Perhaps I need some retail therapy to help me recover from my retail therapy

I bought a car seat yesterday.

That may not seem like a big deal. Today it doesn't even seem like a big deal to me.* But yesterday as my mouse hovered over the button to submit my order, I worried: What if it wasn't the right car seat? What if buying the car seat now jinxes things? Then: What if the baby comes early** and I don't have a car seat? CLICK.

Hi, my name is Elizabeth and I am experiencing pregnancy-induced insanity.

I am finding that I am a strange mix of ready and not ready to have a baby. In spite of all the aches and pains I've complained of over the past seven months, I think this has been a pretty easy pregnancy, and I've truly enjoyed being pregnant. As recently as a few weeks ago I was saying to someone that I wouldn't mind being pregnant forever: I love my round belly; my skin is clearer than it has been in years; when the baby moves, it's like she and I have our own secret; everyone is nice to me; and I nearly always get a seat on the Metro. What's not to love? (I mean, besides the sciatica, the waking up to go to the bathroom every 3 hours, no wine with dinner, the fetal foot wedged uncomfortably against my liver***...) Over the past week or so, though, I've felt that begin to change. I still love being pregnant, but I no longer want to be this way forever. I want to meet this little girl. I'm ready to me a mom.

Except, oh. my. god. Me? A mom? What the hell was I thinking?

So in an attempt to control the uncontrollable, I am spending money (carseat, bassinet, wee clothing) and scheduling things (hospital tour, infant cpr class, breastfeeding class,**** the cat's checkup so I can talk to the vet about helping her adjust to the baby). I suppose it's a kind of "retail therapy." I have no idea whether any of these things will help. Well, I expect the things I'm buying will, as I'm told that I can't bring Sticky home without a carseat, and letting her go around in just a diaper in December and January would probably be frowned upon. I think all the classes are just the Type A side of my personality coming out. All of these things are things I planned to do awhile back, things that I've been researching for months. But now that it's time to put those plans into action, I'm suddenly anxious. Planning I like; decisions are still scary.

All I can say is that it's a good thing the baby will come when she's ready. If we had to wait for me to make up my mind, we'd all be in trouble.


*Okay, I might be lying about that a little. I still think it's a big deal. It's just that I've managed to lower my freak-out level to something more manageable.

**By the end of the week I will be 50 days from my due date. Not that I'm counting or anything. Or expecting her to show up promptly.

***Actually, that foot there is probably one of my favorite bits of this whole thing. The whole pregnancy thing, I mean. Not of the baby. I don't have any sort of weird attachments to particular parts of the baby. Although I would like her to have all of the required parts. Not that Sticky's feet aren't wonderful; I saw them in August on the ultrasound. Very wee and perfect.

****Dude, did you know there were entire classes on how to breastfeed? Or that anyone needed such a thing?