Spirited Child

One of the many good things about maternity leave is that I've been able to go to church. When I work Sat. nights, I just can't stay awake to go to the service at 11am. I'm just too exhausted and I figure God understands. But I do miss it. Last Sunday, a family had their baby baptized and their almost 3 year old son was running all over the sanctuary and the poor mother was stressed trying to keep him under control since Dad was holding the baby, trying to keep him from knocking over the candles on the altar, etc. It was quite distracting as the Pastor went through the Baptismal Covenant. He had a pencil and one of the envelopes meant for the offering with him. He would lay on the floor, in front of the congregation, color a bit, then get up and run to the other end, run by the altar, jump up and down to make noise, try to get his dad to pick him up even though daddy was holding the baby, and he just was nuts. The poor mom, she picked him up a couple times to try and control him, he resisted, fought her the whole time but she managed to stay focused on the son being baptized. Finally, she gave up, let her elder son lay on the floor and color while they finished the baptism. Every mother in the congregation was silently glad that it wasn't their child that was acting up. Seriously, how could that mother let the kids get away with that? Why didn't she have more control? How embarrassing!! Oh, wait, that mother was me and the child was my own sweet "spirited Isaiah that was running amok while Caleb was being baptised!!

8 Weeks

I just can not believe that my baby boy is 8 weeks. It just doesn't seem like it has been that long. I also can't believe I go back to work in 2 weeks. I like my job, but I'm not looking forward to going back. The first night back is always the hardest, and it seems like with each kid, I'm more and more emotional about leaving them to go back to work. You'd think by now I realize it's no big deal...I work 3 nights a week. One thing that will be hard is going back to switching my sleep schedule all the time. Sleeping at night 4 nights a week, working all night the other 3 then sleeping during the day. You don't realize how much that messes with you until you are going to bed every night. I've talked with a few of the girls from work and apparently morale is at an all time low - people who no one ever thought would leave the department are looking for other jobs and are even willing to leave to go to another area of nursing, like ER or med-surg and these are die-hard labor nurses! It's busy, short-staffed and everyone is taking on patient loads that make it hard to give good-enough care, let alone give good care. So I'm really excited about going back to work. Maybe something dramatic will happen and it will be all sunshine and roses, we'll get to do one-on-one nursing care and be able to give the attention we want to give to our patients. I won't be holding my breath.
But, back to Caleb. He's starting to be much more attentive to the world around him. He's been spending a lot more time awake, just looking around. He's starting to smile purposefully now, too. I just love baby smiles! They are addictive and I can tell you I've spent so much time trying to get him to smile again. The other kids look at me like "Mommy, what is wrong with you?". They think I'm crazy, I'm sure. But Caleb will sit in his bouncy/vibrating chair and just wait for someone to come talk to him. Then he just lights up, his eyes get really big and he will try to imitate what we do with mouths. It's so cute. He's still a pretty decent sleeper. He has a good stretch at the beginning of the night for about 5 hours, then he's up every 2-3. He ends up in bed next to me about every night. I prefer to not co-sleep, but he sleeps so much better next to me, and I usually just fall asleep nursing him. But, so far, sleeping isn't too bad. I just hope when I do go back to work, he does okay with me gone.

First 5K is around the bend

I have decided I am officially crazy. I've probably been this way, since, oh, the first time I saw 2 lines on a home pregnancy test back in 2002, but I'm finally admitting that I am in fact nuts. I just got the ok to start exercising last week and I've decided to run a 5K December 4th. That's right, in a month. Its a memorial race back home, so I can hit up my parents for some good food while I'm there, if I survive the run, in the cold of December. My luck it will be sleeting that day. But that's not the real issue. I have a 7 week old baby that was born by c/s. And I am severely out of shape due to lack of exercise for months. The last time I ran, 3 days ago, I did manage to run an entire mile,...but then I had to stop and walk. It was only 1 mile, not 3.1 miles. Plus I was running on a flat treadmill. No wind, no hills, constant slow pace. I don't know what I'm thinking, running a race so soon. But, if I have to stop and walk some, so be it. I'm not too proud to walk. I figured I gotta get back out there sometime, why not sooner rather than later? Talk to me after the race, and see if I still feel the same way!

I'm Too Sexy..

I told Husband last night "I just don't feel sexy anymore, ya know?"
He just stared at me for a second and then laughed. For a brief moment, I was irritated until I realized what I was doing. I was wearing a pair of his gray sweat pants and a tshirt I got in H.S. My hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail and I had minimal make-up on. But the best part? I was sitting on the floor, my old tshirt hiked up, exposing my jowls-of-a-dog post-partum belly, with the breast pump milking me like a cow, with enough suction to pull my nipples to a very unnatural length as milk filled the bottles. Yup, motherhood is sexy!

Reunion with my Running Shoes

Today I decided to go for my first run in months. Tomorrow I see Doc for my post-partum check-up so I figured 1 day ahead of time would be ok. Plus I knew I wouldn't be running very far. I tried to remind myself that I had a baby 6 weeks ago, added to the fact that I haven't exercised since May. Rationally, I knew it wouldn't be that nice easy run around the neighborhood, but in my head was the memory of those nice, easy runs. Let's just say it wasn't pretty! I can only imagine what I looked like. I have a long way to go to get back into shape. That said, it wasn't as bad as I expected, I alternated running and walking, and ran most of the way. I ran slow, but that's ok. I didn't push it, as I haven't gotten the "official" ok to exercise, but I don't imagine there's any reason why Doc won't give me to ok tomorrow. So I did it, I got that first run under my belt. It will only get better from here.

A Labor Nurse's Birth Plan - revisited

Ah, my "birth plan". I was laughing to myself (yes, I'm easily entertained) about the birth plan I had come up with when compared it to what actually happened with Caleb's birth. It is a good idea to have an idea of what you want and don't want, but once again it shows that even with the best laid plans, things may not go your way, even if you write a kind of "anti" birth plan, to ward of any unfavorable vibes for the labor/birth. Guess the labor gods decided to take me seriously and grant me some of the items on my birth plan. Figures, right?


Just for fun, let's look at my "birth" plan:


1. I want lots and lots of Magnesium Sulfate. Gee, I guess I got that, didn't I?!? My whole sense of time the day leading up to Caleb's birth is a bit of a blur, but I got a nice hefty 6g bolus and was on Mag, I believe, about 18 hours, and a nice big maintenance rate of 3g an hour the majority of that time. Good times, good times.



2. I'd like to have an emergency c-section without anesthesia due to a uterine rupture at my old incision site. (yes, unfortunately, we have done c/s sans anesthesia, luckily not often) - Thankfully, I did not have to have this. No emergency, no uterine rupture. And Doc told me after the c/s that my uterus did not look like a uterus that had 2 prior c/s. Nice to know the ole' girl healed well after c/s 1 & 2.



3. If I don't get a emergency c/s and can VBAC, I'd like an episiotomy with a 4th degree extension, please. Wasn't given a chance at a VBAC, heck, it seemed like it was a huge deal that I wanted to wait until Husband was there before I was taken back to the OR. When one of the other docs I work with heard I delivered, (according to a coworker/friend) by c/s, and had a vaginal delivery with my first baby (perhaps a breech in HIPAA, but I don't mind) he said he would have let me VBAC. Go figure. But, in reality, I would have been too nervous to VBAC after 2 c-sections.


4. I also would like to be tethered to the bed for the duration of labor with internal monitoring. No internal monitoring, but I was, in fact, in bed from the time I changed out of my scrubs and into a hospital gown right before they started Mag. However, I wasn't in any shape to stand after a certain amount of time, remembering how weak my muscles were just trying to move in bed and when I tried to get to the wheelchair for my ride to the OR.


5. I desire lots and lots of cervical checks - I did have several exams, but I realize they were all necessary to make sure I wasn't changing my cervix.


6. I also would like my baby taken from me straight away for at least an hour so it interrupts with breastfeeding and bonding. I had wanted Caleb to stay in the OR with me...but that was on the condition he was term and healthy. My coworkers tried their best to keep him in the OR, but I told them to take him to the nursery, make sure he's just fine. I did get to see and touch him before they took him to the nursery, so that was nice. Thankfully he was fine and it had no effect on bonding or breastfeeding. That boy latched easily while I was on the recovery room cart.


So, like I said in the original post, be flexible with your birth plans. You just never know what labor and delivery will bring.

A little daily ritual

Someday, I will not have to change the sheets on my bed everyday. Why, you may ask, do I change the sheets everyday? Is it because I am a clean freak? Clearly not if you saw my house. Do I just like to do laundry? No, not really, and even if I did really like laundry, I have plenty without my bed sheets to satisfy my craving. And no, Husband does not wet the bed, neither do I for that matter, and believe it or not, the baby isn't the reason for the daily bed change. My friends, let me tell you why I do this daily ritual. Husband gets up out of bed to go to work around 4:30am. I fall back to sleep after feeding Caleb about that time and when I wake up, Isaiah has crawled in bed with me. When we get up for the day, Isaiah is soaked. Not just full diaper soaked, but wet pants and shirt. He leaves a huge wet pee soaked spot on Husband's side of the bed, wet pj's, saturated diaper. You may think "Well, get him potty trained". If only it were that easy!! Or "Why doesn't Husband change his diaper when he gets up for work?" Well, that's because Isaiah is still sleeping when Husband leaves...and I don't wake up when he crawls up in bed because, well, I'm tired from the nighttime feedings. I suppose we could wake him up in the middle of the night and change him, I have considered that, but with as horrible of a sleeper that Isaiah is, I changed my mind. You wouldn't wake him up in the middle of the night to change him either, trust me. Bedtime is a huge battle we've been fighting with him for a long, long time so once he finally goes to sleep, we don't want to wake him up. We've tried limiting drinks, and he goes to bed with a fresh clean diaper every night. Sometimes he will sit and use the potty before bed...other times he just plain refuses to sit and try. We've tried so many things (that have failed), every old wives tale, every trick others have used, all have failed. I've decided Isaiah has a bladder the size of the water tower, and can store fluid like a camel. I've even gone so far to do a little dance around a fire and gave a sacrifice of a pack of diapers, hoping to appeal to the dry diaper gods, or at least to the not-saturated-and-overflowing, diaper gods. They haven't heard me. I may need to go buy a few more sets of sheets, maybe a set for each day of the week. I guess I could look at the bright side - if Husband irritates me, I could always NOT change the sheets!