They Grow Up So Fast

cold season

My husband, older son, and I have all been sick with bad colds. My husband's mom had been diagnosed with viral bronchitis. Since I'm breastfeeding my seven week old son, I thought he wouldn't get it as bad as we all did, if at all. 

But I was very, very wrong.

On Thursday night, Archer was spit-uppier than usual, fussy, and coughing/sneezing. By Friday mid-day (when we were an hour away from home, of course!), he was REALLY wheezy/raspy, super pale, listless, his oxygen levels were down, and he had spit up with some blood in it (speculation on that, though, is he possibly got some from a cracked nipple, since he only spit up blood the once). We high-tailed it back into town, got him in to see his pediatrician (nothing but accolades for Dr Smith at Sartell Pediatrics!), and was immed

iately referred to admittance to the hospital.

We were lucky that Archer was only in for one night, but he had to have an iv in (for the second time in his life) and a dose of steroids. His bloodtests came back normal and his wheezing cleared up. We were able to go home the next day.

While I was complimented on my down-to-earth and easy-going manner, what all the nurses, PCAs, and doctors don't understand is that inside I was one big ball of freaking out. This is my (preemie) baby we're talking about!

So, long story short - let this be a PSA to be very careful with your new bundles as the cold season swoops around. It's really scary to think what COULD have happened if we hadn't acted as quickly as we did, and it's scary to think that something as mundane as a cold could make it happen.

third trimester woes

I have entered the phase where I am feeling big and unwieldy and unsexy...  And it doesn't help when I wake up at 5am to my husband masturbating in the bed next to me.  :(  I know the previa has made things a bit more... complicated, and I really do want to ask my doctor on Wednesday if certain OTHER things (ie. not penetration) are still acceptable, but yeah.  Normally I would have rolled over and at least started making out with him while he finished off, while working on myself, too, but yeah, again, this previa thing has really confounded me.

The thing is, I'm glad he's able to still get his rocks off.  (On top of being a male, he's also taking Zoloft, and he's been on enough anti-depressant/anti-anxiety meds that just KILL his libido, so yeah.)  I just, yeah, am really kind of sad that we're not able to either get off together or have actual sexual interactions.  And then there's the whole Big and Pregnant thing where I just, ugh, don't feel pretty or desirable.  And our schedules have us so that we almost never actually TOUCH or anything anymore, either.  He comes to bed after I do, and by that time I have Passed. The. Fuck. Out.  We don't even kiss goodnight anymore.  Only time we really touch is when I'm leaving for work.

And I'm feeling really pathetically girly for feeling this way.  I usually pride myself on not being like your typical female, but these hormones, oh man.  Ugh.  I miss the connection, I need the reassurance.

How is it possible to feel lonely when I am actually surrounded by love?  Why?

every twinge brings about paranoia

So, here we are at 29 weeks.  Pretty uneventful, in all honesty, from the outside.  My glucose test came back just lovely, I have had very little waterweight SO FAR, I have had only slight carpal tunnel symptoms SO FAR, and my weight gain has been pretty much on par with last pregnancy.

Except for this wonderful placenta previa thing I've got, things aren't so bad.  Except that placenta previa is kind of a Big Deal.  *sigh*  It seems both my boys have managed to give me prenatal problems.  It's just that Boo didn't give me a life-threatening one!

Weird thing about my specific case is that while it's a complete previa, somehow the placenta has managed to "divide".  It's all one piece, but the part over my cervix is thin, with the bulk of the rest on either side of my cervix.  All the same, if something should happen, like my cervix beginning to thin or dilate, I could start bleeding, which could then lead to hemorrhaging for me or the baby.

For now, it's all about keeping an eye out.  After 28 weeks, I was upped to the every two weeks doctors visits anyway, but now I'll have another ultrasound (that'll make the tally five for this pregnancy!) around 35-36 weeks to take another look-see at the placenta, and the c-section will happen more toward the beginning of October as opposed to the end.  Also, I'm a pretty good candidate for a tubal ligation - IF my doctor can convince the holy St Cloud Hospital it's not in my best interest to have any more children (which is the only way they'll allow such permanent birth control).

So hey, here's me keeping my fingers crossed that we get to 37 weeks with minimal fuss or "excitement".  If I have to go on bed rest, so be it, but I'd rather work up until I have this kid.  Can't afford not to.  But, only time will tell.

22 weeks

Yeah, I will admit that I invited him to photobomb.  I am trying hard to involve him in every step of this Growing a Baby/Brother process.  I want him to understand he is unquestionably precious to me and that I will always love him with a ferocious and protective intensity.

Reveal!

He was disappointed at first, but I think he's coming around...  He's starting to think about all the things he can teach a little brother.

Pre-Big Reveal

Tomorrow is hopefully the Big Day.  It's the 20 week ultrasound, and we're hoping to find out what the sex of the baby is.  A baby who, by the way, has started be-bopping around my innards.  In the last days of pregnancy, the movements are comforting and either pressing or gliding.  In the first days, it's sort of creepy.  I can't believe I forgot about that...  I mean, there's something moving inside of me, and it's alive!  (And it's not a tapeworm.)

So hey, all bets are on.  Because I'm not even going to take a guess.  Last time I tried, I figured it was a girl, and I got all boy, baby.

the end result is still the same, isn't it?

I think one of the things that bugs me about having a c-section for this baby is that I feel like I'm being looked down upon, made into less of a "warrior woman," because of it.  I mean, yes, I do honestly think that there is too much hospital intervention when it comes to birthing and that a goodly percent of women are woefully undereducated when it comes to their own pregnancies/birthing...  And I DO agree that a natural birth is, well, the way it's supposed to go...  

But what happens when it doesn't go that way at all?  What happens when you've HAD medical intervention?  Does having another c-section make my birthing experience any less valid?  Does it mean I'm less of a mother because I didn't push the kid out vaginally?  It's a vicious backlash, and it almost seems as if, in some circles, you're looked down upon for "taking the easy way out".  Trust me, nothing about a c-section is easy.  

Y'know, I'm glad there are more sites and more ways to access proper information.  I am glad of the resurgence of midwifery and of women's empowerment.  I am.  I am just not one of those women who will  be partaking of that particular brand of empowerment.  I am still trying to be okay with that, and I think that has more to do with the guilt of NOT pursuing it than the actual procedure itself.  I've already BEEN cut open once.  I know how it goes.

And that surge of love you feel when you first feel that baby placed into your arms?  Well, I'm pretty damn sure that's not any different, no matter how the baby's been delivered.  

report

We have now hit 16 weeks!  The 20 week ultrasound has been scheduled!  

I had another ultrasound at 12 weeks because the heartbeat was impossible to find via doppler.  Baby made a good profile and was proven to be growing on track.  Apparently the placenta was shown to be low-lying, so if I have any bleeding or whatnot, obviously I will be calling my doctor.

However, as of this latest doctor's appointment, the bean is still doing just fine.  Maybe measuring nearly a week ahead of schedule, but I'm cool with that.

I even managed to lose a pound in these past four weeks.  Don't ask me how.  It's not like I'm not eating.  But I'm not complaining, at any rate.  I expect to gain weight toward the end, so I'll take whatever respite I have currently.  Heh.

It still feels surreal.  And then I wonder how we're going to deal with two children.  Guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.  Until then, we'll just keep getting Boo used to the idea that he'll be a big brother...  One who is absolutely convinced he's going to have a sister.  He's got a 50/50 chance of being right.

deposit

Guess this is really happening.  Hello baby.

Of course, with the intense nausea (almost horked it this morning after a coughing fit), the super sensitive nose, the amazing amounts of fatigue, the intense hunger, the enlarged and ultra-tender breasts, and the figuring out the heart flutters, there pretty much HAD to have been something in there.  This is gonna be a tough ride, for sure. 

Boo was there, and he was very curious what those pictures were.  Erik and I told him it was a little baby inside mommy's tummy, and now he keeps asking to look at my tummy so he can see the baby.  It's so cute.  I just hope he doesn't feel like we love him any less.  I hope he doesn't feel displaced or cheated because, oh, I love him so much, and if it weren't for him, I may have given up on so many things quite a while ago.  He's my lovebug, my sweetie pie, my Baby Boo.  He's my sunshine.

fluttering

This is an aspect I hadn't anticipated.  I'm having a thumpy heartbeat and even heart palpitations sometimes so bad that I nearly faint.  While at work.  This is what I call Not Good.

Got my first doctor's appointment tomorrow, and while I won't be seeing my OB/GYN (rather, a general family practice dr), I will definitely be asking about it.  I can't NOT work, and I'm scared as well as really sick of not feeling 100%.  Luckily I work part of my shift with some understanding ladies, but still, that won't save me if I faceplant on the floor for the other part where I work with early 20s men.  Gah.

I could even deal with the nausea better if I didn't have the heart thing going on.  *sigh*  I'm no good with not being at 100%.

positivity

Barring an ultrasound to prove yea or nay about an actual embryo, I am most definitely pregnant.  I'm late, I'm bloated and crampy, my boobs hurt like whoa (and holy hell, those nipples stick up like little soldiers!), I'm tired beyond belief, and the nausea has suddenly hit.

Buckle your seat belts and hang on.  I'm only at five weeks.  First doctor's appointment is March 6th...

little wishes

I'm just going to go ahead and dare to hope.

And then shit bricks because the reality of having to deal with Boo plus a baby is utterly terrifying.  He's such a strong personality and sometimes very, very frustrating to deal with!

But, for now, I'm late, the tests report positive, and I'm crossing my fingers for the best possible outcome.  Because, dammit, I want to dare to dream.

preemptive

Not even late, but two pg tests, one on Saturday and one today have both said it's a positive.

So, uh, body, catch that?  Please stay that way?

Maybe it helps that this time I'm actually a bit freaking out, thinking of the reality instead of the cushy fantasy?  Either way, whoa, this would be big.  And awesome.  Making me big and awesome.

Crossing my toes.

Know what you've got while you've got it? How novel!

Tonight was a trying night, stemming from a long and activity-filled day.

First up, we had Boo's oldest cousin's birthday party.  The C-Man turns 6 on Monday.  And oh man, do they get wild and rowdy together and just have a blast.  They play SO WELL together that they might as well be siblings (because they DO also manage to tattle on each other when things don't go their ways).  So, what with the playing and the present opening and the people (read: attention) and the cake, it was awesome overload pt 1.

Then, on the way home, he DID NOT NAP.  This is what it all hinges on.

Third, we met up with some friends at the Paramount for a glorified dance recital.  These friends, between them, have four girls that Boo also regards as siblings, and the older two were there.  More awesomeness, more attention overload.

Sooo, when it was time to get ready for bed, guess who pitched an epic screamy fit?  You guessed it: the Over-exhausted Toddler!  In that fit, he threw his Innotab, his puppy, something else I can't remember, and his cthulhu.  To which I took them all away.  Rule is: If you throw it, you lose it.  That's it.  Respect your stuff or else.

Anyway, fit finally soothed, and stories finally read, and cuddling before tuck-in finally happening, he crumped one more time and asked about his stuff.  I looked at him and said, "I know you want your things, but look around and be grateful for what you DO still have," and I ticked off, one by one, all the stuffies that were still strewn atop his bed.  

And then it hit me.  Be grateful for what you do actually have, not what you've lost.  Lesson learned, kid.  Thank you.

crumple

I think I finally need to admit it...  I'm diving toward a depression.  I am angry, I am oversensitive, I want to hide from the world and all interaction...

I am not well.  I know that.  And I knew this would be hard, these weeks, knowing that if all had gone well, I'd have a baby in my arms right about now.  I knew it would suck...  I was just hoping that I'd be pregnant again by now so the blow wouldn't be so harsh.

But here we are, and I have no baby (since there was no baby in the first place) and no pregnancy to promise a baby.  I have been desperately flailing, blindly groping for a result and an answer, and it's too much.  How do I deserve anything that I wish for when I feel so greedy about it?  When I look at the world and start to ask questions about fairness?  I know the world is not fair or partial.  I know I'm not owed anything, and I know that things will happen when they will.

But my heart, it hurts.  My head is not right.  This healing shit is taking too long, too long.  I don't have time for this.  I want joy in my life, honest laughter, to feel like I'm involved.  And this failure, even just the way I'm feeling...  It's got me thinking I'm on the outside of something, and that's all I'll ever be - is looking in on everyone else.  I thought I would outgrow that, but I guess I won't ever.

I just want to cry and to sleep.  I want someone to take the time to tell me it'll be all right.  It gets so hard being so strong all the time.

another one down

As another month passes, I made damn sure to hug Boo as soon as I got home. He's proof that, on occasion, I can win in life.

Also, hey body, what gives? 26, 27, 27, 29, 26? Can you give me some consistency please?

the short wait that feels long

As we approach the end of the first month of 2012, I am finding I'm dreading the Day.  Y'know, the one I said I would be all nonchalant and zen about, to take in stride...  The Expected Period Day.  Except I'm not all nonchalant and zen.  Granted, I'm not spazzing and freaking, but I do find myself in dread of it.  Erik and I did give it a good go at trying this month, but I'm still dreading the thought that another month went by and nothing.  Which, dammit, will be just fine in the end because, dammit, Boo is awesome-sauce.

But here it is.  Three days to go.  Maybe four.  And I'm already tempted to take a pg test, as if that's going to be accurate right now or anything, even if it says it can tell you "up to five days before you're late".  Uhhh, sure.  Anyway, I almost used one this morning.  I lay in bed as long as possible (it's warm and snuggly under there and cold and NOT snuggly outside!) struggling with the urgent need to pee, and I told myself, "If Boo's awake, there's your sign to not take the test."  Sure enough, I finally got out of bed and his head popped up as I peeked in his room.  "HI!"  I laughed to myself and went "Okay, okay Universe, I get it."

But then I had this dream last night that Erik and I were in either Thailand or Singapore, in a house-like place for some bizarre extended stay, and he wanted a little action.  With his two pronged penis.  Yeah, I don't get it, either.  Except that I looked it up and penises in dreams apparently mean something like sexual energy, power, aggression, or fertility.  So whatever, right?  I told Erik, and he's all "It's gonna be twins."  Makes me wish I was practiced at my tarot cards so I could give myself a quick reading.  As if I'd be unbiased enough to accurately read them.

So now, patience.  And probably a healthy dose of tears no matter how this waiting game ends.

timber

It's interesting trying to feel sexy/appealing again after years of... not. Of being a mom, of being the bread-winner, of being function. Sexy, me? How peculiar. Maybe it's just a realization that I've lost the ability to enjoy myself and my form, and I'm not sure where or when that happened. Maybe I'm pining for my 24 year old body and realizing that the passing of a decade and having a child (through surgical means, no less) has without a doubt changed my body, and it's up to me to reconcile that. Maybe I've just been doing too much reminiscing lately.

Admittedly, I do miss the bygone days of semi-lustful and admiring glances from random people, but life was a lot different back then, too. I went out, I danced, I partied, I flirted, and I thrived on the attention. And I was younger and dumber.

I think, more than anything, it's time for me to realize that physical things are to be enjoyed and experienced rather than mindlessly plowing on. Because that's what I've been doing.

Self-awareness isn't exclusive to only the mental and spiritual aspects. Sensuality, in its actual definition, doesn't always imply sex. Just... enjoyment, sensation.

This could, of course, also be my midlife crisis. Scary thought.

new year

So I had that clogged tear duct in my left eye.

It started in earnest at the beginning of December, the day we brought Boo in to the eye doctor to get his eyes checked.  (Yes, our three year old needed to see an opthamologist.)  My eye had excessive tearing up, pressure on my eyeball, sore skin around my eye because of the salt-water constantly seeping out of it, and my sinus gave off pressure like whoa.  Painful, inconvenient.

But two days after Boo's eye appointment, I went in for my routine check-up (that I hadn't had done in probably four years), got my new prescription, and then had a needle shoved into my tear ducts and saline squirted into it... only to have it squirt out the other duct on that eye, instead of into the back of my throat like it should have.  Throbbing pain, on top of the eye dilation and then the reverse eye dilation.  I had to go to work that day, too, and what misery that was.

So, the eye.  The eye.  The teary, weepy, evil eye.  Betrayer eye, affixed to a betrayer body.  Between the pityriasis rosea and the clogged tear duct, something was telling me that maybe the miscarriage was a harbinger of Weird Maladies.

I got a referral to an eye surgeon in the Twin Cities metro area.  Amazingly enough, it's the same doctor my mother-in-law was referred to when she had her own clogged ducts going on.  It was far enough out that there was the hope the clogged duct would just work its way out on its own.  I did the hot compresses, the sinus massaging, to no avail.  In fact, for a while there, it made the pain and the weeping worse.  So I stopped doing it altogether, except when I'd do a quick massage to try and alleviate sinus pressure.

I thought about going to my regular doctor to check out the sinus thing, but everything I'd read online about a sinus infection indicated a lot more was going on that just a simple clog.  Plus I didn't have green crap coming out of my nose, too, no coughing or lung cookies...  So I dropped that idea.

So now it's, what, three weeks later?  Having gotten used to my condition, I haven't worn make-up in forever, I carry tissues with me everywhere, and I have gotten used to daubing my eyeball as needed.

Except on Saturday, I went to blow my nose and this... ick came out.  Foul stuff.  And it was like something shifted in my head.  I can breath out of my left nostril again, the pressure is gone...  And the weeping is pretty much non-existent.  I haven't had an actual non-sad tear run out of my eye for a few days (even though I have been daubing, but I'm not sure if that's out of habit or necessity).

Of COURSE the appointment with the specialist is in two days.  And as far as having medical bills to pay, I SHOULD cancel it and save myself from wracking up another bill, but for shits and giggles I'm going to go.  I want to hear from someone knowledgeable that my eye is okay again.  IF it's okay again.  To ask questions about why the clog happened in the first place.  To see how long my eye will be sensitive to moisture levels.

Go figure.  But I think, on another level, this eye thing has been a metaphor for ME.  *I* am clogged up, and in order to be clear again, I need to blow away all the foul things that have been festering inside me, the jealousies and bitterness and stress and desperation.  I know the turning of the years aren't much more than symbolic, but sometimes I think we need those symbols as a touchstone, something quasi-tangible that can help us realize (or re-realize) our direction, what's important.

So hey eye, thanks for the lesson.  Now get back to work.