bethysmalls

Here’s something I didn’t realize: Babies don’t know schedules.

Maybe that’s not what I mean. Maybe I mean parents don’t know their babies’ schedules. But I always thought parents knew things like When Their Babies Nap or When Their Babies Eat and the reality, or at least my reality is that it changes. Every. Day. Sometimes Bruno goes 2.5 hours between feedings and plays in between. Sometimes it’s 5 hours in the middle of the day with a 4 hour nap and a clean diaper when he wakes up. I remember I babysat for a friend a year or so ago and I asked, “when does he nap?” and the answer was, “Whenever he seems sleepy.” I thought that was a kind of vague answer and it kind of annoyed me like, don’t people know when their baby naps and now I know, they probably don’t.

Lately Bruno has been going to bed around 8pm and waking up once during the night to eat. One day last week he went to bed at 11pm and didn’t wake up until 7am. WTF, right? I spent the next day trying to do everything exactly the same way so that he would do that again! Fail! Last night we went to dinner with some friends and he didn’t get to sleep at the usual time and ate an extra meal before finally going to bed at 10:15 and so he didn’t wake up until almost 6am. That actually worked kind of great but if I put him down at 8 or 9 and he stays asleep I’m not going to get him up again, or should I? What’s the rules, people?!

Unfortunately for both of us, my work schedule is inconsistent. Some days I work at 10am some days I work at 1pm, some at 4pm and so I don’t need to wake up at the same time every day. This means we won’t be able to get a routine. So I’m unsure of myself. Should I wake up at the same time every day for the sake of consistency? Or should I let myself sleep if/when I can so that I can function, you know, at life?

I assume at some point Bruno will be waking up early all the time because that’s the story I get from other parents I know. Although I don’t ever remember waking up super early ever in my life without someone or something making me but I also remember not liking to go to bed when I was supposed to either.

Anyway, I need help, folks. Give me your input. (Sorry I’m being so bossy but I’m tired :[ )

(P.s. Want to see some baby-talk? Ok.)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEtUDKABxvk]

I’m not thrilled about posting something like this but I had to get it off my chest.

I was just listening to NPR, Fresh Air I think, and Terry Gross was interviewing a doctor who refuses to prescribe the pill to single women because she is against it morally. Her defense is that she finds that single women who are sexually active are more likely to contract STDs, etc. So she has a medical reason as well as her moral and religious reasons and I can sort of understand but then she said she wouldn’t, and spoke about a time she didn’t, give the morning after pill to a rape victim because, “I believe life begins after conception.” Here’s my issue. The morning after pill prevents ovulation. It only works if conception hasn’t taken place. Read a book, Dr.

Grr.

Bruno Rex!

He has, as of yesterday, begun to fit into his 3-6 months clothing better than his 0-3 months clothing . The doctor asked me if I was still exclusively breastfeeding and if so how long on each side. I told her he still goes 20 minutes on each side and she said it might be okay if I took him off after 10-12 minutes. He’s, literally, off the growth charts. I’m relieved since my pumping has sort of taken a little bit of a dip recently (as in 3 oz a day down from >4) and I was worried that I was maybe not making enough to keep up with him but it looks like he’s doing juuuuust fine.

Here’s my beef:

Everything I’ve read and every lactation consultant/nurse has told me that they’ll let you know when they’ve had enough, let the baby pull off of the breast on his own, yadda yadda. If I let him, Bruno would eat on each breast for an hour maybe more! I know this because I’ve fallen asleep with him eating and woken up and he’s still there. Some people/books say that after 20 minutes they’re not getting anything anymore and it’s just sucking while other people/books say your breasts are always making milk. And since his appointment yesterday all of his feedings have been 10-12 minutes per side and he’s not a screaming mess he’s still happy healthy Bruno.

In the hospital, Bruno had lost a little too much weight and it was recommended by the nurses and lactation consultants that I pump and supplement his feedings with what I express which at the time was 10ml. But the pediatrician, the same one who told me it was okay to do just 10 minutes a side, told me that unless I could pump a whole ounce, I should use formula, too. The nurses said his stomach wasn’t big enough to hold an ounce yet and 10 ml in addition to what he was getting straight from me was MORE than enough. I didn’t end up using the formula and he still bounced back, obvs, but back to my beef: Who do I believe? The doctors? The books? The breast-a-nistas?

What do you think, Bruno?

You're clearly doing an awesome job, mommy.

Oh yes! Bruno’s Birth Story, Part Deux. (I’m going to talk about the actual birth this time so proceed at your own risk!)

So Click and Clack came to the rescue and fixed the water heater. Then I took a shower.

I called the hospital at 4pm and they said, “Come on down! We’ll see you around 6:30!”

I prepared Hoagey and my last meal as a couple (Tacos of course) and we headed down to the hospital!  Woop!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScOHf8VWofg]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WH-NhT9xquo]

And sat in the waiting room because they had a bit of an increase in traffic since my phone call 2 hours earlier. They said they’d call me when they had a chance to check me in.

So we sat in the waiting room… For an hour. While lots of families came in and talked about their daughters and daughters-in-law and sisters were dilating and 4 cm! And we tried to drown out their chatter and watch Jeopardy on Closed Captioning.

Talk about letting the wind out of your sail. We sat there in that tiny, tiny room getting hotter and hotter and more and more pregnant and crabby for about an hour when Hoagey went out to the registration desk to see what the deal was. “Oh no one told me there was someone waiting to be checked in.” I should be given a medal for not throwing something.

We checked in. Then a nurse came out to say that it was a bit crowded and that it would be a while. I wanted clarification. “An hour? A few hours? Are you going to send us home?” I don’t remember what she said but I remember it didn’t answer any of those questions. But still, we went back into the waiting room where it had reached, no kidding, 150 °F so we went back out to sit in the registration area. I explained, through fought-back tears, that it was too hot in there and like an angel, that nurse came back and put us in a room. Yay!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhE4SfB38mg]

I remember it was just in time for House to start so we sat back and relaxed. It was a while before we were taken to the 2nd room where we would talk to the doctors and nurses who would actually start the baby-birthing process but it was better than going back home.

We watched a lot of TV.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BO8CRi3or2s]

And then! Good news! We were in a part of the Labor and Delivery ward where people just wait. We were going to move to where you wait and then get examined and wait! Woop!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dAXHB20INMI]

This next part takes a long time. At 1am we finally get the go ahead to start the induction. Some things that contributed to the delay: Can’t find the ultrasound machine, my blood work was lost or something but then found, lots of other people having babies without medical interventions (show-offs).  So part one happened at about 1:30am on 12/30/08 and an unintended result of this was that I started contracting, yay!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFrKu1VjwKE]

Man, I didn’t realize how swollen I was. I did realize how bad my hair was and we could NOT find my hair elastics.

When Hoagey returned from feeding the cats, I did not push a baby out. What did happen was my contractions got much MUCH stronger and very VERY close together. Like they were 1 minute long and 1 minute apart. As in NO down time. And my last examination showed that despite my hours and hours of intense contractions with NO break between them, I was BARELY 1.7cm dilated. My cervix was ‘softening’ but absolutely not thinned out at all. The Doctor pantomimed shoving his finger through his other fist and said he could touch the baby’s head to which I replied, “I’m not thinned out!?!?”

I had hoped to give birth without pain medication mostly because I wanted to have a good solid hour of bonding after he was born and the drugs supposedly make the babies sleepy. Not ever experiencing labor before, however, I understood that it might be more pain than I could handle and we had reached that level, folks, if for no other reason that my body never got a break from the contractions. Unfortunately, my platelets had responded to pregnancy by decreasing in numbers. They had dropped so low that the anesthesiologists would not approve giving me an epidural because of the risk of bleeding into my epidural space which meant I either had to continue in this state of CONSTANT EFFING PAIN or we had to do a Cesarean. This decision was made easier when the doctor explained that while my uterus was contracting, it wasn’t giving the baby what it needs. Continuing the way I was going was risky for the baby and I really didn’t think I could handle the pain much longer and considering I was not opening up or thinning out. At this point, I was relieved that there was actual medical reasons to do a C-section because leading up to that point I was very very against it. I had the dream of the baby being placed on my chest and letting him find the breast and gazing into his eyes while he was alert but those damn contractions. Painful painful contractions that were not progressing me along. I was heart broken and I cried and called my mom who was waiting down the hall and she told me it was okay and I knew it was but I needed to talk to someone who understood. Thankfully my blood count was not so bad I couldn’t get spinal anesthesia. It’s a one time shot and not a continuous flow into the spine as I understand so I was able to be awake for the birth. Hoagey was able to be there with me and in the end we had this perfect, awesome, adorable baby. All the pain and surgery and meconium(ew) were worth it.

Cuz look at him!

My perfect baby