Baby Bonner: Online Feb 2010

I never thought that I would ever be writing these words, “I’m pregnant.” Yep, Sean Bonner and I are going to have a baby. I wrote a post awhile ago explaining that I have advanced ovarian endometriosis in addition to hypothyroidism and I was told by two different doctors that specialize in fertility that I had about a 1% chance of conceiving naturally. I guess I should have gone for that third opinion because they were both wrong (note to self, contact them and let them know the good news).

As per my post I did make some health changes.  I ate vegan for a little while, but found it too challenging, so I essentially am vegetarian but will indulge in seafood now and again.  I stopped eating dairy for the most part and started drinking rice and almond milk instead.  I upped my veggie and fruit consumption and of course don’t eat meat.  I don’t know if it made any difference or if it was Sean’s Superman Sperm, but we bucked the odds.  I still have endometriosis, but I am told that it might retreat during the course of my pregnancy.

Finding out I was pregnant was a MAJOR shock to both of us.  I had been feeling really crummy and attributed it to my endometriosis and made an appointment to see the doctor.  It was a couple of days before I went to see him that I took the pregnancy test and it was positive.  I started laughing because it was just too unbelievable to me.

Sean and I talked about kids in the sense that one day if we both wanted them we would look at adoption, but it was a very infrequent conversation. Neither one of us goes gaga for kids and I don’t have a ticking clock going off.  In fact, we had just started discussing a year long trip around the world. Getting pregnant was not something we planned or even thought we could plan.  All I wanted from trying to beat my endo was to not be in so much pain and to take back the choice to have kids so that if I decided to, I could.

Despite our apprehension with the situation, we went to the OB-GYN and sure enough, there was the little blob with the flicking heartbeat.  I’m put in the “high risk” category because I turn 35 in November but we just finished some screening tests and the doc said the baby looks healthy.  I decided to let people know after this doctor visit because let me tell you, keeping this secret at work when you are sick and tired is the hardest thing I have ever done.  I am so thankful to my boss whose wife is pregnant because I finally broke down and told him and he immediately started giving me info on doulas (I heart you Bob Moz!).

I am also very thankful to the people who have been supportive of me and it’s nice to know I have friends that are also pregnant or recently gave birth so I can inundate them with questions and be part of another club.  Of course I am the most thankful to my dude Sean who is very supportive despite being incredibly freaked out.  Didn’t we just get married?

So ya, I’m pregnant, and I’m super scared and nervous but I also have little moments of excitement.  I mean, who wouldn’t want Sean Bonner to be the father to their kid?  He’s badass, adventurous, loves cute things, has a bunch of rad toys, and is pretty dang smart.  I know everyone thinks that their baby is a miracle, but I honestly really think that.  The baby is due on Sean’s birthday in late February and in the Year of the Tiger which is the same as my Chinese Zodiac.  I think that just puts a cherry on top.

Filed under: life, pregnancy , holy shit

Twitter is Greater Than YOU

I recently tweeted “I have thought long and hard, and decided to stop following ppl that have no causes other than their own. I’m sorry.“ and once again, 140 characters doesn’t explain properly what my message is.  It’s pretty simple really.  We all know by now that Twitter is an amazing way to get your message across to many people in a short amount of time.  What I am hopeful for, and asking you to think about, is not just using it to satisfy your own ego.

I have checked most of the Twitter pages of the people I follow and was pretty sad to see that some are just tweeting to get followers and as many replies as possible and replying back to people that reply to them about whatever self-marketing they are spewing.  If all you care about is getting fav’rd then that’s concerning to me.  It is also very heart-breaking to me that many of these people are my personal friends and I know they aren’t heartless, so I hope this makes them think at least for a second about changing their tweeting ways. Take a minute to read your last 10 tweets and ask yourself what their purpose is and if a single one helps someone other than yourself.

It is effortless to take advantage of this amazing platform to help your fellow man, woman, child, animal, insect whatever.  It doesn’t have to be for something great like saving the world from deadly disease, it can be as simple as trying to help someone get a job, finding a lost pet its way home, letting others know about an issue in your neighborhood.

I am fully aware that we all use Twitter in different ways, I’m just saying that if you don’t use it on occasion to help someone or something other than yourself, then it makes me think you are using Twitter as a marketing tool and I really have no interest in continuing to allow you to indulge on my time.

Lastly, just because I unfollow, doesn’t mean that I don’t consider you my friend, just means that I have a different view point than you on how you are utilizing Twitter.  We can exchange phone numbers if we need to text each other.

Clear now?

Namaste.

Filed under: life, twitter

Manners #1: Be a good houseguest and host

I complain about a core group of things that irk me and I figured that I would write about them in attempt to let the bad vibes out and to hopefully give and learn some tips on manners.  To be clear, I’m not saying that I have good manners, and I’m not saying I don’t do things that annoy people, I’m just pointing out the things that piss me off.

The first on my list is overnight guests.  There are some key elements to being a good guest and there are definitely some key elements to being a guest that never gets invited back. On the flip side, I am also attempting to be a better host, so I am exploring what I can do better to have a pleasant experience with house guests as opposed to counting down the minutes until they depart.  Let me know if you agree, don’t agree, have additional suggestions.

Some things that make a good houseguest:
- Be very clear about arrival and departure times
- Ensure that the length of stay is appropriate for the familiarity you have with the hosts
- Do not expect the hosts to be travel guides or entertainment for your entire stay, take the initiative to plan activities.
- Offer to pay for at least one breakfast/lunch/dinner or make one of those meals.  It can be expensive to host someone, extra food, water electricity, etc.  Think about how much you would be paying for a hotel.
- Clean up after yourself and participate in keeping the house tidy, and don’t expect your hosts to be your cleaning service.  If you want that, get a hotel. Don’t leave garbage behind. Leave the area that you slept in tidy. Clean sheets or at the very least fold them.

Some things that make a good host:
- Have a house policy with a clear definition of a guest. This way there is no passive aggressive behavior when they don’t clean their own sheets or help load the dishwasher.
- Know your limits.  As Miss Manners states “never issue an invitation that you do not want to issue.” If you need a lot of space, then limit the amount of time a guest can stay.  For me, I have an extra room that is used as an office, and if a guest stays more than a weekend, I lose access to it and it starts to really bother me.
- Do not propose an open-ended visit.  Be clear about the length of stay and don’t let it go over.
- If a guest asks to stay longer and you don’t feel comfortable, you should talk to them about it and work with them on alternative accommodations.
- Be clear on how much time you can spend with your guests. Something I disagree on with Miss Manners is that a host needs to include a guest in all of their social activities.  I agree if their stay is for a weekend, but if it is an extended stay, I don’t think this should be necessary.  What is necessary is being very clear upfront if you are working and can’t vacation at the same time as your houseguests so they know if they are on their own.

Filed under: life, manners , host, houseguest, manners

My Mum’s response to Cat Workout on CNN…

My Mum sent me an email in response to the article I sent her:

Furry Pals Can Be Partners in Fitness
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/06/05/fat.cats.owners.exercise/index.html

Well, I’ve told everyone I know about my infamous daughter Cat Flexing.
It is amazing what kind of responses I get.
Some stare at me as if catatonic.
Some give me a pitying/ catastrophic kind of look.
Others act like I … or YOU are clearly from CatMandoo – or otherwise
“out there”/
Some are even a bit catty about the whole thing.
The more optimistic and health focussed individuals think this type of
exercise program might cat…ch on .
Some have asked for a catalogue of cat flexing exercises.
Despondent types think this type of thing might be cathartic. (None of my
Catholic friends, though).
The global concerned types are worried the trend might result in a
cataclysm of cats.
I wouldn’t cater to that kind of thinking if I were you, though. But if
it happened, I am sure you would open a cattery.

I have to say, however, that the funniest cat flexer is Sean. He was a
little catawampus, if you ask me, and almost reminded me of a cateran.
Nearly put me into cataplexy.

Filed under: life , catworkout, cnn

Can serious classes be fun?

At this very second I’m attending my second CERT class in Silverlake. I decided to attend because I want to be able to take care of myself and the people and critters I love when disaster happens.

The class instructor is a fireman who has been on the force for 15+ years. He is a very nice guy and has a ton of patience and experience. The problem is that I am bored to tears.

I realize this class is free and important but dry material is covered, but there has to be a way to make it more interesting. It is even more difficult to concentrate because the class is after work and held in a stuffy church room.

I don’t have any good ideas on how to make it more interesting other than perhaps making it more hands on as opposed to reading from slides. The class Sean took – Urban Escape and Evasion was all hands on and you were forced to learn skills and then utilize them. For me personally, I prefer a demonstration and then try to practice the same skill. There must be classes where they can mimic fires, tsunamis, earthquakes, etc. and you have to try and stay alive. That would definitely keep me engaged.

Alas, that is not this class so I’m going to post this and then put my head back down on the table until Sean wakes me up so we can go home.

Namaste

Filed under: life , CERT, class

Help me Coachoose

I have been trying to coachoose wisely for Coachella 2009, but there are some open slots where I don’t know the band or just can’t make up my mind between all the great tuneage!! Check out what I have and share your advice! Also, if you think I have coachoosen poorly, bring it!

Pink square = definitely! want!
Green circle = maybe, waffling, I dunno
Pink square and Green circle = really want to see the one in the pink but conflicted because of the green
Blank = halp! no freaking idea

Filed under: music , advice, coachella, coachella2009, help, music

Knighting myself “West Coast Girl”

One week tomorrow I’ll be driving from San Francisco to Venice Beach in a truck with my stuff. This will mark the fourth city that I have lived in on the left coast – Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco, and now Venice (LA). I don’t know how many others can claim that, certainly no one that I know. So, I have decided to give myself the title “West Coast Girl” and see if anyone else tries to claim it.

It’s really kind of crazy, I mean I just moved back to San Francisco in August after four years away in Seattle. I was so so happy to be back and absolutely adore the Mission where I live. That being said, there is a cheesy saying “home is where the heart is” and someone named Sean Bonner has claimed it over San Francisco.

After mulling it over and me spending more time in LA, we decided to make Venice our home – and by home I mean this is the first time that we will be living together officially. We got married Oct. 31st, 2008 and still haven’t moved in together. Sean is leaving his beloved eastside but as he has mentioned the air there is killing him and being closer to the airport will make things more convenient for him. Plus there is a badass new Intelligentsia opening up in Venice and he is super psyched about that.

I’m super excited to make my dream of living at the beach come true, still be able to ride my bike to work, and be closer to the airport. I have also made some new friends in LA who I am really excited to hang out with and make brunch for and I’ll never complain about more sunshine.

The good news is that I will be back up in SF once or twice a month to work out of the Topspin San Francisco office and my lovely Angela is letting me crash with her in the Mission. I feel so so fortunate to have my cake and eat it too.

I hope that my friends on the west coast and around the world come and visit me and Sean and Funston and LuckyCat. We have a lovely guestroom and spare bikes.

The adventure continues…

Namaste

Filed under: life , "helllooooo beach", "see ya", "west coast girl", Moving, venice

I’m gonna get you endo!

Recently I wrote a post on “7 things you probably didn’t know about me.“  I didn’t add everything (gosh, I hope not, how boring) but one thing that I wanted to add but didn’t was that I have endometriosis.  It’s not like I am the only one with it, around 90 million women globally will be affected in their lifetime, and certainly don’t feel sorry for myself, but it has had a major impact on my life.

I have had pretty painful menstrual cramps since puberty, and was tested for endometriosis years ago, but it wasn’t until last year that I was actually diagnosed with it.  When the specialist showed me on the ultrasound that I had it, and that it was very advanced, I didn’t really understand the gravity of it until he added that it makes me infertile and I couldn’t have children without IVF treatments.

I am in my early thirties, and like most women my age I am thinking about children. I started researching IVF and talking to people that have gone through with it and I just can’t imagine doing it.  Not only is it extremely expensive, its painful, lengthy and its not 100% guaranteed.

With this realization, I started talking to my friend Angela and she mentioned that there could be a natural way to combat my condition.  I do have some friends that have battled unexplained infertility naturally with acupuncture, uterine massage, etc. and so I figured knowing what my problem is could be half the battle.  Angela and I researched some mega vitamin and herb dosing which seemed pretty intense…100,000 UI of Vitamin D? I can’t even find a bottle that includes 10,000.

I did some more research and the easiest, healthiest and most consistent path that I have found is diet.  Interestingly enough, the diet is basically vegan with a twist, no wheat and a reduction in soy.  Luckily for me, my husband Sean is vegan and so I will have a coach. I am definitely freaked out that I am going to go crazy with a lack of food choices and that my friends will never want to eat with me again. It is going to be really really hard for me to give up dairy and milk chocolate anything…so I am easing in…but hopefully it will be worth it.

My goal is to combat my endometriosis in one year.  I am going to go to the doctor and get a baseline on my condition and go from there.  Even if I am never able to have children (yes, we can adopt, or have a million pets, etc.) I really want to see how a change in lifestyle can combat a condition. Au naturale over western medicine.

Would really really like to know that I’m not alone amongst my friends and I can use any support and advice that I can get.

Namaste

Filed under: life , diet, endometriosis, infertility, vegan

7 Things You Probably Didn’t Know About Me

The rules:

1. Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
2. Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
3. Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they’ve been tagged.

I was tagged by Sean Bonner

Usually I am a meme hater, but I was going to write a blog post anyway so what the heck.

1.  I am a commitment phobe.  I have never lived in one house for longer than 2 years since I was 21.  I have owned 3 houses within the span of 4 years.  Even now I am looking to find a new place to live.  It’s exhausting and I’m getting too old for this.

• 1995 – moved out of my Dad’s place to boyfriend’s place in Burnaby (Vancouver)
• 1996 – moved to Springer Street in Burnaby (Vancouver)
• 1997 – moved to Kitsilano on Balsam (Vancouver)
• 1998 – moved to 6th street (Vancouver)
• 1999 – moved to 12th street (Vancouver)
• 2000 – moved to Sunnyvale in corp. housing (Bay Area)
• 2001 – moved into apt on Evelyn in Sunnyvale (Bay Area)
• 2002 – moved to apt in the Haight (San Francisco)
• 2003 - bought a loft in Potrero Hill (San Francisco)
• 2004 -  bought a 12 acre farm in Carnation (Seattle)
• 2005 -bought a house in Wallingford (Seattle)
• 2008-moved to the Mission District (San Francisco)

Where’s next? I don’t know, but I really want it to be somewhere that I stay long enough to get some dust on the furniture.

2.  The most epic of epic parties that I ever threw was when I was 15.  My Dad and Step-mum left for a vacation in Mexico.  His secretary was in charge of  me and my 3 younger brothers because he didn’t trust me.  I decided that I wanted to have a party so I could meet some boys.  I started telling friends about the party and before I knew it, it was announced on two radio stations in Vancouver.  I told the babysitter and she decided to just roll with it, so we packed up all the crystal and valuables and stored them away.  We shipped my brothers off to friends houses.  We had bouncers. We had booze. A few hundred people showed up. People were everywhere including the hottub and the pool.  I found the babysitter having in my parent’s bed having an orgy. The cops came and people cleared out but once the police left people started coming out from their hiding places and the party continued.  The following day things were missing like the stereo speakers, home phone, some of my dad’s rare liquor bottles.  There was nothing I could do about it so the party continued for a few more days.  When my parents got home I was grounded for at least a month.  At the time I regretted it, but 20 years later people still bring up that party and how amazing it was.

3.  I learned to drive when I was around 14 or 15.  Me and my friend Patrick would steal my step-mom’s mini-van late at night and drive around.  She would always wonder why the gas gauge was low and I would blame it on a neighbor kid with a motorcycle and tell her I heard he was syphoning gas.  I think my Dad was onto me because he put bars on the windows to my room…my room was in the basement and I would sneak out every night to go party in “the back 40″ with friends.

4.  For as long as I can remember I have wanted to write movie scripts. I went to the Vancouver Film School for scriptwriting classes and even started writing some but never finished.  I have fantasies of being at the Oscars and doing my acceptance speech for some sci-fi movie that I wrote.  They are all sci-fi related by the way and in space. And aliens of some sort are always in the picture.

5.  When I was going to B.C.I.T. a guy caught my eye. He drove a blue Toyota 4Runner when they were super cool and he played hockey.  I decided that I just had to have him.  I was The Province’s “Smile of The Day” and totally made most of the answers up to match his attributes…like I said I liked “sockeye salmon” because that was the name of his hockey team and I said I was born in Michigan because he used to wear a Michigan sweatshirt.  I made friends with one of his friends who I found out liked my friend Jennifer.  I made him a deal with him that if he brought Drazen to a club outting then I would bring Jenn. The whole thing was a success and we started dating but once I achieved my goal I quickly became bored of him and dumped him for someone else.  Winning is bittersweet.

6.  I am copy and pasting this one from Joi Ito because I couldn’t have written it any better: I’ve always wanted to sing but I suck at singing. My mother is was good at singing and many people in my extended family are professional musicians. I flunked the choir entrance test in Jr. High School and always embarrass myself at karaoke when I’m forced to sing. I hate that I suck at singing. My father can’t sing so I blame him.

7.  When I was 24 I was “discovered” by a modeling agency and started to model.  I was constantly being asked to diet and they would lay out my meal plan and tell me I had to lose weight even though at 5′8″ I weighed 115 pounds.  I gain weight just by looking at chocolate and that was one vice I refused to give up.  I told them they could stick their meal plan and their naturally skinny models where the sun don’t shine and that I was going to go do something that required brain power.

That’s it. This was easier than I thought. I have a bunch more but I know these kinds of memes come around quite often so I’ll leave it at that.

I’m tagging Daisy Barringer, Angela Baxley, Dan Dofter, Alix Han,  Jay Hathaway,  Cindy Li, Ian Rogers

Filed under: life , 7 things, me, meme

Save the Sea Kittens!

Peta announced a new campaign to rename fish to “sea kittens.” The idea is that people wouldn’t want to eat them if they had a cuter name. I asked my fellow tweeters the following:

“Dear fellow Pescetarians, would you stop eating fish if they were called “sea kittens?” @officialpeta’s new campaign. http://bit.ly/hyVw“

This started a flurry of responses:

>> bronwynlewis: @tara “every time you order sushi, god kills a sea kitten”?

>> bronwynlewis: instead of ordering sushi now, i’m going to order “raw sea kitten”

>> jpdefillippo: @tara I’m going to stop eating the poor sea kittens. Furthermore, to save the animals I’ll just eat the humans. 1 PETA pita please.

>> seanbonner: @tara won’t someone please think of the sea kittens and their poor, wet fur.

>> MackReed: Because “Sea Kittens” are tasty

I had sushi the other day and I didn’t think once about the yummy fish I was eating as “sea kittens,” so the campaign hasn’t affected me. It has however provided me with entertainment such as this game by Peta where you can dress up your own “sea kitten!”

Here’s mine:

Create Your Own Sea Kitten at peta.org!

Filed under: life, twitter , "sea kittens", peta