People often glow about their second trimester—they feel good, they have more energy, and they finally look pregnant instead of 4pm Thanksgiving Day.
I prefer the 35th trimester.
My children are now 4 and 7, meaning mostly potty-trained and not in constant danger of death-by-inconsequential-household-everything. If something hurts they can tell me, and the loss of screen time or threat of time-out can keep their uglier behaviors at bay. Or at least in the harbor. Okay, only in the bathtub and only if you exclude “keep your body to yourself” from the definition of uglier behavior.
Parenting gets easier by the 35th trimester. Not only do you get to sleep through more nights, but your kids become more self-sufficient. My four-year-old might wear his clothes backward and his shoes on the wrong feet, but By God he dresses himself.
Suddenly my cat looks cute again instead of like a furry vomiting ball of demands. Same with my husband. Both startle less reflexively at my presence—not just because I appear bathed and put together more often, but also because of a significant reduction in my stomping and screaming silent curses.
In the 35th trimester more of our needs get met more of the time.
**segue**
Remember your first ballet class? Instead of prancing around in a tutu like you imagined, you stood at a barre in pre-spandex exfoliating tights doing 300 tendus? Remember staring at the crocheted bun-warmer in front of you? I fantasized about the day my Dorothy Hamil would finally grow out ,and I could wear a bun-warmer instead of 71 bobby pins to keep the hair out of my face.
Sweet Dreams are made of this..
For the last ten minutes of class you finally got to leap over the pond, princess twirl and fairy curtsy before heading back into the tiny dressing room filled with terrifying big-girl parts and complicated leotard removal.
In child-rearing ballet, the second trimester is picking out pristine toe shoes you won’t wear for five years, raising babies and toddlers is the barre work OVER AND OVER AND OVER, and finally leaping over the pond fairy-princess style is the 35th Trimester.
The tiny terrifying dressing room? Adolescence, I presume.
We’ve plie’d through late night crying jags, rond-de-jambe’d hundreds of diapers on tiny butts. We degaje’d through sleeptraining, battement’ed potty training in the behind, and pirouetted all the while counting 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3 MAGIC!
Now—finally now—we get to dance a little. Every single day might not feel like The Nutcracker, but considering how my boys wake up my husband most mornings, the name still fits. Things feel lighter and happier, and we’re less likely to gash our feet on the thick layer of metaphorical eggshells that used to carpet our floor.
For a few years dancing seemed inconceivable. We couldn’t hear the music—only the metronome of no time for ourselves, like Debbie Allen slamming her cane in the beginning of each FAME episode “You want fame kids? Well, fame kids cost, and right here’s where you start paying.” We began to wonder if we liked the same music anymore, when we could abandon the barre for a bar, and if we’d ever dance again.
Thank God we got through it.
We no longer worry about forgetting the steps and fret less over our technique. Sure my toes resemble bloody stumps from years of point shoes, from a partner who leans left when I lean right, and from these little Barishnykovs I try to keep up with, but dancing is work after all.
And before we know it we’ll have to enter that scary dressing room of adolescence, and I am not prepared to pas-de-deux with dirty athletic supporters just yet.
About Ann Imig
Just wait, it gets even better UNTIL, in ballet terms, you throw your leg up and realize you can’t even extend it to the bar anymore…you’re too damn old. That’s what trimester I’m in…
Just saying
Twitter Name: allfookeduptoo
I couldn’t even touch my toes as a baby, Lynn.
I love this.
Unfortunately, I still have a ways to go before I hit my 35th trimester.
Good thing you’re a marathon runner!
Twitter Name: annsrants
Oh, my God….did I need this today!
Thank you. Seriously, thank you. Just knowing there will be different days ahead helps me keep moving forward. I’m so tired! : )
Twitter Name: aregas
And your comment just helped keep me moving forward. Thank YOU.
Twitter Name: annsrants
Light… at… the… kind … of … end of the tunnel. THANK you for reminding me of this.
Twitter Name: Faiqa
Now if I could just get rid of the pee smell..
Twitter Name: annsrants
Thank you for this. I’m in full on barre mode right now and I need some reassurance.
((crocheting you a rainbow bunwarmer)) xo
Twitter Name: annsrants
I’m in about the 30th trimester… getting there!
Twitter Name: robinobryant
Did that take you as long to calculate as it took me?
Twitter Name: annsrants
I keep getting close to the 35th trimester, and then keep getting knocked up, I mean knocked down to the 1st trimester again :) BUT, this one (i think) is the last. And then, AND THEN, I can rest. Or jump over ponds and stuff. YAY!
Please no pond-jumping until you deliver. ;)
Twitter Name: annsrants
Thank you for the reminder – Debbie Allen’s been screaming at me for days. I will sleep and it will get better.
It all comes down to sleep. It really does.
Twitter Name: annsrants
Parenting has been way harder than anticipated. When my son was an infant, we’d say, “I can’t wait for him to be old enough to sit up and crawl.” And then it was, “can’t wait for him to be able to walk” and then “can’t wait to get rid of these diapers” and “can’t wait for him to start preschool.” You get the idea. the 35th trimester sounds real nice.
Pumpkin breakfast bars sounds real nice too! Hope you brought enough for everyone.
Twitter Name: annsrants
oh man – I am currently smashing my head into the barre and I was wondering if it was EVER going to get better. hmn. Apparently, it is. Hallelujia. THANK YOU!
No heads on the barre! Debbie Allen will start yelling at you!! ((Breathe.))
Twitter Name: annsrants
We are SOOO close I can taste it- one still in diapers, but currently, he only tries to kill himself once or twice a day, rather than all day long.
Great one, Ann.
Twitter Name: Flammang Audra
Better him than you. xo!
Er..wait.
Twitter Name: annsrants
i totally almost had this. And then I had twins. But someday I’ll have it again. Love you ann. This is fabulous. Only you would think of the 35th trimester.
So true, Ann, so true!
My daughter is a pre-teen…
I should start watching “The Turning Point” now
I think I am approaching my 1000th trimester. Life is good. But my cats still vomit. And I also loved ballet class, but I was “asked to go on permanent sabbatical” due to my excessive height and shoe size. I like to think that the ballet teacher just hated my mother, and used this as a way to get back at her…molly
I am too tired to figure out what trimester I am in.
Teens do that to you.
NutCracker.
Great.
Loved it!
Twitter Name: RottenMom
“considering how my boys wake up my husband most mornings, the name still fits.”
(Awesome.)
I can see you dancing from here, Ann. Here’s me throwing roses at your feet. :)
(Thanks for keeping us all smiling.)
Twitter Name: claritychaos
Your blog is very out of the oirrnady. I am loving all of the in a row you are sharing with each one!
Twitter Name: hqxdYzEHpjXXeAEQ
I never had kids because I was so terrified of birthing someone who embodied by knack for stirring up trouble wherever I go.
I think you are all quite brave.
I want you to switch to jazz or tap. Or promise to stay away from Winona Ryder when you’re in your tutu. I’m having a lot of Post Traumatic Black Swan Disorder.
I loved this post!
Twitter Name: gonnakillhim
This was beautiful to me.
It is so much work in the beginning, then , in the middle you get to dance a little. It’s the sweetness right before the dance comes to the end, and they’re off to college.
It’s like the last slow dance you try to get in with that cute boy you’ve been wanting to ask all night.
It finally happens, and you close your eyes and try to make it last forever.
I adored this post.
Twitter Name: gdrpempress
You are a genius. Awesome thing is that I can finally see this on the horizon and that is what gets me thru the day.
Steph
Twitter Name: babysteph
This is so spot on. Wait until the teenage years, when you trade your toe shoes for a cabbie hat.
Lovely! I can relate. And just wait – it gets even better at 10 and 12…
Ahhh…
Wonderful column, as usual!
XO
A.
Twitter Name: AnnaLefler
This is beautiful and funny at the same time. You are fantastic. My children are exactly the same ages as yours, and it’s true that this trimester feels so much more freeing and dancey than any before. It also feels a little scary, like “what if I figure out that I can’t actually do those leaps? Or I look stupid trying?” but exhilarating at the same time.
Wonderful. Wonderful. Wonderful.
I always wanted a bun warmer. *Sigh*
Every once in a while I get a glimmer of the light down there at the end of the tunnel. A glimmer.
This was perfect – really enjoyed it!
Twitter Name: Missy_Stevens
Damn my singing tourettes! Now I want to break out into song, with a medley from Fame, tossed with song rousing song ‘I Hope You Dance’. Sadly, I don’t think my coworkers would be impressed with lunchtime entertainment…
Great post!
So wonderful, Ann. I am in the 35th trimester, but I wish someone would tell my children. Because they seem to enjoy keeping me at the barre, sweating through 300 tendus.
you are so right. Now my kid takes a shower and refuses to even let me help her wash her hair, God bless her soul. It DOES get easier and a lot more fun
You nailed it, Ann. As always! I’m TERRIFIED of the scary dressing room (aka adolescence!) And I love the comparison of thinking at first we’ll flitting around in our tu-tus when in reality it is so much less glamorous than that.
Twitter Name: NinaBadzin
This was one of the best posts I’ve read in a long time. I remember when I was pregnant with my first, I kept think all the worry would go away if I just made it to 12 weeks. Turns out the mom worry is an everlasting, 24 hours a day thing. However, things do get easier as the children get older. My friend told me when my youngest is five years old, life sort of almost totally goes back to normal, but of course there are always new challenges that come with each stage of motherhood.
Loved this Ann and can totally relate, especially to this… “Things feel lighter and happier, and we’re less likely to gash our feet on the thick layer of metaphorical eggshells that used to carpet our floor.”
Twitter Name: peaceloveguac
Well done, Ann! metaphorical eggshells…. love it.
I don’t know what trimester I’m in now cuz I’m bad at math and too tired to try and figure it out. BUT I do know that I still can’t hear the music and even if I could, dancing is out of the question because I pee a little every time I try. (something about not doing my kegels after I had Hayden)
Perfect analogy. I still can’t believe I finally got to the 35th trimester and then immediately had another baby! Do not pass go, do not collect $200. Right back to the barre. :(
I’m finally at the 35th trimester again, though, and I’m not falling for any baby longings that might rear their ugly heads!!!
Twitter Name: theBitchinWife
Oh yes those terrifying dressing rooms. I was a late bloomer and a late dancer. I didn’t start til I was 12 and I was the big fat kid in a room full of skinny six year olds. Likewise I would have liked to have started a family sooner (cough).
Twitter Name: aladyinfrance
This is pure genius.
My kids are 5 and 8, and on days I find myself doing a fair amount of complaining, I remember the dark, dark sleep-deprived infant years when I would sit in the bathroom, sob, and say over and over “I just don’t know what you WANT!” and I realize that the 35th trimester is a very sweet time in so many ways.
And I try not to let my fear of the tiny terrifying dressing room creep into my periphery too much, but I know it’s going to be here in the blink of an eye.
-Ellie
I am looking forward to those days! I don’t REALLY want to speed up time, though. My 2 1/2 year-old boy brings me so much joy just the way he is, BUT…it will be nice when he can do more things for himself. The other one is 6. I’m doing too much for him still. Ugh! I need to get my act together. Loved this post, though, Ann! Good stuff! REALLY loved the ballet terms. :)
Twitter Name: KelleysBreakRm
What’s a trimester?
:)
I got nothing witty here. In fact, I’m might have teared up a little. I feel so lost in the plies of toddler, but THANK YOU for this message full of hope. In fact, if you teamed up with George W. and Bill Clinton, I think you could get a non-profit ad campaign going. Because who cares about the people of Haiti when mothers in America are losing their minds, right??
Twitter Name: theflyingchlupa
Honestly, until now I had no idea that my bun was frickin’ FREEZING. Need. Warmer. STAT.