doula

Today I hired a doula (a birth attendant). Doulas are tough to locate around here - they don't advertise - but I found out about this woman through a friend.

I interviewed her back in November and then couldn't decide if I should hire her or if I should go with someone my midwife had already worked with. In the end I chose her because she came highly recommended by my friend, plus she is a certified paramedic.

My midwife really wanted me to have a doula, particularly because I am planning a home birth. Midwife is really non-interventionist, low-key, and no pressure - so if she said I should have one, I thought I should do it.

Research backed up my choice. Apparently the rate of medical intervention (drugs, c-section, etc.) dips significantly when a doula is present at a birth.

DH is highly relieved about having her at the birth. Part of her job will be to keep him calm, to help him help me, and to let him know when things are going well even when I seem crazy. And if he can't make it back in time for the birth, he can rest a bit easier knowing that I'll have two midwives and a paramedic with me.

another infertile

Just found out that one of my nieces is going through infertility. It hasn't been going on all that long - they've finished the one year of trying with no results - but we all know what it's like for IF'ers around the holidays, particularly when she had to see her SIL and me heavily pregnant.

It should go without saying that my heart ached at this news.

DH and I are thinking of sharing our story with her. Just not sure.

more clothes shopping (yuck!)

If I thought maternity clothes were bad... holy cow, is nursing wear ever 100 times worse. I know I don't need clothes, other than a bra, that pertain specifically to nursing but I want to make breastfeeding as easy and anxiety-free as possible.

All I wanted were two nursing tank tops. I figured I could wear them underneath a lot of my jackets and cardigans.

Well they are stupid and expensive. They don't even fit correctly: the liners are cut bigger than the actual tops and so the fit is all bunchy and awkward.

I did buy one decent tank but that's it. I'll figure something else out!

______________________

DH says baby is starting to drop. All I know is that walking, in general, is often beyond my capability right now!

Oh my goodness, so much to get ready! I haven’t packed a hospital bag or finished prep for a homebirth. I ran around for the last 2 hours getting things together. Must do school work tomorrow. I estimate that I have 22 hours of paperwork left – on top of regular teaching duties – before I can really and truly be on maternity leave.

accoutrements for baby bums

I want to use cloth diapers – although I’ve purchased a week’s worth of organic cotton disposables – but I have been overwhelmed by the choices. I grew up with cloth diapers but that was the age of flat rectangular pieces of cotton, pins, and icky rubber pants. Now, apparently, there are many choices: all-in-ones, all-in-twos, flats, foldeds, fitteds, wool, bamboo, hemp, cotton, Snappis, and the list goes on.

What do I need? I don’t know what to get. Cloth diapers and all their accoutrements are really hard to find in my area, surprisingly, and so I can’t see much of it before I order it online. As well, I don’t want to blow hundreds of dollars on the initial supply, in case I don’t like something. Another factor is that the system has to be easy for DH to use, otherwise he’ll be a pain about it.

I’m also fussy about what I want to put on my baby’s butt. Namely because of my fear of chemicals. With a DH whose sperm are shit and with my PCOS (for all I know could be sensitive to chemical exposure), I really want to put only natural things on Ninja’s skin so as to hopefully put him or her on the path of normal and angst-free fertility. This includes avoiding products made with PUL (which makes things waterproof) because I don’t think that’s safe to use on a baby, but this choice rules out many options, including all-in-one diapers. But that is okay.

So far, I’ve bought (mostly on Ebay):
2 small fitted bamboo diapers
6 used organic cotton one-size diapers
3 Mother-ease cotton one-size diapers, plus 3 snap-in liners
12 bamboo doublers
One small wool cover

Within the next week, I need to get (mostly from the web site Parenthood by Nature):
lanolin and wool wash
nylon wet bag
1 one-size wool cover
1 or 2 small Bumgenius classic covers
24 small organic cotton prefolds (which I’ll use as burp cloths, too, as well as doublers in the future)
1 Snappi

And eventually I’ll buy 15+ more one-size diapers (unless I decide that I really like prefolds), medium and large wool and nylon covers, and a diaper sprayer. MIL says she’ll make one of the wool soakers – she was excited to hear that I’m going old-school on that.

Is this enough? Am I missing or forgetting anything? Is there anything I don’t need?

Wow, who knew this would be so complicated? And expensive. But it will save us a lot of cash in the long run. It’s good for the earth and good for baby's skin. And when Ninja grows up I’ll be able to sell the stash for a good price, considering what I’ve seen being sold on Ebay.

_____________________

DH bought me a car today. That’s exciting.

It’s an older vehicle in great shape. I don’t care what it looks like as long as it gets me around.
It’s impossible to get by here without a vehicle – there’s no transit system and most things are not within walking distance, plus the weather for ¾ of the year precludes the possibility of cycling – but I’ve been getting by without one. I was worried about how to tote baby around, particularly when DH goes away to work for weeks at a time, but now I can rest a bit easier.

37 weeks

37 weeks!

Baby is full term today.

He’s snug in my uterus and definitely had a good time at Christmas – he stayed awake almost all day for three days in a row! Kicking, pummelling my cervix, twisting, shaking his head, getting the hiccups, jamming his butt into my lungs and over my ribs. Yikes!

Made up with my parents, for the most part. They’ll never really understand what went wrong but it’s ok – I’ll get over it. I don't hold grudges. As for my brother and SIL, I think I’ll just drop it. I love them but they are emotionally on the young-ish side.

Thanks to all who commented on the situation with my AWOL brother. The consensus was not to tell my parents about that grandchild and I agree. They will find out eventually - I'm guessing within a year because bro is on FB with his new name and I know at least one aunt who is aware of his name - but I don't want to be the one to share the news.

Crazy, how much the baby looks like my mom. I wish I could keep her from finding out.

do labour patterns run in families?

Mom says I arrived a week early. Yikes!

surprise, i'm an aunt

As you may have figured out by now, I'm writing posts at home - where I'm internet-less - and publishing them here whenever I get public internet access. I'm behind in posting - entries are written but I don't want to flood you - but I have to write this particular post in real time.

I just found out that I'm an aunt. My long-lost brother's longtime girlfriend, M, had a baby in May. Exactly in the middle of my POAS and beta hell. The same time I sat frozen on the couch, bursting into tears every 2 minutes.

My brother is younger than I am and he has been AWOL for years. He's changed his name and everything.

I'm sure no one in the family knows this information except for me. The only reason I discovered it is because of accidental Facebook (yeah, you know it) reconnaissance. In this small world in which we live, M's family and DH have mutual acquaintances. I was on the FB of one of the mutual friends - I adore her - and saw that M's mom (don't even know how I remember her name) was one of her friends.

Out of curiosity I clicked on the public profile. I saw references to a 'first granddaughter' - who looked suspiciously like my brother and my dad's side of the family - and as I scrolled down, I realized that the pictures of a beautiful 7-month-old girl I was seeing was my niece.

I don't know what to say. I feel devastated for so many reasons, some of which are irrational and selfish, I know, but this is the nature of infertility:

a) I have a gorgeous seven-month-old niece whom I've never met. And brother would prefer that we don't know about her.

b) My parents don't know that they are already grandparents.

c) Our other brother doesn't know that he's already an uncle.

d) I am madly jealous. I can't begin to explain how I feel about this. I tried so hard for so long to get pregnant. First my other SIL gets pregnant accidentally and doesn't even know about it for four months (she's due in spring). Then I find out that my youngest brother already has a kid (and I promise you it was easy for them - yes I know I shouldn't make assumptions but, believe me, this is true). It's been a big deal for my parents to finally become grandparents; I thought I had this honour, after so much sweat and tears, but my idiot brother (and he really is an idiot for reasons I won't get into here) beat me to the punch.

e) Just about everyone involved is not getting along, except for other brother/wife and parents.

This would be too much for me to deal with. If I had found out about this baby when I was enduring IVF #1, a miscarriage, a failed FET, and then IVF #2... I don't know what I would have done. And if this last round of ART had failed, or if I had miscarried, I would be jumping off the ledge right about now, what with my other brother's impending arrival, as well. At the very least, I know that at the end of my teaching contract I would have moved permanently to the other side of the world.

On top of all this, I've been arguing with my parents over e-mail. Still over that stupid stuff that went down last summer. They're saying the most ridiculous things. They want to talk in person so I had said they could come over tonight as long as they weren't going to drag up things that happened 5 or 10 years ago.

This is a Family Day Nightmare Before Christmas.

As well, I don't know if I should tell anyone. I'll definitely tell DH because he'll want to know why I look unhappy. But I don't want to say anything to my parents or brother/SIL. First, I don't want to be the deliverer of that kind of news. Second, I want to have the first grandchild - the one who's there in person. If my parents know about the 'real' first grandchild, they'll be sad. Seeing my baby will remind them of the baby they don't know. (I'm surprised that I still care about their feelings when all they've shown me lately is a cavalier attitude.)

Is it selfish of me to want to keep my baby's birth a happy event? After all DH and I went through to get him here?

Yes, I sound jealous and bitter and ugly. That's what IF can do to a person. It never really goes away.

All I can think now is: what if something goes wrong with Ninja? How would I ever live?

My heart goes out to those of you who are still fighting that demon IF and who also have to cope with siblings having offspring. xxx

36 weeks

36 weeks! I’m nine months pregnant.

The midwife came to my house today. (She wanted to check out the place because we’re planning a home birth.) All was well. It was an eminently civilized medical appointment – we had tea together and I folded laundry as we were talking. From now until birth I will have weekly appointments with her.

Must remember to get car seat base installed. In one week the baby will be considered full term and so we need to get that together. DH will HATE having that base in the truck but he’ll have to get over it.

boring list of symptoms

More and more pregnancy-related side effects are kicking in. It’s all very interesting (to me). Please skip this post if it bores you (and trust me, it is boring) or if you’re feeling sensitive. I’m keeping this list primarily on the chance that I ever get pregnant again because I’m sure I’ll want to compare that situation with the current one.

-I’ve started having cm again and at least once a day for the last 3 days it has looked like ewcm
-for the last month I’ve been ‘leaking’ down there – ewwwww
-I’ve leaked colostrum once and can express it from time to time (I just have to see how it works!)
-a little bit of cramping in the last few weeks – midwife assures me I’m having regular toning contractions but I don’t feel them
-a few months ago I noticed that my nips have developed a brown ring around the rims (including several birthmarks) which looks hilarious
-I get ‘lightning boob’ a few times/week
-no stretch marks yet
-belly button is popping out
-hugely swollen ankles – but they do not hurt
-squishy and swollen feet – none of my shoes fit, nor do my socks!
-hands are mildly swollen and they hurt every morning
-I’m warm even when my students complain that the classroom is cold
-four of my birthmarks have grown exponentially since I got pregnant and I look forward to having them removed
-lots of fine golden hair on my belly
-haven’t gained an absurd amount of weight – I think I’m right on track
-my hair and nails have not grown faster or thicker
-pelvis feels very loose and sore; at night it feels as though it’s going to fall to pieces – it’s so unstable I can’t even roll over in bed
-most of my muscles and joints are sore; paradoxically, I could swear that I feel the pregnancy hormone relaxin kick in periodically because suddenly my joints all get warm and loose – it’s as though I’ve just downed two glasses of wine!
-am often out of breath for no good reason
-eyes are blurry occasionally
-had just the one episode of acid reflux, so far
-on occasion, bleeding gums after I brush and floss
-sleep is becoming harder and harder to get – every night I have to get up a few times to go to the bathroom and to drink water – fortunately, I’m starting to be able to go back to sleep after these awakenings (have never before been able to do this and so I’m glad it’s happening before the baby comes so that I get used to falling back asleep after night-time feedings)
-abdomen is not at all uncomfortable except for night-time when it really, really hurts to roll over (why just at night? I don’t get it) – and I can still bend over to pick things off the floor
-bm’s have slowed down since spring but I’m not constipated
-in the last 3 days I’ve been hungry shortly after I eat a meal (yikes, as though Ninja needs to go on a growth spurt?)
-after a five- or six-month absence, my sex drive has returned
-have a severe case of the dropsies – oh man, I’m klutzy lately!
-acne is getting better, though it still shows up in funny places!
-starting a few days ago, I’ve been needing a nap every day
-my nose is often stuffed, especially in the evenings
-haven’t really been sick – I had 2 or 3 uber-mild colds in September but, after that, nothing
-cravings – I wouldn’t say I’m having cravings but I am still eating a lot more sweets than normal (I guess it is Christmas, though…)
-my sciatic was bugging me in the first part of the third tri but I haven’t really felt it since

And, of course, my belly is huge! I look ready to tip over, only my fat ankles are keeping me grounded!

Funny thing is that I’m only now just starting to feel pregnant. None of the pregnancy symptoms I’ve listed are overwhelming. Most of them are subtle and they come and go. Right now I’m sitting on my comfy chair in my living room and I don’t feel remotely pregnant, though I will when I try to get up and my pelvis starts grumbling and the baby kicks me in annoyance and I realize I can’t see my feet!

DH asked me a cute question today: “How come you’re not taking any pictures of yourself? You should. You look great.” I guess I’ll take one tomorrow to celebrate hitting 36 weeks. (Wow, 36 weeks!)

preemptive cooking

That so-called ‘nesting urge’ is kicking in. I never believed in it until now. I’ve been giving DH supreme crap about our messy house and so we spent half the day cleaning. DH even washed the floors. He’s a good man.

I’ve started making meals to freeze for next month. I don’t want to have to cook for at least four weeks because I want to focus on the baby. I know people will bring us food but I need to be sure of a full freezer. I’m on holidays, anyway, and so I might as well use the time doing something besides marking final exams and doing report cards.

My goal for this task is to have ready a variety of food that has sufficient protein content (because I’m not a huge fan of meat) and that contains a lot of vegetables and fibre.

Breakfast dishes: eggs on English muffins, baked oatmeal, and a few other things. Heavier than what I usually eat.
Lunches: vegetable soups, spaghetti with a veggie-heavy sauce, and leftovers from dinner.
Suppers: southwestern meatloaf, taco soup, lasagna, green chile/chicken soup, turkey dinners, fish, chicken, enchiladas, pizza buns, and a few other odds and ends.
Snacks: bran muffins, banana bread, pigs in a blanket.

This ‘preemptive cooking,’ as I call it, means that our grocery bill is through the roof. (Particularly because I’m also stocking up on cupboard items and on such things as toilet paper and cosmetics.) It also means that I’m grumpy because I dislike cooking. But I think the relief of having a well-stocked freezer will be worth it.

now i'm smarter?

Wiseguy asked me a while ago if I did get my thesis done. Yes, for the most part (thanks for asking!).

I did have the defence – had to fly back to my university for that. (No physical complications except that my ankles swelled to enormous proportions!) The defence itself went well – although I stuttered through much of it, mainly because my external examiner is a huge name in my field – and I am so relieved to be done. Though I need to do more revisions before I can submit my final copy. My committee assures me that my thesis is publishable.

Yay for me. Another piece of paper to hang in my bathroom.

Will I end up doing a Ph.D. in the future? I never used to think so but now I’m feeling that it’s a distinct possibility. Don’t know how that would all work with a spouse and a child but DH says if I want it we will make it work. Isn’t he a great guy?

Anyway, the worst part of my trip was that the baby didn’t move much during the first day. At midnight I was panicking. I played loud music, drank cold water, poked his head, jumped around, but nothing. Finally, I decided that I’d drink half a litre of 7-Up and then if I still felt nothing, I’d head to the local ER. After I downed the soda and poked around in my abdomen, he finally woke up. And then, much to my relief, for an hour I felt his rage at being disturbed from his slumber.

Whew… I’ve never in my life been so happy not to be able to sleep.

lightning in my throat

Was up all night with heartburn and the burps. Have never experienced that before. Hope I did not have bad breath at school today! Haha.

there's a light at the end of ... my pants

Had a midwife appointment.

She wants to keep an eye on my painful hands. (My hands feel arthritic. I’ve heard that carpal tunnel syndrome can happen in pregnancy. It’s really, really strange.)

I did the strep B swab – I don’t think I could possibly get it, really, but I figured I’d veer toward the safe side – and I will get the results in a few weeks.

Baby is breech and seems quite happy in his current position. Midwife says that if he doesn’t turn in the next few weeks, she’ll have me – oh this sounds funny – stick a light down my pants every night and sit on the couch. She assures me that babies love light and so Ninja will want to move his head toward it. She says this technique works in 8 cases out of 10.

Yes, pregnancy means a complete loss of dignity! Good thing that the IVF thoroughly prepared me for this.

bugging ninja

Fought the baby in the afternoon. Man, it was funny. Ninja likes to stick his head behind and – I don’t even know how this is physiologically possible – in front of my ribcage. He was trying again today to displace my ribs. I got DH to put his hands on my belly (I wanted him to feel the reaction) while I pushed Ninja’s head down so that I could breathe. And DH got to feel the fists of fury! Hilarious.

Later, he told his mom what he did and she wasn’t happy with him. She lectured him to leave the baby alone!

That night, DH looked at my belly and his face melted all over the floor.

“It’s really amazing, isn’t it,” he said.

I nodded and replied, “And pregnancy’s been a hundred times better than anyone ever said it would be.”

DH turned glum and said, “That’s because the worst part is yet to come – when he’s a teenager. If he’s anything like how I was . . . ”

Oy!

prenatal class

I keep forgetting to mention that we did end up having a prenatal class. You may recall that it had been cancelled but our district made an effort to provide at least a condensed class. Much to DH’s joy. Haha.

I must say it was a waste of time, at least for me. I’ve been reading a ton of books and asking other mothers for advice – and I watched The Business of Being Born – and so I feel that that’s as prepared as I can get. How ‘prepared’ can you get for such a hugely momentous event, anyway?

DH needed the class, though. He’s in panic about labour and delivery. He’s a farmboy and so it’s not as though he hasn’t seen animals being born but he says that that is different than witnessing his wife giving birth. He has avoided coming into contact with any information about what’s normal about human birth. It was good for him, then, to see the birth videos the nurse popped into the DVD player! He turned white – which he denies – but at least now he has seen women giving birth normally in positions that do not involve lying flat on one’s back.

I was surprised to see that, of the 14 or so couples present at the class, we and another couple were the only ones going with a midwife. I don’t know if the other couples are using doctors because they want to or because they couldn’t get a midwife or because they didn’t know they had the option of working with a midwife. I feel so happy to have my midwife.

u/s

I broke down and had the local ultrasound. Despite my annoyance at the hospital’s dumb and archaic rules (e.g., no telling sex, no partners in the room until the end), I wanted to know if Ninja has anything going on that might interfere with breastfeeding, such as a cleft palate. If it weren’t for that, I would’ve been fine with refusing an ultrasound altogether.

Fortunately, the tech was not as bad as I was led to believe. She was nice. But DH and I were not allowed to view any of the measurements and tests. So I lay there quietly as Ninja tried to escape the u/s wand by hiding under my ribs. (Whoa, that feels weird!) I did get to see the babe’s face, though, when I got up to empty my bladder – I looked at the screen as I was getting back onto the bed. All I thought was: my, what a chubby baby!

Finally, DH was called into the room and the tech pointed the screen toward us. First shot was Ninja’s profile. I started laughing because he looks exactly like DH – right down to the lips and nose. DH has really distinctive lips and I’ve been teasing him that the baby will inherit this characteristic. DH said it wouldn’t happen and so when I pointed out that I was right, DH pretended to pout. (The kid's nose looks overly huge, though, which is weird!)

The tech took her time showing us fingers, toes, spine, and all that. Everything was normal and good. DH was almost frantic with excitement and kept asking the tech to point out certain things – the heart beating, the fingers curling – and to go back and show him again. It was hard to see much in detail, though, because Ninja takes up so much room in the uterus.

This was my first experience of maternal pride. Ninja got 8/8 on his first test! (In which the tech looked for things like gross motor skills, fine motor skills, practice breathing, etc.) Yes, we are proud of him already!

And I’ll tell ya: Ninja is not a small baby. He’s in the 80th percentile for weight. At 34 weeks, he is pushing 6.5 lbs and he’s got a biggish head. I’ve heard that u/s estimations of weight can be far off, though, so all I can do is laugh about it. Ninja is NOT starving in there!

I wish we could’ve found out the sex. DH did actually tell me this morning that he was ok with me knowing but I reminded him that the hospital won’t divulge that information!

34 weeks .. and finally getting the '20-week' ultrasound

34 weeks today! How strange to think that Ninja will be full term in just 3 weeks.

Think I’m starting to have contractions. A weird tightening in my abdomen, like period cramps, and I have to stop what I’m doing to focus on them. Had 2 or 3 of them yesterday.

Guess I’m not getting the ‘big city’ ultrasound, so I have to settle for one at the local hospital. It’s scheduled for Thursday. I caved because I want to know if the babe’s got any deformities, such as a cleft palate, that could interfere with breastfeeding because I’m really committed to that. Also, I want to maybe get a preview of the sex, if the technician makes an oops. DH even said we could find out the sex, that is, until I reminded him that we’re living in Hicktown, Canada, and that the tech won’t tell us!

i am an alien

So, so sore. Wow. Every muscle hurts – woke up with what felt like carpal tunnel in every ligament in my body. And feels as though I’ve been kicked 4 times in the crotch – it’s as though my pelvis is going to fall off! And my feet and ankles are so swollen, I can’t even get my feet into the ankles of my winter boots, which I sorely need right now because it is frosty outside! (I think I’m up 1.5-2 whole shoe sizes. Yikes!)

Yet my back and neck feel wonderful. I’ll take that trade-off ANY day! Overall, because my back feels so good, I still feel better now than when I did pre-pregnancy. And, to tell the truth, IVF (with the needles, dildo cams, OHSS, horrendously painful retrievals, etc.) hurt a hundred times worse than pregnancy has, at least so far. Though I just re-read my first paragraph and it looks as though I’m complaining, I’m really not. I have a detached, almost anthropological, interest in the things happening to my body because I still can’t quite believe these crazy symptoms are a result of the ‘p-word.’

Sat here – after making the first official postpartum ‘freezer meal’ – sorting through baby clothes and watching the TV show Big Love. Teenaged daughter is pregnant, decides against placing baby for adoption. Subsequently has a miscarriage: stepmom walks in on her as she cries, sitting on the toilet. Oof, I shouldn’t have watched that episode. Sat on the living room floor and cried along with her – that’s too raw for me to think about, still. I looked around at the tiny clothes around me – I know how lucky I am – I think about it every day.

my little pugilist

Today baby punched me 106 times straight in the pubic bone, every few seconds, like a metronome. It didn’t hurt but it felt very funny! DH thought that we should change the little pugilist’s name to Tyson, in honour of Mike. I said absolutely not!

baby name

I think we settled on a boy’s name. DH and I bantered back and forth via e-mail. I was supposed to make a shortlist, and then he’d choose the winners. However, though I did my part, he did not do his! I nagged him for a few weeks, and he kept giving silly excuses about why he couldn’t pick anything.

Finally I e-mailed him and said, “I think we're having a boy, and his name should be _____ _____. (Sorry, for privacy reasons, I’m not going to post it here.)

And he said “THAT’S GREAT.”

I was surprised: I was pretty sure he’d like the first name, which is traditional, but I thought he’d veto the middle name. But he didn’t!

If we have a boy, which I’m pretty sure we will, he is officially named.