M's nanny

M has her not-so-pleasant side in the evenings.  Some nights this is not a big deal, other nights its a little scary.  Last night was a pretty scary night.  She fussed and freaked out from 8pm-2am.  We call this the purple-flailing-frog mode.  She gets herself all totally worked up, the arms flailing -- which then freaks her out even more, and she beats her head against your chest and tries to suck on you like she's never been fed in her entire life.  It's so sad, just breaks my heart. 

Today was the first day Dh went to work all day and M's nanny came.  We hired a wonderful Tibetan woman who works with babies from newborn to pre-school age.  She will come two days a week to help me out.  I was very hesitant about what it would be like to have someone hanging out in my house (it is a small house).  I only just recently started having a house keeper come once every-other-week, and that still kind of weirds me out (but I really, really needed some house cleaning help, and I LOVE it). 

I am hoping that by having the nanny come from virtually day 1 it will be easier for me to transition back to work slowly as the time comes, as it won't be like leaving M with a stranger.   Once M is eating on a somewhat less frequent basis I hope to be able to spend an afternoon or two at school each week for meetings.  But back to M...

We interviewed the nanny a few weeks or a month ago and fell in love.  She immediately won me over as she is very peaceful and just radiates a good aura.  Plus, a close colleague and his wife had nothing to say but wonderful about her (she cared for their two kids when they were younger, and still baby sits from time-to-time). 

She showed up around 9am and spent the vast majority of the day just holding M, changing diapers, and bringing M to me when she was hungry.  I took a wonderful 2 hour nap in the bed all by myself and a really long shower without feeling guilty.  I answered some email.  And then it was time for her to go.  While it was a little weird when I got onto the computer, I think this will feel more normal as time goes by.  In the meantime, I am over-the-moon about the little break. 

I feel refreshed.  It's wonderful to have M back in her moby wrap sleeping on my chest now.  I'm ready for the return of the purple-flailing-frog tonight.  Bring it on...  :)

A week with little M

I can't believe M was born a week ago today.  This has been the most spectacular, wonderful week of my life.

Dh has stayed home every day and we've lived in a cocoon filled with baby cuteness and snuggles and disbelief that we made this amazing little creature.  She is perfect in every possible way.  Even her crazy crying fits are adorable (we call this the purple-flailing-frog mode).  She makes this eh-eh-eh sound when she's getting pissed; it is hilarious and so freaking cute.

She still had on her hospital tags as of this morning.  We finally cut them off since we decided that we won't need to take her back for a refund or exchange..  ;)

Dh is still wearing his wrist band from the hospital.   He is such an amazingly cute father.  He is way more into M than I had even thought possible (and I knew he'd be crazy about her more than he did -- he kept saying that he'd be more into her once she turned 5).  But little M is so snuggly and sweet...  millions of years of evolution have resulted in babies being completely irresistible to their parents. 

I am working on my birth story but find it hard to find time when I have two free hands for typing.  I can't resist holding M as I know this super snuggly fetal stage won't last and I want to revel in every minute of it.  Dh and I went through the labor and delivery over the last fews days and wrote down all the details we could remember.  I will get it together soon and share. 

M amazingly has slept for 3-4 hours at a stretch at night for the last 3 nights, and I actually have to make myself wake her up to have a snack.  It is wonderful.  I'm afraid it won't last, but I have my fingers crossed.  I'm still tired and in a bit of a mind-fog, but nowhere near as tired and exhausted as I had mentally prepared myself to feel.

I can't believe how quickly my body is healing.  I already lost half of my pregnancy weight gain and my down-there girlie-bits are looking even more like the ones I recognize from before getting pregnant than the ones I had during pregnancy. TMI alert:  my butt on the other hand... I seem to have avoided hemorrhoids but let me tell you honestly that body parts are not going in the proper direction, if you understand what I'm saying.  It's uncomfortable but doesn't hurt.  Kegels, kegels, kegels.  The stress incontinence seems to have disappear immediately with birth, as did my asthmatic allergies and other more general discomforts.  Weird how quickly that all changed back. 

I had thought I'd feel empty once M was born, but instead I just feel more like me. 

The breastfeeding is coming along, but it really isn't easy.  and I say that knowing from the lactation consultant that I have actually had a very smooth start compared to most women.  My milk came in by Wednesday morning, which feels miraculously fast.  Little M was psyched though as that completely rocked her little world.  Nothing soothes M like a milky snack.  And I love breastfeeding her; it is so sweet to sit quietly and just stare at her getting more and more relaxed and satisfied.  But OMG, it hurts.  The first minute or so is painful and then it is fine.  We have a little bit of a latching issue because M gets on and will not let go no matter what, so it's hard to readjust when the latch is wrong.  I show the consequences... quite sore on top of very, very large breasts that just might drive me insane over the next few months.  But being able to monopolize on the snuggly milky baby is so worth it. 

I think of you all lots and am slowly catching up on all my blog reading.  Luckily that is fairly easy to do one-handed.  I love all of you and can't wait to be all caught back up on how things are going!

3:49am March 14, 2011

Thank you so much for your good luck wishes! It ended up being a 25 hour labor, nowhere near as painful or scary as I had prepared myself for, but it was exhausting, and luckily ended with a vaginal birth at 3:49am this morning. My little M was born and she's perfect!

7 lbs 3 oz, 19 inches long

I can't even begin to describe how amazing and relieved I feel. And it is so hard to believe this beautiful little creature is ours to take home! We are both so smitten with her.

I will write more later with details on the birth and a photo, but wanted to share the amazingly wonderful good news!!!

the daylight savings surprise!

At 2:30am on saturday night (a time that technically didn't exist) I was woken up by an amazing tsunami of amniotic fluid gushing from my body. There was lots of meconium in it so I've been at the hospital ever since. Contractions started on their own as we were driving to the hospital. Around noon I went for an epidural and things are moving slow but I am feeling pretty good. 5cm and 100% effaced. I have thrown up a few times, which I hadn't realized often comes with labor. Now, just waiting. The amazing thing is that it is happening and it doesn't feel anywhere near as sureal as I was expecting...

The end game strategy

I had an OB appointment this morning and a fetal heart monitoring (non-stress test). 

Turns out that my body got started on this birthing thing a few weeks ago but nothing has changed in about 3 weeks.  So, the OB wants to take action.

Since she'll be in the hospital on Monday we are going to go in on Sunday night and start inducing!  They'll give me cervidil on Sunday night and some drugs to help me sleep.  At 6:30am on Monday I'll start pitocin.  If all goes well little M will be born Monday afternoon/evening.

I had feelings of "don't want to do that", realizing that I had developed a little scenario in the back of my mind about waking up with contractions, waking up Dh, laboring at home for a while, etc.  I guess I also had kind of wanted something about this pregnancy to start "naturally", as if it was meant to be.

But that's silly.  "Meant to be" makes no sense.  Just because something is random does that mean it was meant to be?  Was my miscarriage "meant to be"?  Was the tsunami and earthquake in Japan meant to be since it happened "naturally"?  Obviously the answer will depend somewhat on your religious leanings.  But for me, the answer is "no".

An induction, in many ways, makes life a bit less stressful as we go into this transition.  Part of what has been really hard on me this last week has been the anticipation and let-down.  Every morning I wake up a bit disappointed that I didn't go into labor.  And I have to psych myself back into enjoying what might be my last day of pregnancy.   

It looks like I have two more nights in my own bed before I have my baby!!!  I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am.  Little M will be here soon!!!!

The waiting game

Going past one's due date is a cruel joke to play on a woman who has been through IF.  All during this pregnancy I've felt like it wasn't real, that it was a joke and that there was no way I'd walk away from this experience with a baby.

Now I spend my days getting increasingly more and more uncomfortable.  My hands ache terribly.  My hips ache.  My back aches.  My stomach feels so large and distended that virtually every position is uncomfortable.  I can't stand on my feet for longer than about 5 minutes.  And the sad thing?  I have had a remarkably easy pregnancy, so I know that this is just nothing compared to what most women go through.

But here I sit, almost 2 days past my due date.  People keep constantly telling me that their sister went 2 weeks past her due date, their cousin went 3, another woman said she went a month past hers (I don't believe this one), everyone smiling and laughing when they tell me (as if they are the first to inform me of this) that all first time pregnancies go late...  even my husband tells me that I knew to expect this because that was the first thing a male-MD friend emphatically told me over dinner a few weeks ago.  Men, telling me that I shouldn't be so frustrate because it is expected.  Women, telling me all the horror stories.

Aside from the physical difficulty, what is really hard is the emotional side.  I can't help but feel like I will be pregnant forever, as before I thought I'd be infertile forever.  This is all just a cruel joke -- let me prepare and get excited, and then never let me get to the ultimate goal... and torture me with the physical crap on top of it.

The cup

I've written before about not really knowing what to put into a birth plan.  All I really want is to make it through safely and have a healthy baby to take home.  Otherwise, I'm really flexible.  I mean think about it, after you completely give up on a romantic passionate evening with the love of your life being the moment-of-conception memory that you hold forever for your child, do the birth details really matter either?

But I realized that there is one thing that I do care about.  A physical object that has come to represent quite a lot to me.

And it's a big plastic cup.

On June 11, 2010, Dh and I had a monitoring appointment as we went into our second IVF attempt.  We had planned to take the day off from work to celebrate our anniversary, so this monitoring appointment was supposed to be something relatively positive on the baby-front that we did early in the morning before heading to the zoo to watch the monkeys. 

But this monitoring appointment did not go well.  In fact, it was terrible.  We were told that we only had one follicle after all the injections and surgery and cyst and waiting, etc. etc.  We were both upset but I was pretty devastated.  That was rock bottom and I was ready to give up.  If we weren't already so invested by that time, and already paid close to $25,000 on this baby project, I would have given up and walked away.  Licked my wounds.  Tried to pretend none of this every happened, that I didn't really want to have a child.

We went to the zoo as planned and ended up napping in front of the monkeys, just absorbing the news and not really talking about it.  We managed to have a really nice day that ended with margaritas at a wonderful mexican restaurant.

But the strange thing was that that one follicle turned into three, and one of those was the golden egg that is now little M.  My little M who is due TOMORROW.

We shared a drink that day at the zoo, one that came in a big plastic cup with a lid and straw and a giraffe on it.  One of those cups meant to be kept and used over and over. 

I started using this cup at work to help me keep track of how much water I was drinking over the last 9 months.

It reminds me of that day at the zoo, the day I pretty much gave up hope.  And it reminds me of how wrong I was. 

I brought that cup home with me when I left school the other day.  I want to use it during labor to keep hydrated.  I want it to be there to remind me how far we've come, how wrong I was that day, this crazy path we've taken to little M, and all of my blogsisters who have traveled this path before me and who will follow in my shoes hopefully very, very soon.

So my birth plan?  Perspective, gratefulness, and a take-home baby.

I'v been good and I've been bad

39 weeks and 5 days.  I'm doing really well, but primarily because I've dramatically changed my life and completely given in to being very pregnant.  I haven't been to school since Wednesday.  I didn't say goodbye to anyone, made no announcement of being out, just never came back.  That feels kind of weird, but it also feels organic to have just not returned when I couldn't any more. 

I have a weird pregnancy snore that makes it hard for Dh to sleep (wakes me up sometimes too).  Over the last couple of months I'll periodically sleep somewhere else to give him a break.  But early last week I tried for a few nights to sleep in the guest bedroom, on the couch, or in little M's room but slept terribly.  That put me over the edge and I became dysfunctional and frustrated.  We have figured out that, much to dh's chagrin, I sleep better when we are together.  He's being really sweet and insisting that we sleep together from now on; maybe he doesn't entirely mind since it makes him feel needed (which he is).   I wonder if subconsciously I feel better knowing he's right there to help if I wake up in labor. 

I have been getting up pretty much on the dot at 6:30 or 7am and have about 4-5 hours of energy.  This is good for me to get dressed, have breakfast, and accomplish one or two specific tasks before getting really worn out.  I then have enough energy to sit around for another couple of hours but absolutely have to nap from about 3-4:30pm or so.  Then I'm back to a small amount of energy until 10 or 11pm but only enough energy to stay happy, not enough to be highly functional or accomplish anything (although last night Dh and I went for a little walk).  Because of this recognition of my very restricted mental and physical capacities, I have only set little goals for each day, just one or two things that I want/need to get done.  Like today I managed to change the sheets in the guest bedroom and catch up on my blog-reading.  Aren't you proud of me?!

I consider this change in activity, this listening to my body, a really good thing. 

Little M feels really big to me now and she moves around a lot.  Every movement is noticeable these days, which is good but also distracting.  And honestly, sometimes it is really uncomfortable.  Her head is very low in my pelvis.  When she moves her head around my pubic symphysis gives me a really sharp pain.  I've had these from time to time throughout my pregnancy, but over the last week they've gotten much more serious and last longer in duration.  It's debilitating when it happens as it is a really sharp pain.  A couple times a day little M will really get moving in there, shaking her head around and doing something that feels like tugging on the umbilical cord.  I have to stop whatever I'm doing and just wait for her to settle down, it is so uncomfortable it is, honestly, almost painful.  But it is good.  When she is quiet I start to freak out a little and sit very still waiting for the next movement.  Ah, nothing like a little baby foot swooshing by to ease one's mind...

But I have also been bribing myself these days to keep my mood up.  As you know from my last couple of posts I have had moments of frustration.  About a week ago I decided that I would just eat whatever I want from now on, anything to reward me for staying positive about hefting around such a large and heavy belly.  This means comfort food.  The only redeeming thing is that I am not hungry so I'm not eating all that much (and actually lost a pound), but still, the sum total of what I've put into my mouth over the last week would make a nutritionist cringe.  It's a trade off -- want me in a good mood or want me to eat my vegetables?  I decided to go with the former until this baby gets here.

Can you believe I'm at 39 weeks and 5 days?  It feels so surreal, I'm not sure I'll believe it is all real until I actually see my baby and they let me take her home from the hospital.

The art of being ecstatically happy

Justine's post today and Pie's comment that women are very quiet about the non-joys of breast feeding got me thinking about something I've wanted to get off my chest (aside from my very large breasts, although I have to admit that the huge belly has temporarily solved the hugely disproportionate breasts problem... in fact many people comment that I don't look 39 weeks pregnant, which must result from the relatively smallish belly compared to other women at 39 weeks)

But back to the topic for today. 

As you all know, getting pregnant was not easy for me, and the experience of a prior miscarriage brought with it serious fears of staying pregnant. 

Additionally, my husband has always worried that I'll have a hard time truly stepping away from my career, as I come from the 80-hour-a-week world with no holidays. 

And, I'm now 40. 

All that said I feel intense pressure to always be optimistic, happy, and to feel great.  I worry that people think I'm too old to bear a child, and that any tiredness or achiness just shows how I shouldn't be pregnant at my age.

Dh has a tendency of reminding me that I really wanted to be pregnant and therefore I deserve no sympathy for my pregnancy symptoms. 

And I feel like I can't ever express concern or worry about the radical change that is about to come to my life, and yes, my career.  I want this change, but that doesn't mean it will be easy or all good. 

I am kind of scared.  I worry that I might not love little M enough to overcome all the hard parts.  And I am most afraid that I might be very lonely since I won't feel like I have the right to have any unhappy moments.  I wish that getting pregnant hadn't been so hard, as then I might have more of a right to experience and talk about the good AND the bad that comes with this life change. 

I really really appreciate your all's honesty on your blogs, especially coming from women with IF and loss in their pasts, as it lets me know that the good and bad will be normal.  I know that I can come here to be honest and get honesty in return.  Just because getting and staying pregnant was so hard for us, that shouldn't mean that having a baby is any different from other women.  When do we start feeling normal?