No time! There's never any time!

I don't have time to study! I'll never get into Stanford! I'll let everyone down, I'm so confused!!!

Does anyone else remember that episode from Saved By the Bell? HAHA!

But in all seriousness... I had no idea how much work this little bundle of joy would be. No complaints here though. I enjoy spending all of my time with her, even though she's a lot of work. And funny thing, is she is a great baby - she doesn't cry unless she's hungry, dirty, or wants a hug. She's not colicky or difficult at all. So I do not envy parents who have babies like that which are most likely a lot more work than this little peanut. My days go like this:

Wake up, change baby, feed baby, burp baby, change baby, lay baby down for a nap, pump my boobs, try to nap..baby wakes up, change baby, snuggle baby, change baby, feed baby, burp baby, change baby, lay baby down for a nap, eat a sandwich, go to the bathroom, pump my boobs, try to nap, baby wakes up....and so on. When Husband gets home, he's super helpful. He makes supper, cleans the house, and takes care of baby while I take a nice long shower. Then I take her back while he takes a shower. Then, we go to bed and baby watches TV with us, I feed her, I give her to him to burp her, and she falls asleep on his chest. Then, I fall asleep, he puts her in her bassinet, and she wakes up a couple of times throughout the night. Sometimes I'll ask Husband to change her and hand her off to me to feed. Sometimes he changes her and feeds her. Sometimes I let him sleep and I do both. It's going much better now. The first couple of weeks were awful. I was exclusively breast feeding and she wasn't gaining weight. We thought it was my milk supply. Turns out she's a lazy eater. So I started pumping and keeping track of how much she was getting. We also supplement with formula. She's a cute chunker.

She has her 1 month appointment tomorrow!

I don't know what else to say. Nothing is new. Just been spending my time doing the above. Here are some pictures. :)

this week

There were things I wanted to do today.

• Return the phone call to my lactation consultant that I missed on Friday
• Make Sofie's 1-month checkup appointment
• Get more than one nap in
• Eat toast with peanut butter and blueberries and yogurt
• Take Sofie to work to visit Husband and meet coworkers

So far, I've done all of these things except for bring her to work and get another nap in. I did get a good solid 2.5 hour nap in this morning when Sofie took a nap after eating. It felt great. I fed her again, and then put her in a cute outfit so we could go and visit Husband.


Husband then called and I asked him if it would be a good idea to bring her. He said he didn't think so. He said it was too soon to be taking her places other than her doctor's appointments. That, and the weather is gross. Humid and hot and hazy and gross. So after hanging up, I contemplated bringing her anyway, thinking that it'd be fine, I'm her mom, I'll take care of her and we won't stay too long. She then proceeded to spit up breast milk all over herself. And her entire outfit. And her lounge pillow. So, I guess that was her way of telling me no, therefore it's two against one, and we're staying home.

I got her changed. We snuggled. She fell asleep. I put her down for a nap. I then went and returned the phone call to the lactation lady and also called and made a 1-month appointment for Sofie with the pediatrician. Then I ate my yummy lunch. I came back upstairs to still find her sound asleep. I feel like I won a prize or something. Like I should try and get that second nap in right now. Maybe we can go and visit husband next week.

Tomorrow a nurse is coming to my house to check up on me and the baby and see how we are doing....to make sure we made the transition alright. She'll probably want to talk about breast feeding and see how that's going too. She'll probably want to watch me breast feed Sofie and check my latch. Do you know how many people have seen my boobs? Almost as many people who have seen me naked within the past two weeks, and that's a lot, and I've lost count. I don't even care anymore. Whoever comes to my house to visit runs the risk of seeing my boobs. I'll never whip them out in public or anything, but at home, all bets are off. Since I live here and all. I wonder if that's weird.

Wednesday I don't think we have anything going on. Thursday Sofie gets her newborn photos taken so we get to go and do that. That should be fun, I hope. I get nervous thinking about it because I worry she'll poop or pee on something. She probably will. I'm guessing the photographer is prepared for this type of mishap. Knowing my baby, she'll probably crap on something white and fluffy, like a sheepskin rug or something. Her poop is nothing to take lightly. Her poop is officially breast milk poop and when she poops you can hear it splattering in her diaper. It's pretty nasty. It doesn't smell like regular poop, which is good, but it's still kind of raunchy and it looks like the color of mustard and has the texture of...nevermind. I'm not going to make this entire blog entry about her poop. But I feel like her poop has become a pretty big part of my life considering the fact that she poops so much. She sharts, too. I'm not sure if this will embarrass her later on, but I will be sure to incorporate it into a conversation with her first boyfriend.

In other news, I can see my feet. As in, the actual shape of my feet. Not to be confused with not being able to see my feet at ALL while pregnant. What I mean, is that my feet are no longer swollen. I hope I'm not jinxing myself. But I can see my ankles now, and all the bones in my feet again. They look normal and cute, not swollen and fat, and my shoes fit! I'm fricken excited. It's amazing - I just woke up this morning and there they were. Now, they do start to swell a bit if I'm on them for too long, but this is still a step in the right direction. Hooray!

I ordered some nursing bras and they should be here by Wednesday. I hope that the breast pump I ordered will also be here soon. I haven't had issues with engorgement since the other day. It's like the baby knew I was in pain and decided to help me by putting herself on a 3-hour eating schedule. Like clockwork, she wakes up and wants to eat every three hours now. It has only been a couple of days, but at least there's some consistency starting. Also, I don't have to feel guilty for not waking her up to eat. I was told by the nurses at the hospital and the pediatrician that I should be waking her up if she goes more than three hours without a feeding. There is a reason why people say never wake a sleeping baby. I tried that once and it was the worst decision I had ever made. Husband and I were up all night with her. Good thing it was on a Friday night and not a night where he had to get up early and work the next day. She was just irate. So I let her sleep now. And if she wants to sleep for longer than 4 hours, I check to see if she's breathing and if she is, I leave her alone. She didn't even want to eat when I woke her up that time. She got made and crapped her diaper.

I should have titled this entry, "Boobs and Poop."

Sleep when she sleeps....

....is some good advice. It's like a race against time! Like, "Oh sweet. She's asleep. I need to hurry now."

So, I'm tired. But that's okay.

Hey, remember this post?? I might break a lot of those promises. Not the one about wearing mom jeans or getting a mom haircut though. But I get it now. I guess I just had to have a baby to really understand. I think it's exciting when she does things. I am quite aware that a lot of people will not care that she sneezed or rolled over for the first time or [insert something she did here]. BUT, that being said, I know that all of my mom-friends will care, because they will understand because they have been there and when they were there, they also thought it was the best thing in the world. :) So, that being said, I make no promises anymore, other than I promise that people will probably hear WAY more about my daughter than they care to. I won't post a picture of her using the toilet for the first time though. I won't!! I may take a picture, but I will not post it on Facebook. Because that's just mean.

Sofia is an eater. I haven't figured out her pattern yet. I have figured out when she is hungry though. Aside from the fact that it seems like she's hungry whenever she's awake...she does give me cues. She tries to eat her hand and she smacks her lips and sticks her tongue out.

I know when she has dirtied her diaper. Her cry is different. It's like a shrieking cry. Almost as though she is disgusted with herself, and disgusted with me for not taking care of it immediately.

I can tell when she's content. Because she's not acting hungry or acting as though she dirtied her diaper. Haha!

I'm glad I'm breast feeding. With how much she eats, we wouldn't be able to afford formula. Good thing my boobs are enormous too. Which is another thing. They are huge. Huger than they have ever been. Is huger a word? It is now. I'm to the point where seriously need to invest in comfortable sleep bras because if I have no shirt on, I leak all over myself. It's pretty bad. I had no shirt on the other day and I was walking to the bathroom to take a shower, and my boobs dripped milk onto my feet.

Sofie poops a lot, and her farts are loud. She must take after Husband.

Sofie's hair is growing more and it's getting darker. Her eyes are a dark steel blue, which I am assuming will change color at some point. I wouldn't mind if they stayed that way though. It's a pretty color and looks nice with her dark hair.

OH! I lost 20 pounds! In a week! I know it's all fluid, but it still makes me feel good to see it.

My mom and dad brought over a pan of lasagna yesterday. I was having a sad morning and it made me feel better. I am not taking comfort in food - I was just really happy that my mom and dad thought of us and brought us food. It's nice since I'm not allowed to cook right now and I didn't want to have to eat something frozen.

Look at these funny faces.

I had a baby.

Here she is. :)


Which is why it seems like I have disappeared. I haven't. Just been focused on her. That, and I was in the hospital for nearly a week. So I'll start from the beginning. On a side note, I should probably be sleeping now, but I'm taking this opportunity to update my blog because Husband is napping with Sofia and it's a good time to do it. :)

I last posted a week ago Thursday. The next day I had an appointment with my midwife, during which it was discovered that my blood pressure was dangerously high. I think it was 148/100. At any rate, rather than send me home, she decided it'd be best to induce me since my due date was coming up soon anyway. I'll do my best to summarize, in chronological order. Pretty sure I can remember everything. But if some details are off, it's not like you'll know since you weren't there. :)

Friday, July 22

• 12:00pm: Checked into hospital
• 3:00pm: Membranes stripped, was dilated to 3cm, and pitocin started

Saturday, July 23

• 12:00am: Asked for pain medication for the contractions
• 12:15am: Midwife checked my cervix and there was no change at all.
• 12:16am: I cried.
• 12:20am: Pitocin stopped. Nap commenced.
• 7:00am: Prostaglandin given to help ripen my cervix and encourage dilation
• 11:00am: Cervix checked, was dilated to 4.5cm, pitocin started again.
• 11:00pm: Midwife broke my water
• 11:10pm: Painful contractions started so I tried sitting in the jacuzzi tub to relax.
• 11:20pm: The hot water wasn't helping so I asked for the epidural.
• 11:30pm: Got the epidural

Sunday, July 24

• 5:00am: The epidural failed so they upped the medication dosage.
• 7:00am: Still hurting, the epidural was useless. Felt like I had to poop and was crying with each contraction. They checked me again and I was complete, so they said I could start pushing.
• I pushed for 4 hours. She wouldn't come out. I thought I was going to die.
• Sometime between 11am and noon: Talked with the doctor on call and decided to have a cesarean because nobody knew why she wasn't coming out and I couldn't take it anymore. They prepped me for surgery. I continued screaming because it hurt so badly. Then for some stupid reason my PARENTS walked into the delivery room even though it had been discussed many times prior that they were not to do that. I yelled at them. They left. I don't remember what I said. I think my dad saw my vagina. I remember a nurse shaving me in an inappropriate area. I don't know if he saw that take place. I don't care.
  

I saw husband putting on scrubs. The anesthesiologist put some different medication in my epidural catheter to numb me. Oh and yes, the nurse shaved me. I knew I should have just gotten waxed beforehand. At least I had gotten a pedicure and shaved my legs the day before. I don't know if anyone noticed. I did get compliments on my toes though. They took me to the OR. I saw a sign that said "c-section" on the door. How interesting that they had a special room just for that. There were like 20-something people in there and they all looked the same. They strapped me to a table. They strapped my arms and legs down and hung up a blue sheet so I couldn't see what they were doing to me. The anesthesiologist stood by my head and asked me a bunch of questions about some things. They were poking me in different areas on my belly asking me if I could feel it. Each time I said yes, they'd give me some more medication in my IV. One of the nurses had a bandanna on. There were a ton of lights above me. It reminded me of those movies when people get abducted by aliens and have procedures done on them. Only these people at least talked to me and were nice to me. I felt them slice me open. I felt them move my muscles to the side and I felt them suctioning stuff. I could hear it, too. I felt them cauterize things and I could hear it. I couldn't smell anything though. Husband sat by my head. He talked to me and told me I was doing a good job. I didn't think I was really doing anything other than laying there in a drug-induced semi-coma. The only reason I was doing fine was because of all the narcotics they gave me. I think if I had been more alert, I would have been hysterical. I realize that c-sections are routine and done quite often, but I wasn't prepared for this and didn't plan on it, and it was really scary.

12:19pm:

• I heard the baby cry and I saw them lift her up.

She was all wiggly. I saw them take her over to the side to clean her up and I told Husband to go and be with her. I didn't get to see what they did. He said he got to cut the cord, and that made me happy. He brought her over to see me. She had a HUGE cone head. I didn't understand why since she wasn't delivered vaginally. Seriously, biggest cone head ever. Apparently, it was indicative of how hard I tried to get her out. The problem was that she was face-up and my pelvic area was too small for her to fit. She wasn't a big baby either. She was 7 pounds, 6 ounces. I'll never be able to have a natural birth because of the way my bone structure is. If I ever do this again, it's going to have to be another c-section. When Husband brought her over, she was crying. She stopped crying when I started talking to her. It made me feel good. But I was still so out of it from all the pain medicine that I didn't get to really enjoy the moment the way most people would. I don't remember a whole lot. I just remember her cone head and her really big, dark eyes. I also remember her sticking her tongue in and out of her mouth because she was hungry. I felt bad that I couldn't nurse her right away.



I felt them staple me up and then I was taken back to our room. They bathed her in the room and put her on my chest and let me feed her. She took to it just fine. So if anyone says having a c-section will prevent you from nursing and bonding with your baby, they are totally wrong.


I stayed in the hospital until Wednesday. I could have stayed until Thursday but I didn't want to. I got tired of being alone. Husband works during the day and couldn't stay with me overnight because of having to care of our pets at home and having to be to work early, so I only saw him for a couple of hours each evening. There are a lot of other reasons why I wanted to go home too, but mainly just because I wanted to sleep in my own bed. I'm still sore from the surgery. I have all these restrictions for the next two weeks - no cooking, cleaning, driving, or lifting anything heavier than my baby. I have a follow-up with the doctor on August 9th to see how my incision is healing and stuff, and then I have a 6-week follow-up with my midwife sometime later in August. I don't know when I will be able to go back to work - I think it will be the 2nd week of September, which is only one week after my original return-to-work date. Not sure though.

Here are some pictures from the hospital. I'll be posting an update on life at home so far with baby, either today or tomorrow. :)

The birthing suite I was in before my surgery was super nice.



The bathroom was great.


Husband was so happy. Then there's me in the background, strapped to the table. Chopped up and forgotten.....LOL!!

grammatical side notes

I'm sorry, but these things annoy me to no end. I've been wasting a lot of time on the Babycenter message boards and I can't get over how annoying it is to read something when people don't know how to spell or use proper grammar. I see this on Facebook too, and I am constantly dying to correct people, but I know they'd just get offended and unfriend me.

The improper use of "lose" vs. "loose."

• Example: When did you loose all that weight?
• Correction: When did you lose all that weight?

The improper forms of there, their, and they're.

• There refers to a place or a pronoun. Let's go there. There is no hope.
• Their is a plural possessive pronoun. Their babies.
• They're is a contraction for "they are." They're stupid.

There is no "A" in the word tomorrow.

• It is spelled tomorrow, not tomarrow.

It's castor oil, not castrol oil or castro oil.

• Castor oil is an oil obtained from the vegetable, the castor bean. It has many uses, one being its controversial use to self-induce labor.
• Castrol oil is a brand of industrial and automotive lubricants which is applied to a large range of oils, greases, and similar products for lubrication. I would hope that if you are going to self-induce, you would not choose to drink this. Because, you would probably poison yourself and die.
• Castro is a Cuban revolutionary and politician. It's also a neighborhood in the Eureka Valley in San Francisco, and is renown as one of America's finest and best known gay neighborhoods.

Your vs. you're.

• This one murders my soul. And it happens ALL the time. "Your" is a possessive pronoun, as in "your face" or "your baby." "You're" is a contraction for "you are," as in "You're screwing up your writing by using your when you really mean you are.

It's vs. its.

• It's is a contraction for "it is" or "it has."
• Its is a possessive pronoun as in "that baby has crapped its diaper."

Affect vs Effect.

• Affect is a verb. As in, "Your ability to communicate clearly will affect our friendship."
• Effect is a noun. As in, "The effect of your poor grammar makes me hate you."

5 days....

...until my due date!

Are you enjoying this countdown? I'm not, really. I would like to have her. But this makes it interesting for a few minutes each day.

This post is chock full of TMI so if you don't want to hear about things that might gross you out, then I suggest you leave and come back tomorrow.

I woke up this morning feeling alright. Kind of sluggish, but still had enough energy to want to go and get a pedicure. My friend Jenna picked me up a little after 9 and we got to the place around 9:30. I have lavender colored toes now with sparkly flowers and jewels. I took a picture, but it didn't look as nice in the picture. The camera picks up every little thing and as nice as my feet look, they looked freaky on camera. Plus, nobody really likes looking at pictures of feet. Unless you're some sort of freak with a foot fetish, and if that's the case and you are reading my blog, that's creepy.

After the pedicure, we stopped at Starbucks and I got my iced venti soy chai, and then Jenna dropped me off back at home. I waddled inside, and that's when it started. The uncomfortableness. I still don't know if I'm going to be able to explain it well because I don't fully understand it. All I know is that the pelvic pressure I was having was super uncomfortable. I went to the bathroom which usually helps (because it sort of hurts if I have to pee and I don't go pee), but that didn't help this time. So I took off my clothes because they felt tight, and I tried to lay down. I couldn't get comfortable. So I sat on the bouncy ball for a while, which seemed to help a little, and then I tried to lay down again. But then I couldn't get comfortable, so I went back on the ball. This back and forth from the bed to the ball went on pretty much all day and I started to get upset. I was tired and wanted to take a nap but it's hard to do that when you can't get comfortable. I was also having these lightning bolts of pain hitting me in the sides of my belly and in other unmentionable areas. AND, I kept feeling like I had to go poop but every time I'd go sit on the toilet, the feeling would go away and of course there was no pooping to be had.

My mother-in-law stopped by for a little while since she was in town. Then she left. OH, I did put clothes on before she came over. After she left, I went back upstairs, and was feeling worse. Now I was feeling as though something was going to fall out of me. The only way I can describe it, is that it felt as if my water bag was bulging out of my cervix. Like something was stuck up there. Like when you put a tampon in but you mess up and it doesn't go in all the way. Gross, right? So, I sat on the ball again. Then I tried to lay down around 3:30, and was actually able to get comfortable and get a short nap in before Husband got home. When I woke up, I still had that heavy feeling but that weird bulging feeling has since subsided. I also had an appetite, which was good, because Husband brought me some potato oles from Taco Johns. Sweet.

So, I'm sitting on my bed now after having spent some more time on the ball to relieve some more lower back and pelvic pain, but I'm still having these shooting pains in a bad area. I'm also having pain in the sides of my belly. I've had some mild painless contractions today, and the only reason I noticed them was because I had my hands on my belly when they were happening. Nothing regular though.

Know what? This sucks.

I was talking to my friend Nicole on the phone and explained that, it's not that I just want to push this baby out for selfish reasons. I have this sense of anxiety that if she's in there too long, something bad will happen - like the placenta will die or she'll poop or something and get really sick. Nicole reminded me that things like that only happen if I'm really overdue, like 43 weeks, and my midwife won't allow me to go that far anyway. I'm not even DUE yet. But I think that's where a lot of this frustration is stemming from - the anxiety I am having. I'm also starting to have anxiety off and on about the whole labor process. It's scary to think about. I'm paranoid that she's going to get stuck and we're both going to die or something. I'm sure it's perfectly normal to feel this way, but I really don't like it, and I need to just stop worrying about it. I'm sure that if my midwife was concerned about complications during birth, they would have been addressed by this time. I don't know what's wrong with me.

I'm going to try and get comfortable and see if I'm able to take a nap. Maybe I'll wake up with contractions and the countdown will end and tomorrow I can say I have a baby.

6 days........

....until my due date!

Yesterday after my blog entry, my friend Jenna texted me and had some free time, so she came and picked me up and took me shopping. I got the ring sling I wanted, and also treated myself to some expensive shampoo and conditioner. Husband got home and saw how much it cost and he asked me if it had gold flakes in it. I told him that it did. It doesn't. Sure smells great though! I also went to work and visited some of my co-workers and had lunch with Husband. It was a nice way to break up my afternoon. I thought the moving around would be good for me, too. And I think it was. Although I haven't had my baby yet, there are some noticeable changes!

My belly has dropped some. Here is a picture of me on Monday:


And here is me today, at 39 weeks.


I wish she would migrate down a bit more now! Like, out of my body. :)

OH! So Husband tested out the ring sling baby carrier tonight. It works!

At first Monster wasn't sure...


But then she liked it.


She stayed in there for a while. It was hilarious!

I had some really mild false labor today. One of my contractions made it hard to breathe and it actually hurt. But it was just one. And then it was gone.