My delightful weekend: Pregnancy news (not mine) & potential root canals

It's been an up & down weekend. On the bright side, the weather has been quite nice, the house is clean, we had a nice dinner out last night.

On the other hand -- I spent all day yesterday cleaning & doing laundry. Dh is doing his taxes (our deadline in Canada is April 30th. He did mine last week, & I'm getting a big fat $17.75 back, woohoo!!).

And I'm getting that "everyone in the world is pregnant except me" feeling again & it's not nice. We spent last evening at FIL's with BIL & family. FIL & stepMIL are redoing & expanding their back patio with interlock brickwork -- stepMIL's youngest son (the dad to be) is doing it for them. StepMIL said they are planning to have the baby shower for his wife out there in late July. "All these years and all the baby showers I've been to for other people's grandchildren -- now it's my turn!" she said triumphantly. I had to bite my tongue to restrain myself from saying something sarcastic like "Really?? Tell me what that feels like, I can't imagine."

Really, as I've written before, I honestly can't begrudge her this. She has four children between the ages of 40 & 50 -- I'm sure she thought she would have been a grandmother long before this. Instead, this will likely be her one & only grandchild (it's a boy). Dh reminded me, too, that she has mentioned our daughter occasionally over the years when most other people have not, & once gave me a Christmas ornament for her at the same time she gave one to each of our nephews, which touched us both immensely.

Then she dropped the bombshell that they had seen one of dh's aunts (on dh's mom's side), & dh's cousin & his wife are pregnant again. This is the doppleganger couple I wrote about awhile back, whose daughter just had her first birthday party in March. I just assumed that would be their only child, but I guess I was wrong. After more than a decade of marriage, & both in their 40s, they've somehow found the magic formula. (At least, I hope they have, & that everything continues to go well for them.) This baby is due in late summer/early fall. The parents are both 44, going on 45.

"I'm sure she was pregnant at that birthday party -- they could have told us," SIL said peevishly. "Well, sometimes people don't like to tell when it's early on," was all I said. Plus, I imagine they didn't want to draw the spotlight away from their daughter on her first birthday.

They also mentioned another cousin (on dh's dad's side, in her early 30s) is expecting her second child this summer too. "I didn't know that," I said. "I did -- you told me!" dh said. "I did?" Once I started thinking, I vaguely remembered. We don't see dh's paternal cousins very often. I guess I was having a bad day & shoved that piece of family news into the recesses of my mind. On the bright side, since both these cousins' pregnancies are second babies, there likely won't be baby showers for them. Whew!

To top the evening off, I had a toothache (lower left jaw) that kept me awake part of the night. I broke this tooth about four years ago & had it filled -- it's more filling than tooth now -- and was told at the time that a crown/root canal might be necessary in the future. It's been bothering me on & off for the last while. I've also been having sore throats/earaches/sinus infections on & off all winter -- but I never put two & two together until last week. My left ear felt all plugged up & the glands on the left side of my throat began to both look & feel swollen. And my jaw under that particular tooth was aching. Uh oh. I recalled one particular winter when dh kept having earaches & sinus infections -- until finally, the one side of his face swelled up like a chipmunk's cheeks. He got diagnosed with an abcessed tooth & had to have a root canal & take antibiotics. (On the bright side, he hasn't had an earache since then.)

I decided to start with my family dr & went to see him on Thursday morning. He could feel the swollen glands right away & wrote me a prescription for amoxicillin, but told me I should get the tooth checked out by the dentist. Dh had a medical appointment on Friday afternoon that I wanted to attend with him, so I decided to wait until Monday. The penicillin is helping, I think -- my glands aren't quite so swollen -- but it's still not 100%, & my tooth still aches from time to time.

So I guess I'll be calling the dentist on Monday. I'm not looking forward to a root canal, but if that's what it takes to get things back to normal, bring on the novocaine...!