Daily Tasks

Today is Travs last day home on Paternity leave. BOO! I don’t know what I am going to do without him. He has played such a vital role in taking care of Clark and I for the past two weeks. CRAP…

Last night was the first time Clark slept in his bed, the whole night! No, he didn’t sleep through the night but he did let us put him back in his bed after each feeding. Unfortunately he woke up every two hours on the hour to eat, and put back almost 5 ounces each time. Must be a growth spurt! That makes me sad… I want him to stay tiny forever. I guess we are just going to
have to make more babies…

Today we are doing the final stuff that has to be done for Clark’s passport and social security card. My Dad is in the states and terminally ill so we are most likely going to be going to visit him within the next month or so, in order for him to meet his only grandson. I’m not going to go into details about his health but the passport is on the agenda for today.

We are also going to go to the Airfield about an hour away from here because my cousin is deploying for the next six months and he is flying in this evening. We aren’t sure if he is going to have a long lay over or if we are even going to be able to see him, but we are going to do our very best to sneak in a hug. I am baking cookies for him today. Even if we don’t get to see him and I don’t get to give him the cookies, I can mail them in the morning and they should be there to him within a few days. I have to admit, the Military Postal Service does a pretty good job of taking care of our soldiers. I think that as a whole we should be more appreciative of the service that our soldiers are providing. They risk their lives on a daily basis to make sure that we can sleep safe and sound in our beds at night. I don’t think that we do enough for them in return.

On the workout front, I was going to teach yoga this evening but am cancelling class due to our going to see my cousin. Hopefully I can sneak a walk in somewhere today, I’m sure that the dog will approve.

Happy Wednesday!

Life in my new world

I am so far behind I think that I’m first…

Life has been a little hectic around here with a new baby. Trying to get into a schedule is a little more difficult than expected. I have learned some hardcore facts though:

1. Shower when possible. Right after a feeding when the child is in a titty coma, or when daddy has him sleeping on his chest.
2. Sleep: HA, yeah right. Not good sleep, not going to happen. Even when the baby is sleeping I am so paranoid that he isn’t breathing that I can’t sleep well anyway.
3. Caffeine: There isn’t enough to sustain life in this house…
4. Diapers: This kid will poop and then wait to pee until there is a fresh diaper on, change it and he poops the new one… So plan on going through three to four diapers just at the changing table before all is said and done.
5. Loaded Weapon: My son is a loaded weapon. He will pee on anyone or anything you aim him at. He managed to pee on the computer at the doctor’s office. I totally gave him a high five on that one.
6. Testosterone: I need to have a little girl… NOW!!! At any given moment in my house there is a boy 1. Sleeping, 2. Eating 3. Pooping or farting. Between my husband, my son, and my dog I cannot walk into a room without expecting to smell a fart or soiled diaper nor expect to get out of that room without having to provide
some sort of snack or meal for one of the three…
7. Laundry: I seriously thought that I did loads of laundry before… HA HA HA I have officially turned into a stay at home mommy. Before children I wondered what
it was that these women did all day to keep busy. I know now that it is rid their homes of the smell of ass and laundry.

I am quite sure that I have plenty of more lessons in mommyhood coming my way, all of them add to this ever growing lesson in humility that donkey punched me during delivery, so if you are one of those people that I used to be, that turns your nose up at the moms who stay home and take care of their family and still manage to walk out of the house without looking like troll, or hell even the moms that walk out of the house looking like a troll, you should rethink your position because HOLY MOTHER OF GOD… This is the hardest job I’ve ever had.

Clark goes to the NICU

Baby Blog?

I wonder if this is starting to turn into a baby blog, I know that there are more things to come but right now my life revolves around Clark. I know that after a while, once we get into a routine, things will change. I will be starting my Body After Baby journey and writing about that. I have already started taking photos to show the progress that comes right after birth, without exercise, and once I swallow the sharp pill that comes with eyeing up my post baby body pictures I will post them for the entire world to see. I think that it is important for people to see what the body of a mother looks like. A real life woman, that isn’t touched up with air brushing or people to do her hair and makeup. So I will be posting those soon.

To continue from after the birth of Clark and to catch up to
today:

Clark had an infection in his blood when he was born. The doctors weren’t sure what it was from, something about my epithelial cells getting into his system and causing the levels to increase… Who knows. After he was born Travis and I were in pure bliss. We went back to our room, I took a shower (to the dismay of the midwife on duty, she couldn’t believe I was up and moving around), and then we had a couple of visitors. Jamie came back for a few hours, my friends Cassie and Agnes came to see the new addition and then around 8 we kicked them all out. I was TIRED. Travis had taken a nap while I was in the shower and cleaning myself up, I was still working on the 3.5 hours I had gotten from the night before. I put Clark in his bassinet and tried to get in a nap while he slept. Travis said that he would take diaper duty for the night but I figured that I would let him get as much sleep as possible, since I needed to feed Clark and then he could snuggle him all the next day while I napped. This lead to me getting roughly 4-5 hours of sleep through the night. Needless to say, I was tired again the next day.

Sunday brought more visitors, a short nap, lots of snuggling with Clark and going over the previous days events in my mind in complete disbelief about the fact that this cutie pie was in my belly less than 24 hours ago. I still can’t believe it! Then the doctors came in to get Clark, they wanted to run another blood test. They said that they wanted to check a liver level and that there wasn’t anything to worry about, they would send the results to Heidelberg and have him checked out the next day by the pediatrician. When they said they were sending the results to Heidelberg, I thought that they meant to the military hospital that we were supposed to go to for a three day checkup once we were dismissed, so I didn’t give it a second thought.

At 10PM the doctor came in and said, “I have bad news, Clarks got an infection and the doctors from the University Klinik are coming to get him, he needs to go to the NICU.” I am in the middle of breast feeding, and I don’t want to freak out but inside I’m screaming, “NO NO NO NO!!! NOT MY BABY!!!” Tears are streaming down my face, I’m trying to take in everything that she is saying, a million thoughts are swirling around in my head, and I just don’t want to let go of my little boy. She says she will be back as soon as they get there.

She isn’t gone for more than ten minutes and a nurse comes in, she only speaks German, she says, “The doctors are here to take your son.” I somehow manage not only to ask her if the doctor is coming to our room, but I manage it in perfect German (something usually allocated for drunken evenings when I have lost all inhibitions in my foreign tongue). She tells me no, that we are supposed to go to him. So I wrap Clark up in a blanket and snuggle him close, with tears running down my face we make the walk to the doctors office. This was the longest walk of my life, dread, fear and pain… I cannot describe the feelings that come over you when you are so completely helpless. I hand Clark over to the doctor who explains that she is going to put in an IV, and then we can come back. Travis and I go and sit in the hallway andwait…

After the IV is inserted the doctor tells me that if my doctor will release me then we are able to go to the NICU with Clark, that the KinderKlinik believes that it is more beneficial to the child to have his mother by his side, they will provide a bed for me to sleep next to him. I LOVE THE GERMAN HEALTHCARE SYSTEM!!!! She also tells me that I cannot ride in the ambulance because it is full, that Travis will have to drive me. UM OKAY!!! GET ME THE EFFF OUTTA HERE!!! I haul ass to my room, pack my shit in less than two minutes and head to see my doc. She does a check of the girl bits to see how they are healing, and then gives Travis a five minute spiel about aftercare, the only comment that I hear is, “Mr. Dixon I am going to direct this to you because I’m sure that your wife is not going to remember any of it, her mind is with her son.” GENIUS!!! This must not be her first trip to the rodeo…

Travis and I are off to Heidelberg… When we get there we go to the 10th floor, I walk in and ask for my son. A wonderful woman that speaks broken English (Much better than my German) takes me to Clark. She has made a bed for me next to his and is explaining that I can stay until he is able to leave. She then says, “he can sleep with you but I would prefer it if he slept in his bed.” She has him attached to a heart rate monitor and an O2 monitor; she has already changed his diaper and is asking me about how I prefer to feed him. I am a wreck. Travis gets me settled and stays with me for a few hours. I tell him he should go home and get some rest; it looks like this is going to be a long road to hoe.

Travis heads home and Clark and I try to settle in for the night. Clark starts to get cranky. I feed him every hour but it isn’t making him any better. Ingrid, the night nurse that has been so kind, comes in with a pacifier; she asks me if it is okay to give it to him. I have read that this isn’t a great idea for mothers who are trying to breastfeed because it can cause problems but Clark is inconsolable, I agree to let her. I cry… A LOT. The night is long, I don’t sleep, I can barely breath, there are so many questions, I want to make my baby better, I am helpless.

Travis comes back to the hospital, Clark is still inconsolable, the pacifier is starting to lose its luster, I have no breast milk yet, and colostrum isn’t cutting it. A new nurse comes in and asks if she can feed him with some formula, I cry even more… My poor baby is sick and he is hungry, I know that he needs the calories to fight this infection, I allow it but not without a lot of tears. I am not whaling or throwing a temper tantrum, I haven’t yet, I just have these silent tears constantly streaming down my face, I can’t do anything for my son, I am tired, weak, and slowly losing my mind.

The day goes by, the doctors come in for rounds. This is a teaching hospital so there are multiple people in the room explaining what the next steps are, we are going to be here for 7 days, 5 days of antibiotics and two days of testing his levels after the antibiotics to ensure that he is recovering. These “doctors” all look like babies themselves, I can’t get past how young they are. Holy moly.

The day starts to wear me down, Travis says that he wants me to go home for the night. I don’t want to hear it, what kind of mother goes home when she can stay with her baby? I am refusing… He is adamant. It takes me calling my two best friends, my sister, my dad and my mom to finally decide that he might be right, maybe I need to get some rest to be able to take care of my son. It has been four nights since I last slept more than two hours at a time. My body is breaking and my brain is fried. I say goodbye to Clark and Travis basically drags me out of there.

At home I am a wreck, I want to be with my son, I cannot concentrate on what I need to be doing. I decide that a shower is in order and then a beer and some sleep. The shower is wonderful; I just let the water run down my back and chest, I am starting to relax, just a little. I go down stairs and drink my first beer since February and it is GOOD!!! Travis puts me in bed and heads off to Heidelberg to be with our boy. He stays with Clark for hours, he feeds him, snuggles him and gives him the love that he needs.

The next morning I wake up with a surprise! MILK!!! Lots and lots of milk! My tits are HUGE!!! I yell, “Babe, wake up! We have to get to the hospital! I need to feed my baby!”

We get to the hospital too late, by an hour. I have to wait for Clark to wake up so I can feed him. He eats like a champ. We have to weigh him before and after each feeding to see how much milk he is getting. He averages between 70-80 ml, roughly 3.5ounces. I am super excited!!! Then I learn to pump off the rest of my milk for stockpile. Travis has decided that it is best for me to go home at night to get caught up on rest before Clark comes home for good. That means I really need to stockpile; I am only pumping around 40ml after each feeding… So our schedule goes like this, feed Clark, Clark sleeps, I pump, change diaper, feed, Clark sleeps, I pump… etc. At night I go home, Clark eats his weight in stockpiled liquid gold and I come back in the morning to feed him. The cycle starts over. We do this for four days.

On Thursday the chief of the NICU comes in and tells us that because Clark is recovering so well and putting on weight, he is going to let us leave on Friday instead of Monday, provided we see our pediatrician on Monday. YAY!!!! Friday comes and we get the okay to get out of there. We are on our way home to start our new life with our new baby! You’ve never seen two people happier than Travis and I!

Clark meets the world... Part 3

We last left off with my breakfast pastry giving me the low down on the possible side effects of the epidural…

I sign the paperwork and Croissant gets to relieving me of my pain. He gives me a trial shot to see if the catheter is placed properly, I have to sit on my rear for ten minutes to see if it is going to work. This means that I am going to have to suck up three contractions on my butt, which is like a living nightmare, and then sweet relief!!!

I want to kiss Croissant! I swear to him that if I wasn’t married I
would propose right then and there. He gives me the real deal and then my eyes uncross themselves, I am no longer on the verge of turning into Linda Blair and spewing pea soup from my spinning head, and I am now able to concentrate on the fact that I will be meeting my sweet little boy soon. The best part was that I was given a walking epidural so I was able to walk to the restroom, still in my fashionable panties and tank top, and back. I could do squats and sit on a medicine ball to assist Clark in dropping. I dilated to 9cm within 20 minutes. It was quick!

I asked Jamie to go to my room and get my makeup bag. Travis gave me stink eye and said, “Really? You need makeup? “To which I replied, “yes, we are meeting an important person today; I need to look my best.” The first part was reference to a comment made by the husband of a girl who’s blog I read and I thought it was such a sweet comment; Travis knew what I was referencing. Jamie came back with the makeup, I fixed myself, she braided my hair, and then I was ready to go. Or so I thought…

I started to do squats to help Clark out, as I stood up from a squat I felt like I
needed to go to the bathroom, I said to Jamie, “I need to poop.” Heike had just happened to have walked into the room as I said that, I was a little embarrassed, and she said, “Did you just say you need to poop?” “Um, yes.” Heike started to laugh… I thought that she was just laughing at my silliness again. Nope, she wasn’t. She looked me dead in the eye and said, “you don’t need to poop, you need to have a baby.” “No, really, I just need to poop, I’m sure.” So she said that she would check my progress and then we would see who was right, she had me get on the bed and she checked…

Nope, you need to have a baby. When you get the urge to push, start pushing. So I got in a squatting position to see if that would be a comfortable way to have the baby. Nope. Back on my back, and then Heike made me roll onto my left side and hike my right leg up. She then said it is time to push. So I thought that I’d give it a test run to see if I was pushing the way that I was supposed to and to see if I was going to feel better. That test run put Clark right where he needed to be. We were off…

So at this point Travis is on my left, Jamie on my right, Heike is next to Jamie on the business end of the deal, there are two doctors,one at 1200 and one at 1030 on the business end; they are all telling me to push. I give a fairly decent push and their eyes light up. They all look crazed and are urging me to continue, “GOOD, Keep going, we can see his head!” To which I reply, “I don’t believe you, you’re all lying.” It is starting to hurt when I push but when I stop pushing the urge to continue is stillthere, the pressure is still there, and the desire to go home and take a nap is kicking in.

I look at Travis and say, “I can’t do this.” He replies, “Yes you can; you are doing it.” That irritates me, he doesn’t realize that I’m serious, I really cannot do this. I look down at Heike, “I really don’t think that it is time. I just want to go poop and go home. I will come back tomorrow and we can try again.” She chuckles and says, “no, you are going to push this baby out now.” So I push, they get excited, I push a little harder, more excitement, I rest.

Then one of the doctors decides to give me a pep talk... "It is like running a marathon, you just..." I interupt her, "this is nothing like running a marathon, I've done that! I'll do that again! This is worse! MUCH WORSE!!!"

Here is where the tides turn. Heike tells me, “you need to push when you
feel a contraction.” The problem, I tell her, is that I can no longer feel those contractions because there is just a constant pressure from Clark being lodged in my birth canal. She replies, “so push.” I push and push and push. They all get very excited, “YOU’RE DOING IT. PUSH!!! JUST LIKE THAT!!!” His head is out! I look at Travis and am done, “babe, I can’t do anymore. I’m done.” He leans in close to my face and says, “keep pushing, you’re doing great.” I snap, "GET OUT OF MY FACE!” (I later learn that I simultaneously cocked my right fist back and Jamie thought I was going to cold cock him) He backs up. The room is spinning, the walls are closing in, I push. Through the push I manage to look down and see a flash, the light slicing through the air and shining back on me from sharpened metal. SCISSORS!!! My favorite doctor is holding a pair of effing scissors and she is aiming them at my girl bits! WTF!!!???!!!

I reach for Travis, butt walking up the bed and yelp, “Don’t do it! Don’t cut me! I can’t, I swear, I’ll push!” I go for broke! I push with every ounce of energy I have, thinking that if I push with all of my might she won’t have to cut me. WRONG!!!!! She did it. No local. No warning. No F-you. No flowers. No drinks. No bullshit! She just does it.

Now I am pissed. Not really pissed at the doc or anyone in particular, just pissed. I push harder than I have ever thought imaginable; my face is smooshed partially into the bed and partially into Travis. I feel Clark fly out. I look down, he is a blue baby. They are removing the cord from around his neck, rubbing him with towels to get him to perk up and to give him a little bit of a cleaning off.

I’m on my back so fast it makes my head spin. I am ripping my shirt off and attempting to get my bra off, I want skin to skin contact and I want it NOW!!! I can’t get my bra, it is a sports bra and it is giving me some serious grief, I am fighting with it and finally I bark out, “get this damn thing off of me, I don’t care if you have to cut it off!” Jamie helps me out of it and I start reaching for my baby.They get Clark cleaned off and put him in my arms, I cry…

The doctor asks Travis if he wants to cut the cord. He does. I don’t see any of it, I am staring at my little boy and I can’t get over his little face. He is beautiful! His nose is a bit bruised from labor and he has a few blood vessels busted in his eyes but he is BEAUTIFUL!!!

Jamie says goodbye, she is crying and is walking away spouting something about family time, etc. I don’t argue because I’m engrossed in this little boy that has just changed my world in the blink of an eye. Travis joins us and we just stare at Clark.

I am no longer the same person. The world is no longer the same place.