Month: May 2013
Truth and Coffee
Growing up, we all made fun of my mom constantly for her habit of leaving half drunk cups of coffee all over the house. I never understood how she could keep forgetting her cup and never quite get through it without having to reheat it. Let’s just say the veil has lifted.
I am now the mother of 2 children under age 2 and can barely find time to feed myself, much less finish a cup of coffee before it gets cold. I’ve found my forgotten half drunk cups all over the place from the microwave to the changing table and everywhere in between. The other day I found myself complaining about never getting a chance to just sit down and enjoy my coffee and breakfast. I felt an ache in my heart for my old job in full time ministry with Young Life. I loved that job and pray that He calls me back to it when this season is over. In that moment I felt the Lord’s gentle reminder that THIS is the season I am in right now and it won’t last long. This season of 2 in diapers and nonstop breastfeeding and 3 hour intervals and never being alone and never having a completely clean house for more than 10 minutes – THIS is where He has me right now. In a brief moment my baby will be a toddler and my toddler will be a big kid. Before I know it their complete dependence on me will be gone forever and I will have all the time in the world.
I am so thankful for the reminder to be where He has placed me right now. So today I am choosing gratitude. I am thankful for 2 healthy children who need me constantly. I am thankful for an easy childbirth and quick recovery. I am thankful for a teacher husband who has only a few days left of school before summer vacation. I am thankful for nap time. I am thankful for this high calling to be a stay at home mama. I am thankful for a God who loves me even when I choose to be a brat instead of a grateful child of His.
Frugal Friday: Reducing Our Cleaning Costs with Norwex ~ An Enviro Cloth Review
Trying for a VBAC Guest Post: Carson’s Birth Story
While I’m on a little bloggy maternity leave, I’ll be featuring a few guest bloggers. As part of my Trying for a VBAC series, some of my guest posters will be sharing their own birth stories with y’all. Today’s guest blogger is Holly from My Everyday Adventure. Thanks for sharing your beautiful VBAC birth story with us!
At about 3am, Donnellyn took my vitals, listened to the baby’s heart beat and checked me – I was at 9 cm! She said I’d be having this baby soon and that was so exciting to hear! After that I got in the birthing pool which felt SO amazing!!
After I got in the pool I’m not 100% sure on all the timing but I don’t think I had very many contractions after that till I started feeling the need to push. Once I started wanting to push is when things got painful. I kept pushing through the contractions, thinking it was soon over only to have Donnellyn say that I need to bare down and get him down through my pelvis.
In between contractions I felt very relaxed and extremely tired – just wanting to sleep really. James was right there with me, holding me, kissing my forehead and telling me how much he loved me, how amazing I was doing and how we would soon be holding our baby boy…I couldn’t ask for anything more. Oh, and he also let me squeeze the crap out his arms 🙂 Best.Husband.Ever. Then I guess not too long after that he was crowning and I was pushing him out! It felt like I didn’t do that for too long and then he was being placed in my arms! During the stage of pushing him out that’s really all I was focused on. Yeah, it was painful, but my mind knew that he was almost here and all I needed to do was focus and push! Donnellyn was such a great coach, telling me how to breath, to vocalize in a low tone and not to waste a contraction by crying! I said “I can’t do this” only once and I think it was mostly to hear from them that I could do it and that I was doing it!
Once he was out and in my arms I felt so wonderful. I had done it and I was holding our sweet baby boy! He was born at 4:47am on Friday, January 18th – just about 3 ½ hours after contractions started! We stayed in the water for maybe 10 minutes, just soaking up our sweet baby boy! Hudson was pretty interested in what the heck just happened as well 🙂
From there me and baby got up and wrapped ourselves in towels and went to our bedroom to lie down. Aiven slept through ALL of this (which is crazy because I was pretty darn vocal!) and didn’t wake up till he heard his baby brother cry for the first time 🙂 Baby boy latched on immediately after we got in bed. James went to get Aiven up to meet his baby brother. He looked so sleepy and confused but when he saw the baby, he kept saying “baby, baby” – it was so sweet.
Then baby and I both got in a herbal bath that they prepared in our bathtub. It was so nice and relaxing.
After that we went back to our bed and Donnellyn did the newborn exam right on our bed while James, Aiven and I lay there together watching – and Aiven eating cheese, haha. J He weighed 8.2 lbs. and was 21 ½ inches long. I was so shocked by how big he was since I was 2 weeks early – but good thing I was or I would’ve had like a 9-10 lb. baby!!
After the exam, at about 6:30am, my dad and Peggy arrived with breakfast! Once Donnellyn was done doing the newborn exam, taking my vitals, and the students were done cleaning up and emptying the birthing pool – we all piled in our room and Donnellyn prayed for our sweet baby boy. It was such a sweet moment and I felt so thankful and blessed.
Then they left by 7am! We all ate breakfast and then my dad and Peggy took Aiven with them so James and I could get some sleep 🙂 It took us until Sunday, but we finally named our baby boy – Carson Ray Faske. My dad had suggested the name a few weeks back and Ray is my Dads middle name. The birth of our son was so sweet and was everything we wanted. It went so smoothly and quickly, I couldn’t have asked for a better birth! Yes, it was painful, but so worth it knowing that, to me, I was doing the best I could for my baby and for myself. I loved being at home, because I felt so comfortable. I loved not having to pack up and get in a car during contractions! I loved holding my baby till his newborn exam and even then not being separated from him. I loved crawling into my own bed immediately after giving birth. I loved not feeling drugged during and afterwards, but being completely present in the birth of my son. I am so thankful that the Lord allowed me to have a vaginal home birth after having a c-section with Aiven. If we ever have another child, we will definitely plan to go this route again, Lord willing!
Travel Guest Post: Adventure in the Holy Land with Nicole of Three 31
Hey BFOTD readers! My name is Nicole and I blog at Three 31 — connect with me on social media too! I am a sweet tea drinking, Jesus loving, country girl from Kentucky married to a Texan named Husband. (Well, that’s not really his name but that’s what I call him.) We live near Fort Worth on a small spread with a white horse named Blue. While I have never given birth to another human, I consider my eighth grade students (129 in all) to be my precious, annoying, and hormonal angel babies. When I’m not blogging or teaching language arts, I enjoy photography, cooking, target shooting, reading, mission and volunteer work, reality TV, and traveling. My most recent travel experience and passport stamp came from Israel where I toured the Holy Land.
If you have plans to visit the Holy Land, may I offer the following suggestions:
- lose all expectations
- become a dry sponge willing to soak up all the sights, sounds, and experiences
- wear comfortable shoes + sunscreen
- take your camera, extra batteries + memory cards too
In regards to expectations, it is important to remember that the Holy Land has endured battles, uproars, disagreements, wars, and power struggles for thousands of years. Modern ideals (i.e. religious law, gender roles, clothing, food, etc.) must respectfully take a backseat during your visit. I also suggest you dust off your history books and religious texts. According to tradition, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (also called the Church of the Resurrection) sits atop Golgotha (Calvary). Visitors can kneel at an elaborate altar and touch the stone believed to have held Jesus’ cross. There is also a large stone slab in the Rotunda where Jesus’ body was prepared for burial, the Anointed Stone. Once the tour group left the airport in Tel Aviv, we went to the coastal city of Jaffa, the oldest port in the world. According to the Bible, Jonah set sail from Jaffa before encountering the whale (or was it a fish?), and it was in Jaffa where Peter raised Tabitha from the dead. Inside most temples, cathedrals, and churches were the most beautiful tile mosaics I have ever seen. Along the Via Dolorosa, I saw this incredible mosaic (about 8-feet tall and 20-feet-wide) of Jesus carrying his cross. Every tile had to have been cut and polished by hand, then very carefully arranged to create this beautiful image. I’m still in awe. The hill of Mount Zion, the highest point in Old Jerusalem, is dominated by the Church of the Dormition (left photo, below). According to Christian tradition, it is the place where the Virgin Mary died. Nearby is The Upper Room, where Jesus washed his disciples’ feet and served The Last Supper before being crucified, and King David’s Tomb. The Church of Saint Peter in Gallicantu (right photo, below) is a stone’s throw from The Upper Room, located on the lower east side of Mount Zion. This Roman Catholic Church takes its name from Peter’s triple rejection of Jesus. The church has been rebuilt several times, the latest construction in 1931, and further connects Peter with the golden rooster on the roof. Inside are multiple underground caves and crypts. Some believe Jesus was imprisoned here. On the north side of the church is an ancient staircase that leads to the Kidron Valley and many Christians believe Jesus followed this path down to the Garden of Gethsemane. There were so many wonderful, magical moments on this trip. I had a blast following the footsteps of Jesus and visiting places important to his ministry. However, walking along the stone streets of Old Jerusalem put so much into context. I don’t know if it was the conglomeration of three major religions (Christianity, Judaism, and Islam) or the sense of old world charm in a bustling metropolis, but I loved every minute of it. Luckily, my tour group spent the last day of our pilgrimage in Jerusalem. We even shared Holy Communion in the Garden of the Empty Tomb. Even though the final day focused on the Via Dolorosa, I intentionally stayed at the back of the pack (like I normally do in large group settings) to capture lifestyle shots. Anybody can Google the places I’ve seen, but I wanted photos that captured the essence of the people who live and thrive inside the ancient city’s walls. There were open-air markets and street vendors selling shawarma (meat prepared on a rotating spit), brightly colored scarves blowing in the breeze, a variety of candies and sweet treats displayed on tables, and more fresh produce than this country girl could ever imagine! It was truly a magical day, an unforgetable experience. More highlights of my Holy Land trip came from experiences with water. Where there is water, I usually find a way in … literally! I swamfloated in the Dead Sea (which was so cool and made my skin feel AMAZING!) and another day I ate Saint Peter’s fish (similar to tilapia) beside the Sea of Galilee (which is really a big lake and fresh water, not saltwater). After lunch, I snuck away from the group to dip my toes in the very chilly water. The large rocks provided perfect coverage for my secret mission. I was eventually discovered and joined the tour group on-board a cruising vessel. The skies were a perfect shade of blue, the water was calm, and the captain turned off the engines to play a soft melody of It Is Well With My Soul over the speakers. If you get the opportunity to sit atop a camel, just do it already! There were 54 adults standing and gawking, talking about how cool it would be to ride a camel, but nobody was willing to get on the furry animal until Yours Truly demonstrated it was perfectly safe. And no, Mister Camel did not spit or bite me.
I hope you enjoyed this post and maybe you learned a few things too. I’d love to visit Jerusalem and the Holy Land again sometime. Have you traveled to the Holy Land? The Middle East? What were your favorite spots? What other destinations are on your dream list? Someday, I want to travel to Africa and Asia.
Thanks so much for sharing your adventure with us, Nicole! I long to visit the Holy Land and see all the places I’ve read about since childhood.
Trying for a VBAC Guest Post: Josiah’s Birth Story
While I’m on a little bloggy maternity leave, I’ll be featuring a few guest bloggers. As part of my Trying for a VBAC series, some of my guest posters will be sharing their own birth stories with y’all. Today’s guest blogger is Andrea. Thanks so much for sharing your beautiful birth story with us, Andrea!
Andrea has been married to Tim for almost nine years, and together they are homeschooling parents to Lydia (6), Benjamin (3) and newbie Josiah. They also remember their son Jonathan in their hearts. Andrea has been interested in all things related to pregnancy, birth and motherhood since high school, and sometimes calls her first child “well-researched.”
Here is my birth story, about 99% complete. Most of this story is from what I directly remember, but there are parts that I was told about afterwards, from my midwife and doula and a friend that was there, filling in the blanks when I was too out of it to fully realize what was going on. I don’t yet have my midwife’s written notes, but it’ll be a little while before I get those, and she and I have talked about the birth, so I’ve included those bits in here and am going to call it good for now.
I also mention my Christian faith a few times, so if that will offend you, just be aware that it is there and an important part of my life.
And the final disclaimer, this is my narrative story and should in no way be taken as medical advice.
The birth story of my fourth child starts with the birth of my third. Jonathan, my third baby, was an emergency c-section at 25 weeks because of complete placental abruption (which followed my premature rupture of membranes at 23 weeks). He was with us for 27 days before we lost him due to complications from an infection.
Even if Jonathan had lived, Tim (hubby) and I would not have felt that our family was complete at only three children, but now I was a complicated case. I was sneaking up on “advanced maternal age,” I was a hopeful VBAC, I had a history of a preterm birth (even though my first two births were nearly textbook). Tim and I consulted with several people to see when we could try to get pregnant again and still have a reasonably good chance at a VBAC. The delivering OB and another one both said we could try in three months (putting 12 months between the surgery and the next birth). Other opinions wanted us to wait 6 or 9 months. We decided to start trying at 4 months, never dreaming that we would get pregnant on the first try.
I have to admit that I was more than a little nervous at first. I’d read birth stories and talked to people who had a short time span between their c-section and their VBAC. I’d also talked to people who had a full-term VBAC after having a premature c-section. But all my searching came up mostly empty when I tried to find people who had both of these factors in the same pregnancy. I didn’t know what would happen.
I saw an OB for my whole pregnancy, taking P17 shots this time, and I saw an OB all the way up until the week before I delivered. I also saw my midwife for prenatal visits that last month (but had kept in contact with her throughout the pregnancy as well), unsure until the very end whether I wanted to go to the hospital or try for another homebirth. (My second child was a homebirth, and my third child was supposed to be a homebirth as well before my water broke so early and I had to transfer out of my midwife’s care.)
I was officially due on 12/27, and in the couple of weeks leading up to that, I’d been having fairly decent Braxton Hicks off and on for several weeks, very similar to the way it happened with Benjamin (my second baby, 3 years old at the time of this birth). My due date came and went. I was a VBAC this time, so I didn’t want to be induced. I just had to wait it out. I had an appointment scheduled for 1/2 for a NST and ultrasound since I would be turning 41 weeks the next day. Then if I made it to 42 weeks, the OB was recommending induction at that time (which I was agreeable to, but still praying that I wouldn’t make it nearly that far).
With both of my other full-term labors, I had light bleeding throughout the whole active labor, so I kept waiting for that to show up to indicate that I was finally in real labor, but it never did. I also was waiting for a loose stool, which could indicate my body cleaning itself out in preparation for labor, but that never happened either. (I did, however, have two separate solid BMs during labor, once it finally started.)
On 12/28 and 12/29, I was losing teeny tiny pieces of my mucous plug, but nothing to make me say, “This is it!” I just kept monitoring it throughout the weekend, and it would come and go as the days passed. I had an appointment with my midwife on 12/28 and my blood pressure had spiked a little bit, and she said that it might be an indicator of labor starting soon. She estimated his size to be at about eight and a half pounds. She also made the comment that she likes doing baby-size estimates on women with my body type because it’s easy for her to be fairly accurate. The afternoon of that appointment, I made some eggplant Parmesan using a recipe that is “famous” for putting women into labor within 48 hours. A friend of mine had made it with one of her babies and had gone into labor that same night. I made the recipe, but it was deliciously ineffective for that first night and the second night.
On 12/30, I woke up having lost a lot more of my plug the night before. I was having contractions that could still be called BH, but they were coming close enough together for me to think that they could easily turn into something more later. I texted our doula to see what time she was going to be in church, and to give her a heads up about the plug and that something might be happening later on. Tim and the kids and I went to church as well, and were there from about 9:00 to 11:30, where I continued having contractions.
After church was done, I got Tim’s attention and told him that he needed to get the kids in the car (i.e. don’t dawdle and visit with people) and that today was probably going to be the day. He grinned at me. 😀 One of our friends who was going to come to the birth to help with chores or whatever else we needed came up to me before I could get outside and asked if I was in labor, and said that when she saw me when we first got there that morning, that it looked like I was. I told her that I don’t know but that she should come over after lunch. On the way home, I called our doula and our photographer and midwife and made plans to have them all come over at their various times that they could make it (from being out of town or whatever).
My midwife got to the house first and we talked about what was possibly going on, and I went ahead and had her check me, and I was at a 3, 50% effaced, and very squishy. My bag of waters was intact but she could feel the baby’s head through it. He was floating, though. Since I was still in very early labor, my midwife stepped out to grab lunch with her hubby and then run another errand.
Throughout the afternoon, the rest of my “birth team” arrived, and we were lighthearted and chatty since my labor was also lighthearted. 😛 The birth supplies were assembled, but I couldn’t find the little hats that I had crocheted, so I spent a little time in early labor making one more hat, just to be sure we’d have one. I also had some music on with a portable stereo, and Benjamin was laying down on the floor, directly facing the speakers, singing the familiar church songs on the CDs that I had picked out. It was so heartwarming to watch him do that. Lydia (my first baby, 6 years old at the time of this birth) played games on various electronic devices (like our photographer’s iPad and my Kindle). We eventually let Benjamin take a long nap, but Lydia stayed up the whole day and all the way through to the birth. At some point, we blew up the birth pool (but didn’t put any water in it yet) and the kids were enthralled with their new “toy” and kept playing over the edges of it. At one point, they managed to flip the pool on top of themselves, creating an air-filled cage. 😀
I got checked early in the afternoon when my midwife first got there, and I was at a 3, 50%, and very squishy. Since labor was still so light, she went to eat lunch with her hubby and run another errand. I gradually dilated to a 5, and at that check, my midwife was able to stretch me to a 6, but then I never dilated past that because my bag of waters was keeping the baby’s head from putting direct pressure onto my cervix. (My midwives called it “bag of water dystocia.”) I did a round of nipple stimulation, which helped the contractions get stronger and closer together, but it still wasn’t enough to move the baby onto my cervix and finish dilating. She suggested maybe breaking my water in an hour or so if there’s been no progress (and if baby was not posterior).
I wanted to go ahead and fill up the pool first, though, so we started to do that. When Tim and I had made preparations for this birth, we got a hose and some fittings to fit it onto the shower head, because our washing machine spout wasn’t easily accessible. We hadn’t run any water through the hose, though, and instead had just seen if it would screw onto the shower head prior to birth day. Once it came time to actually fill the tub, Tim had a little trouble getting the fittings tightened properly, and it kept leaking, so we had a lot of stop-and-starts when trying to fill the pool. He finally got the fittings finished and then turned on the water. About a minute later, he called down the hallway, “Here comes some water!” to make sure that someone was holding the hose at the other end. It was a humorously delayed warning, but someone had been holding the hose anyway, so everything was good.
I was in the pool for an hour or so, but the contractions slowed down, so I continued the nipple stimulation. They picked up, but again, not enough to do what they needed to do, so I got out and agreed to have my water broken. It felt like a gallon came out of me (but was really only about two cups), and it kept coming out in several spurts as I continued laying there, but as soon as she broke it, I was at an 8.5. She said that since I was so soft, it would probably be only an hour or so after she breaks my water and then the baby would be born. My amniotic fluid was meconium-stained, so it was yet another thing to keep an eye on during this birth. My doula had had a “streak” going where all of her clients had started labor with their water breaking, so I was glad to break her streak and have my water intact for so long. It took her some effort to break my water since my sac was so strong this time, which was such a change from my third pregnancy.
My contractions picked up in intensity, but not frequency, after my water was broken. I was back in the pool but couldn’t get comfortable. I started vocalizing and screaming through the contractions, and at one point, they suggested that I go to the bathroom to get my full bladder out of the way (everyone had been giving me sips of Recharge and water throughout the day). I did that, and had a few contractions on the toilet and felt pushy. I wanted to get to the bed so they could check me, but I had to time it just right because the contractions were finally coming pretty close together.
I felt the contractions so low that it felt like they were running down the side of my thighs as well. It was quite the odd sensation. While still in the water, I started needing some counter pressure applied to my low back/hip area, which Tim did for me. He was amazing through my whole labor, just doing what I said I needed instead of what he thought I needed. :p Overall, I’m glad that I gave water a try, but I don’t know if I’ll do it again. It didn’t really feel like it was the “magical pain relief” that people have made it out to be.
I got to the bed and was checked, and I just had a lip that moved back and forth as the baby tried to find his way down. I was complete, but my cervix kept slightly shrinking back with the contractions. My midwife checked the position of his head, and he was asynclitic (with sort of a front “corner” of his head trying to come out first instead of the back of his head). She spent a few contractions trying to push the lip over his head and at the same time get him to rotate. Even with no water, there was room for him to do all that. Both of those techniques were incredibly painful. Throughout my contractions and especially during the pushing phase, my midwife never stopped praying for us, out loud. I greatly appreciated this as it helped keep ME focused on who was in control of the situation as well. Since I was GBS positive this time, they also gave me a chlorhexidine rinse every so often, which was cold! Brrr!
During an incredibly painful contraction, I asked if I could push, and they told me I could. Because of his presentation, I never did get the uncontrollable, “my body’s going to push whether I want it to or not” urge like I’d had with my other vaginal births. My midwife was inside me trying to show me where to push (but I had thought she was holding my lip out of the way), which was also pretty painful. She also was still trying to turn his head in between contractions to a better presentation, but then before the next contraction hit, he would turn right back. I couldn’t feel it, but Tim kept seeing the baby flip back over as he watched my belly. She told one of my friends later that I had a pelvis that could birth a 10-pound baby and that the baby just had too much room in there since he kept flipping back.
I was getting tired and weak by this point and kept saying and thinking, “I can’t do it, I can’t do it,” over and over. But I was also aware enough to realize that his heart rate had gone down into the 90s and stayed there, so they were getting nervous about a possible cord problem. I gave it my all. They didn’t know what was causing the drop in heart rate, but my midwife knew from my previous birth records that I could push a baby out fast, so she wasn’t as worried as she might have been if I were a first-time mom or having my first vaginal birth. We didn’t have the luxury of taking an hour or more to push with that declining heart rate. Tim was trying to help me push better/faster/harder by yelling, “PUSH!” several times at me, with increasing volume, but that wasn’t helping and before it started to bother me too much, the midwives told him to stop.
At some point, I was on my hands and knees trying to get the baby to a better position, but that wasn’t working, so I ended up on my back. I have NEVER had a pushing phase hurt like this one did. I had various people giving counter pressure on all four limbs to give me traction. I wanted to scream from the pain, but I knew if I did, it would make my pushing less effective, so I tried to be quiet and just let all the energy go into my push. From Tim’s point of view, there was one point where a big portion of the head was visible, but then when I stopped pushing, it slipped back. At one point, they invited me to feel his head, and based on the pain I’d been feeling, I thought I was going to feel a huge portion of it, but it ended up feeling only like a half-dollar-sized amount of head. The video is a little blurry because of the low lighting, but it ended up actually being a significant portion of head that I was feeling and not just a tiny little bit.
When the head finally came out all the way, he was looking down towards my left leg. Before the shoulders came out, he rotated clockwise, looking directly at my left leg, then up to the ceiling, then finally straight over at my right leg, and THEN the shoulders came out.
He was neither breathing nor trying to (but did still have a pulse, which my midwife monitored with her fingers on his chest while they worked on him to get him breathing). They kept him right at my feet where he had come out while they worked on him, leaving the cord intact. They suctioned him (getting a lot of watery blood out when they did this) and gave him oxygen. His one-minute APGAR score was only a 6 (but his five-minute one was 9). My friend told me that my midwife was crying at one point. After quite a bit of suctioning and some oxygen, he got a tiny spot of pink on his head which nearly immediately spread to his whole body, replacing the purple that he had been upon first arriving. He started crying and they put him on my chest. His cord (which was two feet long) ended up being wrapped around one of his feet, but that was the only place it was wrapped. And remember that 8.5-pound estimate from a couple days prior? The first thing I noticed when they laid him on me was how dense and heavy he felt. This baby was not an 8.5-pound baby. When we finally got around to weighing him, he was 9 pounds and 6 ounces, my heaviest baby so far.
Another thing I noticed about him was that he had absolutely NO vernix on him, not even in his little neck folds or anything. He was a very well-cooked baby. 😀 I cut the cord this time, and was surprised that I had the strength to do that since I didn’t even have the strength left to fully lift my head to see where to cut, and had to rely on others to move my hand into the proper position. And 36 or so hours after the birth, I had a sudden realization, “Oh, yeah, I cut the cord this time,” like I’d forgotten that I did it. The assistant midwife and my friend were looking at the placenta later, and that midwife pointed out the few calcification spots in there and said that it wasn’t a “bad” placenta, but it was definitely done and time for the baby to have been born.
One more thing I noticed was a “scratch” on his abdomen that looked like there had been a cat inside me with him that gave him a good clawing. It ended up being just a weird arrangement of dried blood, though, and came off in the bath, revealing smooth and unblemished baby skin.
Sometime earlier while I was still in the birth pool, I was nauseous, and threw up all the fluids I’d taken in in the previous hour or so. They wanted me to keep taking more fluids, so I kept trying, but the nausea never went away, and I also threw up all those additional fluids along with the few bites of eggs that I’d tried to eat as my first postpartum meal. This loss of fluids combined with the loss of blood made me incredibly weak and lightheaded, and I came very close to passing out many times, and actually did pass out once, later, after my herbal bath. Baby was born at about 2:24 a.m. and it wasn’t until noon that I finally felt able to walk a few steps by myself and got my appetite back. I didn’t even try to carry the baby before then, either, because I felt that bad, and instead just kept him near me in the bed and had Tim change all the diapers. And even after feeling better, I still had another few sporadic incidents of lightheadedness where I had to stop and bend over, and these incidents reminded me even apart from bleeding intensity that I needed to get back into bed or into a semi-reclining position.
It was a little while before I delivered the placenta. They kept checking to see if it was ready to come out or where it was. I had lost a lot of blood beforehand and they were wanting to make sure I didn’t have a bunch behind the placenta as well. When it was finally ready to come out, I didn’t want to push it out since the baby had been such an effort. But everyone reminded me that the placenta had no bones, lol, and I pushed it out and that was that.
He nursed very well, once we finally got around to it. It ended up being about an hour and a half after the birth before we were able to successfully latch. From the loss of blood and fluid, I was too weak to do it lying down (though I did try with what little strength I had) and too weak to sit up without help. I was also too out of it mentally to ask for help sitting up and to realize how much time was actually passing.
When we finally did sit up, my midwife asked us if we were going to circumcise him, and we said no. She said “Yay,” but I didn’t quite understand what she said, and she had a weird look on her face and said it in a weird tone of voice. I thought that she was upset at our decision until I asked her to repeat herself. Tim and I had had that discussion while pregnant with Benjamin and had left him intact as well.
I did not tear at all, but I had some bruising. It felt like I had been trying to climb out of an above-ground pool but that I was repeatedly dropped on the edge of the pool, with one leg in and one leg out. In addition, I was swollen so much that I couldn’t pee within the time that my midwives wanted me to (even with the assistance of some peppermint oil), so they did end up cath-ing me. After that, the assistant went home but my primary stayed and dozed on the couch and wanted me to try to pee again after an hour and a half or so. I was keeping fluids down again by then so I thought I might be able to go when it was time, and I did, and didn’t have any further issues in that regard.
They offered an herbal bath for me and the baby afterwards (and they also thought I might try to pee in the bath as well, but that didn’t work either), which I took, but I got increasingly lightheaded during that, and hindsight said that they probably should have skipped it. I had to have a ton of assistance walking just to the door of the bathroom, then they had me sit in our wheeled office chair to wheel me to the bed, and I think I might have passed out for half a second. I remember sitting down in the chair, then the next thing I know, they were calling my name and I realized I was leaning on the door jamb with my eyes closed. I woke up from whatever state I was in, and then they wheeled me across the hallway and to the side of the bed.
Tim changed all the diapers that first day, including the first meconium diaper, which had a HUGE pile in it for him. Tim made the comment of “nothing wrong with that system,” lol.
He smiled in his sleep within the first few hours, and then on Tuesday (I’m still wondering what happened to most of the rest of Monday), I saw him smile while he was awake and in a quiet alert phase. 🙂
One odd thing I noticed early postpartum with myself is that my uterus seemed almost cylindrical when it was freshly empty, instead of shrinking in a rounder fashion. My midwife mentioned this to me at my postpartum visit and said that she and the assistant midwife had noticed the odd shape even from when they broke my water. I don’t remember the shape of my postpartum uterus with my pre-c-section births being anything remarkable like that.
The kids just love him to bits. Benjamin was sleeping when Josiah was born, and when he woke up this morning, I was in the bed and I asked him where my baby is. He indicated my now-shrunken tummy and said, “In your tummy.” I told him that he came out, and Tim helped him climb onto the bed so he could see the baby. Benjamin promptly squished him in a hug and said that “he’s sleeping” and gently touched his tiny hands. 🙂 Lydia was still awake for the birth, and when he came out, she said that he was “so cute.” 😀 A good friend of ours took our kids for the first 36-ish hours after birth, so that was nice, since one of the things that first made me consider a hospital birth this time was the postpartum stay without having my big kids around. 🙂
We sort of have a “theme” going on with our names and our kids’ names – three-syllable names from the Bible. (My name is Andrea, which is the feminine form of Andrew, so I’m counting my name as a Bible name as well.) Then Tim is legally Timothy, and there’s Lydia, Benjamin and Jonathan. What WERE we going to name this baby, to keep with our theme? We chose the name Josiah Nathan, which means, “God has healed, God has given.” We couldn’t think of a more appropriate name and are just so happy that he is finally here.
What an incredibly beautiful birth story God wrote for Andrea and her family. Thanks so much for sharing Josiah’s story with us, Andrea. You can find more from my Trying for a VBAC series here.
Welcome to the World, Eleanor Pearl!
Ellie and I are getting into the groove of nursing, but she had a severe tongue tie that made it difficult at first. We’ve had to have it clipped twice, because the first time didn’t go far enough. Hopefully this will enable us to have a long and healthy breastfeeding relationship and will prevent any speech difficulties as she gets older.
Baby Bloom Blog Event: Graco FastAction Fold Jogger Click Connect Review
This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Graco. All opinions are my own and as always I only write about products I would personally recommend to a friend. Thanks so much to Graco for the opportunity to review this jogging stroller and car seat.
Graco‘s latest development in jogging strollers is the super easy to use FastAction Fold Jogger Click Connect. The name is more complicated than operating this stroller, I promise. True to its name, the jogger folds and unfolds in one step in one second. Amazing. If you’ve tried to manhandle your share of bulky strollers, you know this is a big deal.
The snack tray removes completely so you can clean it well. Y’all know those things get NASTY fast and are so hard to clean when you can’t remove them.
When you fold the jogger (in one step, in one second) it automatically locks and stands and stores upright. As you can see it is much less bulky than some competitors and is a great option for families with small cargo spaces or storage issues.
Favorite Features: the double cupholders, smart phone cradle, and reflectors for night time and early morning safety. What can I say, I’m a details kind of girl. Our previous jogging stroller did not have any of these features, and the cupholder and phone thing was an issue for me. If there is an emergency, I don’t want to have to dig through the basket under the stroller to find my phone.
Least Favorite Feature: the air filled tires. They provide a smoother ride than hard tires, but can also go flat requiring more maintenance.
**Thanks to Julie Harding Photography for the use of photos from the Dallas Graco Party.