I might be a little emotional

Being pregnant is emotional.  There are a lot of hormones racing through you.  I am finding that I am extra emotional these days.  Not only do I have your normal pregnancy hormones rearing their lovely heads, but for quite a few weeks, I have had an added hormone syringed into me weekly to help keep my "not so perfect" uterus healthy.

I am finding myself focused on my two year olds birth, The Tater Tot.  From my past post, you can see that it was a bit of a traumatic, unexpected birth since he arrived at 33 weeks.  Its funny... when you have a preemie baby, your life shifts in ways you could never anticipate.  I find myself remembering things that I haven't thought of in a while.  What's funny is, we've made it past 33 weeks... this little Firefly is cooking in there, and we are now almost to 36 weeks, so these concerns shouldn't be consuming me, but that just isn't how the brain works I guess. 

I am remembering the NICU vividly.  I remember waking up the morning after he was born and finally being able to see my son and walking through the cold halls of the hospital in socks and multiple hospital gowns to find my son.  I remember the multiple isoletes that held all the little babies and being ushered to mine.  I was able to hold him, I was in shock, I was dazed.  He had wires on him, he was hooked up to things that I didn't understand at the time.  I remember being told I could do kangaroo time right away and having no idea what a blessing this was... I just remember being afraid.  Afraid I was going to hurt him or do something wrong.  All the wires were hard to manage while trying to put him to my chest.

I remember being discharged from the hospital and leaving without my son.   I never want to feel that pain again.  People were cheerful, telling me that he was in the care of professionals, that I should relish the sleep since I could go home and sleep for a whole night.  But I couldn't, they were wrong... I had to pump every 2 or 3 hours, I was worried, I felt a part of me was missing, I didn't sleep while my baby was in the NICU.  In the mornings, I rushed on the subway with the hoards of commuters going to work while I was going to the hospital, anxious to get there during Rounds so I could see the doctor... I rushed to get there before one of the NICU nurses feed my son, since I wanted to do it myself.

I remember arriving at the NICU with my 2 or 3 oz of milk that I had painfully pumped all night only to see other NICU Mom's with multiple 8oz bottles of milk ready for their child. I had to settle for formula, supplemented with my drops of milk.  

I remember walking through the hospital and seeing parents with their plump little babies in cute little outfits milling about the hospital and feeling so mad at them... I don't know why I was mad, but I was and I feel terrible about that.  

I remember my notes... the copious notes I took about The Tots weight, feeding schedule, strange terms that I had to Google when I got home that night.  I still have all of those binders with all of my notes and they seem like they come from a different time, because they do.  

And oh, meeting all of the other parents and their babies all in varying degrees of distress.  Offering advice to the new parents, watching the parents who had been there for months who seemed to know what they were doing.  

And The Husband, forging this path with me and our little boy, also unsure and scared, but positive and strong.  Going back to work so we could "save up" on his paternity leave so he could take it later if we needed it.  Telling me over and over that I was doing a good job and supporting me while I struggled to pump for months and helping me give myself permission to stop.  

As I sit here with 36 weeks within my grasp, I realize that the birth of the Firefly might be uneventful, and I don't even know how to feel about that.  I am thrilled, keeping my fingers crossed that it is a "normal" birth, but quite frankly, all I know is trauma and NICU time, so I am yet again faced with the unknown.  

Writing this out helps... I think.  Being emotional during this time is hard, and normal, so I accept that it is normal, and this is just where I am.  I am here, and my second child is safe for now and I can relax... so I will try. 

Birth Story - the Tater Tot - Sept 30, 2012

I had a traumatic delivery with the Tot.  Whew, I said it.  You may read this and think, what? that's nothing! But for me, it was traumatic.  I like things to go as planned. I love plans.  I love lists, I love to think of the worse case scenario and then plan it out to make sure to avoid it.  I don't like the unknown, and I don't like things to veer off course, unless of course I have planned for it to do so, spontaneously!  haha

I will begin with Friday, September 28th 2012.  I was at work, and The Tater Tot was very active.  So active, that I kept calling over my co-worker to watch my belly... he was moving so much, you could see my whole belly shudder and shake.  It was a fun day and I felt very connected to The Tot. Outside of the movement, nothing strange seemed to be going on.

So, we move to Saturday... again, nothing major most of the day until the late afternoon when something odd did happen.  I had been reading about all of the signs of labor and the week before our Lamaze teacher discussed the mucus plug and bloody show and contractions (sorry TMI, just wait more TMI on the way).  So, when it appeared as if I lost my mucus plug, I was concerned and called my doctor.  I was only 33 weeks, and was pretty sure that loosing the plug that early was not good. When I talked to my doctor, she said not to worry.  I look back now, and I am pretty sure she didn't believe me.  I believe she thought it was just general mucus and not the actual plug. I knew differently, but I listened to her and assumed that it didn't mean anything. 

Sunday, September 30th:  The Husband and I had plans to watch football and baseball downtown with some dear friends that we hadn't seen since the beginning of the summer. We were both excited to get out of the house and be social.  We had a lot of prep work to do for the Tot's arrival, but figured we had a least 5 to 6 more weeks, so there was no worry and no hurry. 

We had a great time... I indulged in fried pickles and a huge brownie sundae for lunch.  We were both tired so we left and headed home. I remember the cab ride being especially uncomfortable and asking repeatedly for the driver to slow down.  

I was still concerned about the mucus plug and became very concerned on Sunday early evening when I was sure I had witnessed a bloody show.  Both The Husband and I thought it would be a much bigger show and as he commented, it was less of a Show and more like community theater.  So, the second call went out to the doctor, who finally took me seriously and said I should head to the hospital.  

After a bit of discussion and a role reversal for my husband and I, we sat down to eat a bit of dinner. We figured it would be a long night at the hospital and in fact, oddly, the husband thought we shouldn't go at all and wait until the morning.  I think he was in shock and couldn't quite comprehend that having blood at 33 weeks was a bad sign, and we had to get to the hospital fast.  But I was hungry, so I ate some soup, and then MY WATER BROKE, and then we started to move fast. That hour was so strange... I knew something was terribly wrong, but I think I was in shock and didn't want to panic my husband.  But we should have moved MUCH quicker than we did.

After my water broke, things obviously got serious!  Again, many of you would say that we had reason to be serious about an hour before, but we were in a bit of a fog I think.  We quickly started to pack bags, we had not yet done that, since we had weeks yet, and quite frankly, that was next weeks Lamaze class agenda, packing the hospital bag.

We were relatively calm as we walked to Broadway to catch a cab.  I didn't want a prospective cab driver to pass us by thinking I was in labor!  We finally got in a cab and that's when the fun began.  A contraction began, and well, it pretty much continued until the baby came 2 hours later.  Again, another bad sign.

Once we got to St Lukes / Roosevelt Hospital, we went up to the Labor and Delivery floor.  Nobody seemed to take me seriously.  I don't think they understood that I was 33 WEEKS and my water broke, even though that was my mantra and all I kept saying to them. They had me fill out paperwork.  Seriously, a lot of paperwork.  Which I did, somehow.  Then they finally took me back and they wouldn't let The Husband come, and the shit hit the fan.  I promised him that he would be back there in two minutes.  It is always strange, but the hospital did this anytime I went there.  They take you back by yourself, ask if you have ever been abused by the man waiting outside and when you say no, they let him back.  Whatever...

So once I was back in the Labor Triage area they hooked me up to monitors and again, seemed very nonplussed.  The Husband and I were completely freaked out by now.  Once the contractions began in the cab, we knew we were in trouble and the fog lifted.  But now everyone else seemed to be in a fog.  My doctor was called, but it would take her a while to arrive, so they decided to give me drugs to slow down labor.  I was only 2 cm dilated, and by now the contraction was excruciating and unlike I had learned in Lamaze class, this was just one big contraction that didn't take a break.

So, by this time, the doctor on call came to see me and basically said that they were going to monitor me and wait for my doctor to arrive.  They had given me drugs to slow down the labor, and they were going to leave me there, with The Husband in the triage area until the doctor arrived.  The look of shock and horror on The Husbands face will always stick with me.  They were just going to leave me like this, screaming in pain? Nothing about this seemed normal.  This was not a normal delivery where I would wander the floors waiting for the baby to come and 22 hours later he would arrive.  He was coming now and we knew it.

The Husband asked the doctor to take one last look before she left AND low and behold, they finally took us seriously.  In the 15 minutes that we had been in triage, I had gone from 2 cm dilated to 10 cm.  IN 15 MINUTES. Thus the screaming and pain.  The look on that doctors face will also stick with me.  Panic.

Within seconds they had lifted up the bars on the bed and were rolling/running me down the hall to a delivery room... totally like the movies.  The pain in my body and my head was like black and red swirls... I was screaming while numerous nurses ran down the hall with me, The Husband holding the side of the bed.  I kept grabbing the side of the bed and reaching for my husband, and the nurses kept yelling to keep my hands in the bed.  So I started yelling back, for unknown reasons to me now... "keep your hands and feet inside the ride, keep your hands and feet inside the ride!" Nuts, I know, but it did feel like I was on some sort of morbid roller-coaster ride.

The Husband always describes once we got into the Labor room, since I don't have clear memories. He says that from the time we left triage to the labor room its like there was a secret code sent out to the hospital. Where once there was a calm Sunday evening staff, now we had 30 nurses, doctors, NICU nurses and everyone magically in surgical attire.  My doctor walked in the room just after the on call doctor was suited up and ready to "catch", so she stood by my side and orchestrated and held my hand.

Apparently we were ready to go, so they asked if I knew how to push.  What?  NO! I had no idea how to push.  We had not gotten to that class yet in Lamaze.  We had discussed it, but we hadn't practiced it yet. So, after a quick instruction they said go.  And oh my god, I thought I was dying.  I turned to my doctor with tears in my eyes and said "no, I didn't want to do this" I told her she had to make it stop. There was something wrong with the baby, and he wasn't supposed to come out yet, I had 6 more weeks and I wasn't ready, and she had to make it stop.  I said all of this while crushing her very small shoulder.  She gave me a weak smile and said I had no choice, I had to help the baby out.

The next few minutes I was inside my head... I didn't feel like I was in the same room, but somewhere inside myself.  I remember being afraid.  Afraid the baby was going to die, afraid I was going to die.  With those thoughts, I pushed.  The Husband says that at one point I got very calm and focused, and then I pushed and our wonderful little Tot entered the world.

I had always pictured this moment, planned it out.  I wanted to hold him immediately, I wanted to bond, I wanted to smile, I wanted to breast-feed, I wanted to share this with The Husband... our little pack growing with this new baby. But that isn't what happened.  The Tot was born at 33 weeks, so they whisked him away to the corner of the room, nurses running, machines beeping, and then I heard The Husband insist that we see him and hold him. My dear sweet traumatized husband.  They all stopped what they were doing, and with caution in their eyes, they held my little spud on my chest so I could see him, then they lifted him up to The Husband and he could touch him, and then they took him away.  

Now, you can stop reading if you want... this may be too much for some, but hell, I'm sharing, so here we go.

So, now, I'm laying on the delivery room bed and we are waiting.  I finally ask... "how long until the placenta comes out" and the doctors tell me... just a few more minutes.  It was quiet... they were quiet... I was exhausted, and we waited, for a LONG TIME, but the placenta didn't come.  Finally I catch the doctors giving each other worried looks and then I know we are in trouble.  They explained that too much time had passed and the placenta wasn't coming out, and they needed to manually extract it.

Stop reading now, seriously.

I'm gonna write this out quickly and will probably not edit... since I don't want to relive it more than once.  So, they give me morphine.  We wait.  And then they tell me that this is going to hurt.  And then the doctor reached inside and manually, with her hand, ripped out my placenta which was stuck to the uterine wall.  I wanted to die.  I wished death.  I never want to feel that again and it makes me cry to remember it.  I bled a lot and then I finally fell asleep, because that is all I remember until I was in a recovery room hours later.  The end to that part....

So, we had to wait until the morphine wore off before I could see my son, who was in an isolete, waiting for me.  When I finally could, I waddled down the hall in a hospital gown and socks until they finally let me and my husband see him.  Luckily they let me pick him up immediately and in my morphine induced state, I cried for my little Tot, I cried for me and then I started the long trek up a hill that I never anticipated.

It was a long climb up.  But we had a beautiful baby, who was healthy and just needed a bit more time to grow.  17 days in the NICU and then he came home.  It was not easy, but he is amazing that little Tot and now he is 2 years old.

I needed to get this story out before the Firefly arrives.  It scares me to write it out, but I needed to... thanks for reading.

Mommy, the name

As I hit 24 weeks of this pregnancy, I can't help but think of The Tater Tot's birth just under 2 years ago.  I have written out his 'birth story' and plan on posting here soon, but had a few side stories that I thought I would get down on paper, as it were. 

Once I got to the hospital to deliver The Tot, I was amazed at how quickly I morphed into "Mommy".  I was never referred to as Mrs.Whatever, never, at any point.  When we were in triage upon arrival to the hospital the nurses all started calling me "Mommy".  As in.... "ok mommy, how do you feel"  or "ohh that was a contraction, mommy" or "UH, this baby is coming NOW mommy".  I didn't really have a name anymore.  My husband was also simply referred to as Daddy the entire time. 

At first this felt oddly comforting... Wow, I was already a mommy in their eyes, how fun!  But as my time in the hospital continued, it became a bit odd. From my hospital bed, nurses would enter to take my vitals and just ask, "how are you feeling Mommy".  I could have been anyone, did they look at my chart? Did they know which Mommy I was?

The Tot was born at 33 weeks and spent some time in the NICU, so I continued to be called Mommy... by everyone.  It wasn't that I became concerned about some sort of loss of identity, it was more that I wasn't sure they knew who I was and which baby belonged to me... I was just one of the many Mommies.  What started out making me feel special, a new mommy, suddenly made me feel interchangeable.  Like another "Mommy" could walk in and take care of my baby... since we were all just mommies, who cares which one. 

But in those tender hours and days after the Tot was born, I felt damaged.  He came too early, he was in jeopardy, I felt in jeopardy, and I needed to feel taken care of, and that my tiny, tiny boy was also special and being taken care of... instead I was just in the pool of other mommies.  (side note: I have a billion positive things to report about the NICU nurses, and will in another post... this was just an odd, well, side note.)

At times it felt like the old 60's version of a secretarial pool.  I would show up to the NICU early in the morning and deposit any breast milk I was able to produce into the communal refrigerator into a basket with my name on it (thankfully all the baskets didn't just say "MOMMY" on them!).  Then I hit the NICU and found my baby.. sometimes they had moved him to make room for a new baby without my knowledge and I would be frantic to find him... sometimes he would make progress overnight and they would move him into a new room of the NICU, each room taking you closer to going home. 

There was an ever changing chorus line of nurses, who I frantically tried to memorize names... but to them, I was still just Mommy.  I was there a lot and got to know a lot of the nurses, but I guarantee, they couldn't call me by name.  There were other babies there whose Mommies had to go back to work, and would show up during the day sporadically to see their NICU babies, and at least one Mommy who never seemed to leave the hospital.  But we were no different, we were all just pool of Mommies. 

Its so funny that this started to bother me, and I haven't really even thought about it in the years since we left the Hospital... and it is somewhat ironic now as I covet that name, Mommy.  I waited patiently until the Tot finally uttered "mama" and I thought I would die from love.  And now, being Mommy and being called Mommy is the most amazing thing. 

I am so excited to be a Mommy for the second time, and I am keeping my fingers crossed that this little Firefly takes his time and doesn't surprise us with an early arrival... either way, I look forward to being the Mommy again.

Almost 2!

A year has gone by....

A year has passed... and the past month has flown by.  My little Tater Tot turned a year old.  While I was over the moon excited about his birthday, it oddly brought up a lot of anxiety around his birth.  I haven't posted his "birth story" but plan to do that.  It is a story I want to remember, but it is also a story that I didn't expect, and it you know me, expectations are important.

Here is a picture of my little Spud at a year old.  I love him more than I can express.  He has changed my life.  He has changed the books I read, the TV shows I watch and quite frankly every part of who I am.  I used to LOVE murder mysteries, I used to love true crime novels, I used to love Primetime, to Catch a Predator type shows.  I no longer can read these books or watch these shows... I don't know why.  I don't want to hear about crime, or murder or bad things happening to people.  I scares me.  It doesn't interest me anymore.  Odd huh?  

My life has changed in a way that makes it hard to blog too... I love to blog, I love to write.  I always have a "novel" I am writing on the side... but I don't have time.  I am ok with this.  I only have a small amount of time with the Spud during the week since I work outside the home.  Our mornings are spent eating, playing, getting ready for "school" and work.  We walk to daycare and then off I go to work.  At the end of the day, we walk home, walk Noodles, eat, play, dance and sing, take a bath, read a book and bed.  Once the Tot is in bed, there is only so many more hours of awake time in me, which are spent with the Loving Husband. Then off to bed! No time to write.  

The past year has been crazy.  I am amazed how things can change so drastically, yet we find our way, find new patterns, find new likes and dislikes, all while watching the miracle of a little boy learn and grow.  He does something new to make me laugh every day.  So, in the spirit of new patterns, I am going to try to write more, either on here or offline.  The Tot's birth story is on it way... along with other posts. But for now, Happy Birthday to my little Tater Tot! You are a year old! (or you were, this post is late!)