Crazy In Love

I am smitten with this little guy.

6 weeks and already wearing “3-6 month” outfits.  He’s long… roughly 2′ long and a skinny little guy, just around 12 lbs… maybe 13. (I’m guessing because our scale isn’t the greatest)

A woman on a message board I go to about pregnancy/baby things just found out she’s pregnant again.  She had her baby just a couple of weeks before I had John.  I couldn’t imagine.  Well, actually I can imagine and that is why abstinence has been my BFF these days and I’m going to chat with my midwife about birth control on Tuesday at my 6 week appointment.

Noah and I haven’t completely solidified our family plans but what we do know at this point in time is that we would like another baby some day… but that “some day” is not now.  I’m thinking maybe around the time John starts pre-school or kindergarten we will start thinking about another baby.  I really want to enjoy his baby and toddler years to the fullest and be able to give him our full attention.  Nothing is set in stone, obviously.  But another baby is not in the plan at the moment.  Maybe we’ll change our minds tomorrow, but I don’t think so.

and as such, I can never pass up a good deal.

Yesterday I went to Target to pick up printer paper and face wash.  Of course I had to check the baby clearance section and I hit the jackpot!

I got…

1 fall/spring jacket, 2 thick sweatshirts, 3 adorable sweaters…

2 super cute t-shirts…

2 pairs of sweatpants, 1 pair of blue khakis, and 2 pairs of jeans.

All for the low price of $35.  I am very pleased with myself and Johnny is going to look so cool next fall/winter/spring (whenever he fits in the 12 and 18 mos. clothes I picked out).

Then today I went back and they had a really great convertible car seat for 50% off.  I checked it out on amazon.com (via iPhone) and it got great ratings. I saw the new model out on the shelf too… it’s always strange to me that they discount the old ones so much just because the trim color is slightly different or something equally as insignificant has changed, but it works out well for me.  Well, actually, this one is for my mom.  She’s been looking for one to have at her house just in case and it’s not like she needs the full on infant seat for every day use like we have so this is a good fit for her as it will fit kids 5-80 lbs… she’ll never need a new one!  I would have bought it for myself if they had two but it was the only one.  I’m kind of OCD and want the ones we get in my and Noah’s cars to match… whatever, it’s my neuroses to live with and I’m okay with waiting until I find a bargain on two matching ones.

I’ve gained 6 pounds since I had John.  Aren’t you supposed to lose weight after having a baby?

I happened to be one of the freaks that came home from the hospital having lost all of the weight I gained during pregnancy.  Well, all but 2 pounds… but a success none the less.  I attribute it primarily to having worked all but the last week of pregnancy and just generally staying busy and not sitting on my butt watching tv and eating.  Then I birthed a gigantic monster baby (love you Johnny!) who was kindly eating up all the calories in the Whoppers and Cherry Pepsi I was consuming.

Now I’ve been home for 6 weeks doing little but sitting on my tush and eating.  I’m not like binge eating but I can definitely say that I’m not eating as healthily as I should.  Also, it is not helping that when I do eat, I’m scarfing it down so that I can get back to the baby who unless he is sleeping would like to be held.  So… yeah… I need to get back to healthy eating.  I am getting back to healthy eating or at least trying to do so.  The key element that is missing is the working out.  I see the midwife on Tuesday and will hopefully be released to work and workout (I don’t see why I wouldn’t be).  Lots of ladies would have just gone back sooner but I’ve done the whole “not following doctor’s orders” thing before and it usually doesn’t bode too well for me (see large Frankenstein-like scar on right foot).

Another thing that is missing is the metabolism boost.  My body is weird and doesn’t do all of the things it’s supposed to do metabolically and hormonally on it’s own; she needs a little help.  Before I was pregnant I was on lots of medication to help that and had to stop when little Johnny took up residence in my womb.  He was a big helper for me and took care of things for me (it’s one of those conditions that either gets better or worse with pregnancy, and mine got better) but now that he’s out… I’m a mess again.  Time to call my reproductive endocrinologist and get back on my meds.  Time to stop eating crap and start eating scrambled eggs and salad again.  This won’t be fun… but knowing that the alternative option is to go up a couple pants sizes is a helpful motivator.

I’m accustomed to cleaning the house — dusting, mopping, … other deep cleaning — every other Friday on my day off. I give the bathrooms a once-over at least twice a week and the kitchen and living rooms are straightened as needed. That was then.
Now… now I’m home all day (not forever but for the time being) and I can’t help but notice all the mess there is to clean up. It’s not even baby stuff, though there is a decent amount of that too: bottles to wash, clothes, cloth diapers. We’re not slobs but when life is happening there is the unavoidable mess of socks on the floor, dust, dog hair, cat paw prints on the side table, glass of water on the dresser… just the things that happen in a house where a family of 3, plus 3 pets, lives.
I’m doing a decent job of staying on top of things now but I dread what will happen when I go back to work. I already know that no cleaning will be happening on my part on my work days and with Noah being the stay-at-home parent, I think he’ll be a little busy with John to worry about the house (as it should be). Hopefully I’ll be able to either stay on top of the mess or just learn to ignore it.

On Saturday night my brother treated us — my sisters, husband, and I — to a night out (his Christmas gift to us all).  We had KFC (don’t judge, that shizzit is fantastic!!!) first then headed down to the city to see Brian Posehn at the Lake Shore Theatre.  You may know Brian Posehn from The Sarah Silverman Program, Newsradio, Just Shoot Me, his appearances on Friends, and/or the many other notes on his resume.  Not only was he hilarious and very enjoyable company, the two openers for the show were GREAT too.  I’m trying hard to remember their names… Google helped me out with one, Mike Stanley, because all I could remember was his last name, and the other guy was quick with the political commentary humor but I can’t remember his name… short guy… late 20’s… ???… oh, I don’t know, nevermind.

I’d never been to the Lake Shore Theater, although I had walked past it dozens of times and I’m sad I didn’t go in sooner.  I sort of forget how much I enjoy stand-up comedy, until it’s right in front of me.  Weird.

So it was also the longest time Noah and I have left John.  No, we didn’t leave him in the car.  He was with my parents who were super eager to get him all to themselves.  My parents are great when we are up there and the most recent addition to their awesomeness is their willingness to assist with the baby care.  It is SO NICE to get a little break during the day to just chill or go run an errand without having to pack up John and take him along.  I do miss him though.  I’m used to holding and snuggling him a good portion of the day and when we’re with family, I get to missing his weight in my arms and his sweet drool on my chest.  He’s such a sweet boy!  Luckily, my family doesn’t seem to mind too much when I steal him back for a feeding or a snuggle.

Also while home I watched Aziz Ansari (Tom on Parks & Recreation) ’s stand up that my sister and brother had saved on the DVR and, never having seen his stand up before, I had a sore face from all the funny.  It was a weekend of fun and funny.

I leave you with this:

My baby boy is already 4 weeks old.  Time is going by too quickly!  In two weeks I’ll be released back to work by my doctor and after that I only have 5 more weeks that I can take off before my employer can give away my job… that is only a maximum of 7 weeks left at home with my baby.  My heart is breaking just thinking about not being with him all day long.

It is crazy how much I miss him when I’m not holding him, even when he’s right next to me.  Don’t get me wrong, I take full advantage of his nap time to get laundry, dishes, errands, housework, personal down time, etc., but I miss holding him still.  This weekend we were at my grandma’s house for their 60th anniversary party and, of course, everyone wanted to hold him.  It was great that I could eat and do some socializing without having him in my arms but after a couple of hours I had to steal him back for a little snuggle because I missed him so much.

John is so snuggly and cuddly… I love it!  He would take every nap and spend all day being held if we would let him.  I would love to let him sleep on me all the time but I know that would be setting us up for some hardships later on when that is not feasible.  He likes the sling sometimes but really just wants to be up against my chest so maybe I’ll try out one of the moby wraps or something similar so I can multi-task.  We will see.

Birth announcements are going out this week, as soon as I can get my address list completed.

We are trying to organize his Baptism, but the Catholics are being a tad elitist and making things difficult for us… again.  Why won’t they respect my casual observance of their organized religion and let me and my offspring make the sacraments in peace and without a huge fuss?  We’ll get it worked out though.

Baby is awake, “me” time is over.

For the five of you that still visit this blog, I have not deserted I’ve just been busy.  Life with a baby is so different than life before… but in such an amazing way that makes it 100x better.  I am loving being a mom and find such joy in watching Noah be a dad and in raising this little boy together.

I know some people like to know about delivery stories so here’s a rundown of the event, as best I can recall:

• Monday, December 21: having contractions about 20 minutes apart most of the afternoon but wasn’t alarmed because those same contractions had been teasing me for over a week.
• 10:00pm: I took a shower.  While showering and getting dressed I noticed that I was having more contractions than earlier and they were more uncomfortable so I started timing them.  5-7 mins apart.
• Hung out, folded laundry, watched TV… contractions continued at pretty steady 5 min intervals.
• Midnight-ish: called my family to tell them that I thought we would be having the baby soon.
• 1-2am contractions became about 3 mins apart
• 2:10am we were out the door, headed to the hospital.
• 2:30am: Admitted to the hospital.  Dilated to 5 cm. Baby time!
• Sometime around 3am maybe my family began arriving.  My mom and sister Jackie were in the delivery room with me for a while (I ended up booting them at some point when I was in an extreme amount of pain and they wanted me to switch positions, or so I’m told.  I have very little recollection of this.)
• Around 5:30am (?): Dilated to 7 cm., Midwife broke my water at this point and things started getting really painful.  Like, really.  :o)
• I didn’t want an epidural but the nurse and midwife suggested an IV pain reliever to help “take the edge off” and help me relax a little between contractions, because they were coming really fast but I wasn’t totally dilated yet and was getting a little… I think “panicky” is the best way to describe it. — Yeah… pain med didn’t kick in at all for pain but they did make me pass out between some of the later contractions and Noah tells me I was talking nonsense in my “sleep” which I’m sure was at least slightly entertaining.
• At 7am the nurses changed shifts and my fabulous nurse was replaced by a giant bitch.  Thankfully I didn’t say anything offensive — I was afraid that in so much pain I’d lose control of the brain-mouth barrier, but I apparently maintained my manners through child birth, which is nice.
• At 8am the midwives changed shifts which was GREAT because the one that was on duty was irritating me and the one that came on shift was so amazing and supportive and if not for her I don’t know if I would have gotten my monster baby out with as little wreckage as there was.
• I don’t know how long I was pushing for but it couldn’t have been more than an hour since the midwife came in at 8 and he was born an hour later.  All I remember was screaming, trying to push without screaming, wanting to bury my face in Noah’s chest (he was such a champion of support for me through the whole thing), and being more thirsty than I’ve ever been in my whole life.
• 9:07am:  Johnny was born and I continue to fall deeper in love with him each day.
• At around 10:15/30am I was all sewn up and the chaos of delivery was over and cleaned up so mom and Jackie came back in to meet the boy.
• 2pm:  Visiting hours started and so the rest of the family (Dad, Meghan, & Bryan) finally got to meet baby John.
• December 23: Around 2pm we were discharged from the hospital.  The nurses were encouraging me to stay another night but I wanted out.  Everyone at the hospital was amazing but with the checks on me and on the baby, I only got maybe 45 minutes of sleep because they kept waking me up for one thing or another all night long.  I really wanted to get home to my own house and start living life at home with baby, without all the outside interruptions.

John Reginald Riordan Traynor

born December 22, 2009

10 lbs, 8 oz; 22″

80 minutes old

2 days old

Today I did a good deal of walking.  I walked around the mall, around the neighborhood, around Meijer… We park at the back of the lot most times and get in a few more steps that way too.  I can honestly say I have never been more uncomfortable in my life.  In public and in person I will put on a strong face but all I want to do a lot of the time is cry out of frustration.  I’m going nutty.  I will add (as I believe I’ve noted before) that I am well aware that I was so lucky to be able to work up until a week ago (39 weeks) without any issues at all, aside from some very mild discomfort towards the end of a long shift.  I was able to, with few exceptions, sleep fabulously through most nights with few interruptions, up until a week ago.  The trend here is “a week ago.”  For the last week, I’ve been miserable.  Poor Noah has been cooped up with me and has to live with the weepy, whiny person I’ve become.  (I love you Noah!)

Tomorrow I see the doctor and while according to their dates I’m just at 40 weeks, according to my calculations and what he’s been measuring all along we could be approaching 42 weeks.  Whatever the week mark is, I’m ready to get the show on the road!  I am hoping that at my appt. the doctor finds that I’ve made good progress since last week and thinks maybe it’s time to break the water or do something to help me/us along.  Something has got to give.  I am honestly not in favor of induction unless it is medically necessary and believe that babies will come in their own time.  However, I’m also realistic that perhaps my body just doesn’t know what to do.  I mean, it doesn’t know how to ovulate regularly on it’s own, it didn’t know how to produce enough progesterone initially on it’s own, … my body doesn’t have a good track record for being a reproductive self-starter… maybe she needs a little help? I’m not saying that’s the case, but I think it’s worth a minute or two of consideration.

Hopefully this kid will vacate my uterus soon and move in to his kick ass nursery that is sitting unoccupied, waiting for him.