Unexpected

As I type this post on my new iPad (yay!), my son is asleep on my shoulder and I'm taking a moment to reflect on the last 10 weeks or so. The feelings that I have for him have evolved into something that I was never expecting. What started as disbelief and evolved into a tad bit of resentment (I'll admit it) has turned into that rainbow and sunshine feeling that I had been waiting and wishing for. We still have fussy days and I still get puked on, but I'm ok with that now. I've become the mom who can tell you what his crys mean and who can nurse in public without a nip slip (I fist bumped myself for that one). I've become a mom who can feed, dress (him and me), pack and be out the door in 1/2 hour. I've become a mom without even realizing it. Everything just seemed to click. Maybe it was because I didn't have a ton of help after the first two weeks. Maybe my hormones leveled out. Or maybe I just accepted that this was the new normal.

Five weeks ago, I remember telling Nick...begging Nick to stay home and let me go back to work instead. There were tears and irrational conversations. Through it all, he supported me and had faith that I would find my groove as a momma. He would encourage the smallest victories and interactions, hoping that I would latch on and build on it to find my confidence and new self. Through it all, I kept changing diapers and wiping spit up, hoping that I would start to get it. I had no idea what "it" was or when I'd know if I had it. I'm still not sure if I know when I got it, but I know that I did and it feels really really great.

What is "it" you might ask? It turned out to be funny faces during playtime, dancing in the kitchen, making up songs and being the one that he needed for comfort. It became outings to the mall and a television turned to the "off" position. It was walks in the sunshine and and fewer tears. It was Nick asking me questions and me answering confidently and passionately. It was mastering the Moby Wrap. Most of all, it was new feelings of purpose and the creeping feeling of working mommy guilt. Before, I was counting down and so ready to go back to work and now I find myself dreading it. This feeling is so unexpected that it caught me off guard. Suddenly, Motherhood doesn't feel like an obligation or a business transaction,. It feels like a reason to make sacrifices and hard choices. It also feels like a reason to play with toys and dance in the kitchen and its something that I definitely want to experience to the fullest.

Six Weeks

When Baby B turned 6 weeks old, I realized how important it was for me that I took the full twelve weeks off for my maternity leave. The first 5 or so weeks were spent healing, learning, crying and questioning. At six weeks, it was like a switch turned on and all of the sudden there was more laughing, smiling, dancing and sleeping. Had I not been waiting for that kind of moment, I may have missed it.

The first weeks of Baby B's life were hard for me. I was hormonal. I know that I had a case of the baby blues. They weren't severe, but at times I was struggling with loving him so much but not liking him and then feeling the overwhelming guilt of the combination of those feelings. I knew that having him was one of the greatest things that we'll ever do, but during those times, I questioned my feelings and wondered when it would get better. I'm so thankful that I have friends who told me the real story about being a mom. They told me that it would be wonderful, rewarding and fantastic - but they also told me that it would be hard. Really hard. I am lucky enough to have friends that prepared me for how it would feel to go cold turkey from the pregnancy hormones. Knowing that my feelings of being not normal were actually normal helped so much.

When the calendar turned to 6 weeks though, something fantastic happened. Baby Bean started to eat and sleep at regular intervals, making him somewhat predictable for the time being. He started to smile, on purpose. Seeing that face respond to us was something that I had been waiting for and it was just as awesome as we thought it would be. He also began to play with us, kicking and watching his little toys, stretching his growing body on his play mat. I also began to gain some mommy confidence. I found myself identifying his cries, knowing the difference between the hungry cry, the annoyed cry, the dirty diaper cry and the tired cry. I knew what tired eyes looked like and what to do when he was refusing to sleep. I was starting to really get to know him, which is a big difference  from just taking care of him.

For me at least, six weeks marked a time that my body had healed and that my mind was beginning to clear. Instead of thinking of what I couldn't do, now that I was a mom, I began to think of what I could do. Bean and I started venturing out more together, by ourselves. I stopped flipping out at Nick when he wasn't ready to leave at the exact moment that Bean was done nursing. I stopped fearing the idea of publicly breastfeeding and was able to take care of him at restaurants, malls and stores without slipping a nip. We had a lunch date and many outings to the mall. I also mastered the Moby wrap and I was even able to take Bean and Chino to PA to visit my parents - by myself.

For me, 6 weeks seems to have marked the beginning of the fun part. The tears, poop and spit up will still happen, but the smiles, laughter and cooing will balance it all out.

Posts

Since I've become a mom, I've had visions of blogging every day to capture the moments and thoughts that have become my (our) new normal, since the arrival of Baby Bean. Most of my eurekas come in the middle of the night while I'm nursing. When I have my phone with me, I add the possible title of the post as a note, when I don't have it with me - I hope that I'll remember it the next morning (I rarely do). Instead of dedicating entire posts to each of my ideas, I'm going to dedicate a post to a couple of the posts and hope that I do better with blogging.

• Sleep Deprived Dairy Farm
• This title is pretty self explanatory. At the beginning, I was having a lot of trouble with breast feeding. Thankfully, the trouble wasn't with my milk supply (Baby Bean has rolls galore), the problem was with the technique, which caused a lot of pain for me while Baby Bean feasted every 1 1/2 hours. 
• This title also may have been thought up during our first induction into "Cluster Feeding" - which is something that THEY don't tell you about. Once I knew, I was a much less bitter person about the irrational, screaming baby who wanted to eat every hour...at least.
• Smiles
• I'm a self-proclaimed non-baby person. My baby is one of few exceptions that I've made to my rule that an infant must be able to hold its own head up before I'll hold it. I prefer babies who interact and who don't look like baby birds. Thankfully, my baby has been working hard at holding his head up since day #1. Its like he knows. Anyway - I had been searching for the light at the end of the infant tunnel, and that light came in the form of a smile. Not a milk drunk smile, or a sleepy smile, or a gassy smile - a legit toothless grin - all the way to the eyes. That moment made me really excited about all of the other moments to come and made the not-so-great moments fade a little from my memory.  

I have a few other potential posts, which seemed like brilliant blog ideas at the time. Some I remember what I was thinking and some I don't, which is probably for the better. I'm going to do my best to try to capture both the good, the bad, and the blow outs. The bad and the blow outs make the good so much better, and those moments tend to be hilarious (usually after the fact). Speaking of blow outs - here's a little gem that we'll be sure to add to Baby B's wedding slide show.

Important advice

Throughout my pregnancy, I received a lot of advice from friends, family, co-workers, books and instructors in the classes that we took. When push came to shove (pun intended), everything escaped my mind except for a few critical bits.

1. Use the ice pads. 
2. Empty the cart that the baby's basinette is on. Take the wipes, the diapers, the bath supplies and everything else that's in there. 
3. Take a blanket and hat home to the dog. This was great for us because Chino was able to conduct a full inspection before we brought Baby Bean home.
4. Have giant, overnight pads on hand. You'll need them.
5. Bring your Boppy or breast feeding pillow to the hospital. Your arms will thank you.

Here are a few tidbits/observations of my own (in no particular order - except for #1):

1. Use the ice pads. Yes, its that important.
2. Breastfeeding is not natural and it is hard. If you want to do it, commit to it and know that it will take awhile for you and your baby to figure things out. For me, it was physically and emotionally painful. It took awhile for my milk to come in, which meant that I was frustrated and my baby was screaming. Just when I was ready to give up, things started to click, but it was heart breaking to know that my baby was hungry and there was nothing I could do about it. I'm thankful for Nick and for my mom who supported me, dried my tears and told me that everything would be okay. And it is.
3. In addition to figuring out how to install the car seat in the car, making sure its level, make sure you know how to install the baby into the car seat. Seems like a no-brainer, but when you're exhausted and overwhelmed and emotional, it is a difficult task.
4. Take a sleeper as a going home outfit. It is just easier than pants.
5. When ordering food, order two entrees. Insurance is paying enough that you can stealthily feed your hubby too.
6. Tip for daddies - take your own pillow and blanket. It might make your uncomfortable couch a titch more bearable.
7. Don't feel guilty about sending your baby to the nursery for a few hours so you can sleep. Or, if you feel guilty - just do it anyway because the sleep was worth it.
8. A tip for mommies and daddies - Its okay to cry. A lot. The happy hormone plug was abruptly removed and it takes awhile to level off after that. Not to mention the huge, life changing event that just occurred and the adorable tiny human that is now yours to take care of.
9. If you chose to breastfeed, go to a lactation consultant and get a bra fitting. Your boobs will thank you.
10. You will figure out your own way, what works and what doesn't and it is okay that it isn't what worked for your super mom friends or for the instructor in your baby care class. Be sure to tell yourself that while you enjoy the initial moments of cluelessness as you and your baby start to get to know one another.

Baby Bean's Birthday

We have been a family of three two leggers and one four legger for almost two weeks now, and wow does time fly. I can't believe that about two weeks week ago, this squirmy, snorty, poopy, snuggly little boy was a baby bump that we affectionately called "it". Even though I have no idea what I'm doing, I feel like I already know him, after spending so much time together before his arrival. My brain has shifted from "have I felt him kick recently?" to "when was the last time he ate and what boob was on the menu?"

Now that he's here, I really understand and appreciate Riverside Hospital's tagline; A Birth of a Mom. As soon as he was placed on my chest, it happened. I transformed from a selfish pregnant lady to a mommy. It happened so fast, I almost missed it, but the feeling was unmistakable. All of the sudden, I forgot about my swollen ankles, my sleepless nights and my craving for lunch meat because I was holding my son. "It" had a face and a name and a GENDER! He was here and it was love at first sight. Before I move forward into what I've learned in this week, I want to back up to the day he decided to enter this world.

I woke up when my alarm went off at 6:30am, with every intention of heading into work, since Baby Bean wasn't due for another week. I was still hoping for an early arrival, especially since my Dr. gave me the impression that I wouldn't be making it to my scheduled appointment on Monday. When I woke up, I noticed that I was having some cramping - nothing major, nothing to call home about - but definite cramps. Then they stopped. Then they started again. That's when I said to Nick, "I think I'm having contractions."

Being the newbies that we are, we still weren't sure, so he proceeded to get dressed and ready for work, and I decided that I'd be working from home, just in case this was the real thing. I made my way downstairs and the cramps continued - stop, start, stop, start - in irregular intervals. At this point, I knew that this was IT. I was going to have a baby. They still weren't bad, so Nick went to work to get his laptop so he could work from the kitchen table while keeping a close eye on me. We started timing the contractions, using an app of course. They were pretty irregular in duration and in the time in between. Because we are Mr. and Mrs. Directions Followers, we were waiting for that magic time that they taught us about in class - the 5-1-1 rule. Contractions that are five minutes apart, lasting at least one minute for an hour.

As the day went on, the contractions (cramps) continued. I was able to walk around, eat (popcorn, cereal and mac & cheese), talk and watch TV. Somewhere around 5pm, they started to intensify to the point that I had to sit and bounce on an exercise ball in order to get through them. At this point, we were realizing that this was really real, so Nick loaded our hospital bags, packed a bag for Chino and then made a call to his Aunt to arrange a mutt drop-off before we went to the hospital. In the back of my mind, I was still in shock that this was actually happening. I was afraid to go to the hospital too soon because I didn't want to get sent home. All through this process, we had been keeping my parents updated, promising that we'd call when we decided to head to the hospital, so they could start making the trip to Ohio from PA.

Finally, around 6:30pm - the contractions were around 6 minutes apart. We decided that we should go to the hospital NOW versus waiting for them to be 5 minutes so we had some time for traffic and to drop Chino off. We got in the car and headed to the hospital. We pulled up to the valet at the hospital, met Nick's aunt, and handed Chino off. She seemed more nervous than we did. I was still walking and talking and wondering if this was it, as we headed through the doors.

Once we got to the maternity floor and into triage, the nurses asked a ton of questions, including how long I'd been having pain and what my current pain level was. They eluded to the fact that we may not get admitted. Maybe it was because I wasn't screaming and swearing? I don't know. They finally checked me and found that I was already at 7cm, which meant that it really was time for Baby Bean to make his arrival! Aside from high blood pressure, everything looked good and it was time to get admitted and to get to the labor and delivery room.

Because laying in bed made the contractions more painful, I stood while the paperwork was completed and then walked to the room where Baby Bean would be born. After our class, I was expecting to be able to use the shower and the birthing ball to help ease my labor pains, but as soon as we got there, I was hooked up to an IV, which limited my mobility. Although I had yet to have THE contraction that made me want an epidural, I asked for one as a preventative measure, and was put on the list. Even though I couldn't move too far from the bed, I went through labor by standing and pacing and leaning on Nick. I had a short leash, but moving made labor bearable.

As we waited for the anesthesiologist, the contractions started to get more and more intense, making me glad that I had asked for and signed the papers for an epidural. Finally, just as the anesthesiologist was walking into the room, I had THE contractions that made me so glad that I got on the list. I was breathing through them as they were placing the epidural in my back. Nick said that between getting into the room and the epidural, I went through around 12 REALLY intense contractions. I think that I was having an out of body experience because I remember the pain, but not the duration.

Once the epidural was placed and I was laying down, the pain just stopped. It was pretty freaky how fast it worked. My legs were heavy and felt like they were asleep, and I was able to feel a teeny bit of pressure "down there", but that was it. Now that I was comfortable, they checked me again and I was 9cm, and almost ready to go! The timing was perfect, because at this point, my parents had made it to Ohio and were waiting in the waiting room. I gave the OK for them to come back and say hello before the pushing started.

Before I knew it, it was time to push. The stirrups came up and these nifty little handles popped up on the bed for me to pull against. The nurse gave me instructions, deep breath in, blow it out, deep breath in and PUSH. She counted to 10 and I repeated this 3 times. Nick held one of my legs and looked down and saw our baby's head starting to show. The Dr. was on his way! I continued pushing on and off until he got there - a couple of times she asked me to stop pushing so the baby wouldn't arrive before the doctor. The competitive lunatic in me was patting myself on the back for being an awesome pusher, which is a totally irrational thought to be having under such circumstances.

The doctor walked in, got himself prepared and situated and told me to push and before I knew it, there was a baby on my chest and it was a boy. A boy. A baby. What just happened?! Nick cut the cord in one cut, making him a championship cutter, which was fitting, considering my self-proclaimed status as championship pusher and the baby was taken to be weighed and measured.

Keeping the suspense going, we texted the grandparents to come in to "meet their new grandchild". When they walked in the door, Nick and I both announced that it was a boy and their tears started flowing. Because of the epidural, I still felt fantastic and even said "that wasn't so bad, I could do that again." My mom still cracks up about that because it was about 1/2 hour after I gave birth.

Once I was cleaned up and able to move a little bit, they bundled Baby Bean up, put me in a wheel chair, handed him to me and off we went to our postpartum room to recover.

Nesting

I've heard that when you get close to having your baby, that a mysterious nesting instinct kicks in. From what I've heard in classes and from other mommies, you get this undeniable urge to clean or vacuum or something. This concerns me because I don't really EVER have the urge to clean, I don't know how to clean properly and I really don't even think I've ever used our vaccuum. Seriously. I made a deal with Nick that I'll continue to fold his never ending supply of socks, t-shirts, and underwear if he takes on cleaning. He's 100% OK with this, as am I. Win-win.

So. Back to this mysterious nesting instinct. I was wondering how mine would manifest, since cleaning is completely unnatural to me. Low and behold, mine manifested itself in the form of organization, specifically attacking the pantry and fridge yesterday afternoon.

We got back from the grocery store on Sunday and as I was putting things away, I realized that there was no way I could put one more thing into the completely disorganized pantry, filled with some expired food. What happened next was a shelf by shelf purge of EVERYTHING in the pantry. Nick stood back and watched with awe as I threw out mystery sauces and dip mixes, old dog treats and expired canned goods.

This isn't the most flattering photo of me, pregnant, and plopped on the stool, but I can still feel the gratification of that overflowing garbage can and the auxiliary garbage bags that followed.

A short list

1. Woah belly - that ruffle on my shirt really accentuates the obvious
2. This weather makes Chino act like a puppy - I love it. 
3. Every week, we take two photos of me - one by a wall and one by the stairs. It started because my mom wanted me to stand in a doorway so she could see the belly progression, but we realized that most of our doorways opened into a mess of some sort, so we substituted stairs and added Chino.
4. How is it already been 37 weeks?!?