"Nice"

One summer weekend, I found myself exploring a small town in Maine. Oddly, almost every store in town featured a sign in the window that included unnecessary quotation marks.

I'm referring to the phenomenon by which people inexplicably use quotation marks to emphasize something.

The local diner sold "FRESH" PIES. The bank was giving away "FREE" TOTE BAGS. And they were perpetually celebrating their high school football "CHAMPIONS."

The best we could figure is that they all had the same sign maker. Perhaps there was some grammatically misguided person with really good handwriting who was hired by all the local businesses and the school to make the signs.

The result was a whole "town" filled with "unnecessary" quotation marks.

We decided to interpret the quotation marks as meaning "it's as though they were..."

For example, it's as though the pies were fresh. It's as though the tote bags were free. It's as though the team were champions.

Ever since that day, I've applied the "it's as though they were" rule to unnecessary quotation marks, bringing me internal joy instead of the tooth-grinding that usually accompanies grammatical gaffes.

Imagine my joy when I found this website: The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.

Now I don't need to travel to a remote corner of Maine to inundate myself with "it's as though they were" situations. Awesome!

Rue de Boucher

Lannae has been chronicling her European adventures, and her latest post is about eating on the Rue de Boucher in Brussels. It made me remember something marvelous that happened to me on that street.

It was January 1989, I was 17 and on my way home to the United States from a couple of weeks in the Soviet Union. We had to stay for one night in Brussels before our flight home, and I found myself on the Rue de Boucher with seven other teenagers.

We were all in love with each other. I guess nothing brings you together like living in a nearly abandoned tourist hotel in the dead of winter outside of Leningrad.

So this was our last night together. Because we were unsophistocated teenagers, we landed on the Rue de Boucher and thought that was all of Brussels. So we found a "fancy" restaurant there, pooled our few Belgian coins, and bought some dishes to share for our last dinner. (It was also the only meal that didn't include orange caviar and borscht.)

We were rambunctious, I'm sure, reminiscing about our trip together and making promises that we'd do this EVERY YEAR for the rest of our lives. Then the waiter brought over a massive bottle of red wine.

"We didn't order this," we worked to communicate to the waiter.

"No, but he did," he said, pointing to a well-dressed middle-aged man across the room.

Do you know how exciting it is to be seventeen and to be surrounded by good friends in a foreign land with a honking bottle of red wine before you? We felt like the most sophistocated, most lucky people in the world.

We showered the man with gratitude, and as he and his wife stood up to leave, he told us, "All I ask is that you do this yourselves someday." And he left.


Rome. 1996. I was staying in a hostel near the train station, waiting for my flight the next day. I ran into a bunch of kids who were studying abroad. They were in high spirits, pooling their money for a loaf of bread and some cheese to eat that night.

So I ducked into a wine shop and bought them a big old flask of their own.

"Just do it for someone else someday," I said, as I handed them the bottle.

All hail the touristy but delicious happy memories of the Rue de Boucher!

Meow

My friend S. was holding Baby V yesterday, and when her son saw her, he hollered from across the backyard, "MAMA!? What are you hugging? A CAT?"

I guess that's my cue to cut her hair. At least a trim to make it look more... human.


In other news, the neighbor's dog is gone. We spotted an Animal Control truck driving away from their house while the family lingered on the front lawn. What transpired? I didn't want to barge in on what might have been a sensitive moment for them, but I'm burning with curiosity. It is absolutely amazing to have NO BARKING anymore. I didn't realize what a fixture it had become in my life.

But the postpartum part of me feels like we failed that dog, as humans. He was confused and pent-up and sad. If only Cesar Milan were our neighbor instead of these well-meaning but ill-equipped folks. I hate to think of his ultimate fate. The Animal Control van doesn't bode well.

But it's peaceful now. It's really peaceful.

And also, I should tell you people that Baby V isn't always a cakewalk. After I posted all my blather about "tracking" yesterday, she got really pissed, as you can see in this photo. It took a lot of jostling, a lot of smooth talk, a lot of boob and formula, and ultimately a ticket into Mama's bed before she slept last night. Why did Hub-D take this picture? I guess to show how hard I'm working as a mom. Or perhaps how ineffectual I am...

And finally, Chebbles has potty trained herself. I have no better explanation for you than that, but she just kind of decided it was "time." Maybe my blog pissed her off too. She just saunters over to the toilet and pees and poops when she has to. Uh, OK.

In alignment with that development, she has started waking up in the middle of the night to scream that she has to go to the bathroom. Crap! Can't you just pee in your diaper when we're sleeping?

So tomorrow she's graduating to a Big Girl Bed. She's got a load of new bedding from Target ready to go, and tonight we plan to shop for the perfect mattress. Her crib converts into a full sized palatial bed, and we've got our fingers crossed that she'll make the transition well.

The only trick now is to teach her what "Seven AM" means, so that she knows to stay the HECK in her bedroom until that hour. Not. A. Second. Sooner.

So we're all going to sleep better, now that there is no dog and better bedding, yes?

It's because I didn't take prenatal vitamins, isn't it?

I know this is ridiculous, but Baby V's not "tracking" with her eyes and it's on my mind.

Why isn't she tracking? According to BabyCenter, she should be tracking. According to Dr. M., she should be tracking. But she just aims her eyes at the lights above, or briefly on my eyes, or toward a sound -- no tracking.

Dr. M. said that tracking is a developmental milestone connected to brain development, and this struck cold fear into my heart.

What if she's not smart?

See, both Hub-D and I were nerdy growing up, and when you're shunted off to the nerdy side of the school cafeteria, you start casting about for something upon which to build your self-worth. And we both discovered that we were more intelligent than, well, pretty much everyone within sight in our school cafeterias. So there you have it: an identity. We're the CLEVEREST TWO PEOPLE EVER, and wouldn't you know it? We created an EVEN SMARTER KID!

Chebbles is wicked smart. She blows away every BabyCenter "milestone" by a year or so, and we crow to ourselves about her extreme advancement, particularly now that she seems to be using the toilet with some regularity.

So I'm just realizing this -- how much we value brains over most other qualities -- as I'm watching Baby V find her place in our family. Where will she fall in the intelligence spectrum here? Right now it's:

1. Chebbles
2. Hub-D
3. Me

So, what if Baby V is #4??? That would suck! I'm happy being the cranial caboose in our family. Because I'm also better at many other things than the others. I'm good at finding things for my "absentminded professors" and enjoy tending to them, secure in the knowledge that I'm still smart -- just not as smart as them.

Anyway, I'm just afraid for a child who would come into our family and be "normal." Or somehow "slow." I worry that it won't be enough that a person is lovely and kind -- if they can't solve even the Monday New York Times crossword puzzle then what will we have to say to each other?

I just see our fragile identities for what they are. I see the boundaries of perceived superiority that I've built. If a child of mine should fall outside those boundaries, I will have to reconstruct everything, and convince Hub-D and Chebbles to work with me.

I'd rather not. I'd rather continue to have smart kids and spare myself further painful reflection. So I'm frantically asking Baby V to track... presenting Disney Princess dolls, or my own face for tracking.

But she could be off-track developmentally. Sure. And she would be fine. It would be I that would have the problem, and I would have to get over it pretty damn fast.

We grow 'em large

Stats, fresh from Dr. M....

* Chebbles' current percentiles are height = 90, weight = 65 and her head remains "off the charts." Thanks for the noggin, Daddy. She's 37 inches tall and 29.8 pounds.

* Baby V is a half-ounce short of eleven pounds. Her percentiles are height = 90, weight = 90, head circumference = 75. She's also grown an inch and a half to 23.5 since her birth, which explains why she's bursting out of her newborn clothes like a Kewpie Doll crossed with The Incredible Hulk. A certified honker.

Let me tell you why all those numbers are important. It's medical PROOF that my children are thriving, and as a result, I confess that I have never been so happy.

My dreams have come true with the advent of Baby V, and now that my incision is not hurting, my kids are both growing and we're past the "sepsis scare," we're really bonding as a family of four, and I can enjoy this moment in time. I'm not actively mourning miscarriages, I'm not actively TTC, I'm not vomiting or waddling. I just treasure my massive, sweet girl-child companions.

I have funny, true friends, and a cuddly, supportive husband, and I'm grateful, grateful, grateful.

Who you callin' fat?

Can a child really outgrow a whole size practically overnight?

I thought I noticed Baby V was developing a double chin, and her fingers were getting more pudgy and dimply. But today A. noticed that the child was fitting in her PJ's like a sausage in a casing... so I pulled out several other newborn PJ's she'd been wearing lately, and they suddenly looked miniature compared to Baby V's massive body.

I'm completely stymied by this turn of events. Chebbles was a big, healthy baby, but she did NOT grow this fast. Baby V seems like one of those rubber mermaids you soak in water, and they grow to 100 times their size overnight.

In other news:

* I washed her hair today and, it turns out, it's a light brown color. It was just greasy, I'm ashamed to say.

* Something is just up with Baby V's relationship with my boobs. She gets annoyed every time she nurses, even when it seems there is plenty of milk available. She shakes her head back and forth rapidly while breathing in a panicky way. So whatever, bottles, fine.

* I don't think I have 3-6 month PJ's appropriate for springtime. Hey, I didn't deliberately space my children such that they were born in opposite seasons, but it's a nice excuse to shop nonetheless.

* Chebbles attacked her baby doll today like a pit bull. No, seriously. She grabbed the baby doll's face with her teeth, screamed in rage and shook it back and forth as though to break its neck. Uh, better that than the real baby, yes?

* But really, at this rate, Chebbles and Baby V will be swapping clothes in a few months.

The Cute and the Spooky

Chebbles made a "Tower of Babies" in her crib yesterday. Baby V was the base baby in the tower, lucky girl.

Maybe it was a mistake to let her read the "Bible Stories for Young Hearts" book because I'm pretty sure this was a take on the "Tower of Babel" which she found most fascinating and pointed out all the shirtless laborers who were building it.

But anyway, we have several things going on around the Shaken household...

* I really want Chebbles and Baby V to have the same kind of relationship my sister and I do. We can be very different, but ultimately we like the same songs and we have a special shorthand for making fun of our parents. I think this is very important. How do I foster it? How do I not wreck it? I've already enacted a "No Tattling" rule in this household for Chebbles and her friends. And I let Chebbles use Baby V as a building block, obviously. But beyond that, how do I MAKE these two be VERY BEST FRIENDS? My best guess is that Hub-D and I should be as weird as possible, inspiring our children to band together for survival.

* I think there is a ghost in Baby V's nursery. I know, I know, I'm being weird already, but seriously. Two nights ago, when she was crying as I changed her diaper, I heard someone say "SHHH!" behind me. I could dismiss this as sleepless delusion if Baby V hadn't turned toward the noise too, and immediately stopped crying. "Did you hear that!!??" I asked her as she gazed at the wall behind me.

* Chebbles says she sees a ghost. "There is a ghost who comes in my room, Mama," she told me as we read "Spongebob's Halloween" for the 500th time. "Oh really?" I asked. "It's a mama ghost and she hugs me when I'm sleeping." I never go in her room and hug her while she's sleeping -- I'm glad someone's got that covered.

* Does it somehow effect one's psychic energy to have one's chakras surgically opened with a C-section? Will this whole thing stop once my incision totally heals? But anyway, I've started having dreams about K.'s memory again. You know that thing that happens to me, where I dream K.'s past? It hasn't happened for at least five years, until two nights ago. I was in Stockholm at night, searching for change in a strange tin cup because I needed to take the train back to my house. I realized several hours after I woke up that K. used to live in Stockholm. I called her. "Sure! I always had to take the train back to the suburb where we lived. And I used to keep my change in a rattling silver cup, did you see that?" she asked.

* "Sorry mole, I'm sorry you died," Chebbles said at the mini-funeral we had today in the backyard. We wanted you all to know that the mole is buried, so our backyard is no longer a fly-filled stinkfest. The mole was really cute, to tell the truth. I hate it when the cats kill cute things. Moles and hummingbirds are totally off-limits, dudes. Stick with the rats, the neighbors love us for that.

* How did Chebbles learn every word to "Under the Sea" from The Little Mermaid? Perhaps I shouldn't complain, as it gets her mind off the shirtless dudes of Babel.

Sunday Savasana Summary

Happy Easter!

* There is a dead mole decomposing just a few feet from where I currently sit. The cats brought it to the back door, presumably due to its proximity to Baby V's room. A gal's got to eat, yes?

* Speaking of feeding Baby V, I am a dolt. Last night at 10pm, Baby V started to holler. She'd suck on her pacifier for a few minutes and then start screaming, and she got more and more frantic as the hours went on. My boobs were empty from her nursing, and my patience as at an end as I tried to snuggle her into bed and she kept kicking at my incision and hollering in my ear. So on a desperate whim, at 1:30am, I gave her a big fat bottle of formula. And she passed out halfway through sucking it into her growling gullet. Oohhhh, she was hungry. God, I'm an idiot.

* Christmas was a breeze to explain to Chebbles compared to Easter. "Some people say that Jesus died and then he didn't die, actually, because it was yet another magical thing that Jesus did. It makes people feel happy and emotional to think about Jesus dying and then not being dead, and so we celebrate today." And Chebbles munches on jellybeans and looks at me askance.

* God, that mole smells. I had to clarify to Chebbles that ONLY Jesus gets to be resurrected, so, for example, Stanley will NOT rise from the dead. And as much as one may wish it so that one does not need to bury it, the mole is also dead forever.

* Summer is nipping at the heels of Spring here, as is the wont of our East Bay climate. Already, Chebbles is yelping around the yard naked, and I'm sitting here in a tank top, watching the sun ripen the oranges on our neighbor's tree and the mole gradually sinking into the tile on our back stoop.

* I'm having an identity crisis regarding stroller acquisition. It seems to make sense to buy a double stroller, so that I can cart Baby V and Chebbles through various situations (airports, most notably). But really, who am I? Am I a JOGGING mama, who will brave the trails with both children in order to get some exercise? (No, I think I'm a mama who leaves her hard-won children with a babysitter so I can run alone .) Am I an urban mama? Am I a mall mama? Am I a group exercise mama? Where do I stand on hiking with children? And shouldn't Chebbles be walking anyway? But a double stroller will also be handy if I live my dream and successfully gestate another person into our family in short order. But not if (like last time) I lose too much weight from all that running alone and short-circuit my fertility... Aaaaugh! Who am I!!??

* Oh, and I decided I don't like nursing. I'm not saying I won't do it, but I don't like it. This is compounded by the fact Baby V doesn't like it all that much either. It's just annoying. There I am with my rack all leaky and exposed, and the jolt of prolactin just gives me the creeps. Again, I'll DO IT, but I won't LIKE IT.

* Baby V likes to be on the floor. Sure, she enjoys being held like any normal baby, but all things being equal, give her the floor any day. When she's fussy, I just put her on the floor and she looks all around and takes in the patterns of our upholstery and our rugs. A sure way to piss her off is to pick her up before she's done being on the floor. Our housekeeper S., who is eerily right about everything, says that she feels supported on the floor. She feels grounded. She's just a Savasana kind of gal.

* Maybe that's what the mole is doing -- just an extended yogic meditation. That's what I'll tell myself so I can put off dealing with it for now.

Namaste

Whatever

Chebbles and I ought to care more about potty training. After all, most of the kids in playgroup are sporting underpants, and dutifully march to the bathroom to do their "business."

We, however, just can't get into it.

True, she'll pee on the potty. She's had the trick down for months now. If we time it just right, she'll pee on the potty. But whatever, it's nothing consistent. She has never been able to predict when she'll pee or poop. Sometimes she just announces to me, with a look of surprise on her face, "Hey! I'm peeing!"

And she pees into her Princess Pull-Up and I change it eventually and we all move on with our lives.

At her 2-year doctor's appointment (six months ago), Dr. M. recommended that I get cracking on the potty training, so that we would have it mastered by the time the baby came. Motivated by him, I enacted a rule whereby she gets:

* One mini-marshmallow for sitting on the potty
* Two mini-marshmallows for sitting on the potty and peeing
* Three mini-marshmallows for sitting on the potty and pooping

And she's psyched about the mini-marshmallows, but not enough to master her bodily functions. It's ultimately not worth the trade-off, and I understand that. It's easier to just keep on playing than to stop everything and jam into the potty.

So she kind of forgot about the marshmallows and the potty, and so did I, and now we have this little trove of stale mini-marshmallows festering in the bathroom closet.

Lately, she has been slightly intrigued by the potty. We're not making a big deal out of it, but twice now she's woken up from her nap and peed in the potty. And once she actually pooped in it. And Hub-D and I told her how proud we are, and we doled out the stale mini-marshmallows and let her wear Disney Princess underwear for a few hours thereafter.

But I just don't have any sense of urgency, so to speak, about potty training. If she stops using the potty tomorrow, I won't really care. It's easier for ME for her to pee in her diapers when we're out and about. And muuuuch easier than cleaning off actual cotton underpants (my plan in case of errant underwear poops? throw them away...sorry Snow White).

I have no interest in cleaning up pools of piss in my house, so I'm just casually coasting past the challenges of potty training. Sure, I have a twinge of embarrassment at dance class, where most of the other kids are in underpants, using the potty before and after class. But that twinge is completely obliterated by the marvelous convenience of just removing the wet Princess Pull-Up and chucking it in the trash -- instead of having my kid interact with a public toilet.

So whatever, Baby V is going through about 10-15 diapers a day, all of them filled with yogurty golden newborn poo. What's another 3-5 diapers on The Chebs? Yeah, we've got two Diaper Genies filled to the brim here at our house. Any questions? Because really, whatever.

Happy Equinox!

This morning, I kissed Baby V's slightly zitty head (I forgot about newborn pimples, and can't remember if they're my fault for not washing her more thoroughly, or if they just "happen," but anyway...) and wished her a Happy First Day of Spring.

What a wild ride of seasons Baby V and I have been on...

We met in Paris in the springtime. On the morning that we were leaving Paris, I had an anxiety attack about getting to the Paris East train station on time. I was barking orders at my child, husband, mother and taxi driver -- and they all still loved me at the end of the journey (with the notable exception of the taxi driver). Before we boarded the train, my mom even had time to snap this picture of the three of us. And just after we got on, I felt myself ovulate. It was that distinctive twinge, and within moments, my oddly effective OV-Watch declared that I was ovulating. I explained this to my mom, and we joked that Hub-D and I should go settle down in one of the sleeping cars.

[It's kind of odd to me now, to think how much of this reproductive journey I've shared with everyone. Did I really joke with my mom about getting it on with my husband?]

Anyway, the above picture is the last photo of us taken WITHOUT Baby V. I can explain this further, but it's making me blush. Just believe me that it makes sense.

So that was last Spring. We spent the next few weeks at a wedding in Germany, then playing with our Washington cousins, then goofing off around the homefront. Hub-D snapped this photo of Chebbles and me the day before we learned we were pregnant.

I thought I wasn't pregnant because the now-legendary bleeding had already begun. Who knew that Baby V was such a hardy soul? Who knew she would persevere through every challenge my body presented to her over the next 36 weeks?

I was so sure that I wasn't pregnant that I had jumped violently around on the trampoline, then I went to The Police concert with my sister and drank a bunch of beer and ate the most foul hot dog that all you vegetarians can envision. (And I bought that cool black sweatshirt too. Antthing for Sting.)

And despite my lack of faith, Baby V decided to stick around, through that whole summer, which barely exists in my memory. This is what I remember, mostly:

* Driving down to Dr. W's office every other day to get ultrasounds of a baby I was sure had perished.
* Vomiting every few hours (or minutes) while Chebbles pulled the toilet seat down on my head again and again.
* My friend A. coming and taking my kid. Every dang day. She would just pull up heroically in her Volvo, where she had installed Chebbles' carseat, and whisk her away so I could vomit in peace.

GOD BLESS A! And Z., who shared his mama with grace throughout those dark days.

Together, we weathered through the Forgotten Summer, into the Autumn of Hope. Once we were past the initial 10 weeks, then we had the good 12-week ultrasound, we dared hope that Baby V might actually materialize. Well, everyone else did. I remained guarded and skeptical... just in case.

During this time, we went to Indiana to see Oma, and play with our cousins (in and out of Pack-n-Plays...). The idea of housing toddlers within a retirement community was particularly asinine, but it was Chebbles' and my last grand adventure, as I became more ungainly by the week.

By Thanksgiving, I looked like I was stealing a turkey from the supermarket, my belly was so large. Once the Winter-of-the-Eternal-Wait hit, I was a battleship of baby.

At Christmas, I just sat on the couch, filled with "Santa's" cookies and lamely rooted Chebbles on as she plowed through her bevy of presents. I was really pregnant, it was really happening, and on New Year's Day, it occured to me for the very first time, "Hey, wait a minute. I might be having a BABY here."

So I embarked on a manic journey of bonding with Chebbles. "Oh Cripes, kid, we only have a few more weeks of being alone. Let's do EVERYTHING!"

At last I wasn't sick. At last I wasn't anemic. I may have been big as a house, but I hauled The Chebs to the park as much as I could, frantically pushing her in the swings, saying, "Are you having a GOOD TIME? Are you having enough of a GOOD TIME to sustain you through the time that your mama (shudder) goes to the hospital and has a baby?"

And that is precisely how we capped off the winter -- by a drama-filled birth, a series of "wrong cup" tantrums, and finally, a Family of Four.

So now that springtime has rolled around again, can you forgive my desire to do the whole thing again, just precisely the same way, so that we can have another one of these?...

(Hat by Aunt Kat)

Save Baby V's head

I've noticed that so many of my brilliant and adorable fellow bloggers use the word verification for the comment section of their blogs.

It must not bother anyone else. Or maybe everyone is more popular than I am. But since I took the word verification function off of my blog two years ago (for the non-bloggers, I'm talking about the thing where you have to enter a series of random letters in order to prove that you are not an evil spamming auto-commenter) I have had a grand total of five spammy comments, all on one old entry, and all of them amusing in a poetic way.

I also estimate that by removing the word verification function, I've saved my readers hours of memorizing and typing random word combinations.

Others' use of the word verification function never irked me before, but now I'm doing the majority of my commenting with Baby V nursing in my lap, and I have to smush her head under my breast in order to lean forward and comment, then I have to re-smush her head in order to peck out word verifications which I believe to be site-security overkill. (Not that the world is so lucky to have me comment on their blogs, but it's nice to leave a little somethin-somethin when you've enjoyed someone's entry.)

So this is my challenge -- if any of my fellow bloggers remove the word verification function, then experience ANY COMMENT SPAM between now and Baby V's two-month vaccinations, I will send you a dollar as a form of contrition. And I will publicly apologize and will have no problem smushing my child's head in the future on your behalf. (Note: I only have four dollars, so that's the limit of my contrition.)

Man I'm so glad to get this off my chest. Now I have more room for Baby V there.

"No running by the pool, Mimi!"

Chebbles didn't nap today. Although I heard her making a ruckus in her room from the time I put her down (1:30), I didn't go in to retrieve her until 4pm. I could say that this is because I want to be consistent in her sleep training, but really it's because Mama Needed a Break.

Plus, she was clearly engaged in some kind of imaginative activity. I didn't ask any questions, I just merrily mailed off birth announcements, straightened up the house and ignored her.

At 4pm, I walked into her room to discover this scene:


For the uninitated, Chebbles is happy to explain what she is doing. She is being a lifeguard.

She has pulled a wooden-framed hamper into her crib, and leaned it against the corner. She has also taken off her pants and scattered her stuffed animals among her blankets. They are apparently "swimming," and she is making sure everyone is safe. When I discovered her, she was perched atop the wooden frame, kicking her legs lazily and hollering directives at some stuffed animal that wasn't toeing the line.

Hub-D and I are particularly amazed by this game because... when in the WORLD did she learn about lifeguards? She has never met a lifeguard, nor, to our knowledge, has one appeared in a book of hers. I can't recall a time where I said, "OK, Chebbles, that's the lifeguard. They're in charge of the pool." So where did she pick this up???

Anyway, before bedtime tonight, I moved the hamper well out of her reach and made her wear her ratty old backwards PJ's (that she can't take off). As I turned off her light and closed her door, I heard her explaining to Otter, "No, I have to wear these PJ's because I took off my pants."

I guess Otter's the fashion critic of the pool.

How I spent my St. Patrick's Day

I've detailed my struggles with de Quervain's disease before, even going so far as to recommend everyone in the world get cortisone shots. So it won't surprise you to learn that it flared up again right after Baby V's birth. It's basically tendonitis-o-the-mom, or really painful thumb joints.

Today, I used up almost a whole day of babysitter/naptime to go stand in line with all of the other achy slobs at the orthopedic clinic, because DUDE, I needed the cortisone shot.

I wouldn't say I'd come close to dropping the baby, because you might take her away from me. So I'll just say I started losing my coordination, and I started to avoid carrying my children because the pain was becoming more intense by the day.

When Chebbles was little, I tried to "power through" the pain until I was truly debilitated.

Not so this time. As with so many other things in second-time motherhood, I wasn't dicking around. Just as I didn't write a "birth plan" and I continue to rely on formula supplementation, I am taking the true path of least resistance with the de Quervain's disease, and I am insisting on medical intervention... right away.

I don't care what the possible drawbacks are, I don't know, extra hair or whatever. Or turning my innocent girl-child into a hermaphrodite (not really, Baby V fans). I just want the pain to stop.

Dr. B, the orthopedic surgeon, looks just like my old algebra teacher. He dresses formally, and today he wore a green carnation on his lapel. I tried not to leap up from the examining room table and grab said lapel in my achy arms and demand he give me the cortisone shot immediately, but I wanted to. Instead, I pretended to be casual about it, saying, "Yes, well, what do YOU think we should do about this pain?"

And, as usual, he said, "Have you tried using the thumb stabilizer?"

And I didn't say, "What the HELL, man? Thumb stabilizers are for IDIOTS who don't know that the only thing that helps this condition is a big fat SHOT TO THE BONE."

Instead I kind of fibbed, and pretended that I'd been using a thumb stabilizer to no avail. In reality, I didn't even mess with it this time. Have you ever tried to wear a big brace on your wrist and change two dozen diapers a day? It's a disgusting combination, not to mention useless against the tendonitis.

This time, he said, "I think we should do X-rays," and I cheerfully agreed, all the while thinking, "Oh my GOD, I have to wait at least twenty more minutes before you shoot up my wrist?"

So I submitted to the X-rays, and the resultant discussion about how it looks like there is some calcification around the relevant bones in my wrist. And I pretended to be interested, just kind of skimming through the conversation in case I had wrist cancer or something, but finally he said, "So let's try to alleviate your pain with some cortisone and hope that helps."

HELL YEAH! I was lying back on the bed with my wrist in the cortisone-shooting position within seconds. I was practically swabbing myself with the betadyne. And I whistled all the way out to the car afterwards, swinging my Band-Aided wrist around, feeling the chilly after-effects of the numbing solution, so happy... so happy.

Ridiculous

Absolutely ridiculous, V.

As for Chebbles, she'd like everyone to know she peed on the potty this morning, earning two mini marshmallows and the right to don her Snow White underwear. Just an FYI.

Keep singing!

* The neighbor's howling hound-dog is officially driving me crazy. I bought the sonar anti-barking device, but it won't work from the vantage point of our house. Instead, I have to introduce it to THEM and somehow get THEM to install it in their yard. And in the meantime, "Bark bark bark HOWL"... every time I finally get a chance to rest.

* Chebbles continues to vacillate between gorgeous little helpmeet and red-eyed devil child. It's exhausting all of us, except her, as evidenced by the hours she spends singing in her crib when I put her down to sleep. And it's not just any singing, it's a replay of the tune that Ariel sings when Ursula is taking her voice. Over and over and over again, an aria of desperation from the direction of The Chebs.

* Baby V does have a cold. It lives in the right side of her face and makes it difficult to nurse from my right breast, So I'm pumping Old Righty and giving her a bottle. It's awesome, bottle-feeding. Chebbles would never do it, so it's a whole new world of "Hey Daddy, could you...?"

* Did you know it's impossible to buy the soundtrack to "The Muppet Movie" on anything but highly expensive LP's? This strikes me as an imbalance of the universe and must be rectified. File it, with the neighbor's dog, under "One Mom's Crusade."

Whereas I totally have Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome

I got into such a frenzy of worry about Baby V that I sped her into Dr. M's office FIRST THING this morning.

First, the thrush. I decided that she definitely had thrush because someone at ballet class asked me if she had thrush, and I casually answered that no, she did not. Then I started getting obsessed with it and worried about it and I tried to scrape off some of the white gunk on her tongue and when it wouldn't come off I decided YES she has THRUSH and we're both going down the yeasty tubes together.

Then, the breathing. Late last night when I was feeding her, I felt like her lungs were kind of gunky. It just sounded like there might be some extra fluid rattling around in there. And I started thinking RSV, RSV, RRRRSSSSSVVVVVV!!! My baby is going to get the deadly RSV, as two of my friends' babies did this past winter, and this is the FIRST SIGN.

And then I decided that she had a fever, and maybe a yeast infection/diaper rash, and possibly lethal gas in her gut.

So I rushed her into Dr. M and he very nicely told me that my child is completely fine.

What is my deal? When will I accept that my pregnancy resulted in a perfectly healthy child? Have I become addicted to the ministrations of medical professionals? Am I obsessively seeking reasons to re-engage with doctors?

Yeah so I totally have Munchausen by Proxy syndrome. What doctor do we see for that?

Gruppie Mama Goes Live

After much urging by her pals, Gruppie Mama has launched a public blog. This is especially thrilling to those of us who depend on her wisdom.

See, Gruppie Mama is THAT mom. You know, that mom who does more research than you? Who does a LOT more research than you? And you get into her good graces so that you can solicit advice on everything from solar paneling to educational decisions?

It was our friend GM who talked me out of my tree on the GERM subject. I've been going insane trying, in vain, to keep germs out of our house while we have such a fresh newborn around. But she pointed out that almost every younger sibling in HISTORY had a toddler sibling in the house, and toddlers have never been fastidious people, and the vast majority of younger siblings seem to have survived their germy elders... so I can just chill out about the germs.

See, she's smart like that.

So anyway, Gruppie Mama has made her blog public. So now I'll NEVER need to do any of my own research again. Right?

Baby blues

Cindy was nice enough to ask how I'm feeling in the comments of the last post. Oooh boy I'm going to make you sorry you asked!

Physically, I'm getting better. I haven't taken a Midol or a Vicodin for 24 hours, a new record. I'll probably take one in the next hour or so, but the fact I forgot to take them is impressive -- the cramping and incision-related pain is definitely subsiding.

Emotionally, heh heh, let's just say I'm textbook postpartum.

The least stimulus makes me cry. For example, last night I got all maudlin about the Lindbergh Baby. I started thinking about how he died during the attempted kidnapping, and how he was safe and snug in his bed and he was alive and fine, then suddenly he had been accidentally killed by his would-be kidnappers and BOO HOO HOOOOOO! BOOOO HOOOOOO....

The fact that this happened almost 100 years ago, and that everyone else in the world is completely over it has no bearing on how SAD it is.

And as I peruse people's blogs late at night, I have to be very wary of sad posts, particularly regarding babies. I just don't need any more sad stimuli right now.

And I'm in a postpartum frenzy of obsession about GERMS. It seems like, no matter what measures I take to protect my newborn from the germs and viruses of the world, they GET IN MY HOUSE.

First, Chebbles brought home the croup and coughed directly into Baby V's face while crooning love songs to her. Then Grandma R., who was staying in our guest room, got the grown-up version of the croup, which included a fever of 103 and another hacking cough. Then I allowed Baby V to be smooched and nuzzled by Chebbles' friend K., who was perfectly healthy with freshly washed hands... but she came down with a 102 fever that very night. THEN our dear friend Z., who submitted to Chebbles' headlock/hugs at Music Together yesterday came down with the same crazy virus.

So germs are GETTING IN MY HOUSE. I've wiped down every surface with Lysol wipes. I've doused every person in hand sanitizer. I use paper towels, not dishcloths. But I want to just burn down my house and start over, in a completely sanitized environment. I fantasize about a house that sprays disinfectant automatically, like the sprayers of the produce at the supermarket -- every half-hour, the hoses would activate and cover every surface of my home with germicide. Now THAT would be satisfying.

Anyway, what did I tell you? You'd be sorry you asked.

In other news, Chebbles has cried foul on the Easter Bunny at the mall. "He is BROWN, and the Easter Bunny was pink last year."

What the heck? You were 18 months old last year! How do you remember what color the Easter Bunny was?

Sitter B. saved the day by informing Chebbles that another magical thing about the Easter Bunny is that he can change colors whenever he wants! This worked, for now. But I sense we aren't long for the world of Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy around here. Chebbles is just too exacting to make it work.


And finally, Baby V has really started to smile. I haven't been able to capture a good picture of it yet, but the best comparison is Corey Feldman, circa 1989. She does her mouth in the same subtle, mischievous way. And their hair is the same. Wait a minute... she looks a LOT like Corey Feldman. What's going on here? BOOO HOOO...

Oh come let us adorn you...

"Hey Chebbles, what you got there? Oh, some Disney Princess Band-Aids? That's cool. What are you going to do with them?"
"My baby needs them on her face."
"Are you sure, I don't see any ouchies on her face."
"Oh yes, Mama, she needs one on THIS side, and one on THIS side."

(Don't fret, Baby V fans, they were very unsticky Band-Aids.)




And finally, a Baby V Video Production... she has really become increasingly alert over the last few days, and will dart her gaze from object to object, in this case from Prince to Otto and back again. She's also got the hiccups.

Trick Baby

We definitely have a "Trick Baby."

A Trick Baby is a well-behaved child who, from birth, sleeps, burps and smiles on command. It's called a Trick Baby because it's the kind of child to inspires others to procreate, as they think, "Hey, kids are EASY! And so cute!"

Then they go on to have a normal baby, realizing much too late that they've been HAD by a Trick Baby.

Anyway, last night Baby V slept mostly with Hub-D and me.

I've resolved that, in general, she should sleep in her crib (Dr. M. has changed his position on co-sleeping, having recently attended a SIDS conference that scared the poop out of him). Luckily, it seems that Baby V agrees with the crib, as she sacks out there for 3-4 hour stretches in her "Kiddopotamus" swaddler.

But last night was a little different.

After nursing for a long time, I accidentally lay her horizontally without giving her a chance to digest all that hard-won boobmilk -- so she hurled up the whole mass of it. It was heartbreaking, watching everything shoot out the wrong way, soaking through my PJ's and hers.

Then, of course, she was hungry.

[NB: This is another place where my sorority experience comes in handy. Specifically, I have a lot of great words for the various phenomena surrounding throwing up. As in: "Sweetheart, is this a boot-n-rally? OK, you can boot-n-rally. Just give Mama a chance to make some more milk and you can totally boot-n-rally." (For the uninitiated, "boot-n-rally" refers to a partygoer who keeps boozing it up after they've thrown up their entire stomach contents. Go Blue!)]

So I snuggled with her for awhile. She was hungry, but not making a big deal out of it. And eventually, she and I just passed out in bed together. Hub-D checked on us periodically, making sure no bedding was close to Baby V, and it was so cozy and warm. We nursed a little, then slept like that until 6am. She ate again and sacked out in her crib until 8:30am.

What'd I tell you? Trick Baby.

What time is love?

It's 6am, I'm up with Baby V, and I took this quiz (clickable graphic below) that tells me that I am 10:02. I love this because (a) it's accurate, and (b) Chebbles was born at 10:03.



What time are you?

The Chebs muddles through

There is just no way around it, it is HARD being displaced as the family baby. Chebbles is valiantly going through all of the stages of grief while loving her baby sister as best she can.

Yesterday was the depths of sadness (so far) for her. Seeing Baby V nursing in my lap filled her with RAGE. She never directed her anger at Baby V, but just yanked and yanked on my arm, weeping with grief and begging me to stop nursing the baby. She did this twice yesterday, and both times I started to cry myself. She's been kind of bratty ever since I got home, but this was an all-time low.

Luckily, Hub-D has kept a cooler head than I have. I keep thinking back to my own sadness when my sister was born. My sister came home, but then went back to the hospital with a staph infection that kept her (and my mother) away until after Christmas. It was the first real tragedy in my life (...only to be trumped a few months later by the moving truck running over my tricycle.)

Anyway, Hub-D doesn't put up with Chebbles' crap. He doesn't see his own life tragedies in Chebbles' tantrums. He doesn't cave in to her demands, as I do, making excuses for her bad behavior such as (a) she's got the croup, (b) she's still traumatized from missing her mom last week, (c) she's got low blood sugar, (d) she hasn't slept well because of the croup... etc. etc.

NOPE. He just tells her to put a lid on the dramatics. And it works. Hub-D has got that kid's number. His being home from work today made a huge difference in her attitude. She knew that her shenanigans wouldn't be tolerated as long as Daddy was in the house.

She was so freakish and horrible yesterday, it was nice to get our good kid back after stern old Daddy laid down the law.

How freakish and horrible had she been? She blew her top at everything, and I mean everything. For example, I was on a campaign of reading books to her all day long. This gave us an excuse to cuddle up while Grandma R. took the baby for awhile. Good idea, yes? Except that everything we read about or talked about made her mad.

We were reading Rapunzel, as retold by Paul O. Zelinsky. It is a truly badass book with infertility and morning sickness frankly discussed, AND great paintings of cats and horses, so we both enjoy it. She was interested in the herb that Rapunzel's mother was eating, and I told her it was called "rapunzel," and that sometimes little girls are named for herbs, like Rosemary or Heather. Then I said, "Actually, Mama's name is an herb too!"

And she blew up. Her body convulsed around on the sofa, kicking against me and crying, "NO MAMA! YOUR NAME IS NOT AN HERB! DON'T HAVE YOUR NAME BE AN HERB!"

So you see, we were pretty screwed no matter what we did.

But Daddy told her today that he expected her to stop crying about stuff.

So she did.

They jumped on the trampoline together, she and Daddy, and she gracefully shared her toys with a little boy who visited our house today (one hopes she did not also share the croup...). This evening, she even washed her greasy goldilocks, kissed Daddy goodnight and hopped into bed with a smile.

Oh Chebs, it's nice to have you back.

Absurd but true

I recognize how totally ridiculous this sounds, but I feel impatient to be pregnant again.

I know, I know -- that's nuts! I just barely survived this pregnancy by the skin of my teeth -- the bleeding, the hyperemesis gravitas, the anemia, not to mention the dramatic delivery that resulted in my whole torso looking like a giant smiley face.

(It really looks like a giant smiley face, but I really shouldn't post a photo of it. So you'll have to imagine that my pendulous nursing breasts are the eyes, my still-sticking-out belly button is the nose and the big brown glued incision over my pubic bone is a lovely Mona Lisa smile. It's awesome.)

Anyway, when I talked with Dr. W. a few weeks ago before Baby V was born, I asked him about our getting pregnant again. We'd like to have three (or four!) children, and I'm 36.5. And gee, according to the hospital, that's "Advanced Maternal Age" already.

I told him that we want to have more kids, but we don't want to be silly about it, if our risks of having a baby with birth defects is too high at this point. He looked me in the eye and said, "Well, every day counts. The sooner the better."

That should have grossed me out. That should have pissed me off. But instead, I got really excited. Oh, to be pregnant again!

What in the heck? Am I being sentimental now that my pregnancy has ended, now that Chebbles is hurling herself around the room in abandoned grief while I try to nurse Baby V? Big fat tears roll down my older daughter's face while I helplessly try to mitigate the effects of displacement on my first baby?

And now I'm excited to do it again? To displace both of my babies? To have to put on my OV-Watch again, to stalk Hub-D around for six months of TTC, to feel crestfallen every time I get my period, then terrified once I get a positive? I mean, the odds are I'm going to have at least one more miscarriage before this drama is over -- WHY am I chomping at the bit to get started?

Perhaps it's because I know that the sooner we get started, the greater our chances of success will be -- if we have to have long seasons of NO pregnancy, then some pregnancies that don't make it off the ground, then we'd better GET CRACKING if we want to fit in another baby before I'm 40.

And the "success" I'm striving for is so sweet. There is nothing like greeting a baby into your family. And I can't bear to think that this is the last time I'll ever do that. That seems impossible.

I'll pack all these newborn clothes into the attic (which should be next week, based on Baby V's rate of growth) and start hoping.

Yeah, this is all quite ridiculous from a woman who is still shedding her uterine lining from a pregnancy that ended in a live birth just 10 days ago, but that's the way I roll.

O-Beine

Nobody panic, but Baby V's bowlegged.

At her appointment yesterday with Dr. M., he admired her twisty little legs and said that it has to do with her position in the womb (read: totally SQUISHED). Apparently, babies are born bowlegged more commonly than not.

Chebbles wasn't bowlegged at all. When she was tiny, I'd look at other babies and think, "Pah! Bowlegs. Not my ballerina." But now that I have a little bowlegged beauty of my own, it's impossible not to obsess a little over these gorgeous little bendy stems.

"What should we do about the bowlegs?" I asked Dr. M.

"Buy her a horse," he said.

It's hard to get her PJ's to fit right over her little O-Beine (that's my Oma's word for bowlegs -- it means: "O-legs") and I can't get her to do that fake baby walking that I used to do with Chebbles... where I'd suspend her in the air and let her leg reflexes scamper all over my lap. Baby V's legs just collapse in a way we used to call "Indian Style." It's all very yogic.

"She'll look like Roy Rogers when she first starts walking," Dr. M. said, "But she'll grow out of it. They all do."

In the meantime, they're fun to ponder, these wee O-Beine. I bet she'll start walking a little later than Chebbles -- it was a breeze for The Chebs because she has those extra-wide feet and straight gams. But Baby V won't be far behind, our Roy Rogers horse-riding O-Beine beauty.

Corrections and weight gain

I've got new stats to share, now that I have the Neonatal Discharge Summary in front of me, and I've just returned from Baby V's first appointment with Dr. M.

First, our girl is already 9 pounds, 6.7 ounces -- up from her lowest weight of 9 lbs. 1 oz. But my boobs could have told you that. (Ohhh, my poor boobs.)

And she's in perfect health. And the odd little lump on the back of her skull is, as it turns out, her normal skull plates -- not a malignant growth, as I'd started to imagine in my postpartum nightmares.

Second, I was totally WRONG when I told you that my infection was related to my Group B Strep. I mean, it's not completely impossible that it was GBS that had infected my womb, but it was more likely some other wily bacteria. So although I was a "GBS Carrier," the reason I underwent the emergency C-section was "chorioamnionitis" (translation: some THING got in there and infected it) and a "non reassuring fetal heart rate during labor."

Baby V is also a "large for dates infant" which is kind of cute.

These are all quotes from her Neonatal Discharge Summary:

"Baby V was born a 41 1/7 weeks (by dates) to a 36 year old woman who was G 5 and P 1 (SAB 2, TAB 1) at the time of delivery.

"L&D Events: Advanced Maternal Age (multiparous) (36years), Post-term (40-42 weeks), Dysfunctional labor, Augmentation of labor, Fetal tachycardia, Abnormal fetal heart rate variability, Electronic Fetal Monitoring (labor), Artificial rupture of membranes, Group B Streptococcus Carrier, Chorioamnionitis, Maternal fever in labor, Antibiotics before delivery-therapeutic, Epidural or Spinal during Labor or Delivery. Mother developed fever in labor 101.4, GBS positive, received 2 doses of ampicillin, C/s for chorioamnionitis, fetal tachycardia, FTP."

"Baby born with pallor, dusky, sats 92 in RA."

"Baby brought for sepsis evaluation. Pale on admission, perfusion improved rapidly."

"Apgars 1 min: 08, 5 min: 09"


I'm so PROUD of our little girl, overcoming all of her maternal obstacles to be a healthy Apgar-kickin' cowgirl. But some of the terminology they use here makes me feel defensive. How many times do they have to rub in my GBS positive status? I GET IT. Sorry! I won't carouse so much during my next pregnancy.

And the "Advanced Maternal Age" diagnosis? Come on, people, I was just starting to get my groove back and start to feel like a sweet and tender young thing again. Then you drop THAT moniker on me?

And not that anyone cares about MY weight, but it's 164 pounds today (I snuck onto the doctor's grown-up scale). So I lost 20 pounds in one week! Imagine that. And with the ongoing taxation on my mammaries, I should be back to my wedding weight within the month.

Postpartum waterworks

I came across this ad today on the Cinderella DVD and blubbered all over Baby V's Sleepsack.

I am losing so much fluid out of my eyes, I need to restart my IV. These hormones are comical, even to me right now.

My post-C-section morphine dreams

I have a fairly useless, but definite psychic ability. It revolves primarily around my friend K., and as I've chronicled here before, I dream her past.

I have specific dreams about her family members, and they usually turn out to be actual experiences she'd had over the years (summer camp, winter vacations, sleepovers). These are experiences I couldn't possibly have known about -- but they become my own "memories" once I've dreamed about them.

I've had a few flashes regarding other people, but my "special" dreams are usually connected to K.

Whenever I wake up from these dreams about K.'s life, I notice that my dream memory has a different quality than normal dreams. Instead of dissipating, they become more vivid over time, so that after a few days, it becomes difficult for me to distinguish what are her memories and what are my own.

OK, last Tuesday... Hub-D and I made the decision at around 3pm to go ahead with a C-section, in order to relieve me and our unborn child of an endless, dangerous labor. I was wheeled through bright red doors into the operating room, shifted to an operating table, and surgery began shortly thereafter.

At some point during the procedure, or immediately thereafter, Dr. W., the exceedingly nice anesthesiologist began to administer morphine to me. (NB: I still am amazed at how motherly and marvelous he was, coaching me through my post-surgery barf festival, but anyway...)

Maybe I'll never know if it was the surgery itself, my fever, or the postsurgical morphine, but I started having the most striking and disturbing series of "memory-dreams" I'd ever experienced. They verged on frightening, they were so vivid, and so resembled actual memories that it took me about five days to fully sort through the images that flooded into my head and pick out what was mine, and not mine.

The images that were not mine were truly not mine. They were someone else's life, someone I didn't know, someone who seemed to want to communicate something. The best comparison I can think of are the spirits depicted in the show "Medium," who beseige Allison Dubois until she listens to their messages.

The dreams revolved around an adolescent boy -- I think that's who I was. As in the K. dreams, I didn't see my "self" in these stories, but out of this person's head.

There were no women in these visions, and nothing that was familiar to me, but the scenes were all familiar to him. During the visions, I didn't think, "Huh, what is this place?" but I would think, "Aha, here we are again."

The main dream:

I was with "my" father, a big man with some shady gang-like affiliations. I looked up to him, but I feared we were over our head as we walked into a glass-fronted house that was filled with underworld-type men. We were Hispanic, I think, or Native American. It could have been California, but might have been anywhere in the Southwest, based on the landscaping and the way people were dressed.

Many of the people around me were in motorcycle gear, but there was also an air of money around some of them -- there was an art opening going on, for which we were underdressed, but we were trying to connect with someone. My dad was letting me tag along, and I respected him, but I was wary of the situation, feeling a little sorry for my dad as he negotiated poorly with these more cunning characters.

This scenario played out over and over again, maddeningly, as I tried to recover from the surgery and get rehydrated and see my baby and function as a 36-year-old stay-at-home mom from the suburbs of San Francisco. But I kept losing my grip on that reality and returning to the glass-fronted house, to the people in the art show, to the motorcycles and characters wheeling around me.

I tried to express what was going on to Hub-D. "I'm having trouble distinguishing reality and dreams," I said. I didn't tell him any more, for fear of scaring him. I felt very isolated in these visions, because they didn't make any sense and they kept returning with increasing vividness. I felt there was something I was supposed to DO with this information, but what could that be? I was recovering from major abdominal surgery while bonding with a newborn girl -- how could I help this person and his father, what was I supposed to do with this information?

I could just dismiss it as a super-funky morphine dream, but that doesn't give the situation enough credence. If I didn't have the history of dreams about K., I could more readily let these dreams go. But these dreams had that specific quality. These were someone's memories, and they were urgently related to me as I shivered in a gurney recovering from my surgery.

So what if they weren't just morphine dreams, perhaps they were someone's memories. Now, who? Someone who just died at the hospital, who desperately wanted to pass along some message? Or were these the vestiges of Baby V's past life, scrolling out for me before she forgot them completely? Both of these possibilities occured to me in the hospital, when I thought I might go crazy from their running and re-running through my head.

I wondered if it were a movie I'd watched, and somehow that scene had gotten stuck in my head. But which movie? It was too mundane a scene to belong to a movie. The next day, I told Hub-D that I was being plagued by something that felt like a made-for-TV movie, stuck on repeat.

I finally called for the nurse and asked her to remove my morphine drip. The "visions" became more vivid every time I hit the button on that drip, so I made the decision to let them all go and return to my tasks at hand, despite the potential for more pain.

I couldn't identify why these scenes were happening in my head, only that I couldn't help the people in them. I felt helpless and supremely confused. It took another two full days before the dreams fully subsided. By the time Hub-D drove Baby V and me home from the hospital, the dreams had settled down completely and they are now gone.

But what were they?

As it turns out...

...There are big sister Mimis and little sister Mimis. And everyone should hold their age-appropriate Mimi.

Jackpot

Hub-D has always wondered when my blogging might finally pay off. I'm happy to report that we finally, finally can justify all of these hours of tearful typing into Blogger and obsessive sorting through Google Images for just the right picture of a glass of wine.

Yes, the day has finally arrived, as Starfish knitted Baby V a kick-ass ensemble. I never would have "met" Starfish if it weren't for our blogs passing each other in the night. It was a surreal moment, opening this lovely package from the East Coast and pulling out these exquisite hand-knitted creations. It finally proves that my blogging friends EXIST!

She also sent a matching knit hat for Chebbles, but my elder daughter is unavailable to model it, busy as she is with her "Fame" audition, currently taking place in her crib at 9pm.

Grandma R. is here, and we are both swooning over Baby V in these clothes that Starfish knitted. How did she know what colors would look perfect on my child, who was unborn at the moment she was creating them? Some kind of blogging-buddy ESP, certainly.

So thank you, Starfish! Now I can justify another two years of not-for-profit blogging.

NICU

I hope you never have cause to visit a NICU, (and that only full-term babies rain into your lives).

It's a spooky place, where the tiny patients are encased in incubators, and it's oddly silent. There are no flowers or stuffed animals, and the nurses are focused on observing their charges with eagle eyes (the babies don't have call buttons).

This is where Baby V spent the first 48 hours of her life, where the nurses watched over her for any sign of sepsis following her birth to a fevered, infected mother.

We were very lucky -- she never showed any sign of the infection, but to be on the safe side (the hospital is one big safe side), she was tucked in there with the other, tinier babies.

Basically, she weighed three times as much as her neighbor babies, and I would have felt self-conscious about my child's being there, lording it over the preemies, if I ever saw another parent in the NICU. I never did. I don't know why. We speculated on this a lot, because the people I know who have had kids in the NICU have spent every last possible second with their children -- you know, kangaroo care, negotiating with the staff, talking to the babies, delivering pumped breastmilk -- so it was surprising how vacant the hallways were.

The nurses told us that Baby V's neighbor (the one in the giant glowing spaceship incubator) was born three months early, and her parents can only come visit her after work. That makes sense. It's so damn sad, though. Imagine having a preemie in the NICU, then having to attend meetings and be at work and act like everything is normal?

OK, I'm being hormonal. I'll stop.

I thought it might be interesting to show everyone the route I would take to see Baby V while she was in the NICU. The video is kind of shaky because I was walking quite tenderly, and I was not sure if I was allowed to be filming the NICU. It starts at the mandatory hand-washing station:

Good sleeper

I know that this may not last, but we have an EXCELLENT sleeper in Baby V.

Last night, she slept soundly in the bed with me.

I'm so caught, by the way, between being paranoid about SIDS and being cozy with my child -- I feel that Baby V is perfectly safe sleeping tucked into my arm while I sleep next to her. But I am simultaneously worried that I'm endangering her in some way. With my incision and abdomen still aflame, it's difficult for me to get up several times during the night and fuss with her -- and with her sleeping next to me, I can detect her hunger signals within seconds, she never needs to cry. There must be a sweet feeling of security for a baby who is always so close to her mama's boobs.

But anyway, I'd be interested in your opinions about this. I have the little "Snuggle Nest" for our bed -- so she can lie between safe barriers. But in order to use it, I have to reposition her after she nurses. It may sound lame that I'm reluctant to reposition her, but she's so dang HAPPY when she drifts to sleep next to me, and I'm happy too, and it feels so natural, both of us snoozing and sniffing each other, staying warm and cozy.

I did the same thing with Chebbles, tucking her next to me in her first month of life, just snuggling and nursing, then waking up scared that I was doing the wrong thing by her. It was so nice to have that time with The Chebs, and it just... felt right?

In the middle of the night, I joked to Baby V, "If loving you is wrong, I don't want to be right." And I know that my pediatrician has two minds about it -- he knows that the AAP recommends against co-sleeping with infants. But he also had his two babies sleep directly in the bed with his wife and him. So he leaves it up to us parents.

I know I'll fret about it either way. But anyway, Baby V is a dream sleeper. She slept in three-hour increments last night, falling back asleep every time she ate. I woke up this morning shockingly refreshed and ready to take on the day.

Baby V had a great morning, too. Chebbles demonstrated the Gymini to her, explained the heating system, tried to cut her bangs (how LAME is Mama that she stopped it?), dressed her in all the latest baby fashions and declared that Baby V's favorite color is PINK. What serendipity that pink is Chebbles' favorite color too!

And Baby V is digging the swing. She will lie in there with a happy smile on her face, her eyes closed contentedly, for hours at a time.

So all is well in the Shaken Mama household. Zzzzzzzzzz.

Family of Four

If I ever wondered, “What’s it going to take for Hub-D to make me a mix tape?” I now have my answer.

This morning, he delivered a hand-picked bunch of songs to my hospital room on his iPod, to commemorate what might be the weirdest week of our lives together so far. The mix is called “Crash C” and the songs are nice illustrations of the events that transpired, beginning last Tuesday at 5am.

“I’m Coming Out” by Diana Ross

I was pissed off all of Monday night. I tossed and turned in bed, finally vacating my marital bed for the guest room, where I read “To Say Nothing of The Dog” by Connie Willis until I fell into a fitful sleep. Chebbles woke up at 5am hollering, “The heat is on and BLOWING ON ME!” So I went into her room and pretended to shut off the heat, which was already off, then backed out of her room singing “Away in a Manger,” still her favorite bedtime ditty.

I fell back into bed (all 182 pounds of me) and resumed my reading, only to be greeted by a big, fat massive contraction.

This is what was weird about the contraction – it didn’t go away. It never went away. (Until the baby was out, but that’s getting ahead of myself.)

In my labor with Chebbles, I had a series of fun little progressive contractions, giving me 12 hours to get used to the idea of being in labor. I’d catch my breath between them while packing my hospital bag and having a few last child-free chuckles in our house before heading out to give birth.

Not so this time. I just had one huge contraction, like a lightning storm that shows up on a clear day, and it just sparks and thunders and jolts without cessation, without a chance to say, “Now this is unusual.”

I went in to wake Hub-D at a little after 6am, and what should have been an exciting moment, “Want to have a baby today?” turned into a weepy, maudlin moment where I was struck speechless by this horrid storm in my gut and just cried all over the covers while he had all the more appropriate reactions to becoming a second-time parent. He was thrilled!


“Let’s Go” by Wang Chung

I insisted on taking a shower before we went to the hospital. I wasn’t about to give birth with greasy hair.

I was in a lot of pain, but I figured the shower might help me feel better with these contractions (I looked longingly at the hot tub too). The shower did give me a moment to collect my thoughts. I put my hand on my gut and said, “This is IT baby. We DID IT. WE DID IT!!! We made it through to the very end and I can’t wait to meet you!”

Then I dropped the soap. Leaning down to pick it up, my perineum started to shoot more lightning bolts and I started to feel completely shitty. No thrill of energy for the labor to begin, just crappiness.

A.. arrived to take care of the sleeping Chebbles so Hub-D and I could leave for the hospital. Then Hub-D wanted to wash his hair too. I seethed while he groomed, but was secretly glad for the extra time to collect a toothbrush, hairbrush, socks and various other things I’d neglected to pack.

“Does this shirt match my eyes?” Hub-D called jokingly from the bedroom.

“Are you seriously PRIMPING right now?” I yell/whispered from the front door, where I stood leaning against the sofa and clutching my luggage. He emerged from the bedroom and we took off. He only made one joke about not knowing the way to the hospital.

The traffic was initially fairly thick – it was rush hour and the hospital is on a major commuting corridor. My pain was so constant and horrible that we contemplated going to the very local hospital where Chebbles was delivered. But I really didn’t want to. The hospital where we were due to give birth to Baby V is so much better in almost every category. My prayers to the traffic gods were answered, the traffic thinned out, and we made it in about 20 minutes.

Hub-D pulled up to the front of the hospital and I started sobbing. The crying was so loud and pitiful that a nice man emerged from the hospital with a wheelchair to transport me up to the birthing center. Thus ended my walking career for a long time to come.

I should mention here that Dr. W.’s staff had accidentally switched off their answering service on Monday night. So I had no way of contacting my doctor all morning. We called about a dozen times with no answer. We learned later that one of his assistants had just forgotten to turn on the answering service when she left for the evening. The last time they were out of touch like that was the 1989 earthquake. And the day my child was born. But anyway…

The birthing center staff sent me to triage and checked my cervix. It was incredibly painful for them to check my cervix, and I made the nurse stop what she was doing twice. The one long contraction was STILL GOING ON, and I was curled against the side of the bed whimpering and weeping and begging for the pain to subside. It did not feel like the same labor I’d had before, not by a long shot. I watched the geometric patterns on the curtains that separated the beds, and thought, “I can’t believe it, but I’m going to get an epidural, and I’m only 2cm dilated. What the hell? But yeah, epidural, ASAP.”

The other laboring moms were in good spirits around me, yucking it up and having occasional cute little contractions. I wanted to die. And I was no more dilated than I’d been at the doctor’s office the day before.

Thank God Dr. W. was in the hospital that morning already, where he was discharging a few other patients. The birthing center nurses caught up with him, and he burst through my triage curtain, saying, “Why didn’t you call me?”

After a spate of righteous weeping, I managed a conversation with him in which he said he was going to admit me to the hospital now and get me comfortable.

From this point forward, I couldn’t open my eyes, I was in so much pain. I was crying and weakening, although the giant, wavering, thunder-filled contraction wasn’t moving anything along.

The nurses established an IV in my arm, and started fluids and antibiotics for my Group B Strep situation.

My doula arrived, and forwarded her theory that my problem was dehydration. She felt that as soon as I got my fluids back up, I’d start to have the dreamy labor we’d fantasized about.

It sounded like a good theory, but it turned out to be completely wrong.


“Heat of the Moment” by Asia

I was dehydrated, we eventually learned, because I had a deadly infection of the placenta. But at this point, I only had a white blood count of 16.5 (healthy is under 10, apparently), and I was just doing poorly for no discernable reason.

We didn’t know that I had a mad-as-hell placenta that was aiming to do away with both me and my child. (Note to pregnant moms: This is an extremely RARE event. Ninety-nine percent of people who test positive for GBS experience no symptoms whatsoever, and those that do experience symptoms have relatively normal labors. And another side note: Thank God I had opted for the bigger, better hospital Tuesday morning. Thank. God.)

Anyway, we didn’t know how deadly things were at first. We just thought it was painful, and everyone focused on getting my labor to move forward. I had a fever, Baby V was doing only “OK” but everyone continued to operate under the assumption I’d have a vaginal delivery, and I’d get hopped up on antibiotics and everything would be cool.

But first, I had an epidural for the pain. That was step one toward getting the labor to smooth out and progress. I wasn’t able to function at all in that amount of pain.

And guess what? The epidural was AWESOME. It hurt about the same as having a mole removed. The man who administered it was the chief anesthesiologist of the birthing center (the biggest birthing center west of the Mississippi), so he knew his crap. It was a great epidural. I asked him if he’d like to name the baby, I was so smitten with him once the epidural had taken effect. He suggested “Carlia.”

So we hung out and chatted and I told the nurses they were beautiful. I told Hub-D he was the man of my dreams. I closed my eyes and kind of dozed while I chatted about how much I was in love with everyone. The nurses turned my Pitocin higher and higher throughout the morning.

Dr. W. came back at lunchtime to check on me. I felt piqued and weird. My fever was heading up. And so was Baby V’s heart rate. It was hovering higher and higher, not responding to the contractions as it should. And I was only dilated 2.5 cm after all that time and all that contracting.

Our doula rubbed my feet helplessly while the medical staff hemmed and hawed and started throwing around terms like “tachycardic.” Dr. W. went off to have some lunch, telling me that things were moving slower than he’d like, but that they’d give me more Pitocin and I should have the baby by 5pm or so.


“Plan B” by Huey Lewis

When Dr. W. came back in the room, he looked at my still-rising fever, the baby’s yucky heartrate, my cervix (3cm), and other readings from various machines scattered around the bed, then stepped in the hallway to call his office and cancel every appointment he had booked for that afternoon. And he spoke to a few others before heading back in.

He told Hub-D and me that he’d like to talk with us about something. He was preternaturally calm, so I said, “Are we going to have a C-section?”

While Dr. W. was carefully making us feel like it was our choice to go ahead with the surgery, a team of surgical nurses, pediatricians and other specialists were secretly assembling in the hallway.

My doula said, “Do you want some time by yourselves to think about it?” but Baby V’s heartrate had broken 200 and was staying there. Hub-D and I looked straight into each other’s eyes and our decision was absolutely forgone: let’s cut this baby straight on OUT of there.

They kindly involved Hub-D in the Hallway Confab that followed. Dr. W. rattled off a bunch of terminology only meaningful to the hospital staff… basically translated, it meant, “We’ve got a deadly placenta on the march. It’s our job to stop it. Go team!”


“First Cut is the Deepest” by Sheryl Crow

Hub-D looked incredibly handsome in the blue scrubs they gave him. No really, he was hot. I was entranced with him, thinking absurdly, “If I weren’t having a C-Section, I would have no idea how terrific my husband looks in scrubs.”

I was in the middle of suggesting that he become a doctor, just so he could dress like that all of the time, when they turned up my epidural to, whatever, 1,000. They needed to numb my whole body south of my boobs. And the side effects of this crank-up were horrible. I started shaking and shivering and trembling uncontrollably. My teeth were clattering so much that they still feel displaced in my gums. I was out of control and I started getting scared.

I had been relocated to the operating room, where I tried to focus on the pretty lights and the fun medical equipment, and to kind of shake off my corporeal existence for an hour or so in order to observe this highly interesting event – but I was prevented from any rational thought by my flopping arms and shoulders, and my constant need to barf despite having no control over my stomach muscles.

Isn’t it kind of unfair, by the way, after a pregnancy of barfing so much, that I had to keep barfing, even when I was getting prepped for the C-section?

The barf was purple, incidentally, because they’d given me some kind of wicked “grape” pre-op beverage that allegedly was to help with the acidity of my esophagus. You can’t tell me that wasn’t plain old evil Ipecac.

My memories get a little foggy here, due to my overwhelming shaking and sudden thoughts including, “Hold on a minute. I could DIE.”

The crack surgical team was busy setting up the equipment. They made Hub-D wait outside (I wonder why. Do husbands rearrange scalpels if left unattended? Or do they inordinately irritate sedated wives?) until they were ready to begin the surgery.

The anesthesiologist was very kind to me. He had a metal rod in his hand and pressed it against my shoulder and said, “Cold?” I nodded. Then he pressed it against my belly. “Cold?” I shook my head – I mean, more than it was already shaking. I could feel the pressure of the metal rod, but not the temperature. That kind of freaked me out.


“Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor

As it turned out, I could feel everything they did to me in that operating room, I just couldn’t feel any pain associated with it. I could feel Dr. W. cutting into my gut, and I could feel them clamping my skin aside and suctioning things. I could feel a good deal of rearranging, and things were taking forever.

Dr. W. had said that they’d have the baby out within a few minutes of the first incision, but this wasn’t the case. I was growing increasingly impatient to hear a mewling newborn cry, just as they always do in about 30 seconds on “A Baby Story” on TLC. But there was more futzing going on over my abdomen.


“Doctor’s Orders” by Carol Douglas

Not unlike Hawkeye on the hit show “MASH,” Dr. W. asked in an urgent tone for SUCTION. Thank goodness the Hotlips equivalent was there to help him out. As it turns out, it wasn’t suction to remove blood from the uterine cavity, but suction to remove Baby V’s head from the birth canal, where it was valiantly trying to go out the normal route. She hadn’t gotten the memo, apparently, that the theater was on fire and it was time to use the emergency exit.

Meanwhile, I was shaking and worrying, and wondering where my baby was, and feeling increasingly out of control. I was cold and hot, and my guts were glistening on the other side of the blue sheet in front of my face.

And I felt them jiggling like crazy down there.

“This kid has a lot of hair!” someone said.

Jiggle jiggle. Rearranging of body parts. Mine. Baby V’s. The unmistakable sensation of a tiny little person being collected from inside my abdominal cavity. Then pop – a little cry, like a bird song, and Baby V was OUT.

“Wow, she is BIG!” Dr. W. said, briefly admiring her before going about the business of reassembling me. The pediatric staff announced she was 21 inches long, and 9 pounds 3 ounces. There was general celebration.

Hub-D and I sat on our side of the screen, and they brought her around for us to see – just a half-second viewing of our darling second-born. She had great vernix action going on – the white substance almost obscuring her incredible head of dark, luscious hair. She is tall, with a sweet round face and she was only mildly pissed about being removed from my body. Basically, she looked like a mellow newborn Chebbles wearing an Ethan Hawke wig.

They went to work on her right away. If the GBS infection had passed into her system, they would need to work fast to get her pumped up on her own antibiotics and save her little organs from the deadly infection.

This is what newborn babies die of, as well as mothers, the world over. According to Dr. W., the deadly germs of GBS get stirred up by the onset of labor (“agitated like a washing machine” was his exact terminology). So, when I was started to have more serious pre-labor contractions last weekend, the fuse of this infection was lit, and my placenta started to come down with this horror. But it wasn’t until full-on labor started on Tuesday morning, that it really caught fire. (Note, once again, to pregnant moms, this is EXCEEDINGLY rare. The odds are wildly in your favor that this will not happen to you.)

Anyway, this is why some women and babies die in childbirth, is that the mom has an active GBS infection, and don’t have access to these medical facilities, and access to this precise antibiotic, which (add this to the Thank God category) just recently came back on the market after being unavailable for some time.

I should also add that I am far from an expert in this subject. And all of my knowledge on the topic was acquired while under the influence of an epidural, then copious amounts of morphine.

So Baby V was instantly admitted to the NICU, and Hub-D hurried after her, crying with joy at his daughter’s beautiful, healthy countenance. He kissed me and marveled at the new life before shuffling after his second child on her own journey into medical testing hell.

And I went to the recovery room, where the anesthesiologist coached me through the insane shaking that got worse and worse after I’d been stitched up, and my doula came to sit with me and drop ice chips into my parched mouth (oxygen mask + fever + withholding beverages = thirsty mama).

The only thing that would stop the shaking was if I left my body – if I focused on some totally unrelated image and made up a story in my head about it. I thought of the most unrelated, ridiculous things I could – I thought about the colorful parachute at Gymboree. I thought about the Baldwin brothers. But as soon as someone would come by and talk to me, I’d start shaking like crazy all over again. It was maddening.

Then Hub-D returned to report that they couldn’t get an IV started for Baby V because they couldn’t find a goddamn vein. I wanted everyone to be fired, including Hub-D for sharing that information with me while I endured the last massive physical insult of that long, long pregnancy.

I gave up trying to leave my body while I endured the shakes and the news of my child being tortured, and instead I talked with our doula about “Lost.” Thank goodness she watches the show.

So as I sat there, the glue covering my C-section stitches drying in the parched hospital air, and my legs slowly regaining sensation while my child was finally tapped for blood and pumped full of antibiotic and IV fluids, and I made the doula chat with me about Sayid. I mean, is he one of the Oceanic Six or not? I’m guessing not, but so Aaron then officially IS a member of the Oceanic Six? And what happened to Clare? No way would she submit to being separated from Aaron, right?

Oh, “Lost,” thank you for being there so I could survive the simultaneous lowest and highest moment of my pregnancy. You were the perfect distraction, you crazy TV show, so that I didn’t implode physically or emotionally at that moment.


“Who Needs Sleep” by Barenaked Ladies

And Baby V is FINE! She was in the NICU for 48 hours, where she was treated like the princess that she is. She was doted on by the staff there – they rarely get nine pounders, and almost never get such luxurious heads of hair to comb. Baby V was the nurses’ own My Little Pony with those thick, crazy locks. One nurse spent a whole third shift washing and styling it into a kind of Val Kilmer as Iceman in “Top Gun” hairdo.

Her official reason for being a NICU baby was “Possible Sepsis.” And it was a glorious moment when she was officially cleared – all of her cultures came back negative and she was released to our loving arms.

I had visited her a great deal before she was declared Sepsis-Free by the no-nonsense, Russian NICU specialist, and we did get some serious breastfeeding in despite our mutual maladies, or in her case, possible malady.

My fever had spiked in the recovery room, at 102.8, but then I felt an extreme wave of HOT pass through my body, and radiate up toward the ceiling. I knew that the fever had lifted. Now that my body is through with that placenta-gone-bad, it was well on its way to recovery. I asked the nurses to check my temperature, and it was 101.7, then ever-lower, before it settled at an inexplicable but constant 97.5.

So I was on the mend, and I set the postpartum unit record for C-section moms who journey to visit their NICU babies. I wasn’t settled but for a few minutes before I was running my virtual tin cup over the virtual iron bars of my confinement, demanding to be hauled to my newborn daughter.

They did so, and I just started loving on her. Plus we needed to make sure we had a name for her. Hub-D and I confirmed with each other that we had chosen the most rocking name for this most superb child, and that it indeed fit, and we’d be happy the spend the rest of our lives calling it out in glee.

And here I sit, about to be released from the hospital for good. There are more songs on Hub-D’s mix (listed below), but I must sleep a little before the big day – incorporating Baby V into Chebbles’ World. It should be a hoot!

* “Goody Two Shoes” by Adam Ant
* “You Might Think” by The Cars
* “Somebody” by Bryan Adams
* “Help!” by The Beatles
* “I Feel Fine” by The Beatles
* “Just Can’t Get Enough” by Depeche Mode
* “Your Song” by Ewan McGregor (This is Hub-D and my special song – played at our wedding. Ahh, I love that man. You should see him in scrubs!)
* “The Future’s So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades” by Timbuk3