Hitting the Beach

Starting South Beach diet on my primary health provider's recommendation. My bp is good, but since the baby I've lost, then gained, some of the baby weight and I'm not in a great place. She also thinks my thyroid might be back out of whack and I'm being tested for that, including a new thyroid ultrasound. My goiter (yay me) seems to have grown. AND I get to have my first mammogram. So anyway, I'm doing South Beach and I'm on my first day and fairly optimistic.

A bajillion years later....

Haven't kept this up, have I? Well, I doubt anyone's reading anyway, at least not after this amount of radio silence!

Anyway, Liftoff Boy turned 1 in June and he's just an amazing and cool little guy. Mostly cheerful, very smart. His animal noise repertoire includes cat, dog, cow, bee, snake, dolphin (has to be heard to be appreciated), lion, duck and rooster. We're still working on sheep and a few other things. He will blow when you mention the wind and makes cool thunder noises. He will imitate train whistles, sirens and airplanes. Words he uses fairly regularly include "Whassat?" (accompanied by pointing at something), yeah, no, ba (bottle still), wa (water), tsehss (cheese), suwo (squirrel - we have lots outside) and Diddy (Daddy). Notice the lack of "Mommy". He loves to say both "boo," and since the Fourth of July, "boom!". Fireworks are cool! He repeats words when we introduce them too. He also does traditional ASL signs for "eat" and "all done" and has made up his own for showing he's sleepy (touching his ear with his hand). He can point to his nose and mouth, clap and stick out his tongue on command (even if you don't do it yourself), and sometimes will point to his eyes or ear when asked. He has no interest in waving. If he's in the mood he can complete spoken tasks like "Bring me a book" or "Can you go hug Jerry the giraffe?" He loves books and will bring them over to be read repeatedly.

He walks, runs, climbs on the furniture, and is very interested in in all kinds of toys. He's trying to figure out doorknobs at the moment. He'll try coloring with crayons, but so far the temptation to eat them is just too strong. He's starting to show interest in putting knobbed puzzle pieces into their proper spaces. He points all the time. He likes to play his recorder (toot it anyway), play his kazoo, hit his drum, etc. No real interest yet in stacking anything.

I think that's it.

Boom!

A spring in his step!

I haven't posted in a long, long time. But it is spring! Yowza. AND, get this - Liftoff Boy is walking. Walking! Thus the punny title.

I had a conference to go to at the end of March. In Monterey. And I was very, very happy about this because it was at a conference center by the sea. And it was all kinds of anthropology types who do religion and related things. And I would get to sleep. Yay, sleep!

But I knew that LB was getting close. Standing. Standing without holding onto anything. Getting a daring look in his eye.

So I go to my conference and there is the giving of a paper and the schmoozing with the colleagues and scholars whose work I've cited remembering my work and who I am (yay!) and wandering along the rocky coastline. And one evening a bunch of us escape into Pacific Grove and go eat some actual local seafood (as opposed to the cafeteria food at the conference center) and as we approach the restaurant on foot, my phone rings. It is Liftoff Guy, returning my call and letting me know that LB...had taken his first steps.

First steps! With Mommy on the other side of the continent! My heart broke a little bit. I really did feel like crying.

But you know what? I was home the next day, and soon LB was showing me his steps. And within 10 days, he was motoring across the house in a lovely, awkward way, holding his little hands up for balance and being very proud.

And I'm proud of him too. And I could have missed those steps by being in the bathroom or at the store, and instead I was someplace where it was almost worth it.

Oh, and...

Since the crying seems to have stopped, I think I'll add that my department is going through some particularly nasty politics at the moment and there's a meeting today where a lot of this is going to come to a head. To put it very briefly, department bully with a history of ethically questional behavior but lots of seniority is angling for a position of greater power and expects it to be handed to her since there is no one else in the running at this point. There is a resistence movement that might keep this from happening anyway (lack of department confidence may lead to an appointment of someone else) but the repercussions of standing in her way or making her have to work a bit harder for this are going to be unpleasant. However, knowing her likely reactions to the existence of the resistence movement are a large part of why there IS a resistence movement. Do you want someone insulting, punitive, insecure and paranoid to make the decisions for the next three years? No, but I still feel guilty for being part of the reason her paranoia may be justified.

It would have been nicer to deal with this on a full night's sleep.

Uurgh....

We all just got over stomach flu. During the worst of it, Liftoff Boy was a great sleeper. Naps during the day and a big old stretch from 8:30 or so to 7am. Even when he's sick, he usually sleeps through the night. Last night he went to bed easily about 9pm after playing for a good hour and after eating a big dinner (his appetite seems to have returned yesterday, yay). But he woke up crying miserably at 12:30am. We don't generally feed him during the night (we generally don't get up and eat during the night either), but after an hour and a half of diaper change and holding and unsuccessful self-soothing, I got him a bottle and that sucker was slurped down fast. He fell asleep at about 2. But he was up again at 3 (another bottle) and 4:30 (no bottle, but a stuffed animal in an effort to try something else that might be soothing. He seemed delighted at the stuffed animal (Flopsy, a bright yellow bear given to LB by my mother) and spent the next half-hour talking to it until he fell asleep. I woke up to his desperate, pained cries at 6:45 and brought him another bottle. Now I'm up with a full day of work ahead of me and the crying has just recommenced.

There were two doses of Tylenol in there. We don't know what is going on. This isn't how he acts when he's teething, so my guess is ear infection or possibly massive hunger bought on by his body trying to put on the weight loss during the flu. But this is probably the worst night we've had with him since he was born! Calling the pediatrician at 9 to see what's what, but then I have to be out the door by 9:45 or so so it'll all be up to Liftoff Guy.

I'm a hypocrite

I have several blogs that I read regularly and I get so annoyed when they don't update in a timely manner - and then there's my blog. But I rationalize that hardly anyone ever reads it (only one person that I know of), so....

Anyway, this has been a wacky week in the Liftoff household. The Stomach Flu Fairy visited and we've all spent the last few days (since Sunday) engaged in various forms of spew. Being sick with an equally sick baby is not fun. Also, Liftoff Boy had a tooth break through yesterday up top and has the other top one working its way through, so he's had a lovely combination of nausea, intestinal discomfort AND teething pain. He's usually quite the adventurer, but when knocked low like this he HAS to be on someone's lap or hip at all times.

On the plus side, LB thinks it's delightful and hilarious when I use my battery-powered toothbrush. It always gets a big grin, sick or no. And he'll hold on to it for me and help me brush if he's on Liftoff Guy's lap. Brushing Mommy's teeth is a good hobby I guess.

Also on the plus side, today the diaper changes were less frequent and, wonder of wonders, LB was actually willing to eat. Anything but milk or formula has been rejected this week, or, if not rejected, the cause of much vomiting. Even Pedialyte made him throw up. So hearing from LG that LB ate a bunch of apple sauce today and some oatmeal and seemed really interested in it is great news.

Also also on the plus side, my department unanimously recommended me for tenure and promotion to associate professor (up from assistant). There are a few hoops to go through before it's official in May, but it would be really weird if the personnel committee, the dean or the provost overturned it after such approbation from my department. So yay!

The Accelerator

One of my friends jokes that we put Liftoff Boy in an accelerater. We didn't, but man is he moving along with things. First thing, he's got these superstrong, thick, tree-trunk legs (they come from me), which means he was able to support his weight on his legs at 2 months. Even the pediatrician remarked on it - usually it's 4 month thing. Because of the legs, his crawling development has been different - normally babies pull themselves by their arms until their legs get strong enough to pick up the slack. With LB, the arms had to get strong enough to partner the legs. So now he's crawling like a pro, about two months ahead of schedule, and he's figuring out that if he holds onto things, like the cushions on the couch, he can balance himself enough to remain standing. He loves holding onto someone's hands and walking around the room too.

Yesterday Liftoff Guy's mom and I took LB to the mall (malls are a blessing when it's 0 degrees outside and taking a child outdoors would be really dangerous) where he rode his first merry-go-round animal (a frog - I was holding him tight) and he got to play in the big playground thing they have set up. It looks like a forest scene with lots of rocks and tree stumps and animals, but everything is this soft rubbery plastic and the ground is foam. LB was entranced watching all of these bigger kids run around him and climb over mushrooms and such... Eventually he started to try to pull himself to standing, but the little mushrooms he had chosen didn't let him get vertical (I bet no one else has ever written that sentence!). Still, as an only child he doesn't see many other kids and when he sees what they can do, I think it makes him even more driven.

I've been watching him lately, and he makes me want to sing that old Matthew Wilder song "Never Gonna Break my Stride". I apparently walked by 10 months and I think LB will be able to do it before then. It's weird to be proud of something and dread it at the same time...

New year, etc.

I've been a bad blogger. Oh well.

1. When you stop pumping it's glorious, glorious freedom. But it's weird to get used to the idea that what you eat/drink won't go into the baby. I remember taking my first aspirin and sort of worrying that it would show up retroactively in the frozen breast milk.

2. Speaking of frozen breast milk, Liftoff Boy is still getting that every day, although we're giving him bottles of formula too. He had formula only during our week in California last month, but the real stuff is still in pretty good supply. Maybe a month's worth left?

3. Speaking of California, traveling cross country with LB and WITHOUT Liftoff Guy is a challenge I probably won't repeat. Everything would have been easier with one more parent around. Two arms aren't enough. Especially when LB is TEETHING. Yes. He was. He got his lower incisors just before Christmas, one before he turned 6 months and one just after.

4. He'll be 7 months old on the last day of Bush's presidency. Go away, Bush! LB has really got the crawling thing down - he occasionally ends up on his tummy, but it's mostly the alternating knee/hand thing. His poor knees are very pink right now, but he doesn't seem to mind the soreness. It's full speed ahead!

5. I got my tenure portfolio done on time and after receiving a few comments this week I'm allowed to make revisions. No one seems to think I need any - just a little fiddling with my CV. This is a good sign, I think. I would like to be tenured. And to be promoted to Associate Professor. I would like those things a lot.

6. Back to LB - he can say "Mom mom mom mom mom!" now, but I don't think he has any idea that the fun sounds he's making connect to an actual person. I have a student this semester who was raised by deaf parents and he thinks he's going to sign for sure with any children he has. He was also a late talker though. Like 2 years old. I'm not sure whether I want to do signing with LB to have earlier communication if it means that verbal communication would be delayed. I just have to keep thinking about it.

That's it for now. Yawn.

California bound

It's late. Just finished grading the last final exam and posting the grades. Have gone 25 hours without pumping, and am surviving. I fly to California tomorrow (today!) with an almost six-month old on my lap. Oy. It's a good thing I work well under pressure.

I'm going to need to update the photo soon. Everything here is actually covered with snow.

Autumn

Hello, long time no post.

Liftoff Boy is doing brilliantly. He had his 4 month appointment last Wednesday and has now been through two rounds of immunizations. I'm amazed at the anti-vax stuff on the internet. The way some people approach studies that indicate no link between vaccinations and autism reminds me of the way some people keep insisting Barack Obama is secretly Muslim, or a terrorist, or a Black Panther or whatever. They look at the evidence and given that it disagrees with the fears they hold, they decide that the people providing the evidence are in on the conspiracy.

I didn't like seeing LB get four shots. He wasn't happy. But it was okay, it happened fast, and I want him to be protected from hepatitis and meningitis and a host of other illnesses that are, indeed, preventable through immunizations.

LB is still our giant baby. He weighed 17 pounds, 5 ounces (98th percentile) and was 27 inches long (100th percentile). His head is 97th percentile. So overall he's a big old guy.

I am still amazingly grateful and happy that his birth turned out to be a cesarean. Thank you, my little big guy, for refusing to turn upside down. The procedure itself went very well, was safe, and assured that LB and I both survived the process of getting him out. I'm in a snit right now because I occasionally search the internet for information about cesareans that is positive, and it's just not out there. I signed a petition stating my support for prophylactic cesarean deliveries as a legitimate birth choice after receiving an invitation, but there's so little out there. Mostly c-sections are made out to be a horrible, frightening attack on the body by evil doctors who want to endanger you and your baby to make money, but it's just the same old stuff all over again.

I agree that unnecessary surgery is often a bad idea. But anyone who seriously thinks that I should have endangered LB and myself by trying to get him out bottom-first with that big head of his stuck above the birth canal can jump in a lake. And even if he hd turned head-down, his birth would still have been dangerous. I'm glad we had the c/s, and I wish there were some pro-Cesarean group out there that I could join. The birth experience can be wonderful when it's fast, efficient and artificial and if I ever get pregnant again, it's what I'll be planning to do.

In other news, we've been meaning to start LB on solids soon (since he is gigantic) but other things intervened. We'll maybe try it this morning...

So sleepy...

I don't know the last time I wrote, but we're back in school now, and have even passed midterm week!

Liftoff Guy has a Tuesday/Thursday schedule and I've got a Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule, so we take turns with Liftoff Boy. LB is 16 weeks old today and is really getting the hang of this whole body thing. He can turn on one side, lift his head and shoulders up when he's on his stomach, and his head is totally steady when he sits. His eyes seems to be turning brown, and hair is starting to grow in more on his head. His eyebrows are getting darker. He smiles a LOT and laughs occasionally. Sometimes when he hears music he makes singing sounds. He can be exhausting, but he's such a sweet guy and so amazing.

But I have spent the whole day with him (he slept enough for me to be able to grade midterms, yay), and now I'm barely holding on. Zzzzzz....

Random stuff....

I saw a Hummer today. The back window was covered with Obama stickers and other left-leaning items. I wasn't sure what to make of it. But I was on my way to a Hindu temple for statue installation ceremonies, so I just assumed it was part of my day.

Liftoff Boy has made a cognitive leap this week. Suddenly rattles are interesting and can be shaken at will. The crib can be crossed with the right amount of wriggling. The mirror attached to his play mat can be adjusted to provide better and more interesting views. It's like he's waking up, very slowly, over the course of months, (re)gaining consciousness. After watching a cat slowly die, it's really interesting to watch a creature get stronger and better and more capable. It's also scary because when he's mobile, we're totally screwed.

I am afraid of Sarah Palin on multiple levels.

Sunday morning

Liftoff Boy is sleeping, which he wasn't doing so much last night when it was bedtime. He's been doing a starving/sleeping/fussy combo that is associated with growth spurts. And he's in need of a growth spurt, because at 10 weeks, he's only 15 pounds! Liftoff Guy asked me when the growing would stop, and I said when LB is 25 years old or so. From what I understand.

To be fair, he slept all night through on Thursday, spent Friday day with Daddy and Daddy's best friend doing a bookstore/video store/Indian restaurant crawl and was very well behaved, slept all through the night on Friday night... But yesterday, Saturday, he was mostly home with me and kept wanting to cry and fuss. Last night LG's best friend came over again and we watched Star Trek videos and ate pizza and LB was mostly fussy. We tried to put him to bed at 9, but he was totally awake, and still hungry, so he was up again at 10, eating and cuddling, and LG finally got him to bed sometime after 10:15 or so. I think. I was so tired, I can't remember. There Kirk was, trying to save the universe from some giant planet-eating robot, and I could barely hold my head up. Then LB was up at 4am, hungry, and didn't sleep the night through. LG gets up with him though...

I'm trying to drop my 3am/4am night pump. This is a challenge. I basically have to reduce the time I spend pumping at that point, by about 2 minutes, then keep that number of minutes for a couple of days, then reduce it again. So I've had two nights in a row with it at 13 minutes, down from the 15 I'm more used to. But THEN I'm supposed to keep my first pump after dawn pump down to its usual 9 to 11 ounces, and this meant I only pumped for 11 minutes. That was at 7:30 or so, and 2 hours later, I'm really uncomfortable. I want to get these things emptied. I'm supposed to be getting my breasts on a schedule (seriously) where they will know not to make milk in the middle of the night. The reason for this is that LB is usually sleeping through the night (not last night though) and if I were actually breastfeeding him, then my breasts would have to adjust to the lack of nursing. So I'm trying to recreate this slowly, in a way that won't lead to mastitis or some other nasty thing.

Tonight I go down to 11 minutes, and I'm not sure I'll be able to handle it.

Alone for the first time

This won't be a long post, but Liftoff Guy drove out of state to rescue a friend of his who's working in a very rural area, has terrible kidney stones, no medical insurance, and no access to those sound wave kidney stone breaking-up thingies (sorry). LG will be bringing Friend home so that he can get medical treatment here, but this is a 10-hour trip each way. So Liftoff Boy and I are in the middle of our first night home alone together.

It's 4:14am. I'm up pumping breast milk (I almost typed beast milk), hoping LB will keep sleeping at least until I'm done. I'm sleeping tonight better than I expected, but we'll see what happens in the near future.

In other news, LB continues to be giant. He had a pediatrician's appointment on Wednesday and is in the 100th percentile for both height and weight. At 2 months, he's 14 pounds, 6 ounces and 24 3/4 inches long. His head is 90th percentile. He's likely to be a big guy forever apparently, because of the size of his head. He's not just growing fast, he's sort of consistently big. I don't know. But wow. He's about the right size for a 4 month old. He can also support his weight on his legs already if you help with balance, which is also a skill associated with being 3 or 4 months old, per our doctor, not two.

LB had to have an ultrasound to check his hips, just because he was breech. He was fine, but the ultrasound tech felt compelled to mention that her giant child (another 9 pounder at birth) started walking at 6 months. Walking! Please, LB, don't be THAT fast!

Breasts

I am Lait-tit-ia, queen of all nourishment. My breasts flow with white delight. I am abundance and plenty.

Well, this is basically true. I've always had large breasts. Before I got pregnant, I was rocking 38DDs. This is something I apparently get from my dad's side of the family, not my mom's (and no, Kimba, this wasn't directed at you - my mom states this almost daily as in, "You sure didn't get those from ME!"). Anyway, now that I'm nursing... Well, they warn you that your cup size will increase 1-4 sizes. Guess which way I went! Yup, I'm now a 38I. I. As in ice cream. I bought a couple of nursing bras before I had the baby and guessing from my measurements then, I ended up with 44Fs. But pregnancy expands your rib cage in weird ways and after you have the baby your torso returns to its normal dimensions. So the 44Fs fit okay in the cups, but are huge otherwise and offer basically no support. I took my measurements, bought a couple of more accurately sized bras online, and now I'm waiting for sweet relief. Because you think you can buy 38I-sized bras anywhere in real life? Maybe somewhere but not so much here.

This is how bad it is. Liftoff Baby likes pacifiers. They gave him one at the hospital he really likes, so I went online and bought more of them, including a variety that's - get this - vanilla scented. We were trying it out this morning after I fed him expressed breast milk in a bottle and he spit it out and it kind of went flying, but I was too intent on cleaning up spit up to notice where. I forgot about it. We went out to lunch and to a farmer's market and I got home and decided to pump. Upon lifting my shirt I looked down into my bra and saw this bright orange latex vanilla-scented pacifier resting peacefully in my bra between my breasts. I had no idea. I guess it's always a good idea to carry a spare pacifier around in your bra, right? Ahem...

Evolution didn't create perfection

I have very strong feelings in the creationism vs. evolution debate. I even have a Charles Darwin pendant, although here in west Michigan I'd be kind of scared to wear it around (I have, but LG has relatives who are young earth creationists (really!) and it just would muddy some waters that are usually very clear despite our ideological differences). I'm a dyed in the wool evolutionist who's willing to consider that some force may have put evolution into effect, but that it works on its own without constant guidance. I guess I'm a deist, sort of. An agnostic deist. Hm...

Anyway, on the other side of things are people in the homebirth/no vaccines/attachment parenting/rabid breastfeeding until 7 camp, who are evolutionists, but tend to assume that because we evolved, the "natural" way of doing things is what's best for everyone concerned. I can kind of see this when it comes to diet. To a certain extent. But on one of my favorite blogs, Mainstream Parenting Resources, there was recently an excellent post on why what evolved and is natural isn't always the very best approach. It's called Evolution is not an excuse. I agree with the post 100%. Yay science!

I also happen to think that the screwups that have occurred through evolution (Humans can talk, but the physiological changes that took place to allow that make us more likely to choke to death on food! Not-so-intelligent design at work!) demonstrate the non-guidedness involved in the process.

On milk

The artificiality of my motherhood is still in place. Liftoff Boy gets breast milk, but he gets it in a bottle, usually 4 ounces at a time. Pumping is a pain, but it's tolerable. I hook myself up (I even got a hands-free bra that I use sometimes) and spend 15 minutes either online or reading, while the pump does its work. Depending on how long it's been since I last pumped, I usually get 4-7 ounces. 4 will go into a bottle and leftover milk will go into storage bags. We have about 220 ounces in deep freeze right now.

LB gets about 24 ounces of milk per day and about 8 ounces of formula, usually over two night feedings. Formula takes longer to digest, so leaves a baby feeling a bit fuller. It also contains vitamin D, which is missing from breast milk. He apparently eats more than he's technically supposed to, but if a baby is nursing from the breast they eat on demand and no record is kept of ounces, so it's hard to know. He shouldn't get more than about 27 ounces of formula right now based on his weight, so the fact that he's getting about 32 ounces of food (both kinds) per day seems high, but they said he'll spit up anything that's actually too much for him.

The milk issue is interesting to me. I've tasted it (gross? but how can you not be curious when your body is making it and you're feeding it to your baby?), and the stuff is sugary. It's also really sticky compared to formula. Something I read compared the flavor to melted vanilla ice cream and that's really close. Bottles of milk in the fridge also tend to separate - the cream rises to the top and I have to shake them before I feed LB. If he were getting the breast, the thin, skim-type stuff would come out first to quench his thirst and then the heavier, fattier stuff would come out near the end of the session. With pumped milk, he's getting it all at once.

LB doesn't nurse directly very often, but occasionally I'll try it, like when he's in the middle of a hunger freak out and his bottle is still cold, or when he's acting ragey for no reason. He'll latch on, rage, try again, finally get a good latch and then mellow out completely as he drinks. Meanwhile, bad mom that I am, I'll sit there feeling trapped with my back hunched into an uncomfortable curve, wondering how this will affect my pumping later on. I'll have my baby in my arms but wish I could spend the time doing something with my brain, like reading or surfing the net. I get bored during bfing, in a way that I don't when I give him a bottle. When I hold the bottle, I'm in control or at least we share control. When he's at the breast, he's totally in control and I feel like a milkslave. With pumping I can be away from him sometimes and measure how much he eats and I produce and feel like I can make decisions about what I'm doing. I like it a lot better, which probably makes me a freak of nature.

This is funny; it happened last night and has happened before. LB had his last bottle before bed, 4 ounces of formula. But then he was too awake and riled up and would only mellow out if he had his pacifier and would scream if it fell out. He was rooting and acting hungry. So I got him out of bed and gave him a bottle with freshly expressed milk in it. He got the nipple in his mouth, looked totally blissed out, and fell asleep. When I took the bottle out, he had drunk about 1/2 an ounce. And that was it. It was like he'd taken a hit of the good stuff and that's all he needed. I put him to bed and he sleep like 'til 4:30am. You can just see his expression, "Oh yeah, that's the stuff. Zzzzzzzz...."

Every day is different

Liftoff Boy doesn't do much in terms of establishing patterns. I guess I expected he would sleep at certain times and eat in predictable ways... But instead he's, you know, like any other kid. Yesterday we went to Meijer Gardens and took him around in his stroller and he was wide awake 90% of the time, looking up into the blue sky and the green tree branches and turning his head toward the sound of water and swamp frogs (they sound like an old guitar if it was missing 3 strings and you randomly plucked at what was left). His eyes were wide, he'd look at us as if to say "This is AMAZING!" and then he'd drift off a bit - only to wake up again later, still very impressed.

We got home and LB would not sleep. He was all wound up. Semi-hungry, demanding food and then falling asleep after a few swallows but then waking up again as soon as we'd put him down - and demanding more food. Instead of his 4 ounces or so every 3 hours, he'd want 2 and then 3 and then 1 and the pattern was just blown all to hell. Just as he'd start to drift off, he'd be wide awake again. It was sort of painful to see. I can't remember being his age (just over 3 weeks) but I can remember being a kid and having hyper battle with tired and not being able to sleep.

So he finally fell into a real, deep sleep about 11:30pm. Then was up to eat at 2 and back to sleep pretty easily. Then up at 6 and had a hard time, but finally back to sleep at 7 or so. Then up at 10 and awake for about an hour and a half. It was time for him to eat again at 1, but Liftoff Guy took him and he ate only about an ounce and a half (expressed breast milk) and then fell asleep again. So now the pattern is off. He's sleeping and didn't eat what he's used to so he's probably going to be hungry at some weird time and want less than what he usually eats... And it's going to be tricky.

I think he's making up today for missed sleep yesterday. He's stirring now, but I don't know if he's going to go back to sleep or demand the rest of his lunch. He doesn't know either.

So, I'm writing again....

It's been a while. Things have been super busy, as you might imagine. I'm trying to think how to blog about this briefly...but I'll just jump in and try.

1. Liftoff Boy is here. He was still breech the afternoon of his birth and we went ahead with the c-section. It went really well, amazingly well. I had my music playing (I didn't watch because I felt nauseated at the beginning) and he was born to "When You're Smiling" by Dean Martin. Liftoff Guy watched him come out, cut (okay shortened) the umbilical cord, and didn't get woozy at all. I nursed LB in the recovery room. I didn't get a headache from the spinal, my itching from the morphine was minimal, I didn't get the shakes, I never threw up. LB's apgar scores were 8 and 9, which are awesome. He was 9 pounds, 5 ounces, 18.5 inches long, and had a 15.2 inch circumference head. He's a wonderful little guy. As of yesterday, he was 9 pounds, 12 ounces and 21 inches long! I think his head circumference was 38.2 cm but I haven't translated it yet. Whatever that is, it's 90th percentile.

2. Although the surgery itself had no complications, I did develop a uterine infection that made itself known the day after we came home from the hospital. So there I went, 8 hours in the ER and then 3 more days in the hospital, this time without LB, which was pretty agonizing. LG brought LB and my mom to visit all three days, but it was really difficult. I also developed some weirdness with my blood pressure and am on meds for a while now. Hopefully they'll reduce them on Monday when I go in for a blood pressure check. I had to pump and dump because of one of the antibiotics though.

3. I am a pumping machine. Literally, right now, I am pumping as I type. LB never got the latch thing down, and then he had to be on formula, so right now he's getting 2/3 of his feedings as pumped breastmilk and 1/3 as formula. I'm making a lot and have 50 ounces of formula frozen so far. I hope to give him breastmilk for 6 months and maybe I can stop pumping early and rely on our stores (in the deep freeze now) for the last month or so? This is tedious work, and you have to feed him and then pump and I wake up desperate to pump even if LG has the night feeding covered.

4. LB is a wonderful little boy. Dark hair growing in, indigo eyes that seem to have gray and brown in them (they might end up brown like mine or even hazel, who knows). He's pretty mellow, loves to look around (especially at distant moving things like the ceiling fan or tree branches overhead), and talks to himself as he's falling asleep.

5. I have until August 10 to finish revising an article - this will be challenging, but it's good because a panel I participated on in the fall is looking to get our whole crew published in a journal somewhere. Since I'm up for tenure in the spring, this would be a good thing. Must revise article. Must do research. Oy.

Tomorrow's the day

And oh my goodness, I am freaking out. I'm moody and semi-scared - not just of the surgery, but of being a mom. Well, there's not much I can do at this point other than ride the wave. I'm sure I'll feel much better later, but oy, right now.