Higher and higher...

Yesterday was Abby's one month check up. She is definitely one healthy girl! She weighed in at 11 pounds and 4 ounces (lighter than we suspected, actually) and 22 inches long. She's in the 95th percentile for her weight and the 80th for her length. The doctor was very impressed with how well she focused her eyes and thinks she'll have her sight intact well before the usual 3 months. She also said she's very strong for her age and will probably be an "early mover." Dan and I both walked at 8 months, so that doesn't surprise me. The doctor said she may start rolling over a lot sooner, too, and to make sure that, even now, we don't leave her on the couch or bed unattended, but I've seen her roll herself to her side plenty of times (she loves sleeping that way), so I don't leave her alone anyway!

Have I mentioned recently how incredibly adorable she is?? and smiling so much these days, too!

My Justification

I've always said I'm lacking that domestic gene, but lately I've felt the pressure to be more...I don't know..."motherly," I guess, for obvious reasons. And by "be motherly" I mean "be more of what I've always thought a mother should be," which is a) neat and tidy, b) a good cook (or at least someone who cooks at all), c) organized. Otherwise saying, I've been feeling like I should be MY mother. :) And that's not a knock in any way on her--I've been blessed with the most absolutely incredible mother on the planet, and she was a tremendous role model for me, but bottom line is I just don't have it in me. And that makes me sad sometimes, because I'm afraid Abby will grow up and have no clue how to take care of a house and it'll be my fault.

But then I found this poem today and it made me not care so much. :)


"Mother oh Mother, come shake out your cloth
Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
Hang out the washing and butter the bread
Sew on a button and make up a bed.

Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I've grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue
(Lullaby, rockabye, lullaby loo)
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo)

The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
And out in the hard there's a hullabaloo
But I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo
Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?

The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow
For children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow
So quiet down, cobwebs; dust, go to sleep
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep."

Now granted I was like this before I became a mother, but still, at least now I can stop stressing about it so much. :)

A Poem to Abby on My 30th Birthday

If you were not here
today would be a Party Day.
I would
sleep in late
take a long hot shower
put on something sparkly and sexy
and not worry that it might get
peed and pooped and spit up on,
because you would not be here.

I would have a Big Birthday Blowout,
at a restaurant
or club,
where I would
dance
do some karaoke
eat and drink
and not worry that what I eat and drink
might upset your little tummy,
because you would not be here.

But,
you are here.
So I
get up at seven
squeeze a shower in while you nap
put on sweats like I have almost every day
for the last month.
I will not
go out with my friends
eat and drink to my heart's content
dance and sing and stay out till all hours
without worry about someone else.
Instead, I will
sit with you on the couch
like I do every day
and watch reruns of
Cosby
Gilmore Girls
What Not to Wear.
I will
try to remember to eat something
and drink my water
and change your diaper almost every half hour.
I will
let you curl up on my chest
sing you songs you can't yet understand
melt when you stare at me with those big blue eyes
and give me a smile.
And I will cry,
not because of what I'm not doing today
or because of the things I'm missing out on
but because that Party Day would be so empty
that life would be so empty--
because
you
would not be here.

So much STUFF!

Abby took her first roadtrip this weekend--we went to Ventura to visit Dan's parents and his brother's family. We go up there once a month, usually, and we have the packing routine down pretty well; we can decide out of the blue to go there and be out the door in fifteen minutes, tops. At least, that's how it USED to be.

The trunk was PACKED, and that's not an exaggeration. Why is it such small people need so much stuff? Stroller, bouncy seat, Boppy pillow, diaper bag, bag of diapers, box of wipes, co-sleeper...and her clothes took up more space in my suitcase than my own did! And it's not like we did the new parent "take everything just in case" thing--we actually used it all. It took three trips to get it all into the house once we got there, and we were only staying for 48 hours. And looking ahead, I know it's going to get worse before it gets better: Dan's brother has a three year old, and they packed out their van for their 72 hour trip out here from Vegas. When do they stop needing so much stuff???

Beautiful dreamer...

I can't imagine what she could be dreaming about, but Abby apparently is--and unfortunately they seem to be nightmares! How can a baby have nightmares?! What on earth are they about--being poked in utero? That sudden burst of blinding light when she was born? These giant adult faces that rudely thrust themselves mere inches from her eyes and make ridiculous faces and babble in high voices? But I'm pretty sure that's what's going on. Every once in a while, in the middle of one of her many naps, she'll suddenly whimper and then cry--and these aren't little cries, these are WAILS, which she never does otherwise--and then she'll stop and get a worried little look on her face that slowly fades as she heads back, I assume, into a happier mental place. It just breaks my heart! Any of you moms out there experience this with your babies?

And suddenly...she's real.

In the middle of the night, somewhere between hauling Abby out of the co-sleeper to nurse and easing her back in with a prayer that she'd stay asleep, she and the whole concept of motherhood became real. Suddenly the dream-like quality that the last 2.5 weeks have held dissipated, and it became clear to me that this was now my life. That I am a mom. That Abby, that squirming little being who melts my heart when she falls asleep on my chest, is my daughter, and always will be. That I'll be braiding her hair and giving in to her plea for sparkly shoes at Pay-Less and kissing bruises and scrapes in the years to come, and that, somewhere down the line, I'll be meeting The Boy and defending my choice of curfew and offering my sympathy when her firt relationship goes bust. And while I've thought of all this before, this was the first time when it all felt, well, real. I can't think of any other word that suits. It was like waking up, like snapping back to reality after getting lost in a daydream. And I'm glad it finally happened, because now I feel like I can get on with my life instead of just sitting around in a daze.

Now if only my body would find the energy to LET me get on with my life....

Cutie pie!

Thanks to Maaike and Jurgen for the precious outfit! It's one of my favorites--and one of, like, 3 outfits she has that ISN'T pink. :) This is the photo we sent out with our Christmas cards/birth announcements. I really need to get the camera memory cards downloaded to my computer--so many more sweet pictures to share. (I'm on my way to being one of those really annoying bragging moms, aren't I?)

Chunkin' up

Abby had her one week check-up on Thursday. Our doctor is fantastic--she's got a great sense of humor, is really laid-back, and gives you all the time in the world to ask every ridiculous first-time-parents questions you can think of. The highlight of the appointment: having the doctor see Abby's weight and gasp, "You've got some high octane milk there!" Between January 1 and January 5 she'd gained eleven ounces--from 8 lbs 13 oz to 9 lbs 8 oz! Sheesh! The doctor said they want them to gain at least HALF an ounce a day--talk about an overachiever!!

Warning: depressing post

(Before I get into any of this, let me preface it all by saying that none of what I'm about to write is eclipsing my love for Abby or my overall happiness. I'm not depressed or experiencing PPD or anything like that, so no one has to worry. :)

I was on BabyCenter.com and found a message board called "C-section support." It took me a minute to allow myself to check it out because I hadn't't yet let myself really analyze and process the turn of events that we experienced a week ago today. But I read some of the posts, and in doing so, I began to look more closely at Abby's birth and my c-section, and I finally figured out why it is I get all weepy (and not in a good way) whenever I think about that day.

I feel robbed.

I wanted so badly to have a natural birth. I wanted to be able to say that I'd had my baby naturally and loved every minute of it (which I had, up until the Pitocin kicked in). I wanted to videotape her little head coming out and Dan announcing the sex to everyone, and be able to go home and watch it all over and over again and relive that incredible miracle. But instead I had to lay there on a surgery table and do absolutely nothing while my baby was extracted rather than birthed into the world.

I don't blame myself for any of it; I did everything right that I was able to do. I don't feel guilty; a c/s was the only solution in the end. I just feel cheated out of one of those experiences that you only get one chance to have: the birth of my first child. I wasn't prepared for things to go that way--my pregnancy was so mellow and easy-going, comparatively speaking, I never imagined I wouldn't be able to have a natural birth. I wasn't prepared to experience two major events at the same time: birth and surgery. I wasn't expecting to have to deal with stitches and staples and eventually a major scar on my already stretch-mark-ravaged body. And having to deal with all those emotional things on top of the emotions that come with sleep-deprivation and the weighty responsibility of parenthood has really blindsided me.

So that's where I am right now. I'm sure these feelings will fade, especially the more time I spend contemplating just how amazing and beautiful Abby is. In the end, it doesn't matter how she came out; the important part is that she came out at all and is healthy.

And, speak of the devil, Her Highness has awakened (thank heavens--she was about to start her fifth hour of sleeping!) and looking for lunch. Guess that's my cue to exit...

And the winner is...

Thanks to everyone who entered the baby prediction contest! I devised a complex scoring system to determine the winner, and the high score went to Maaike van den Haak of Amsterdam! Maaike is also a new mom--her son, Matthijs, was born on Christmas Eve. Congratulations, Maaike!

Pictures!

Finally!!!


Yes, that says 9 and 1.3 pounds. Still can't get over that. I must have ingested some Miracle-Gro somewhere along the line.


Our little Weeble Wobble!


LOVE that face!

I could post about a hundred more, but I figure y'all would get bored. :) What can I say, I think she's perfect!

Oh yeah...

Yes, there are photos a-plenty coming soon to the blog, but I don't have the energy to go through the 200+ we've taken so far. :) I'll get a few up in the next 48 hours, I promise!!!!!

Welcome to the world!

Happy New Year! How appropriate that we would be bringing our baby home on the first day of 2006. We can’t wait to see what this year holds for us as parents!

The last 5 days have been a whirlwind. Everything started December 27th, the day after my official due date. I starting having contractions that morning, and they felt different from the contractions I’d been getting for the last couple weeks. Even so, they were sporadic, and I expected them to simply peter out like the others had. But by 10 PM I realized that they were getting much more regular and intense, and Dan wisely suggested I take a shower to help myself both relax and prepare for a trip to the hospital, just in case. After my shower, I sat in Dan’s office, timing the surges and fighting the urge to get very excited at the thought that this might actually be it. Over the next two and a half hours, the surges worked their way down to between 5 and 2 minutes apart, and I was fully engaged in my hypnobirthing visualization and breathing. At 12:30 we called Dr. Robinson, and she gave us the thumbs-up for going to the hospital, so we took one last belly photo and took off for Saddleback Women’s Hospital.

We called Tina, our birth coach, and she met us at the hospital. Flora, our first nurse, checked me out and gave us the good news: I was 3 cm and 90% effaced! Per Dr. Robinson’s orders, they had me walk the halls for 45 minutes to see if I would continue to dilate—which I did, to 4 cm, and at that point I was officially admitted to room 290.

The next few hours consisted of wearing a rut in the labor and delivery hallway and retreating to my hypnobirthing zone in various positions in our labor suite. I’d walk for half an hour or so, then relax and do my breathing exercises for another half hour. While Dan and I paced the floors together, we tried to decide what to do for a name if it was a girl—we’d settled on Holly because of my due date’s proximity to Christmas, but our first choice before we even got pregnant had been Abby. The name discussion (and the “Can you believe we’re actually having the baby now?!” discussion) kept my mind off the surges and helped me to actually enjoy the process I was going through. Finally, after all that work, I was up to 5 and a half—and by 10:30 I was at a nine! “A baby by lunch!” was the new cheer, and Tina announced she’d treat us to a take-out lunch from Ruby’s so I could have the chocolate milkshake I was suddenly craving.

Eleven-thirty, 12:30, 1:30….time passed and my body decided that 9 cm was a nice place to hang out. I was tired, but the hypnobirthing was still doing its thing, and I wasn’t really aware of how much time was passing. Every once in a while I’d doze off for a bit, and Pam, our nurse, was astounded at how easily I managed the pain and could actually sleep. (Pam would later decide to attend Tina’s next hypnobirthing class because she was so inspired by my performance. Apparently she was also bragging to the other nurses on duty about me!) However, my doctor wasn’t comfortable with the way things were going (or not going, as the case may be), and wanted to do a little investigating and experimenting to figure out what was going on and try to fix it. They measured the strength of my contractions, and decided they weren’t strong enough—possibly the reason I couldn’t get to that last centimeter. Their first solution was to break my water (everyone was shocked it still hadn’t broken, given all the strain it had been under and all the poking around they’d been doing)—but that didn’t change anything. Their second solution was one I’d been hoping wouldn’t come up—Pitocin. They hooked me up to that around 6:15, and that’s when things started to go downhill. The Pictocin not only made the contractions stronger, it basically strung all the contractions into one giant surge that never ended. At this point I’d been in labor for over 22 hours and awake for 34, and I could have handled it had I been less exhausted and frustrated with how things were going, but given the circumstances, it was just too much. I bore it for an hour and a half before mentally breaking down. In came the epidural, and I’ve never known such relief—I believe I actually uttered the clichéd, “I love you!” to my anesthesiologist.

My doctor encouraged me with the fact that many women progress after getting the epidural because their body is able to relax a bit and not be so stressed. However, after half an hour it was clear this wouldn’t be the case for me. My doctor, the wonderful, gentle woman she is, broke the news that a c-section would be the wisest course of action. Had she brought this up an hour previously, I would have burst into tears, but by this point, I didn’t care. I was tired, and all I wanted to do was meet my baby!

Into the OR we went, and at 8:56 PM, December 28th, Abigail Joy Morrow was pulled into the world, It turns out we had three strikes against us having a vaginal delivery: she was “sunny-side up,” misaligned with the birth canal, and over nine pounds! (Well, one ounce over, anyway!) They measured her as being 21 inches, but everyone agrees they didn’t stretch her enough. She instantly stopped crying when Dan began to talk to her and stared into his eyes like she actually understood him. Everyone marveled at her hair, which was so perfect it look combed, and at the fact that she looked nothing like a newborn. She looks at least a month old already!

It started out exactly like I’d hoped, and while the ending was the exact opposite of what I had dreamed of, the result was beyond anything I could have prayed for. Abby is absolutely perfect. She’s totally mellow, hardly ever cries, and has the most beautiful face! And Dan was amazing throughout the whole thing—he was so calm, despite the frustration I know he felt and how worried he was for me, and he never let me see his tension or concern. Kelli , my sister-in-law, drove with my brother from Bakersfield, CA in the middle of the night to be there as our photographer, and even jumped in to help now and then and keep track of the day’s timeline for us so we’d know later what happened when. Tina was the perfect birth coach—without her I don’t know if I would have stayed focused, especially when things started to get gnarly.

We’re home now, and the family room looks like an explosion in Babies R Us. As I type, Abby is sound asleep on her daddy’s chest, looking like the angel she is, and Dan and I are beside ourselves with all the blessings we’ve received with her arrival. It still hasn’t sunk in that she is our daughter—that she’ll be here for the rest of our lives, that we’re responsible for this little life—but I suppose the realization will come eventually. Until then we’re content to cater to her ever whim and stare at her while she does absolutely nothing of exception. Sounds like a decent way to spend my every waking moment!