Half a dozen of the other

***Pics in a password protected post to follow.  Same password as last time.  If you need it, let me know.***

We have a three week (and one day) old.  I can’t believe it.  As I gear up to go back to work on Monday (been off since Dec 23) I find myself wondering how I got here.  Wondering in this little life that has joined our family.  Trying to remember who “we” were on Jan 4, the day before induction.  I keep running through that day in my head, remembering the excitement.  the wonderment.  Remembering a time when we didn’t know who was joining us, just that someone was.  The simmering energy that bubbled beneath the surface the week before he came.  The feeling that followed us to the hospital as we worked to usher him out.  It is all so surreal.

We now know who has joined us; or at least are continuing to get to know him.  And he is amazing.  We are in all kinds of love.  Sleep-deprived, but getting used to it.  Finding our rhythm.  Learning our roles, which are reversed this time around (more on that in another post).  Finding a way to keep M engaged in all of this.

Every night at bedtime, M gets to pick 3 stories.  The person putting him down for the night usually reads them in his bed with him.  Once K arrived, he requested that the baby join us for story time.  And so our new tradition has begun– every night both grownups and kids climb into our bed and we read together.  M takes breaks every 3 minutues to kiss his broother or declare, “he is sooooooooo cute!!!  i just can;t stop kissing his cheeks!” or some other very sweet thing.  The baby just lies there all bug eyed and jiggly necked and foread wrinkled.  And I lie there and breathe it all in as deeply as I can.  And try not to cry.  Every single night.  Because for so long this was what we wanted, and now we have it.  Our boys.

These last 3 weeks have not been without their challenges.  M is exploring the boundaries of the family rules and displaying some less than favourable behaviours.  We are exhausted, as he too, has disruptions in his sleep for the first time in a year.  And he has started waking up in the late 5′s and early 6′s instead of the civilized 7-8 am wakeups of 2011. Baby K is very easygoing (compared to his brother at this age– although I am trying hard not to compare, which has proven to be onbe of my greatest challenges to date).  He squawks when hungry or when we make him wear a hat.  And he hates cold wipes, and bum changes of any kind.  he is a decent sleeper– it doesn’t seem to matter how noisy it is, he just sleeps and usually for 3-4 hours at a time.  Even when M gets up into his face and shouts.  But when awake, he tracks our voices with his impossibly giant blue eyes which melts our hearts.  Once asleep, he generally transfers very easily, provided that he is swaddled VERY tightly and wedged into his sleeping space.  He is a major flailer and arms and legs are constantly flying.  When not swaddled for sleeping he sleeps much lighter and often wakes himself up with a punch to the face.  We have invested in a series of velcro swaddlers and they have revolutionized our life.  It is like a drug.  He squaks while we put him in and the second he is in, his eyes droop and he is out.  He sleeps in a swing, his stroller basinett, his car seat, and any surface that we put our bop.py on.  He is a major fan of being worn in his sling or in our kangaroo moby-style wrap.  He loves being sung to and always stops crying the minute we start.  And he loves sleeping in our arms.  What baby doesn’t?

K’s major challenge has been around BF.  He was a meconium birth and highly suctioned at birth and so the MW thought it interferred with his sucking reflex.  Until we looked in his mouth at a week old and noticed he has an extreme tongue tie–  so much so that when he cried his tongue went heart shaped.  And he couldn’t stick out his tongue at all.  We had it snipped as soon as possible (he didn’t even notice!  And we were so stressed at the thought!) and have worked very closely with a lactation clinic to get him on, going daily and sometimes twice in one day (*any people living in T.O that may read this blog who are interested in the deets of the AMAZING FREE lactation clinic in the east end let me know.  They are a great alternative to the Newm@n option.  Gentler touch and FREE!!!!  ).  Jen pumped like a mad woman and we started by finger feeding.  then graduated to a bottle.  then a slower flow bottle.  Then a tube taped on her nipple.  And I am proud to say that as of yeasterday, he has been latching totally normally and with no external aids!  Folks, we have a boob man!!!  Reaching that milestone has been amazing.  Esp because I am heading back to work.  Jen has been pumping so much that he has only been getting breast milk for weeks, but we also have so much stored in the freezer that we are beyond thrilled!!!  I can’t wait to return the hospital pump.  Although i am also so thankful for it.  It has been a huge key to maintaining her supply.  A major key to our success.

So we are celebrating all kinds of milestones ’round here.  And now getting ready for the next chapter– the rest of life.

We did it!  We made a baby!  We grew him, jen birthed him, we brought him home, and here we are. He snorts and grunts and squawks and we are learning his language.  I am reawakening.  It has been some time since there was a baby ’round casa halfadozen.  In some ways, it is like riding a bicycle for the first time since childhood.  I feel shaky, and unsure,  but confident enough to keep trying, to not get scared off.  The rhythms feel familiar, the smells trigger memories, the motions (like bum patting while swaying back and forth) are reflexive.  And yet it still feels new,magical and miraculous.

This baby continues to be our teacher.  Much like our realizations at the time of his conception, labour and the baby’s first few weeks continue to challenge us to recognize the limits of our control and the importance of staying present.  We have found our TTC/infertility mantra of “we don’t get to chose” to be particularly relevant; we didn’t get to chose when we got pregnant or who got pregnant despite every attempt to orchestrate the “perfect” scenario.  Similarly,we did not get to chose how our baby would ultimately move from the womb to our arms, what his temperament would be, or how he would eat or sleep.

Jen’s labour was not what we had hoped for but mostly everything we could have wanted.  If that makes any sense.  Jen never went into labour naturally despite our best efforts.  These included $500 of acupuncture, spicy foods, sex, nipple stimulation, walks, a whole bottle of castor oil (as in two treatments!) etc.  We struggled more and more as we approached the 42 week mark.  We were provided with many anecdotal induction techniques, the usual ones listed above and some more unusual ones (including drinking a can of Guine.ss, and consuming an eggplant parm resipe that supposedly catapults women into labour).  But nothing worked.  At 41w 4d, 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced we went in for the induction.  We got there at 10 am as per instructions.  By 2 pm we had been seen and a plan was made:  Jen’s water would be broken and if nothing happened after an hour or so, she would go on the 0xytocin,  At 4:30 pm, the water-breaking procedure was done.  We walked the halls for HOURS.  Not a twinge.  Not a cramp.  Nada.  Zilch.  Zip.  At 7:30 pm the drip was started.  The first few hours were fine.  By 10:00 pm Jen was in that crazy place that only the drip can take you.  Suspended in a reality of pain that has no name.  She requested the epidural and by 11:45 pm it was in.  We rested, restlessley through the night.  there was some dozing.  there was lots of poking, prodding, shifting, temp taking, monitoring and everything else.  Those night time hours were filled with a magical, ethereal energy I can’t name.  It was the combination of being up all night, knowing that our baby was on his journey, and the surreal nature of the whole thing.  Around 4 am she was 7 or 8 cm.  

Around 8 am, the OB came in to check on her and Jen was at 10 cm.  But the baby was still at -3 station.  She said she would give us an hour and if the baby didn’t drop we would have to discuss next options (as in c-section).  We panicked.   I called the MW who said not to, and that she would be right over (if you get an epi they only come at 10 cm because there is a transfer of care to the OB until the baby’s birth).  I urged jen to visualize the baby dropping and I went to get a bagel.  Around 9:30 the OB came back.  The MW,  Jen and I all held our breath while the OB checked.  And the baby had fully dropped!!!  he was at +1!!!  The OB called the nurses and told Jen it was time to push.  They turned down the epi and Jen started.  It was hard at the beginning but as Jen got the hang of it and the epidural wore off, it got easier.  There is no way to describe how amazing it was for me to watch (as an aside, now that I have both laboured and watched labour, I found it much scarier to watch then to actually do myself).  And Jen was a rockstar.  And on Friday January 6 at 11:46 am our second child was born.

He was beautiful and perfect.  And covered head to toe in poo.  Unfortunately it was a meconium birth.  Which they didn’t know ahead of time because of how he was positioned– it meant all the fluid was behind him, and so when he came out, it was in a sea of meconium. They called in the emergency pediatric team and ran him to the warming table.  Which was beyond terrifying.  He was blue and not breathing (which is what they want since they didn’t want him to aspirate it) and they intubated him and suctioned him and bagged him and rubbed his little chest while saying “come on baby” and I swear I almost lost my mind.  Thankfully jen was too out of it to know what was going on.  The MW kept smiling and nodding reassuringly at me.  Finally they let him cry and managed to get his breathing regulated and his blood-ox came up to 100 and within minutes they all disappeared.  It was crazy.  Supposedly it is normal and routine but the 20-30 minutes that the whole event lasted were some of the longest and scariest of my life.  

By 12:30 pm the room was empty.  The baby was asleep.  Jen was stitched up.  The room was lit with the golden light of mid day.  Our midwife, the same one at M’s birth was speaking in her impossibly calm, grounding, reassuring tones.  It was quiet and peaceful.  And she told us that once Jen peed and could walk, we could go home.  We called Pav and Chip who were with M.  They arrived at 2pm to meet the baby and we all walked out an hour or 2 later.  At 4 pm, less than 5 hours after the birth, we were at home. 

So like I said, it was not what we planned,but magic nonetheless.

And so it has continued.  I can tell you what 13 days of getting to know this baby has taught me about who he is:  He appears to be very chill, and not bothered by sound (good thing because his brother is noisy); he can sleep in lots of places– the bassinet, the swing, our arms, the b0ppy, our bed, his brother’s arms; he doesn’t cry much; he hates cold wipes and diaper changes more than anything; he is a decent sleeper and on a few occasions has made it between 5 and 7 hours in a row at night; he was born tongue tied with a very severe tie which meant he has not been able to nurse (jen has been pumping and he has been getting 95% BM via tube and now bottle); he is no longer tongue tied as he was snipped on Tuesday; today, with the help of the most awesome lactation and BF clinic ever, he had 2 good sessions at the breast, so we are hopeful that he will get there full-time one day; he has blonde eyebrows and light blue eyes; he is very strong; he is incredibly flail-ey (is that a word?); swaddling is his best friend– it is like a drug– and the minute he is swaddled, his eyes droop and close; essentially, this baby is completely different from  his brother in nearly every way.

When M was born I was a disaster.  For at least 6 mos.  M was premature (born at 35 weeks after 2 weeks with PROM on bedrest at the hospital) and intense.  Seriously intense.  He needed to be held All. The. Time.  Or he would lose his mind.  So we did.  he nursed slowly and had to eat on a rigid weight-gaining schedule.  For the first 18 mos of his life he never slept more than 3 hours in a row.  He was sensitive to noise, and transferring him from one place to another was nearly impossible– it was an art that few could master.  While I deeply loved my baby, I was beyond tired, and mourning the loss of my life; the lifestyle change was very hard.  Before K was born, I was very worried about going back to that place.  I wanted a do over though, a chance to really rejoice in my newborn.  I was worried that the big brother factor would make that impossible.  That the one chance I had to have a newborn with no other distractions was wasted in my crazy post-partum state. But what I found has been the complete opposite.  Despite the BF challenges which have been very discouraging, I feel far more grounded, more open to it all and less stressed.  M loves the baby and wants to hold him all the time and kiss him and talk about him– frankly, I find it shocking.  I was sure he wouldn’t care at all about a baby that does nothing much.  But he loves having his brother in his family.  And we are loving having this baby in our family.  The 2 boys are so different so far, and while it is true that K is not even 2 weeks old until tomorrow, the difference is already remarkable.  I love our intense little M more intensely (for lack of a better word) than I ever thought possible.  But I am welcoming experiencing this different kind of baby, and am looking forward to all I stand to experience and learn through loving this wonderful little boy.

So I would say, all in all, we are doing pretty good.  

More pics to come soon.  Password the same as last time and available upon request…

Remains in the belly.
His days in there are numbered. He has been served his eviction notice. The clock is ticking.
Yesterday’s MW appt revealed that Jen is 2 cm dilated and her cervix is very soft. Much more so than before. The MW thinks if induction ends up being necessary that we’ll be able to start by just breaking her water. She also called to see which OB is on, on the big day. We had a hellish one with M and there is a 1 in 14 chance she would be on again. And thankfully, it is someone diff (otherwise we would have changed the induction date).
We are ready. So ready. Pav and chip are on standby in case things happen earlier and they are scheduled to come up when the induction begins.

Everything is ready. We just wish he was!!!

And now, for what is likely my last set of belly pics:
41w 2d

It’s new years day.

Jen and my 13th anniversary.

41w 0d.

No baby.  No contractions.  No sign of action.

A few days ago Jen had bloody show.  We got excited.  We bought castor oil.  Jen chugged 4 tbs and chased it with an ice cream sundae.  And then threw everything up.  Before the castor oil had a chance to work.  Take 2 was last night.  She drank it more slowly and this time mixed in OJ with baking soda.  No barfing.  But no cramps.  Nothing at all.  We were pleased to have a full night’s sleep, but that was the only thing we are pleased with. It did absolutely, positively nothing.  Nada.  Zilch.  All the house guests who came to help with M upon the baby’s arrival have come and gone. Now we are scrambling to line up emergency plans.  Everyone is pressuring us about dates– for the birth, for the bris etc… and it is driving us crazy.  Everyone is trying to plan their busy lives and find this a major inconvenience.  A real drag.  Well, ya know what folks?  WE CAN’T CONTROL IT.  WE DON’T GET TO CHOSE.  DEAL WITH IT.  i have lost my temper a few times with people over this; they all have “plans” and are finding it hard to schedule their lives.  Well us too.  And this is our baby.  HE and only HE will decide when he arrives.  So figure out your plans on your own and complain to each other about the unknown.  But don’t complain to us.  Because we don’t want to hear it.  Because we too, are waiting.  for this new life.  For our new life to begin.

Jen had 5 days of acupuncture and her chi went from weak to bang on.  The TCM doc said he thought it was imminent.  As in last night or today.  But the beginning of this next journey remains elusive.  We continue to hold our breath in anticipation.  Jen’s belly rocks back and forth as little elbows knees and a bony bum shift and stretch and move.  MW comes over tomorrow am for stretch and sweep 3.0.  Good times.

Our 2011 baby has now become a 2012 one.  One which will cost us an additional year of daycare (he will fall on the “other side” of the birthday line,meaning he will start school a year later).  But the positives far outweight this expensive (15k) negative.  For one, he will now be a dragon (as per Chinese horoscopes) the same as me, his mama (and a very auspicious Chinese sign).  But more importantly, by not coming in 2011  he is giving us the gift of a perfect beginning for 2012.  And after the hellish year that shall not be named (2012 minus 2 years, for those newer readers), we welcome any year that starts off with joy and new life.

Happy new years to you and yours.

Coming soon to s a uterus near you…  Or rather a uterus near us.  Hoping we can avoid it though– still some time before here and there.

MW says that 90% of women go into labour between 10 days before and 10 days after their due date.  We never seem to fall on a normative side of statistics.  Will this time be any different?  We are currently 40w 5d.  Jan 4 marks that particular benchmark.  I guess time will tell.

Daily acupuncture every day this week has not seemed to help.

Spicy food, sex, and all the usual suspects don’t seem to have helped.

two stentch and sweeps do not seem to have helped.

Stern words seem to be muffleld by the uterine wall.  They do not seem to have helped.

Making plans, buying tickets etc (aka as the murphy’s law method of induction) seem to have been an insufficient temptation for the fates.

We are thinking the baby may be a pragmatist and so we have stopped procrastinating and have decided to pack the hospital bag.  Jen is doing that at present.  maybe that will bring it on.

Tick tock.  Waiting.

Here we are. 40w 3d. Somewhat peaceful despite the anticipation. The busy helps. As does the existing child who is fun and demanding and charming and needy and adorable and filthy faced with seasonal treats and occasionally facing the consequences of what we are chalking up as “pending big brother behaviour”.
The weather has mostly been sitting above freezing, which is unusual, to say the least. We got a dusting of snow, but really, that’s it. So we go on. Jen has had one stretch and sweep and will have another this aft. She had acupuncture yesterday and is there again right now. The baby daddies are in town and have taken M to see a movie. And me? Still in pj’s. In an hour I will go meet Jen for awesome vegetarian resto food and the midwife appt/stretch and sweep part 2.0.
In other news, we managed to get in a date night including a movie (desce.nd@nts) which I more than highly recommend. We have been walking non stop, trying to encourage the baby out and eating and sleeping and making rice cris.py squares and, well, just being. I hope everyone had a great holiday! And in the absence of anything real to say, some pics…

This is where we live. Well, a block from it. And while we are usually not down by the water in the winter, this season has been unseasonably warm…

Home-based DIY labour induction method # 1- long walks

Home-based DIY labour induction method # 2- soccer with your son!

There has been a lot of this, these days!!! M got a Le@p P@d from his dads for Chanukah and loves it… (and yeah,we seem to have the same taste in shoes

Big.
Bellied.
Beauty.
’bout.
Bursting.

Sooooo…. Jen has been stretched and sweeped. Not fun, but a good fact finding mission nonetheless– they discovered that She is 1 cm dilated and 50% effaced! The midwife told us that she highly doubts we’ll go too overdue! We are so excited!

It is reassuring to discover that things are on their way…

Now, to pick a name…