Cutting Edge

A friend just forwarded a link to the 1974 Weight Watcher recipe cards book, and I started thinking. I stumbled onto a little blog called Pound back in 2001 or so, when I was working at the most boring job in the world. And let's use the term working very very very loosely, because there were weeks in which I did --nothing--. I would surf the internet and email fro hours upon hours every day, all the while waiting for someone, ANYONE to call me on it. It's the sign of ... something... that no one ever did.

So I read blog upon blog upon blog. And this 'Wendy' who wrote 'Poundy.com' was in Chicago and trying to lose weight and so I read her blog. And then she found those recipe cards and the internet shit a collective brick laughing so damn hard. Because they are beyond hysterical. And if you haven't seen them, crawl out from under your rock and search for them on this little thing called Google, because I am way too damn lazy to link to anything. Especially anything that would be that easy for you to find.

(segue)

There is, apparently, a reason that children should be born WITHOUT hair. Twice in the last two days Courtney has reached her arm above her head, flexed and contracted her hand and grabbed a fistful of her own hair. Which she then can't release, and she starts screaming bloody murder, because it hurts.

Airing Out

Warning - Baby bodily functions discussed.

I thought that since this time I have a GIRL baby, I wouldn't have to worry about the one 'pee in the eye' cliche. But even without a pee launcher, Courtney manages to get some good arc going, and the slightest bit of air can set her off. I keep trying to let her 'air out', as the doctors suggest, to ensure that her girl parts stay healthy but after several direct shots, I'm a little gun-shy. And the direct shots are not just pee.

And that's one of the things about breast vs bottle that isn't quite so discussed. Yes, the books tell you what to expect from the rear end depending on if you choose breast or bottle, but they aren't so clear on mentioning that breast milk CAN give your baby very liquid poops, and these CAN come shooting out her butt if you decide that a good way to wake her for feeding is by changing her diaper. At least a foot, too.

It's amazing what you forget when it comes to the newborn months. When I was in the hospital, I rewatched the video on caring for the newborn and asked stupid questions all over again because it's not quite like riding a bicycle. These are the most consistently sleep deprived months of your life without some sort of medical condition, and we all know we don't retain information well when sleep deprived. I can't believe how much the nurses ASSUMED I knew about the whole giving birth-recovery-caring for infant sequence. I did it all ONCE two YEARS ago. (side note you may not want to read as it has to do with my physical recovery - it took me a week and a half after giving birth to figure out I had frickin' hemorrhoids because Luke was a forceps delivery and I didn't get them with him. I just couldn't figure out why my tushie hurt.)

So we're all learning around here STILL, and I'm wondering what would be different if I had a third child?

Smart Aleck

We've been working with Luke on social behaviors, like sitting at the table through dinner, and asking politely for things rather than "IWANTMILK". Last night Esposo and I had the following conversation with him:

Luke - IWANTMILK
Me - Can you ask nicely? Say 'Can I have some milk please?' ?
Luke - milk please.
Esposo - Can you say the whole sentence?
Luke - Sentence.

Wait

On the very last day of my pregnancy, I weighed in 39.2 pounds heavier than at the start of my pregnancy, so I actually reached the 40 pound goal!

When I came home and stepped on our scale, I about fell over when it said I weighed only ten pounds less than when I had left. Fortunately, everything is different with this pregnancy, and where Luke's pregnancy weight fell off in one big 25 pound chunk and I had to work the rest of it off, Courtney's pregnancy weight is sliding off slowly but easily so far. Eight days post partum and I'm 17 pounds less than the day I delivered.

Night and Day

I've been a parent of two for five days now and good grief they could not start out more different! Luke's labor and delivery seems to be shaded in a negative light now that I experienced Courtney's - the worst of all being that I could hardly hold him because my arms were too numb from the epidural, where I was able to feed her immediately and they had to come and get her for the nursery since I had already held her longer than 'allowed' (the babies have to hit the nursery within an hour of birth).

Luke was enormous - with these solid thighs and a barrel chest and large round head. This is what he looked like immediately after birth, (at 9 lbs 8 oz) and I look at him now and just can not believe how large he was.

Courtney is petite. Her thighs and legs are tiny, her head is small, and her ears are so so delicate. Where Luke had blue eyes almost immediately from birth, hers are a deep gray I think are going to turn brown.

Breast feeding Luke was hard. I could never find a comfortable way to sit and hold him, my wrists would cramp and he only gained back his birth weight after a month, and it had been a rough month for me. So far (knock on wood!) breast feeding Courtney has been much easier. She latches on well and comes away satisfied. We'll see how much she's getting at the lactation consultant tomorrow.

It feels that I messed up with Luke in those early days now that I am reliving the newborn experience with Courtney. I remember admiring and sleeping with him much as I am doing now, but as a first time mother, I lacked the confidence that I feel with Courtney. I know I did my best with him, but looking back, I can't help but feel I should have done better. Fortunately, I do feel like each day we're home together I'm improving as a toddler mom!

Courtney is born!

We went in to the hospital at 6 AM, and were brought right to the (last available) room and got settled in. The pitocin IV (the drug that induces contractions) was started right at 7, and at that point I was a little over 2 cm dilated.

The doctor broke my water around 9/10ish, and I was '2-3 cm' dilated. The pitocin rate of delivery was being ratcheted up throughout the day, and I wasn't getting much in the way of labor pains or regular contractions. At around 2, I was close to 4 cm dilated and got the epidural, but didn't have it cranked too high (I think I had it waaay too high with Luke), and was still able to feel mild contractions.

Around 4ish (???) the pains started getting much worse on my left side only - I don't know how exactly it works, but basically my right side was numb, my left side was not (I don't think I could feel everything, but I definitely had to breathe and focus through contractions. I wanted more epidural (why get the epidural AND feel pain!?!?) but they checked me and I had basically gone from 6-10 cm in 45 minutes or so. They wouldn't give me anything more, besides anti nausea drugs (but I still threw up, dang it!) Started pushing at 5 PM (which helped sooo much with the pain! With Luke, I could feel nothing, so I had no real idea) with my left side functional and my right side numb - really really weird sensation and annoying when trying to shift positions with one working leg. There was another woman laboring right about the same speed as I was, so the doctor was going between the rooms, when suddenly Courtney was ready to go and the doctor was NOT! She was gowning up and they're telling me NOT to push, which was just impossible! Born at 6:42, VERY dark hair and A LOT of it! She is completely my husband's child!

INDUCTION!!!!!!!!

I am scheduled to be induced at 6 AM Wednesday March 7! WHOO WHOO!

Still Pregnant

I think of things to write every day but I'm too damn lazy to sit down and think of coherent sentence structure and logical paragraphs. Not that I do a hell of a lot of that when I write on here anyway, but even typing seems to be a massive energy output. My due date is WEDNESDAY, as in two days from now. Do I feel like I'm having productive contractions? No. My biggest fear is that when I go into the doctor and they check my cervix they'll say "Well, nothing's happening, see you next week." and I will lose my freaking mind. I was supposed to be able to get out of this pregnancy at 39 weeks. Not taking it to the last day and possibly over. And I've gotten comments about how it will be over soon, it's all about a healthy baby, she'll be born when she's ready, BLAH BLAH BLAH. Here's 40 pounds, go walk around for awhile, and chronic heartburn, have some of that (Thank you, Pepcid AC), and sleeping on one side until your arm/leg/ear goes numb, and your maternity pants sliding off your belly, and oh yeah, only having four pairs of pants to wear, two of which are a little too large anyway. So yeah, it's about a healthy baby, but it's also about not being in this limbo state anymore.

In the random state of my family, I gained and lost a cousin on the 28th of February. One died from complications of, of all things, a routine colonoscopy, and another was born via C-section. I'm not particularly close to either family, but the 'circle of life' aspect of things is hard to ignore. And being very pregnant, I feel rather enmeshed in that 'circle', not that I can ever seem to distance myself from it, as I'm rather dramatic about existence. Really, you don't want me to go there.

Nesting has continued and we are working on the "kids" bathroom a lot. I hope to have a full post about that in a month or so - from the "before" to the "finish" all together. In about two months time... that would be a significant timeline improvement over the previous bathroom project... of course, the amount of work involved is about a tenth of what we did to the other bathroom, too.

What Nesting Hath Wrought

I am by no means finished redecorating our bedroom, the trim needs to be painted (I started painting it white, as you can see in the picture, but only half the window is done) and furniture neesd to be rearranged (not the bed, obviously, since I painted a headboard on the wall), but it feels so much more homey than before!