Out the door not the window

In so many ways I feel as if I did in fact climb Mount Everest. In the unbelievable soreness of my body (though I am not totally sure how a vagina can be harmed in the climbing of a mountain) but also in the sense of accomplishment. Yes I do realize that this is a universal accomplishment, one that is probably being conquered right now by thousands of women, but that thought adds to the pride and awe more than puts a damper on it. I did it. He came out the door and my ugly window is closed for ever.

Everything about the labour was perfect. If I had written this a short three days earlier I may have offered a less than perfect, less sugar coating, rainbows and bubbles. It was hard, I think, I am so amazed at how quickly we forget the labour part, the pain part, the unbearable 'I think I may actually die' part and remember the important parts. These are the parts leading up to the unbearable and the seconds after, when the baby is placed on your stomach for the first time and you feel as if nothing else exists in this world but this perfect moment with this beautiful perfect baby.

My labour started peacefully at about 3am. I wasn't sure if it was a false alarm, so I kept waiting for the next contraction than the next contraction, than the next contraction until it was about 5am till I woke up Colin. During this time I lay there excitement and anticipation filling my entire being, and so much love for my two boys in which I was sandwiched in between. We were going to meet our new addition soon and I was swooning already!

I nudged Colin and said ever so casually 'what are our plans today again?' to which he replied in the most confused and sleepy tone 'what?' 'Well lets have a baby today instead!'. We slept a bit longer, groggily climbing out of bed around 630am. We did some puttering, got the bag together, had breakfast (french toast, energy food) a cup of coffee.........just try and deny me coffee, I dare ya. Called my brother to tell him the news, than headed over there to visit and drop Rohan off for the day.

I have now discovered that boys are pretty panicky. I was heading into a contraction every 3 minutes, and those guys were practically shoving me out the door towards the car to head to the birthing centre. I was pretty content to hang out there a bit longer, but they were having none of it! So bye bye Rohan, see you soon, into the van and on the road we go. Talked to the midwife en route and my contractions started to slow down. Now stuck in Gatineau until they started getting closer together, I just needed some nature to walk in for a while to get things moving again. We got some bagels and hot chocolates from Tim Hortons (whatever) had a nice contraction in the bathroom! Crazy! And headed for a park to walk in.

It was cold and rainy, but we walked and walked and walked around this little ghetto park, me stopping at each tree to lean against for another contraction. This felt so nice. This felt so natural. It was nice for Colin and I to have this extra bonding time, something we had been lacking for a while. Finally headed to the Maison de Naissance for some serious labouring.

There was such a sense of calm and quiet and peace walking in there, instantly different from the sensation of walking through the sterile halls of a hospital. Our room was purple, a huge bed on one end and a tub fit for several queens to the other. We were still in very high sprirts, turned on the radio (to CBC, god I am a geek) stripped down and hopped into the massive tub. At this point I am 5or 6 cm. I ate, I drank, me and Colin discussed names, giggled together and after much searching, agreed on a classic rock station, Pink Floyd and labouring actually worked pretty well together! Amazing amazing amazing.

Once I got out of the tub, I spent most of the rest of the labour on the toilet. This is obviously when things got a bit less glamorous! I started to sing a deep toned AHHHHHH through my contractions to keep my jaw open (it is connected to the cervix) and go with the flow. Lost my cool on many occasions, did some crying, did some vomiting (this also opens up the cervix) and started pushing while still on the toilet. There was a HUGE pop and an explosive gush of liquid, scared the bejeezes out of us! And so the fun began!

I distinctly remember the difference in intensity between the previous contractions and the very first one after the water broke...............I was up on the bed by then and I was literally climbing the walls. It was pure pushing after that. I felt the baby coming down (hurrah I felt everything this time!), I felt the head hit and the ring of fire begin. Wow! Then the head slipped out, one more push and in a tidal wave of liquid and baby out came the body. Ahhh amazing amazing amazing. There it was goopey and beautiful and on my naked belly, screaming and crying and warm and magical. 'Oh my baby. oh my baby' was all I could say as the tears streamed down my face. We did it little man, we took the trek and we arrived.

There was a book that I read that stated that there was nothing like bearing witness to a woman who accomplished a vaginal birth after a cesarean. After feeling as if your body was faulty, you finally get your chance to realize that you can do it, you can do what billions of women have been doing since the beginning of time! This is what it feels like. This is calm, this is bonding, this is real oxytocin running through my body, this is birth and it was beautiful!

Budder

So there I am at the ole GT Boutique (judge me if you must, I have no excuses for my hypocritical ways) getting some veg shortening, fruit and nut mix a big carton of coffee cream and winter gloves for the man. I am quietly standing in the line up, belly protruding uncomfortable far from my spine, constant Braxton Hicks (trickster contractions) turning my already firm abdomen into a rock hard mass of flesh, waiting my turn.

The line is a bit wonky, off to the side instead of straight down, but whatever, I sidle up anyway. A middle aged gentleman holding a bag of chips climbs up to the line in front of me, making a fork in the road. I think to myself 'he only has a bag of chips, I will let him go ahead of me' but it turns out, he did anyway. There is another lady that is just ahead of me, she veers off from the line on the search of another potentially open cash, none to be seen (though, really there is like, three options, I am sure she would have been able to check it out by standing on tip toe!). She than goes around behind me, down the aisle beside me, than Swoop right in front of me.

This is getting more regretful and sad, and as I didn't have Rohan screaming on my large protruding belly, amusing. So far, standing in line, very very pregnant, juggling several articles in my hands, I have had 2 people bud in front of me in line. Crazy.

Than a new cash opens up and I nearly get pushed over for the rush to get to it (total exaggeration of course). I have a total of 3 people bud in front of me while standing in line. Is it me or is this very very wrong? No more niceties for the preggers, fend for yourself 'little' girl, this is the GT Boutique and we got's some serious consuming to take care of! Sheesh.

I am not okay

As I get bigger my ability to keep it together is getting smaller. I can't seem to get my shit together these days to function as a warm and caring mother to my beautiful unknowing son. I can't help but hope to myself that these are not the memories he is going to have of me when he grows up. 'When I was two and a half my fat mom sat on the bathroom floor and cried because I spat in her face'...........not my most shining moment in parenthood.

This is just one time in a long list of throwing in the towel and having a little tear fest. The first trimester was similar to this as well as the first few months of Rohan's life. I am thinking that I just don't take to the extreme increase in hormones as well as others. Too many hormones to start with maybe? Never the less, I catch myself weeping over the simplest things and wondering how I am going to manage to do this with two?

I sometimes get the image of the mom in the movie About a Boy When the son comes home to see his mom weeping. I think of what Rohan is seeing. He is so unbelievably sensitive and offers so much of this sensitivity to me that it just makes me feel worse. He has sat on my lap and wiped away my tears, given me kisses and hugs and just generally maintained my presence to make sure I was okay. Actually, he would make an amazingly attentive boyfriend, lucky girl that eventually snags this gem!

These are the days that I feel like I am failing as a mom. These are the days that I feel like I am just not cut out for this job. These are the days that I think to myself 'what right do I have to bring another child into this world when I am doing such a poor job at being a mom to my first?'. These are the days that I wish I had some close friends that I could call and they could come over and drink tea with me and just..................be here.

Motherhood is such a lonely job. Even with a partner, and at times I think, even more so when you do have a 'partner'. And what, you may ask, gets me out of this funk? leaving this house that, more often than not, is what brings me into it in the first place. When in the same place day in and day out, spending more time than you would ever like trying to maintain some semblance of cleanliness, things get overwhelming. Especially when you are attempting to keep your two and a half year old entertained and you are so unbelievably large and pregnant and oh so very tired. It is hard to be at home and not clean or want to clean, or make mental notes of what needs to get done or cooked or baked stresssssssss. As soon as we leave the house, the house is out of my vision and, for the most part, out of mind.

That is why, in public, I seem like a much more calm and attentive mom, because I am not at home! That also applies with company. I feel much less inclined to worry about the house when people are over, I would much rather sit around and gossip!

The conclusion? We need a maid in order for me to be a good mom!! haha yeah right!

Home alone

I went to my brother and sister in law's for Thanksgiving dinner tonight. It was a nice small gathering with the two families and Michelle's mom. It was super nice.

I have recently taken up the habit of forgetting holidays. This I find odd considering it should really be the opposite considering this whole parenthood thing that I have taken on. I think it should be ingrained in with all the other maternal instincts that I have acquired, but nope, I forget every time. It is nice to have family around to not only remind me, but to encourage me to celebrate these holiday's as well. I am pretty sure, if it wasn't for them, we would be eating pasta and going to bed early (though that bed early is still in the world of possibilities for me at this point).

I find now, that when I go to social gatherings, or have any social outing at all, that I tend to communicate out of a daze. I feel so out of it and spacey and tired and just incapable of holding a real conversation with anyone. I should really just hole up at home until I get my personality back! However, the benefits of this is that I am blatantly pregnant, and that tends to be the one thing that I talk about. Mostly about the girth, my very very large presence. Even those snippits of conversation get broken up with Rohan trying to get my attention. Blah, I need my brain back!

So anyway, had dinner and now Colin went out with my brother, which I actually think is great because they just don't hang out enough in my books. For some reason, beer always seems to be the one tool in which men are able to bond the best with each other. Oh what I wouldn't give for that bonding vessel to be a chess board or jogging shoes and not a beer bottle, but whatever. And here I am, home alone.

I have been home alone before, though I didn't know it was going to happen at the time, so I pretty much slept through the whole event. It feels................okay. I mean I have a slight tinge of paranoia, but in all honesty, when don't I have a slight tinge of paranoia? I like having the whole bed to myself (well, until Rohan climbs in). It is pretty quiet. I kind of wish I had a good book to settle into the night with. Steal all of Colin's pillows, create myself a little pillow heaven. I like to have one especially to hold the book as well. That is pampering! I will look for one I guess. Hmmm Yes, it is pretty quiet.

burny, ouch

We had a very painful lesson learned the other day, me and Rohan. I will give it equal blame. I blame myself for creating an area of unsafety in my kitchen, and Rohan for not using his, not developing as I feel they should be, listening skills.

I was preheating our sandwich press thingy to make some super delicious cheese, tomato and tofalony sammies for lunch. I must admit here that the press was unnecessarily close to the edge of the counter, I will offer myself a shake of the head and a loudish 'idiot' for that not thought through move. Rohan was jumping around me excitedly. Nice combination right?

So I leaned down and to look him in the eye and said 'Rohan, I want you to be aware that this is very very hot *Pointing emphatically to the sandwich press* please be careful'. Well, my dear little man decided to take this opportunity to express his 'terrible two's' proof of independence with a nice big dash of rebelling against his mama. Up goes his hand with a look of pure defiance plastered on his face.................and smack right onto the preheated for a good 10 minutes, sandwich press.

Now would be a good time to show off the trucker mouth. Fuck. Ouch city. So he was obviously pretty upset about the whole ordeal, as was I, but not enough maybe? I offered a loving and supportive sympathy for him, but I have to admit, in the back of my head I though to myself 'cause and effect, a very good lesson for today' also, 'always listen to your mother because she knows best. Does make me evil and completely lacking in sensitivity? Hmmm maybe. I don't really know. I feel pretty sensitive most of the time!

It was a pretty bad burn in the end, the picture does not give it justice. He is really good sport about it and now he is pretty unaffected by the blisters in his hand. He was, however, affected by the situation itself. When he wants to discuss this moment of drama he tends to say ' Mama, No', meaning mama said no and I did it anyway. Hmmm I guess it was a lesson learned, he certainly backs away anytime I say something is hot now! Poor little guy!

pictures!

Just a few of the awesome pictures that we had done! Yes Rohan looks VERY unamused, but overall we are super happy with these! Yay!

Down Town Bribery Town

We had a photo session today at a professional photography studio. http://www.babyandbelly.ca/
We had done the same thing while I was pregnant with Rohan, so to avoid immediate concerns of sibling favourtism, I decided that we should offer similar pictures for bambino numbero 2. It wasn't a very difficult decision to make, even though the pictures that we had taken before turned out to be horrible. Colin and I take pretty okay pictures.....................alone. Together we look ridiculous. At least one of us always has some sort of very unfortunate expression on our face. And it didn't help that I had the appearance of the stay puff marshmallow man by the time we had them taken!

I also wanted to have some really cute images of Rohan being all lovey toward the baby. See baby number two, your brother loved you before you were even out of the womb. Aww look at those two inseparable siblings, it started before sibling number two took it's first breath of air! I had looked through the pictures in the portfolio and the ones that incorporate the first born's are so unbelievably adorable. I had some pretty darn fantastic pictures in my head as well.

Well, as to be anticipated after so much expectation, the pictures didn't go as well as I had expected. We started off with family photos on the floor. Rohan looked positively pissed off. He just sat there with an ever widening frown upon his angry little cheeks. To be fair, it was pretty bright behind all the lighting, it was pretty impersonal and of course he could most likely feel our uncomfortable tension. We let him go play while Colin and I did our ever so classic maternity poses together.

Then we tried to coax Rohan back to take some more pictures. He was having none of it. And so ensued the bribery. Cue candy here. This was initially offered by the photographer, and out of desperation for our perfect family photo's, we went with it. The main problem with this of course was that Rohan doesn't even know the word candy, so it did not even faze him as far as his stubbornness went. I offered and bribed a few more things that he would know and potentially want, to no avail. He just got progressively angrier and determine.

This was all fine, I was hoping to have more photo's with Rohan in them, but that may come with the next set of pictures which will include our new addition. What the real concern for me is the allowance and then the continuation of the use of bribery. I didn't think that this was going to be a method of parenting that was going to take part in. Do I want to coax my wee man into doing what I want him to by offering him sweet rewards? Is that not a similar downward slide to giving him a sweet when he hurts himself. Food that is bad for you is your reward and the one thing that may make you feel better about scraping your knee. Nope, don't like it.

I will attempt to avoid these food offerings as much as I can, that is until our next photo session!! Crap!