Round 2, Hooray for Ethan Baby!

Since I didn't have much time off saved up at work, I decided early on that I would work right until I went into labor with Ethan. That way, I could stay off for Christmas and New Years, and have a lovely holiday with my beautiful family. I figured the absolute, perfect time to go on maternity leave would be 1 week after my due date. That plan was going very well until Ethan decided to beat Jonathan's birth-weight by a full pound, if possible. I was at work one day when we had a really low census. It was about 5 days before my circled calendar due- date, and I was feeling huge. Ethan had been consistently measuring a week or 2 "big." I talked to the charge nurse, who agreed I could go home early, then called my doctor to schedule an appointment. The receptionist actually scheduled me for the wrong office, so I thought I would get even more sympathy points for having to travel twice to get there. I played the most miserable, big, "poor me," I could, just to have the doctor tell me to come back in 4 days. They would do an ultrasound then and go from there. I was beyond bummed. Everyone at work knew my little plan, and as I left work that day they had all wished me luck. "Hope we don't see you tomorrow!" (in the nicest way possible, of course). So, there I was the next day (Tuesday) donning my blue scrubs to finish out the rest of the week. Eventually Friday came, and by ultrasound, Ethan baby was measuring 9 pounds. They scheduled an induction for Sunday evening at 5. That weekend was stake conference (everyone at church meets together Saturday evening and Sunday morning) and James told me to make sure I put our hospital bags in the trunk before I went. I thought it was sweet, but silly of him to suggest. I did it anyway, and it was a good thing because I went into labor on the way there. I must have looked like the biggest jerk, looking up at the clock every couple of minutes, but I had left my watch at home and had to time contractions. James had slipped out with the monk, and once I was sure it was labor, I went out to tell him. I kinda wish I had just sent him our predetermined text message. It said, "bombs are flying, the moose has kissed the goose!" (This was James' idea. He picked it because, and I quote "I'll know exactly what that means. If you wrote out something like, 'I'm in labor,' I wouldn't know if you were joking." I called my doctor, and three hours later they were planning to send me home. I wasn't showing any outward signs of true labor, but the midwife took pity on me. She knew I wouldn't be able to sleep if she sent me home contracting, so she admitted me and wrote for morphine and a sleeping pill. Bless her sweet heart. When I woke up the next morning, I was nearing the end of labor. For those who like numbers, I was 7 centimeters dilated. I couldn't believe it.
2 hours later, Ethan was born, a healthy 8lbs, 15 1/2 ounces. James jokes it's because I prayed I wouldn't have a 9-lb baby. "See, God answers prayers!"
I got a little dose of pain medicine not too long before Ethan was born, and he came out kinda sleepy. He was born at 10:16 am, and from 5 o'clock on, he was asleep. Somewhere around 3 am the nurses got worried and woke him up to try to eat. If they could see the size of my little boy now, maybe they would not have been so concerned (he's not quite 7 months, and already 22 pounds!) I gotta say, though, think of me what you will, having a baby born slightly drugged is not such an awful thing. He was happy, he slept, life was good. I felt sooo much better after Ethan was born than I had the first time. I wasn't nearly so tired, and I had an idea of what to expect. Going home, though, was every bit as awful the second time around. James' mom was there to help, which was great, but I still wasn't prepared. With the first baby, the shock is the baby. With the second, it's having this overwhelming puddle of joy, and another little one to keep track of, feed, and play with, not to mention that he misses you like crazy because you were gone for 3 days. Oh, and you can't lift him for 6 weeks. (Well, you aren't supposed to anyway. I wonder how often that actually works out).
We had decided beforehand that James would get up with Jonathan in the middle of the night, and I would get up with Ethan. That first night, however, I was just slipping back into bed after feeding Ethan for the third time when I heard Jonathan start crying. Rather than wake James up, I figured it was better to just take care of him myself. I went in with a bottle, and realized he had actually peed through his diaper. In the midst of changing his bed, and his pajamas, and trying not to pick him up at all, I broke down. I went out to where my mother in law was already awake in the living room, and started bawling. "I have decided, I'm running away." I have decided that those first few nights awake, with any new baby, are nothing short of terrifying. I felt more incompetent and unequal to my challenge than ever before. When I did crawl back into bed, all but defeated, James heard me sobbing and asked what was the matter. I told him over and over that I just couldn't do it. I can't be a mom to two small boys. I just can't.
He told me that of course I could, I just couldn't do it alone. He lightly scolded me for trying to take care of Jonathan without help, and shortly thereafter we all fell into a great sleep. Now I won't say I wasn't pleased when my mother's car wouldn't start a couple days later. The prospect of her being stuck there a little longer was kind of a nice one. I will say, though, that life wasn't ruined 20 minutes later when the car finally did start up again.

thanks goodness for... cheese.

Lately Jonathan has actually found an appetite. I am not sure if it's his brother's love of food that has propelled this, but regardless of the cause, it's delightful. Provided I can give him something to eat within ten minutes of bursting through the door after church, he goes to bed with a full belly and life is good. When we got home today, I started working through my options. There's always the dependable PBJ, except we are out of bread. There are instant mashed potatoes, but that would require too many clean dishes. Perhaps something with Cheerios and raisins? As I was picking my brain, I suddenly remembered a little stash of ready made toddler meals in the cupboard. I was thrilled. I accidentally pressed the 3 minute button, which is cleverly very near the 30 second button, and about a minute later took out a nice steaming mess of mac n cheese. Jonathan recognized it instantly, and went running to his booster seat with expectant eyes. I quickly stirred it, blew on it, and set it aside, figuring it would be done by the time I got Jonathan stripped down and changed his diaper. No such luck. "Hoch, hoch!" he said, as he pushed a spoonful in front of my face. Once he was satisfied that I had blown long enough on his one little cheesy noodle, he shoved it in his mouth and reached for another. "Hoch, hoch!" This continued for about 8 or so rounds before I finally just plopped the whole bowlful in a plate, and quickly de-nuked it in the freezer. At one point I made the mistake of licking my mac'n cheese finger. Ewww. There are few things more disgusting than premade mac n cheese. Let's see-- there's Ethan diapers, cherry flavored medicine, and Chef Boyardee "meatballs."
As I laid the Monkey Man down for his nap, I was feeling quite accomplished. I actually fed my son, the non-eater. Just in this moment of euphoria, I came across the oatmeal from this morning-- sitting in a heap on the floor, right next to the bowl he raked his foot through moments before we left for church. Hooray for a day of eating. Yay for mom and Jonathan.

Childbirth, Round 1

I couldn't wait to go into labor with Jonathan. The thought consumed me from the moment he was term. Well, more from the second I knew he could survive life in the outside world. He didn't show up on his bright, sunny, Easter Sunday due date. I even had it circled on the calendar for him. Silly boy. When I showed up to church and was scolded for doing so, I knew life would be misery until the day he decided to make his grand appearance. I would go to the mall to take my mind off the empty nursery, just to have someone poke my belly and ask when I was due. "uh, last Sunday." I buried my head in shame and walked to Cold Stone.
I was about a week over when I had the office appointment that I had predetermined would be my last one. It was my first day meeting Dr. Brown, but I told him I was done. James swears there were threats and tie grabbing involved, but I don't remember anything like that. Just a very sweet, very big, very miserable Danielle that couldn't see her toes or the bottom half of her shirt. He must have had experiences like that before, because he wasn't phased a bit as he told me to arrive at St. Joe's at 4 o'clock that afternoon. We made a gloriously brief trip home, and had our last meal as a carefree twosome at KFC.
We stayed up that night in the hospital room, too excited to sleep, and played cards and daydreamed about what our son's face would look like. We didn't have any idea, because he buried it on every ultrasound I ever had. Somewhere around midnight I finally drifted off to sleep, only to wake up very wet 2 hours later. I couldn't believe it- my water broke! I sat there for a moment in silence, just enjoying the moment when it finally hit me I was going to be a mom. I pushed my call button, and a very rough sounding voice disturbed the splendor of the moment. James was waiting anxiously at my side, as we heard "What do you need?" "How dare she?!" was all I could think. "If I rang my button, that means I need my nurse!" I didn't want to tell some voice over a speaker that my water broke.
Once I was all settled in, I realized what labor was all about. It is a nice, little word that means you can't get comfortable, can't sleep, and all you are allowed to think about is how exhausted you are and how much work you have ahead of you. Very clever of them to just put that all in one, innocent-sounding word.
Labor was slow, at first, but toward the end everything picked up speed. I remember being miserable, especially when I was all ready to push but had to wait on my doctor. He had just gotten scrubbed up to do someone else's Cesarean. My nurse got me some nubain, which I will forever hold dear to my heart. It doesn't really take away the pain, but gosh it makes you sleepy. And it sure made me strange. 45 minutes later, when my doctor was finally present, I announced to him that I didn't have a shower that day and I wasn't wearing deodorant. He laughed and made some sort of a joke, at which point I started flapping my wings. "Cakaw! I'm a bird!" When my son was born, ten minutes later, I looked at him and beamed. "Look! He's purple!" No one understood why I sounded so excited. That was when the real misery hit. I was suddenly convinced, due to my altered state of mind, that the entire labor had been a dream. "I can't do it again. That was a dream, and I can't do that over again." It took awhile for me to believe everyone who told me it was real. I will never forget clutching that little boy like he would disappear if I didn't.
Somewhere around 7 that night, I was hit by a wave of guilt. "James! We haven't changed his diaper yet today! He's 5 hours old, and he is still wearing his diaper from birth!!" I wanted to cry I was so upset. Of course, he hadn't even peed yet. He was fine. But I felt terrible.
The whole night was kind of a blur. Jonathan was up every 2 hours for a feeding, which meant that I got exactly 90 minutes of sleep, then 30 minutes of wakefulness, the entire night long. I couldn't care less, I was still walking on a cloud. The next night was a lot more difficult. He was hungry, but sleep is a necessary component for milk to come in (sorry if that's TMI guys), so I had nothing to really offer him. We were up the entire night long. I think we maybe got 2 hours of sleep total, and that was only because I broke hospital rules and brought him in bed to sleep with me. I got another 45 minutes that morning, while James had most of his hand gnawed off by a very hungry baby. We went home, exhausted, that morning. In retrospect, I wish I had sent him to the nursery for at least part of the second night. I was so darned scared the nurses would ignore him. Silly new mom.
I think it's somewhat traumatic to come home from the hospital. When you are there, all your meals are made for you, your bed is made for you, all you really have to do is get up to go to the bathroom and make sure you take care of your baby. Once you get home, responsibility just smacks you in the face.
James was in the middle of classes ending, so Jonathan and I spent about 4 hours alone together. He was starving, I was exhausted. Instead of feeling sweet relief when James was 10 minutes from being due home, I started thinking, "Jonathan would be just fine until then if mommy accidentally drowned washing her face in the sink...." Of course, I couldn't think of a way to accidentally drown, and James was home before I knew it. I remember just hugging him, bawling my little eyes out. He held me and reassured me, and told me to go ahead and get some sleep. "But Jonathan is starving!" I protested. "He needs me!" In his very wise way, he explained that Jonathan could not feasibly starve to death in 60 minutes. I believed him and gladly turned over our young son to his daddy. I awoke a little while later feeling like the energizer bunny. And I finally had milk! Jonathan ate like it was his last meal (which is funny, since it was his first), and finally passed out from contentment. Best day ever.

How you know you're a mom

You spend your whole day doing things you just did.
You remember judging other moms for the way they handled their children, but now you wish you could remember their tricks.
An ounce of milk is suddenly a very, very important thing.
You keep thinking about all the things you will get done when the kids go to sleep, but when they finally do, you are too tired to care anymore.
A solid night's sleep is the stuff of dreams, but when you first get it, you wake up in a cold sweat.
You wonder how such teeny, tiny clothes build up into such huge mountains.
You wonder how those teeny, tiny clothes cost so much.
You want to spend any extra money in your budget (or even part of your grocery budget) on little outfits that they will outgrow in a matter of minutes.
You have entire loads of laundry that you do so that you can pack them up in boxes to save for the next baby.
You don't even want to think about the next baby.
You hold someone else's teeny tiny baby and suddenly want another one.
You dream of going out on a date, but can't stop thinking and talking about the little one at home.
You are suddenly grateful that you don't remember a thing from the first few years of life. You know there is a divine reason that you don't remember your own birth, or teething, or diaper rashes, or the frustration of crying when no-one knows what you want.
The hours drag on, but the days fly by.

the world through a Monkey's eyes

Screwdriver- used to screw my belly button on and off
trashcan- used to collect treasures, especially those of importance to mommy and daddy
toilet- used as a swimming pool for favorite toys
bathtub- place where water is created for the purpose of drinking, splashing, and dumping
baby's head- acts as a backboard to throw things off of. especially important as a learning tool to see which objects bounce
socks and shoes- used as entertainment for long (and short) car trips. Can be pulled off and thrown in a number of places
baby bottle- used to mark territory by putting upside down and shaking/ squeezing. Must be kept in stashes in case of famine.
tears- used to protect me from punishment when I have been naughty
diaper- object which hinders elimination and must be removed just before nature calls
couch- perfect substitute when a toilet is not readily available
toilet- place to escape as soon as possible, because the best place to make messes is actually the floor
dishwasher- place where I can turn knobs and press buttons all day long, especially when I need to hear noises
peash- magic word to get what I want
tank-ew- magic word that will make people happy when I take things out of their hands
Etan Bentew!- name for my baby brother. (translation: Ethan Spencer)
pants-what mommy dresses me in when there is a high of 80
shorts-what mommy sends me to daycare in when it rains

I could not eat a bug. (Exept maybe when camping.)

As I planned out my schedule for work, I carefully plotted out a little cluster of days to set aside for a mini-vacation. It was ultra mini, as I am in the red for time off, but 4 days is plenty of time for a family vacation spent sleeping on an air mattress, sharing a tent with 2 small boys. James and I set out to Dick's to find a new canopy (our old, hand-me-down, originally from someone who bought it at a yard-sale, who probably got it from their pioneer ancestors, just didn't cut it anymore). As soon as we crammed the canopy into my little Hyundai Elantra, we saw a major problem brewing. "James, both of our cars are too small. Now we need to get an SUV." James is usually the more rational of the two of us. "No, we don't. One of us will just have to ride on the top, that's all." We rode in silence for a couple of minutes before James pulled into one of the millions of car dealerships in Syracuse. In the next two days, we became much more well-versed in car-shopping than ever before. James googled "dealer tricks" while I googled "how go get a car cheap." To be honest, I probably spent a little too much packing time trying to seal a deal on a Jeep Liberty or Rav 4. (By I, I mean we, by we I mean James, but it was based on my insistence- yeah). Long story short, we ended up taking my little car, packed to the gills with James' Tetris-like precision, and we still had room to breath. It was great.
I forgot when I was packing how cold the mornings can be camping, especially when little feet want to be moving at 5 am. I packed each of us only one pair of jeans and one sweatshirt, and Jonathan had his hoodie covered in gogurt by 5:45. Way to be, little dude. James washed it out and hung it up to dry, and it was ready by set of sun, just in time to be covered in marshmallows. (Yeah, good job mom- "here Jonathan, have a s'more!")
The thing that always gets me the most is how chill I am about bugs when camping. There was a bug in the sink when I went to wash my hands. Ordinarily, that would be a death sentence. But when you're camping, everything is different. As James would say, "you're invading his home"). So, the little bug in the sink got to live. Just like the bug in the shower. And the bug in the toilet. The bug in my soup, well, not so much; but it wasn't for lack of trying.