Crankypants

There are several circumstances in my life right now making it more and more difficult to stave off the crankypants mood I've been fighting for a few days. And, since I have no current therapist, and I value my marriage way too much to continue to whine about the same thing over and over to my loving husband, I will tell you, Internet.

But first, let me start by saying that I feel terribly guilty for even feeling cranky, at all. I read the news about Haiti, and I know my life is practically gilded. And yet, feelings are feelings, and I have had enough therapy in the past to know that I need to let them out. So... bring on the complaints.

Milk Supply
About the time my baby decided to have a major growth spurt, my body adjusted to his tiny self and his itty-bitty needs. So, for the past four or five days, we've been struggling with milk supply. I've been trying to keep him satisfied enough so that he will stop fussing between feedings (which happen about every 1 - 1.5 hours). So far, I have failed miserably at that task. I'm pumping and downing fenugreek tablets in order to try to increase supply.

Fussy Baby
Well, duh. He's hungry. We're supplementing him with breastmilk I froze a while back, but it's not an endless supply. Also supplementing too much interferes with his need to feed on me, therefore, interfering with my supply. An endless circle of fuss.

Fleas
4:00AM changing sheets, vacuuming, and scratching until it bleeds. Enough said.

Mice
Not just so much the fact that they exist in our kitchen, but more the fact that one seems to have gotten into the wall and died, stinking up the whole joint like roadkill. Speaking of joints...

Pot-Smoking Neighbor
He knows we have a tiny baby up here and that his smoke gets into our apartment (despite the fact that we covered all of our heat vents and no longer are able to heat our apartment because he won't stop smoking). And yet, he continues. Which leads me to...

Cold Apartment
We can only use two rooms of our house because the others are way too cold for baby. This makes our 1000 sq ft apartment into about a 200 sq ft hovel. It feels very confining. Which leads me to...

Rain
I love rainy weather, but don't have anything waterproof in which to take the little one out. So, we've been stuck inside almost the entire week, so far... with the fleas and roadkill and pot-smoking-son-of-a-bitch.

Lady Business
It's still not healed and mighty painful making me wonder if I will ever be a whole woman again.

Baby Finger Infection
The poor baby has come down with a finger infection. The whole tip of the finger is red and swollen and warm to the touch. The pediatric nurse said to soak it in warm water with antibacterial soap for 10 minutes several times a day. Has she ever met a 10 week old baby?

Out-of-Town-Husband
The love of my life has been out of town since Monday. The baby misses him and has been fussier for that reason (along with the milk thing). Baby sleeps less, mommy sleeps less, and friend who's here helping sleeps less than all of us because she's washing pump bottles at 3am while I'm trying to get back to sleep. So, thank you, Lisa, for helping out! And to my darling husband, when you read this... we love you very much. We never want to be away from you again. And not just because you change the poopy diapers. Thank you for finding us a new home far from all this cranky-making.

And, the baby just began fussing, so it's time to feed him again, and frankly, that's my favorite part of any day. I just love bonding with him. So, I guess that, overall, I'm one of the luckiest people I know.

A Year in Pictures - 2009

It's been a big year here in San Francisco. I don't have much time to blog about it (scroll down to see the adorable reason for my time crunch), so I'll put up some photos, instead.

We started the year off well with Bryan getting his weirdo thoughts published on a bunch of kitsch from a San Francisco based company! His first paid job! Look for the items in novelty stores all over.


I got a new bike, and we took a ride in Golden Gate Park!


I got to meet my good friend's baby. He's half Frenchman.


We threw an anniversary party in Arizona for my wonderful parents.


Then, we did some sight-seeing in an old mine.


We went on a wine tour to some fancy-dancy wineries in Napa...


...and had a blast.


Funny that this is the next photo, but I swear, I didn't get knocked up because I was drunk from wine tasting.


For my birthday, despite the fact that I was still suffering from major morning (all the time) sickness, we visited the remodeled Academy of Sciences.


Bryan's sister came out from the East Coast to visit, so we got to do some touristy stuff with her.


Then, we went and did some more touristy stuff in Seattle! Most of it involved a lot of eating.


Then, it was time to get the room ready for the baby. Bryan painted his former office baby blue for the upcoming little arrival.


At the end of the summer, we were able to get away to Yosemite with some friends from my work. It was Baby's first trip there. His room had no view, but perhaps, we'll go back soon.


We celebrated Bryan's birthday with ice cream cake from one of the best creameries in San Francisco. Mmmm... malted ice cream with chocolate sprinkles!


This fall, we had a babyshower, for which my parents flew in!


A fun time was had by all (including the little belly monster pictured here).


Bryan got to work assembling many baby items.




For Halloween, we tossed together his costume from things we had around the house... yes, he owns a sheriff button just for real life stuff.


And my mom made my costume.


We had some really bad car karma this year. When I was eight months pregnant, a woman in the Babies R Us parking lot backed into our Honda, causing $2300 in damages. We took it as a sign and decided to sell the car...


...in order to buy a much safer-for-baby brand new car...


...which was then hit by a crazy person while parked on the street outside our home less than a week later. The crash caused $8000 in damages. Boo. It's mostly fixed, now.


I spent some time, as my due date neared, taking advantage of maternity leave. I took this while I was strolling along in the Presidio.


Then, the big day arrived! Baby made his debut!


And my family came to visit for Thanksgiving, since the Little One was still too small to travel!


The grandparents enjoyed the baby at both Thanksgiving and Christmas...


...for which they returned bearing many presents.


That's the year in a nutshell. If you want to see more photos, you can add me as a contact on Flickr. I can, then, add you as a friend, so that you can see my "friends and family only" photos. That is, if you're really my friend.

Happy new year!

Six Weeks

I'm not that strong a healer. I just had my 6-week postpartum check up. I knew I wasn't entirely okay yet because the evening before the appointment, I was sitting on the bed and moved to get up. Holy Bajeezus. It wasn't like pushing a baby out, or anything, but it sure didn't feel like my hoo-ha was all healed up nice and tidy.

Without getting into gory details (and they are literally gory), let me just say that fixing the issue involved cauterizing delicate bits of me with silver nitrate. It was the second time since I squeezed the baby out that I've needed that procedure performed.

Also, I have developed (through the course of pregnancy and during postpartum baby hauling) bilateral tendinitis in my wrists. Not easy with an 11+ pound, quickly growing baby.

Don't get me wrong, it's all completely worth it and I love my little B more than life itself. That said... to those of you who continue to ask when I'll be having the second baby I say:

Mwaaaahahahaha! You should do stand up comedy because that is terribly unlikely, my friend.

Baby B

Apparently, my baby can read my mind. Or, he must have heard me reading my last blog post out loud. The same afternoon I posted my last blog entry, my water broke and it was GO time!

I started writing this post shortly after returning home from the hospital with my son... but holy crap, taking care of a baby is a lot of work! So, I'm taking a moment while he naps to finish my entry. I'm running on about 5 hours of sleep in the last 36 hours, so please excuse any typos, and I'm no longer responsible for my syntax.
____

I never really saw the appeal of reading someone's birth story. Having had the experience of giving birth has changed my mind completely. It's profound. So much so, that I'm afraid I won't be able to encompass the emotion involved... which is how I suppose a lot of people feel, and why birth stories aren't that compelling to the general public. Knowing what I know now, I can listen to the vast untellable behind the words in the birth stories I've read.

Here is ours.

It all began with a movie. With me being four days past my due date on Sunday, November 8, Bryan and I thought we should go see a movie, since it might be the last time we get to do that for a few years. The baby was really active during the film, and I figured he was reacting to the sounds in the theater, which were louder than our usual daily activities. On the way home, we stopped to get some small things at the store. I was feeling unusually sickish, but sick had been my constant companion all throughout the pregnancy, so I wasn't thinking much of it.

I was having some smallish contractions and figured I was dehydrated, so I drank a bunch of water when we arrived home. With so many false alarms, dating back for weeks, I was dubious that this could really be labor.

Bryan and I decided to take a little rest before dinner and laid down on the guest bed in the sunny front room. As we chatted, I felt the contractions come and go, so I drank some more water.

Around 4pm, I got up to use the bathroom and, halfway across the guest bedroom, I felt a rush of warmth starting at my nether regions and spreading all down my legs. We heard in our childbirth class that the water bag rarely breaks early and very rarely gushes like in the movies. I'm such a drama queen that way.

While Bryan called the OB's office, I tried to empty the rest of myself into the toilet and managed to get most of the fluid, at least, onto the bathroom linoleum. And with that, we rushed off to the OB reception. They'd seen us to much, I think they were ready to roll their eyes and send us away. Luckily, I had soaked my pants and had proof that I was in eminent labor (finally).

After all of the standard checking of vital signs, etc., they assigned us a nurse, who accompanied us upstairs to the labor and delivery room that we would occupy for the next 20+ hours. We stayed in that room through three nurse shift changes, one of which, I spent the entirity of nearly unconscious.

Because my water broke so early in the labor, and because I had tested positive for Strep B (a bacteria that comes and goes in healthy adults, but can cause issues for babies), the staff wanted to get my labor going faster. They gave me Pitocin, which increases the strength and intensity of contractions. Like they aren't painful enough to start with.

The OB on call came in, checked my cervix, and told me it was a big, fat one centimeter dilated. ONE! After seven hours of labor. Boo! She took that opportunity to chat with me about possible pain management options. I had been interested in attempting a natural birth, but with the IV for antibiotics, and now the Pitocin, I was feeling less able to move around freely. Besides, every time I got up, a new rush of fluid hit the floor behind me. My sweet, loving husband actually followed me around and cleaned it up. I have to imagine that was part of what they mean in the "for worse" part of "for better or for worse". The OB made a good point in that it was now nearly 11pm. My usual bedtime was 8pm, those days, so I was already good and tired. The OB said that when I was fully dilated (sweet Jesus, when would that be?), I would need to push the baby out. And... well, pushing is hard work, so I might want to be able to rest before my services were needed.

At 11:30pm, I was exhausted, contracting every 3-5 minutes, and terrified of having an epidural. A catheter in my spine? Come on. I have such needle phobia that I nearly passed out when they inserted the IV. But, fatigue is a funny thing that way. I called for the nurse, and she hooked me up with the anesthesiologist, a funny, charismatic man in his late 30s. He was magical, and in my blurry thought process, he was some sort of angel or elf or other do-gooder character. Mmmm... epidural.

So, for the next seven or so hours, Bryan and I slept on and off. I was constantly awoken by the automatic blood pressure cuff (every 15 minutes) and nurses checking my nethers (5 centimeters, 7 centimeters, 9.5 centimeters!). I also felt a lot of pressure in my... downstairs areas. I was confused as to why the baby wanted to come out of my butt, frankly. Nobody tells you that having a baby feels like being really constipated. Weird.

At 9am, the hospital staff decided it was time to push and, just like that, it was show time! The nurse said average pushing time is two hours for first timers. So at 11am, I was all, "What the hell, Baby? You're late!" He was, in fact, stuck on my pubic bone or something of the sort. I remember everything in a foggy haze of sleep deprivation and endorphins. Then, the nurse midwife (who happened to be a man, by the way), whom I had met several times in the past, came in to help out. According to Bryan, he literally stuck his hands inside my hoo-hah and turned the baby. Apparently, Little B was "sunny side up", or in layman's terms... facing the wrong way to make a clean exit. After that, within 10 minutes (or maybe it was an hour... who was counting?), my son was born. I had a mid-husband's hands all up inside and a lady doctor putting all of her weight on me just under my ribs, and then, someone said, "Look down." And there he was. All bluish and slimy and beautiful. He was so quiet and stunned. And then... he let out a wail I'll remember always. That's my boy!

Within minutes I was being sewn up. There was some business about a placenta. Did I want to see it? Ew. No. Bryan saw it and it nearly scarred him for life. Besides, why would I want to see some ugly old placenta when I had this beautiful little brand new person on my chest? His hands are huge, like Bryan's, and I noticed his fingernails immediately. Shaped like his daddy's.

Then, he was nursing. And they wheeled me upstairs to postpartum recovery. And Bryan and I spent the next two days blissfully falling madly in love with our baby. He took some time to figure out, and we're still working on understanding him.

And this is all the most incredible thing I've ever done or can ever imagine doing. And that's the best way I can put it. That's what I meant by not being able to put it into words. There just aren't any that suffice.

...

Okay Now... Seriously

Come out!

I have a non-stress test scheduled for Tuesday, and really thought that this baby would be out of me by then. So far, no indications that he has any intention of going anywhere soon. Yesterday, I tried dancing around the living room for about 20 minutes to everything from merengue music to hip-hop beats. Some contractions ensued, but then calmed right back down. And... I think all that action rocked Baby to sleep.

So, non-stress-test on Tuesday, followed by my regular OB appointment. And the induction has been scheduled already (a fact which, originally, made me scoff in disbelief and disdain). Well, at least, I have a limited time to continue to be pregnant. I was just hoping to avoid the intervention because I wanted to have a prompt and obedient baby. I mean, I can't very well say, "Do you want me to pull this belly over?! Then, I suggest you start listening to me, Mister!"

November 4

A year ago today, the United States finally succeeded in electing someone other than a stuffy white man for president. It was momentous, and I was so happy to be a part of that particular celebration in our nation's history.


And, just for the record, I think he's doing a stand up job, for the most part. But, this isn't a political post. (See my previous post on 10/21 for reference to why.)

Today is also a much-looked-forward-to day in our household because it is also (drum roll) my due date, and the little one is not cooperating with the schedule. Technically, according to my calculations, the actual due date was yesterday, but since Baby has yet to make any moves toward the exit, I'll go along with my OB's assessment.

So, just for any of you out there keeping score. No baby yet. Maybe I need better signage in there... or that exit lighting they have in movie theaters.

We Can't Have Nice Things

That's what Bryan said when our brand new car was hit by some crazy person in the middle of the night. We had had said brand new car for less than a week and put only 140 miles on it since driving if off of the car lot. And it was really only that many miles because the dealership was pretty far away.

The note the offending person left (and I give her credit for leaving one because goodness knows she could have just driven away... if her car was still working... a fact about which I am dubious given the damage to our car after impact)... the note said, "I hit your car, obviously. Extremely sorry." Along with that was her name, phone number, and insurance information. Very decent of her.. and yet, I found myself very upset.

All of the things our brand new car symbolized to us now felt cheapened. A new life starting, acting like grown ups because we're going to have a baby, spending some extra money to be safe and secure for our family. Boo. Stupid lady blew that to hell, obviously.

The "obviously" part of the note baffles and amuses me. First, well, it was obvious that she hit our car. Seems superfluous to add the word. Second, she punctuated the sentence correctly, making it hard to assume she was a drunken teenager. I picture some college-educated mid-30s person, working some lame job which is far beneath her education level, but not being able to find something else. She comes into the big city (different area code on her phone number) and has a night out with her ladies. Either she's drunk or not. She reaches out frantically to catch her cell phone which slides off of the car seat as she rounds the U-turn a bit too fast. She's lost because this is not her town and ended up going the wrong way on a nearly deserted street at 1:00am. And... BANG! She hits our brand new, bought it for baby's safety, first new car either of us has ever owned, prized possession at 40mph, shoving it against the curb and taking out the entire bumper, the hatch on the hatchback, and enough of the driver's side to require replacing the entire metal panel.

And I'm sure she yelled at her steering wheel, "Shit! Shit! Shit!" before possibly pausing to consider driving away. Then, doing the right thing, she took out a notebook and wrote us a note with her info.

It was the same note we found, soggy and sticking to our windshield the next morning as we joyously rounded the corner to take our brand new car to a friend's graduation ceremony. I read the note through hysterical tears, cursed the woman for being a crazy drunk, and called our insurance company. They, by the way, basically said, "You have got to be f-ing kidding us" because we just reported buying the brand new car exactly one week before. We did not get to go to the graduation ceremony, since our car was no longer drivable.

So, now the news is that the car is not totaled (meaning no frame damage). The damages on the body pieces alone came to a grand total of nearly $8000. Holy crap. That woman's insurance must be very unhappy.

For our part, we're still saddened by the turn of events, want to go live in the woods away from society, but are very, very glad to have been sleeping safely in our home when the accident occurred. (And I feel baby kicking me in the belly as I write this, affirming my last statement.)

Before


After