Chasing A Child

A peek inside my head

Yay, it's finally my one day a week when I get to stay home from work with the baby! Wish I had more energy. There's so much to do.

Why does it seem like every time I brush my hair it gets dirty? Hmmm. Oh wow, look at all this gunked-on crap on my hairbrush. Wonder what it is? Hairspray, residue of hair products? Gross. No wonder it's making my hair dirty. I could toss it and get a new one but this was an expensive brush. I'll clean it. The baby is whining, but she can wait a few minutes. I need clean hair! Gack, this is taking a long time. I can't believe I haven't washed this hairbrush in 3 years. Oh wait ... has it been longer than that? Maybe. Eeew.

God, I wish I had time to give myself a pedicure. Guess I'll settle for finally clipping this torn toenail ... oh, wait, the baby is asleep! I'll clip all my nails, yay! Maybe now my socks won't get holes in them.

When was the last time I shaved my legs? I have no idea. But the baby is sleeping! I'll just clearcut the forests of hair from the knee down ... there. Hooray! But I still feel frumpy. None of my pants fit and these jeans I got at Goodwill 2 weeks ago are too big. I look like hell.

Oops, she's awake again. Feed the baby, burp the baby, cuddle the baby.

I'm tired. I'm so tired. Holy hell, I'm tired. I feel like I'm going to throw up I'm so tired.

Switch sides. Funny how my left breast is the big producer. Poor baby almost drowns sometimes. Baby is getting sleepy again. I'll just peek at my work email while feeding the baby.

Wow, look at all those people writing to tell me I was completely wrong in the question I sent yesterday ... to every general counsel in my teensy little industry. Oops. That's embarassing. That's what I get for trying to cram a new regulatory scheme into my head while feeding the baby, eating breakfast and force-feeding my 3-year-old. Too bad none of them know I've been on maternity leave -- they might cut me some slack. Damn, that was a dumb question. Can't believe I sent it.

Did I mention I'm tired?

Hm, the baby's sleeping. I'm hungry. Why does it seem like there's nothing to eat when our fridge is packed full? Oh, maybe I'd better toss some old stuff out. Hey, look -- moldy bread, rotten lunch meat, shriveled olives, several jars of homemade stuff that people gave us 2 Christmases ago .. no, 3, was it 4? Hm. When did we order this pizza? It was definitely before last weekend. Not sure. Lettuce is turning slimy, strawberries are shriveled ... yogurt expired in December. Homemade pesto made before I gave birth ... Let's haul all this stuff out to the compost, wash the containers for recycling, put empty jars in the dishwasher ... Okay, fridge is clean. And basically empty.

I'm still hungry. Oh wait, the baby woke up.

Feed the baby, change the baby, oops -- baby poos on the changing table before I can get a diaper on her, clean up the baby's mess, diaper the baby, dress the baby. I always used to wonder why the Boy never had blowout diapers. Now I know. We fed him formula. Breast-fed babies = explosive yellow poo. Who knew?

Noon. Baby is babbling at me. What to do with the rest of the day?

Little things

The basics are pretty important right now. Sleep. Shower. Get dressed. Eat. Feed children. Dress children. Change diapers. Help with potty training. Brush teeth. Commute. Work. Pump. Eat. Work. Pump. Work. Commute. Feed children. Play with children. Put children to bed. Brush teeth. Sleep. And somewhere in there, wash dishes, clean bottles and pump parts, do laundry, pack lunch, pay bills, put on and remove makeup, brush hair, converse with the Mister, email friends and family, and generally keep all boats floating.

*****

I finally gave up and started co-sleeping with the Girl. Two nights so far and, wonders of wonders, the child sleeps! I remember waking up a couple times in the middle of the night to nurse her, but we were both basically still sleeping. It's not perfect -- I'm so focused subconsciously on not crushing her or knocking her out of bed that I wake up with a big crick in my neck from holding my body just so all night long -- but it's infinitely better than trying to convince her to sleep in her bassinet (which she's basically outgrown already), and her crib seems so big and lonely ... But did I mention she sleeps?! None of this up-for-2-hours-for-no-reason stuff. If she's got a warm body to cuddle against and a nearby food supply, she'll let me stay in bed all night long, and wow oh wow does that make mama happy.

*****

The one thing that's really not happening yet is exercise. After giving birth, I immediately lost a ton of weight and was within 5 pounds of my pre-baby weight. I know, disgusting, right? But it was actually a problem, because I wasn't carrying enough weight to keep up with breastfeeding. I ate a TON in the first few months, just to keep a minimal level of milk flowing. Six meals a day and ice cream every night, yay! And I'm still only 6 or 7 pounds above my pre-baby weight. I'm backing off on the ice cream now, because I can tell my body's metabolism is slowing down (drat), but now I'm dealing with the general floppiness of skin and belly and behind and, oh, pretty much everywhere that comes with giving birth when one is 46 and not an Olympic athlete.

During my leave I was at least able to get out the door for 45 minutes or so every day for a walk, but now I'm not even getting that. I basically sit on my a** all day, and it shows. I didn't expect to be Miss America right after giving birth, but I also didn't expect to be gaining weight after the initial loss of baby weight. I'm up several pants sizes from my heaviest weight pre-baby, and it mostly seems to be that my hips have gotten bigger, in addition to my floppy belly/behind issues. Is that possible? Will they shrink down again, I wonder? I wish we had space in our house for a treadmill, but we don't. Not that I have time to use it ...

Even today, the one day a week when I'm home all day with the baby, I haven't been able to get outside the house yet. I was about to head out a few minutes ago, but it started raining, and our stroller doesn't have a rain hood and ... sigh. I may end up going to the mall for an hour, just to walk. During the week, there is literally no time to exercise. None. How do other working/nursing moms do it? Or do you just not do it until something else in life eases up?

*****

In happier news, the baby coos now. And smiles big grins. And the Boy spontaneously tells us he loves us (while continuing to fight bedtime as if it's his worst enemy).

Hi-ho, hi-ho ...

I went back to work last week. Our little girl was 9 weeks old. It felt like I sprinted out the door Monday morning, ran full-tilt all week, and sprinted in the door Friday night. It was a full week. FULL. The temp attorney actually did a very respectable job keeping the worst of the work under control while I was gone. There are huge stacks on my desk, of course, but it's not the chaotic mess I feared. Just a lot of work requiring me to focus every minute I'm there on the task at hand, so I can dash out the door at 4:30 to start my home shift at 5. I'm working 7.5 hour days without a lunch break, which means that I have to pack all my food for the day so I can eat at my desk.

If I could leave the house earlier in the mornings, it would be helpful, but the sleep deprivation makes that impossible for now. Since the Mister is a nightowl, he's handling the Boy's lengthy bedtime process, and I try to go to bed with the baby at 9pm. She usually sleeps solidly until midnight or 1am, then feeds for an hour or so. After that, she naps an hour here and there in between feedings. She's a loud sleeper after midnight, so even when she's asleep, I'm not able to fall fully asleep for the rest of the night. I often seem to be awake or dozing with her in the chair from 1am to 5. She'll usually toss and turn in her bassinet from 5 to 6, when she needs more food. My alarm goes off at 6:30, the Boy is up at 7:30, and we're off to the races. I can barely get out the door by 8:30 when our nanny arrives.

And then we're spending half the weekend seeing various friends -- a friend's birthday dinner Friday night, brunch/playdate this morning, dinner/playdate tonight -- and Sunday morning we're having a photographer over to do our first set of family pix. After that, I plan to pass out. In all likelihood, I'll end up paying bills instead.

My maternity leave consisted of 2 weeks of sick time, one week of vacation time, and 6 weeks of short-term disability leave (at 60% of my usual pay). It was the best we could cobble together. I'm working 4 days/week, with the 5th day being unpaid FMLA leave. I'll do that until we can't afford it anymore. I wish I could stay home with the baby for the next few years, but that will have to wait until my next life when I'm reborn in the Netherlands or some other civilized place that mandates reasonable parental leave and universal health care.

The Boy is in preschool 4 days/week and his nanny has transitioned to being our baby nanny 3 days/week (she's in college the other 2 days). For now, the Mister has both kids on Tuesdays and I stay home with the Girl on Thursdays. We're hoping to switch the Boy's schedule around so that the Mister only has the baby on Tuesdays. Not that he can't handle both kids, but he'll be able to do a little bit of income-producing work if he only has one kid, and we need his income to pay for all this childcare. Figuring out our schedules has been like a very complex game of chess. Figuring out our finances is a never-ending balancing act, performed in the spare minutes I can grab here and there. Somehow, we're making it work, but it feels a bit like a house of cards -- if one extra thing piles on (visitors, school vacations, etc.), the whole thing could come tumbling down.

*****

I'm breastfeeding the Girl as and when I can. We got off to a rocky start. She had a great latch from the first minutes after her birth (our doula called her a hoover because she had such a strong suck), and I apparently have the perfect equipment for nursing. (Never in my life did I imagine that I would have so many women complimenting my nipples as I did in the days after her birth ... nurses and lactation consultants literally oo'ed over them! Way to make a girl proud ...)

But our little Girl had severe jaundice when she was born, and spent 36 hours under the bili lights at the hospital (bringing our total hospital time to 6, count 'em, 6 days). She had to be hydrated quickly, and my milk hadn't come in, so I gave them permission to start her on formula. I went to the nursery every 3 hours to nurse her, and I'd bring as much colostrum as I could pump in between visits. But it wasn't an ideal start. Eventually my milk came in (engorgement, ouch!), but it's never been enough to fully satisfy her ravenous hunger, so we're supplementing with formula.

This is good in a way, because it gives us the flexibility to use formula when we're in a place where nursing might be awkward, and the Mister can step in at 4am when she's been nibbling on me for the past 6 hours straight so I can get some sleep and my "perfect" nipples can get a break. The lactation consultants all suggested various ways I could increase my flow, but most of those methods involved more work than I had time for. For example, they told me to pump after every feeding, which was pretty much impossible, since she was eating every 2 hours and took up a full hour to eat because she'd fall asleep as soon as she latched on. I'd wake her up, she'd suck down a few drops, and pass out again. Lather, rinse, repeat. Then I'd have an hour to clean the pump parts, deal with the 3-year-old, do laundry, eat, sleep, pay bills ... Um, yeah. So post-feeding pumping was a non-starter. I'm actually fine with it -- the situation is what it is. I nurse her in the morning when we wake up and once more before I leave for work. Then I pump twice a day at work (yay for a private office -- I can pump and work at the same time). Our nanny feeds that milk to her the next day via bottle, with generally one additional feeding of formula. I nurse her as soon as I get home and then she might have one more bottle of formula before bed. After that, it's mostly breast milk the rest of the night. Sometimes she wants an extra couple of ounces of formula towards dawn, but I've worked up to managing most of her feedings all night. Which, of course, means that I'm getting less sleep, but that's okay. The minutes may drag, but the days fly quickly, and before I know it, she'll be weaned and I'll be glad I did what I could.

Did I mention she has an enormous appetite? Seriously, our little girl went from the 12th percentile on the growth charts in the first weeks after her birth to the 75th percentile at her 2-month well baby appointment. It's truly astonishing to watch her grow. She blew through the newborn clothing in her first month and is now out of the 0-3 month clothes too. The Boy was always on the lower end of the growth charts, so I'm a bit stunned by our little Amazon. She's going to be tall.

So much to say; so little time. Must wake up the Boy and get myself and the baby ready to go out. More another day.

He's dead, Jim.

Some people say that births, deaths and weddings bring out the worst in family members. I have a tale to tell about my daughter's birth causing a family member to die. No, not a literal death. More like one of those mob family deaths, as in "He's dead to me."

So my in-laws came to visit. The idea behind their two-week visit, as I understood it, was that they were coming out to meet the baby and to help out. Two weeks seems like way too long, in retrospect. I'm not actually sure I knew it was going to be two weeks until they were on the road, but then I was 8 months pregnant when this was all finalized, so it's totally possible that I was informed but the info just flowed off my brain while I worried about other stuff.

Anyway. Meet the baby, they did. Helpful? Well, yes, periodically. MIL, to her credit, helped us prep for and clean up after a "meet the baby" party we threw last weekend. She also spent hours and hours and hours holding and changing the diapers of the young lady I sometimes refer to as Princess Poops-A-Lot. I was able to get some important paperwork taken care of, laundry done, and a variety of other household chores wrangled that require two hands and/or half a brain to manage properly. Truth be told, I'd much rather have spent the time holding the baby and resting while someone else did the chores, but sometimes it's just easier to do things yourself, and I appreciated the thought behind the gesture. Too bad I can't end this story here, but ... well ... shit happens.

As some of you know, my in-laws and I have a bit of a history, particularly when it comes to visits involving new babies. Suffice it to say, there's been some drama in our past. And then more drama about my blogging about the drama. And all that drama nearly ended my marriage, which was already in dangerously rocky territory. I haven't blogged about that part, but trust me when I say that the Mister and I were very close to calling it quits for awhile there.

Fast forward two years to the last day of their most recent visit. We were all freakin' exhausted. The Mister and I had been averaging 3, maybe 4 hours of sleep a night. The night before, I think I got 2 hours. Brother has a horrible cough, had been on a multi-day hunger strike, and has been having sleep problems again. His behavior ranges from fragile and sweet to maybe-we-should-get-professional-help atrocious. He's waking up multiple times in the night wailing, and I suspect that he is waking more times than we realize (Sister has a strong set of lungs and is not afraid to use them), perhaps as often as we are, which of course is making him act out even more during the day. The ILs stayed at a motel, but had been at our house for dinner often enough that they'd seen Brother's mealtime madness and had an opportunity to form judgments about the ways that the Mister and I are trying to deal with his behavior. They hadn't said much, but they definitely let their opinions slip in here and there. I was proud of myself for successfully biting my tongue when the how-to-parent-properly opinions got tossed around. I kept telling myself that the only kids the ILs have raised are now creeping up on 50, and the memories of how it actually feels to be parenting in a sleep-deprived state have probably faded to very pale and wispy clouds. In other words, I was trying to cut them some slack. But the comments did begin to wear at me, and this had been an unusually long visit during a very stressful time.

The Mister decided that it might be good to go out for dinner to "a restaurant with toys" (aka a brewpub with a play area). The one we went to was crowded as hell, and the crop of kids was older than usual and very rowdy. Brother had just come from preschool and was exhausted. He promptly picked up a toy and hurled it at another kid, hitting him in the face. Awesome. It took us a half-hour of disciplining/consoling him before we could even order our food, and when the food came, of course he didn't want to eat it. We ended up putting him in a high chair because he was acting out so badly. Disheartened and depressed, I turned to the Mister and started telling him that I'm concerned Brother may be displaying ADD behavior.

MIL interrupted me. "He's three!"

Yes, I started to explain, but I've seen behavior that can't be explained away by his age ...

She interrupted me again. "He's three!"

I started to reply, but realized my "just let it slide" defenses had reached their limit. I was tearing up from anger, frustration, exhaustion, hormones, whatever. My baby isn't even a month old yet, my older child is displaying very worrying behavior, I've had houseguests for half of the time I've been home from the hospital, and now my MIL is both interrupting me and dissing my very valid concerns about my child. Where to begin expressing how wrong all of this is?!

MIL saw my tears and shot me a look that said "what's wrong with you?" So I replied, in what was undoubtedly an angry tone, "He's MY kid!"

"What?! What brought that on?" she said in a shocked tone. Part of me says it was faked shock. But let's be generous. Maybe she really didn't know why I was fed up. So I started to explain. "He's MY kid and I'm trying to explain that I think something is really wrong with him, and you interrupted me twice ..." (At least, this is what I think I said. It's what I meant to say, and it's the gist of what I remember saying.)

One thing is certain. This is the point where FIL lost his frickin' mind. "Shut up! You just SHUT UP!" he bellowed. I gaped at him, as the restaurant fell silent. The man was a professional actor and knows how to project his voice. All eyes were on our table. "NO ONE talks to my wife like that! God DAMN it!" he yelled, then got up and stormed out.

Um, okay. Let's take this step by step.

• My father-in-law (a man who prides himself on being cultured and gentile).
• Cursed me out. (I remember him saying "God damn you", but the Mister swears it was "it", so I've provided the gentler version. Regardless ...)
• In a restaurant that was full of families with kids.
• In front of my husband.
• In front of my children.
• Less than a month after I'd given birth to the second of his only two grandchildren.

Nice, eh?

I feel compelled to point out that, although he said no one talks to his wife like that, he should have added "except me." Their conversational style is an endless nit-picking argument, with her peck peck pecking at him, and him responding by bellowing things like "No it's not a hot day, for god's sake!" It drives me nuts. It's so habitual that the Mister thought it was the way all married people talk to each other, and when he started using that conversational style with me, it became fodder for more than one marriage counseling session.

But let's back up. What exactly did I say to her that was so offensive? Nothing, as far as I can tell. My sin seems to have been confronting her at all. See, their family doesn't discuss difficult topics. They talk about other people and other people's problems, but if there are interpersonal problems that involve one of them, their approach is to sweep it all under the rug. MIL has actually lectured me about this in the past when I have insisted on discussing difficult topics with her. They are simply not used to being confronted about anything they say. So when FIL said "no one talks to my wife like that," he may be speaking a literal form of truth. The Mister's brother and his wife have given up speaking to the ILs entirely for months at a time, because it's easier than trying to have an honest conversation with them.

Of course, none of that gives FIL the right to yell at me in this manner. My friends have offered possible explanations -- is he an alcoholic? suffering from early onset Alzheimer's? No and no. He's hard of hearing, and I doubt he actually heard or understood what I was saying to MIL. My read is that he saw me confront her and lost his marbles. The Mister says he thinks FIL was just worried about MIL crying all the way home (because she apparently did that the last time) and lost his temper, but that's no excuse.

The aftermath? Nothing. Nada. Zip. The Mister sat there with his head in his hands. Afterwards, he admitted that his parents were in the wrong. I suggested that an appropriate response might have been "No, YOU shut up. No one talks to MY wife like that." He said he didn't want to escalate thiings in a public place, and I suppose that makes a certain amount of sense. But it would certainly be appropriate for him to have that conversation later in private, and I'd pay good money to see it happen.

MIL's response was to completely ignore her husband's outburst (lift carpet, sweep unpleasant thing underneath, ignore, repeat) and to change the subject. "I really don't know why you care about my opinion!" she said, shaking her head in (fake?) dismay. Um, if you don't want me to care about your opinion, why share it with me at all? Honestly, I think she had no idea what I was talking about and no matter how long I took explaining it, she still wouldn't understand. As far as she's concerned, it's just another instance of me overreacting to a harmless statement. (For context, "harmless statements" in the past include her spending the weeks after Sammy died yammering at the Mister that we had to try again right away or her father's lineage would die out. Not once did she offer me condolences for our loss.)

Have they apologized? Nope. And until they do, they're not welcome in our home, nor will they be seeing their grandkids. (And the apologies need to be real, as opposed to the stuff I've heard in the past -- e.g., "I'm sorry for anything I may ever have done that upset you" -- which is just like saying "I'm sorry you feel hurt" -- it's a BS apology that doesn't name or take any responsibility for one's actual actions. A real apology would be "I'm sorry that I said you'll be able to get pregnant now that you lost one baby. That was rude and insensitive of me.")

Will they be furious that I've blogged about this? Absolutely. But FIL lost the right to feel outrage when he cursed me out for no reason in front of my kids. Folks have tried to tell me that there is real value in kids having grandparents, no matter how damaged the grandparents may be. But if the kids see the grandparents treat their mother with utter contempt and disrespect, where is the value in that? It's better to have no dad than to have a dad who beats your mom, and the same can be said for the rest of the extended family. Kids learn to imitate what they see. I worked too hard to build this family to allow that kind of behavior to stand.

So, yeah. Good times.

No baby today

So we're ready for baby to come, but baby is going to stay put for a little while.

After many exams and much discussion this morning, the L&D doc decided that Sister is an "unstable lie", which basically means she's too damn squirmy to stay in one place very long. Meaning that, if we tried to turn her today, she'd likely flip back around tomorrow. She's still sideways, but since Tuesday, she'd flipped around from having her head on my right side to having her head on my left side. How did she do that?? And the risks of the external version outweigh the benefits of turning her at this point, "particularly with an anterior placenta" and the way she was laying. The little bugger was on her back, with one of her hands and both feet all jammed down in the exit door, which would have made it extremely hard for the doc to get a grip on her. She's small enough and I have enough amniotic fluid that they think there's a good chance they could turn her at the last minute if I go into labor in the next week -- the consensus was that there was no burning need to turn her today. Which means I went without food & water until 1pm for no reason at all, sigh! By the time they were ready for me to make a decision, I was too spaced out to think clearly, so I asked the Mister to decide for us. (He said he knew then that I was really really hungry, since I'm usually the Queen of Control Freaks.)

The current plan is to try to turn her next Friday. If that's successful, the doc recommended binding my belly so she can't flip back, and then inducing immediately. I'm okay with that plan for now. I'm opposed to induction for convenience and have been opposed to the idea that we need to induce just because I'm old and she'll be at 39 weeks, but now that we've added in the flip-flop problem, I'm thinking it's probably our best bet to avoid a c-section (although I know of course that induction can cause its own series of problems). I'm also much more confident that the hospital will let us move as slowly as we need to, unless there's a real emergency. I can't say enough nice things about the L&D staff I've dealt with so far. They say they're a baby-centered hospital, and I really see that in my experiences. No one is rushing me or pushing for medical interventions, and the focus keeps coming back to making sure baby will be as well-baked as she can be, weighing in all the various risk factors.

Plus, my Doc is back next week and will have plenty of time to overrule or tweak the current game plan, and the hospital staff has made it clear that if Doc wants a change, the hospital won't get in her way. It's kind of fun to see the look on their faces when I mention her name. She definitely gets a lot of respect : )

And, there's always the chance I'll go into labor before then. I'm still having mild contractions, and the L&D doc said this morning that I'm 1cm dilated, which made me burst out laughing. My body may be 46, but it somehow knows that it's going to have a baby! How amazing is that?!

****

Finally, because this blog can't possibly be all baby all the time, I've got to give a shout-out to Squeaker, who has slept through the night for the past FIVE nights in a row. He's really turned a big noticeable corner in the past few weeks. His behavior during the daytime is markedly improved. He's cheerful and engaging in lots of imaginative play that we didn't see before. He's eating better and appears to be ravenous. I think the sleep-deprivation has been messing with both his developmental and physical growth. He's still borderline hyperactive, but it's much less destructive, and the tantrums are subsiding enough that he's tolerable to be around more often than not. Such a relief for all of us! And just in time ...

L&D - test run #2

I've been worried about the baby the past few days. She hasn't been moving like she usually does. Last night I was up half the night (despite the JOYOUS fact that Squeaker slept through the night for the third night in a row ... first time in his entire LIFE he's done that!) because I wasn't feeling any baby motion. Woke up this morning in tears, told the Mister I was thinking of heading directly to L&D. Luckily, baby started moving as I was making breakfast, so we decided it was safe to wait until this afternoon's NST to get things checked out.

Busy day at the office. Made great headway on cleaning my desk, drowning my poor assistant in stuff to file, things to follow up on, etc. Finally headed off to the 4pm NST, where I found out that the baby is now ... SIDEWAYS again. #$%%&%@!!  Then the monitoring test strip came out "nonreactive", so they ran a biophysical profile (basically a long ultrasound), which baby passed, but both the nurse and I were uncomfortable with how lethargic baby seemed to be. The nurse buzzed her three times and ... nada. That kid would not wake up. That, combined with my worries of the past few days (plus the notes Doc put in my file that apparently read something like "Do NOT take any chances with this patient or heads will roll when I get back from vacation!") led the doc who's filling in for my Doc to order me straight to L&D for extended testing. The NST nurse (a self-confessed infertile who loves that I'm preggers at 46) was really worried and mentioned things like "emergency c-section," which of course was not what I wanted to hear. Keep in mind that it's now 6pm and I haven't eaten since noon. I have low blood sugar issues and I was tired from worrying all night. At that point, I was very suggestible and already convinced that something horrible was happening -- how could it not? An ideal pregnancy for an infertile is just too much to ask for. The universe was getting ready to smack me upside the head, I was sure of it.

I realized that I was starting to fall apart, so I grabbed a few snacks from a vending machine, then called the Mister (who promptly went into full-scale panic mode) and drove myself across the medical complex to L&D. The L&D nurse was great -- very no-nonsense and kind -- got me hooked up to the monitors, asked me a million questions, then brought me a box lunch and a big sippy cup of ice water. There was no cell phone service, but I figured out how to work the hospital wi-fi, so I was able to eat a crappy sandwich and email the Mister while I was getting monitored.

In the end, it all turned out to be much ado about nothing. The nurse and midwife both declared this test strip "gorgeous" and said the baby is doing great. Naturally, the on-call doc was the one I fired 3 years ago, but apparently we're best friends now, because she made a point to stick her head in and see how I was doing. I got stuck between nurses at shift change, so it took some time to get out of there, but eventually they discharged me to my own care, and off I went. I was home by a little after 8pm, just in time to dive into the chaos that is Squeaker's bedtime routine.

The good news is that now the Mister has his and Squeaker's bags packed, which means that we'll be able to get out of the house quickly if I do need to rush to the hospital. I learned a few things about what I should do if I go into labor while baby is still transverse (mainly, lay the F down to decrease the chance of cord prolapse while someone else gathers up my stuff, or, if I can actually feel the cord coming out, lay the F down and call 911). I figured out how the hospital's wi-fi works. I confirmed that it's a 20-minute trip when there's no traffic (and up to an hour when there is). But most of all I learned this -- for future NSTs -- eat first, as both the baby and I will do much much better.

Farewell, tonsils & adenoids ... hello, insanity.

Don't ever let anyone tell you that a tonsillectomy is just a simple procedure. Okay, don't get me wrong -- after spending the better part of a day and a half in a highly-rated children's hospital, I know that we are lucky beyond our wildest dreams that our worst problem is our child's sleep issues and the relatively minor annoyance of having his tonsils and adenoids removed. I know only too well, after seeing the anguish on the faces of a family waiting for their 15-year-old daughter to emerge from surgery for a brain tumor, and after talking with a mom whose son was born with parts of his skull prematurely fused together (at 9 months, he was in the midst of surgery to unfuse his skull so his brain can grow properly) ... I know that, compared with these kids and these families, we are incredibly blessed. Truly.

However, if I might indulge in a bit of a whine for awhile ... Today is Sunday. Squeaker's surgery was Tuesday. And everything in between is one big exhausting blur. I will always be everlastingly grateful to this mommy blogger, whose post I found before the surgery. If we hadn't known what was coming, we'd have been completely gobsmacked. The docs hinted at it, but they certainly didn't prepare us in detail for what was coming. I know that every kid's experience will be different, but here's how it's been for us.

On surgery day, Squeaker was Not Happy At All to be skipping his breakfast. Once we got to the hospital, he forgot about hunger in the newness of the adventure. He played with his toys in the waiting area, and did great in the pre-op staging area. He chatted up all the nurses, rode a tricycle around (and around and around) the nurse's station like a wild man, and happily played doctor on the Mister and I using his brand new doctor kit. When they gave him the versed or valium or whatever it was (bad mama, not paying attention), he got quickly and hilariously stoned, and when the nurses wheeled his bed off into the operating room, I was the only one in the hall crying. Squeaker was cheerfully pointing out the colorful giant butterfly stickers on the ceiling. I ran down to the cafe and got a quick snack for the Mister and myself. Our wait was very short, and soon the surgeon was coming to tell us that the surgery was over, Squeaker was in good shape, and we'd be able to see him as soon as he woke up.

Then things got a bit ugly. Squeaker had a horrible time coming out of the anesthesia. When we got to him, he was wailing and thrashing, his eyes were all unfocused, and thick stringy drool was coming out of his mouth nonstop. I sat in a rocking chair and held him as best I could, while the machines beeped away and we waited for him to emerge from his drug haze. He hated hated hated his IV lock and kept wailing about it being "owie." The nurse assured me that all kids his age said that, but I was still skeptical, having had more than one seriously owie IV in my day. Eventually he woke enough to ask for the Mister, who held him for about a half hour more. Finally the nurse said we could go upstairs to his room. We wheeled his bed through the halls, with me holding his good hand so that he couldn't tear at his IV lock. His room was pleasant enough with large yellow-leafed maple trees right outside, a private bath with shower, and a window seat that doubled as an adult bed. He continued to cry and wail inconsolably for what seemed like ages, while clutching a drool-soaked towel to his face. His room nurse, Mike, came in and talked with us about meds, and we finally got Squeaker to take some tylenol with codeine. At long last, he stopped wailing and began to express an interest in his toys and his Peter Pan video. After a few hours, he demanded dinner. I started him on a cup of crushed ice, which he tore through ravenously. Then we got a popsicle, and he kept that down. Finally, he had a few bites of mac & cheese and a cup of chocolate pudding. Everything stayed down, and his energy began to return. Mike came in and expressed wonder at what a different child he was. Food makes such a difference in our boy.

Several hours later, we were able to settle him enough that he slept. The Mister stayed the night, and I drove off into the pouring rain, exhausted and worried about Squeaker, but also worried about myself and the baby. I barely ate or drank all day and could tell that I was pushing my limits. Plus, I was driving with one dangerously soft tire. I took the streets home rather than risking a flat on the freeway, and finally found a gas station with air. So there I was in the dark at a nearly-deserted gas station, the rain sheeting down, holding a flashlight, pumping up the tire, 8 months pregnant and hoping that I wouldn't get mugged or pass out before I got home. Awesome. Fixed myself a huge breakfast when I got home, watched some Law & Order, and went to bed. Slept restlessly, woke early, showered, and went back to the hospital.

Squeaker was awake and wailing when I got there, and the Mister looked like he'd been up all night. Turns out he had been. See, here's the thing they don't tell you. The pain of a tonsilectomy is really horrible, and if you're a little kid who doesn't quite understand what is going on, all you know is that you hurt and these people are making you swallow stuff that makes the hurt worse (even though it will eventually make the hurt go away). So the Mister and the lovely Jamaican night nurse had spent the better portion of the night trying to force meds down Squeaker's throat. And he puked it all up, and there was blood, and that freaked him out, and when he's freaked out, he screams, and screaming hurts his throat, and so it went. Yet, at the early rounds that morning, the surgeon declared him to be "doing great" and discharged him into our care.

We're alternating the tylenol/codeine with ibuprofen round the clock. Each works well enough to take away most of the pain, but on his bad days/nights, if you get too close to the dosing time or past it, all hell breaks loose. He wakes up wailing, which hurts his throat, then the thick ropey drool starts in, which chokes him, which makes him cough and gag, and then he claps his hands over his mouth and refuses the meds because swallowing hurts, and so we have to hold him down and force him to drink, while hoping he doesn't puke it all back up from gagging on the drool. Sometimes he acts like he's going to drink the meds himself, and then throws the cup across the room or dumps it on his bed instead. The hysteria is really what hurts him, but the pain is so bad that he can't stop shrieking. Last night was particularly bad -- apparently at this stage, the scabs start to slough off -- and he began clenching his teeth when we held him down, which meant we had to dig our fingers into his jaw (which was already sore from having it held open for surgery) and pry it open. Plus, to add to the joy, he's having night terrors, which makes the hysteria completely unrelated to the pain, and makes our ability to soothe him almost impossible. The Mister has been sleeping in Squeaker's bed with him, and I wake up and run down the hall when the crying starts. Last night it was 10:30, 2ish, and 6:45. Each time it takes about an hour to dose him and calm him. And so it goes.

Yep, good times. During the day, he feels well enough to eat a litttle bit and drink just enough to stay hydrated. My mom came up on Friday and left today, giving the Mister and I a bit of a break to do things like exercise, shower, and pay bills. We're hoping that last night, or perhaps tonight, will be the worst of it, and that he'll be on the fast-track to healing this week. In the meantime, we watch his ups and downs and try to keep him from wearing himself out. Oh, and somewhere in there, I cooked a full Thanksgiving dinner for the Mister and me. I even baked an apple pie. Because, after all, we have a lot to be thankful for this year ...

Parenthood is not for wimps

Oh my lord, this child is wearing us out. Squeaker, that is.

To go off on a tangent for a moment, I think he needs a new blog name. He was Squeaker from the beginning because, well, he made the cutest squeaking sounds as an infant. And then, as he got older, he developed this scream -- a joyous playful scream, but a hell of a scream nonethless -- that was so shrill it could shatter glass. It was horribly painful to any adults nearby, and made him easy to identify on the playground. I decided that once he got past that stage, I'd consider gracing him with a more dignified name, befitting a child who doesn't break people's eardrums at a moment's notice. Right now, if I had to pick a new name for him, it would be Storm, Whirlwind, Hurricane, or perhaps Thor. He is embracing the essence of not-quite-three with every ounce of his being. The tantrums, the rages, the willfulness, the assertions of will over Every.Single.Thing. ... it's all the Mister and I can do to survive a full day with him. I can't imagine how his nanny does it. I suspect that the fact that she's 20 years younger than us probably has a lot to do with it.

The child fights us on whatever issue he can dream up. Food? He won't eat it, or if he does, he certainly won't chew it. And if he chews it at all, he's liable to make himself gag so he can spit it out, just because he knows it causes our blood pressure to shoot through the roof. Same goes for bedtime, bathtime, potty time, riding in the car ... every situation he can find to do what he knows he's not supposed to, he will. If he's playing with his toys, he's going to pull all of them out and then hurl them across the room, preferably into something with glass doors, just to get our attention. He is an attention hound, and will always take negative attention over no attention, every single time. I was standing at the sink washing lettuce, and he squeezed his body between me and the counter, then began opening and slamming the cupboard doors as hard as he could, while yelling at me that he needed a hug. When I asked him to stop, he started hitting me. He won't go into time outs anymore, so aside from ignoring him or carrying him upstairs to shut him in his room (because he would never deign to walk up the stairs if he knew he was already in trouble), there's not much we can do to discipline him. He simply doesn't take us seriously enough. He believes he's in charge, and about the only time he wavers on that position is when one of us breaks down and roars at him. Then it's tears and wailing and begging for a hug. And (hi mom!) don't waste your time feeling sorry for him, because that's also the reaction we get if we deny him a piece of chocolate or don't turn on the TV when he demands it, or, god forbid, if we try to get him to eat anything resembling food. He can turn the tears fountain on at a moment's notice.

I'm sure this is exactly where he should be developmentally, and I also am sure that he's at the extreme end of this kind of behavior, as he is with most things he does. There are probably a bunch of parenting books out there that address this, but I really don't have the time or energy to read them, nor do I have much faith in parenting books after the utter failure of the Sleep Experts to explain how to get a kid with sleep apnea and restless legs to stay in bed. My faith in the Experts is pretty much nill at this point.

Because, of course, he still doesn't sleep, y'know.

Which, by the way, we've finally decided to address (or attempt to address, keeping our fingers crossed that it will be worth the pain and effort) by scheduling him for a tonsils-and-adnoids-ectomy. His pre-op appointment is in a few weeks, and surgery will be during the first part of November. They tell us that we'll need to keep him calm for two weeks -- no running, jumping, etc. -- ha! hahahahaha! Like that's even possible. Which means no preschool, which means one of us (probably me) will have to take time off work to stay with him on the days his nanny is in school. And he'll have to be supervised 24/7 in case he starts bleeding or stops breathing or whatever, so the Mister will probably camp out on his floor for a week or so. From what I've heard, the first week is painful and miserable for the kid, and narcotic painkillers are a necessity. All of this makes the Mister and I more than a wee bit sick -- we really hate to put Squeaker through it, but OMFG, this family has to start to sleep at some point! Better to get it all taken care of before the baby comes. With luck, Squeaker will heal quickly and start to forgive us in time for the distractions of Christmas ... assuming the baby stays put. She's due January 7, but Doc wants to induce sometime between Christmas and New Year's.

Speaking of Sister, she's started to grow, or so I presume by the ever-increasing size of my belly. It's such a strange phenomenon. I'm daily grateful for the experience, but I'm also bamboozled by how weird it is to have a human growing in you. At 27 weeks, I've finally started to feel uncomfortable. I'm a light sleeper normally, and between Squeaker waking up multiple times a night, all of us having a horrible cold with a bad cough, my having to pee, and the general pain in my breasts, cramps in my legs, and pain in my shoulders (from sleeping on my side in strange positions), I find myself remembering most of the night every night, which basically means I'm not sleeping. And we've been so busy, and haven't been home on the weekends for nearly 6 weeks, so I'm barely able to get any exercise at all, which means that something as simple as walking up the stairs (home and work) is a chore. Plus, because I didn't have enough to deal with already, my new fun symptom is wetting my pants every time I cough. Very attractive indeed!

16w4d

Saw Doc today for a routine checkup. She was impressed by how tall my uterus has become. "Can you feel that? Wow, that's some good growth!"

Somehow, I was still nervous. It's been a rough week or so. The Mister was out of the country for 5 days, Squeaker has been particularly challenging (omg! the tantrums!), and I haven't felt pregnant (except for that whole thing about my clothes not fitting and my chest threatening to grow out of the enormous bra that was way too big for me a few weeks ago).

Doc whipped out the Doppler and immediately we heard the little drumbeat, a little slower this time, about 150 bpm. Phew! Made it another 2 weeks, yay stowaway! Doc is very proud of "our" accomplishment so far, and I'm proud that my blood pressure is staying at a nice low place. Doc is ready to step up her vigilance when I get to about 24 weeks, because that's when preeclampsia might kick in. My bp has always been borderline too low, though, so I'm hopeful that we'll get to skip that bit of excitement.

I'll feel so much less stressed when I can actually feel some movement from the baby. And when I get to see him/her again. It's been ages ... The big scan is scheduled for just after 19 weeks. Really looking forward to finding out whether this is my girl (hope hope wish wish!) or another sweet boy. Squeaker will get to come to the scan, and we're excited to see his reaction. He's always fascinated by medical stuff, so I think he'll really be into it.

My other fun symptom is insomnia, ugh! I'm having the worst time getting back to sleep once I wake up in the middle of the night. Last night I woke up at 3am to deal with Squeaker (sopping pajamas, had to change his bed, the whole works) and couldn't go back to sleep until just after 5am. And of course the damn cats started howling for breakfast right about then. Miserable! And of course I had stayed up late to spend some quality TV time with the Mister, so I think I managed about 5 hours sleep total. Really hoping this is a passing phase ... Coffee, how I miss you!

I've been going to prenatal yoga classes once a week and am going to try to increase to twice a week. Can I just tell y'all how bizarre it is to sit in a room full of pregnant women and actually be one of them? Then add in the fact that I'm inevitably the oldest woman in the room ... The teachers haven't said anything, but I see them peeking at me. Surreal only begins to describe it.

It's so awesome to be back in yoga, though. I can tell it's going to be really good for me. I desperately need to add something aerobic like walking or swimming, but time is just too limited. I was able to squeeze in a lunchtime walk along the river with some coworkers the other day, but most days I'm just not in the mood to leave the office, and then when I get home -- bang -- I dive right into terrible two-and-a-half tantrum management. Add in dinner and Squeaker's 2-hour bedtime process, and there goes the day. I figure I'm getting my weight-bearing exercise every time I pick him up (kicking and thrashing) and haul him to the time out spot or wrestle him (kicking and thrashing) into the car seat ... Not sure if fending off the hair pulling/hitting/scratching/slapping activity counts as cardio work, but it must, right? I actually broke one of our house rules and gave him a smack on his bare behind the other night when he was purposely trying to kick me in the stomach during a diaper change. He was shocked and burst out wailing, and of course I felt enormous guilt, but -- as my doctor mama friend told me the other day -- you've got to draw the line somewhere. I'm pretty sure that attempted sibling murder is where I'm gonna draw it for now.

Burning my pile of "baby sleep training" books

So the sleep thing. Where to begin. We took Squeaker to a sleep specialist, who, after interviewing us and examining him, recommended a sleep study. Squeaker's tonsils, on the scale of 1-4 (with 4 being ginormous) are a 3+. It's likely that they're blocking his airway when he sleeps, adding to whatever weirdness seems to be going on with his adenoids. Even with the steroid nasal spray, he still snores and wakes multiple times a night.

I'd read some horror stories on the internetz by parents who had sleep studies done on their toddlers. Luckily, I read those stories, I should say -- because we were ready for it. Squeaker was well-prepped to expect "stickers" all over his face and a "tube for nose medicine" in his nose (actually, the cannula helped measure how much air he was getting, I think?, but he's used to getting his "nose medicine" every night, so we went with that explanation). He knew that he would be sleeping all night at "the doctor's" with daddy, and he knew that he'd need to leave all of the stickers on his face until he woke up in the morning. The Mister brought Squeaker's favorite stuffed monkey and a bunch of stickers, so that Monkey could also have the fun of getting all stickered up before bed.

Our boy was actually better prepared than I was, as it turned out. Because when the Mister sent me the photos of him that night, wires coming from his face, his head, his legs, a stocking cap covering his head, the tube in his nose, all I could think was "oh my god, my poor baby!!" My panicky side thought that he looked like he was in the ICU (I know, of course, that he didn't look anywhere near that bad, but it was my first reaction). So, naturally, I was up all night worrying about him.

 
As it turns out, Squeaker was fascinated by the whole process and had a great night's sleep, or so the Mister thought. "Sure, he woke a few times, but he went right back to sleep. Much better than normal." The Mister, on the other hand, barely got a wink, because each time Squeaker rolled over, some wire or another came unplugged and the sleep technician came into the room, turned on the light, fixed the wire, and left. Repeat ad nauseum all night long. They arrived at 8pm, got Squeaker all wired up by about 10pm, the poor kid passed out at about 10:30 and the tech woke them up at the ungodly hour of 5:45am. Then came the process of peeling off the stickers and washing the glue out of his hair. That was apparently the only time my boy cried. He came home with adhesive marks all over his face and body, but otherwise was in good spirits, excited to see me and tell me all about his adventure. The Mister looked like the walking dead. I didn't feel all that much better.

The results came within a week, and -- lo and behold -- the bottom line is: He Doesn't Sleep. What the Mister thought was a good night's sleep turned out to be 15 wakings, a handful of obstructive apneas, a handful of central apneas, and many many many hypopneas. The diagnosis was mild obstructive sleep apnea, plus restless leg syndrome. "Significantly decreased REM" is the one phrase that jumped out at me from the report. And this was on a good night. Imagine how bad his bad nights are. Our poor kid doesn't get any sleep. No wonder he's so insane during the days -- he spends most of his time being over-tired. Decreased REM can affect a kid's growth and cognitive abilities, not to mention overall health. And the whole concept of "he stops breathing multiple times a night" would make any parent freak out, I think.

So ... off we go in August to the ENT to have him evaluated for an adenoid / tonsillectomy. Let's hope that does the trick. I sure would like to have one kid sleeping through the night before the next one shows up, y'know?

(As I type this, I can hear him singing upstairs. Loudly. This is his new thing that he does when he's supposed to be going to sleep, in addition to hopping out of bed multiple times, throwing all of his blankets and stuffed animals on the floor, and climbing up on top of his bookshelf to pull apart the iPod speakers that are mounted high on the wall. Every night. I put him to sleep at 8:30pm. It's now after 10, and he's still wide awake. The Mister is on guard duty, telling him to be quiet, telling him to go back to bed, etc. Eventually, the kid just passes out. Of course, we'll hear from him in the middle of the night, and then again at dawn ... He actually "slept through the night" a few times this week -- i.e., woke once, and only because he'd peed through his pajamas. I realized yesterday that all of his 2-year molars broke through when we weren't looking, and we're guessing that's helping a bit. But this 2-1/2 hour bedtime routine -- oy!)