Exchanges with People that Make Your Brain Hurt

[Bexx27]

Well, technically, those women could have been pregnant the whole time, just not with the same baby.
One of my friends when I was younger had biological full siblings were only born 5 months apart - her mother was carrying her brother, and then her sister was conceived sometime around the 5th month.  Ergo, her mother was pregnant for more than a consecutive year - it was just not with the same child.

How did she manage to give birth to one without miscarrying the other?

[greencat]

Well, technically, those women could have been pregnant the whole time, just not with the same baby.
One of my friends when I was younger had biological full siblings were only born 5 months apart - her mother was carrying her brother, and then her sister was conceived sometime around the 5th month.  Ergo, her mother was pregnant for more than a consecutive year - it was just not with the same child.

How did she manage to give birth to one without miscarrying the other?

I'm not exactly sure of the medical details, but I suspect it was a C-section.

[cabbageweevil]

"Walla" instead of "voilà" is my hot button. Drives me right up a tree.

Walla, persay, say la vee...  Can we just agree that the romance languages are getting butchered?

There's nothing new under the sun: cherished examples from British troops in France in World War I, trying to cope with the French language –

san fairy ann  (ça ne fait rien)

plinketty plonk  (vin blanc)

napoo  (il n’y en a plus)

and the much-loved catch-all expression, tray bong (très bon)

[ClaireC79]

Well, technically, those women could have been pregnant the whole time, just not with the same baby.
One of my friends when I was younger had biological full siblings were only born 5 months apart - her mother was carrying her brother, and then her sister was conceived sometime around the 5th month.  Ergo, her mother was pregnant for more than a consecutive year - it was just not with the same child.

How did she manage to give birth to one without miscarrying the other?

I'm not exactly sure of the medical details, but I suspect it was a C-section.

Nah can't see it happening with a section - all the other cases of superfetation if born by section are both born at the same time.  Sometimes with very premature labours if things stop after one baby doctors won't deliver the next baby, I've cared for women who have been fully dilated for 48 hours before, and I've heard of some with a few weeks between twins

The 5 months between them makes me doubt it a little though - there are some recorded cases with a few months between (but all born at same time) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfetation

[Diane AKA Traska]

"Walla" instead of "voilà" is my hot button. Drives me right up a tree.

Walla, persay, say la vee...  Can we just agree that the romance languages are getting butchered?

There's nothing new under the sun: cherished examples from British troops in France in World War I, trying to cope with the French language –

san fairy ann  (ça ne fait rien)

plinketty plonk  (vin blanc)

napoo  (il n’y en a plus)

and the much-loved catch-all expression, tray bong (très bon)

Coma tally view? 

[WillyNilly]

My brother, back in the '70's was 6.5 weeks late in delivery.  So not so far off from 2 extra months.  I was 5 weeks late being delivered.

[Luci45]

Well, technically, those women could have been pregnant the whole time, just not with the same baby.
One of my friends when I was younger had biological full siblings were only born 5 months apart - her mother was carrying her brother, and then her sister was conceived sometime around the 5th month.  Ergo, her mother was pregnant for more than a consecutive year - it was just not with the same child.

How did she manage to give birth to one without miscarrying the other?

I'm not exactly sure of the medical details, but I suspect it was a C-section.

Nah can't see it happening with a section - all the other cases of superfetation if born by section are both born at the same time.  Sometimes with very premature labours if things stop after one baby doctors won't deliver the next baby, I've cared for women who have been fully dilated for 48 hours before, and I've heard of some with a few weeks between twins

The 5 months between them makes me doubt it a little though - there are some recorded cases with a few months between (but all born at same time) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfetation

When I went back for my 6 week exam after delivering our first child, the doctor found mass about the size of a grapefruit and said, "Uh-oh. Did we forget a baby?" I turned out to be an ovarian cyst and I don't remember how old a fetus is to be grapefruit-sized, but I guess if the obstretician thought it was possible, it must be.

[figee]

"Walla" instead of "voilà" is my hot button. Drives me right up a tree.

Walla, persay, say la vee...  Can we just agree that the romance languages are getting butchered?

There's nothing new under the sun: cherished examples from British troops in France in World War I, trying to cope with the French language –

san fairy ann  (ça ne fait rien)

plinketty plonk  (vin blanc)

napoo  (il n’y en a plus)

and the much-loved catch-all expression, tray bong (très bon)

Coma tally view? 

'Wipers'  (Ypres) and so on.

[Midnight Kitty]

My favorite from living in California, "No hobble spaniels." <no hable espaniol>

[cabbageweevil]

'Wipers'  (Ypres) and so on.

That one gave me, once, a splendid dreadful-pun opportunity. Some years ago, a friend and I were driving through part of Belgium, on the way back from a holiday further east.  His car's windscreen wipers failed -- luckily, the weather thenceforth turned out mostly dry.  The incident enabled me to say: "If our route were a bit different, we might be driving through Wipers without wipers."

[BabyMama]

My coworker's husband was carried somewhere around 10 1/2 months, and his brother was somewhere around 10. They were BIG babies apparently too.

[sunnygirl]

My father is a complete technophobe:

F: I need to buy an iPod, will you come and help me?
Me: Sure ... wait, didn't I just give you an iPod last Christmas?
F: Yes, but it didn't have an instruction manual, and I thought if I bought a new one, it would come with an instruction manual.

It took me a minute to grasp that, yes, he was planning to buy a £200 gadget he already owns, just to get the instruction manual. I already put all his music on the iPod anyway, and sorted it into playlists, so all he really needs to know is how to plug it in to charge, switch it on, and play it.

[ladyknight1]

I was a 10-month baby, arriving 29 days past my due date. I weighed 10 lbs, 6 oz. I am very good to my mother after that and the awful drama princess I was my teenage years.

DH loaded up my car with the rubbish from the garage, drove it to the compacter, and has the nerve to tell me the horrible smell is not that bad. It's a good thing I have 10 hours to cool down before I see him again.

[Luci45]

My father is a complete technophobe:

F: I need to buy an iPod, will you come and help me?
Me: Sure ... wait, didn't I just give you an iPod last Christmas?
F: Yes, but it didn't have an instruction manual, and I thought if I bought a new one, it would come with an instruction manual.

It took me a minute to grasp that, yes, he was planning to buy a £200 gadget he already owns, just to get the instruction manual. I already put all his music on the iPod anyway, and sorted it into playlists, so all he really needs to know is how to plug it in to charge, switch it on, and play it.

Did you tell him he can get the instruction book online? If you don't want to print all that, you can bookmark it for him. He should be able to do that much even if all he does is email. I've bought several things lately that didn't have instruction manuals. My camera and my iPad, for instance.

[Jones]

DH's grandmother and I had a similar conversation.

She told me about how she used to sew her children's little pantaloons and diaper covers, with millions of little frills, and then after they were dirtied she'd handwash (only option back then), line dry, and carefully iron each little frill every time.

When a second baby was born, she'd still iron, but was grateful she didn't have to sew so much (hand-me-downs). About the time she had three children--all girls at this point--she had to cut back on the ironing, then she had two boys but still started waving the kids out the door in the mornings in clothing that was ironed (on the outer layers), but she was sooo embarrassed that ruffly underthings weren't carefully ironed anymore.

Meanwhile, my brain exploded that she had time for ANY ironing at all with 4+ small children underfoot. These were the days before she had an electric iron, as the lived on a farm in the middle of nowhere. The fact she carried MIL (her youngest child) an extra 2 months in utero because she "didn't have time" to go see a doctor hurts my brain too, but coupled with the fact she was trying to find time to iron a bunch of clothes helps alleviate the brain pain due to cancelling each other out to a minor degree.

She did what now?

I second that. Forget the ironing- she didn't seriously have an 11 month pregnancy did she? How well cooked was your MIL when the baby eventually turned up?
Good Lord.

Sorry, I was outtie this weekend and didn't get here to expound on this.

As MIL was the youngest child, GMIL is fairly certain she got the dates right; she had been through 5 of her own births before, after all. If I understand correctly:
When MIL was born, she was allergic to nearly everything, as her body had depended on GMIL's nutrition for so long that she couldn't process anything on her own. The doctor ended up having to invent a new type of formula to keep her alive (they didn't have the variety back then that they do now), and even then she was pitifully small throughout toddler-hood. She grew up and has had a healthy life, growing out of most childhood allergies, and...now that I think about it...she is taller than her older sisters.

But, yes, GMIL literally told me while I was 9 months pregnant, when I mentioned we'd be "inducing on Monday if she doesn't get here on her own first" that it couldn't be that bad, she'd carried MIL 11 months after all.