long time." Some countries have easy access to the US. A visa to visit or vacation is permitted automatically. Venezuela is not one of those countries.

My water broke in the middle of the night on February 16, 2009.

Hilarious side-note here: Apparently women get this "nesting" instinct when they are about to deliver where they want to clean and make things cute. That did not happen to me. I watched YouTube videos and called the mechanical dudes that I knew trying to figure out how to repair the dents of my car with Bond-O.

My parents took me to the hospital in the middle of a quiet blizzard. My stomach was not as big as other pregnant women I knew and the security guard apparently didn't realize that I was in labor. She refused to let me in the hospital gates, asking me,

"What is your name? Who are you here to see?"

I responded "Sarah, Please let me in."

She looked for my name in the computer. "I'm sorry ma'am," she said sternly. "There is nobody listed under that name in the hospital now."

Confused, I said, "...but I am here!"

"No ma'am, Sarah is not in the maternity ward."

"But I am here. I need to go into the hospital."

"Why do you need to go in there?" she asked with suspicion.

"Because I am having a baby." I said, half laughing at the irony.

"No ma'am, Sarah may have been here, but she ain't here anymore."

Shit. Really?

So that is how the birth of my daughter started. Eventually I got into the maternity ward, but the security officer almost called back-ups to get me out. It didn't get any better.

Welcome-Get to know me, quick!

My name is Sarah and I am a single mother. I am so grateful for the love and support my family and friends have provided me and my infant daughter in order to make parenting a positive experience. The purpose of this "blog" is to share my experience, struggles, and victories as a single mother. I am working on creating an actual location where people with similar experiences can gather to share their common stories and helpful resources.

Please read the blog entries in chronological order.

I arrived in Venezuela on January 20th, 2006 and hardly spoke a word of Spanish. My host family kept saying "pero" and I got really excited. I knew "perro" meant "dog" and there seemed to be an excessive amount of random dogs running around in the street, so I just assumed that everyone was taking about their fascination with dogs.

Great, I thought, I have a dog too! "Tengo perro!" I would say as I smiled triumphantly. Just one day in a foreign land, and I was already getting along with the natives. That is how great I thought I was.

Turns out, the spanish word "pero" simply means "but" or "although" and I just made an ass out of myself.

By the beginning of March of 2006, my self-driven ego had already purchased a Chinese motorcycle; a 200cc Bera BRX,  gotten into one terrifying accident with a Land Rover (and many police confrontations), started a money laundering business which kept my finances stable, and turned the heads of the entire pueblo. I had things made, so I guess that a man was the next thing on my to-do list.

I met a young man in March, after a little over a month in Venezuela. I took him all around the countryside on my motorcycle, and he helped translate and explain my surroundings (turns out, the signs that said "CURVAS PELIGRAS" on the mountain roads I frequented meant "DANGEROUS CURVES"). It was very a convenient relationship.

We decided to go to the beach, so after a ten hour bus ride, we transfered to another bus which brought us up and down a mountain in about an hour through Henri Pittier National Park.

Side note: Have you ever had a feeling of panic that stopped your heart but nobody else seemed to notice? Once when I was a teenager, I was riding as a passenger while the driver drove through a red light in a busy intersection. I was terrified, but she never knew our near death experience ever happened.

Once on an airplane it appeared that there was another airplane hovering next to my window. Surely, the flight staff was not notifying the passengers to avoid panic. I thought I should tell another passenger, so we could share our last moments of life together. Turned out, I was fatigued from hours of flying and not seeing nor comprehending anything. It was simply a strange reflection in my window.

The bus ride through Henri Pittier National Park is like that but the danger is real. The road up the mountain is a little wider than one lane for both directions of traffic and all turns, none of them greater than 90 degrees, are taken without a reduction in velocity. Busses usually have to stop halfway through to replace faulty mechanical parts, or to allow passengers to vomit out windows and nobody is ever sure if there is a fallen tree or landslide around the next curva peligrosa. People die. Seriously.

So finally this young man and I made it to Choroni Beach. We settled into our hotel room and I took a deep breath and thanked God for listening to every one of my prayers to keep me and the other  bus passengers alive. We had a couple of hard lemonades, some delicious pizza, and went to the beach. It was beautiful and so romantic. We conceived my daughter that evening.

I knew something was not right with me immediately. My skin (which is usually that of a 17-year old with subsiding acne) became that of a greasy hormonal 13-year old. My breasts (which have always been those of a 13-year olds') began to hurt.

I went to the doctor, the spanish speaking gynecologist and she said some things to me, and what I understood was that I had a false pregnancy because it is difficult for an individual with type 1 diabetes to conceive. I remember her laughing at my situation and saying "Las gringas siempre piensen que ellas son embarazadas" which means "Crazy americans always think they are pregnant."

Well doctora, laugh it up. I was right. I was pregnant.

Abortion is not something I could do. End of story. I was 26 years old, in a third world country where abortion was not permitted and without typical medical treatment. I drank herbal teas known by the natives to end weak pregnancies yet not cause problems if the pregnancy came to term. I treated my body poorly. My diabetes was acting up as well. Turns out, having a baby living inside your stomach makes insulin dependance more difficult to control. I figured it out though.

I was concerned about myself first. Where would I live when I returned to the US? What kind of story would I tell? How did I get pregnant? How did all of this happen? I had quit my job and had another semester of school to finish before I graduated. I had lost my apartment as well. Technically, I was homeless.

My family's reaction to the news really frightened me. What would they think? I was especially petrified of what my father's reaction would be. In addition, it was May and my sister was getting married in September. As the Maid of Honor, I did not want my unplanned pregnancy to divert attention from my beautiful sister's wedding day!

My third realm of concern was that of the Venezuelan family that I had just inherited by default. Would I keep the baby's father in my life? Could we really work as a healthy and functioning family with language barriers and cultural differences? I decided to try in the interest of my unborn child.

Sometimes I would worry about the little fetus growing in my belly, but honestly, it was the least of my concerns. Overall, I have always been a pretty healthy woman with a good diet and an acceptable amount of physical activity and exercise. I have always been a little neurotic at times, but who isn't?

I told my mother first. I called her from a phone booth while I was in Venezuela. She took the news well. I voiced my concerns about my school, money, and living situations. "We've been through worse," she said.

I came home to live with my parents in August of 2008 and I was still not looking very pregnant but my scale told me otherwise. I spent a lot of time finishing up my school. I did some work building and tearing down stages for acts like Aerosmith and Brittney which afforded me a couple of luxuries once in a while. I also had student loans that helped me out financially. My baby's father and I spoke in Skype daily.

My grandfather had not been well for a long time, and died while my mother and I were in his company. My sister got married two days later at a beautiful wedding, and somehow between these two overwhelming family events I managed to disclose that I was pregnant to each of my three siblings and other close family members. The magnitude of the events taking place around us really helped me realize that life is not only about me and the baby living in my stomach. Grandpa always said things happen in threes: a death, a wedding, and news of a birth!