Hi all -
I'm continuing this blog at http://oregonramblersx3.wordpress.com
:) Liz
4.17.2009
3.13.2009
3.10.2009
3.04.2009
3.03.2009
New Video and Pics
One final childbearing postpartum indignity: you will assume, 6 weeks out, that you will fit into your pre-baby clothes. You don't. Not even your socks.
Cassidy is now 6 weeks old and weighs almost 9 lbs. She is growing like the little piglet that she is. Some photos below:
Cassidy is now 6 weeks old and weighs almost 9 lbs. She is growing like the little piglet that she is. Some photos below:
3.01.2009
The things no one tells you about childbirth...
I did not feel adequately prepared. With every new post-partum indignity, I found myself looking around and wondering three things: 1. How can this possibly be normal and 2. Does it not happen to anyone else? and 3. Why, for the love of God, did no one TELL ME?
These questions were answered by experienced mamas with a sly grin and a sage nod. "Oh yes," they'd say solemnly, "that whole _______ (name your indignity) thing really sucked. You didn't know about that?"
All you expecting mamas out there take note. Expect the best, but prepare for the worst. It is, indeed, all worth that little baby on your chest but it takes a hell of a long time to realize it. And then, from what I understand, you begin to doubt it again around age 13. Here's the list.
1. Immediately post-partum, you will feel as though you have been hit by a 10 ton street-cleaner. No one will care. Everyone will be cooing over the baby, which the nurses will bring to you in order to encourage a form of torture called breastfeeding.
2. In order to help you and the baby learn the breastfeed, the nurse will grab your boob (without warning), grab your child's head, and somehow attach said child to boob. It is shocking. Be ready.
3. The nurses will call your affected area your bottom. This doesn't seem quite right to me.
4. The hospital provides tremendously huge diapers (for you) and tremendously huge ice packs, which you will wear while waddling around your hospital room. Given the first aid, you will wonder seriously where the get-well cards and flowers are. You will wonder why the baby gets all the damn gifts.
5. The nurses will continue to allow the baby to harass and torture you by breastfeeding. No one will care that you've just been hit and dragged by a streetcleaner.
6. You will leave the hospital. When you arrive home, (wondering where the hell all the get-well cards are) you will wonder when do I get to take a 48 hour nap? Where's the babysitter? Over the next day or two, it will hit you: you will never sleep again.
7. You will realize all those cute little maternal activities such as nursing in a rocking chair, walking and bouncing with a gurgling baby, and dreamily sitting up in bed to nurse, all become unfathomably uncomfortable when your bottom has been pieced back together with sutures.
8. Everyone will suggest (see, they know all about it but just don't warn you) a device called a sitz-bath, which is a pink bowl that fits into the bowl of the toilet. You fill it up with warm water, then sit in it. It is very weird until you realize that it is the only thing that eases the pain.
8. The first few days home, you produce only colostrum, no milk. Your baby will stay hungry and lose weight. It is terrible; you long for your milk to come in. On the third day home, you will wake up with boobs the size of watermelons. None of your shirts will fit because of your tremendous hooters. You will catch your husband staring.
9. You expect breastfeeding to improve now that your milk is in. Instead, you realize you have boobs that weigh 30 lbs each, are extremely painful, and are now being subjected to the vise-like bite of a newborn land-shark.
10. A week passes, and you haven't slept more than 2 hours at a time. You enter a new dimension, a dreamy semi-reality. Daytime involves sitting on the couch, staring into space, sometimes drooling a little, and breastfeeding the baby. Nighttime involves sitting in bed and doing the same, usually while staring at sleeping husband with a mixture of envy and unbridled hatred. How dare he sleep?
11. Your milk is definitely in. You always assumed milk just kinda came out when the baby nursed, right? Another indignity: it can come at any time, very little warning and a lot of leakage. You notice little round milk stains on your t-shirts which look like bullseyes over your nipples. You start to wear "breast pads," little round cotton pads that absorb the leakage. These are scattered around your house; you find caches under the couch cushions. They collect in the lint filter of the dryer.
12. A few more weeks pass, and you realize you feel pretty good. You decide to go for a hike. You realize you do not feel pretty good.
13. Another week passes, and you realize you feel great. You decide to start pumping milk to prepare for going back to work. In an effort to not sit around all day breast feeding and pumping, you attempt to nurse your baby while pumping. You hold pump to self with pinky, while holding baby with the remaining digits. It doesn't work. Milk spills everywhere. You resign yourself to a future career as a dairy cow.
14. You go back to work and realize, despite your cranky cynical self, you miss your kid.
15. You never thought you'd be so entranced and in love with an infant. In the past, you have only glared at them over fancy linguini dinners in nice restaurants. Now you think they might have some virtues.
16. You go to friend's houses (who are parents) with your kid. She sleeps through dinner, and you absorb all the parenting advice your friends are willing to give. You leave the house realizing you are one of them, and it feels kind of normal.
17. Your baby smiles at you, and you realize you have never loved anything so much.
So, once you get to that stage, you can basically sub in what everyone else has told you up until this point: that it's all worth the pain. It is, but I'm a fan of full disclosure.
These questions were answered by experienced mamas with a sly grin and a sage nod. "Oh yes," they'd say solemnly, "that whole _______ (name your indignity) thing really sucked. You didn't know about that?"
All you expecting mamas out there take note. Expect the best, but prepare for the worst. It is, indeed, all worth that little baby on your chest but it takes a hell of a long time to realize it. And then, from what I understand, you begin to doubt it again around age 13. Here's the list.
1. Immediately post-partum, you will feel as though you have been hit by a 10 ton street-cleaner. No one will care. Everyone will be cooing over the baby, which the nurses will bring to you in order to encourage a form of torture called breastfeeding.
2. In order to help you and the baby learn the breastfeed, the nurse will grab your boob (without warning), grab your child's head, and somehow attach said child to boob. It is shocking. Be ready.
3. The nurses will call your affected area your bottom. This doesn't seem quite right to me.
4. The hospital provides tremendously huge diapers (for you) and tremendously huge ice packs, which you will wear while waddling around your hospital room. Given the first aid, you will wonder seriously where the get-well cards and flowers are. You will wonder why the baby gets all the damn gifts.
5. The nurses will continue to allow the baby to harass and torture you by breastfeeding. No one will care that you've just been hit and dragged by a streetcleaner.
6. You will leave the hospital. When you arrive home, (wondering where the hell all the get-well cards are) you will wonder when do I get to take a 48 hour nap? Where's the babysitter? Over the next day or two, it will hit you: you will never sleep again.
7. You will realize all those cute little maternal activities such as nursing in a rocking chair, walking and bouncing with a gurgling baby, and dreamily sitting up in bed to nurse, all become unfathomably uncomfortable when your bottom has been pieced back together with sutures.
8. Everyone will suggest (see, they know all about it but just don't warn you) a device called a sitz-bath, which is a pink bowl that fits into the bowl of the toilet. You fill it up with warm water, then sit in it. It is very weird until you realize that it is the only thing that eases the pain.
8. The first few days home, you produce only colostrum, no milk. Your baby will stay hungry and lose weight. It is terrible; you long for your milk to come in. On the third day home, you will wake up with boobs the size of watermelons. None of your shirts will fit because of your tremendous hooters. You will catch your husband staring.
9. You expect breastfeeding to improve now that your milk is in. Instead, you realize you have boobs that weigh 30 lbs each, are extremely painful, and are now being subjected to the vise-like bite of a newborn land-shark.
10. A week passes, and you haven't slept more than 2 hours at a time. You enter a new dimension, a dreamy semi-reality. Daytime involves sitting on the couch, staring into space, sometimes drooling a little, and breastfeeding the baby. Nighttime involves sitting in bed and doing the same, usually while staring at sleeping husband with a mixture of envy and unbridled hatred. How dare he sleep?
11. Your milk is definitely in. You always assumed milk just kinda came out when the baby nursed, right? Another indignity: it can come at any time, very little warning and a lot of leakage. You notice little round milk stains on your t-shirts which look like bullseyes over your nipples. You start to wear "breast pads," little round cotton pads that absorb the leakage. These are scattered around your house; you find caches under the couch cushions. They collect in the lint filter of the dryer.
12. A few more weeks pass, and you realize you feel pretty good. You decide to go for a hike. You realize you do not feel pretty good.
13. Another week passes, and you realize you feel great. You decide to start pumping milk to prepare for going back to work. In an effort to not sit around all day breast feeding and pumping, you attempt to nurse your baby while pumping. You hold pump to self with pinky, while holding baby with the remaining digits. It doesn't work. Milk spills everywhere. You resign yourself to a future career as a dairy cow.
14. You go back to work and realize, despite your cranky cynical self, you miss your kid.
15. You never thought you'd be so entranced and in love with an infant. In the past, you have only glared at them over fancy linguini dinners in nice restaurants. Now you think they might have some virtues.
16. You go to friend's houses (who are parents) with your kid. She sleeps through dinner, and you absorb all the parenting advice your friends are willing to give. You leave the house realizing you are one of them, and it feels kind of normal.
17. Your baby smiles at you, and you realize you have never loved anything so much.
So, once you get to that stage, you can basically sub in what everyone else has told you up until this point: that it's all worth the pain. It is, but I'm a fan of full disclosure.
2.25.2009
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