Happy things Archives - Page 6 of 35 -

Surviving Doomsday

December 21, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

If you can read this post then a celebration is in order.

Yes, apparently the world hasn’t ended after all. Of course, as an increasing number of people are pointing out, the Mayans didn’t actually predict the end of the world on December 21, 2012. That just happened to be the day this particular cycle of their calendar ends. But that’s not why we should be celebrating.

You see, it’s my birthday.

December 21, 2012 also happens to be the day this particular cycle — this particular year — on my calendar ends. Coincidence? I think not.

I do sort of feel like I’m on the cusp of something. A new chapter in life. We’ve now lived here for a year. It’s been a year of getting to know a new city and settling into a new job, a year of adjusting to (and loving) a proper Canadian winter. I’ve met new friends and kept in touch with old ones. We’ve started again with a whole new life that has only just begun.

We went “home” again recently. I’m not sure that’s the right word, but it’s the only word I can think of to use. We went back to the city I grew up in, the city where Connor was born and the city where my husband and I lived together for 11 years. And it felt distinctly unlike home.

I drove past our old house for the first time since we moved just over a year ago, and I got a little verklempt. Last year we sold the house to another family; their chairs are on the porch and their Christmas lights decorate the railings and flower bushes, but it still feels like my house. The city doesn’t feel like my city, though. I moved there when I was almost five years old, so in many ways it was the only “home” I had ever known. I’m not sure why it doesn’t feel that way now.

It was grey and rainy while we were there. I don’t miss either. I don’t miss the slow drivers or the traffic lights or the way the city feels dark even when it’s not. Those are all things I didn’t notice when I lived there (except for the grey raininess, which I did notice and was thrilled to move away from). But when I thought about the city beyond all those less-than-ideal, sort of frustrating things, I just didn’t miss it.

Rich thinks it’s because I left a lot behind when we moved away. The year prior to our move, and all the challenges that time brought with it, is firmly planted in the ground that is that city. The seeds were scattered there and the rain soaked them, bringing them to life. All that stuff sprang up and I had to hack it down, which was a long and painful process. And when I was finally better I found myself unable to tolerate all the other stuff that had previously just lurked in the background.

So I fled.

Or at least that’s what it feels like to me. But as much as there are things I do miss — people, mostly, and a certain kind of chicken burger at a restaurant we don’t have here — all my visits home have confirmed that it’s not home anymore.

My home is here now, and (happily) so are some of my people. It took the better part of this year to scatter these new seeds and let them settle, but they have. And now it’s time for a new cycle to begin.

I survived doomsday, but it wasn’t today. Today, I’m pretty sure, is more a beginning than an end.

Filed Under: Happy things, Hard things · Tagged With: gratitude, living life, perspective

To Hold You While You Sleep

December 19, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Babies don’t ask for much. Oh sure, when we’re tired or can’t figure out what’s wrong or just plain don’t have enough hands it feels as though they want the world. As though their needs are the only thing that matters. As though we’re never again going to be able to do what we want (or need) to do without worrying whether a small person needs something first.

That’s the reality of being a parent. We have these small people and they have needs, and those needs that feel at times like so much to ask are really pretty basic.

They need to be fed. They need to be clothed and kept warm. They need some stimulation and for someone to promise to teach them the ways of the world.

I look at the smallest person in my life and I know that he doesn’t even really know what he needs. He just looks to me to give it to him. I can fix what’s uncomfortable and most of the time whatever that is is all he really needs fixed.

He was fussy the other day and I knew he needed to sleep. But sleep is so hard when you’re a mere 10 weeks old. Sleep, which we cherish as parents, is not something that comes easily when we’re this new. So we look to our mamas to fix it.

I picked him up and nestled him in close to my body and held him tight. All the tension in his small frame released, suddenly, like a drain had been pulled so that all the angst could just swirl away. Within seconds he was snoring.

He was like that again today; for him, mornings are hard. And today it was dad who was there to pick him up and give him the place and the space to sleep. Because sometimes it’s really that simple.

Sometimes all we need is for someone to hold us while we sleep.

I wrote this last week (and then didn’t publish it) before the tragic events in Newtown, Connecticut. I wasn’t going to post it this week but then I decided I would and, in doing so, count my blessings.

Filed Under: Happy things, Motherhood · Tagged With: family, gratitude, love, moments, sleep

A Little Bird Told Me to Give You This

December 13, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

It’s Friday, which is always happy but today especially so because one week from today is my birthday. But don’t worry – you don’t need to get me anything. I got you something instead!

Many, many months ago (like sometime last year) I came across the most beautiful thing. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Happy things, Stuff I like · Tagged With: community, my wish for you, perspective, we're not alone

Doritos and Do Overs

December 11, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Have you seen that TV commercial with three moms at a playdate? It’s for something like Doritos, and they’re sitting around eating whatever it is the commercial is about while their babies sleep peacefully in their bucket seats.

I used to hate that commercial.

It was on a few years ago, around (or shortly after) the time Connor was a baby. I can think of ONE time he slept peacefully in his bucket seat. He was a few weeks old and I had come home from somewhere and he had fallen asleep in the car. And he slept for at least two hours after I got home, which I thought was just dandy. Except he never did it again.

Play dates saved my sanity that first year (inasmuch as my sanity was saved), but they were not play dates where we sat around eating chips while our babies slept in their car seats. They were mostly breastfeeding fests, and while that was great — it was nice to sit on someone else’s couch and nurse a baby instead of sitting by myself on my own couch nursing a baby — I was very aware that my baby was the fussy one.

It didn’t take a play date with other (relatively calm) babies for me to notice that. No, that was my reality day in and day out for months. And everyone else was aware of it too (though very accepting, I must say). One day I went to a baby group at the nearby public health clinic. Connor was doing his fussy Connor thing as we came down the hall, and a friend of mine yelled out, “Here comes Connor!” It was impossible to go anywhere without people knowing we were coming.

If I sound bitter then you’ll understand why I hated that commercial. Because that was not my reality. It was the reality I felt I had been promised – babies sleep a lot, right? So, sure, I’ll be able to sit around eating chips with my friends while my baby snores nearby.

Now, you should understand that I’m not quite that deluded. (But my level of delusion about what having a baby would be like really needs to be a post unto itself.) I just didn’t expect it to be SO DAMN HARD. And that stupid commercial just reminded me of how hard it was.

We’re now two months in with baby #2. And so far this is much more what I thought having a baby would be like. He goes to sleep all on his own sometimes. And he likes cuddles and sometimes needs to be bounced but not ALL THE DAMN TIME. My quads are worse for it but my mind is better.

I know this time that babies sometimes need help to go to sleep. (Seriously, I should write a post about my delusion.) And I know how to tell when they need to go to sleep. With Ethan there’s the usual (glassy eyes, yawning) but the tell-tale sign with him is that his eyebrows go red. We have a tough time getting him to nap in the morning but when we manage to hit that sweet spot (a very short window, though Connor’s was shorter) everything works a treat. The whole day generally goes well, in fact. He goes to sleep (by himself! Not on me!). He wakes up. He eats. He plays. He gets sleepy-eyed and red-eyebrowed and he goes back to sleep. Repeat.

I’m doing a mom and baby yoga class with Ethan and I’ve only ever had to pause during class once in five weeks to feed him. I would never have even taken Connor to a mom and baby yoga class because it would have seriously zapped everyone else’s zen. But Ethan is different. I can take him to a grocery store without having to leave a cart full of groceries and flee home so I can cry about my crying baby. I can even go for lunch with a co-worker and not have to stand there bouncing a baby in between frantic bites of sandwich.

Ethan’s not perfect, though. Don’t get me wrong. (No, perfect is the wrong word. No baby is perfect. “Perfect” babies — if they didn’t ever cry or fuss or refuse to go to sleep at the requisite time — would be boring. They wouldn’t grow up to contribute anything to the world (and Connor is going to be a force to be reckoned with, you can be sure). Instead let’s say this: Ethan is not without challenges.) On the days when he doesn’t sleep very well I get flashbacks (Post Traumatic Connor Disorder, we call it). At the moment I despair of ever again sleeping more than three hours at a time. And if he’s hungry and you don’t feed him right away, you had better be wearing ear plugs because, damn, that kid has a set of lungs.

But still. This time around is much closer to my own unedited version of a Doritos commercial and I’m grateful for it.

Two months in, and I think I’ve decided that it’s going to be all right.

Filed Under: Happy things, Motherhood, Postpartum depression · Tagged With: expectations, perspective

Ethan’s Birth Story: Part Two

November 29, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Here’s part one, and here’s Rich’s version of this story.

We got to the hospital (the same one I was born in, incidentally) and we had to park fairly far away from the doors. And I was totally that woman walking through the parking lot, up the stairs, and through the hospital lobby, stopping every few minutes to moan and double over with every contraction. And I was totally that woman who didn’t care.

We went into the delivery room at very end of the hall. It had a long bank of windows all along one side that looked out over the grounds and part of the city beyond. I could see the lights in the nearby beyond shining out into the night, and it felt a little bit like a stage. As though everyone could see into the room in which I would bring a baby into the world, which made me feel simultaneously vulnerable and inspired. But it soon ceased to matter and I forgot all about those windows and whatever and whoever was beyond them.

I got hooked up to a fetal monitor and focused on making it through the contractions. At that point we found out another midwife from our team was at the hospital already with a client who had come in earlier, so she was able to support us as well. We were so incredibly lucky with our team of midwives, and I felt so blessed by the two who were at Ethan’s birth. They kept an eye on him and noticed that his heart rate was going down with every contraction, which they said was due to the cord being compressed. It would go back up, but after a while of this they started to be a bit concerned.

At that point, they brought in an OB who suggested an amnio-infusion (adding fluid back through an intrauterine catheter). They explained that it would help the issue of the cord being compressed and avoid other complications, but it would require transferring care from the midwives to the OB. The whole team (our midwives and the OB, who was a resident, and her supervisor) was very respectful of our feelings about this, but we didn’t hesitate. Do it. Definitely. No question.

That process did help for a while and we continued on. And then his heart rate started going down again and wasn’t coming back up, so the OB decided it was time to make this thing happen. I had been at nine centimetres the last time they checked and she now indicated that it was time to push when I felt the urge. Push with all your might, she said, or they’d have to use the vacuum.

At that point I started to feel like I had no idea what I was doing. How would I know when to push? And how do I do it? How do I get him out fast enough to make sure he’s okay?

My labour wasn’t especially long (unless you count the two straight days of contractions) but it was intense. And I was tired. All I could feel was pain – there was no beauty, no serenity, just pain. And then suddenly I realized what people mean when they say they had the urge to push. Hoo, boy. This baby was coming out NOW, but I still had to do my part.

Because of the deceleration of his heart rate, the OB had me push as long as I could during contractions, and then started asking me to push even when I wasn’t having a contraction. By this point there were all kinds of people in the room – two midwives, two OBs, an OB’s assistant of some sort, a nurse or two and a team from the NICU, who were there to check him out after he was born. And Rich of course.

Thank God for Rich. He had talked me through every contraction, using imagery and counting down and telling me when each one was just about over. I know he had been worried about whether he’d be good at supporting me during labour, but I never was. I knew he’d be fine. And he was – better than fine. Amazing, in fact.

Having everyone in that room telling me to push quickly became overwhelming, so I finally looked at him and asked him to tell me what to do. I blocked out every other voice in that room and just listened to him. And when it felt like it should be over I asked him to tell me what was happening.

“I can see his head! His head is coming out!”

It was the most intense moment of our relationship.

It really felt like it should be over by that point. It certainly felt like I’d pushed enough to get a whole baby out, but apparently not. It’s an odd sensation to have a baby coming out of you and to feel as though you don’t have it in you to push past the head.

“I can’t do it.”

“GET HIM OUT!”

It wasn’t my finest moment.

They told me to reach down and feel his head, so I did. It was small and slimy and it belonged to the baby I had waited so long to meet. I had no idea who he was, but I was ready to find out.

I pushed with absolutely everything I had in me, admittedly mostly motivated by the desire to have this over with. And just as I was convinced I wasn’t going to be able to do it, he was out.

Snuggle.

We delayed cutting the cord for a bit and the OB was awesome then too, suggesting that he’d be best with me. So they put him on my chest and there he was. My baby. The one I had waited for. We had done it together.

We had a cuddle and Rich cut the cord, but Ethan didn’t cry when he was born. The NICU team took him to have a look, and he still didn’t cry – never did, actually, but he was okay. I remember looking over at him and thinking he looked like Connor (though later I decided he didn’t). I noticed his hair – blondish red and wavy. I noticed how little he was.

By that time the OB was trying to deliver the placenta, and that’s where things got really interesting. She had part of it in her hand and realized it hadn’t all come out. Apparently I have a heart-shaped uterus (which apparently likely explains why Connor was so stubbornly breech) and some of the placenta was stuck. The OB was going to reach in with her hand and try to remove it, so my midwife offered me gas. “This is going to hurt,” she said. I almost laughed – I had just given birth without pain relief, and delivering the placenta was going to hurt?

I should have asked for something stronger. Like a frying pan to the side of the head.

There are really no words to explain how painful that was. I held the mask to my face until I felt loopy from the gas and thought I might pass out, at which point I removed it and resorted to good old fashioned screaming. It was a stubborn placenta and I vaguely remember the OB telling me she needed to try again. And then, “I’m sorry – just one more time.”

I couldn’t even process what was going on, and when she was done I noticed that the OB had blood all the way up to her elbow. In my post-pain, loopy state I couldn’t figure out why. It was (of course) from her attempts at making me placenta-free, which, I found out later, took four tries. No wonder it bloody hurt.

After that, things were mostly normal. I got stitched up (oh wait, there were some issues there too, but you don’t really need to read about that, I’m sure) and we visited with Ethan. My midwife brought me toast and apple juice and I wanted to marry her.

It was at that point that we finally weighed him. I knew he was little, but I didn’t expect him to be 5-lbs-6-oz little. I nursed him and he was a champ just like his brother. He still hadn’t cried.

We were in the delivery room with our midwives until about 4 a.m., at which point we got moved to a postpartum room because I needed antibiotics after the uterus-scraping incident. But that time in that room will forever stay with me – looking out the windows, which I noticed again, talking with the team of people who helped me do the most profound thing I’ve ever done, and taking a bath with the newest love of my life.

As we made our way down the hallway towards the postpartum unit, we passed the nurses’ desk and some people in the hallway.

“Do you see?” I wanted to ask. “Do you see what I did? I made this and he’s tiny and beautiful and perfect.”

I did it.

We did it.

He’s here.