Away

Well I've been simply terrible at posting. I'm still sloooowly working on Atlas's birth story. Life with two is good. It's great. I'm really happy. I should post more. I will. Soon. For now, though, Atlas is seven weeks old and simply delightful. 

Calm in the Chaos

Babe is ten days old, things are mostly good, save a bout of mastitis, and the usual bleeding nipples and sleep deprivation. Trying to work on a birth story.

Finally

Atlas Constantine Boddy. More to come. 

Still got nothin'

So. Here we are, at the eve of 42 weeks. Wow. Today was actually a good day. Another NST under my belt this morning. Same old thing. Midwife agreed that waiting another day was a sound decision. Did a check, and finally finally finally my cervix appears to be functioning. We're at 3cm now, which is a relief. Still, we waited today and nothing much happened, which means we take the nuclear option in the morning: Artificial rupture of membranes and another round of castor oil and hope for the best.

I feel great, actually. I get to meet my baby tomorrow. I GET TO MEET MY BABY TOMORROW! Somehow or other I will meet my silly little stubborn baby tomorrow.

See you on the flip side!

No news is bad news...

So. I am still pregnant. No, I don't entirely believe it either. 41 weeks, 5 days, no signs of anything changing now or any time in the near future.

Yesterday was okay. We had a BPP ultrasound and he was the most boring perfect beautiful little thing ever. It was my first time having a late term ultrasound, as Tycho was born before his BPP appointment, and they are strange. Hard to see much of anything, really. But they did they 3D of his face and... he looks exactly like Tycho. And had an estimated weight 9lbs, 4oz, which the tech was afraid to tell me. But been there, done that, no big deal. Yesterday I had a lot of contractions but they never organized themselves into anything productive. But it was an okay day. I didn't feel like the world was ending or any crazy talk.

Today is a different story. Today was castor oil day. You'd think at this far along on my second pregnancy that there is no way castor oil wouldn't work. But I've had not one but two doses of the stuff today, and nothing. Nothing at all, nothing nothing nothing. And sitting around waiting for labor to start is a completely different thing than trying to kickstart it and epicly failing, so today I'm much less stoic about the whole situation. Third day of tears since my due date past, which is still a pretty great track record. But really, what the hell? There is no reason in the universe that this shouldn't have worked but it didn't, and normally I buy into that whole thing where my body knows what it's doing and to trust that things will happen when the time is right, but it's really hard to continue to believe that right now.

The original plan was for tomorrow to be artificial rupture of membranes day, but since my body has responded to nothing at all in the appropriate fashion, I think I'd like to put it off until Monday morning, so if I don't go into labor that my hospital transfer goes a little more smoothly... Another NST in the morning, so we'll see...

Uncharted Territory

At this point in my last pregnancy, 41+2, I was in labor.

I am not currently in labor.

I am not doing so good. I've really managed to keep this hysterical sobbing thing under control this time around, but we are now venturing into the unknown and I am freaked right the fuck out. I have a biophysical profile ultrasound scheduled for Friday. I had one scheduled with Tycho, too, but he was born before we had to go. I don't want to go. I don't want to drink castor oil, I don't want someone to break my water, I definitely don't want my baby delivered by a doctor I've never met in a hospital room I've never seen. I don't want an IV or labor inducing drugs. It may not be accurate, but I feel like not being in labor right now means that all these things are inevitable. Officially I have five more days, but I feel like I've run out of time.

It's not supposed to happen like this. My first baby was late because he was my first, but my second is supposed to be easier. Everyone assured me that he would show up in a timely manner with no shenanigans. Because number two.  But here we are.

41

Aaaaand here we are again. I'm overdue. Really overdue. A week, today. I don't know why I thought things would be any different this time, but I did and now I'm bummed because they aren't. Even my midwife was like pffft you won't go that long the second time. But here we are. To be fair, baby still has a couple more days to beat his big brother in punctuality, but at this point I still don't feel like anything is even imminent, and maybe he will turn out to be even more stubborn. Great.

It's interesting how different my feelings are about it this time, though. With Tycho these days past my due date dragged on and on and on forever and I was a miserable mess of tears and hysterics and every moment was an eternity.

This time it's the exact opposite. Time is just flying by. I have no idea how it's already a week past my due date, and it certainly doesn't feel like there is enough time left for me to into labor and have a baby before I hit that all important 42 week deadline. Time is moving too fast for me to have a baby by then. So my panicking is of a different nature. And fortunately, it is more in the background, because hey, I have a three year old, sobbing breakdowns just aren't on my agenda so much right now.


Anyhow. That's the boring boring still pregnant update. Hopefully there is more exciting news soon.

Today

Today is my due date.

I'm actually doing pretty okay. It's almost 10pm and I've made it this far with no tears, which is far greater than I expected.

It helps to have a plan, I think. I knew I needed to keep myself busy today. Fortunately it's Kyle's day off work, so we had a family date after Tycho got home from school. Just brunch and walking around the drizzly, deserted zoo (the best time to go!), but it was a happy thing.

It was for me, but also for Tycho. His world is about to change so much. He only has a few more days (hopefully only a few) to be our one and only. I had hoped to do more fun exciting Tycho things before the baby got here, but life has gotten in the way. The zoo isn't super special, but it was fun and he got to have Mama and Daddy all to himself.

I can't wait to meet my new baby, but I'm also going to miss flying solo with my first.





All photos by the amazing Ashley Vos  as usual.

SCHOOL!

So with all the other excitement going on lately, I totally missed blogging about pretty much the most important thing ever: PRESCHOOL!

It's been a little more than a week now, and so far so good. No, so far, excellent. Easiest transition ever. Even though I was soooo excited for school I was also nervous about how it was going to go over. We haven't ever really left Tycho with anyone that wasn't a close friend or family member, that he already knew well, so sending him off to hang out with strangers... well, who knows how that will go down?

But the Friday before class started we took him to the open house, and he was immediately totally comfortable in the classroom and with his teachers. So Monday morning we cold-turkey-ed it and stuck him on a school bus and sent him on his way.

Crazy! But it was great. Zero tears, easy peasy, and then he was gone. His teacher called me as soon as she stuck him on the bus at the end of the day (the end of the day, ha! 11am), to let me know that he had a great day, zero crying, was on his way back to us. And that was it!

It's very strange, though. We can't get him to tell us anything about his school day once he gets home. I ask him what he ate for snack and he always tells me "cereal and apple juice" which I'm pretty sure is not even close to true and today when he got off the bus he told me alligators were going to eat me, but really I have no idea what happens in the three hours he's gone each day. And I've never had that before. Obviously with two working parents, Tycho has spent a fair amount of time in the care of others, but since it's always been people that are close to us, I've always had a good first hand account of everything that's been going on with him. And now there is a part of his life that belongs just to him and not to me anymore. I'm not sad, but it's new, and it's only going to get bigger as he gets older. That's good, I think, but still. Different.

Dress Rehearsal

So last night I thought I was in labor.

Actually, scratch that. I didn't. I was pretty sure that it wasn't really happening, but my friends and my uterus and my fear of giving birth alone convinced me it might be. But it wasn't. So we had a home birth dress rehearsal of sorts.

I started having contractions around 5 pm. Real ones. Not hard ones, but they were there none-the-less. My best friend of course is out of town shooting a wedding and so it was the worst possible day for me to go into labor. So I park my butt on the couch to rest and hopefully will them to stop. But they don't stop.

I'm hemming and hawing, but updating my friends who are convinced things are really happening even though I'm refusing to even try to time them because I am in denial about the whole thing. Apparently my pain tolerance is not to be trusted because I had an easy labor with Tycho and I get tattooed for four hours while barely even flinching. Okay, I guess. I tell Kyle eventually that he might want to come home from work.

When I finally start timing them they are six, no, four and a half, no, three minutes apart. But still easy. Really really easy. But enough that I would prefer you leave me alone while I deal with them, and close enough together for long enough that... well maybe we should call the midwife?

Long story short, everyone converges on our house. Midwives get there and I say I'm sure when you check it's going to be nothing.... and yeah. Nothing. 1 cm dilated, whoop-de-doo. She says it doesn't seem like a labor cervix. No surprise there. And then everyone packs up and leaves and I feel like an idiot. Drink a bunch of water to calm things down and try to sleep.



So. That happened. It was the worst. I feel like an ass. And I feel even more done being pregnant that I did before, because even though I didn't think it was happening, some tiny little part of me was so excited to meet my baby and I'm sad I still have to wait.



But there is some good here. I feel better now about trusting my gut. I KNEW when I was finally really in labor with Tycho and I KNEW when it was time to head into the birth center even though no one thought I was far enough along. And last night I knew it wasn't time. So my intuition is good. We are going to trust it. No more second guessing myself.

And I feel even better now about my home birth. I've been feeling pretty confident about it for some time (after initially being terribly nervous when we first made an official decision), but envisioning having my baby here felt so right. And my support team that came to help me out felt good. And Tycho was so great and I really think it is the right thing to include him. So we know what we are doing and we are confident and ready and things are going to be a piece of cake when the time really comes, right?

Hopefully it will come soon.

Leaving

So plans seems to have a tendency to change.

As of last Tuesday, I guess, I am on maternity leave. I had planned to work up until the 20th, which will be a couple days before I hit 39 weeks, but I manage to misalign my pubic symphysis, and I'm mostly okay unless I'm doing a lot of walking. But retail, so a lot of walking is practically my job description. So, I'm at home on the couch. I feel... weird about it. On the one hand, it does feel very nice to actually be taking care of myself, and every time I do manage to overdo it, I'm like YEP, RIGHT DECISION.

But it's also anti-climactic. The last day I was at work I left halfway through my shift because I was in too much pain, so it just feels like there is a lack of closure and a bunch of dangling loose ends and such. Too late now, I guess.

So feelings, lots of different ones, but mostly I just feel relieved. And ready to get this show on the road.

Updates, the usual.

Oh poor blog that no one reads!

I swear I mean to post, and maybe probably there have actually been things to post about, but I haven't, and that is lame. I actually really like having the record to go back and look upon, remember things that otherwise would have been forgotten, but to make that possible you have to do the record-taking in the first place.

Baby-prep is the biggest thing happening in my life right now, surprise surprise. It took until a couple of weeks ago for me to even be more than sort of casually aware of my pregnancy, but now I'm 100% pregnant 100% of the time. I am exhausted and cranky and enormous and disagreeable. But it's good that I'm finally able to focus on this, so we can actually be prepared for, you know, the birth and having a newborn and all that.

We are officially officially having a home birth. I'm sooooo excited, I can't even explain. At first I was very on the fence about doing it at home vs. another go at the birth center, but really, this makes much more sense for us. We are stupid far away from the center now that we have bought our house, and it makes sense to have Tycho in his own space and to disrupt him as little as possible. He can be present for as much or as little of the birth stuff as he wants, or if he is asleep when I am in labor we don't have to disturb him or whatever. My mom is officially in charge of keeping him happy during labor, but it will be so much easier if he can be in his own space. Anyway, my birth kit is about 80% assembled, I've reserved my labor tub rental, my mom's been spending my days off from work for me going through baby things and getting my house ready for impending events. We've pushed through most of the big stuff that had been weighing on me, and now I feel nothing but excitement and readiness and let's get this show on the road! I'm 36 weeks today, so another seven days, and baby boy is welcome to show up whenever. Officially my maternity leave isn't starting until September 21, but I wouldn't be adverse to leaving before then.

Tycho is ding great, too. He is excited for the baby, as much as he can be. We've really done everything possible to prepare him for the birth and the new baby, but really there is only so much you can do to prepare a three year old and regardless it's going to be a shock to the system for him. Now that we're closing in on the end I'm feeling a little emotional about the loss of my "only" child. But I'm hoping that in the long run having a brother will be way more awesome than having mommy all to himself.

Compassionate Parenting

Thoughts for tonight...

It can be really hard to have compassion for a tantrumming toddler. Really really hard. When it's been a long day and I'm on my own for the evening and I didn't sleep well last night and I'm very very pregnant and he is working my last nerve. And I do what I am supposed to do and I draw boundaries and dole out consequences... and then what?

He's three. Even if he didn't listen and he misbehaved and a timeout is well and fully deserved does not make his upset at being there invalid. Of course he's upset. And even though I've already had it, maybe it's better for me to just love him through it.

No, I will not back down, and no I'm not reading that book now that you earlier refused because you had your chance at a nice bedtime routine and you blew it, but YES, that is really sad and it's okay to feel sad about it and I'm sorry you're feeling sad and I will sit here with you and hold you until you feel better and we will try again tomorrow.

I could have just thrown my hands up and walked out and closed the door and he would have yelled for a few minutes and then gone to sleep on his own, but this was better for both of us I think. It's so hard when I'm already exhausted to remain calm in the middle of it all and feel with him. His feelings are important because that is how he is learning. And I'm learning, too. And I think we did an okay job with today.

3

My baby dude Tycho turns three tomorrow. Kind of incredible. I'm normally not a pinterest-mom, but sometimes you just want your kid to wake up in the morning to something special.

Survived

We're back in town. Well, we've been back in town, but I haven't posted anything because I am lazy and no good. And now I'm back to work and life is boring again. But I should tell you about our trip!

IT WAS GREAT. I mean, an international trip with a three year old (almost!) while seven months pregnant sounds like any sane woman's nightmare, but it went really awesome. First of all, Tycho. He is just the best thing ever in the entire world ever. Period. He was 100% perfect amazing. For a toddler, at least.

It probably helped that I was PREPARED AS FUCK. I had been exploring the (completely insane and delightful LET ME TELL YOU) world of woven wraps for baby number two, and ordered my first a couple weeks before we left. And so had to try it out with Tycho. Now, I won't claim that it is easy to carry a 41lb kid on your back while you are pregnant, but I liked it enough that I brought it along.  And thank god for that. We literally would not have made it there and back without. And I was exhausted, but I felt like a goddamned super mom.

Carrying him was not an option, and we had too much luggage to really keep track of him on foot, so thank goodness I could wear him. It was hard, and it was exhausting, but it was awesome.

And then he did amazing on our flight. (Both ways, actually.) I was DREADING ten hours in the air with nowhere to run around with this kid. It sounded like a recipe for disaster. DISASTER. But I packed him exciting presents to unwrap and unlimited peanut butter sandwiches and his seat had its own easily navigable tv screen, so he was happy as a clam for the entire freaking flight. Both ways. OMG. And then he was good for the subsequent subway (two lines), train (another 2.5 hours), and car ride (35 minutes) to get to our destination.

The manor house we were staying in was incredible. Most of my trips to Europe (god, I'm such a snob) have been to large cities, and we were out in the tiniest ever town of Sassetot-le-Manconduit, in the Normandy country side, a billion years away from anything. With the cows and the goats. In a nine hundred year old manor. That was gorgeous but also had running water and plenty of electrical outlets and a modern kitchen and wifi internet. So basically perfection.

It was so good to see my sister again after almost a year. We do a good job of regular video chats, but nothing is the same as seeing someone in person. She was stressed out from wedding planning and getting on my last nerve, but as soon as we were in the same space all the annoyance was gone and I was so happy to be with my sister! (And yes, we did have a 4th of July party in France, of course!)

Tycho also recognized her right away, even though a year in toddler time is actually forever, and that was amazing. And since my parents and my aunt and uncle were also there, he got really comfortable really fast, and everyone else staying in the manor seemed to be okay with him by association. We pretty much let him run amok in the manor the whole trip and he got lots of quality time with various and sundry family members.

The wedding itself... needs it's own post, which I will eventually get to. It was one of those days where every last little thing goes wrong. A comedy of errors, if you will. But one that all came together beautifully in the end, thank goodness.

And after we got through wedding festivities, we had a few days to actually do a little low-key sight seeing. 

The way home was slightly more complicated than the trip there, simply because we didn't have as much time to get between our train stopping in Paris and the airport, and CDG is a mess of checkpoints and security lines, and Kyle is pretty much the world's grumpiest traveller, but we did in fact make it back to Seattle, so I think we did all right. 

And then I had an additional three days off work, so I didn't feel like I was going to die. That was nice too. 

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I'm in France with my family and my sister got married yesterday and there is so much to tell, but for now I just have one thing to show you.

The usual disasters.

Oh hey. It's been a month since I've written, so I should perhaps update before we leave the country for two weeks.

Oh right, that. We leave on Tuesday for France for my sister's wedding! Apparently I like going to France while I'm pregnant. I'm more excited to be there at 27 weeks than at 12 though. I was still so sick last time that I didn't feel like I got to enjoy anything.

Although I've barely been able to get myself excited about this trip either. Besides it being an incredible expense for us (international plane tickets for three people; please kill me), I've been so busy in the months leading up to it, what with the whole being pregnant thing and Tycho's EI adventure and my Grandpa's funeral and the subsequent sale of his house (saaaaaaaaad) and my in laws (Kyle's parents and all the BILs) visiting earlier this month, I've barely put any thought or planning into this trip beyond getting my vacation time approved.

And then everything went all to hell when I went to pick up my bridesmaid dress from the salon. I was afraid I would be swimming it in, because the consultants talked me into ordering it 3 sizes larger than I measured. And then it was three inches too small. Oh. But okay, don't panic, get someone to put a corset back in that sucker and it will be all good. Thank Maude we ordered extra fabric.

Went to my final fitting on Friday. We were hoping I could take it home that day, but there might be a couple tweaks that needed to be done over the weekend. I go to try it on and... it's a mess. I terrible terrible no good unwearable mess. So we discuss ripping out two weeks of alterations and starting from scratch. Four days before I have to leave. With plans to spend my entire Monday afternoon the day before we leave hanging around the shop. Like I need that stress.

By the time I got to Ashley's to pick up Tycho I was thisclose to hyperventilating, and planning to take Tycho to the mall with me at 7pm for emergency backup formalwear because OMG. But Ashley is a delightful human being, and told me to leave Tycho with her husband, and she would come with me. Thank god. I needed the moral support.

Do you know how scary it is to try to find a black tie appropriate purple gown that fits off the rack with no notice at 27 weeks pregnant? I was sweating. And so we went to Nordstrom. And found not one, but two dresses that fit the bill and looked awesome to choose from. That I actually loved and weren't just a sad substitute. Say what?

So. New bridesmaid dress, whatever. More money dumped into this trip, but at this point another $200 is just a drop in the bucket and well worth minimizing my stress level. Originally I was planning on returning whatever backup I had purchased in the event that we somehow magically got my first dress working by go time, but I like new one so much I called my alterations lady and told her not to kill herself trying to fix it. Because I need to stop worrying about it. So. Yeah. It all works out in the end I suppose. Unless I grow another five inches in the next six days. Please no.

At the very least I had the foresight to take off two buffer days on either side of our trip. I'm 95% packed for Tycho and I, so today is simply getting Tycho's haircut and buying airplane snacks, and tomorrow all I have to do it get my hair/nails/etc. taken care of. I'm actually... relaxing on my vacation? It's kind of awesome. Especially considering how NOT relaxing the last several months have been. We leave in less than 48 hours, and I'm FINALLY excited about this trip. Phew.




Catch you on the flip side, blog. With lots of photos, of course.

Good and Bad

The good: Wednesday afternoon brought us Tycho's very first ever IEP meeting. It was great! We are now just waiting for school placement, but starting this fall he'll be going to developmental preschool for a three hour session Monday-Thursday, with DOOR TO DOOR BUS SERVICE  OMG. It's official and I feel like I can breathe a little bit better for the first time since I started worrying about this in, oh, I don't know, February?

Anyway, the team met and we have official goals for Tycho for next year, and I find them to be laughably optimistic, but that's okay, because professionals are going to help us work on them. And if at the end of next school year I have a potty-trained kid who can dress himself and transition between activities without having a meltdown I will probably die of happiness.

In other news, the bad: I am sick as fuck. Ended up in the ER on Monday afternoon. I spent several hours considering if it was really worth it to brave the emergency room on a fucking holiday, but in the end I was puking all the time and couldn't even keep down water and was getting totally dehydrated and therefore hysterical and weepy. And then I realized I hadn't felt the babe move since that morning and I made Kyle pack up Tycho and take us in. Zofran and IV fluids and fetal heart tones, oh my!

We explained to Tycho that I was too sick to drink water with my mouth so I was going to drink it through my arm instead and he miraculously didn't freak the fuck out and was actually pretty well behaved considering he spent five hours in a hospital room with me.

My midwife told me I was okay to tough it out, but I just couldn't take it anymore. I'm still not well, and now I'm going on a week of being sick. I'm better than I was on Monday, but I'm still on the BRAT diet and taking Zofran around the clock and probably mildly dehydrated and exhausted and uncomfortable and let's throw in some round ligament pain and debilitating heartburn for good measure. I'm at that point in my illness where I don't remember not being sick, and I've given up the possibility of ever feeling well again, thinking about how I'm going to manage feeling this bad at my sister's wedding which is OVER A MONTH AWAY.  Hopefully this passes.

Him

Also in big news, we found out about a week and a half ago that we are having another son! Tycho went form always answering that he wanted a sister, to being adamantly pro-brother about three days before our ultrasound. Not that he really understands what either of those words means, but oh well.

I'm so excited! I really and truly did not have a preference, even though literally no one actually believed me on that. People told me they were hoping for a girl for me, like that would be some sort of extra gift. I don't understand. The only thing I'm bummed about is no getting to use our girl name, because I really loved it. But after a couple days of discussion we picked a named for this baby (to be announced) and I am in love with it.

Funny, now the he is in fact a he and has pronouns and a name and all that and that things feel more definite and real and he kicks me all the time and makes his presence known... I am just so impatient to meet him. Until a week ago I was pretty contentedly plodding along in the pregnancy and then all of the sudden I have no more patience, I do not want to wait any longer, I just want to fast forward to September and meet this little dude. I never felt the way with Tycho, even when I was tired of being pregnant I was also facing a complete unknown and I felt less than prepared for parenting and I wasn't going to be ready for him until he was thrust upon me, but this time I have all the confidence in the world that I can mother a newborn and I don't want to wait any longer to get there.

IEP time!

Too many things to share! Let's start here.


Tycho is IN! He's in!!!! He will be enrolling the school district's developmental preschool in the fall. Four half days a week, transportation provided (omg the short bus!!), amazing. I'm so relieved and happy and nervous and emotionssssss! We have his very first IEP meeting next week, but I was finally able to actually talk to his social worker person on the phone instead of the series of voicemails we had been leaving each other, and it looks like that meeting is mostly going to be details, and the big stuff that I was worried about is all going to be fine and it's going to be so good for him and he is going to thrive. My goal for him to be on target and mainstreamed by kindergarten feels reachable and everything is awesome. I think he's going to love it.