My body has changed...

We finally introduced Emma to a bottle, so that I could have a tiny bit of mommy time when Danny comes home from work. He'll get home and I'll pump a few ounces, I'll get on the bike, ride for 10 minutes (that's all I can do to start out with, I haven't been to a gym since 2008... and haven't worked out since about May 2009) stretch, and take a shower.

As I stood in the bathroom looking in the foggy mirror, I realized everything had changed. Since I got over my awkward phase, I'd considered myself a good looking woman since college. Though there were things I always wanted to improve, like my arms or my abs, I was overall very happy with the way that I looked. Staring back at me now is a different person. Face a little rounder, giant breasts streaked with bright purple stretch marks, a dark line running down the center of my stomach along with a handful of purple and red stretch marks, sagging skin and a stretched out belly button, love handles that make the fluffiest muffin top you've seen...
But it's ok. I will get some of my body back, it will take time but it will come. And I am still beautiful.. in a different way. A mommy kind of way.
I know not to obsess over these things, especially in front of Emma. I would hate to be that example: the "I'm not good enough" example. 
I stared into my own eyes, and braided my hair. Yes, I braid my hair again, just like when I was younger... it's simple and keeps everything out of  the way for my all important mom duties. I put on a pair of too tight sweat pants, a regular now-a-days, and grabbed yet another nursing tank top from the pile of clean laundry and pulled it on. As I picked off the pink fuzz left behind by my sweet child's blankets, I smile... Danny and I have always hated lint... but the fuzzy pink balls that stick to everything we wear don't seem to matter. I'm a mom. With big beautiful blue eyes, blonde hair that will always fit into a pony tail holder, and a heart that belongs to my amazing daughter.

3 Weeks Down!

I am not "fully" recovered but I'm getting there!!

I can pee without numbing, the biggest plus. And I have feeling in my bladder again. (did I mention that last time? That you lose feeling in your bladder after a vaginal delivery?  you do, and you have to remember to go pee... imagine having to remind yourself to breathe.... kind of similar.)

I'm off the motrin, I'm off tylenol, I'm off of all the drugs! YES!! And Emma is doing great. Breastfeeding is going great, it still stings sometimes and sometimes things get a little raw, especially after that three week growth spurt talk about ouch. But now that she's over 3 weeks old we were able to introduce her to a bottle, and pumping hurts much less than a tugging baby. So I get one break each day when Danny comes home from work and can give her a bottle, and I am free to do my own thing, like shower or ride the bike. WOhoo!

I am still fat, but that'll take time and that's ok, it took 9 months to gain all this body fat and extra skin, it'll take a little while to put it all back where it belongs. I've lost about 13 pounds I think.. and am kind of at a stand still on that number. I can't wait to get under 140, I'm stuck at 142 and have been for over a week. But I can start adding in 30 minutes of slow peddling on the bike 2 to 3 times a week now that Lochia seems to be just about over.

Over all, recovery is going very well. Can't wait for my checkup to get the green light on resuming normal activity and pumping up workouts to a higher level.

Here's a cute Emma face just to top off the post, we call this her monkey face, and it makes us laugh every time she does it!

Recovery - week 1 & 2

The things you don't hear much about...

1. Tearing and healing from it
2. Afterbirth pains
3. Anxiety

The tears are still healing, and could take up to 6 weeks to fully heal. I'm pretty sore but thankfully have this magical gel that numbs the heck out of everything.
After giving birth, you have what is referred to as Afterbirth. The first time standing up after giving birth is a trip - it literally feels like your entire contents of your body - all organs and everything, are going to fall right out of your behind. There is so much pressure it catches you off guard. No one ever mentioned this to me before... I was not expecting it.
Then there are the pains that are associated with this. I feel like I've been on the worst period of my life for two weeks now. Motrin is my only way to escape the pain, though the doctors offered much stronger medicines to cope with this - codine, percocet, etc. I decided that I wanted to keep my baby away from narcotics. I felt bad even taking the motrin, after avoiding everything during pregnancy and child birth - I never even took a tylenol. But as Danny put it, I have someone who depends on me now, and if I'm in too much pain to walk around without my legs shaking, I can't take care of her in the perfectly loving way that I want to.

Today I tried to wean myself off the Motrin, as I had been feeling very good the past two days. However as soon as the build up of medicine cleared my system (about 24 hours or so) my legs started to shake again and the pain made me claim my reclining throne. Luckily Em is sleeping so I have some time to let the Motrin I just took set in a bit before I have to go get her again. And it makes me feel better that Motrin is considered "safe" during breast feeding though... I wish I could avoid it all together.
I also "pulled a muscle" so to speak down there, so I'm sure that contributes to the amount of pain.

We have been so blessed that Danny has time off of work to help me, and that his parents have come to help as well. I haven't had to make dinner (or breakfast or lunch) since I had Emma, and I'm so thankful that I don't have to do anything. Learning to breastfeed exclusively and trying to keep myself alive on a small amount of sleep is pretty exhausting, but I love every moment of it.

I love being a mom. It is the greatest gift in the world, and I know Emma already knows me!! And Danny, too! When no one can calm her cries, one of us can take her and she'll calm immediately. I just love that.
With being a new mom comes anxiety though. Danny and I talk about our fears, irrational or not, it is so scary. I'm so afraid of doing something wrong and losing my daughter. I can't sleep some nights because I have to check to make sure she's still breathing. She sleeps on my chest most of the night, and in the morning she sleeps on Danny. Last night she spent a whole 2 hours on her own in her rocker, but the anxiety made me crazy, every time she whimpered in her sleep I wanted to pick her back up. Then, I didn't know what was wrong with her when she did wake up and cry, because it was a cry I hadn't heard before. (I know her distinct cries, "I'm Cold" "Hold Me" "I'm Hungry" "Change my Diaper") It scared me and when I was holding her, her skin felt hot, and I thought she might be running a fever. She wouldn't eat and I was just so scared that she was sick already, I kept running through how she could have picked something up, was it because we let Atreus sniff her? Did someone not wash their hands? Did someone at Danny's work have an illness?(we went to his office earlier that day)... It turned out she was just hot. As soon as we opened the window and turned on the fan, she was fine and slept soundly for another 3-4 hours. So now I know what the "I'm Hot" cry sounds like.
I'm also scared of her belly button. I know, it sounds crazy. But it was bleeding the other day and I didn't know what to do, it was only a very small amount of blood but I don't have an umbilical cord stuck to me so I didn't know what to expect. I can't wait for it to fall off so I can stop avoiding it. I'm scared of hurting her! She's so precious. I love everything about her.

Emma Rose Madison's Birth Story

Emma Rose Madison’s Birth Story

There are so many details that I cannot clearly remember, but I will do my best, inserting memories given to me by those who were present at her birth.

Saturday (March 5^th) I woke up with terrible pains. My back hurt and my lower abdomen was cramped up. Danny and I decided to kind of take it easy that day, and stayed home and watched way too many hours of television together on the couch. That night Danny wanted to go out to get an external hard drive to put photos on to make room for pictures of Emma on the computers. We went into town and ate dinner together, and after shopping decided to take a walk to try and see if anything started happening. It was raining and really cold out, so we walked around Wal-mart for a while, up and down every isle and around the store. I started to have some contractions and was really uncomfortable so we headed home, and went straight to bed. The contractions continued but were fairly mild so I was able to go to sleep.

At 4:30am Sunday morning, I woke up to a pretty intense contraction. I fell back asleep, and had another one, and another one, and at 5am I decided to start timing them. They were 10 minutes apart, lasting for 90 seconds each. They were slow to peak and quick to end after the peak. At 7:20am I decided I was in quite enough pain to get into the bath tub. The warmth made the pain feel much much less intense, though I still had to “moan” through the high part of a contraction. (moaning is a technique many women use to release pain with contractions.) Danny woke up to the sound and came looking for me, and asked what was wrong, and I said, “I’m pretty sure… I’m in labor.” I told him not to get excited, while this was much more intense and painful than any other time I had been “in labor” that I didn’t want to get excited if nothing were to happen.

After my bath I got into bed, trying to fall asleep between contractions, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t relax enough to let myself sleep. For the next 12-13 hours, contractions continued to last for 90 seconds and were 8-9 minutes apart. I got up to use the restroom at one point, and lost my mucus plug. Just after the plug passed, contractions shot down to 5 minutes apart and were much more intense. They still lasted about 90 seconds each, but peaked almost immediately and stayed strong and slowly faded. Danny suggested walking around, so I started to walk around downstairs, leaning on whatever I could grab on to during contractions. I could walk through only a few of them, but it was exhausting, and I ended up lying back down.

Around 11pm, I was sitting on the toilet laboring, not wanting to move or do anything, when Danny brought me some pants and shoes and put me in the car to go to the hospital. This process of moving me took nearly an hour. On the way to the hospital contractions got closer together and lasted much longer. I had very little time between contractions to breathe. We got to the hospital and Danny had to find a wheel chair for me, and I got scared being in the car on my own, and was having a very long contraction and I panicked, and felt like it was time to have the baby (in retrospect it was probably just stress)

Finally we made it up to the Labor and Delivery department. They kept asking me to pee and I kept telling them I couldn’t. Danny kept trying to get them to read my birth plan. I was so concentrated on getting through each contraction that I didn’t have enough will power to tell them what I wanted. They put me in the delivery room and took off my pants, and put a hospital gown on me, sat me on the bed and told me they were going to check my cervix and I told them “NO NO NO!!” but they did it anyway, and DURING A CONTRACTION none the less!! The stupid nurse couldn’t “find” my cervix, and they had to bring someone else in to do it again!!! Then, even after saying, “Don’t tell me” they said “well you’re only two centimeters dilated. You’ve been doing this for 19 hours?” then they asked me to sign a consent to use an epidural and pitocin, which thankfully I was paying enough attention to refuse, and then they had me sign all of these other forms while I was contracting. Since I didn’t want IV fluid, they only put a saline lock in place and the nurse putting the lock in kept telling me that I needed to calm down and breathe (I was still contracting, I’m telling you the stress made my contractions go nuts). I wanted to throw things at her for telling me that. She kept saying it over and over again, “you need to breathe!”

FINALLY SOMEONE READ OUR BIRTH PLAN, and everyone left the room. They only came in once an hour to take my blood pressure and monitor the baby during one contraction. That’s the only way that I knew time was passing, was because before I could get a grip on anything, they would be back checking on me.

I don’t know how far apart my contractions were for the most part, but after I got in the shower they increased in length. I was having two, three, four minute long contractions, many with double and triple peaks. I kept hearing Andrea say “wow was that a 3 minute contraction?” and “was that double peaking or was that more than one?” none of this I could answer, and I didn’t want to talk at all. After an hour in the shower I had to go back to the bed to monitor the baby again. I remember the nurse making it easy and letting me sit and lean forward while she simply held the monitor to my belly rather than strapping me down.

Now things start getting fuzzy. I can’t remember too much, but I do remember the pain. And the length of contractions. And since they were keeping track on my iphone I could go back and see transition: One 7 minute long contraction, with only a minute break, and then a 19 minute, 6 seconds long contraction with peaks and valleys but no breaks. I was at this point begging for help. I wanted something. I didn’t want an epidural I knew that, but I wanted something for pain. I was begging for it, I stared at my husband’s eyes and begged him for help, I wanted it to stop, it wasn’t fair this contraction was never ending. It had brought me to tears and threw me over the edge of sanity. Finally, the contraction stopped. And I had an amazing 5 minute break.

Andrea and Danny convinced me that Emma needed to drop, and that I should get up and sway. We went into the bathroom so I could pee I think. The nurse brought me apple juice. I loved it, the sugar in the apple juice was amazing, it tasted like heaven. I’ve never enjoyed apple juice so much in my entire life.

I stood in the bathroom, hovered over the sink, while Danny pushed my hips so they would rock back and forth. I remember that with each contraction, I could feel something… my waters were leaking, slowly but they were leaking. I had 5 or 6 minutes between contractions, it was so nice to have a small break between them, and they weren’t as intense as they had been prior, though still horrible. At one point I started throwing up with each contraction, I lost all that apple juice. I didn’t feel sick though, and it actually didn’t bother me to throw up, and I could feel it actually push the baby down.

Then, finally, I said “Uh oh… I HAVE TO POOP!” and sat on the toilet. Andrea told me that if I needed to poop, I probably needed to push. After a minute (or who knows how long) I made my way back to the bed. I was too exhausted to push standing or squatting, I just didn’t have enough energy. Thankfully I had a breakaway bed, though I don’t know how well I used it.

It was still just us, Andrea told me that I could push (even though the doctor wasn’t there) so I did. She coached me on how to push, to keep the air in and not let any power out by exhaling during a push. Still 5 and 6 minutes between contractions, I was able to rest between pushes. A nurse came in to monitor the baby, and I had a pushing contraction. I lifted the blanket and felt something with my hand, and I said “THE BABY IS COMING!!!!!!!!!!!” and the nurse checked, it wasn’t the baby’s head, but my bag of waters.

They told me to stop pushing (though I didn’t want to, that was really hard, my body tried to take over and do it for me). The doctor came in and some stuff happened and suddenly there were a million people staring at my crotch waiting for something to happen. He was anxious, and didn’t seem to like that I had such a long time between pushing contractions. I pushed and pushed, but I didn’t feel like anything was happening, and the bag of waters was still not bursting. He, during a push, PUSHED BACK on my bag of waters!! I think I almost bit his head off when I told him not to touch it, because after that he left and he didn’t come back. A midwife intern came in, and though I never felt my water break I guess it did eventually, it all felt the same, the head, the bag of waters, I thought I was still pushing on the bag of waters when they said her head was coming out and to look down! I looked, and could see black hair. At this point, I couldn’t push any longer, and started to fall asleep during my 5-6 minute break. I felt another contraction coming on, I kept telling myself “I’m not going to push with this one, I’m too tired, I can’t, I’m just going to rest and let this one pass” but my body said “heck no” and pushed for me. And kept pushing.

It burned, I felt like I was on fire and everyone was telling me to push through the pain, and I did just that. I wanted that burn to go away and I knew the only way to make it stop was to get the rest of her head out. I pushed so hard and I pushed with all my might and strength, and then kept pushing some more. Finally her head was out, and I could see the midwife intern pulling the umbilical cord, I could see Emma’s chest, and then her tummy, and then finally her legs, and they said “pull her out mom! Pull her up!” and I tried to reach for my baby but there was no strength left. There was nothing left in me. And all I could say was “I can’t!” with tears in my eyes. I wanted to hold her but I couldn’t reach down and lift her up. So they did it for me, and lay her on my belly.

Immediately after giving birth, thirst hit me like a freight train. Danny fed me ice chips, and it felt so good to have something to swallow. I was so thirsty!

I don’t remember much about the next few minutes, my first moments with my baby, I don’t remember. But we have it on video!! They soon took Emma from me and while they fixed her lungs (her breathing sounded like she was half way under water) I watched the midwife wait for my placenta. She tugged a little on the cord but I told her not to, that I could deliver it, and I did. Much easier than delivering the baby, that’s for sure!

I had two stitches put in, as I had a 2^nd degree tear. The stitches weren’t bad, the shots of local anesthesia weren’t really painful, but the rest of the exam was really painful. A different kind of pain than giving birth. They had to check everything, I had torn in many places, and had I had an epidural they informed me that I would have had several more stitches, but that it would be far too painful a procedure to do on someone without that kind of pain relief. I didn’t want to be holding Emma while they stitched me, because I didn’t want her to feel my stress, so I was ok with them taking her to weigh her and measure. She was 5lbs 9oz, 19 inches long. She was very alert and they told me you could see the difference in her compared to medicated babies. After everyone had left the room, Emma was able to calm down and nurse.  She’s been a feeding champ ever since. And she is my heart.

After 37+ hours of labor, and who knows how many hours of pushing, my miracle baby finally came to us. 3 years of trying, and waiting, she was worth the wait.

I still don’t feel like I ever want to give birth again. Thinking about labor makes me want to cry. Having had lasted so long was like torture. I thought it would never end. I know I would do it again in a heart beat if I had a shorter labor, but that 30 hours was the most difficult of my life. Delivery was cake compared to the labor and if it was just that part of it I’d do it a million times. I’m so glad that I was able to give that to my baby though: a natural, unmedicated arrival to this world. I love her.

40 Weeks

Birth story will be posted when I have a chance to write it. But in keeping with the blog, here is my 40 weeks photo and weight.
Weight: 148 (lots, and lots, of swelling. I didn't even lose as much as Emma weighs after birthing her!)

39 Weeks

The last week of my pregnancy.

We are excited and nervous. This has been the hardest week. Pain, more pain, and a little more pain accompanied by stress and no sleep. I'm looking forward to meeting my baby girl.

Complications suggest we may be induced tomorrow. This could be my very last maternity photograph during this pregnancy with Emma.

I love you all and thank each and every reader for all of the support that was lent to me during this pregnancy. In the end I'm thankful for the journey and can't wait to meet my little miracle.

Weight: 155
Waist: 40 inches