Colds

Colds should be illegal. They should be banned. They should at the very least just not exist.

I'm sure there is some big beyond my understanding reason for the common cold. Maybe it's a way of reminding us we're human. Maybe it's our body's way of telling us to slow down. Whatever it is, I don't like it.

Now, getting a cold as an adult is bad enough, but being a baby who doesn't understand what's wrong? That's just not right.

Poor Kaelyn got her first cold at 4 months of age. I guess we were lucky to shield her from germs that long. It was a mild cold, I'll have to admit. When she sneezed, things flew out, if you know what I mean. And she breathed through her mouth quite a bit. The first night I felt like she was getting sick she got up many many times so the following night I made a little bed in her room. I hauled the couch cushions from the basement through the main floor up to her room on the second floor. I put a sleeping bag and a few other blankets on that and it was quite cushy, thank you very much! Not that I noticed much that night. She got up every 15-30 minutes. Well, get up is an overstatement. She was just uncomfortable. She never really opened her eyes. She'd just roll around and cry for awhile and I'd get up from my makeshift bed onto my knees and pat her back to sleep. Nights after that one got increasingly better until she was back to her old pattern.

And what is it about kleenex and nose wiping that kids just HATE? It's not like I'm trying to kill her, I'm trying to get the snot off her face!!! Apparently she thinks for former and does not appreciate any attempt at cleaning her up.

Kaelyn's second cold made for a wonderful Thanksgiving. I'm thankful that she didn't have it the week before and I'm thankful that it won't last forever. But thanksgiving was rough. This cold seems to have settled in her eye. Every time she sleeps her eye crusts shut and then I have to wipe it off. See paragraph above about the kleenex and repeat that thought about a warm washcloth and her eye. It's MAJOR screaming. I'm sure her eye is tender but I'm not wiping hard. I'm just trying to allow her to see! Excuse me! :)

This cold was even worse sleep wise. She was so stuffed up she refused to sleep in her crib. We were at my parents house in a double bed, which already feels small compared to our queen at home. But after several attempts at getting Kaelyn to stay in her crib I propped her up on a pillow in the bed and eased myself in beside her. She may only be 7 months old but she's quite a little bed hog! I was BARELY in the bed on my side and VERY uncomfortable. And since I had to pat her every 5-10 minutes I wasn't getting any sleep anyways. Occasionally she would cry so hard I couldn't just pat her so I would nurse her and then we'd rock in the chair for an hour...or two...or three. I'm guessing I slept a total of one hour that night in 5 minute increments. Not fun. Not thankful.

We went home the next day but the next two nights were no better. IT was a little easier because I took her to the guest room and had a WHOLE queen bed for just the two of us. I propped her up and was able to semi-pat and semi-snooze at the same time. My husband took a few of the rocking shifts so I slept an hour or two during those periods. It's just so heartbreaking. She's just not herself. She would cry and cry. She never does that in the middle of the night. She cries when she needs me and I go to her and that's that. With this cold, I go to her and she continues to cry. IT's pretty awful.

However, her eye wasn't crusted shut this morning so I was sure hoping the cold was on its way out. The mouth breathing continues and she's been a little crab bucket all day long. We'll be sitting there playing and all the sudden she'll just start screaming. Okay, you didn't fall over, nothing hit you, nothing bit you, what's the deal? She's doing the same to my husband now. Welcome to my day, dear! :)

So, as I mentioned at the beginning, I'm all for making colds illegal. I guess I'm not sure how that would be enforced so let's just ban them completely. There can't be a reason SO important to have them exist that we can't rid of them, can there? For the sake of babies and parents' sleep, please! :)

Baby Weight

I am simply amazed. That's all there is to it. When thinking about getting pregnant and through growing measurably in size during pregnancy I figured I would never look this way again. Well, I'm amazed.

Before even getting pregnant I began gaining weight. I wanted to be prepared, you know! :) Just in case! So I probably weighed 2-5 pounds over my normal weight when I found out I was pregnant. During the pregnancy I steadily gained about a pound a week. I really didn't feel like I ate a TON more than I usually did but I did snack on crackers and other things between meals a little more. And, now that I think of it, I would keep crackers by the bed and even eat them in the middle of the night when I woke up starving to death. By the end of the pregnancy I had gained pobably at least 35-40 pounds. though, to tell you the truth, I lost track of exactly how much I weighed and gained towards the end.

Kaelyn weighed 8lbs 6 ounces when she was born so I knew I lost at least that much! Plus all the water weight etc that comes off in the days after. I should have kept track of what I lost on what days but I was probably a little bit busy in those days. You know, feed the baby, burp the baby, change the baby, repeat! There were days when would lose 5 pounds in a DAY, though, back right after she was born. Other days were just 1 pound or 2.

Let me just say, before Kaelyn was born I used to run 5 miles a day on my elliptical machine. It helped wake me up in the morning and I enjoyed watching movies while doing that. Since Kaelyn was born I have taken a few walks here and there but I haven't run a single step! She's 7 months old now. I can't imagine how out of breath I'll be when I finally do get back into it. I'm pretty sure I'll feel like I'm dying but so far I haven't figured out how to make the time for it so I won't worry about it just yet.

Anyways, a few months after Kaelyn was born the fast weight loss stopped. I would only lose a pound every week or every couple of weeks. When I reached about 10 pounds over my norm it all just stopped completely. I figured, well, this is what I'm going to weigh now. At least until I could figure out how/when to work out again. Oh well, what do you do.

I resigned myself a little too early, however, because in later months more came off. Slowly, but still! I can't believe that I am able to say after having a baby, gaining probably 40 pounds, doing nothing, not working out, eating constantly, I now weight 15 pounds less than is normal for me. Less than I've ever weighed in my life. Except for maybe in 6th grade. ;)

So, I sit around and eat and lost all the weight and then some? Not fair! How did that happen? Well, I bounce and play with Kaelyn all day. I get up several times a night with her. And I breastfeed. That's really the only thing I can attribute it to. Because I eat a ton. I always say she just sucks it out of me cause where else does it go? Most people eat three meals a day, right? I eat probably 6-7 times a day. Not full meals necessarily, but still more than average for me. Kaelyn, at 7 months, eats ever 3-3 1/2 hours, right? Well, so do I! :)

My mom has decided I no longer have a butt and she needs to bulk me up a bit. I'm over at her house visiting for a week around Thanksgiving and I've taken her up on that challenge. I've eaten everything offered and then some. Though I have to admit it's not any more than I would have eaten at home. I don't have a scale here but my skinny jeans (you know, the jeans you bought that you always WANTED to fit in but never did...the ones that I could never wear before being pregnant) still fit.

So thank you Kaelyn from sucking it out of me! I didn't need to deal with all the baby stuff, being tired, worrying if I'm doing things right, trying to keep her baby, etc, AND feeling huge at the same time. However, I do have to wonder...once she becomes a big girl and eats REAL food, will I be able to stop eating so much? Will the magic of her sucking it all out of me stop and will it all pile back on? I don't mind going back to my normal weight, but I certainly enjoy where I am! Especially since I don't have to run 5 miles a day to get there!! And can eat anything and everything I want!

The moral of the story...my story, at least, I know it doesn't work that way for everyone...want to lose weight? Have a baby. Then eat whatever you want. And breastfeed. Don't worry about the diet pills and the magic formulas. Just have a baby! :) Just breastfeed! Of course, you have to give up quite a bit of your life in the meantime. Not only just having a kid around, which is lifechanging in itself, but tying yourself down to breastfeeding is a big deal. Forget about going very far alone cause you can't leave a hungry baby with people that can't feed her! Well, you can, but that's just mean.

There's always pumping and all that good stuff but I haven't messed with that. I figured she'd only do it for a year or so and I didn't want to mess with sterilizing bottles and keeping the milk fresh in the freezer or whatever. It seemed complicated to me. Though now I wish I had because perhaps when Kaelyn is done with me I could continue pumping and keep these weight results?? :)

To be continued, only time will tell what Kaelyn's upcoming independence will to do me! But at least for now I can wear these jeans!!

Being Alone with a Baby

When you're of baby-having age, you tend to hear a lot of advice from people. When you actually get pregnant, watch out! It comes at you left and right, wanted and unwanted! Everyone tells you how your life will change and how nothing will ever be the same. They were all correct, that's for sure! However, I don't remember anyone ever telling me how lonely I would be!

Now, I've been alone before. Most of my job required me sitting alone in a room talking to myself all day. Or writing or creating commercials etc. Nonetheless, I was alone for the majority of the day. Sometimes my husband would get home from work late and I would be alone in the evening for awhile. Sometimes he would have things going on on the weekends and I would be home alone. I never really minded that. In fact, I actually kind of LIKED being alone.

So, now that I have a baby, why am I so lonely? I'm never TRULY alone. I have human contact all day everyday. She's never far away from me. And it's not like it's complete silence in the house all day. I talk to Kaelyn pretty continuously. And sometimes she talks back! Nothing I can yet distiguish, but plenty of various babbles and motor boat type noises.

I still work a few hours a week but for the most part, I'm at home...alone...with Kaelyn. Don't get me wrong, I love spending all of my time with her. When I'm away it's all I can do to get back to her as FAST as possible. But when I've been alone with her for 10-12 hours straight, things start to go a little crazy in my head!

Is it strange that I start to gaze out the front door for my husband's car around 5 even though I know he won't be home until at least 6? Is it a bad thing that the highlight of our day is often a trip to the mailbox? Do I get a little TOO friendly with the check out people at the grocery store?

Case in point...the other day we were checking out. It was our one and only outing for the day (other than the mailbox). The check out person says, "Did you find everything okay?" as they usually do. "Sure did!" I say and then I make a comment about how cold and windy it is outside or something to those effects. In return the check out person nodded and that was that. I left the store just crushed. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration, but I was certainly disappointed. Couldn't they have told me about their day? Couldn't they have asked about mine? Couldn't they have been one of those people who decides to tell me their life story for no particular reason?

When we got home we read the book Bubbles Bubbles for the eleventh time that day. Kaelyn lit up and giggled up a storm at Bert on the first page, as always. I don't know what it is about Bert but she just loves him. My best human interaction for the day.

And I can live with that. It's great to see her grin at me when she's thumping around in her crib after a nap. It's the best to see her eyes light up when I do something that delights her like sing a silly song or bounce her next to the back door. Sometimes I like to hear stories from check out people, so sue me! :) But if all I get is a smile or two from my baby, I'll be just fine.

Warning to my husband, though...he's a quiet sort of fellow. But when I have a day of isolation from the adult world, he needs to come home prepared. Chat me up a bit! So what if I only have stories about diaper explosions and spit up, ask about it anyways! :) And pretend to enjoy what you hear! It's all I have to look forward to after a long day of the Bubbles Bubbles book!!

Hand Eye Coordination

When I was growing up we had the original Nintendo. I was the QUEEN of the game Dr. Mario. It's kind of like Tetris. There are little colored viruses on the screen and you line up the right color pill to make them disappear. You could play against someone and my dad and I would always play. We played for a dime a game and kept a tally for a few months until I finally made him pay up. It was rare that he had more than a couple of hash marks on HIS side of the paper! In fact, he probably hasn't yet retired because of all the money he gave away in those days. Ha! :)

Because of that game I feel like I had pretty good hand eye coordination back in those days. I think Kaelyn is taking after me. Maybe someday she'll beat ME in Dr. Mario! If anyone has an old fashioned Nintendo these days!

Here's what leads me to believe Kaelyn has such good hand eye coordination at the age of 6 1/2 months. For the last month or so she has been fascinated with sticking her finger in things. Small things that her finger JUST fits in. I first noticed this when she began concentrating on my hospital mug. It's a big insulated mug with a straw and lid that they kept full of water when I was in the hospital for her birth. Since then I have continued to keep it full of ice and water and pretty much take it with me wherever I go. Kaelyn has always liked the mug since she became aware of things like that, but lately the interest has intensified. She'll grab the straw and I think 'oo, she's going to try and suck on it like she always sees me doing' but no, that's not her intention. She gets this look of serious concentration on her face. Sometimes she'll even stick her lip out and furrow her brow. One hand steadies the straw, the other hand sticks out the index finger and goes for it! Once she has her finger firmly placed in the straw she pops it back out and looks at me like, look what I did! Then the look of concentration returns and the process repeats. Occasionally she'll bore of one hand and let the OTHER hand have a go at the straw. This can last for quite sometime.

Whenever we run out of games to play I think, huh, we haven't gotten out my hospital mug in awhile... Whenever I'm thirsty and TRY to take a drink I often get the straw yanked out of my mouth so she can stick her finger in it. I've created a monster! Since this seems so entertaining to her I've watched for other things with holes that she can stick her finger in! I got a small My Little Pony in a Happy meal the other day (yes I eat happy meals, what do you do!) and it has the perfect sized holes in the bottom of its feet. She could care less about the pony. You're supposed to comb its hair. All she wants to do is stick her finger in the hole of the feet.

And I've also discovered that most toys with batteries have screws in them and that means a screw sized hold. Once I showed her that, oh boy, who cares that the toy makes noise and lights up, let me put my finger in that screw hole!!

At church on Sunday my husband had to count the offering money after so Kaelyn and I had some extra time to kill. She didn't seem to be into playing with the few toys I brought so I sat her on the floor by her carseat...and then I saw it! The side of the carseat has a hole that shows either green or red depending on whether the handle is up or down. But the hole was JUST the right size! Once I put MY finger in it, Kaelyn was happily entertained for the next 20 minutes. Cheap and easy entertainment, I might add.

The most amusing hole she has found happens to have been at 4:45 in the morning. She was having a good night and it was her FIRST time up. She was starving so she ate like gangbusters and that must have given her a second wind because she got that cute look on her face and would NOT close her eyes again. When she's awake and happy and nursing she'll often reach up and play with my face. Touch my hair, grab my cheek, that sort of thing. However, at 4:45 that morning after she was done eating, she had other intentions. Oo, a hole! She thought as she looked up at me. And yes, you guessed it, inserted her finger into my nostril. What am I to do about that? It's 4:45am, I'm rocking the chair, trying not to interact when her too much because I desperately want her to go back to sleep so I can go back to bed myself and she sticks her finger in my nose! Intentionally! And repeatedly! I just kept turning my head away but I could see her out of the corner of my eye...that look of concentration, the lip out, the furrowed brow. She wasn't done. She had a goal in sight and the goal was my nose and her finger, joined as one. Ugh.

She did eventually go back to sleep an hour later. She hasn't paid any attention to my nose since. I guess I've been trying to keep other perfect sized holes in her view so she won't!

I think it's a good sign that she has such good hand eye coordination and can be so easily entertained at times. I just hope she doesn't soon discover her OWN nose and REALLY enjoy herself!

How to entertain a 6 month old

I have spent the last 6 months attempting to entertain Kaelyn for her wakeful hours. She doesn't like to nap for very long at a time so this means MOST of the day we are playing. Or eating. And she eats fast, so we mostly play! Here are some things I have found helpful in entertaining her. And let me just say, toys are overrated. We haven't spent much money on them because my sister has two kids and we got a bunch from them and have gotten others as gifts. Otherwise, random household items seem to be the most fun.

-The ever present plastic bag. Now, I know is says right ON plastic bags that they aren't a toy and are not to be played with by children. But they're SO much fun! And it's not like I hand Kaelyn a bag, sit her in a chair and leave the room or anything. Actually, I play with the bag more than she does, she just enjoys watching. I throw the bag up in the air and we watch it float back down at which point I hit it back up again. It's a little like playing volleyball with yourself only slower. And a lot less fun, however a lot MORE entertaining for a baby, apparently. If I let the bag come completely down and hit Kaelyn in the face, boy that REALLY gets her going. Once we've thrown it up in the air a few times I let it hit her face then grab it and rustle it against her belly real fast and noisily. It can be quite entertaining for her for a good 10 minutes!

-Tissue paper from the millions of baby bags we received with gifts. Again, I know you're not really supposed to play with paper, but if you saw the look of joy and heard the loud screams of delight from Kaelyn, you'd play with it too! This is another item that I play with and she watches. After she eats some cereal or veggies or something at meal time I clean her face off (which she does not appreciate) then get out the tissue paper. Simply rustling it high up in the air above her gets a huge scream and giggles. Only the first rustle gets a big reaction. The rest of the time she smiles and enjoys it but she is no longer delightfully surprised. Also shaking it right in her face gets a big grin along with a lot of blinking and some nose wrinkling, which is quite cute!

-The household cereal box. We visited my parents a few weeks ago and my mom brought out a cereal box. Apparently it's like gold to a baby because that cereal box has been pounded on and opened and closed and pounded on and pushed and pounded on...you get the picture. It's not something Kaelyn laughs about but she's quite serious about pounding on it and making sure it's as flat as possible. Though I think I helped with that the other day when I sat on it, oops. I have to start eating more cereal so I can get her a new box one of these days!

-The ever present wipe box. Oh yes, the plastic tub that the wipes go on has to be her all time favorite toy. We take it with us whenever we travel. For obvious reasons, but more so just to play with it. The fact that it has a little door on the top that opens amazes her. She just pushes it back down and watches it pop back up over and over again. When she tires of that she simply turns the box over and pounds on the bottom. It's her wipe box, her drum, her practical toy!

-Magazines, mostly mine. Sometimes when Kaelyn seems to be playing well on her own I get out a magazine and sit and read while she plays. She doesn't like it when I leave the room so I have to sit close, but at least I get to read a few articles from time to time...until she notices. She'll work her way over my leg and around the corner just to get to that magazine. The magazine I THINK I have out of sight and out of reach! Rip! There goes the page I was reading. Hey! I wasn't done with that yet! I gave Kaelyn her own magazine, some junk mail ordering catalog we get all the time. She thoroughly enjoys that, however, whatever I'M looking at always seems more entertaining, of course. I spend many afternoons picking up shreds of paper from the floor after a magazine ripping session. Maybe she's just trying to help in the recycling process. At least she doesn't put it in her mouth, she just rips and drops, rips and drops. Fun for the whole family. :)

So if you feel like you've played with every toy in the house today...twice, as I feel many many days, get out some of the random household items. It's a nice change of pace. Hugely entertaining, and very cheap! Most days I can't believe we're surrounded with all these neat toys and all she wants is the plastic bag I brought home from the store.

Babies and Sleep

Kaelyn is an excellent sleeper...always has been...IF you hold her.

Perhaps that is my fault. She was just so little when she was born. And I am a first time mom so I had nothing at ALL better to do than sit around and hold her! When she was first born I held her pretty much all night long in the hospital. She was eating about every hour so it was just easier to snooze myself in between feedings. When we got home I spent many nights in the chair in her room, sleeping when she slept and watching her eat between naps. I set up an old lap top computer in her room next to the chair so I could watch movies when we were awake. I put headphones on the computer so she wouldn't hear the noise.

I sometimes did put her in her bed and then I would sleep on the floor of her room. And occasionally I would put her in the pack and play in our master bedroom and sleep in our REAL bed. But that always wore me out more because I would just have to get up again shortly.

It was wonderful that my mom stayed with me for the first two weeks of Kaelyn's life. I got to nap often and try to recover from her birth and from staying up most of the night. I realized after my mom left that this new little baby would NOT sleep alone during the day. I would get her to sleep and then try try TRY to put her down and she'd just wake right back up and yell at me. I tried everything and everywhere. The car seat, the swing, the crib, the pack and play, even my own bed. She just would NOT stay asleep unless I held her. And her waking up meant many things. She would be crabby. I wouldn't get to rest either so I would be crabby. It was a vicious cycle.

So being a first time mom that felt like I really had no idea what I was doing, I gave in. I held her. For months. I could only get her to go to sleep in the first place if I held her upright against my chest and bounced around the house. We had quite a little routine. We'd bounce through the kitchen, into the dining room, past the back door, over by the bathroom, across the entry way, through the playroom, repeat. Sometimes she would fall asleep in minutes. Sometimes more like 20 of them. Or even an hour. But it always got to her EVENTUALLY!

Once she would drift off I would walk by the mirrors to make sure her eyes stayed closed. Then finally venture into the family room and try sitting down in the reclining rocking chair. If there was success and no yelling ensued, I would rock for 5-10 minutes and then attempt to put the leg of the chair up and recline. Finally, a break for us both! I would grab the pillow I kept nearby and take a nap myself, with Kaelyn on her stomach against my chest, snoozing away.

It wasn't the most convenient way to nap, but it worked for us. We both got to sleep for awhile and were much more fun when we awoke! I kind of felt like all I ever did was sit around all day, but I also felt like I was doing what I had to do. I tried everything and she just would not sleep alone during the day.

Nighttime was a different story. She was just fine in her pack and play once she got over having to eat EVERY hour. Though she did have some issues with her legs. She seemed to like to stick them up as high as she could in the air and SLAM them down as HARD as possible. Repeatedly. Sometimes after she ate I would have to stand there and pat her for an hour to get her to go back to sleep. I heard lots of suggestions...swaddle her (she would scream at me), duct tape her down (I figured that would probably be a little severe), etc. FInally I got so tired of hearing her wiggle all night long we moved her from the pack and play into her own room. At the age of three months. The first night she slept in her own room we BOTH slept better. It was amazing. I felt human the next day! She started only getting up maybe once or twice a night.

We still had daytime napping issues though. And I really didn't mind holding her. It was quite sweet how she was lay her head on my shoulder and go to sleep. But I didn't want to have to hold her for every nap through her napping years. I didn't want to have to go to college with her just so she could get some sleep after studying late into the night! :) Okay, so maybe I WOULD want that, but after she started sleeping pretty well at night and I didn't NEED to nap as much during the day I got kind of tired of sitting around all the time while she slept. I had to start trying to put her down.

Easier said than done and I prepared myself for some rough times. Around the 3 1/2 month mark Kaelyn could hold her head up SO well that she no longer needed to rest it on my shoulder and therefore didn't fall asleep nearly as easily when I bounced her around the house. I then switched tactics. I laid her back in my arms and cradled her and bounced. She couldn't hold her head up that way!

Once I decided to try to lay her down I would get her to go to sleep then slip her in the swing. This would occasionally work for a good 5-10 minutes. I felt like that was a success. Sadly enough! After trying that for a couple of weeks I decided it was kind of a dumb idea because I'd get her all used to that and then want to switch and get her to nap in her crib instead. So I should really just go directly to the crib.

I got out the Baby Einstein lullaby CD (which is great but I complain about it a lot because I feel like I hear it 40 times a day!) and played that in her room while cradling and bouncing her. Let me just say that yes, I HAVE tried to just lay her down and let her sleep on her own. If she's not mostly asleep when I put her in her crib she seems to think it's play time and her feet thumping and cooing begins. I don't want her to think her crib is a place to play so let the bouncing continue. I'm also not able to do the whole "cry it out" thing. If others want to do that with their kids, fine, I'm not one to tell you what's right or wrong! But I simply can NOT let my baby cry. Someday, when she's old enough to understand what I'm doing I may very well have to. But for now, sometimes she doesn't even know why she's crying, just that she needs something, and I'm always there for her.

Anyways, after a rough couple of days of a lot of yelling (on KAelyn's part, not mine!) I started to succeed a few times here and there with getting her to sleep and dumping her in the crib. Sometimes I would have to try several times before it would work and sometimes I would try for an hour and it would NOT work. But I knew the one thing I could NOT do was let her win.

Kaelyn is 6 1/2 months old and we're still doing the cradle and bounce to the Baby Einstein CD. I still occasionally try to lay her down and just pat her or let her fall asleep on her own, but that's when she looks at me like 'what's up with this?!' or just starts yelling. And so we bounce... :)

But it is working for longer periods of time. At first she would only stay in her crib for maybe 30 minutes tops. And sometimes that's all the longer her naps are now as well. But occasionally she'll sleep for a whole hour, very rarely even two hours! Of course, I never get anything done during those times because I expect her to only sleep for 30 minutes!

At around 3 months of age, when we moved Kaelyn to her own room, she started sleeping really well at night, only getting up once MAYBE twice a night. She even slept through the night twice! But when she got to the 4 1/2 month mark she did some major backsliding. Not only did she get up a ton but when she would get up I would have trouble getting her back to sleep. She wouldn't be upset, she'd cry, I'd come in, feed her, and then she's be all happy and bug eyed looking like 'time to play mama!!' Um, no, I don't THINK so! :) An hour or an hour and a half later I would finally win and get to go back to bed. Only to have her screaming for me 5 minutes later. I don't know what the deal is or what I'm doing wrong, or if there is such a thing, but the next morning, when I feel like death warmed over, it's the hardest part of the day. I'm not much fun for her. SHe's got to be tired too because she was up as much as I was. But what do you do! For the last couple of months she's been going through phases. SHe'll have a bad week where she'll be up 5-6 times a night and not want to go back to sleep. And then the next week will be awesome and she'll just get up once, eat, and drift right back off. This happens to be a good week. Perhaps we've reached a turning point? Maybe next week will be good too? We shall see.

My mom keeps telling me to hang in there, it'll pass. The pediatrician says that no matter what she does sleep-wise now, she WILL grow up to be a teenager and then I'll have to PRY her out of bed. I know they're both right. It's just hard to think about that at 3am when she's all bug eyed and ready to go!! But after a night of decent sleep like last night, it's easy for me to say it's worth it! Talk to me after a bad night and I might have a different opinion. But all it takes it one smile or giggle on Kaelyn's part and I would say it's worth it again. Cause that's what kids do to a mom. Frustrate us, push us, make us think we're at our wits end, and then make us love them more than we ever thought possible.

I look forward to the day when I can post something along the lines of "Kaelyn sleeps through the night now!" But until then, at least we have plenty of time together and don't miss each other too much overnight. Something like that.... ;)

Pregnancy

Ah yes, the joys of pregnancy. I have to admit, I had it pretty easy from what I hear from others. But when I look back on it it's not something I was thoroughly enjoying at the time. I remember people saying I was glowing and that I must be enjoying being pregnant. I may not have pretty feet, but I did like to see them on occasion. Getting out of bed without having to rock myself just right was also nice. There was a lot I did NOT enjoy about being pregnant! :)

I always felt I would adopt children someday. It's just something I wanted to do. My husband and I were looking into it and decided to let God have the ultimate say in the matter. We stopped trying NOT to try to have kids. In other words, I went off birth control.

Now, I'm a very regular sort of person. I HATE being late. If I tell you I'm going to meet you at noon, chances are I'll be there at 11:45. Being late just makes me nervous. So when I was 4 days late for my monthly visitor, I was pretty sure. But I got the home pregnancy test and took it in the guest bathroom upstairs in our house. Why I went to the guest bathroom, I'm not sure, but I did. I stood over the thing waiting the 2 minutes wondering if I'd be able to tell. The blue plus sign was very faint at first but it became more and more clear. I wasn't sure if I was more shocked that I could clearly read it or that I had just gone off birth control 3 weeks ago and was already pregnant. I guess we had our answer, we were meant to have a child biologically.

I text messaged my husband to hurry home. I often got lonely in the hour between when I got home and when he arrived so that was nothing new. He wasn't suspicious. He didn't keep track of my monthly visitor so he probably had no idea I was on edge from being late! When he got home I showed him the test along with a shirt I'd need to start wearing that said "Baby on board".

This was early in August 2008. We decided to tell our families labor day weekend because they would all be over that weekend. Not because the weekend was so appropriately named LABOR day. :)

The beginning of pregnancy was charming. I had a little secret that was going to grow into a huge part of my life. I smiled continuously and was shocked no one could figure it out just from seeing the look on my face.

Two weeks later...the thing they call morning sickness hit. I still don't think it's nearly as bad as what some people experience but I did a lot of laying around on the couch. I would get up at 4 or 5 in the morning sometimes and feel SO sick. I never got sick, so that was nice. But I couldn't move from the couch. I watched movies and after a few hours ventured into the kitchen for some crackers or a muffin if I was having a really good day. And what they say is true, morning sickness is a weird phrase because it can last all day. I remember sipping sprite at work and attempting crackers for the first time at 3pm because I felt so green. But it would pass, everything I read said so! And it did.

At the beginning of the second trimester I felt great. I was tired more than usual, but I got back into running. I used to run (via elliptical machine) 5 miles a day and it was really bugging me laying on the couch all morning long. But I simply couldn't move! SO when I woke up and felt good enough to elliptical I knew I was back in business. Granted, my so-called running was more of a slow gimpy job and I only went about 3 miles in 45 minutes, but I was moving, so there!

The tiredness pretty much started with the "morning" sickness and lasted till, well, I'm still not over it and my daughter is 6 months old now! I would often sneak out of work for lunch and go somewhere fast so I'd have time to take a nap...in my car! Many people in my work parking lot got dirty looks from me. How dare they slam their car door when I was trying to nap in the backseat of my car? On a nice day, one guy even dared smoke in his car RIGHT next to mine as I was trying to nap with the window cracked a bit. Boy did he get a look! Don't these people know there's a pregnant lady trying to nap here? I guess they didn't. But in my clouded pregnant brain they SHOULD have! :)

I also napped often when I got home before supper. If I wasn't too starving and could wait to eat a bit longer.

I never had any weird cravings. I never really craved anything out of the ordinary. Things sounded good on occasion but I never felt like 'oh my goodness I HAVE to have such and such RIGHT now.' I'm always up for a bowl of ice cream but that isn't any different!

When the third trimester hit I continued to elliptical but it was definitely more of a slow walk than a run. I napped any second I got the chance. I didn't sleep much at night anymore because I had heart burn SO bad I had to prop up in a chair to sleep at all some nights. My dad has always had heart burn. I never understood what it was like. I do now. It's exactly what it sounds. Someone had the nerve to light your insides on FIRE and then expect you to lay down and sleep at night. Yeah, not gonna happen. I heard chewing peppermint gum helped so I went through several packs. And I bought some generic versions of tums. Nothing made it go away completely so I just dealt with it. What do you do!

Oh yes, and as you get bigger in pregnancy, your bladder gets smaller. So when I WAS able to sleep I had to get up about every hour to go to the bathroom. No exaggeration. I've always been a frequent bathroom go-er. Especially after a mighty glass of tea. But this was ridiculous!

The tiredness reached an extreme level towards the end and I could no longer elliptical. I was pretty proud to say that I exercised probably at least 7 of the 9 months I was pregnant. I had to take one week off in the middle because I broke the elliptical machine (too much exra weight, perhaps?) and I didn't exercise at all for a few weeks at the beginning and end. But I wanted to keep in the best shape I could because I heard that labor was hard work and you needed to be prepared for it! Plus I like watching movies and I do that while running in the morning. :)

I think pregnancy really prepares you for a lot about being a parent. How to get up 50 times a night. How to sleep ANYWHERE whenever you get the chance. How to deal with discomfort. How to keep trucking when you have no other option but to do so. THough I still think it's not really fair to go through all that and then have to take care of a little creature so fragile and needy that you have to stay up so many nights while trying to recover from the trauma your body has already been through. Though who ever said being a parent had anything fair about it. IT's no longer about fairness, it's all about the baby! And once you meet that child, you don't ever care. It's all about the baby and always will be from here on out!

Labor and Delivery

I wrote this shortly after Kaelyn was born on April 24th, 2009 so I could remember how it all happened later on. People always say you forget and it's true because as I go back and read this now I didn't remember many of the details!

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So here is the story of Kaelyn's labor and delivery. Read at your own risk! :) Not that it's that bad, but if you read something you don't like, don't say I didn't have a warning on it! ;)

Thursday April 23rd I just felt crampy all day. Kind of like I was going to get my period or something. Nothing terrible, but it's just not fair when you're THAT pregnant and still have period-like cramps. I also think I was experiencing what they call "the bloody show" which I read online is the mucus plug (what holds your water in) slowly releasing itself. It wasn't a big huge mess or any big deal at all. Just a huge increase in mucusy stuff and a tiny thread of blood on occasion. I really only noticed because it was different than anything I'd really had thus far in the pregnancy. So I wondered if something might be up.

I'd been having very minor contractions for a week. Mostly in the car, it seemed. Nothing that hurt, just a tightening around the middle for a few seconds and that was that. On Thursday I didn't really have any of that, just the cramps.

So I worked all day Thursday and then came home. I had a feeling something was up and I knew they don't let you eat or drink once you get to the hospital so I made supper (chicken breasts and baked potatoes!) I felt kind of sick like I had a touch of the flu or something so I really didn't want to eat it, but I did anyways. However, I couldn't sit down to eat. I felt much better if I was up and walking. Pretty much, again, like the beginning of bad cramps when you get your period. So I'm pacing around, taking a bite of supper on my way past. Sean went upstairs to shower or something so I called my sister. I was like, I'm really crampy, but no contractions, what do I do? SHe's like, uh, call your doctor!!! Oh yeah, good idea! :)

I called the doctor and described what I was feeling and she said yeah, it sounds like you should come in. So I started to pack up the few other things we wanted to take with us and off we went.

We got to the hospital right around 8:30pm. I didn't have to do much to check in because I pre-registered. I just gave them my insurance card and they took me to a labor and delivery room and told me to get naked. The nurse came in after awhile and "checked me." I told her the doctor on Tuesday had said I was about 5cm dialated. The nurse said she thought it was more like 4. I was like what?! No way! So I was starting to wonder if they were going to send me home or something.

They took my blood pressure which was 145 over something. She asked if I had problems with high blood pressure. I'm like, uh, no, it's usually like 90 over something. They hooked up the baby heart monitor and the contraction monitoring thingy, whatever it's called. She said I was definitely in active labor and she would call the doctor with her report.

She talked to the doctor and it sounded like I really was in labor but not REALLY hard active labor so they wanted to break my water. All I wanted to do was get up and move around and I was really annoyed that they made me lay there for that long!

They had me start signing a bunch of forms. I could have signed my whole life away or written them into my will for all I know. I just signed what they put in front of me. They asked what I thought about epidurals and showed me the list of possible complications for that. I said I wanted to wait and see so I didn't sign that at that point. Still all I wanted to do was get up and walk around. I knew if I could do that I'd feel just fine. They said they'd break my water and then monitor the baby for 20 minutes and then I could get up and walk if all was well.

They started an IV of fluids. I remember asking in our childbirth class if I'd feel the IV in my hand and the teacher said yes, but you won't care. She was right. I did feel it go in but once it was set up there were other things going on so I could have cared less.

So about 9:30 they brought in that crocheting looking hook. I said, what is this going to feel like?! They said it would just feel like a regular "womanly" exam. Though they didn't say womanly, those are my words. And really it did, it didn't hurt. Some people had said it hurt really bad and others said it didn't hurt at all. I side with those that say it really didn't hurt. And it wasn't even a huge gush or anything. I barely noticed. And at this time it's past my bedtime so I really just want to go to sleep. Or walk around, I guess.

They monitored the baby for 20 minutes. Again, I was just really menstrual like crampy and I just wanted to get up and walk already! Everything must have looked good because they finally said I could get up and walk. Sean helped me get up and drag the iv poll thingy into the bathroom. I thought I'll go to the bathroom quick and we'll go stroll the halls. Well, I got into the bathroom and felt SO sick. Like I had the flu really badly. So I just sat there for awhile. Then I got up and put my forehead on the cold sink and stood there for awhile. I didn't want to lay down but I couldn't move from the bathroom either. I never did get sick, but I sure felt like I could. Maybe I shouldn't have eaten that chicken breast after all?! :) Sean asked a few times if I wanted to go walk and I don't remember really answering him. At that point I just was beyond being polite and answering when I was spoken to. You don't feel like talking when you have the flu either, do you?! After maybe 20 minutes of standing around I made it out of the bathroom and back into bed. The last thing I wanted to do was lay there, but the last thing I COULD do was walk. The one thing I wanted to do. What do you do!!

From that time on things happened really fast. I remember Sean asking if he should call my mom back. We had called and told her we were going to the hospital but we didn't know if I was REALLY in labor or not so we'd call her back and let her know what was up when we knew more. He didn't call anyone because like I said, things started happening fast and he probably got distracted too! Again, I didn't care.

I don't know how to describe the feeling really, other than really bad menstrual cramps. And feeling really sick. I heard Sean ask the nurse how long it would take and she said generally 8-24 hours for a first baby. At that point I thought, if this is the beginning of labor, I can't do this for very long. I even said something to Sean about I didn't know if I could NOT have the drugs because I felt really horribly sick. And if that was just the beginning, I didn't know if I could handle that nasty feeling for 24 hours.

Then things intensified quite a bit, though, apparently. I had no idea what time it was or what was going on. I had heard contractions felt like getting your blood pressure taken. Your middle just gets tighter and tighter and tigheter and then lets up. That was what I had been experiencing the last week in the really painless contractions. I don't feel like that was the case during actual labor. I don't even know how to describe it, really. You hear about the urge women have to push. I never understood that either. But it was definitely there. It was like my whole belly had taken over everything. I suppose that was a contraction but I didn't feel like things got tighter. You know when you're going to be sick and you try to stop yourself but it comes up anyways. I didn't feel like I was going to be sick anymore, but my whole stomach area was convulsing somehow and I didn't feel like I could stop anything. I don't really feel like I was in pain, but I was definitely uncomfortable.

I must have grunted or groaned or something because when the nurse came in she said "Are you feeling pushy?" I whispered yes because I wasn't really into talking at the time. Sean was being really sweet and wiping my forehead with a cold wet cloth. I was sweaty and really hot. I had been since the bathroom incident so he had a job in trying to cool me off.

Anyways, the nurse checked me and I was at 8cm. I don't know what time it was, but it had probably only been an hour, maybe an hour and a half. I think she was really surprised. I was very pleased because that meant hopefully I wouldn't have to deal with that sick crampiness for 24 hours!!

At that point things get pretty hazy. I know Sean cracked a joke about the baby's heartbeat sounding like a goose. He also made an actually really funny joke but neither of us can remember what he said now. And it didn't matter how funny he was being, I pretty much ignored him. I think I said "ice" once and "chapstick" once and that was about it.

The nurse kept coming in and out and telling me to blow through the contractions. Because apparently you can't blow and push at the same time. I still don't know if I believe that because I feel like I could have pushed while doing about ANYTHING else. But I blew. Sean was helpful because he was watching the monitor and telling me as the contractions were coming back down. That was good to know. However, he also would tell me to get ready, one was coming. I didn't appreciate that because I KNEW when something was coming, I didn't need to anticipate it more. But once again, I wasn't in the most talkative of moods so I couldn't tell him to knock it off at that point. Sometimes he would blow with me as well and that was annoying because he had gum and that peppermint smell was getting to me.

The nurse checked me again and I was at 9 1/2. I Was like you have got to be KIDDING me. IT was happening fast, but at that point, not fast enough for me! I know I barely whispered something to Sean along the lines of I can't do this. I didn't mean that I couldn't have the baby. Obviously that wasn't a choice! :) I meant that I cannot just lay here and NOT push anymore. IT's the weirdest thing. You hear about the urge to push but until you're in that situation...it's almost IMPOSSIBLE not to do what your body is SCREAMING you HAVE to do! But I blew and blew. The nurse checked shortly after and I was at 10. She then called the doctor. I still don't think the nurse believed what was happening because hello...I went from 4-8 in no time flat and now 10 was here and no doctor? As she called the doctor she said "let's see how fast the doctor can run!" Once again, I didn't care, I just wanted to push. I didn't care if anyone caught the baby or they just put a basket under there.

The nurse finally let me start pushing. I really feel like the hardest part was NOT doing what my body was telling me to do and trying to hold back. Once I got to pushing, watch out! :) I had no idea what time it was and I didn't care. I keep saying I didn't care, I didn't care. But that's exactly what I felt.

I pushed maybe 3-4 times and the doctor FINALLY got there. EVeryone kept saying what a good job I was doing and I was like whatever, I Don't care! :) Just get this baby out of me! At one point they put an oxygen mask on me. I'm still not sure why I didn't feel like I needed a thing. I think I overheard something about it happening SO fast I needed the extra oxygen to take stress off the baby. The mask was annoying me more than anything. I asked Sean later if it scared him when they put that on me and he was like no, not really. Thanks, Sean! :) After a couple of more pushes I was able to ask Sean what time it was. HE said like 11:45pm. I knew it was getting close to birth time because they were talking about crowning.

Sean and I have a thing with 4s. I Was born on a 4, he was born on a 4, we got married on a 4. So I was curious about the time to see if the baby would be born on the 24th or the 23rd. At that point, I didn't care, can you believe it?! :) I just wanted her out.

According to Sean, we got up to 11:57pm and the contractions were coming really close together and really fast. They had me push 3 times for 10 seconds each each time a contraction came. That was awesome because that's all I wanted to do. But at 11:57 the contraction monitoring machine just flatlined. Everything just STOPPED completely. They had JUST said probably one or two more pushes and you're done. Well, everything STOPPED. I had no urge to push, no contractions were coming, nothing was happening. That made me rather angry but I still didn't feel like talking so I just laid there. The doctor said I must be working up to one last big one and I'm like oh great. Just bring it on already! At 12am here it came and the baby was officially born at 12:01am. She was just waiting out those last few minutes to get a 4 in her birthday. That's our theory. That made me pretty mad at the time, but I've since forgiven her. :) They put her on my chest and I think I Was mostly feeling a sense of disbelief. This living breathing thing really came out of my belly?! They took her to be weighed and measured and cleaned up a little and Sean went with her to watch and start taking pictures.

They had a little problem getting the placenta out of me. I probably wasn't helping much at that point. I was thinking, I already had a baby, leave me alone! But eventually it came out and it looked gross and all was well. The doctor said she'd done a small episiotomy on me. I never noticed, nor did I care. I also heard her as she was leaving tell the nurses there was a second degree tear. I don't know what that means. But honestly, I didn't feel any of that. Once I Was pushing what I Was feeling was a burning sensation "down there" I didn't feel a tear or a rip or a cut or stretching or any of the things you would THINK you would feel when you're trying to get an over 8 pound baby one of an area that just doesn't seem like things like that should fit!

The baby pretty much screamed through her whole bath. I guess I can't blame her, she was used to being in a warm safe tight environment and now she was naked and cold and getting water dumped on her! Strangely I had to go to the bathroom really soon after they were done with the stitches. They made me lay there for awhile and then took the IV out and helped me get up to go to the bathroom. I was moving pretty slow and was sore, but not unbearably so. They said they would bring me motrin but they must have forgotten because I didn't get any until I Was in the regular hospital room about 10 hours later. I never would have asked for it, though. Had they not said I really should take it I wouldn't have bothered.

As for the baby, it wasn't an instant burst into tears type of moment. I think I was more in a haze of disbelief. I've loved her since we first found out about her, but that intense motherly love feeling came later on. At first I was just glad she was out! As I've said a dozen times by now, I just didn't care about anything more! But I find now that each time I see her that love grows more and more. It's fascinating all of the details she has, I mean, eyelashes and fingernails and dark hair on her head. Just from hanging out in my belly for a few months? That's pretty amazing!

So, what's the verdict?! Will I have another baby? I can't say that I will. I can't say that I won't. I just know that this one is enough for now! But to get her, I would do it all over again. And from the horror stories others just LOVE to tell pregnant people, I had a really easy labor and delivery. I really never felt like I needed the drugs they offer. It was fast, to the point, no complications, straight forward. It wasn't the most fun I've ever had in my life but it wasn't horribly awful like I stayed awake some nights imagining. She went easy on me! Or perhaps as they always say, I have already started to forget it all. That's why I wanted to write down as much as I could remember now! People would ask, do you enjoy being pregnant? Um, no! I don't enjoy going to the bathroom every 30 minutes and having to rock myself in just the right way to try to get up from bed. I don't enjoy following my belly around and feeling very tired all the time. But I have to say, I pretty much enjoy everything about this baby! She sometimes eats EVERY hour. All through the night. My mom says you've got to be exhausted! Sometimes I am. But like in labor and delivery, I just don't care! I'll do this as long as she needs it to be done. Nothing else matters anymore.

Thus ends the story of Kaelyn's labor and delivery. I am happy to be able to tell a positive story. Like I Said, people tend to like telling their labor horror stories to pregnant ladies. That's not very nice. Save it for AFTER I have the baby, would you? They didn't! :) So if I can reassure someone sometime that the experience is different for everyone and it doesn't have to be a horrible awful ordeal, then I will!

Just a Mom

My name is Brooke. I used to be a radio personality. I used to make radio commercials locally. My voice used to be on commercials all over the country. I used to write copy for businesses. I used to create audio drama for the ears. I used to make feature length radio programs. I used to arrange promotional events.

And now I'm just a mom.

Now I feed the baby. Change the baby. Play with the baby. Repeat.

JUST a mom?!

Now I'm the first thing my daughter sees in the morning. Now I'm the one who fills her empty stomach. I'm the one who gets out the second washcloth at bathtime because she's chewing on the first one. I'm the one lets her smear cereal into her hair and behind her ears AFTER bathtime. I'm the one who plays with EVERY toy she has at LEAST three times a day. And then starts over with the first one yet again. I'm the one who changes the major diaper that seems to have blown up her back and around the corner. And I'm the one she looks at with pure joy. I'm the one whose shoulder she lays her head on when she gets sleepy. I'm the one she screams at when she sees something she finds funny. I'm the one who rocks her to sleep at night.

Yep, I'm just a mom. And I'm okay with that.

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My name is Brooke and my daughter Kaelyn was born on April 24th, 2009. I absolutely love to write and since her birth I haven't had much time for anything other than emails. Now that I have a daughter I find the only thing I have to write about is her and my experiences with her. So I thought I'd create a blog to share the parenting experience with others. And someday maybe Kaelyn can read these posts and see what she has put me through!

Everyone always told me how hard being a mother would be. But no one was able to prove what it would actually feel like. The way your heart breaks when you hear your baby scream when she hits her head. The way you rush to her side at the first whimper. The idea that you would gladly lay down in front of a bus to keep her from ever feeling any pain. It's something many people say, but I don't think it's possible to TRULY understand until you're actually in the situation.

When Kaelyn was born I instantly loved her. But I get to know her better and better each day. And with that my love only grows. I never had a clue that I could love someone this much. Of course, I love my husband, but that's a different kind of love. I CHOOSE to love my husband. I GAVE my husband my heart. With my daughter there IS no choice. She IS my heart. It doesn't matter what she does or where she ends up. She will always have my love.

This blog with be a love story for Kaelyn. The good times and the bad. The times when she's the cutest and the times when she frustrates me so much I want to pull my hair out. The best advice I've received is to keep in mind that these times will pass. Someday she'll grow up to be a teenager and think I'm strange just like any other teenager thinks of their parents. So treasure these times as much as possible. Even at 3am when she's all eyes, cooing happily as if it's noon.

To all parents out there, I now understand all you do and have done for your kids. So thank you...I feel your pain...I feel your joy. There's nothing like it and I wouldn't trade it for the world.