Half a dozen of the other

Our baby turned 4 mos on Friday. And in honor of the event, he cut his first tooth!

His cheeks had been rosy but that was it– the only sign. He grabbed my finger to chew on it and cut me and that was how we discovered it… And then 2 days later while admiring this little nub, I noticed a white lump next to it and this morning the second tooth had cut through! Jen reported biting yesterday from the BF front lines. But he is do little and we suspect also in pain, and so we are not sure how to deal with it. Bittersweet. That’s how I feel about it. Those first few teeth are impossibly cute, but they mean that soft gnashing gums are a thing of the past…

This baby has turned my world around. I forgot what it feels like to fall in love with a child. I mean, not the love of those early days, but the love that stems from really getting to know them. And from them knowing you. I wondered before he was born, if it would be the same as with M. What it would be like. When I would start to feel it. And it is every bit as magical as in remember it. Every time I kiss those fat red cheeks, squeeze that giant new boy of ours, I am in awe that he is part of our family and that we all get to love him forever.

I remain tortured about baby #3. I keep reminding myself that I don’t need to decide yet. But it is always in the back of my mind. I also keep reminding myself that this perfect little boy and his darling big brother are rocking my world right now. And that is all I need.

This.

And this.

Wow. It has been forever. Not sure where to pick up. Hard to even tell where I left off. Not sure where I am going with this blog. Not sure I want to keep going, but not sure I am ready to close shop. I guess for now I will keep my options open. There is so much I love about this space, and the people that I have met through here. So for now, just a good old fashioned update. And a promise to myself that I will figure out what I want to do with my blog….

So, the baby…. Baby K will be 4 months old at the end of next week. Seriously? How in the world did that happen? The experience is all kinds of different this time. The baby is different. The circumstances are different. I am different. Jen is different. So,what is our baby like? who has he become? For started, K is ginormous—M was a tiny premie, born at 35 weeks and this post-term baby is a hunka hunka burnin’ love, wearing M’s 6-9 month clothes already! This baby’s cheeks defy description. His ability to explosive poop through outfits 3-5 times a day never ceases to amaze me. This guy is chill. So chill. He spends lots of time observing the world. He is used to a 6 year-old face in his all. The. Time. And so it takes a LOT to ruffle his feathers. K will often tire of being held (seriously? I didn’t know babies were capable of this) and squawk until he is put down. He loves his swing. His bumb0. His vibrating chair. His playmat. His exers@ucer. He likes to lie in his crib while his retro crib lights and sounds toy plays music. He likes to put weight on his impossibly fat little legs. He smiles almost every waking minute, on loop. His smile is mostly a big, wide,gummy open mouth. Often he tries to shove both fists into his big open smile in order to satisfy his recent endless oral fixation. This last week saw him roll over a few times and in both directions. Although he is much happier to just stay on his back. He has started drooling. He has started humming while he nurses and falls asleep which melts my heart. He has been sleeping from 7 or 8 pm to 5:30 or 6 am. Sometimes straight through, and other times with one middle-of-the-night feed. M didn’t sleep more than 2-3 hours in a row until he was 18 months. Yup, that’s right. eighteen. months. This sleep pattern is rocking our world. We try and sleep K in his bed but I think he has mild reflux and seems to need to sleep upright. He has a sleep wedge but it isn’t always enough. Often times he ends up sleeping in his swing (not turned on—we keep it still). But he is asleep. And stays that way. And as a result, so do we, So we will take it for now.

We work very hard never to compare the boys out loud when M is around. I grew up with a lot of that and am not sure it was the best in terms of building healthy sibling relations. But when M is tucked into his top bunk and K is in one of his sleep spots we steal a few minutes before Jen tucks in for the night (she is on K duty and goes to bed early) and compare notes. We whisper in the quiet and remark how different things are this time. How much easier it all is. Even though of course, we have our days, we are just a lot more relaxed this time. Did the relaxed baby make us more relaxed or did the relaxed parents make for a more relaxed baby. I guess we’ll never really know which came first. What I DO know is how much we are both enjoying things this go around. A fact which surprises us both.

And of course, life is lots more than this baby and his big brother. There is my work, which I am mostly loving. There is the coming summer which is filling me with excitement at the thought of wearing all my summer dresses and going to the beach and pool, and having time off and a relaxing pace of life. We are going on a family trip to NYC to visit with the daddy-o’s and I am excited just to get the flock out of this city—albeit we’ll be heading to a much more intense one (hey, anyone know of any good NYC playgrounds or things to do with a 6 year old? We are staying in Chelsea…).

And in the midst of all this, miraculously, I have found a little piece of me. When I had M, I felt myself slowly but surely slip away. Not in a bad way (even if it kind of sounds that way), but more in terms of becoming someone who is needed all the time. I now wonder if I had some PPD but in retrospect I felt so intense, so needed, and so terrified, somehow, of loosening the intensity of my role with M. I gained 30 pounds on mat leave (after I gave birth) and then packed another 20 in the years that followed. I reached a weight that scared me; the number was just so terrifyingly big. I had a pocket or 2 of exercise, but not much. I was grossly, grossly out of shape. And then the TTC stuff took its toll on my body, my weight, my mental status. By the time K was born I was more than 100 pounds overweight, completely out of shape and desperate. I tried everything over those years; WW, the 17 d@y diet, WW again. I logged and dieted and failed and was miserable. I researched b@riatric surgery and then ran from that idea terrified. I felt out of control. Totally and completely. And like an enormous blob. And like I didn’t know how to stop. And like maybe it would never end.

Then on February 27, I made a commitment to myself to change. Which I had done a million times before. But I made it anyway. I vowed to start slow. I started a personal blog (as in one that is not open) to keep track of my efforts. To make small, weekly goals. And to keep them. And I did. And it has worked. I started to eat well. I started to feel in control of things. I have struggled with disordered eating my whole life, but for the first time did not feel like food was more powerful than me. Then I started to exercise. Slowly but surely, I used my elliptical machine after work. 30 minutes at the beginning, now 35. I went from just struggling through my workout to making cross training fitness goals. And attaining them. And working out HARD. In the 8 weeks since I started, I have dropped 21 pounds. No gimmicks. No $$ put out. Just good old fashioned hard work. I am feeling strong. I am feeling in control. And I feel like I am getting to know myself again, taking care of myself again. I am feeling great.

I have not lost this much weight at once in probably 10 years. And while I am proud and buoyed, I am also very aware that I have 100lbs to lose. I have set my personal goal at 89. So by my estimation, I have lost about 22%of what I need to. And that leaves me with a disheartening 78% to go. But from the get go I told myself that this needs to be a lifelong project. And so if it takes me a year or 2 that is ok. Because I know I will fight this demon for the rest of my life. Right now, I am triumphing. And I am proud.

So that is what has kept me from here. That and the two beautiful little spirits I have been charged with growing, guarding, teaching and loving. Life is good.

I am still here… My absence has been the result of the crazy that is 2 kids and work and commuting and life… I miss blogging. A lot. And I have stuff I am thinking and working through but i just can’t get the time to throw it together in coherent sentences. I have a phone full of pics and have awakened my drowsy WP app. I hope that I can start writing again. I doubt there is anyone out there still reading but I find it so helpful, therapeutic and centering… I am here and I’ll be back. But for now a pw protected post with my same password as the last time. With lots of pics of the kiddies… And a promise, to at least myself, that I will be back for more…

Every night, after M is tucked in, I take baby K for a few hours so Jen can sleep. The house is silent, and I put our flail-y baby into his kangar00 wrap and he instantly goes slack, fat check pressed against my chest. He breathes deep and slow and does lots of those newborn-y hiccups and sleep smiles. It is wonderful and magical and I breathe every drop of his new baby smell in, while kissing his downy head top. I feel his solid weight and we share the warm spot where his small body presses between my breasts.

I miss Jen. Those used to be our hours. But I know that soon enough they will be again. But for now, I love that time with my baby. Those silent dark, peaceful hours. When it is just the 2 of us.

Actually, NO time is more like it. The schedule these days in beyond grueling. I wake up at 6:15. Wake the older kid 15 minutes later (if he isn’t up already). Get us both dressed. Make his lunch. Pack his bag. Make and pack my own. Make and feed him breakfast. Wrangle him into his coat and get him out the door by 7:30am. Drive him to daycare and get him settled. Drive home and park the car. Walk to the streetcar and take it to work. Work from 8:45 or so till 5 pm. Race up the street to catch the express home. Get off and walk the 10 mins to my house. Walk in the door and hug and kiss all the people I love. Assemble and/or cook dinner. Eat and then play for 10 minutes before its big boy’s bedtime. Put him to sleep. Then when I get out around 8:30 take baby boy from Jen so she can get some sleep. Keep baby boy till 10:30. Put him down with Jen and them take a shower. Get ready for bed– goal of asleep by 11:00 or so.

Hit repeat.

And work has been beyond crazy. So no lunch breaks. No me time. And by extension, no time to blog.

And while I am ragged beyond ragged, I wouldn’t change anything. Not for the world. Because of these beautiful little people…

***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…