This kid must have a great destiny, I tell ya, cuz life sure threw up
plenty of obstacles.
You all probably remember my multiple posts about how miserable a "close
enough" diagnosis of gestational diabetes was making me. I spent the
last month or so of the pregnancy with NO energy: literally, walking a
couple blocks was a triumph. Additionally, I hadn’t been getting more
than 2 hours of sleep at a stretch, with usually a total of 5 hours per
36 hour period. Well, no matter how emphatically I told him to get out,
it seemed like DS2 wasn’t moving. So, out of exhaustion, I agreed to be
induced on last Wednesday, when I would be 40 weeks, 3 days. One doctor
out of three (the one I saw most often) was concerned that he was going
to be a very big baby – the other two were unimpressed. The luck of the
draw meant I would be induced under the care of the worried doc.
Leading up to the induction date, I was hoping he’d move on his own, but
skeptical. In the meantime, my other son had developed a cough, which
we thought was just allergy-related since he didn’t really have any
other symptoms. Then on Saturday, I started coughing, too. Great, I
thought, I get to be even more run down.
On the Monday before the induction, we decided to visit Grandma in
Berkeley. Due to a snafu with paperwork, our car, while registered, did
not have the stickers. So we came out of our visit to find it in the
process of being towed. By the UC police, of all things. They let us
get everything, and we borrowed Gramma’s car to get home. Monday
evening, DS1 complained of a terrible earache, and I suspected an ear
infection (his first!). On Tuesday, while DS1 was at school, we went to
Berkeley and spent the day and a substantial amount of cash getting the
car back. After school, DS1 had his urgent care appointment, where the
Dr. said not only did he have an ear infection, he had walking
pneumonia! So after all our weeks of planning things for him to do
while waiting, he wouldn’t be allowed anywhere near the hospital. Fooey.
Some scrambling resulted in a plan for Grandma and Auntie (MIL & SIL) to
sit for the sick boy at home, while Mom & Dad were at the hospital.
Wednesday morning, according to plan, with Auntie fixing breakfast for
DS1, we set out.
We got to the hospital at 8 AM, and I was immediately shown my room,
asked to strip (hospital gowns suck), and met my nurse. I gave my
instructions: No epidural, because I’m scared of needles anywhere near
my spinal column, and no artificial nipples. She was wonderful, but
failed twice trying to get the IV in. Oh well. It was accomplished
with some help. We jumped right in with the pitocin. Due to being
positive for Strep B with DS1, I also got antibiotics. Not,
unfortunately, a kind that helped my lungs. Oh well, again.
Next was a fairly uneventful, downright boring stretch. Contractions
progressed, but fairly unnoticed by me, and every time they checked for
dilation, he was high enough that I now know for sure that I don’t like
fisting (very uncomfortable!) Deciding that it was gonna be boring for
a while, yet, I sent DH home for a bit in the late AM, to check on DS1,
and see how he was getting along with Auntie. He got back a bit after
lunch, and the contractions were starting to get bad. Shortly after, I
asked for some IV pain medicine. BAD IDEA. They gave me Stadol and
some anti-nausea stuff, and I dunno if it was one, the other, or the
combo, but it was the most unpleasant experience. It was like very
high-speed dreaming, with an ongoing awareness of where I was, and a
background sense of the developing contractions. Never again.
By the time it wore off, the contractions were really going, I was
whining pathetically, and fighting to get up off the bed. They couldn’t
get all the monitors, etc., unplugged fast enough for me at one point,
and that’s when I turned the corner to being really irritated with all
of ‘em. I spent a while standing up, leaning on the bed, with DH
applying cooling cloths.
When I couldn’t take it any more, I announced that it was time to push.
They wanted to check me again, which I countermanded – nope, we’re
going now. I couldn’t bear the thought of anything going inwards right
then. Then comes a long blurry stretch of people saying irritating
platitudes. DH was wonderful, though – he kept up with the cool cloths,
and, for some reason, holding his hand on my forehead so I could push
against it.
After FOREVER of people chanting "One more, almost there," and DS2
playing peekaboo, I knew I really didn’t have much more reserves of
strength. I asked for an episiotomy. The Doc seemed surprised, but
complied. DS2 came out shortly after that, to exclamations of "Oh,
that’s a big baby!" DH says that he had thought when I asked that the
snip was unnecessary, but immediately changed his mind when he saw the
little man. Labor wrapped up pretty quickly after that.
He pee’d on the nurse during his first check, setting a precedent he
has kept to. We got out of the hospital on the evening of the next day,
and DS1 was delighted to finally meet him. DS1 has been an excellent
big brother, so far.
His name is Harry Daniel, he was 9 lbs. 5 oz., 21 inches when born, and
was back to his birth weight by Monday.
He gave us a bit of a scare over the weekend: a bad latch and a Mommy
too tired to deal with owie nursing had gotten him a little dehydrated,
with an almost 101 deg fever. We went ahead and got supplies to
supplement with formula for a while, and his fever came down, weight
came up. Now that my milk is in, he’s nursing well (still owie, though,
tho’ I know that’s normal).
He’s beautiful. He looks almost exactly like his brother at that age,
though he does have some crazy big earlobes. As for me, I feel so much
better now that he’s out, I can almost forget about stitches, fluid on
the lungs, and not being able to put him down long enough to eat [grin].
DH put pictures up on his blog, here:
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=12923…
–
Cheri Stryker
Mom to DS1 – 6 yrs old
was preg w/ DS2 – born 2/22
