Monday, May 14, 2012
Four
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
9 months
Saturday, December 31, 2011
New Year's Eve
Friday, July 08, 2011
Thomas’ birth story
Read at your own risk. Since Sofia’s was in the blog, I will subject you to Thomas’ also.
In case it’s not your cup of tea, here’s a photo of me seeing him for the first time and then you can skip the rest of this post.
(I have no earthly idea what I’m wearing)
The week before his birthing day, I had kind of felt crampy off and on. But at 39 weeks, nothing too surprising. They always seemed to subside after laying down a few hours. On Saturday, feeling it again and trying to find ways to induce labor, a friend says what worked for her is letting her husband drink too many beers. Then, when she NEEDED to go to the hospital, she almost had to drive herself. Also remember another friend who went into labor with a hungover husband. Tell Big S to start drinking! Go to bed, text him a few hours later that I feel fine, go ahead and tip a few back, who knows how many more nights he’ll have that option.
Then, about 12:30 realize that this feeling is back and not going away. In fact, it’s actually more of a problem, preventing sleep. Start to read a while. About 1:30 a.m. tell Big S to get to bed, who knows how much more sleep he’s going to get tonight. Plus, sitting up in his recliner is more comfortable. After a few hours of reading through contractions, decide they are getting a little more serious and meet the guidelines for calling the midwife. About 3:30 call in, they ask if I want to go now or now. I’m fine waiting. They recommend laboring in the tub. Voila! My vision of laboring in the hot tub can be realized. Hang out in there, reading and being in labor with the contractions getting stronger until I can’t read through them anymore. Enjoy the pre-dawn view and impending sunrise. Try and hold out until 6:00 am so Big S gets a few hours of sleep, remembering the sleepless marathon of Little S’ birth. Manage until about 4:30 or 5:00 am and realize if I don’t get out of the hot tub now, I’m not going to be able to get out, and despite joking around about giving birth in there, it’s not actually my plan.
Tell Big S it’s time to go. Contractions stop me in my tracks now. Get the baby monitor to my sister and two steps before the car, my water breaks. Accuse husband of taking bumpiest road possible. And, for looking for every bump he can as he wheels me to Labor and Delivery. Give requested “specimen” and FREAK OUT that it’s green. That means meconium and that’s not good. Start to abandon hope for VBAC. Lean against wall during contraction accidentally setting off the “help me now” button. Which sends a cadre of nurses scrambling to the room. Oops. Manage to do that about 5 or 6 more times during labor. Consequently, husband gets good at recognizing it right away and hitting the cancel button.
Now we’re getting intense. And I’m yelling louder. Screaming is more apt. Possibly even shrieking in pain. It’s no silent Scientologist birth, that’s for sure. Get to the point where the pain is constant with no break between contractions. Have nearly; broken my husbands hand, fingers, strangled him, broken his ribs, practically chewed a hole in his shirt, deafened him… Probably more things to, those are just what I remember and remember feeling badly about. At the point I’m on the floor, under the bed (getting in touch with my inner cavewoman perhaps?) accidentally rip out the IV line in my arm (no memory of that, just a gnarly bruise for 2 weeks and a permanent bloodstain on DH’s pants) am now screaming for pain meds for me and for the sake of everyone around me. The get me into the bed, calmed down a little, and decide the epidural is coming. Like little S, I’ve only gone from 6 to 7 cm in 3 hours of pain, and getting me to relax is the best course of action. At this point, am told that if baby doesn’t descend more, there’s a good chance of a repeat c-section. At this point, that sounds better than continuing the way it’s going in excruciating pain. Manage to hold still for the epidural somehow, possibly knowing the outcome of NOT holding still when someone is putting needles in your spine. It’s now 8:00 or 8:30. Become sane again. Tell husband to go get himself food. Piece together that a c-section isn’t for sure the outcome yet, I get to try pushing if baby descends.
A little after 10:00, a get to start pushing. Unlike with Little S, I can’t actually feel the urge to push, but, I follow instructions and push when they tell me. It seems like even though the midwife is encouraging me and telling me how good I’m doing that there isn’t any progress. I’m nothing if not stubborn, so resolve to push even harder. At some point, get word that the baby is kind of stuck, shades of Little S. It feels like it’s been a while and I’m expecting them to call it off any minute now. They were only going to give me an hour of pushing and if baby is stuck, well… it is what it is. It’s now the last "chance”. Giving everything I've got, the midwife has me feel the head. Oh my gosh! A fuzzy little head about to emerge. I’m home free. I’m going to do this! After what still seems like forever, the baby is born! 11:04 a.m.
But, because of the meconium, and because I’m Group B strep positive, he’s tended to right away. I ask Big S what it is, and he emotionally tells me it’s a boy! Baby Thomas, named after my father, born on Father’s day. But, his breathing isn’t strong. They take him to the nursery and Big S goes too. Come to find out that his umbilical cord also broke on birth, so he didn’t quite get all the blood he should have either. (and, it made for quite the horror show. Pools of blood, splashed even over my head!)There is talk of needing to transport him to NICU, they can’t get an IV in and the veins in his extremities are collapsing. But, after hours of trying, his color is coming back on his own, and, they get the IV in through his umbilical cord! At 3:00, I’m okay to get wheeled in to go see him. Watch the doctors for a while (hours?) and finally get to hold him. Ask to nurse him, and wow! First time is a charm. Latches like a pro and nurses happily. Very good and good for his recovery too. Go back in every 3-4 hours throughout the night to nurse and cuddle him. By about 11:00 am Monday, he’s cleared to come back to the room with us. Hooray! Now family like can begin.
Tuesday, July 05, 2011
Sunday, December 05, 2010
The cutting o’the tree
It was Sunday and it wasn’t raining. Perfect conditions to go on the hunt for the annual Lorpi Christmas Tree. Since Little S was in utero, we’ve been going to a great U-cut place in Oregon City. Trees! Sheep! Lamb pepperoni! (Boy, that’s going to be hard to explain someday)
It’s so great as she gets older and has a better idea of what Christmas is about. She gets about 60% of it. Christmas trees are exciting. Lights are exciting. Presents are exciting. Santa is exciting. He comes in a sleigh with reindeer. The fact that he brings presents while you sleep hasn’t quite been fully connected yet. And, she keeps wanting us to take her to Christmas. We haven’t listened to that much Christmas music, but this morning she was singing “down through the chimney click, click, click”. Yesterday was “cradle, cradle, cradle, I made you out of clay”. Dreidel not being a word she hears every day.
The fetching o’the tree was much anticipated and used as heavily as possible to bribe her into nap time. (“after nap, we’re going to go get our tree”) . On arrival, she got right down to business, finding us the perfect tree
So, we then had to tell her to find one as tall as Daddy. But, we found her one her size to hold with her as we walked
After Dad scoped out the perfect one, we wanted to get a picture of it in it’s natural environment
Little S was so fascinated with the machine that shook the needles off and the tube they put it through to wrap it in netting for the trip home. She really wanted her tree to go in there too. And on top of the car, but we convinced her to keep it with her instead.
The end result? Well, that’s still on top of the car, waiting for pizza night to settle before we drag it off and cut it down to size in the chilly, windy night air. Hopefully we’ll get a photo of it sometime between now and New Years.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
a sleddin’ we will go
We had been planning to go sledding on Tuesday. However, the weather was throwing a curveball. Chance of snow in Portland, and getting really cold. The town shuts down with snow, so, I wasn’t optimistic we would get to go anywhere, except maybe sledding at the park. Well, the snow never arrived in much quantity, and fortunately everything mostly dried out before the cold hit so we weren’t battling a giant skating rink, so we decided to pack up and hit the mountain.
Little S was sufficiently excited. She helped make “puppy chow”. Although she asked what it was and told me she didn’t like it. Then I told her it had chocolate and peanut butter and she said “that sounds so yummy”.
Well, the roads down here were pretty good, save a few icy spots, the roads closer to the mountain were more treacherous. Big S hauled out the tire chains and got us chained up and safely on our way again. What a great guy. Once we got into areas with snow at the side of the roads, Little S kept saying “Wow. Look at all the snow!” After a really long drive, we finally get to a sledding hill. Get bundled up and ready to go play in the snow.
As Dad learned last winter when he took her skiing, one of her favorite things to do is eat snow. Convincing her NOT to eat the snow off of her boot from the parking lot took some work, but we finally got to some nice, fluffy, safe to eat snow.
Well, the allure of snow and sledding SOUNDED good to Little S. But the reality of it held much less appeal. It probably didn’t help that the sled was so slippery
Mommy and Sofia took a few runs on the sled, and at the bottom, she wanted to go again, but walking up the hill wasn’t much fun, and riding in the sled up the hill wasn’t fun either since she kept falling out of it, and it was at some crazy, bumpy angles that worried her. One of the problems with really deep snow and a 2.5 year old. Deep? how deep? Well, the dog got into a hole and had to get help from Big S to get out
We really didn’t bury her in the snow. It was that deep in some spots.
Little S was quickly tiring of this, and probably cold too. We knew it was bad when she was asking to go back to the car and take a nap! We did convince her to put her skis on for a few minutes though
But, she was pretty much dead weight with rubber legs and my back is paying the price today. A promise of hot chocolate and puppy chow perked her up and motivated her towards the car, where we discovered something new about her. At first we were worried it was frostbite, but as we watched, we think the color just changes from her apple-cheeked redness back to it’s normal color in a very obvious way
If you look closely, you’ll see white circles on her red cheeks. The circles grew until her cheeks were the same color they normally are.
Despite her tears, frustration and spending lots of time in the snow, not on it, when you ask her if she had fun sledding and skiing, the answer is a definitive “yes” and she can’t wait to go again. Hopefully next time will be even more fun!