LizSpeaks

This, I Don't Get

2010-02-03T01:48:00.000-08:00

It's 2 things really. First? The number of people who were shocked
that I didn't want to even attempt a VBAC. Apparently, in some circles
(by and large, it seemed to be circles of people without kids, people
who might not have even seen that film in health class) it's expected
that one would, of course, be willing to risk uter.ine rupture/the death
or severe maiming of the child. All in exchange for the sheer joy of
ripping apart one's lady bits.

Gee, no thanks. Not for me. Especially now, when I have the advantage
of hindsight. Vivian didn't drop, she made no real attempt to head out
via my still-intact lady bits. I suspect that being 0 for 2 in the 'kid
trying to emerge via your privates' department is related to a tailbone
injury I got a few years ago.

But who knows and who cares. What I don't get is the number of women
who are not doctors and who are not me yet rage freely on message boards
far and wide about how horrid women are for 'choosing' c-sections.

I have just one thing to say in response.

Fuck you.

Well, maybe two things. That, and shut the fuck up, what do you know?
I guess you're 'lucky' enough to have had a life-changing, unmedicated
birth surrounded by 800 of your closest friends and some kind of
extensive ritual. I wasn't. And a lot of women aren't. No, we had to
make a hard choice to put our children's safety before our own. Like
that will never happen again in the course of parenthood.

What's so bad about starting that program at birth? What? You need to
fill some void in your life by berating those who don't get to have the
same experience as you?

Well, you and your weird agenda can just suck it.

I realize that sounds defensive. I can only offer you this: I'm really
not. It's more about being really tired of self-righteous people with
weird agendas telling other people what they should or should not carry
guilt about.

2 for 2. C-sections, for the win.

The other thing that Absolutely Blows My Mind is people giving me shit
about pumping. Because apparently, I'm supposed to do two things: call
a lactation consultant and try a nipple shield in order to improve
Vivian's latch.

MOTHER OF GOD. DO YOU HONESTLY THINK I HAVEN'T DONE THOSE THINGS?

Clearly, these people do not know how very stubborn I am. My kids get
breastmilk for at least a year. I *will* make that happen.

If pumping is soooo bad, what's better? Formula?

Not to the lactavists, not by any means.

The lack of appreciation by folks with these weird agendas for the extra
efforts inherent in pumping as much as I do and for the extra recovery
time/issues involved in a c-section will no doubt always piss. Giving
birth and breastfeeding are very personal experiences. I resent anyone
who dares to question a parent's motivation in either area. Especially
mine. Heh.

In the meantime, I'll continue to be a bit of a hypocrite and give you
shit about your carseat usage. How do you like them apples?

How It All Turned Out

2010-01-30T01:41:00.000-08:00

Vegas was great, if a bit odd. One by one, a good chunk of the team got
sick. Including me. Instead of skating in our 4th game, I stayed back
at the hotel barfing my guts up.

We saved a lot of money on buffets, I tell you what.

We made it to the championship, where we played our hearts out for 5,
count em, full periods. We went to a shootout and unfortunately lost in
the shootout. But sometimes, that's all you can do. We're disappointed
but we could not have tried any harder.

For the record, I played those 5 periods after eating nothing but
saltines, gatorade and part of a Sonic cherry slush. I sorta feel like
superman for having done that.

So now, instead of a monstrous trophy, we have little ones that Val is
fond of creating little displays for all around the house. They're
often adorned with a variety of stuffed animals, small plastic toys or
notepads.

I will console myself with the knowledge that I'd be less inclined to
let her play with the big trophy.

Both girls responded to the disruption in their lives by taking turns
having huge meltdowns when we got home. I spent 4 solid hours on
Tuesday dealing with one child, then the next, screaming her head off.
It sucked in ways I can't fully describe.

However, it beats going back to work, which I'll be doing on March 1.
Sigh.

Post-Flight Report

2010-01-22T15:58:00.001-08:00

I said more than once that if I spent a lot of energy worrying about
getting through security with the pump and enough milk to get through at
least a day, that it would turn out to be no big deal but something else
would cause issues.

And hey, I was right.

The milk itself was subjected to some vapor test. Right, still not a
bomb but thanks for checking. And that was it. Pump and parts were
hardly glanced at and we were on our way.

To a plane that didn't leave until 4 hours after it was supposed to.
Weather in Vegas prevented them from leaving so we sat at the gate.
When it was clear it would be a while before we'd actually leave, I
availed myself of the nursing room off the airport bathroom. I
displaced the custodian who takes her breaks in there but it was all
fine.

I packed frozen milk in my checked baggage and that was just starting to
melt when I finally got to our condo around 10 pm.

Long Time No Blog

2010-01-19T05:53:00.001-08:00

But it's for a good reason, I swear. I've been playing a shitload of
hockey and when not playing hockey? Enjoying the heck out of my time
with the kidz.

However, since it is now 5 am and my back pain has once again flared up,
rendering me wide awake and more than a little afraid to lay down, I'll
fill you in on what's going on.

Hockey. I am slow. My shot, which was once sort of okay and could
somewhat consistently get a fair bit off the ground, is now a dismal
shadow of the kind of shot I seem to remember having. But I've got
faith, it'll come back eventually. For now, I keep winding up like I
expect it to be my old shot, then being annoyed when the puck gets about
2 inches off the ground instead. I get even more annoyed when the puck
stays on the ground.

But oh, am I having a fab-u-lous time out there.

Random - what is with all these cooking shows hosted by people who chop
as poorly as I do? Isn't that sort of the basic requirement for the
job?

Anyhoo. Val is a fabulous big sister. She's handling the whole thing
very well and we're so proud of her. It kills me that I can't carry her
around right now. Between my c-section scar and my back, all 32 pounds
of her are out of luck. Of course we cuddle in the bed, couch and on
any horizontal surface but I know it's not the same for her. And it's
sure not for me.

To that end, I'm headed into the chiro today to get started on actually
fixing this.

Also random - we now have more breastmilk in the freezer than we have
food for people who chew. We're about to start eating only frozen meals
to make room for more milk in there.

Though we don't really have space for it, I see a small upright freezer
in our future. It pleases me to have so much milk on hand. Assuming my
stubborn ass makes it through Viv's first year with the breastfeeding,
it's my hope that she'll be able to have a bottle of the stuff a day for
months after the year mark thanks to this freezer stash.

Recently, I posted on fb a question about flying with the pump. In
response I got a whole bunch of assvice about working on Viv's latch.
Wtf, seriously? Was that in any way related to the question I asked?

Why do breastfeeding advocates have such a narrow agenda about the
'best' way to feed a baby? According to them, the only acceptable way
to feed my baby is at the boob and I'm at fault for not trying harder.

I know. It is complete horseshit and about as unsupportive of pumping
moms as you can be. Would they rather I just quit and buy formula
instead? No?

Then SHUT THE FUCK UP. Exclusive pumping is hard. Ridiculously hard.
You do not know the suck that is attempting to pump while the baby
you're pumping for screams her head off because she's hungry for a
bottle you can't quite prop up correctly with your elbow and your 3 year
old is suddenly no longer content to watch Olivia.

Oh, how I wish that I were making that up. But I keep at it because I
know the value of breastmilk. No matter how it makes its way from the
recesses of my boobs into her wee tummy.

To that end, I didn't give up on the Latch Situation. No, no, it has
actually improved and right now she is feeding The Preferred Way
(according to breastfeeding enthusiasts with an agenda) about half the
time. That is good enough for me.

I realized recently that one of the greatest gifts in my life is that I
am rarely plagued by self-doubt. I'm guessing that this confidence is
my reward for suffering through years doubting myself/low self-esteem
and now I'm done. It's freeing, knowing that at any given moment, I'm
confident enough in my choices that I don't make them more difficult by
second-guessing myself.

Just now, I put together that my Days Of Doubting Myself ended right
around when Andrea and I got together. Go figure that she's the
catalyst for even more fabulousness.

That's all for now. Hope you all are well.

Breaking My Own Rules

2010-01-09T05:35:00.001-08:00

We're going to take Val to see the new princess movie. I'm making this
exception because 1. there really aren't a whole hell of a lot of movies
Val can see in the theater and 2. the princess isn't lily white.

Since movies seem to make her scream and cry these days, I don't have
high hopes for how this will go. The weird thing is, she screams and
cries during the movie, then, later. talks incessantly about the parts
of the movie she did get to see.

For example, we saw the chipmunks movie while my folks were here. First
scene in, she screamed and cried. Andrea took her to the lobby for a
while and when they returned, she buried her face in Andrea's lap,
peeking out periodically.

At school, EVERYONE knows that she saw the 'squeak-wheel' and she's even
made her male teacher be Alvin, to her Brittany (of the Chipettes
fame). So there's something about movies that she likes.

We'll see how it goes. That's all we can do.

Back To It

2010-01-05T00:46:00.001-08:00

Ha, ha, I know, a pun in a post about my back. Very funny.

Yes, it is, thank you.

Anyhoo, it was 2 days of misery, absolute misery before my back and abs
felt better enough that I um, skated in a really low-key local hockey
tournament while hopped up on a large number of Advil. Y'all knew that
sitting around is just not my thing, right?

However, lowering myself down from the world's tallest boards took a
toll and I ended up skipping our final game.

The good news is that I've sort of started to regain my skillz (limited
tho they are) on the ice. Or at least my confidence. The miracle of
water aerobics means that my stamina is sort of intact, and that is just
huge.

Also, somehow, I fit back into my excellent, super-favorite red hockey
pants. This feat, which took almost 3 years after Val's birth, took all
of 7 weeks after Vivian's birth. Go, me!

5 days after The Great Back Pain of 2009-10, I'm still in a bit of pain
but it's a lot better. I have learned my lesson, I won't be attempting
a full ab workout anytime soon. Sometimes I can be just so dumb. This
was one of those times.

While These Drugs Are Working

2009-12-31T03:18:00.001-08:00

I realized that 2009 contained 0 failed cycles for us. Because the only
one we did actually worked. And somehow, we have a Real Live Baby
resulting from that one attempt this calendar year.

The numbers go like this:
Failed cycles in 2007: 1
Failed cycles in 2008: 11
2009: IVF and eventually, wee Vivian!

Every day of her short life thus far, I look to the heavens, I look down
at her perfectly round, slightly hairy head, I plant a thousand kisses
on that perfectly round, slightly hairy head. I grow drunk on her baby
scent, I listen as she sighs and snorts, I look into her blue, blue eyes
as she attempts baby pushups on my chest and I thank God for the miracle
and the technology that brought her to us.

Though it seems pushing my luck to do so, I also give thanks that she
was not born with a heart murmur the way Val was. We are spared any
visits to the cardiologist's office. Even though having Viv end up back
in the hospital was awful and scary (make no mistake, it was all of
these things) I knew that we would emerge from that hospital stay with
her jaundice fixed. And we did. And it was.

And with that, 2009, I bid you a fond farewell. I thank you for the
many blessings we received this year and hope that your replacement,
2010, has only good to offer as well.

I Must Have Overdone It

2009-12-31T02:48:00.001-08:00

Tonight at water aerobics, I was the only student. We had a substitute
instructor, as our regular one is out of town. The sub taught Monday's
class as well so I had an idea of how much faster the pace was.

I thought I was up for it.

So when tonight's sub put me through the paces, I tried to keep up. And
I did, for the most part.

Only, um, about an hour ago I woke up in the worst pain of my life. My
abs and my back were so painful. Cannot. Describe. There was
sweating, my face was red, red and oh the panting/heavy breathing got me
nowhere but made me feel like I was doing something.

I took 3 advil and paced the house, breathing like I was in labor,
periodically crying out. Eventually, I wavered between wanting to go to
the hospital (but stopped short since who would take me? Andrea? Yes,
but then What About The Kidz? Ah yes, the shortcomings of having a very
limited local support network once again rear their ugly head. Why
can't emergencies happen at a convenient hour?) wanting to die and
wanting to just call 911. I grabbed my giant ice pack and headed back
to bed, stopping to take a perco.cet on the way.

At this point, I woke up Andrea because the thought of being alone and
feeling like this was too much. Even for stoic me. She asked what she
could do (nothing) and held my hand.

Eventually, the drugs started to kick in.

That's right. This post is brought to you by advil and narcotics I just
happen to have laying around the house. It's been a little while and
I'm starting to feel less awful. But crap, I'm scared about how I'll
feel when these drugs wear off.

Let It Be Noted

2009-12-28T06:35:00.000-08:00

That just now, the Baby Who Won't Latch enjoyed a whole feeding session
from the Real Thing, then fell asleep.

I Do Not Care To Discuss It

2009-12-25T20:23:00.000-08:00

But for posterity's sake, I want to share that I just threw away Alice's
well-loved teddy bear. She's been gone 8 years now and I doubt she'd
feel I've betrayed her memory by doing so, but still. It smarts even
though it's the right thing to do.

Yes, I still miss her. After all, she was #1.

Christmas

2009-12-24T07:44:00.001-08:00

So we have this thing, where for Val we don't go batshit crazy at
Christmas. In her 3 previous Christmases, she's not woken to a giantess
pile of presents from us (please note that her grandparents have been
amazing in this regard and she has, in fact, gotten many, many wonderful
Christmas gifts thanks to their generosity). Instead, she's gotten a
few, hopefully well-chosen items that we feel good about giving her.

Plus, she wasn't all that cognizant so it was just fine. She didn't ask
for many things and we didn't bombard her with demands that she want
many things. As an aside, I remember so many Christmases where I was
hounded for a list of Things I Wanted. We had a budget for our
Christmases and I felt obligated to use that whole budget on Things I
Wanted so there would be enough packages under the tree to make a Nice
Christmas, even though I might've liked fewer things. I know this type
of tradition isn't unusual and oh yes, I had many Nice Christmases. But
I also had some where most of my memories are clouded by the pressure to
want Things when, that year, I really didn't.

I've wanted something different for Val. And I think we've created it,
for the most part. Yes, so far, our Christmas is still Santa-free but
we're on track for Val to have another Nice Christmas without adding a
ton of things she didn't really want and we don't really have room for.

Instead of that giant mound of gifts at Christmas, she gets things
throughout the year, little or big surprises ranging from blowing off
some activity for a bookstore trip to the day she got to get a Hello
Kitty dress that has glitter, sequin AND a built-in tutu. If you ask
me, these random gifts are more powerful because I'm thinking it's a lot
easier to be sure that gifts bought one at a time are the Right Thing
than to compile a list of 20 things.

Plus, Val gets a surprise, which she loves. For me, these outings are
about the memories we're creating and oh, I must tell you, her excited
3-year-old gasp makes it all worth it.

But as I wrapped her few (hopefully) well-chosen gifts for this
Christmas, I sort of felt like a chump. Seeing the meager pile under
our tree doesn't quite outweigh those excited gasps throughout the year,
not when compared to the Nice Christmases of my youth. I look at our
pre-lit Charlie Brown tree, the one that we now sing the opening bars of
the Charlie Brown theme song for each year as we pull it from the box
because it's more than a little vertically-challenged, and I think oh,
this is so much less than what I had growing up. Is this Enough
Christmas for my children?

But I know I'll get over my minor guilt over having just a few things
for her because in the long run she is getting something much better -
the knowledge that we really do listen to her (even when that means
embracing the fact that somehow we have a daughter who loves all things
pink, sequined and of course, The Tutu) and that we're more than willing
to spend time really listening to her.

I think the power of spending time together when we didn't expect to or
the appeal of a little impromptu shopping is greater than the sum of all
packages under the tree. It's just proving harder to remember that
today than it is on the random June day I pick Val up from school and
take her to the park, walking with her in a man-made stream as the sun
begins to set.

Last Year At This Time

2009-12-19T10:40:00.000-08:00

We were knee-deep in what would be our last IUI cycle in what was
seeming like a completely fruitless effort to create child #2. We'd
already tried clomid for a while, then moved on to injectable
medication, because who doesn't like getting shots at home? This was
our last-ditch effort before moving to IVF and since the other
injectable attempts had failed, I said what the hell, up the dose. Make
a thousand follicles and see what happens.

Now, what can happen is best summed up by 2 reality shows: Jon & Kate
and Table for 12. That's right, if you make a shitload of follicles,
then do an IUI, throwing what could be a shitload of sperm at them,
well, you *could* make a shitload of babies.

The odds are small, but I have bad luck. We rolled the dice anyway and
didn't cancel the cycle. In fact, hell, we did 2 IUIs just for the hell
of it. The day of the first one, the RE mentioned that if we actually
got pregnant, we had a 20% chance of it being triplets.

And then, was I sure I wouldn't selectively reduce if pregnant with
multiples?

So we went for it, but in each day of those two weeks I got more and
more nervous. What if? What if more than one took? Like, as in 3 or
more.

I spent most of the time between Christmas and New Year last year
worrying, praying for either 1 or 0. When my period finally came and I
knew that IVF was our next step, I cannot tell you how relieved I was to
know that we would have more control over how many possibilities there
were.

Ironically, it's the billing over those IUIs that's part of our
still-ongoing dispute with the RE. I know, that's funny. Only I'm not
laughing.

But I am, because somehow, through the miracle of modern medicine and
insurance that came along exactly when we needed it, I am blessed to
have a chubby little baby who re-enacts her own version of Jack.ie
Chan's 38 Cr.azy Fists several times a day, batting the shit out of
anything we put into her mouth if she's not ready for it.

It's As If

2009-12-19T05:17:00.000-08:00

In the last year we've gone from:
- it seems like we've always been patients of the fancypants fertility
clinic, always living our lives in 2 week increments (2 weeks to gear up
for the attempt, 2 weeks to wait and see if it worked).
- to it seems like I've been pregnant forever, being almost violently
kicked by a fetus who turned out to be wee Vivian.
- to it seems like I've been pumping forever, washing pump parts every 3
hours, with our fridge full of milk.

We are so damn lucky. Even though having Andrea's company be bought by
Giant Soul-free Company has meant her job now contains a lot of
suckitude, the astounding insurance that company provides is a big part
of the reason a wee baby is here between us, snoozing on her little
reclined mat.

Yep, lucky. I may not have a lot to say here these days, that's because
I'm busy enjoying the hell out of our expanded family.

Let The Assvice Begin

2009-12-12T20:42:00.001-08:00

Today, we were at Val's first dance recital. When she came on stage, I
totally started to cry. And spent too much of her dance taking
pictures. I shoulda just watched.

She did great. We are so proud.

Afterward, another mom came up to admire wee Viv and ask how old she
was. I told her, just shy of 4 weeks. She told me she'd just had twins
6 months ago. Congrats, I said. She came back with some shit about how
it wasn't that long ago but oh how glad she was to be past these early
days we're having with Vivian.

Gee, thanks.

She ended her 'wisdom' with 'good luck' as I just stood there,
speechless.

If I'd had my wits about me, I'd have said that her being here at all is
the culmination of a long, painful, expensive, heartbreaking road, that
given all that was required to bring my lovely, tiny daughter into the
world, I simply do not give a shit that right now, we don't sleep as
much.

Because I wouldn't trade this little sweaty patch on my chest that Viv
is making as she sleeps for anything. It took a thousand miracles to
add this baby to our family, no way will we take her for granted long
enough to complain about any bits of these early days.

Followup

2009-12-10T04:42:00.001-08:00

The breast pump somehow survived getting milk into itself. Lesson
learned: try not to fall asleep while pumping. And I think I'll keep
that manual pump I have as a backup. Just in case.

The wee child survived a night without eating much due to bottle
failure. In fact, she's gone on a crazyass growth spurt and is about to
leave newborn clothes behind, abandoning them in a huff for the promised
land of 0-3 months.

Of course, I'm cheap so she'll likely sport many of those teeny clothes
one last time before I totally stop dressing her in them.

Me? (If I didn't post this already) as of last week, I'm only 4 pounds
over my pre-pregnancy weight and I've been cleared to return to water
aerobics. So I did, I've gone thrice now and it feels great. It's also
weird to be able to bound up the locker room stairs, now that I'm down
22 of the 26 pounds I put on while With Child. But it's good.

I'm planning to attempt a hockey clinic next week, a little earlier than
my doc suggested. With the holidays and the hockey break due to leagues
wisely scheduling 0 games during that time approaching, the choice is to
wait longer than I want to or come back a little early.

Vegas is not that far away. So I'm coming back a little early. And
I'll sit the hell on the bench if it feels like I need to. But mentally,
I am so ready. I'll be interested to see if my body is as well.

And that's the news from 4:30 am. Where I alone am awake, having been
forced from sleep not by an angry, hungry infant*, no, but by the need
to pump milk for that child. The child herself is a fan of sleeping
long stretches at night.

Do not think for one moment that we're not insanely grateful for this
phenomenon or that we remotely understand it.

Also, I think if you make a statement like 'we really don't know that
much about the baby,' it might behoove you to go ahead and ask a
question, ANY question about that baby. Right away, so you don't look
like an insensitive boob when you then launch into a very detailed story
that in no way relates to that baby.

* my mother has declared that wee Viv is no longer a newborn since she's
almost a month old. I have no clue from whence this distinction came or
why it needed to be made but it's sort of amusing. My mother also
seemed surprised that I was driving around by myself with both kids in
the car at the same time and that wee Viv, in fact, has her very own
carseat.

Mechanical Issues

2009-12-06T04:42:00.001-08:00

Friday night, wee Viv was mighty unhappy. For a baby who (so far) is
rarely unhappy, this was odd. She was up much of the night, fussing and
being mad, mad, mad. She also was eating but the bottle seemed to stay
at the same level (this should've been our first clue but hey, sleepless
nights don't really mean top-notch intelligence). It took until the
next day at lunch for us to realize that her bottle was clogged and she
wasn't getting much/any milk.

Yep, that's now twice when we've inadvertently starved her.
Fortunately, once we figured it out, she sucked down a whole bottle,
pooped up a storm and was happy baby once again.

Part two of our mechanical failure is me falling asleep while pumping
just now. Somehow, the milk spilled into the pump tubing and made its
way into the motor. It's 4:39 a.m. and I'm parked in the living room,
running the thing until the milk works itself out. I can only hope that
it didn't completely fuck up the pump since it's not like you can buy a
new pump right now. If the kid ate any other way, I'd have swapped out
the lines and hoped for the best at my next pumping session.

But since pumped milk makes up 90% of Viv's food, here I am, watching
that milk get sucked out of the motor while everyone else sleeps.

Sick

2009-12-01T12:22:00.001-08:00

Wee Viv and I have colds. Only 2 weeks old and this poor girl has been
jaundiced, in the hospital, hating the boob (learning slowly to like it,
tho) and now she's all sniffles.

She's sleeping on my chest right now, scooting as close as she possibly
can. As I write this, her wee face is under my cheek and I feel all of
her breaths on my neck.

I hate that she's feeling so yucky. She's been through more than enough
in her short life already.

Bliss

2009-11-29T00:23:00.001-08:00

There is a wee baby sleeping on my chest. The ghosts of infertility may
never fully leave me but. But they do add up to me being so very
grateful for this tiny girl.

She's nothing but a miracle.

Settling In

2009-11-28T00:52:00.001-08:00

Having both girls home still seems like a dream. A very very good
dream. Miss Vivian is very mellow, she sleeps 3-4 hours at a stretch at
night. This blows us away since Val took many many weeks to get to that
point.

I'm sure that this difference is related to the fact that Val actually
breastfed, you know, from the breast. I'm pumping a ton of milk for
Viv, which is great. But I'm pumping all of this milk because she's
just not a fan of the boob.

We're working on it. We'll continue to work on it until we figure it
out. In the meantime, I pump. And pump. I'm pleased that I'm making
as much now as I did at the height of my nursing days with Val. I don't
have to worry that there's not enough. Because oh my, yes, there is
enough.

I'm glad as hell that I was able to buy a newer version of the pump I
had with Val and that I had it all ready to go before Viv was born. It
seems more efficient and works about as well as the hospital grade one I
used at the hospital.

Other than the not-latching thing, she's settling in nicely. She sleeps
an unheard-of 3 to 4 hours at a stretch at night. So we're really not
all that exhausted.

I know, it's weird. And it could change at any moment. For now, it's
Very Nice.

We're also doing well with cloth diapers. I adore knowing that for
about $100, we've assembled enough diapers to get through at least the
newborn size. I figured we'd commit to one size and see how it goes.
The trick seems to be finding the right number of diapers to have so
we're not spending all the money we've saved on washing diapers every
day. I think we've hit that number - 40 prefolds and 7 wraps, plus 3
bum genius my mom scored for us over the summer. We have other
varieties in larger sizes for later but for now, we're all set with the
prefold/wrap combination. Which, btw, is really cheap if you get the
wraps used.

Val is rolling with all of the changes. She brings a stuffed animal to
the baby anytime she cries. She sings her lullabies about big sisters
and wants to kiss her all the time. We've realized that it's easiest on
her if one of us takes wee Viv and the other hangs with Val while Viv
eats or gets changed. Since (in theory) anyone could feed Viv, this is
working out to sort of equal time between us. The only major issue was
when I realized that I simply can't carry the carseat with Viv in it,
not yet. So we grabbed our trusty stroller, intending to put the
carseat on it and push that around.

Only our trusty stroller? It's Val's. And she wanted to go for a ride
the minute we pulled it out of the car. She threw such a fit, she
earned herself a timeout. But I get it. She didn't want to share her
stroller, which makes total sense. Fortunately, the double model did
arrive so we won't have that particular struggle again. Val gets her
own seat *and* I can put the carseat on the thing, too.

And now, me. 12 days after the c-section and I'm feeling pretty good.
So far, the whole experience and the recovery has been about a bazillion
times easier than it was with Val. Hell, in the hospital, some of the
nurses couldn't tell who the patient was, I was so perky and wearing my
own pj's. I still can't fit into my pre-pregnancy pants (oh jeans, how
I miss thee) but I'm getting there a lot quicker than I'd expected.

My scar hurts, I can't pick Val up or carry Viv in the carseat, but I'm
dropping the weight pretty fast and moving around pretty well. I was
driving at 5 days after, which was 1 day after I was discharged. I had
no choice - I was driving Viv and myself to the hospital so she could be
admitted. Doing crazy things like playing my sax, water aerobics or
hockey still seem far away but I know those things are coming soon.

I am grateful to everyone who may have been tempted to visit in the
hospital, but didn't. We so needed that time and the privacy to keep
working on the nursing thing. We've needed that time at home, too. And
it's starting to (slowly) pay off. I do think we'll get there. In the
meantime, seriously, thanks to everyone who didn't push to come over.
This has given me time to sit with Viv and attempt many many tricks to
get her to latch.

And to pump. And pump.

We take her back to the doc for a weight check this week. The goal is
to have her back at her birth weight by then. We're not too worried,
but it'll be nice to have this kind of rocky start behind us.

I look at her and I marvel that the group of cells we started with back
in February is here beside me, snoring her wee baby snores while her big
sister snoozes with her purple hippo in the next room.

We are so very lucky.

Laundry List

2009-11-24T05:56:00.001-08:00

Because I just don't think I'm up for complete sentences, I offer you
the following observations:
- having both kids home is fabulous, just fabulous
- I hate lugging the infant seat around. Plus, it's just too heavy for
my incision right now. Time to get used to the sling.
- Val's having a blast playing with Grandma K and showing off her
friends.
- I did not imagine for one moment that this could happen but I'm more
crazy in love with Val than ever. She's an awesome big sister - singing
lullabies, bringing supplies as needed and offering a crying Viv her
beloved purple hippo for comfort.
- we are doing cloth diapers and it is not that bad. Service quality
prefolds with a wrap over them, in case you're wondering. We bought
many of the covers used for almost nothing, the total cost for the
newborn size was around $100. I think we'll come out ahead over buying
disposables or using a diaper service.
- I am pretty sure the stool softener was a bad idea.
- my recovery is going pretty well. Because I only gained 26 lbs total
this time, the weight is dropping off pretty quickly. I don't hurt all
that much and I'm pretty much back to my previous fast-paced lifestyle,
minus water aerobics.
- I hope to keep up water aerobics. I've met some really nice people
there and the regular cardio has been great.
- 5 weeks till hockey. This, I cannot stress enough.
- viv is still not latching. But we're working on it and in the
meantime, I'm making as much milk now as I did with Val, aided by a
drug. So that's a huge plus. I've gotten the name of a lac.tation
person who might be decent for me to work with. I'm willing to give her
a call and get some help if Viv and I can't make more progress on our
own.
- val thinks the new show Jungl.e Junction is the shit. It features the
same 2 songs in every episode, one or the other of which is pretty much
constantly in my head.
- also constantly in my head is calculating the proximity of the nearest
place to get some sort of icy caffeinated beverage from wherever I am.
In the end, this mostly means going to mc donald's because it's close
and cheap.
- my recovery from viv's birth is going much better than with val's. I
felt like a damn genius for bringing my own giant undies, pads and pj's
to the hospital. Seriously. These 3 things added up to a great deal of
comfort and normal-ness.
- viv slept 4 hours in a row just now. However, she's now wide awake
and ready for a baby party.
- viv bears a striking resemblance to ed asner when she's mad. Also,
she sounds like an angry goat when she's really mad.
- val fell asleep in a shopping cart at target the other night.
- thanksgiving is in 2 days. I guess it's time to firm up our plans.
- we pulled Val out of school for the week so she can hang with us and
Grandma K.

That's it for now.

Home

2009-11-23T01:24:00.000-08:00

At this moment, there is a wee tiny baby sleeping on my chest. At home,
with her big sister snoozing away in the next room.

Now We Wait

2009-11-22T04:01:00.001-08:00

After a long night in the hospital, Viv's bilirubin levels came back
significantly lower yesterday morning. But not quite low enough to
warrant her getting discharged. Sigh.

I hung out with her for part of the afternoon, then Andrea came over to
relieve me. I pretty much ran to get Val (Grandma K is in town for a
visit, she's been awesome about hanging with Val while we've dealt with
Viv's issues) and take her to do a few things.

I cannot quite explain how much I have missed Val this week. We've gone
from only being apart 1 night ever (a sleepover, preparation for this
week) to being apart for 5. Talk about sucktastic.

But we had a nice day together with Grandma K. It helped take my mind
off worrying about Viv and I got to reconnect with Val (who seems giant
these days, compared to Viv).

Andrea went on to volunteer to stay overnight in the hospital so I could
get some rest. Val and I stayed up super late cuddling blissfully in my
glorious bed, then konked out together.

Of course I woke up a couple of hours later to pump and am having a
little trouble falling back to sleep. But I'll get there. And wee Viv
will get home. Preferably really soon on both counts.

2009-11-21T00:31:00.000-08:00

And Here I Thought The Pig Flu Was The Worst Possible Thing

At this time last week, my biggest worry was the fact that Andrea's mystery flu would prevent her from being at Vivian's birth. And for the record, we were pretty set on the name Vivian for a while, if by pretty set you mean we toyed with some other options until literally 2 days before her birth all the while fairly certain we'd go with Vivian, well then yes, we were pretty set.

So, since I have time, I'll tell you the whole story.

Viv's scheduled Birth Day arrived last Sunday. She'd made pretty much 0 significant signs of wanting to arrive on her own time so I was resigned to the scheduled part. Glad as hell I'd bullied my doc into doing the section so close to my due date, though, so I can say with all certainty that Miss Vivian had all the possible time to attempt to arrive.

We'd gone through Plans A-H (for Hamdemic) and landed on Plan I for the logistics of the day. Here's how it all finally shook out:

10 am -- Cheddah picks me up and takes me to the hospital.
11 am -- Soosan arrives at the hospital. With Andrea possibly being swine-infected, these two lovely ladies were kind enough to sign up to be the Delivery Support Team.
11ish am -- Andrea arrives after dropping Val off at Sue & Sarah's for a long playdate with Isaiah, having ditched her fever to the point where we felt okay about her coming to the hospital but not being in the OR -- something about having my guts all splayed out while she was coughing/possibly actually ill made us shy away from that.
12ish pm -- I get all IV'ed up, have the first of many things taped to me and saunter into the OR. At that point, I'm alone with the many nurses and facing the moment that for some reason, I'd been dreading -- getting the spinal block. The nice nurse had me hold onto her while this was inserted and I must admit that I mightve held on a little tighter than she'd bargained for. Sorry, nice nurse, that was Not my best moment. But you were so very kind. And soft.
Sometime after that, I'm all draped up and Soosan is allowed to come in and park it next to my head. She's seen a bazillion c-sections but not a one from this position since she's usually waiting to do all those Things Nurses Do at C-Sections. I cannot ever fully express how grateful I am that 1. she was willing to sit there, 2. that she chose not to give any kind of medical play-by-play (I can just imagine it, 'oh look! There's your guts!') and 3. that she could not wait to get up outta that seat and go be with Viv.

During that time, Andrea and Cheddah were doing their best to stay behind a giant, clearly-marked red line just outside the OR. That line was the only path to a tiny window that ended up giving Andrea a better view of Viv's arrival than she would've had sitting by my head, including a very odd moment where my OB saw her and nodded as if to indicate something good, whatever that may have been.

Soon enough, they brought Viv over to me, where Soosan held onto her and I stroked her (slightly goopy) face while I was being stitched up. Not too long after that, Viv had to go to the nursery for her first bath and whatever medical things needed to be done so Soosan went with her. Cheddah gracefully stepped over the red line and onto the seat at my head while Andrea and Soosan took Viv down to the nursery.

Eventually, I was all stitched up and wheeled into recovery. I was doing fine, or so it seemed, until out of nowhere I started to barf. Now, I do not barf. Ever. Like, literally, once every 10 years at this rate. Let alone with my nice friends standing there chatting with me.

And then it happened again and again and again. Over the course of the next 10 hours, I would barf many more times, noting for the record that starting with an empty stomach, then switching to a clear liquid diet made this experience slightly more pleasant.

Yeah, I know. That's gross.

Eventually they found a drug that worked to offset this and I stopped with the barfing. Thank God. Because that was gross.

While I was barfing, the medical personnel working on Viv were discovering that she had slightly high blood sugar. The cure for this would be for her to eat a bit then see if the level went down. Somewhere around this point and between barf sessions, we discovered that Viv is actually not a fan of breastfeeding. She did manage to eat enough that day to get the level down but it was so little milk, I didn't quite grasp how that was even possible.

We were able to sneak proud big sister Val in for a visit.

Later that night, the nurse (who I later nicknamed Dumb and Dumber) stood me up, then, when I said I'd brave walking to the bathroom, ran to get her counterpart to help steady me, LEAVING MY UNSTEADY ASS STANDING THERE ALONE. They got me to the bathroom and had me sit on the toilet. Do you know how weird it is to sit there while you have a catheter in?

It's really weird. And yeah, that's gross.

They left me alone again, this time to go back out into my room and tourette about something or other. I had to call them back in to help me. Dumbasses. Seriously.

I did discover later in my stay that nurse #1 was actually not that bad if she was not with Dumber, and that the key to dealing with her is to simply not engage. I tried to just let her tourette for the rest of the stay, which sort of helped.

Towards the end of her shift, Dumb came in and asked if I wanted to get up again before she went off shift. No thanks, I said, I don't feel up to trying that again. In this case, 'that' meant 'dealing with the risk of being left completely alone while you go out and fuck around with something that IS AT NO RISK OF FALLING OVER.' When my favorite nurse waltzed in along with our pediatrician later that morning, I was so damn happy. Diane (favorite nurse) got me up again, got me cleaned up and at some point, took out the damn catheter.

During the long night of Dumb & Dumber's reign, Viv started the great boob rage of 2009, refusing all offers to eat, choosing instead to scream and scream at my boob. Talk about disheartening. Not only is the kid not eating, she's mad at the only food source we'd like her to have. Sigh, and weep quietly.

This food rage led to her basically not eating for 2 days, which led to high bilirubin levels and the need to feed her formula in a vain attempt to reduce the level (apparently formula processes quicker than breastmilk). I cast disparaging glances at each of the formula bottles we used and was not sad when Viv didn't finish the bottle and I got to throw it away. Meanwhile, I started pumping breastmilk and that effort has me already pumping the same volume in a sitting that I used to do with Val.

So even if we never resolve Viv's Boob Hate, she'll have enough to eat. That's a relief that I can't quite put into words.

Right before we got to go home, in between many warnings from the weirdest nurse we met that incisions shouldn't be pus-filled.

Fast-forward to when we got discharged yesterday and they did a really fucking torturous blood draw on Viv to check her bilirubin levels. I thought it was just a routine thing but Viv had other ideas. The level went back up and now the pediatrician is Worried about her. We got another level taken this afternoon and it's gone up. Again.

So, the end result of this increased level is that Viv and I are spending the night in the hospital. She's in an incubator thing, under the bilirubin lights that are supposed to break up the bad stuff, pronto. This has not been an easy transition for her since she's been held and cuddled for almost every hour of her life to date. Putting her in there, knowing I can't cuddle her for more than a few minutes at a time, ripped my heart wide open.

This was right before she went into the damn incubator, as I was struggling to keep my shit together.

It took her 2 hours to calm down enough to sleep in there. It is taking all of my strength not to reach in there and pick her up, pull her close to me and sleep. But she really is yellow, this really does need to be resolved. Even if the getting there is breaking my heart.

Here's this lovely little girl, for whom we longed and prayed through all of those failed pregnancy attempts and then the IVF that brought us this wee miracle. And I can't touch her, nor does she want the one significant comfort I could give her -- the boob.

This is proving to be a long night. All I can do is hope and pray that one night under the lights is all it takes and we'll get home to Val and Andrea very, very soon.

Glad We Stayed

2009-11-19T00:27:00.000-08:00

We could've come home today but chose to stay in the hospital so we
could work on wee Viv's feeding issues. We made some good progress,
finally figuring out a couple of ways she'll eat. I feel somewhat more
prepared to head home than I did yesterday.

I think we'll end up renting the hos.pital grade pump for a while. It
seems that no matter how you slice it, pumping will be an integral part
of this child eating so it may as well be as comfortable/efficient as
possible.

But I cannot wait to get home to Val. I've missed that girl so much.

It Was Wise

2009-11-18T15:37:00.000-08:00

For me to say please, no visitors. Miss Vivian is apparently not a fan
of breastfeeding and it's taken us this much time already to come to
some sort of a truce in the matter. The first two very long nights, she
screamed and screamed at any notion of the boob as food. By yesterday,
she'd eaten so little that she was getting lethargic and a bit
jaundiced.

Between my own increasing guilt about my child essentially eating
nothing while we waited for her to figure out eating and the threat of
the jaundice, I made a very hard call yesterday.

I asked for formula and a syringe. And me, adamant, yet reluctant
breastfeeder, busted that shit out and fed my kid. Who rewarded us by
finally opening both eyes. At the same time.

In addition, I'm becoming fast friends with the pump once again. Those
efforts are totally paying off - I'm getting a good amount of milk now,
enough that merely a day after I started, I think we can ditch the
formula for good.

It did what it needed - cleared out the stuff that causes the jaundice.
Her levels were back down in the 'we will make no more threats/demands
around this' level and that's good enough for me.