The Land of Milk and Poo

Chloe Ellen!

Chloe Ellen arrived at 9:01 pm on Tuesday, June 10, after 12 and a half hours of labor. She's perfect, 8lbs 1oz, 21 inches long, and all healthy chub. She has long finger toes, blonde hair, and is absolutely beautiful.

LOADS to tell and lots of funny stories, too. It was an incredible birth and Chloe and I are in the thick of nursing--she nursed from 11 pm to 7 am this morning, so I am a tad bit tired right now and as soon as I eat I'm going to feed her again and take a nap.

I'll fill everyone in as soon as I can--I didn't sleep the night after delivery or last night, so I've gotten about three hours of sleep since Monday night (when I didn't sleep much either). I'm on some kind of adrenaline high right now.

Thanks for being here to share this with me. Stay tuned for the full story!

U Induce Me, Baby

As Shakespeare would say....

tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow.

At this time tomorrow I could very well have Chloe Ellen (AKA Rocky) in my arms. (Ellen is my mom's name. I insisted.)

I'm being induced for continued high blood pressure. Random and I go to the hospital at 7:30 a.m. It should be interesting, as I think my doc is starting me on Pitocin right off the bat and we have no clue how my cervix is doing--whether I'm dilated at all, effaced, whatever. I'm still going to try and go without an epi. We'll see. My doula is going to meet me at the hospital at 8 a.m. and MP will be staying with our incredible daycare provider, who has offered to host a sleepover with icecream and games.

See you on the other side! AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Holy shit!

I Am No Longer Human, I Am Stretch Mark.

  OVERNIGHT. As in, not there when I went to bed at night, there when I woke up. They came, they attacked, leaving long red claw-like rips down my formerly model-like (except for that psychotic belly button), pristinely white, belly. 

What else can you do overnight? Hmmm, let's review.

You can work a shift. You can have a baby. You can drive 480 miles. You can watch four movies (one of them being Stephen King's The Mist, which will leave you heaving with sobs at the horrible ending, and afraid of giant Transformer monsters crushing you, any foggy weather whatsoever, and prehistoric bugs smacking against your windows). You can take 8 showers and dry your hair 8 times.

Apparently, you can also get a belly full of stretch marks. Amazing. I went to bed with my untouched belly. I felt a bit itchy. I scratched idly in the heat, feeling like a rashy whale. I woke up, looked in the mirror, and gasped in horror. CLAW MARKS. Ruined. Ne'er to be revealed again, I shall have to throw away all of those thong string bikinis I purchased and get myself several skirted one-pieces with day-glo mosaic patterns on them. Why didn't you tell me this could happen? I blame all of this on you.   

Okay, enough babbling about that.

I am hot. We have no central air, but we do have a portable air conditioner, and J (our dog) and I go and lie on the bed with it blasting on us, both of us spread-eagle, flappin' in the cool manufactured wind. I watch endless episodes of Property Ladder (won't those numbskulls EVER learn and listen to Kirsten?) and The Bachelorette, comparing feet to see which one is winning in the "you're swell" contest. Sometimes I waddle downstairs to order items from etsy.com (oh this site is a pisser) or Amazon.com. I just ordered this bag. It is a diaper bag. It is flashy.

And I eat. A lot of food, even though I am so hot. Rocky is hungry all the time, and apparently this makes me hungry. 

And I wait. Random has found that I am an incredible "get-out-of-jail-free" card and has begun using me for excuses, as in "I can't do that, my wife might be having a baby." It's drawing near, even though I have nothing to show for it except swelling and hugeness. Tomorrow I learn more--will I be induced at the end of this week? Will I soldier on?

In the meantime I am weepy over MP calling me "mommy" and making up songs about me (lyrics are mostly "mommy, mommy mommy mommy! Mommy, mommy..."). Also, I bought her a new outfit (pic 1). And MP is very, very intent on making sure that she cuts the Play-doh exactly (pic 2; how this makes me laugh). Picture 3 is just my smiling girl; she's so beautiful I ache.   

HA! And....ACK!

*I know something you don't know* *dancing around madly and cackling* And nope, I'm not telling. It's good, though. It's fucking awesome, actually.

Anyway, I went to my OB's appt today--arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. My BP is 130 something over 90 something. Baby is okay as per non stress test. OB wants to induce late next week; she's unhappy with my BP overall. My mother, you might recall, went into labor around 42 weeks plus with each of her babes, so I could very well be pregnant for another four years.

The ultrasound tech saw me and said "ARE YOU STILL PREGNANT???" Then one of the office staff asked me if I'd like to wheel my bed into one of the rooms and just stay there for the remainder of this pregnancy. I told them they could hire me as their resident pregnant lady. The fact that I was saying this made me shudder inwardly. How I would have hated myself just a few years ago! Oh the cursing damage Infertile Myrtle would have invoked on me!

But--I'm a bit skeered, if you want to know the truth, of induction. I know it increases c-section rates. I wanted a half-crunchy, half-hospital birth--you know, the orgasmic experience with the monitors close by and the tray of bland food brought to your room, and the on call button, and the craftmatic bed, with a side of granola and soul-searching and deep breathing techniques.

PLEASE--if you were induced....tell me what happened.

TERTIA!!!!!! I.E. Mrs. Big Tease.

Sorry, guys. It's not me who had the baby. I'm still sitting here fat and preggo. No Rocky yet. Plus, I'm TOTALLY not an asshole and I'm WAY younger than that hagstress Tertia. Heh. Plus, from the wording of her post, it seems like it might be someone we wouldn't guess right away who doesn't have a blog right now. Thus......

I hope it's Danae, or getupgrrl. But I don't know. My email address that everyone had is long defunct, so I haven't been in the loop.

If it's Julie, I just hope that everyone is okay.

A Quickie (Incidentally, Not the Kind I'd Like)

Monday's doc appointment to check my blood pressure was okay--I was strapped up to the fetal stress monitor, where everything looked good. Pee was protein free. Blood pressure was 140/86, so a bit higher than everybody'd like. I was told to come back on Thursday for another bp check and monitor, to take it easy, and that next week (at 39 weeks) we'd talk about choices.

Then, last night, I noticed I hadn't felt Rocky move.

Her active time is usually around 9-11 pm, so I got a bit concerned. I had eaten, but she didn't respond. I drank a bit of water, prodded her around, talked to her, lay on my left side, did jumping jacks, sat on the washing machine during the spin cycle. Nothing. I couldn't make her do a thing. I got panicky. Usually, she responds to my hand on my belly--she'll kick it within a minute.

I went upstairs, took her heartrate. It was good, in the 140s, but I knew that wasn't enough. She still wasn't moving. I freaked out. I called my OB, who told me to go to L&D.

So at 10:30 pm Random and MP and I drove to L&D. I was admitted and told to drink a cup of juice and a ton of water. I was hooked up to a stress monitor and my bp was taken. It was 151/92. Not great.

Thirty minutes later, after drinking enough water to float an armada, I was released with instructions for bedrest and a follow up with my doctor. My bp went down a bit, but not much. The nurse said that the readings from the monitor were "textbook perfect." She showed me where Rocky moved, and where her heartrate accelerated, which is apparently a good thing. I had no contractions during that period. In fact, I've had no contractions at all in the past week, that I know of.

So that's where I am today. 38 weeks, still hanging in there, trying not to stress too much. No signs of going into labor except for a short cervix. Who knows what the next week or so might bring.

In other news--MP would like all of you to know that she is ALSO having a baby, my baby sister, as it turns out. This is why you all need to be very, very quiet, because my baby sister is sleeping in her belly. And also, she has put her bottle to sleep with a napkin blanket, so don't you yell please. And "Frere Jacques" is now "Frere Ca-Ca," and instead of "dormez-vous," she sings "dormez-poo." Man, she is so much like me it's terrifying. 

Hi, Stress

So this past Friday I got some really suck-hole news, news that had me a sobbing mess of puffy-eyed, red-cheekedness, unable to sleep at all and taking Rocky's heartbeat at 3 am in the morning to make sure I wasn't hurting her with all of my crying. I felt incredibly sick from lack of sleep and so much crying, and spent the first half of the weekend talking to people, trying to get my body back from the edge, where I felt all teeter-y and exhausted. I considered calling my doctor and asking her to just induce me, since I knew my bp was up and about and I didn't see how it would get back down any time soon, and I didn't want to do any harm to Rocky.

Now I am better, but still stressed so much that I can feel my blood pounding through my body unless I wrap myself up in something--like a cuthroat Wii game with Random or the barbecue I waddled to today (yes, I am supposed to be on bedrest. Yes, I walked there--a three minute walk. Yes, I had to go--otherwise my brain would have eaten me alive). I have another appointment tomorrow, where I am pretty sure my doctor will tell me that my blood pressure is notgood, and I don't know what will happen from there--I guess it's possible I could be induced tomorrow night. While I really, really, really want as drug free a birth as possible, I also do not want to cause Rocky any harm, and I can feel that this stress I'm up against is unhealthy. So, there's that.

Anyway. I am not having any contractions, really, that I can tell, so there's that. But it is hard to move around, harder to sleep, and I feel terribly guilty for how things are going with MP--she can't sit on my lap because she bounces on my belly, I can't go on walks with her, I can't sit on the floor with her, I can't bend over the tub to suds her up. I can't take her to daycare, so she gets picked up and dropped off. I can't take her for ice cream or run with her outside. I'm mostly relegated to snuggling with her gently on the couch as we watch endless episodes of Dora and "Hagar" (Diego--but she calls him Hagar). I find myself constantly apologizing, but she's such a good natured kid that she accepts it mostly, says "when baby sister is here then you wash me," and reaches for my arm, tightening it around her. She's another thing that makes me forget the sucky news I received--I have to remember that in the grand scheme of things she and her sister and my husband and this incredible family we've created together is what matter. So.

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Hey, I'm looking for someone who can sew. I need to commission something--a Flop doll, from MP's favorite books by Ted Dewan, the Bing series--for MP for her birthday, which is in mid-July. If you think you can sew this creature,  please say so in the comments with an email that I can reach you at. Thanks! I am the worst sewer in the universe, much to my dismay.

And if you have any good ideas for lessening stress, or any stressed up stories of your own, please share. It helps to know I'm surrounded--at least online--by people who understand what I'm going through, even more so than most of the people in my "real" life.

Off Bedrest! Hurrah! Er...Back On Bedrest! Hurrah!

Today I was officially supposed to be off of bedrest. It was to be a day of much rejoicing, with a grand mall trip and a romp outside with MP and J the wonder dog. I was a little tired--didn't sleep last night--so decided to take it easy in the morning, and take MP to the mall with me in the early afternoon. I plotted where I'd go, planned out my route--Nordstrom for hair pretties to wear during labor, new lip gloss, Baby Gap, Pottery Barn Kids for sale stuff--it was to be a glorious reawakening of the Shoppy! And I had to get a bridal shower gift for a party I was looking forward to on Sunday, a big outing for me with adult! friends! after being cooped up for so long.

But my dent-the-foot game had Random worried, so after his griping for 24 hours I called my doctor. I had an appointment tomorrow anyway, so figured they'd just tell me to come in then, but they told me to come in right away and have my blood pressure taken. It's always been "perfect," but my doctor is awesome and doesn't let you get away with much. So I planned my mall trip for after and schlepped my bulk to the dr's.

I peed in a cup. No protein, hurrah!

I was weighed. Again. Oh, 2 lbs in one week? Is that all? So 45 lbs total? Huh. "You're swollen," the nurse said. "It's that." Um, yeah. I'm going to use that excuse for YEARS, people. I'm really a size 2 underneath all of this swelling. 

The nurse took my blood pressure. She frowned and did it again, muttering about not being able to hear. I smiled, looked off into the distance, dreaming of the Westchester, where there is an ENTIRE WING dedicated to baby and kid stores, with Anthropologie and Crate and Barrel at the end, like the gold at the bottom of a rainbow.

"I'm just going to run this by the doctor," she said, and ran off, my chart clutched in her hand.

I sat, smiled at everyone walking by. I heard grumblings in the office--my doctor said something like "have her lie down" and "take it again." The nurse came back, told me she was going to take my blood. Then she asked me to come with her and had me lie down on a table on my left side.

My beloved Dr. came in and smiled. "It's always something with you, isn't it?" she said.

She took my blood pressure again and sighed. "I won't lie, it's a bit high," she said. "Higher than it was last week. After all this, you might have to be induced."

I looked at her. A bit open mouthed. Erm, huh?

"We need to watch this," she said. "You're back on bedrest. Do nothing for the next three days and I see you on Monday. I'll call you tomorrow with your blood results."

Then she taught me how to recognize swelling in my arms, legs, and face (dent and wait), and mentioned the "I" word one more time--as in "Well, if we have to induce we have to induce, so just be prepared for that." And she warned me about headaches and told me to call no matter what.

And so now I am back on bedrest, which means nothing right now, because I am alone with MP and there are cries of "MOM! I POOPED!" coming from the bathroom, and J needs to pee really really badly, and there's a snacky to be made and a juice to get and you get the idea.

*******************

CHANGING TOPICS FROM THE DEPRESSING TO THE...DEPRESSING, I have some questions about pregnancy and breastfeeding and boobs. Obviously, pregnancy changes your boobs. It makes them bigger and darkens certain areas up considerably. So here are my questions:

1. Will the darkness go away? It's blotchy, weird, and looks like I tried to self-tan my chest and failed miserably. Or MP took her ugliest brown marker and drew on me. Or I got really, really dirty and didn't wash for months and it just kind of merged with my skin. Or they ate a big plate of chocolate icecream and didn't wipe their mouths. It's not pretty. Tell me this is temporary and that things will happily revert back to normal. (And how long will that take?) 

2. How much will breastfeeding change them, and how will it change them? I know you can't look into your magic boob-ball and tell me what will happen to mine, but please do tell me what happened to yours. Even if you didn't breastfeed, did they change? How?

Thank you for indulging my inner boob.

Let's Play Dent-The-Foot

This is the new game in my house: We dent my foot, using our fingers, and time how long it takes for my foot to un-dent itself.

We also play "make a fist," which is an exciting game comprised of me trying to make a fist with my big swolled-up manhands. Seinfeld would not date me right now.

Last night, in addition to the incredible discomfort I have from 1) horrible sciatica in both legs and butts, 2) hip pain, 3) abdominal stretching, 4) abdominal itching, 5) back pain, 6) swollen ham foot pain, 7) restless leg which has me frantically bicycling the air at 3 am, 8) sweaty coal oven hell (it's 85 degrees in our boudoir; we have an old house with no central air; our air conditioner, which we bought yesterday, needs to "sit" for 24 hours) I woke up four times from excruciating THUMB pain. My left thumb hurt so much I couldn't bend it, and when I did force it to bend, it popped. So I switched sleeping sides and an hour later woke up to my right thumb in the same thumby boat. Apparently I am now severing a nerve or blood vessel or something as I sleep due to my increased Hulky Bulk--this is the only explanation I can think up since googling "thumb pain during pregnancy" doesn't do a whole lot. If someone else has experienced this strange phenomenon, please divulge.

In other news, my dreams (when I get around to having them in between all of the night time fun) are getting more and more interesting--the other night I dreamt I got pregnant while I was still pregnant. When I told Random this, he balked and said "IS THAT POSSIBLE???" My mother tells me it is. I read all of your advice about contraception with interest, as it is a hot topic these days (hahahahahahahaha), and thought I liked the idea of the IUD but then realized I'd have a string dangling from me for the duration. Is this true? I'm not so hip to this. I can't do the diaphragm or cervical cap thing since my cervix is so battered. At this point I'm leaning towards either the mini-pill or FAM coupled with lots of spermicide. I did FAM for years and years, and am apparently quite good at not getting pregnant whilst doing it, so it would seem to be a possible contender.

In getting-ready news, we set up the co-sleeper and bought the breast pump, for which you need life savings for, and have decided on a stroller--this one, which is a giant red beast but which drives pretty well. Plus, I can use it to knock other annoying shoppers out of my way as I race towards the regular clothing racks. And it fits our car seat. And it has a huge basket underneath, which is important for stashing the third child, should we ever have one.

At this point I am very very big, although people who see me swear I am not "that big," which frankly is distressing since I am (43+ lbs at this point) and this makes me think that I must have been pretty big before. Anyway, here's a picture from three weeks ago thereabouts. I've grown even more fetchingly giant since then. I have a double chin, too, which is really bumming me out. Nothing fits except Random's t-shirts. I am reduced to Adidas slides on my feet (even flip flops don't fit anymore). All of my rings are in my jewelry box, waiting for the day when I no longer sport manhands. However! I am thrilled, underneath all of the new flesh. 

And I am ready to give birth now, please. 37 weeks. I am in shock that I have made it here.

Way cuter and more interesting anyway: My kid, who is getting more and more gorgeous by the second. Plus, she is sooooooooooo freakishly funny. I have a video of her singing "Frere Poo-poo," which is her own creation (she sings the song in French, but "Jacques" is replaced by "poo-poo"). She also makes up her own lyrics to "Old MacDonald," so Old Mac can have, at any time, on his farm: a poo-poo head (she's a bit obsessed, I think because she's poop potty trained at this point--!!!!), a bath, a mommy, and some medicine (which she also, strangely, loves). I am so lucky it hurts. 

I Don't Have A Title For This Post Because I Don't Really Know What It's About. A Really Bad Prom Dress? My Weird Belly Button? You Decide.

Thank you, everyone, for your thoughts on my prickly name situation. My father has not said a word about anyone's name since that night. He did make an off color comment about something else, which I quickly called him on, which he then (in his usual way) poo-pooed. Later, though, he told Random that I had "caught him" and that he had "messed up" in saying what he said, and that he didn't mean it at all. They talked about it. When Random told me this, I was stunned--it seems important to me that my father can admit to being wrong with my husband, but not with me. And really sad, although I'm glad he knew it was wrong to say. But why couldn't he have this conversation with me? This seems to be something I might need to work on with my dad too--I can be a real ass at times and then not admit I was an ass for ages. To give you an example: I told him right before my wedding that I didn't think he should be the only one walking me down the aisle, that my mom should be there too, and he got so upset at that he cried and I, well I just kept on being a gigantic weenbrain trying to explain myself. The scene ended with my dad having to leave the dinner we were at and Random going out to talk to him and tell him I didn't really mean it (I didn't). I just apologized for that two months ago. It was over eight years ago that it happened. So, yeah, I mean I think we need to work on the being-vulnerable-in-front-of-each-other thing.

In Babyland, I'm still trying to take it easy, but my ever burgeoning belly has recently sprouted a nice red crop of stretch marks which ladder up my skin unattractively. Perhaps they will join with the ones on my hips and boobs and I can just give up and be a giant stretch mark. In some kind of masochistic ritual I find myself watching shows on television where the female cast is donned exclusively in skimpy clothing that leaves little uncovered, and where the host will say something like "ladies, this is the time to wear your itsiest bikini!" and the ladies will all cry with glee and I will cackle from my bedridden perch, unwashed, unshaved, untoothbrushed, unhairdoned, swollen like a blue ham and obscene belly hanging out, "HA! YOU WANNA SEE ME IN A BIKINI? HEY RANDOM! YOU WANNA SEE ME IN A BIKINI?" And I will hear Random's weak reply from the computer, where he is drowning his pelvic-rest sorrows in a rip roaring game of WOW (he is a WOW freak, in case you didn't know) "Huh? Oh, sure, babe!" Last night we watched "The Bachelorette," which I haven't watched in years and years, and after informing Random that he would get a first-impression rose from me without doing a damn thing--just being his hot self--I asked Random if I looked anything like a Bachelorette. He laughed. "You look like a pregnant ho," he told me. "But you are still beautiful." This is why I am with Random. Another reason I love him: He put a pair of MP's shoes in my pillowcase so that when I finally lay down at 11:20 after "The Bachelorette" was over, I lay my head down on MP's shoes. He is such a jokester. 

Further evidence of my Attractiveness: My belly has holes in it. These used to be hidden; they are old piercing holes. Now they are hideously stretched out and lined up above what my belly button has become, which is a ridiculous hole surrounded by a strange whitish circle and two brown dots on either side of it. I can't figure it out. It baffles me daily. The holes are freakish, the white circle was obviously done by aliens who couldn't find a convenient field of crops, and the two brown dots--like I drew them with a brown Sharpie--lined up on either side--I am clueless.  I may post a picture and ask you to figure out what the hell is going on with my belly button.

But before I go any further I need to post this picture:

This is just so terrifying. Apparently this is a prom dress. The poor girl looks like she is wearing it after losing some horrible bet. I just want to wrap her up in a big sheet and feed her cookies and milk. Also, someone took this picture, which means someone is letting her go out in this. That person should be smacked, hard.

Anyway, back to me and my senseless rambling. I am almost 36 weeks, which means soon I will be set free to cavort joyfully throughout the aisles of Babies R Us in pursuit of the final infant stuff that I apparently need. And I still have to pack my hospital bag. Also, there is a stroller to purchase. Do any of you have any feedback on the Quinny strollers? Either the Zapp or the Buzz?

Other questions:

--Do I need a bouncer AND a swing? I have the Combi Pod Bouncer. Is that good enough?

--What birth control besides barrier methods can you safely use that will not compromise your milk supply? Random and I are not interested in getting pregnant again just yet. (We laugh every time we talk about this, because we still say things like "Can you believe there is a BABY in there? WHAT THE HELL?!!!")

Thank you. If there's anything else you think I absolutely need for an infant, please put it here. That way, I can indulge myself of all Shoppy in these last few weeks. 

--Oooh, yes...and to the commenter who thought my dad was responding to the name "Rocky" for my daughter--that he didn't like that name, when the commenter liked it just fine--THANK YOU, m'dear. I think if we were planning to call Rocky Rocky then he might actually have a point in razzing us. Rocky, however, is not the baby's REAL name, it's just a nickname we came up with before we knew her sex. Rocky's real name will be revealed in a future post, promise.