Nutritional Philosophy

So I haven't been able to find much time to sew. I get a couple hours kid free late at night, but I'm usually tired, and sewing while tired is not a good thing. So, while I haven't been able to make anything crafty lately, I still have been able to make food, since we need to eat. I am not a good cook (I have a strange aversion to following recipes), but I've been getting better, so I'd like to share what I've been eating.

In the past I've never really cared about what I ate. I was a multi-sport athlete through high school and college so I required a lot of calories and I ate whatever was convenient. I mostly ate carbs and not very many vegetables. I took a class in college my senior year called Body Image, and nutrition was discussed a bit and that was pretty much the first time I really ever thought about nutrition. Basically what I took out of the class was that the closer a food looked like its original form, the better it was for you. But since I was an athlete and carbs provide instant energy I still ate very carb heavy. Once Selena was born and I was not anywhere near as active as I used to be and had gained a bit of baby weight I started thinking more about what I ate and reading more about nutrition.

The funny thing about nutrition is that it is very complicated so there are lots of conflicting studies, and advice. The U.S. Dept of Agriculture has changed their recommendations multiple times over the years. There are various diets that recommend low fat, or low carb, or low calorie. There are vegetarians who say meat is unnecessary or vegans who say we don't need to eat anything animal related, or people who think we should eat a lot of meat. Then there are the food producers who spend lots of money trying to market their various concoctions as healthy. It is very hard to know what is really healthy and what is not. I find it funny that if you take a few people who are conscientious about what they eat there will probably be some stuff that one person goes out of their way to eat but that another person absolutely will not touch. Based on my research and readings I try to aim for whole, unprocessed foods. The less processed it is, the better it is for you. I believe in eating when you are hungry and stopping when you are full. I think its better to listen to your body than try to count or measure your intake. I believe in making changes to eating habits slowly so your body can get used to it.

Here are my opinions on:

Meat: I am sympathetic to vegetarian and vegan arguments against the unethical treatment of animals as source of food for us, but I do think that meat is important nutritionally for humans. I do not believe that red meat and/or saturated fat is bad for you. Meat provides lots of proteins, amino-acids, and fats that are body requires. You can get most, but not all, from other food sources, but not in the quantities and ratios necessary. However I think the way we raise animals does not provide us with that best nutrition. In general chickens and cows are fed food they are not meant to eat and thus we have less nutritious meat. They should be allowed to graze on green grass and eat what they are meant to eat. When possible I try to get grass fed and/or free range meat, if not available I try to get organic, and/or supplemental hormone free.

Fish: I think fish is a very important, most specifically for the Omega-3 DHA it provides. There are tons of well conducted studies that show eating fish causes vast improvements to your health. I do not eat enough of it and have been taking a fish oil supplement instead, and it causes dramatic and noticeable differences in my mood, and energy levels. If I forget to take it I am a very grumpy person. I would rather eat more fish than use a supplement, but have not got to that point yet. There are large problems with fish being polluted and environmental concerns about overfishing.

Dairy: I think dairy offers a lot nutritionally. I think we should be eating it in its most unprocessed state. The pasteurization and homogenization of milk kills lots of the beneficial bacteria that make milk healthy. I do not drink raw milk, but if I had a convenient source I think I would. I do drink organic whole milk, or eat whole milk yogurt. I try to get pasteurized versus ultra-pasteurized when I can. I eat free range local organic eggs.

Oils and Fats: I think hydrogenated oils are very bad for you and try to avoid anything with hydrogenated oils. (This guy has a great idea to boycott hydrogenated oils and high fructose corn syrup.) I think vegetable oils are ok when not cooked. Cooking vegetable oils causes free radicals to form, so I try to cook with butter instead. I would use lard if I could find it. I try to avoid all soybean oil as well as other processed soy products as the chemical structure of soy is very similar to estrogen and the body sometimes acts as if it is estrogen and I would rather not mess with my hormones. I do not believe that fats make you fat.

Sweeteners: I prefer maple syrup, honey, or plain sugar. I think not eating any sweeteners would probably be the best, but I'm not ready to make that leap. I avoid high fructose corn syrup as well as corn syrup, but I think plain corn syrup is better than HFCS.

Nuts and Seeds: Nuts are shown in many well conducted studies to improve health dramatically. Nuts are packed with vitamins in amounts you can't find in any other foods. Some people avoid them because they are high in fat, but once again I don't think fat is bad, and I think you should eat as many nuts as you are hungry for.

Grains: I think these should be eaten as sparingly as possible due to the fact that they cause spikes in blood sugar which is stressful for your heart. Also many baked goods have aluminum in them and I don't think that is good for you either. I do eat whole grain bread daily. This one is really hard for me, but I try to avoid crackers, chips, cereal and non-whole grain bread.

Fruits and Vegetables: Eat as much as you want of these. Some say to eat less fruit, or not potatoes, but I say eat away. Eat organic, local, fresh and in season for the best nutrition and the best tasting food.

Vitamin Supplements: I haven't really found any research that supports my opinion, but I don't think vitamin supplements should be necessary if you eat a wide variety of whole foods. Apparently it is impossible to get all your daily vitamins without a supplement or eating fortified foods. I think that means the daily recommendations are not correct. Many argue that our food production is so pitiful that we have removed all the nutrients from our food and that is why vitamin supplementation and fortification is needed. I don't know it seems wrong to me. I do however take a fish oil and vitamin D supplement daily. I also take a prenatal vitamin when I feel like I haven't eaten very nutritious.

Favorite Toddler Books for the Month

She'll be Coming Around the Mountain - Level 1 Bank Street Ready-To-Read - Cute book with new verses to the song, and fun pictures.
Doing the Garden - Sarah Garland's books are really simple and just tell a short story of basic things moms and kids do. The illustrations are great and add to the story. It is very easy for us to relate to the mom, her two kids, and the dog.
Abiyoyo - When my mom taught preschool, her preschoolers loved it. My sister recently taught at a daycare/preschool and the kids loved it there too. Selena of course loves it as well.
The Three Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig - Cute twist on the three little pigs.

27 months

Selena is still being a handful. She is lucky she is so dang cute. Her toddler logic is really funny. For instance:

• She told me she is a little adult. I told her that she wasn't an adult she was a kid. She said kids are little adults and big people are big adults.
  
• She was playing dress up and she put on a princess costume and then told me that she wasn't a human anymore she was a princess.
• I told her that she was too cute and she said that she was a big girl she wasn't cute anymore she was lovely.
• She likes to say, "And that's the truth."
• We were out at a restaurant and she needed to go potty and she says, "This is a nice potty"
• She likes to attempt to look under the bathroom stalls and ask what people are doing. This has been especially embarrassing for Floyd.
• I wasn't feeling well and she didn't want to go play with Floyd so I told her that she should go down and pick up her toys, and she said, "I know. (and this is always said with really cute emphasis) I'll make you some toast so that you'll feel better." So I told her that was a good idea. So she runs out of the room saying, "I'm going to make toast, not go pick up my toys."
  

If I had wrote this post four or five days ago I would have said potty training was going really well. We were consistently down to about 1 accident a day and that was usually during nap time when she was wearing a pair of thick undies with a diaper cover so no mess, 100% poop in the potty, and we even had some days with no accidents. It seemed like if we reminded her, and put her on the potty often we had good success. We went to the zoo and she wore regular underwear with no waterproof cover and was good the whole entire day. But the last few days have not been so great, lots of pee accidents and even some poop ones. She is even having accidents 5 minutes after we put her on the potty. I don't know. It is really frustrating because I think she is doing it on purpose. She says she doesn't want to wear diapers, and she doesn't want to go on the potty. Grrr.

She really seems to enjoy being obstinate and doing exactly the opposite of what you ask. She thinks time-outs are fun, "Am I done yet? Am I done yet". She has started hitting a bit. She will only take a nap about two or three times a week, but at least now she is sleeping longer at night so she is at least getting closer to the number of hours she needs to sleep in order to be a more pleasant person. But sometimes she'll crash at inconvenient times. I'm trying to institute having quiet time in her room, but am having a hard time keeping her in there. She keeps coming out and asking "is it time yet?" Basically she is a lot harder to parent and I'm wondering what happened. It seems pretty sudden. Well I guess its probably the fact that Allie is here. She does love Allie, but I guess it is hard sharing her parents.

She absolutely loves the garlic mozzarella raviolis from Costco. Its funny because she is kind of a picky eater, and doesn't usually like her food to be mixed, but she loves the raviolis. She also ate chicken the other day for the first time in a year. We were pretty surprised. We always offer her everything we are eating, but there are some things we really don't think she'll actually eat and chicken is one of them. When she was a baby she would eat anything, but she has become more picky. Another thing she really likes is ketchup. The other day I asked her if we should make homemade french fries and she got really excited and her eyes got all big and she kind of stuttered and said, "yes, yes, yes, and with ketchup?" and then proceeded to run into the kitchen and get the ketchup out of the fridge and go on about how she would help me make french fries with ketchup.

There really isn't anything she is into at the moment. I keep trying to find something, but I've kind of run out of ideas. We've done drawing, play-dough, puzzles, cutting, painting, blocks, alphabet, numbers, shapes. It seems like books and TV (ugh) are the only thing that consistently hold her interest. She actually seems to trying to figure out how to read. We sometimes do the clips on Starfall's website, when I want to be on the computer and she wants to be entertained. So she knows the sounds of some letters and pretends, sometimes kind of successfully, to sound out words. She's a precocious little one.

2 Months Old

Here is an update on our little Allie-gator.

• She weighed 10lbs 1 oz last week.
  
• We found a binky she likes.
• She's been working on her hand control and is good at knocking the binky out of her mouth, and she tries really hard to nudge it back in.
• She coos a lot and is good at saying "goo."
• She's smiley.
• Loves to be naked.
• Loves baths.
• Loves her family.
• She will fall asleep in the swing sometimes, but still prefers to be put in the baby carrier, and walked up and downstairs to fall asleep. For one or two naps a day she will let you set her down and she'll stay asleep for a while.
• She does not like to be in the baby carrier while awake. Which is kind of inconvenient.
  
• Has joined the rest of the family and joined the go-to-bed late club. Apparently our kids haven't gotten the memo that kids go to bed early.
• She tends to be fussy in the evening.
• She likes holding my hand while she falls asleep.
  
• She has slept through the night a few times.
  
• She does not like the library. She cries every time we go.
• She is very gassy. She often tricks us into thinking she has a dirty diaper and thinks its hilarious.
• She is very wiggly.
• She snorts a lot when she cries.
  
• She does pretty good in the car as long as she has a clean diaper and isn't hungry.
• She had some bad baby acne, but it is gone now.
  
• She has pretty bad cradle cap. I scrubbed her head for 30 minutes and got rid of most of it, and a couple days later it came back.
  
• We love her and love seeing how she grows.
  

Toddler Book Recommendations

Favorite books we've read in the last month.

The Terrific Twos

So I was really trying to be optimistic about the behavior of my two year old, but despite my best efforts Selena has been a bit more difficult. I feel like such a smart parent when I am able to trick her into doing what I want, but it has been harder to do lately. I'm not sure if its the stage she is in, or if its just that I'm tired and trying to do too many things at once. But sometimes I just want her to do what I ask without having to think about how to phrase the request in a way that will conform to her two-year-old whims. The biggest problem, again, is the running away. She had been doing really well and we had made multiple library visits and did not have any running away, but since Allie has arrived she once again is taking off. It is really frustrating.

Sleep has also been a problem, or actually is the root of a lot of her behavior challenges. She has always been difficult to get to sleep, and that hasn't gotten any worse but she has been waking up early and refusing naps, or only taking a short one. Occasionally refusing naps isn't new either, but she usually would only do that when she had slept in that day. But now she is waking up early and refusing a nap and trying to live off of 8 - 10 hours of sleep a day, which is not enough for her and she is very whiny and obstinate on those days. And since she is so hard to get to go to sleep I really don't know what to do when she wakes up early. Her behavior is so much better the days she does gets enough sleep. However I am partly to blame because we did try a week of skipping naps because then she would go to bed earlier and faster. My hope was that she would still wake up at the same time and thus get the same number of hours of sleep for the day, but she foiled my plans by getting up early and being super grumpy by the end of the day. So now we're back to naps and I've been trying to stay consistent on nap and bed times but she is so resistant to a schedule.

On a positive note potty training is going pretty well. She had three days in a row where she had hardly any accidents and I was tentatively excited that we were done with diapers, but then the next day she had a lot of accidents. Since then we've had some really good days and some not so good days. I'm hoping that she'll have it all worked out in a month. Once again sleep has been affecting the potty training. On the days where she hasn't slept she doesn't do well making it to the potty. But we've been keeping her in undies pretty much all the time except for at night. We've been using Gerber training pants with a pull on diaper cover over them when we go out or for naps. She's had some accidents when we go to the neighborhood park, but hasn't had any when we are in a public place.

She has learned to open doors which is a pretty inconvenient milestone. I am blaming this on part of the sleep problem. I think she wakes up during her nap and when normally she might whine a bit and go back to sleep, now she sees the doorknob and decides to leave her bedroom. She has also managed to let Dyna out in the front yard.

After doing really well with her new sister, she went through a couple weeks of pretty strong jealously. She would tell me not to feed Allie, to put her down, that she wanted to snuggle mom without Allie, etc, etc. But she seems to be doing a little better now and when she is in a good mood she is very helpful in trying to entertain Allie to keep her from crying. She does this by dancing, reading her a book, giving her toys, or a binky. It is really cute. However she does have a very inconvenient desire to wake Allie every time she is sleeping. I try to explain to her that if Allie is sleeping then I can play with her more easily, but if she wakes Allie up then I'm going to have to pick Allie up and won't be able to play with her, but she doesn't seem to get it.

She is addicted to swings. A nice neighbor friend gave me a key to the private park just outside our cul-de-sac so we've been making daily trips to the park to swing on the swing. This has been very nice. I've always been so annoyed that we couldn't visit the park and that it was very rude to lock people out of it. We also made a trip to a spray park, but Selena only went in the water for about 5 minutes then headed off to the playground to swing on the swings for an hour.

Drawing is cool again. She is back to making her stick people and she draws pictures for everyone in the family. She has little stories for the pictures. It is really cute.

We didn't do much for the 4th of July. We went over to some friends for a bbq. We got a kids pack of fireworks and set them off for Selena. She liked the smoke bombs, but then hid in the car for the rest of them.

6 weeks postpartum

I am six weeks postpartum. I think medically I'm not considered postpartum anymore, but I just read some book that said if you are still changing diapers and waking up in the middle of the night you are postpartum. So I was still postpartum from Selena and 9 months pregnant. :)

Unfortunately I still don't feel completely recovered. For me the c-section was a much harder recovery than my first daughter's birth, but considering how big of a surgery it is, it is amazing how quickly I have bounced back. I know lots of women have a lot of pain as a result, and require medications, but I was very fortunate and never experienced any pain. I took the prescribed ibuprofen for a week, but never needed the Percocet. The hospital gave me a support belt to wear and I am so glad they did and I highly recommend it, especially if you are like me and don't like taking medications. I wore it for about 5 weeks. If I took it off I did get a bit uncomfortable but when I put it back on I felt better. I think it really helped me be comfortable and aided in the healing process.

My scar is still a bit raised but it is getting flatter. If I poke about 2 inches around the scar it kind of feels bruised. If I poke closer to the scar it is numb. I've heard that it can take years to get full feeling back, so that is kind of weird.

I started running 5 weeks after Selena was born. I think I'm going to try at 8 weeks this time, but am not sure how it will go. I still feel some tugging on my scar if I over exert myself. I'm hoping that in a couple weeks that will go away. I'll probably wear the support belt. But I also feel that my stabilizing muscles in my abs, hips, and knees are weaker than they were after my first so I'm kind of worried about injuries. I was in much better shape during my first pregnancy than I was with this one. I'm going to have to take it pretty slow.

Emotionally it has been hard having two, and when two children are crying the postpartum hormones don't help. I've had a few meltdowns. My midwife is a big advocate of using magical fish oil to help regulate hormones and mood and I have noticed that the breakdowns I have had are on days that I have forgotten to take my fish oil for a couple days. So if I start feeling on the edge I start taking the fish oil and it does seem to help.

1 month old

Allie, or as I like to call her, Allie-gator, is almost a month old and we have started to figure her out. The biggest source of frustration for me, and probably her, was nursing. Every time she went to eat she would cry and this was hurting my feelings and making me cry. The biggest problem was that I had too much milk and she was choking on it and having a hard time staying latched, So I went to kellymom.com (the best site on breastfeeding advice, I highly recommend it) and it said instead of switching sides for each feeding try nursing on the same side for 2 - 3 feedings in a row. So I tried it, and it worked. Pretty quickly too it only took a day or so and my supply mostly regulated itself. I am not engorged as much, and Allie isn't choking on my milk as often, and because my supply is better I was able to easily stop using the nipple shield.

She is a very efficient eater. She only nurses for about 5 min at a time. She does eat fairly often. About every 2 hrs during the day and every 3 hrs at night, but because she eats so quickly it is easy to manage. It has been much different than nursing Selena as a newborn. Selena would nurse for 45 min to an hour and a half, every 2 - 3 hours. I remember once she nursed for 3 hours straight. I am very thankful Allie is quick because the last week or so Selena has decided that being a big sister has its drawbacks, and has started to get jealous. Her new mantra is "I need my mommy" and she most often whines and cries this while I am feeding Allie. But Allie is a growing girl and weighs 9lbs 4oz. I'm not sure how tall she is, but she is on the verge of growing out of all the 0-3 month clothes.

I also figured out that Allie really doesn't like to have a dirty or wet diaper. I was offering to feed her every time she fussed, partly because I wanted relief from my engorgement, but also because that was what always seemed to work with Selena. But this was just making her mad because she wasn't hungry, and really she just wanted her diaper changed. She loves being naked so we also let her hang out naked for the few times during the day that she is awake.

She sleeps a lot. I'm pretty sure she sleeps way more than Selena did as a baby. Which I hope bodes well for the future since Selena is really a challenge in the sleep department. Allie pretty much slept for the first two weeks of her life and only woke up to eat. Now she is awake a little bit more, but not for very long stretches. She does prefer to sleep while being held, preferably in a baby carrier while you are walking around. But she sometimes will stay asleep if you set her down. I can usually get one good nap a day out of without holding her. Fortunately I have a wide variety of baby carriers so holding her isn't too much of an inconvenience and I love having a snugly baby next to me.

She isn't a fan of the swing and has been resistant of the binky. Dad and Nana have been able to manage to give her a binky, but I haven't. She has enjoyed the couple of baths she's taken at home. She doesn't really like car rides, but seems to do okay if you load her up while she is deep in sleep. She's starting to give us real smiles and her head control is getting better. I'm excited to see her personality start to develop.

The Big Sister

After calling herself big sister for the past 6 months, she now officially is, and she loves it. She is handling sharing her mom and dad very well, almost too well. I was trying to give Allie to Floyd while I put her down to bed and Selena said that Allie didn't need her dad, she just needed to snuggle in her mama's arms. Unfortunately trying to put Selena to bed and dealing with her many trips to the potty while holding Allie isn't the easiest task. But overall she is very understanding that when Allie cries or needs to eat that it is important to take care of her. In the car Allie was crying and Selena was telling her it was okay and started singing rock-a-bye baby to her. So adorable.

The strangest thing for me has been at how big Selena became overnight. She was my baby and so small, and then Allie came and instantly she became huge and such a big girl. The comparison is crazy when I am holding her in my arms, or changing her diapers. My baby isn't a baby anymore.

The other thing I have noticed is that she doesn't listen as well as I thought she did. Not being able to pick her up and make her do what I want, rudely brought this to my attention. She might not be behaving quite as well as usual due to not having mom's complete attention, as well as lack of sleep, but I'm not sure. The lack of sleep has been a major problem. She hasn't gotten many days with a full night of sleep and a full nap. Hopefully as we adjust to life with a newborn she'll stop waking up early and taking short naps, or even worse no nap. There is a definite correlation between her behavior and how much she has slept.

She is also doing great on her tricycle, or as she calls it, her motorcycle. She has mastered pedaling and turning. We ride around the block and she still has a problem when their is an incline. I don't think the wheels on the trike are big enough. But other than that she is a pro.

We've made lots of trips to the playground and she spends almost the entire time on the swing. She has even graduated to the big swings. I was scared at first that she wouldn't remember to hold on, but she does. She still likes to go in the baby swings too. Actually she usually has to go on every swing available at least once.

She is doing good at counting now. She can count to 10, usually skipping 4 and 5, but sometimes she remembers them. She can also manipulate her fingers into the right numbers. Floyd asked her how old she was and she put up two fingers and said two. She used to say she was 18 or 13. But then she said she was 2 months and she can drive. :)

Potty training is going okay. She goes on the potty quite a few times every day. Unfortunately she seems more likely to go in the potty when she is wearing a diaper than when she is wearing undies, but she loves to wear undies. Of course she is very good about going when it is time to go to bed or take a nap. But she does actually go most of the time so I can't get upset at her stalling tactics. fh

Allie’s Birth Story

I apologize ahead of time. I think I write the longest birth stories ever, but I want to remember every detail so that is why it is a novel.

So after thinking I could have a baby any day for an entire month I’d pretty much given up on the baby ever coming (my first daughter came at 37 weeks so I thought it was likely I would go early again). Since the beginning of my pregnancy I’d always thought Sunday would be a good day since traffic is light and Floyd and most family would be off work. And the prior four Sundays the baby would trick me into thinking something might develop. I’d get more Braxton Hicks, more cramping, some back pain. If I had been a first time mom I might have thought I was in labor a few times especially when the Braxton Hicks would come fairly regularly all day long, but it would all disappear when I went to bed. So Saturday night we went out to eat. I put Selena to bed and went to sit on my knee chair and get some uncomfortable cramping going, that would just go away as soon as I went to sleep. Got some cramps, went to bed, and they went away.

I woke up at 6am Sunday morning, 10 days after my due date, thinking something might be going on, but I’d been having dreams of being in labor for weeks so I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming it, but then I felt a definite pressure wave that was real and thought cool. I drifted in and out of sleep for the next 30 minutes and at around 6:30 decided that I’d had quite a few real waves, maybe 5 minutes apart, and I should probably call my midwife. So I got up told Floyd what was going on. I waited to have one more to make sure they didn’t go away when I stood and called Ann, my midwife. She was ready to get up and leave because she lives about 50 minutes away, but I didn’t think I was that far along yet, so I told her I would call her when I thought she should leave. Then I called my parents and told them to come to my house so my dad could watch Selena. Well now that I had been up and moving they were coming faster about 2 – 3 minutes, so I called Ann back and told her to leave, and called my parents back and told them to meet us there. Then I went upstairs to gather some last stuff for my bag, and Selena and I took a shower. After we were all ready we left at about 7:30.

I listened to my Hypnobabies scripts in the car and while I would rather not have been in the car, the pressure waves were easily manageable. I was really looking forward to getting in the tub. We got to the birth center and Ann wasn’t there yet. She was about 10 min away, and my parents were about 25 min away. So I sat in the car, listening to my hypnosis till my midwife got there. When she did, we went straight inside and she asked me to lie on the bed so I could get checked. I was around 8 cm. She started the tub and I got in. After a few pressure waves I could feel the difference of being in the water. The intensity was diminished by about half. It was so nice. My mom soon showed up and I was chatting with her and my midwife between waves while listening to my scripts. My mother-in-law also showed up a little bit later. The grandpa’s were in charge of Selena. She did manage to sneak into the room a couple times and wanted to get in the tub with me. It was cute.

Around 9:45 I started feeling a little pushy. So I rolled over to my hands and knees and started pushing some. I was doing a good job remembering to breathe through the waves. At around 10:30 I started feeling the baby descending. I was so excited I thought the baby was coming. I even said aloud, “Here comes the baby”. But it was just my water. My midwife checked me and said I was complete, but there was some meconium, which can be a signal of distress, but is also common in late babies. So when the baby came it would need some suctioning. I was bummed that I wasn’t done, but kept on pushing. The waves became more intense after my water broke, and I started pushing harder, but I was still doing a good job remembering to breathe. But the waves didn’t seem to be coming very rhythmically. I would get a strong one, and then a break, then a weak one and that would barely go away, and then a strong one again. It was very frustrating because I felt like it was wasting my energy, but not helping me get the baby out. I tried lots of different positions: squatting, hands and knees, sitting on my knees, hanging over the edge of the tub, but it really didn’t feel like I was doing anything. Ann checked me again and said that now there was a lip. I tried pushing a few times while she held the lip, but the baby still didn’t come, and that was really uncomfortable.

At around 11:45 I asked if I could try the birth stool as that is what worked with Selena. So I got out of the tub and on the stool. It did seem to make my waves stronger and the fake ones seemed to disappear, but still the baby would not descend. Ann said it felt like the baby kept on hitting my pelvic bone. She said there was room lower, but the baby wasn’t going that way, like it wasn’t tucking its chin or something. She suggested I purple push and see if that worked. So I did. Then I started getting really tired and getting a cramp in my arm. I had been guzzling water and they brought me some juice. Now I was getting extremely tired and told Ann I wasn’t sure how long I could do this. I also was feeling that my body was fighting itself and the baby was going nowhere. I got up on the bed and tried some pushes on my knees while lifting my belly. Then she had me lie flat on my back and push. She tried manually opening my pelvic bones, and she tried nudging the baby back up, but she was stuck, and wouldn’t budge up or down. Apparently once I got on my back Ann started detecting decelerating heart tones, but at the time I did not know it. I guess if I had thought to ask why they were putting oxygen on me I would have known. But as long as I stayed off my back the baby seemed to be doing fine. But nothing was working so at this point we decided to transfer to the hospital. At the time I thought we were transferring because I had given up, and later I was starting to feel guilty that I didn’t try hard enough, but later Ann told me about the decelerating heart tones and that she had been subtly leading me in the direction of transferring me to the hospital.

So I got in the front seat of her car, and Floyd got in the back. By now I had pretty much given up, but my body hadn’t, so I was still having contractions every 2-3 minutes and despite my best efforts I couldn’t not push. So I am riding in the car, attempting to push the baby out. Meanwhile she is checking me with the Doppler at all the stoplights.

We get to the hospital and get a wheelchair, which I kneel on backwards and get pushed through the emergency room wearing a diaper and a t-shirt. I do eventually get something draped over me, but still I’m sure it was a sight. The lady at emergency wanted me to go to the emergency room to have the baby, but we tell her it is very doubtful that I’m actually going to manage to get the baby out while I’m pushing since I’ve been trying for a long time now, and that they expect us up in labor and delivery. We manage to convince her that Floyd can fill out the paper work and we needed to leave quick. We get in the elevator and there was some young guy in there and I’m still trying to push a baby out. I felt pretty bad for him.

We finally get up to labor and delivery and the midwife who I was transferred to checks me and asks me if I want an epidural. I tell them I don’t care what they do to me at this point. The bed in labor and delivery is tiny and it is really hard to maneuver on. Meanwhile the nurse is trying to put an IV in my arm while I’m having a contraction and telling me to be still. I ask her to wait. She makes some comment about the sooner it is in the sooner I’ll have relief, but I figure I’ve been doing this for hours I can handle a few more minutes. The anesthesiologist comes in and I do manage to be still during the contraction that comes while she puts the epidural in. I have a few more contractions and finally I stop feeling them and get a break. But of course the first one I have that I don’t feel is when the baby’s heart rate starts to drop. So of course I start crying and feel totally guilty for getting the epidural and hurting my poor baby. It might have been the fact that I was laying on my back that was causing the heart decelerations and not the epidural. But because I didn’t know about the earlier heart problems I was convinced it a reaction to the epidural. Ann tried to tell me it wasn’t, but I thought she was just trying to make me feel better. But they roll me to one side and she does better, but then has problems again, so they roll me to the other side and that seems to do the trick.

They check me and I’m totally swollen from all the pushing and she is too high so they don’t think a vacuum will work. They also think she is completely posterior. My heart rate is too high so they can’t give me medications to make the contractions stop and prevent the baby’s heart rate decelerations. Sometimes they give pitocin to strengthen the contractions to encourage turning but because the Allie was struggling that was out as well. So caesarian it is. At this point I was so worried about the baby I just want to get her out.

Finally the surgeon is ready and they wheel me in there, but make Floyd wait till they finish prepping me before he can come in. I didn’t like being alone and it was kind of scary being put behind the curtain and being all numb and not being able to feel anything anymore. Floyd comes in and the surgeons are shaking me back and forth. I think that is when they were cutting me and pulling me apart. I ask them to tell me when they pull the baby out. They say I’ll hear a cry and sure enough a few seconds later I do. It takes them a few seconds to get her all the way out and tell us girl. It made me smile that Selena would have a little sister. They bring Allie over to a table that I manage to get a view of by moving the curtain and they suction her and stick tubes in her and she is crying and crying and pooping everywhere. They tell us she is 8lbs 2oz, and that is after pooping a ton. And now I’m crying too because I was supposed to bring her into the world peacefully and she should be in my arms and I should be able to see her and hold her, but instead she is being surrounded by strangers doing stuff to her. When they are done Floyd brings her over to me and I get to look at her, she is beautiful. She has a cone head despite not being born vaginally. She doesn’t have any bumps or bruises like my nephew did when he got stuck.

Then they tell Floyd to go away while they finish sewing me up. I don’t think it took that long but it seemed like forever before I got to see my baby. I come in the room and she is being poked and prodded some more and still crying. They bring her over to me and she is anxious to nurse and latches on easy and nurses. Finally I feel like all is right in the world and I’m so thrilled to be holding my beautiful, big, baby girl.

Apparently she was completely posterior and her chin wasn’t tucked. At the time I got conflicting information on her positioning and didn’t realize she was completely posterior as well as not having her chin tucked. There was really no way she could come out in that position. By not having her chin tucked there was no way for her to rotate. I really don’t know when she got like that because I’m pretty sure she was stuck anterior the prior week. But she had been flipping posterior every time I lay down, until around my due date, so she had a tendency to feel comfortable in the posterior position. I was really conscientious of baby positioning so it is frustrating that despite my best efforts she ended up in a bad position.

Obviously I am so thankful that the technology and procedures exist that brought Allie into this world fairly easily and safely because who knows what would have happened had it not existed. It probably wouldn’t have turned out well. But I still felt that it was so unfair that things didn’t go how they were supposed to and it has led to many tears. It is hard to pinpoint exactly what has made me so upset. I was disappointed that I didn’t get my desired ideal, beautiful birth, and it was annoying to be in the hospital where we were bothered every hour by nurses poking the baby or me. But it was more than just the disappointment of failed expectations. I think the thing I missed the most was the after birth high. When Selena was born I was exhausted but I had a feeling of exhilaration and energy and even though I was tired I couldn’t sleep and I stayed up most of the night just staring at my baby in awe. But this time I was exhausted, could barely stay awake, kept throwing up, was puffy and swollen, couldn’t feel anything below my chest, couldn’t eat for 24 hrs (due to nausea) despite being starving, couldn’t move for 12 hrs, couldn’t walk for almost 3 days, and it all just seemed so wrong and so unfair. They say you get a bunch of good hormones right after birth that you don’t get when you have a caesarian and I think I really missed those good hormones.

I do not regret my decision to deliver at the birth center. Although transferring wasn’t the most pleasant experience, it makes me feel better that it wasn’t an intervention, or adverse drug reaction that led to the need for a c-section. I felt very safe in Ann’s care and never felt that not being at the hospital put Allie or me in danger. I am so thankful that I was using Hypnobabies. The first part of my labor was so easy and was exactly how I visualized it (except for the end of course). I had visualized from the beginning that I would wake up in the morning being in my birthing time. I would have enough time to get to the birth center and I would start feeling pushy an hour or two after arriving. When things did get rough it really helped me stay mentally calm. One of the affirmations I listened to every day was, “I will accept whatever my birthing time brings me,” and unfortunately I had to.

Floyd was very sweet. I hated the parts when he was separated from me. He did a great job taking care of Allie and rocking and cuddling her and changing her diapers. Allie would get frustrated nursing and cry so much she wouldn’t latch, and Floyd would calm her down and then quickly hand her to me so I could get her on the boob. We were a good team. My little Allie is doing good and I love cuddling and kissing her.