My mother is crazy.
Not that this should surprise anyone, as most moms are just inherently crazy. She just happens to be crazy in the most unconventional ways. Or rather, she’s crazy in the Asian way. You know, the way where she withholds information until the very end, like it’s a bribe. Or her only way of getting you to call her (which btw, not only do I call her once a week, I tend to see her once a week too, so I don’t understand this craziness.)
For instance, after MONTHS of me asking her about her labor and her telling me she doesn’t remember, which initially didn’t surprise me, she suddenly “remembers” it. Like it was yesterday. The pain. The pushing. The “I think it was definitely under 8 hours” timing. The pain. The screaming that I will most likely do– “I hate you! This is all your fault!” The pain. The being in a hospital and having no idea what was going on. The pain. She then told me that I was going to suffer and suck it up and oh, it was only about maybe definitely I think less than 8 hours of EXCRUTIATING pain and that I was doing it for my baby, for the family, for the homeland. That she was so glad that I was having a child so that she could laugh at me.
Thanks. Thanks a lot Mom.
Then she proceeds to elaborate on breastfeeding, which has been a mystery for me because she had been telling me for the past few months that breastfeeding for her was a tempermental thing. That she wasn’t able to breastfeed after awhile. So I was doing a lot of reading on what supplements to take to encourage breastfeeding for the past few months, fearful that I would have giant boobs without any functionality. I definitely don’t have to worry anymore because she had NO PROBLEM making the milk, until she stopped breastfeeding to go back to work 4 weeks after giving birth. (You think maternity leave in the US is bad, China and Taiwan are MUCH worse.) So I have a fairly good chance of having no problem with breastfeeding provided I don’t return to work (which I won’t be working full time yet.)
And get this: her pregnancy, much like mine, was uneventful. She ate a lot, got fat, and felt fine. She was really happy to see that I was walking around and not feeling much different (except for BO, darkening, and mammoth exhaustion).
Ugh. The things you find out later.
She did give me a random suggestion– to get two bathtubs. One for the dirty water and once for the clean water. Now where the hell am I going to put two bathtubs in my 2 bedroom 1 bath rowhome? Hrm?
