Happy 2010

Superstition says that whatever you do on the night of a new decade you’ll be doing for the next ten years. Will I be drinking wine with my midwife and her family playing taboo for the decade? As it turns out New Years is a little less exciting and a little more meaningful with an infant. The partying is done (for a few years anyway) and you’re left to appreciate and enjoy your surroundings.

Well, here’s my 10 for ’10…

*365 photos of Little ‘Ver’s first year.

*Become certified as a doula

*Regain my prebaby size

*Donate breast milk at least once

*No bottled beverages!

*Eliminate dairy and eggs from my diet

*Update once a week

*Only use yarn/fibre from my stash

*Come up with 20 “go to” recipes

*Love more.

 

And with that I’ll say goodnight and Happy 2010 to you.

 

 

RIP Yogi

It’s taken me awhile to be able to come to terms with this, but…

Yogi, originally uploaded by cerochellet.

You were an amazing friend, we will always love you.

“Our animals shepherd us through certain eras of our lives. When we are ready to turn the corner and make it on our own… They let us go.”

-Author Unknown

Baby’s First Christmas

It was an excellent Christmas. It didn’t feel excessive like previous holidays have. Things were simple, the gifts were small and meaningful, and the conversation was good. My mother and her husband even let us treat them to a home-cooked vegan Christmas dinner.

May you have a wonderful holiday season and even better new year.

Love,

C

Hello?

It has been awhile, hasn’t it? As you may have guessed we had our little munchkin. We made it all the way to 43 weeks! Yes, you heard it, 43 weeks. Everyone loves a woman at 43 weeks pregnant…

After 46 hours of back labor and 10 minutes of pushing we had our Little ‘Ver. It certainly wasn’t the beautiful water birth we had planned, we wound up being part of the 3% our midwife has to transfer. But, we made it!

Little ‘Ver wound up being posterior at the last minute and wrapped over and over in his umbilical cord, with a true knot. We discovered his heart rate had dropped to 50-60 bpm (instead of 120-160) due to the wrapping of the umbilical cord and the intensity of my contractions. He was being hung by the cord and coming through asynclitic. When he came out the cord tore and he was limp. It was awful, and while 11/11 wound up being the best day of our lives, it was also the worst. We were certain for a moment that my pushing off of a cesarean had killed our child.

After he had been revived and deemed healthy it felt like there was a triumph throughout the hospital staff. Staff members who hadn’t even been part of our birth team came in to congratulate us. It’s amazing how our intimate birth of J, our midwife, and myself turned into a huge room full of  specialists and teams ready to go into action at any moment.

I am thankful. I am thankful for my amazing midwife who never left my side and helped us make wise decisions. I am thankful for the wonderful team of women at the birth center who spoiled me rotten and gave me postpartum care on the house. I am thankful for the multitudes of hospital staff who kept my child safe while honoring my wish for minimal interventions.

Right now we are almost six weeks postpartum, been having problems with heavy bleeding due to a prolapsed uterus. -Always birth your placenta, ladies! ‘Ver is doing great. He’s huge! Born 7 lbs 4 ounces, 22″ long. (Even though the ultrasound guesstimated nearly 10 pounds. Yes, ultrasounds may be off by 2 lbs or so.) He is now nearly double the weight. He is amazing and beautiful and his daddy and I love him very much.

He was very alert from the start, loves to talk, and cuddle with the kitties.

There’s been a lot more happening, but this has been long enough.

35 Weeks 1 Day

How is it that I don’t have a “real job” yet I’m always busy? We had the baby shower and scored big. I feel blessed. A little overwhelmed. We have a lot of stuff. A lot. And an already crowded 500 square foot apartment.But we’ve had to buy so little things. I think we’ll have to get some diaper covers, and that’s it.

Physically I think I’m officially in the, “I’m large and in charge and SO over this” stage. He had a growth spurt, putting us from measuring three weeks behind to only one. My back hurts, my rib hurts, none of my clothes are comfortable wa wa wa…  Not to mention our new downstairs neighbors smoke inside so now our apartment smells like cheap cigarettes. Maintenance tried to fix it… Maybe I’ll demand a downstairs unit?

We also lost our health insurance this week. We found this out after we went to pay it. J is between services and we were told that since he is still technically in the NG we’d be fine. Liars. So we either get to cough up an imaginary $500 to get health insurance for October or… We don’t know. Pay for baby out of pocket? I don’t think so!

Isn’t the final stretch supposed to be blissful and relaxing? Grumble grumble grumble.

I know it’s worth it. I’m just ready.

33 Weeks 2 Days

We’re hitting the final countdown. I can’t believe how time is flying. Even without work I’m still busy every day. Cleaning, research, creating, groups, not to mention going to lots of shows… I love being the only pregnant lady in clubs. At what point in pregnancy does it become socially unacceptable to boogy on the dancefloor?

Baby ‘Ver is getting big! I’m still measuring behind but the midwife says our little munchkin feels good-sized. Everyone who feels him kick says there’s no way he’ll be in there for the full forty. We’ll see, he just needs to stay in until October 7th.

This weekend is my baby shower. I’ve been oggling baby stuff. It’s finally time I can actually purchase stuff for our new items and get it set up. Yay! Perhaps this cute little book in Hindu dieties?

31 Weeks

After several weeks… Maybe a month of severe isolated rib pain I finally went in to get it checked out. Turns out I’m growing a cage fighter. The little shit broke my rib! -And people say vegetarians can’t make strong babies.

30 Weeks 2 Days

Last Thursday my niece (who is two years older than I), her seven month old daughter and I packed up into the car to go to our first La Leche League meeting. In short, it was amazing. J and I have invested so much time and energy into this birth, and seeing this room full of new mothers was a bit of a reality check. Yes, there is indeed life beyond the birth.

There are two meetings offered in my area. One for toddlers and one for infants. We went to the infant one. There weren’t very many people there that day. I’d say there were eight of us, not including babies. There was one other pregnant woman, this would be her second child. I was the only one who had not gone through my “rite of passage.” My niece had the oldest child there. All of the others were still under eight weeks. The room was filled with overwhelmed, exhausted, and frustrated new mommies.

I received an overwhelming amount of information and met really amazing women. -Most of whom share the same ideas of birthing + parenting. (Yay!)

Next time I’m so bringing a notebook.

Listening to: Grizzly Bear’s Veckatimest

30 Weeks One day

Pregnancy has finally taken its toll on my emotions. Well, judging by the way I cried because my husband gave me a foot rub. …And because I might’ve bitten the head off of a stranger asking for a cigarette. The next ten weeks + postpartum should be mighty interesting.

Listening to: my cats chirp

29 Weeks 5 Days

Yesterday, upon Jason’s request I ran by the recruiter’s the pick up paperwork for his transfer. Nothing startles a room full of military men quite like a pregnant dread-headed woman with facial piercings and a sleeve tattoo. Thankfully he had called his recruiter prior to my arrival, so he had recognized me and rescued me from the swarm of anxious military personnel.

It should be interesting when we move the a base in the South. Yippee.

Listening to: Charles Mingus’ Oh Yeah