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Our 13th Wedding Anniversary And My Bad Attitude

By Cynical Woman June 19, 2006 October 27, 2009 Marriage

Some days, you can’t win for losing. I busted my ass yesterday morning, trying to get back to my regular schedule and pull off Father’s Day as well, and all I’ve got to show for it today is a really lousy attitude and a bad case of sleep deprivation. I mean, I really tried yesterday. I was up with the chickens and the three-year-olds at 5:30 AM, cleaning up the house and folding laundry. By seven, I was making breakfast (pineapple orange french toast). By eight, the whole family was sitting down to eat, including Dad who really seemed too tired to care.

To be fair, Michael did say thank you for the breakfast, and for the Springsteen CD I gave him. Had to buy that sucker two months in advance, because I knew there’d be no way in hell I’d be getting out to do any gift shopping once the baby arrived. But Michael seemed pretty much out of it all day long, while I felt completely wiped out. He wondered around the house like a zombie all morning while I tried desperately to finish up my morning chores with a baby latched onto one breast and a pre-schooler dancing around me in circles shouting “Hula!” at the top of her lungs. I think my husband and I barely spoke two words to each other, and that was in the morning when we still had some energy.

We did go out yesterday to Huntington Park. They have a giant playground there, so Cassie got to run around and play while Michael trailed after her, making sure she didn’t get lost (it was a really BIG playground). Yours truly spent the entire time sitting on a park bench nursing Sam. I think I spent more time breastfeeding yesterday than I did anything else. After the park, we came home and I thought Michael was going to put Cassie down for her nap while I nursed Sam again, but instead he let her run around the house while he chiseled concrete out of the floor in the downstairs bath. Cassie spent most of her time in the bedroom with me, bringing me things to do for her. I love my child, but this really started to get on my nerves because I’ve got a story to get written by the first weekend in July, and the only time I get to write these days is either in the morning, which I set aside to work on this blog, or during Cassie’s nap, which Michael tends to blow off on the days he’s home. I don’t mind that happening once in a while, but we’re going on two weeks now where Cassie’s been skipping her nap more often than she’s been taking it, and I’m afraid she’ll refuse to go down once Michael goes back to work.

Which would be tomorrow, and quite frankly, tomorrow can’t get here soon enough. I’ve got to get my husband out of the house. I just can’t do anything with him underfoot. Fact is, the man doesn’t seem to understand the concept of having a schedule when he’s not working in his office. I think Michael forgets that this house is my office and that the only way my job gets done is if I follow a schedule, one that includes regular nap times, regular meal times, and regular bedtimes for me and the kids.

So I want my husband out of the house, which is really sad because today is our thirteenth wedding anniversary, and you’d think with a new addition to our family I might be feeling kind of sweet and romantic and mushy, but no, I’m Cynical Woman and all I can think of is how I’m not getting any sleep these days but Michael sure seems to be able to snore the night away, and nothing annoys the hell out of me more than a husband who comes downstairs for breakfast on Father’s Day complaining about how he didn’t get much sleep and he’s so wiped out, but hey, he got to sleep until 8 AM and I’ve been up since 5:30 AM and what the hell is his problem anyway? Doesn’t he see that I’m standing at the stove, cooking his stupid breakfast, nursing a baby in one arm while keeping the eldest child entertained so she doesn’t run upstairs and wake up Daddy on his special day? Does the man not see any of that?

It’s our thirteenth wedding anniversary, ladies and gentlemen, and I’ve got the worst bad attitude I could possibly have. I love my husband, but he’s plucking my nerves and the longer he stays home, the worse it gets. People talk these days about how marriage is an institution. Well it’s an institution all right. A damn mental institution and it’s driving me insane.

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How To Get A Good Night’s Sleep – A Survival Guide For Moms With Infants, Young Children, And Other Bedtime Monsters

By Cynical Woman June 17, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Parenting, Sleep

Now that I am a mother of two children, one infant and one preschooler, I feel suddenly qualified to dispense a bit of wisdom to those moms just starting out. If you’ve just had a baby, or are getting ready to have one, or are even thinking about having one, I have a few helpful pointers for you. Here is my personal, time-tested, step-by-step procedure for getting a good night’s sleep. Starting at…

8:00 PM – You’ve had a long day, chasing after one child and hauling around the other. If you’re in luck, Daddy is home. Hand him the oldest child for a bath, a sippy cup of milk, and a few stories before bed. Emphasize that the oldest child needs to be tucked in no later than 9 PM. Otherwise, she’ll be cranky as a bear the next day. Not that he cares, because he gets to blithely head off to work while you stay home to deal with the little monster.

8:10 PM – Take the baby upstairs. Put her in her basinet and listen to her fuss, cry, and then howl while you try to prepare for the next day. You know that if you don’t pull out your clothes, down to your underwear, for tomorrow morning, there’s no way in hell you’re going to get dressed before 5 PM tomorrow. You also know that this is your only chance to get a shower as well, so if you can stand it, let the baby scream until your ears bleed. The shower should muffle most of the noise.

8:25 PM – hop out of the shower with shampoo still in your hair. You can’t stand the screaming anymore and your husband can’t find “The Pigeon Eats A Hot Dog,” which is currently your eldest daughter’s favorite book. Locate the book, comb out the last of the shampoo and throw on some PJs. Realize you forgot to dry yourself off and toss the now soaking PJs in the hamper. Dry off and put on fresh PJs. Pick up your shrieking infant offspring and collapse in the glider for half an hour of breastfeeding. Try not to swear as your baby chomps down on your nipple in revenge for letting her cry for a few minutes.

8:30 PM – kiss your eldest child goodnight when she comes in to see you.

8:32 PM – kiss your eldest child goodnight again when she comes in searching for the sippy cup she’s lost.

8:37 PM – kiss your eldest child goodnight for the third time and tell your husband you’ve already got your hands full with the infant; could he please put the eldest child to bed before you get irritated?

8:53 PM – your baby has sucked the right breast dry and is too full to even consider the left breast, which is about to burst. At least she’s nodding off, so put her in her bouncy chair (because the only other place she’ll sleep is in bed next to you) and pray she stays asleep for the next two hours.

8:54 PM – take eldest child firmly by the hand and escort her out of your bedroom, explaining to her that the baby was asleep and she didn’t want to be woken up. Pick up the baby and let her chew on your already leaking left breast for ten minutes.

9:04 PM – put the now sleeping baby back in her bouncy chair. Head off eldest child at the door before she comes running into your room again. Take eldest child back to bed. Get down on your hands and knees and check for monsters under her bed. Assure her you’ve sent them all packing and they will not return tonight. Dig out extra night lights and turn the hall light on. Kiss eldest child goodnight again and head back to your own room, where your husband has already managed to fall asleep.

9:06 PM – lie awake for the next hour and a half, listening to your husband snore. Wonder where the hell he learned to make noise like that.

10:33 PM – the baby wakes up crying and hungry. Get up, change her diaper. Pick her up. Hear her make a horrible farting noise as she poops in her clean diaper. Put her back on the table and change her diaper again. Repeat twice more. Collapse in the glider with baby and nurse her until you fall asleep.

11:45 PM – wake up with a horrible crick in your neck because you fell asleep in the glider again. Put the baby back in her bouncy chair. Climb into bed and doze off.

11:52 PM – wake up as eldest child runs into your room screaming about monsters under her bed. Wonder why she always comes to you with these late night problems and not her father who, by the way, is still snoring loud enough to make the house shake. Take eldest daughter back to bed, check for monsters again and reassure her there are no such things as monsters, although secretly you think small children might qualify as such.

Midnight – lie awake in bed for another hour, listening to your darling husband snore some more. Wonder where you would hide his body if you really, really had to.

01:30 AM – the baby wakes up crying again. Nudge your husband and tell him to change the baby. Stumble around in the dark trying to find the bathroom because you really have to pee. Do your business and return to the bed, only to discover darling husband went back to sleep. Swear at husband, who is snoring too loudly to hear it, and change the baby yourself. Plop back in the glider again and plan to stay awake this time while you nurse. Promptly fall asleep.

02:28 AM – wake up in the glider with an even worse pain in your neck. Eldest child is tugging on your sleeve, crying about monsters again. Realize the cats are probably jumping into her bed and waking her up. Fantasize about crucifying all three cats in your front yard, not far from where you plan to bury your husband. Put baby, who is no longer sleeping peacefully, back into the bouncy chair. Take eldest child back to her bedroom. Chase out the cats with a few choice swear words that you hope afterwards eldest child will not remember and repeat. Explain to eldest child there are NO MONSTERS and she really, really needs to stay in her own bed for the rest of the night. Trudge off to bed only to remember the baby is now awake again and wants to nurse some more. Back in the glider you go.

03:47 AM – the baby refuses to fall asleep. Instead, she stares at you with one beady blue eye, daring you to put her down in the bouncy chair again. You do. She howls. You stick your fingers in your ears. No good. She’s still howling, loud enough to be heard over your husband’s snoring. Husband actually wakes up. Tell him it’s his turn to rock the baby and curl up and go to sleep. Give husband a kick if he doesn’t get out the bed.

04:12 AM – husband wakes you up and tells you the baby wants to nurse again. You get out of bed and take the baby. He climbs back into bed and starts snoring again. You realize death is too good for him.

04:28 AM – your neck is so sore and stiff you can no longer sleep in the glider. The baby seems to have permanently attached herself to your right nipple, while the left is leaking breast milk like crazy. In fact, you’re pretty much soaking in the stuff but are too tired to care. Climb out of the glider and crawl into bed with the baby still attached. Pray for some meager measure of quiet as you try to curl up around your sleeping lump of a child. Discover your husband lost his pillow in the middle of the night and stole yours because, hey, you weren’t using it.

04:58 AM – just as you are about to doze off, the bedroom door opens yet again. Eldest child runs in crying incoherently about cats and monsters. Get up with baby still attached to your right breast. Take eldest child back to her room and order her into bed. Tell her she can not get up again until morning. Go back to your own bed. Discover husband has now commandeered your half of the covers as well as your pillow. Swear at husband until you are blue in the face. He still can’t hear you over the snoring. Get back into bed and kick husband until he relinquishes his hold on the blanket.

05:16 AM – Eldest child sneaks into your room and creeps quietly to your side of the bed. In a loud voice, she announces “Mommy! It’s morning!” Open your eyes and discover that yes, the sun is actually rising. In China. Tell eldest child to go back to bed now. Feel incredibly guilty as she runs crying back to bed. Get up, put now sleeping baby back in her bouncy chair, and go to your eldest child. Give her a big hug and a kiss and apologize for snapping at her. Ask her nicely to stay in bed until you’re ready to get her up. Kiss her one more time and head back to bed. Baby is asleep, husband has quit snoring, eldest child has promised to stay in bed. Finally you can get some sleep.

05:30 AM – the alarm goes off because you, you idiot, had actually planned to get up early and get a jump on the day. Everybody except your darling husband wakes up. The baby is crying. Eldest child runs into the room asking if it’s time to get up yet. You sit on the edge of the bed and weep in despair. Hope you remembered to program the coffee maker, at least.

And that’s it, Helen’s step-by-step plan for getting a good night’s sleep when you have children. What’s that? You don’t see any sleeping actually written into the plan? Well what did you expect? You’re a mom. You can sleep when you’re dead.

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The Three P’s of Parenthood – Pee, Poop, and Puke

By Cynical Woman June 16, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Parenting

No adventure in parenthood would be complete without a few tales on the three P’s – pee, poop, and puke. It’s a fact that new mothers can spend hours discussing the contents of dirty diapers. They also like to compare the latest spit up stains on their clothes. When a child is sick, moms can spin epic yarns about how much vomit and diarrhea they had to clean up. All of this means one thing.

Motherhood is one hell of a messy job.

I’ve been dealing with the three P’s ever since Cassie was born three and a half years ago. Her first week of life, I obsessed over whether she produced enough poop and pee. The nurses in the maternity ward had given me a neat little form to fill out that listed times I nursed Cassie, times we changed her diaper, and the contents of those diapers. It was sort of an input/output tracking sheet, I guess you could say. The outputs were referred to as “S” (solid) and “W” (wet), and Cassie was expected to produce a certain number of solids and wets per day. I’ll let you figure out what solid and wet stood for.

So I dutifully recorded every little solid and wet my daughter made for the first week, and I sweated over whether she was meeting her quota. Then after the first week, I quit worrying about whether she was making enough so-called solids and wets and began worrying about how to get solid and wet stains out of her clothes. And my clothes. And the carpet. And the bed spread. And off the wall.

Cassie became champ at producing solids and wets, and she liked to show off her talents. I could never change a diaper without getting the “fountain of youth” – a flood of pee that squirted straight up from her little hoo-hoo and flooded the entire changing table. Didn’t matter if I dropped a wash cloth over her while I was changing her. Didn’t matter if I put a clean diaper under her immediately to soak up and messes on the table. She would wait for that fraction of a second when she was unprotected by anything absorbent and that’s when she’d cut loose. I reckon she soaked at least three changing pad covers a day, and usually forced me to change outfits at least once due to her excessive peeing.

The pee, however, was nothing compared to the poop. Early on, we nicknamed Cassie Slurpee Butt. If you have never seen the poop of a breastfed baby, let me tell you, it looks exactly like some fancy brand of mustard blended with a banana slurpee. It’s seedy, yellow, and just thick enough to go splat when it hits the walls. It can also spurt out the rear end like water from a fire hose. I remember one particular afternoon when Michael was changing her, Cassie just let rip and a river of poop came shooting out her tiny behind. I estimate she ejected half her body weight in poop, causing a big, messy, yellow pool to form around her on the changing table. Fortunately, there was a lip on the end of that table that acted as a levee; otherwise our carpet would have taken the brunt of Cassie’s natural disaster, and I don’t think even FEMA would have paid for that.

Sam has similar talents, of course, although she employs different methods. Rather than spray pee in a fountain, she prefers the old Nile River flood plain method, where she very sneakily leaks a stream of pee that you don’t notice until it’s deep enough to grow crops in. As for her pooping skills… well, I’ve taken to calling her “Bullet Butt.” Sam doesn’t give off rivers of poop, but instead shoots out concentrated pellets that fly all the way across the room to her intended target. Frequently, Sam will wait until I’ve lifted her little butt off the pad to slip a diaper under her and then she’ll shoot, using the higher trajectory to aim for more distant targets. So far, she’s managed to hit the bedspread on the far side of our bedroom and yesterday she nearly took out one of the cats.

You’d think between all the pee and the poop that moms would have enough to clean up in the house. Not so! Puke and spit-up, though not as frequent as poop and pee, do make up a considerable amount of mess in a mommy’s life and you never know when they’re going to happen. I remember earlier this winter, Cassie came down with her first case of stomach flu. We didn’t even know she was sick. We just put her to bed that night. Then three hours later, I woke up to hear my daughter crying in her bed. I walked in and was nearly knocked flat by the smell of sour milk and vomit. Cassie had woken up and puked all over herself and her bed. I went in to calm her down and that’s when she puked all over me. I had to carry Cassie up to the office to get Michael. I couldn’t put her down without risking puke dropping all over the floor. Of course, when we walked in, Michael just stared at us like a deer caught in the headlights. “What am I supposed to do?” he asked. “Well,” I said, trying not to blow my top, “you could help me give Cassie a bath, and then maybe you could change the sheets on her bed, unless you expect her to sleep in a pile of puke tonight!”

It’s then that I came to realize my husband has no idea how to handle messes like that. Michael wasn’t bad with diapers. In fact, he’s really good about doing it when I ask him too. But when confronted with a bucket-load of puke, his brain just turns off. I had to direct my husband in every step of the clean up procedure. First step? Get the sick, screaming child into the tub and undress her. Second step, one parent (Daddy) changes the bed sheets while the second parent (Mommy) bathes the kid. Third step, find clean clothes for everyone who’s been puked on, namely the still-screaming child and the very frustrated mother. Fourth step, take everything that’s been puked on and run it through the washing machine, and no, don’t bother asking if Mommy wants to wash that stuff by hand. The answer is a definite “NO!”

I suppose it wouldn’t have been so bad that night if Cassie had just puked on me once, but right after I got us both cleaned up, she did it again. I was sitting on the bed, holding her and trying to calm her down. She still didn’t feel well, but I couldn’t understand why she was screaming so loudly. Then she opened her mouth extra-wide and out came a gallon of half-digested milk (Cassie drinks a lot of milk, by the way). Michael said it looked like a fat snake of white cheese slowly pouring out of her mouth and onto me. I thought it looked like someone had dumped a bucket of ricotta cheese all over me. It was impressive, to say the least, and extremely messy. Once again, I stood there holding my screaming child, both of us covered in puke. Once again, my husband the aerospace engineer stood there and stared, as slack-jawed and dim-witted as a sitcom husband.

“Well?” I demanded.

“Well what?” he replied.

“Aren’t you going to do something?” I prompted.

“Like what?”

“LIKE GET A TOWEL, YOU MORON!”

With a bit of shouting, I was able to direct Michael through the proper clean-up procedure yet again. This time, I took a bath with Cassie, who was suddenly feeling much better. She danced around in the tub, singing and laughing until she finally wore herself out. I put her to bed and slept on the floor next to her, with a bucket ready just in case.

Sam’s spit-ups have been minor compared to that night, but still pretty stinky and messy. She doesn’t have the capacity to produce a gallon of half-digested food, but she spew a fountain of breast milk at my best friend’s house last week, one big enough to coat her face and ruin my favorite Hawaiian shirt. It reminded me of Linda Blair for some reason. Not to be outdone, Cassie puked the next night at the dinner table. Never fear, she wasn’t ill. She was just talking too fast while eating Chinese and drinking club soda. At least this time she didn’t scream when she was done.

Yep, pee, poop, and puke and the three main messes of a mother’s life. As I wade around in all this mess, I can only blame myself. After all, I’m the one who agreed to have kids. Gotta take the stinky mess that goes with them as well. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go. Someone needs her diaper changed.

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Children Of The Night – Sleep-Deprived Ramblings On The Nocturnal Activities Of A Three-Year-Old And An Infant

By Cynical Woman June 14, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Parenting, Sleep

In case you didn’t know, babies sleep a lot, just not when you want them too. The same holds true for three-year-olds.

Sam has been what I consider a very sleepy baby. I’m still not quite sure of the color of her eyes, as she almost never opens them. Most of the day, Sam is either curled up in my arms nursing or lying limp as a wet noodle in her car seat, stroller, or on the floor. The only thing that wakes this child up is her bath, which sets her to screaming. The rest of the day, she’s snoozing.

At least until midnight comes along.

It’s common for infants to have their days and nights confused. I think this problem starts in the womb. During the day, when Mommy is up and active, the baby is being constantly rocked by the motion of her mother’s body. When Mommy lies down to sleep the rocking stops and the baby wakes up. Pregnant moms will feel the baby wake up and start kicking, usually as they’re getting ready to nod off to sleep. Obstetricians know about this, which is why they instruct pregnant women to lie down when they do kick counts in their last trimester. They know the baby is going to wake up and complain because they’re not being rocked to sleep.

So babies come out of the womb conditioned to think that day is night and night is day, and it takes time to retrain them. We are currently retraining Sam.
She does okay from about 9 PM until midnight. She’ll nurse for twenty minutes and then snooze in her little bouncy chair like a champ. The problems start when she wakes up for that midnight feeding. Once she’s had a chance to cuddle in my arms and rock, she doesn’t want to be put down again. She’ll nurse and nuzzle until she’s asleep, but the moment I put her back in the bouncy chair and crawl into my own bed, she wakes right up and starts fussing. If I don’t immediately crawl back out of bed to pick her up, she starts wailing. If I try to let her cry it out, she starts screaming and I have no choice but to pick her up again.

This all started a couple of nights ago. Prior to that, she was too sleepy to tell night from day. It might have been a growth spurt the first night. Every time I picked her up, she wanted to latch on and nurse, so I spent all night lying in bed hunched over with Sam attached to me at the nipple. Not a comfortable way to sleep. The next night, to save my back, I took her to the glider each time she woke up. She’d nurse for two or three minutes and then doze off. I’d put her back in her bouncy chair to sleep (she hates sleeping on her back in the basinet) and Sam would wake up crying again. We went back and forth for over two hours, with both of us getting more and more upset as the night wore on. By 2 AM, I was swearing at my husband, who patiently lay in bed and tried offering suggestions. He got up and tried rocking Sam himself, but she wouldn’t even doze off in his arms. It had to be Mommy. We kept going back and forth with her until 4 AM when Cassie came running into our room crying. Apparently monsters were trying to get her while she was asleep. I handed Sam to Michael and took Cassie back to her room. We checked under the bed and found nothing. I got her tucked in, gave her a kiss, and told her she’d be all right. I went back to my bedroom, took Sam from Michael and tried nursing her to sleep again. Twenty minutes later Cassie came running back in, complaining of more monsters who sounded suspiciously like our cats. This time Michael took her back to bed. She stayed there another twenty minutes before coming back to us screaming about the monsters again. This time I got up, swearing under my breath at the cats, and took Cassie back to bed. I turned the bathroom light on in addition to all three of Cassie’s nightlights and tucked her in one last time. It was now almost 5 AM. I went back to my room, let Sam nurse one last time and then tucked her in too. Sam fussed for two minutes, let out a tremendous fart and finally fell asleep.

The next night, the pattern continued, except this time Cassie waited until after Sam had farted and dozed off to come running into our room. To keep the peace, I let Cass climb into bed with me, where she slept fairly peacefully for an hour or so. Then she rolled over and elbowed me in the breast, which immediately caused a flood of milk to leak out and soak us both. We did the same thing again the next night. All of this nocturnal activity slowly started driving me crazy.

So yesterday, I came up with a plan, at least for Sam. As best as I could, I kept that kid awake all day, which means she cried a lot. I did every thing I could to piss her off and make her fuss. I gave her a bath. She screamed. I made her lie on her tummy for a while. She howled. I put her down naked on the floor to air out. She wailed in indignation. I let her sleep in short snatches throughout the day, but I wanted to make sure Sam was tired when night came.

For the most part, my plan worked. Sam went to sleep after each feeding except the 3 AM one. That one took a little work. The key seems to be that tremendous fart she makes each night. Apparently the little porker gets gassy and that’s what’s been making her so fussy. I bicycled her legs, massaged her tummy and patted her back before putting her down. She fussed for a few minutes and then I heard this small, wet explosion. Turned out to be a combination fart and projectile spit up. I’m surprised the kid didn’t blow herself inside out.

Cassie still came into our room this morning and curled up in bed next to me. She slept peacefully for a while, which was good, but was a real bear when I got out of bed to nurse Sam. Michael had to take care of her, since Cassie wouldn’t go back to her room and play. But all in all, we did finally get a night of some sleep. I’m still shuffling around like a zombie this morning after having to wake up every two hours to nurse, but I can manage as long as I get some decaf coffee into me.

All in all, I can’t help but quote George Hamilton when I look back on the last few nights. Great man, great actor, that George. He said all there was to say about children and sleep in the movie Love At First Bite.

“Children of the night… SHUT UP!”

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And Then There Were Two… The Grandparents Head Home

By Cynical Woman June 11, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Family

Today is the day Sam was supposed to be born. At least, this is the due date the infertility doctor gave us based on the date of our intrauterine insemination. Sam has filled out quite a bit since we brought her home last Sunday, and she’s finally started opening her eyes. I suspect they’ll stay blue, just like her father’s and Cassie’s.

The ratio of adults to children has changed in this house. My parents, who came up to help us out after Sam was born, headed out yesterday, off to see my aunt for her birthday. The amount of noise and chaos in the house immediately dropped the moment they left, but so did my sense of security. There’s no way this household can handle more than two adults for any real length of time. There’s just not enough room, even in a place this big. We were tripping over each other and driving each other crazy. Still, having Grandmama and Papoo around meant Cassie was constantly entertained and I never had to worry about the laundry or cooking. Now the place is strangely empty.

There are pluses to having my folks leave. I really was starting to go nuts with them around. Dad spends all day sitting on the couch reading, or else lying in bed taking a nap. Those times Cassie could get him up to play, he’d chase her around the house until she was screaming, and then aggravate her until she was hopping mad and crying, leaving Mom and I to deal with a hysterical and hyper-stimulated child as he headed off to take yet another two-hour nap. This did not do good things for Cassie’s mood or behavior, let me tell you. My dad’s an expert at how to upset people, and at the age of three, Cassie’s a prime target for his teasing. The night before my folks left, he threatened to sneak up on Cassie while she was asleep and “get her” in her bed. To a child who constantly worries about monsters in her closet, you can imagine how this came across. I told Dad if he ever teased her like that again, I’d put his butt out on the curb with the week’s trash and he could go to the dump where he belonged. Not nice or respectful, I know, but the man also worked hard on pissing me off all week long too, so he got as good as he gave in my opinion.

My mother did her best to intervene between Papoo and Cassie, but she also got ticked off with him, which only raised the stress level in the house. When Mom wasn’t fuming over Dad, she spent her time cleaning and cooking and shopping. This wasn’t so bad, except that the post-partum hormones have really made me OCD and Mom doesn’t clean the way I do. I’d go into the kitchen to grab a cup of coffee and wouldn’t be able to find the mugs because they were all jumbled up with the sippy cups and the glasses. I’d go to get dressed in the mornings and I wouldn’t be able to find any of my clothes because for some reason, Mom can’t tell my stuff apart from Michael’s, or else I’d find things, but in the wrong drawer because Mom isn’t familiar with my system of sorting. What really drove me nuts were things that were put away in a haphazard manner. Mom moves fast when she cleans, so corners aren’t always squared up and things aren’t always sorted according to size and type. I know, I know. Crazy and stupid to complain about all the help I got this past week, but I tell you, I hate opening cabinet doors and having everything fall out and hit me in the head because stuff wasn’t stacked properly. Kind of negates the point of putting it away in the first place, you know?

In any event, my parents left bright and early yesterday morning. As soon as they were gone, I started cleaning house – picking things up, putting them away, finding stuff out of place, sorting and reorganizing like some crazy demonic whirlwind of domesticity. Michael took Cassie out grocery shopping. Sam slept through all my cleaning and cussing. In two hours, I got a lot of stuff back to the way I wanted it, except for the lonely anxious feeling I still can not seem to dispel.

The good news is Michael and I survived the first day on our own just fine. Sam is settling in nicely, feeding on a regular schedule and sleeping just fine. Cassie is a little whiny and wants to be constantly entertained, but she’s tolerable and has been very helpful any time I ask her to do something for the baby. Michael and I are snapping at each other as we try to pick up the tasks my mother was handling, but we’re not tearing each other’s throats out, and that’s a good thing.

My parents drive me crazy, but I love them. In spite of the misplaced stuff and the aggravation and the way they spoil Cassie, I do manage to think of them fondly. I hope they have a good trip to see my aunt and a safe trip home after that. I know I’ll look forward to seeing them again… just as soon as I can get my house back in order.

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Happy Birthday to Daddy

By Cynical Woman June 10, 2006 October 27, 2009 Birthdays, Hubster

Yesterday was Michael’s thirty-sixth birthday. In spite of all the new baby chaos, we actually did manage to celebrate it, albeit not in any organized fashion. My mom made a cake with Cassie’s help. We had presents, and I even let Michael sleep straight through the entire night before just so he’d feel rested on his special day.

The day was not without its ups and downs though, at least for me. I’m still struggling with those post-partum hormones, and man do they make me bitchy. In spite of my best efforts, I couldn’t help but nag at Michael to move the old desk that’s been sitting in our foyer out the garage. I’d been tripping over the stupid thing (it was huge) and I couldn’t vacuum around it, and the fact was, it didn’t need to be sitting smack dab in the front room of our house. I wanted it hauled out and taken to the dump. I managed to get Michael to take it as far as the garage and I’ll have to settle for that because I doubt I’ll be able to get him to move it any farther any time soon. But as soon as I’m off the doctor’s restrictions, that damn desk is going bye-bye.

I was also frustrated with Cassie for a good part of the day. Mom and I decided to take her shopping for new summer clothes. It ended up being a three-hour trip, mainly because I had to stop and nurse Sam half-way through. I thought Cassie might enjoy taking her new baby doll, Baby Boy, with us and even suggested she push him along in the stroller, just as I would be pushing Sam. That did and didn’t work. Cassie was thrilled to push Baby Boy around and everyone went “ooh” and “ah” over her and told her what a good mommy she was. The problem was that Cassie got too easily distracted, especially in the parking lot, and frequently failed to pay attention to where she was going. She ended up ramming into me several times, got Baby Boy’s stroller tangled up in Sam’s, and darted off in random directions, often in the path of a speeding car, while we were trying to cross the lot to a store. Needless to say, by the time we left first store, my nerves were fried.

But I did my best to remain calm and patient. I swear, I don’t know where the patience comes from, but when I really need it, it’s there. I can keep my voice light, my attitude calm, and my wits about me. I can even keep myself from swearing up a storm when I’ve had my Achilles tendon slammed into for the fortieth time. I can do it, and if I can do it, other people can too.

Which is why it pisses me off so much when I see other people treating their kids like crap.

After the first hour of shopping, we had to stop so I could nurse Sam. Mom, Cassie and I sat down in the café area of Target and drank fruit smoothies while I tucked Sam under a blanket and let her nurse. While we were there, another mom came in with her little boy and a man I assume was her husband or boyfriend. The little boy was so cute. He was about Cassie’s age, with a wild cascade of black curls and a smile that would have turned night to day. The mom was another story. Talk about ugly. It wasn’t her looks or her weight or the way she was dressed. It was that stupid, sullen sneer that spread across her face as she followed her child into the café. The little boy was skipping around the tables as they looked for a place to sit, and she just kept snapping at him. At least three times after they sat down I heard her tell her son to shut up. Do me a favor, people. Don’t ever, ever tell your kids to shut up. It’s demeaning and degrading to them and it makes the parent looks like a stupid ass. I swear, after the second time this mom said “Shut up!” I just wanted to walk over to her and punch her in the mouth (remember, post partum hormones are making me cranky and I’m not a nice person anyway).

But I didn’t. It was one of those situations where I really don’t know what to do (imagine that). With two kids and my mother sitting beside me, I’m not really in a position to start a fist fight, no matter how badly I want to. I’m not even in a position to start an argument, especially since I don’t know anything about her or the guy who was with her. Are they armed? Are they violent? Is either one of them possibly doing drugs at the moment? I have to think about my own kids first before I can stop and think about anybody else’s. So I sat there, listening to this stupid, stupid woman yell at her kid for no good reason I could see. Obviously, she was irritated about something. But like I said earlier, when I get irritated I still try to treat Cassie decently. She’s my child and I love her.

At this point, I also have to say that watching this woman made me feel strange and superficial in some odd way. This is where I get politically incorrect, folks, so if you don’t like that sort of thing, quit ready now. This other mom and I could not have been more different racially, economically, and socially. I never felt so white bread in my life as I did watching this woman and her child. Everything about the mom screamed urban street punk or gang member to me, especially her ratty shirt and jeans and that angry, sullen sneer. Meanwhile I looked like something out of “Desperate Housewives” with my yoga pants, Old Navy Perfect Fit tee, and carefully pampered face.

That got me wondering how much things like race, social background, environment and financial status really influence the type of parents we become. The money issue was what played on my mind the most, because it seemed to be the most obvious difference between me and that other woman. Was I a better parent because I had more money or because I could afford to stay home with my kids all day? Did money buy my patience? I mean really, there was a time in my life when I worked crappy part time jobs to make ends meet, but even then I had my family to fall back on when money was tight. I never had to struggle to survive, and I’ll never have to work a crappy job again as long as I live. Michael makes too much money for that, and if he dies (which better not happen in the next fifty years) I become an extremely rich widow. Was that the difference between this woman and me? My financial future is secure, so I don’t have to deal with the frustrations and uncertainties that economic hardship brings? I’m not going to even consider racial issues, because I don’t think being white, black, Asian, Hispanic or any other race matters when it comes to being a parent. Maybe it matters in other areas of life, but not there.

Sam nursed for a good forty minutes, so we ended up sitting in that little café for a while, watching this woman yell at her child, yank him around by the arm and hit him a couple of times. I did my best not to glare at her and then had to work to keep Cassie from staring, pointing and commenting. I know what questions where going through my daughter’s mind at that point, even if she isn’t old enough to voice them out loud. Why is that mommy hitting her little boy? Why is she being so mean? Does she love her little boy?

I don’t know.

Eventually, Sam quit nursing and we, the rich and privileged, headed out to do more shopping. We hit Bed, Bath & Beyond to pick up such crucial necessities as kitchen chair cushions and a new pizza stone for Michael (his birthday present). It was all so bourgeois it made me sick. Then we headed home, baked a cake, ordered Chinese takeout, ate until we were all stuffed, and vegetated in front of the TV to watch “Chicken Run” on HBO. How upper class. How idle and rich.
None of it could put that little boy from my mind.

I don’t know if I’m a better mom than the woman I saw in Target yesterday afternoon, but I do know this. I love my daughter. I may give Cassie a spanking, but only to correct bad behavior in very specific circumstances and never to relieve my own anger and frustrations. I will never, ever tell her to shut up or call her stupid. She’s too precious to me, too much of a miracle. Maybe my money does buy my patience and love. Maybe it’s just that I can afford to be a better mom. Or maybe it’s just that I really do love my children more than that woman loved her son.

Again, I don’t know. I probably never will.

Happy birthday, Michael. Enjoy your pizza stone. It came with a lot of baggage.

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I Swear – What Happens When Mommy’s Language Goes South

By Cynical Woman June 8, 2006 October 27, 2009 Parenting

There’s one thing about post-partum recovery that really makes life interesting.

Mood swings.

After I had Cassie, I had a terrible time staying on my usual, cynical, even keel. I would go from feeling a freaked-out sort of mania (not a happy feeling) to outright terror and despair in mere seconds. Every time I sat down to nurse, I literally had a panic attack. It was so bad, it felt like the ground actually opened up beneath me and I was falling into a bottomless pit. During the first two weeks home, Michael had to go into work for a three hour meeting. I was twitchy and nervous when he left. When he got back, Cassie was sitting in her bouncy chair howling and I was on the couch in tears. I immediately jumped up and screamed, “Don’t you ever leave me alone with this child again, you bastard!”

I got over it. Eventually.

Things are a little different with child number two. Sam has a very different temperament from Cassie. Cassie was a colicky live wire that almost never slept and shrieked constantly. Because she didn’t sleep, I didn’t sleep, and that more than anything else was probably the source of my problems. I was barely able to function in my sleep-deprived state. I shuffled around like the somnambulist in “The Cabinet Of Dr. Caligari,” my arms stretched out in front of me to keep me from running straight into a wall as I lurched around trying to take care of the baby.

Sam is Cassie’s polar opposite. She’s a limp noodle who sleeps constantly. In fact, last night I had to wake her for each late night feeding, otherwise my breasts would have exploded and I’d be one flat-chested mama this morning. She’s so sleepy that I can dab her face and belly with an ice cold wash cloth and it doesn’t even faze her. She just snoozes right through it. You couldn’t even fart in front of Cass without waking her up. A 72-piece marching band could parade around Sam’s basinet and she’d snooze right through it. It’s a little disconcerting (okay, last night it was unnerving when I couldn’t get her to eat) but Sam doesn’t terrify me the way Cassie did.

Another difference between this time and last time is the physical effects of the post-partum hormones. After Cassie was born, I lost a lot of hair, my skin turned all rough and scaly, and my bleeding flowed hard and heavy for over two months. This time around, all I’m losing is weight and the bleeding is no worse than a normal period. My skin looks better than it did in my 20s (although that’s not saying much), and I could almost pass for one of those fake, airbrushed mommies in the parenting magazines. Hey, right now, it’s 7:30AM, I’m dressed, my hair is brushed, my teeth are clean, I’ve got even got jewelry on and I’m the only person in the house who’s awake, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Physically, I’m doing fine. But none of that means I’m not feeling the ol’ baby blues. I am; they’re just expressing themselves in a different fashion this time around. Namely, swearing.

Now I will be the first to admit I swear a lot. Much more than your average mommy does. I’ve said it before, I got my degree in swearing courtesy of the US Army. I take to foul language like it was my native tongue, and when I’m really torqued, I revel in the imaginative use of blasphemous phrases and scatological terms. I’m a writer. Creative language is second nature to me. But when Cassie came along, I tried to cut back on the dirty words. I had to swear whenever I nursed during the first three months because it hurt so badly that it was either swear or castrate my husband. Outside of that, though, I tried to cut back. I really curbed the habit the first time Cassie tried to repeat a certain four letter word that I usually reserve for computer malfunctions. Nothing like seeing your nine-month old pull herself to standing, shake a tiny fist at your PC and shout, “Fa!”

So I cleaned up my act, sticking to just one mildly offensive word that I could get away with if Cassie repeated it. Then Sam came along and my language skills returned in full force.

Last night, I opened a kitchen cabinet and discovered someone had put away all my glassware in the wrong place. Nothing fell out and hit me. Nothing was broken or missing or dirty. It was just all jumbled up, which annoyed the crap out of me. So when I was confronted by the chaos of mugs and sippy cups, I reverted to true form. I uttered an expletive that I won’t repeat here and five seconds later, Cassie ran into the dining room and repeated it to her father.

Oops.

This has been going on ever since we brought Sam home. Some little thing is not quite right and I express myself in my native tongue with a vengeance. Why? I’m not sure, except that I may just be feeling a little too good this time around. I’m up and moving, cleaning house and taking care of the baby. I’m waking up at 6:30AM, as well as at midnight, 2AM, 4AM, and any other time I feel the need to drain my engorged breasts into sleepy Sam’s pouting puss. I’ve got so much energy I’m not even napping during the day. In fact, the first day home from the hospital, I set about cleaning out our suitcases and putting stuff away. At 3PM, I looked around and realized I was the only person in the whole frikkin’ house who was awake. Michael, Cassie, Sam and my parents had all collapsed and gone to sleep. Of course, this led to a solid round of swearing.

How will I curb my tongue, I wonder? I know I’m tired, even if I don’t feel it, and I know that as long as I’m tired my language is going to be foul. It’s just a natural stress reaction for me. And with so many people in the house, I’m naturally going to continue to be stressed. Of course, as people leave I’m still going to be cranky. Eventually, it’s going to be just me, Cassie and Sam and I’m pretty sure my patience is going to be at an ebb for a while as I learn how to take care of two children instead of one.

Let’s face it. The language is just going to slip, and we’re going to have more “Oops!” moments like the one we had last night. All I can say is I’ll do my best to watch my mouth. I just hope Sam’s first word doesn’t turn out to be “Fa!”

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Why Parenting Is Hell

By Cynical Woman June 7, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Bitching & Moaning, Parenting

Sam is a limp noodle right now. We had a long night full of screaming and fussing and wanting to be held and nursed all night long, with Michael and I arguing over whether or not we should get up and hold the baby. He wanted to get up and rock Sam. I wanted to let her fuss it out. We hadn’t figured out the rules yet last night, so we sort of screwed ourselves in this department. Hopefully by tonight we can agree on what we’re going to do.

Sam’s first few nights home remind me of Cassie’s first night, although Sam and Cassie are two very different babies. Sam screamed last night, but not like Cassie used to scream. You ever noticed the animated cartoon up in the corner, the one of the demon mommy holding the screaming demon baby? That’s Cassie and me. She was a demon child, the original angry baby (so very, very angry) and boy did she know how to howl. I remember when I had my C-section and the doctor pulled Cassie out. Michael said, “She’s out! The baby’s finally out!” But we didn’t hear so much as a peep from her. I got a little scared and said, “What’s wrong? Why isn’t she making any noise? What’s she doing?” “Just kind of looking around,” Michael said. Then the nurses took this strangely silent child to the clean up table, pricked her heel to get some blood, and that was the last time Cassie was ever quiet. Since that moment, my eldest daughter has made her presence know with as much ruckus as she can summon.

So Cassie was a screamer, and her first night home was no exception. My mom and dad came to stay with us and help out that first week (they’re here now too). Mom handled all the cooking and cleaning. Dad sat on the couch and read the entire time. Michael did things like assemble the swing and put batteries in all the baby toys. I stumbled around trying to figure out how to breastfeed and stay sane. The first day home was agony. I couldn’t even figure out how to bath Cassie. I had to watch Mom do it. She screamed bloody murder through the whole thing (Cassie, not Mom). I was terrified, and oh-so-grateful my knowledgeable mother the nurse was there to hold my hand.

Then night time came and my parents went to bed and Michael and I were on our own.
Cassie started out the evening by crying non-stop. I responded by nursing. These days, nursing is old hat for me. Sam latches on and we just go. No pain, no fuss, no problem. When Cassie latched on in the beginning, it was all I could do to keep from swearing a blue streak. In fact, many times I could only hold off from swearing the first few minutes and then I had to cut loose because it felt like someone was sawing my nipples off with a dull steak knife (put that as an 11 on the 0-10 pain scale). Of course, every time she nursed, it started off contractions in my slowly shrinking uterus, which also hurt like a bitch. And then there was the C-section incision, and the fact I was still having bowel problems. I was in my own little personal hell, screaming demon baby and all, and that, ladies and gentlemen, is why you see horns on my head and Cassie’s in that darling little picture I put up in the bio section.

So I suffered through nursing. Then I went to put Cassie down in the basinet next to our bed, with vague hopes of getting an hour or two of sleep before she woke up screaming again. I got two minutes. The howling started out low, quickly built up steam, and then threatened to shatter the windows. My parents, both of whom claim to be going deaf, slept through it all. Michael, who can usually sleep through anything, actually woke up, and yours truly, who will jump out of bed if she hears a flea fart in the next room, was about ready to throw herself off a cliff.

Cassie screamed, and Michael and I took turns trying to soothe her. At first, we tried rocking her in the glider. She hated that. Then I tried nursing her, which only seemed to plug the noise as long as she had one of my nipples to chew on. As soon as I detached her, the screaming started again. We massaged her and pumped her legs. It quickly became apparent that the only way to get Cassie to calm down (not sleep, but just calm down) was to carry her as we walked around the bedroom. She had to be held upright and kept moving without stopping. The only time Michael and I got a break was when I sat down and nursed her again. Because I was in so much agony nursing her, I refused to let him sleep while I was sitting in the chair. In fact, the first time he did lay down to sleep, I picked up a box of tissues and threw them at him. “Wake up, you #&%#@! I ain’t suffering through this alone!”

The night seemed endless. We walked, nursed, swore and lamented. I threatened to kill Michael more than once. At one point, I did let him sleep five minutes, during which time I made my only attempt at singing a lullaby. Unfortunately, I was so fried I could only remember the lyrics to one song – “Why Don’t We Get Drunk And Screw” by Jimmy Buffet. To this day, Michael asks, “You couldn’t remember the words to “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star?” Hell no.

Dawn came eventually. At 5AM, Cassie finally wore herself out and went to sleep. I placed her in the basinet and laid down in bed next to Michael with a heavy sigh. “Sweetie,” I said to him. “We’ve shared some good times and some bad ones, and I love you. But no matter how much time passes, I will never, ever look back on this night and laugh.”

And then from the basinet we heard, “BBBRRRPPPZZZZT!”

“I’m not laughing,” I told my husband as our daughter farted again.

“Still not laughing!” I insisted. But Michael already had tears in his eyes and couldn’t keep from shaking.

By the third time she’d farted, I couldn’t help it either. I laughed too. Cassie had stayed awake all night, screaming because she had to pass gas and couldn’t. That was when I finally understood that parenting was hell, and I was perfectly suited for the job.

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The Human Pacifier

By Cynical Woman June 6, 2006 October 27, 2009 Baby, Breast Feeding

Nothing is more tedious than trying to nurse a sleepy baby. Really. Sam will not stay awake when we nurse. She falls asleep at the boob and just makes these little tiny sucks that aren’t getting her the milk she needs, leaving me as over-inflated at the Good Year tire guy. I swear, my left breast is about to blow and this kid is just poking along. I’ve tried putting a wet washcloth to her neck, giving her a vigorous back rub, blowing in her ear, singing loudly and badly. Nada. Zip. Bupkis. She won’t wake up.

Until I put her to bed that is. Then she’ll be up all night until we sit back down again to nurse. That’s when she’ll drop back off peacefully, using my nipple as a big human pacifier. Then when I put her back down again, she’ll cry. I’ve spent three nights in a row in bed with this kid latched on the whole time. I got to stop this somehow.

Wish me luck.

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A Funny Thing Happened On Thursday

By Cynical Woman June 5, 2006 June 2, 2011 Baby

I’ve been working on another blog entry, but something came up on Thursday that pretty much blows anything else I’ve got out of the water. Thursday afternoon around 3PM my water broke. You can imagine this made for an interesting evening.

I had no idea what was going on. In all those stupid videos they show in the birth preparation classes, when a woman’s water breaks you always see this huge gush of fluid coming out and soaking the place like a centennial flood. Not what happened to me. I’d been having contractions all morning, some fairly strong, although nothing in a pattern that would indicate I was in labor. You know, I’d have a few good squeezes, then nothing for a while, then another contraction strong enough to stop me in my tracks. Only thing unusual about them was that I was supposed to go to karate class that morning, but I’d had enough strong ones on my way over there that I didn’t think I’d be able to either take class or help teach without having to drop everything at least three or four times during class and freak everyone out. Some people in my class having been playing “Prophetess of Doom,” predicting when I’d go into labor, and a couple of folks have just been getting on my damn nerves by going on saying, “Oh, you shouldn’t be in class today! I just know you’re going to go into labor right now!” So I just decided not to deal with the aggravation and stay home instead, although my instructor kept giving me a bunch of crap about how he expected me to show up for the annual dojo banquet that evening anyway, contractions or no. He was optimistic that I would be there, no matter what. I was optimistic that he’d get hit by a bus.

So anyway. I skipped karate class, took my daughter home instead, and let her play in her little wading pool in the backyard while I lounged in a lawn chair and kept contracting. After an hour or so of that, I put her down for her nap and lay down to rest myself. Fifteen minutes later, I had a contraction hard enough to wake me up from a sound snooze, and that’s when I felt this pop and gush between my legs. And I said to myself, “What the hell was that? Did my water just break? I have no idea!” And I didn’t, because the gush was just a little one, not even enough to soak the pad I was wearing. So I figured maybe I was losing another big of my mucus plug, which I’d been doing since 2AM that morning. Yeah, yeah, I’m not too bright. I should have realized what was going on, but hey, I was expecting Niagara Falls here, not a tiny trickle.

But the trickle was what I got and what I kept having, and after half an hour of trying to work at my desk, I finally called the doctor’s office and they told me to come in. I woke Princess, called my husband, and we were all at the office by 4:45PM. I was hooked up to the non-stress monitor for an hour. Hubster kept Princess entertained by spinning her around on the doctor’s chair and playing peek-a-boo with the privacy curtain until I finally sent them both out. Then my doctor came in, looked at the non-stress test and at me and said I wasn’t in labor but yeah, my water broke, and off we went to the hospital.

I spent from 7PM Thursday evening until 11PM walking the halls of the labor and delivery floor, dragging an IV pole behind me. At 6PM, I was barely 1 centimeter dilated, and the doctor said I’d probably have to walk all night to get any farther. Even then, he didn’t think the chance were good that I’d open up, so I could expect to have an emergency C-section. Well, I told him I’d walk and we’d see. He was worried about infection since my water had broke, so he said he didn’t plan on checking my cervix again until morning and then he took off for the night. Here’s what happened after that.

7PM – I finish up registration paperwork in the labor and delivery ward and start walking. Hubster takes Princess over to my best friend’s house to spend the night. I have completely forgotten it’s M’s anniversary, but she told me afterward she didn’t mind, because Princess kept her son occupied and out of her hair, and that was the best anniversary present she could have ever gotten from me. Her husband was hoping to get laid, of course, and that didn’t happen with two kids running around the house screaming, but Mary said she made it up to him later.

8:30PMish – Hubster returns with my running shoes. I’ve already been walking a good while, and my contractions have settled into a regular pattern, but only when I walk. If I stop to chat to anyone, the contractions stop too. So we keep walking and dragging that stupid IV pole with us as we go. The nurses think it’s funny we consider the time to ourselves an actual date. Do you know how rarely we get time to ourselves?

11:00PM – the contractions get hard enough and frequent enough that I can’t keep walking. The nurses hook me up to the monitor to see what’s going on. Sure enough, I’ve finally got an early labor pattern going. After an hour of monitoring, Hubster and I discuss getting up and walking some more. I try, and can barely get two steps before the contractions knock me back on my ass again. Back into bed I go.

11:30PMish? – I start to lose track of time here. The contractions are coming really hard and heavy now, which surprises the hell out of me. I’m more than uncomfortable. The nurse asks me on a scale of 0-10, with 0 being no pain and 10 being like their cutting off my leg and forgot the anesthetic, how uncomfortable am I. Not having ever had my leg cut off, with or without anesthetic, I have to guess. I say I’m at a 5, sometimes up to a 6 with the contractions. The nurse wants to keep me at a 3. Do I want pain medication? No, what I really want is to go to the bathroom. I have this overwhelming urge to have a bowel movement. This should have been a huge clue to everyone in the room what was going to happen next.
Midnight – used the bathroom. Still need to go, and the feeling gets worse with every contraction. I’m at a 7 on their little pain scale now, and am having a hard time keeping up with the contractions. Every time I have one, I’m sure I’m going to rupture my bowels. I can’t stop myself from pushing down on them. The nurse suggests pain medication again. I say yes. She checks my cervix, the one the doctor says he wasn’t going to bother with until 8AM the next morning. I’m 2, almost 3 centimeters dilated. The nurse gives me the lowest dose of Stadol and Phenergan she can give me. I’m completely loopy for the next several hours.

1AM – Hubster tells me I slept for 40 minutes before the contractions started waking me up. Then I grunt and groan and push down on that horrendous feeling of constipation I’ve been fighting all evening for a few minutes while my entire lower abdomen tries to turn itself inside out. Soon as the contraction is over, I’m out again. I start having conversations with people who aren’t there (that’s the Stadol talking). I lose all sense of time. I have no idea exactly what happens when next. I’m still in pain though, so I tell the nurse I want an epidural. I’m getting a little panicky at this point, because I can’t control the need to push and can’t think through the pain (again, the Stadol has really put me out).

Between 1AM and 3:47AM – Things get very confused at this point for me. The nurse checks my cervix again. I’m now dilated 3-4 centimeters, enough to go ahead and call the anesthesiologist in for an epidural. It seems to take forever for this guy to arrive. I recall lying on the hospital bed and demanding at one point, “WHERE IS THAT DAMNED EPIDURAL?”Hubster stands by me the whole time, letting me squeeze his hand. He says I never managed to crush his fingers, but that was probably because all my strength was going toward this tremendous urge to push something, anything, out of my body. He finds a pregnancy magazine at one point and announces that is has an article on “Ten Things No One Ever Tells You About Labor.” Item number four says that the urge to push during labor often feels like having a bowel movement. Great. I’m not supposed to be pushing just yet, and that’s what I’ve been doing all along. I can’t control it and I can’t stop myself no matter how hard I try. I’ve completely lost control of my lower body at that point. Shortly after getting this news, the anesthesiologist arrives. They check my cervix again. I’m now at 6 centimeters. The anesthesiologist asks me to sit on the edge of the bed and curl my back over while he puts needle after needle into my spine. I can barely hold still with the contractions, and the floor seems like a long way down. At one point, I realize I’m about to get extremely sick. The only coherent thing I say during this entire four hour period is, “Get a bucket!”Hubster ’s been married to me long enough to know what’s about to happen and gets a small basin. Most of what I bring up goes into it. Only a little ends up on his shoes. It’s all bile, which I hate.

The epidural sorta kinda kicks in. It takes the edge off a bit, but I can still feel everything. Between that and the Stadol, all I can really feel is every agonizing contraction, but I’m not actually panicking now. We’re too far gone for that. All I can do is ride out the waves and keep pushing. The nurses are the ones panicking now, because I’ve dilated to a full ten centimeters and the doctor hasn’t arrived yet. Poor Doctor T. He honestly didn’t expect to see me until 8AM. Now he’s got to get up out of bed and come running to catch this baby. I don’t think he’s going to make it though, and I tell the nurse so. She keeps saying, “You’ve got to stop pushing. Please stop pushing!” And I keep yelling back, “I CAN’T STOP PUSHING! YOU GET DOWN THERE AND CATCH!” Hubster and the nurses keep telling me to blow. I’m sure I say something very unrepeatable in response. Then one nurse says, “Dr. T is here. I told him we weren’t in any hurry, so he could take the stairs.” I announce that the epidural did not take any great effect on me and I will get off the hospital bed to kill her if the jokes don’t stop. Or at least I think I did. The Stadol really has me going at this point. I know because I spend fifteen minutes talking to my dead grandmother. Unfortunately, she has no advice to offer me on how to survive having this baby.

3:47AM – Finally, Dr. T shows up in the delivery room. He pulls on a gown, gets down and checks me out and tells me it’s finally time to push. Nobody bothers to mention the obvious, which is that I’ve done nothing but push since about 11PM. So I’m pushing, and pushing, and pushing, and the more I push, the more I think I’m going to die. And I mean this. I can feel tissue inside me tearing as something HUGE comes clawing its way out of my body. There’s no way in hell I can pass something this large out of me, and I can’t believe how incredibly stupid I was to think I could ever do a vaginal birth. I vaguely recall one of the other obstetricians at Dr. T’s practice telling me that a vaginal birth after C-section can result in a ruptured uterus, killing either the mother or the baby or even both, and I’m thinking maybe that’s what’s happening now. A few minutes later I realize nothing of the sort is happening, and that I’m not going to die, maybe I can’t die, and that’s even worse because I can’t go on with pushing and I can’t back out. I’m stuck in this eternal hell where my nether region is being stretched and torn and ripped to shreds and I can feel every single second of pain, magnified a bazillion times by the Stadol. But now everyone is telling me to curl up and push, and they’ve got my legs pulled up behind my damned ears making it impossible to do what they want me to do, but I’ve got no choice so I push and push and push and then the contraction quits and I have to quit, and then another one starts so I start pushing again, and if this isn’t the longest damned ten minutes of my life I don’t know what is. Dr. T keeps prodding at my vagina, trying to open it up I guess. He tells me I’m doing good, keep pushing, and I keep trying and then I feel this god-awful tearing/burning sensation and I know I’m actually ripping and I’m not ripping down my perineum like I expected, but up into my clitoris instead, which I figure must hurt a hell of a lot worse, because hey, I use that part of my body for fun and it doesn’t like being tortured. But tear it does and I give a couple more pushes, and Dr. T says a couple more after that and we should be done, and I want to ask, “How many more is a couple more, you *&#$?” But all I can do is push.

And then miracle of miracles, at 3:57AM on Friday, 2 June, I rip open and something slips right out and the next thing I know, Dr. T is catching a baby and all the nurses are cheering, and nothing, I mean nothing, feels as good as having that kid slide out of me, and by the way if anyone ever asks you on a scale of 0-10 how much pain you’re in, 10 has nothing to do with having your leg cut off. It’s all about having your naughty bits ripped down the center instead.

Anyway, that’s how Pixie was born.