She is Here!!

At 40 weeks 1 day, on Thursday 9/29/11 at 8:20 pm, little Autumn Emily arrived.  She weighed 7 pounds 12 ounces and was 18.75 inches long.  And I could not be happier.

As I crept closer and closer to my due date, I decided to talk to my dr. about how far past that date I should go.  Ivy was 8 pounds 3 ounces and the idea of going past my due date and having a baby bigger than that was a little overwhelming to me.  My dr. is very conservative and I felt he wouldn’t do the induction unless he felt it was the right thing for me.  Without any hesitation, he suggested that we schedule it for the day he would be on call at the hospital – 40 weeks and 1 day along.  I scheduled it, but with some hesitation and some hope that it wouldn’t come to that.  Most people would be thrilled with the prospect of the certainty of being done, and don’t get me wrong, I was excited about this idea, but concerned about picking her birthday and scheduling her birth before she was ready.  Hopefully she would come on her own. 

The week went by with no sign of labor, no broken water, no contractions, nothing.  My due date of 9/28 came and went, still nothing.  This lead us to 9/29 – the induction date.  The hospital was set to call me if they had something available.  At about 8:30 I got the call to come in.  Doubt crept back in and I asked if I could think about it for 5 minutes and call back.  I am sure they talked about me after we hung up, about that insane girl who was gong to think things through.  I called Greg and he said go.  I called Angie and we talked it through, at the same time we both said I should go.  It came down to me being past the due date and if any risks were going to come from something, I felt there were more if I waited than went in.  Within a few minutes the plans were set, Angie would be here within the hour to watch the kids, Greg was on his way home to get me and the hospital was expecting me around 10:00. 

We arrived and checked in, and I can say it was nice to be driving and checking in without wet pants and water dripping down my leg from my broken water with both of the other kids.  Definite bonus of this plan. 

With the kids safe with Angie and on their way to the Dr. to have a strep test done for Owen (it was positive, awesome timing), Greg and I got checked in, answered a million questions about my medical history, the birth of the other kids, and this and previous pregnancies, got the IV, started Pitocin and came to the realization that there was no turning back and within a few hours (give or take), she would be here. 

My first nurse took things really slow.  I was progressing slowly but moving along.  I had decided without a doubt that I wanted the epidural and as soon as it was possible.  In the past I held off getting it.  I have no idea why but decided I would be getting it early this time through.  BRILLIANT decision.  Getting an epidural with horrible contractions happening is awful.  Getting an epidural with minimal contractions is so much better. 

After the epidural, my dr. broke my water and a little more progress was made over the next few hours. Around 7:00 that night it was time for the nurse change, and the new nurse, Lacey, is part of the reason that I now believe going in this day was the best decision I could have made.

She started out by moving me to a new position to get things going and she turned up the Pitocin a little.  While she was reviewing the charts and the monitors the contractions started coming much faster and much sooner.  She said she was going to come back and check me in 2 hours.  That was not happening.  I told her to check then.  I had gone from a 6 to a 10 in about 25 minutes. It was time to start pushing. 

The experience at this point was totally different than the other two.  She turned down the lights and it was just her, Greg and I.  There were no rules about taking a breath and counting to ten or who was going to hold my legs or who should do what and stand where.  She just let me figure it out and do what I wanted without even saying that, she just let things happen.  With Owen I was so numb that I couldn’t feel the contractions or the pressure and had to have everyone tell me when to push and because I was so numb I didn’t know how to push.  After pushing forever he was pulled out with forceps.  With Ivy, things started happening so fast, there were suddenly a lot of people in the room.  I was told to push while someone counted to ten and always told me to do one more breath.  In between pushes everyone sat and talked to each other.  I felt a lot of pressure to do things a certain way and eventually the dr. suggested using the vacuum to get her out.  With this baby, I pushed for 40 minutes.  Most of that time was with my new favorite nurse and Greg.  There was no one talking between pushes unless I wanted to.  There was an undeniable calm in the room and a connection between Greg and I.   My dr. was there for the last three pushes and she was here.  Having my dr. and this nurse be a part of the process turned a horrible part of being pregnant for me into something totally different.  I cannot thank this nurse enough for her part in making this experience what it was.   (and I am ever so emotional today and I cannot stop the tears as I write this). 

Baby was cleaned up, weighed, measured and checked out. Greg got to hold her for about five minutes before he left to take care of the other kids and I got her to myself for a little while longer.  We both suffered through the long hospital night being checked every few hours and gladly welcomed the sun and new day. 

The new day brought on visitors and it was quickly apparent that her brother and sister could not get enough of her. We anxiously awaited our check-out time as we could not wait to bring her home and love on her more here.  We left the hospital that night around 6:00 to start our new life as a family of 5 and as that gets underway, as I mentioned above, we could not be happier. 

Birthday Baseball

My husband LOVES to play baseball.  I mean really LOVES it.  He plays on a league where they all play as though they are professionals.  So you can imagine my joy when I went to the baseball website to look up a game location and found an announcement for a great opportunity.  It was a chance to play a game at Safeco field, the home of the Mariners on my birthday.  The game would be against other players in the league, they would have use of the visitor’s locker room, a professional announcer, a concession stand open, introductions and the national anthem… all for a not so small fee. 

Who cares!  Happy early birthday present to Greg!

Yesterday was Greg’s real birthday.  It probably sucked.  He was sick, I am days away from a baby and not the nicest I have been in my life, he already got his present, he had to do the dishes and we didn’t even make a cake.  The day he turned 36 could go down as one of the worst birthdays yet.  

Hopefully the posting of his dream day will bring back the wonderful memories and we can pretend that was his birthday instead.

Oh, and p.s. Greg, I love you.  (does that help?)

Lunch

We put Owen in school two full days and three half days.  He loves the full day (although I am still trying to determine if that is a result of being able to spend the entire day with his new friend – Riley, or should I say, new girlfriend, I think he may have a small crush on her).

On his full days he gets to take lunch.  Today was a full day.  I was upstairs getting ready and heard some ruckus downstairs.  I came down to see what they were up too and found Owen making them both a lunch.  I left him to finish.

Before we left for school I opened the lunch box and found this neatly packed lunch: 

The cookies stayed home (even though I so wanted to let him take them) and every bad thing he has done lately was erased.  

And We Wait

5 days remain. 

We are to the part where everyone keeps their cell phones close by and I feel really important when everyone ALWAYS takes my call.  The part of the pregnancy where after working all day my feet look like they have been stung by bees and I can barely move my toes.  The part where I actually wear the exact same thing for two days in a row and I don’t even care or mind who saw me both days.  The part where I lost two pounds from my last dr. visit (I like that part).  The single digits, the last Friday to be pregnant, the last weekend, the last few nights that I pull the sheets off the bed with my seal like movements as I turn from side to side, the last few days of having 2 kids. 

Dr. said I was a 3 and 60% on Monday.  

5 more days and our new life begins (but I wouldn’t mind less than 5 days).

Kindergarten (take two)

We started school last week and the decision about what to do with Owen was not taken lightly or without anguish on my part. 

Owen has a summer birthday, he makes the cutoff by 26 days.  From the time he was 0 – 2 I figured he would start school when he was five, well, cause that is what you do.  Those two years were blissfully simple and lovely.  Then, we joined the co-op preschool and the assumption by all (including a highly respected and knowledgeable parent educator from the community college) was that he would start school when he was six.  This started the ball rolling for a lot of questioning and worrying for the next 4 years. 

And so the research (and insanity) began.  Greg and I have read books, researched on the Internet, read personal accounts of people who started school at 5 vs. 6, called up old friends from high school for their opinion (of which those that were young all replied they wished they were old and those that were old all said they loved it), asked the doctor at yearly visits, discussed our own personal experiences (me being young and Greg being old), and sought the opinions of family members (which I am sure they are tired of hearing and talking about).   

Our extensive research led us to believe that we would wait until Owen was 6 for kindergarten; however, being unable to commit to such a big decision, we made sure to leave our options open until the VERY end.  We put him in a one day a week preschool when he was 2 until he turned 4.  Then we did a three day a week preschool when he was 4 until he turned 5.   Then last year, when he turned 5, we put him in a private Montessori kindergarten/preschool 5 days a week.  This was done with the idea that we could move on to 1st grade if we felt he was ready, or stay there for one more year if we wanted to wait.  Or in other words, we could delay the decision one more year. 

He turned 6 this summer and there was no more delaying the decision.  The time had come and we did what we knew we were going to do deep down all along.  We put him back in the same private school to do Kindergarten.  He will move on to 1st grade next year when he turns 7. 

For so many reasons we kept him back, one of the strongest being my little brother and the words of my step-mom saying if she could take back 13 seconds of her life, it would be the ones where she decided to put him in school early.  We figure, what is the harm in holding him back.  He gets to be little one more year, he gets the edge in sports, he has one more year to work on his reading/writing, he will drive before his friends, and (heaven help me) when he starts to date, the girls he goes to school with will be younger than him (according to Ben, this was very important).  We found countless more reasons to hold him back, these are just a few. 

And so the decision is made, things are what they are, Owen is happy, and young or old in school, I suppose nothing else really matters!

Not the Night We Planned

You know those nights where kids have reached their limits, which in turn pushes you past your own limits? We had/are having one of those right now.  Call it starting school again, call it days away from having a new sister, call it a mom who is tired of being pregnant, call it all of the above, but whatever it is, Owen is having a rough night!!

It all began on the way home from the office.  He suddenly looked at his shoes and informed me in a not so nice way that he needed new shoes and then starting crying that he needed them now.  I offered to take him to the mall as soon as his dad got home, mind you it was ten minutes after we were set to get home.  That was unacceptable and it started the downward spiral of our night. 

Going to the mall was a necessity but all of a sudden it was not for new shoes, but for Ursula at the Disney Store.  He started yelling at me telling me he wanted and NEEDED Ursula and I needed to get her today and he wasn’t waiting for his dad, and then Ivy started to yell Mama Mama to which every time I answered her she wouldn’t say anything.  All the while I am talking to Angie about a client about to receive $180,000 of proceeds from a property settlement in which he wants to keep and not pay to his creditors and is convinced I have misrepresented him by not allowing him to keep it. Whatever client.  Oh, and my feet are so swollen from sitting at my desk and the heat that I am convinced they may explode. It was a lot going on during a short time and this car ride home sort of set the tone for things to get worse. 

We arrive home with a firm statement that I am not going taking him to the mall. 

I cut him an apple and told him to watch a show and rest for a minute while I figured out what to make him for dinner.  He turned into himself again (briefly) and he showed me how he swings so high, munched on his apple, watched a show and laughed away. 

Then he sees his spaghetti and starts to cry that he doesn’t want noodles.  He makes himself a sandwich instead.  Then he wants to watch another show and cries because he can’t.  Then as I am resting my weary feet I tell Owen to ask Greg in his nicest voice to make us a peanut butter chocolate banana snack.  Owen says, “Dad, do it”.  I ask him to try another way, “Dad, do it please.”  Greg says he will as soon as he is done sweeping.  Then the worst of it begins and I am getting to the really good part.

Owen starts yelling that he needs to make it, he starts to tell me that he wants it now.  I had already said that the way he was asking was not going to get us a snack and maybe tomorrow would be a better day for it.  He starts to yell that he is having his snack.  I say we are done and getting ready for bed.  He looks at my poor puffy feet and hits them.  That was sad both for my feet and my feelings.  Then he stomped away.  I asked him please to go to his room to get ready for bed, he spit at me.  I then told him to please go to his room to get ready for bed and I needed him to stay there because he was being so mean.  He said no.  Greg picked him up and took him away.  He threw all his covers off his bed, threw some books at his door, I said goodnight and gave him some pajamas and told him this was not ok in our family.  He threw the pajamas at me.  I calmly explained that we can be mad, but getting what you want this way can not happen. 

And here is where it gets really good.  We kiss his head, give him a big hug and head downstairs.  In the distance we hear him crying and yelling for me and crying some more.   Suddenly there is a knock on the door.  Greg is greeted by a STRANGER asking if everything was ok.  He said he could hear Owen crying down the street (from the open windows in Owen’s room).  Greg explained that he was a tired 6 year-old in his room.  At first I was annoyed, but then I wasn’t annoyed at all!  How many people now days do something like that.  Not a lot of people hear a small child crying and come to the child’s aide.  So, in the end I liked this guy (I think), although, I hope he believes us and Child Protective Services isn’t on their way. 

I feel sad about the whole thing.  We really don’t put him in his room much, unless he is evil and hurting people, but, I can’t stop rehearsing the events in my head as to what I could have done differently, how could I have prevented things from getting so out of hand, so much so that a neighbor came by to check on him.  

At least now he is calm, he is calling to me from his room, asking me to please come see him.  So I am going.  I am still not going to buy Ursula just because he wants it, and I am not giving him a peanut butter chocolate banana tonight.   But, if I know myself, I am  going to go upstairs and not only see him, but bring him out of his room and snuggle together in my bed while we watch “the clothes show” (Project Runway) and love him a little before he falls asleep. 

Because right or wrong in the teaching department, that is what I do and I don’t question doing that.      

Gross!

Owen was outside playing this evening and came in to eat dinner.  On his way in he took off his shoes by the back door like a good son should.  A little while later he was instructed to put on his shoes to go to the store with Greg.  A few minutes later Owen ran over to me to tell me that he went to put his shoe on and felt something slimy, he took off his shoe and looked inside to find a slug.  (Slugs here are big in case you don’t know).  

It was one of those episodes where you sort of find it funny, but that is only because it is so gross and unbearable and it clearly only remains to be funny because it wasn’t you. 

And furthermore, call me what you will, but you know how as a parent you always say you would do anything for your kids, or you would take the bad things happening to you to save them the heartache, etc., etc.  Nope.  Not this time.   I don’t feel that at all.  In fact, if a slug was going to crawl in any of our shoes, I am quite thrilled it was Owen’s and not mine.