Kate is both hilarious and utterly frustrating right now. The tantrums about every little thing are just ridiculous!

I had to take both kids grocery shopping with me today. I made a list beforehand since I knew my brain would be fried and I would be racing to complete my mission before meltdowns occurred. Ember went in the mei tai and then I took Kate out of the truck, walked her inside to the car cart, and strapped her in as securely as I could. (I am very glad she has grown a bit so she can’t just slip out anymore.) Ember blessedly fell asleep, Kate was chatting at me about foods that she saw, and I started thinking maybe I can do this… this is going to work! But then Kate wanted the bananas. I said no. She cried. I gave her the bananas. (Yes, I know, consistency blah blah crying toddler in grocery store. Bananas were a small price for quiet.) But then she wanted the lettuce. And the chicken. And the milk. And the bread. I said no to all of these… especially the bread. I was even trying to be good about it, saying things like, “The milk has to go in the cart. You can carry the bananas! See? Bananas!” It didn’t work very well.

By the end of the shopping trip Ember had woken up and was crying a little bit and I knew my time was rapidly running out with her. Kate was hanging out the side of the car cart in an overly dramatic (but thankfully unsuccessful) attempt to escape it. She twisted in her seat sticking her fingers into the cart trying to grab food and crying things like, “Stuck!! Bread!! WAAHH!” when it didn’t work. Then she threw an utter fit when I went to the cashier and started putting all the food on the belt. I’m trying to give my rewards card to the cashier, run my debit card through the payment machine, bouncing up and down to try to keep Ember calmed down, and trying to ignore the toddler that was sobbing “Out! Out!”

When at the car I decided got the food in the truck, which caused another round of freak-out from Kate when she saw the stroller back there and started yelling for a ride in the stroller. I had to lift her into her carseat (while Ember was still in the mei tai – I didn’t want to leave Kate sitting in the cart in the parking lot while I strapped Ember in), and basically hold her down to strap her in. Then I put Ember in her car seat, she started crying.

I got in the truck to drive home, both of them sobbing, and decided that I am never doing this again.

I have a twitter account, but some of you may have noticed that I only use it to read, I don’t post. I’ve tried to get into it a few times but every time I do I just get a weird, squiggly feeling and stop. It’s not that I don’t like sharing – I love sharing. I am quite likely an over-sharer. I have blogged for many years, I post on FaceBook daily, I belong to various forums where we talk about just about everything under the sun. So what’s the issue? I think for me it comes down to the publicity. Twitter is this big publicised machine and every time I try posting there I just imagine it popping up on all these random peoples’ computer screens. And why would random strangers care? Unless it was funny, and while I am occasionally witty right now my life is more about yogurt on walls than honing a rapier wit about social topics. Everything I read about twitter is about how to promote yourself. I don’t want to promote myself. I am far more comfortable sitting quietly in the corner, watching. I hate being in the center of the room.

As a teenager I would blog about everything on my mind, it was the ultimate brain-dump. Blogging was new, the community was small, and in a way it felt like you knew everyone. It was to be both an experiment in new technology as well as a kind of writing therapy. As I got older I realized how foolish it was to throw all my thoughts out there like that, to rant and cry and moan about all the things that a teenager rants and cries about. (I’m sure some of it was stunningly thoughtful and deep. Most of it, however, was not.) I realized that on the internet that stuff doesn’t just go away, it gets saved and passed around and talked about in public and private. I became more thoughtful of other people, and more thoughtful of myself too. I’ve become a lot more protective of my words and thoughts.

But I feel like now I’ve swung too far… that I’m afraid of having a public opinion. Maybe afraid is too strong a word…. maybe it’s just that I don’t have the time or energy to endlessly debate things. Maybe I’ve seen too much negativity and resentment and anger. FaceBook doesn’t help matters at all. I am so tired of seeing not-funny snarky images, “It’s my right to have my opinion and say whatever I want” posts, and long comment chains of seethingly angry people who don’t even read the damn facts before jumping into the debate. I usually don’t even bother anymore. It’s become a cacophony of opinions and I just want to shut my ears. I’m going to have to start unfriending/unsubscribing people; my time is limited and I get angry that I spend any of it feeling pissed off for 5 minutes about something someone posted.

Yes, I have changed – but so has the online world. As addicted as I still am (my phone is usually in my hand, pulling up facebook and sending emails back and forth with friends) a part of me really wants to step away from it all. Or rather, to use it as the tool it was meant to be, and stop being sucked in by all the rest of it. I love being able to post photos of my kids so that my relatives can get a closer look at our lives from so far away. I love that I can hold conversations with my best friends any time of day or night. I love that I can look up news and information as I need it. I really don’t like feeling like I need to avoid posting anything of substance because of the inevitable crankiness and debate. (Not everything in life needs to be a debate!)

Blogging used to be a huge source of relief and healing for me. Obviously this particular blog has changed because my life situation has changed, and I am content with that – I want and need a place to document my children’s lives, to share with friends and family and to save for posterity. Documenting this stage is very important to me. But at the same time I have lost my outlet. I no longer really have a place to think out loud – and in this online world I don’t know that I will ever feel fully comfortable thinking outloud in a public place anyways.

My parents were visiting for the past two weeks, which was a fabulous treat for all of us. Ember had more hands to hold her, Kate had someone’s attention at all times, and I actually got to run errands without children! We are all very sad they had to leave. Kate is getting to an age where she is understanding who people are… and that they were here a few days ago and now are gone. I am sad that she gets such a brief time with her grandoarents, due to the distance, but it was really wonderful to see her getting to know them and her excitement every morning when she woke up and found them still here. Hopefully soon she will be able to hold conversations with them on pbone and skype.

My parents remarked on what a big difference they saw inEmber’s social behavior over the span of their visit. At 6 weeks old she was starting to smile a little bit but was still having those fussy awake times where it seemed even she didn’t know what she wanted. At 8 weeks today she is a very smily baby! She smiles pretty much any time someone looks at her. She maintains eye contact, follows people across the room, reacts to facial expressions and happy voices. She seems to especially like daddy’s voice.

She is also easier to keep happy now that she is interested in interaction and the world around her. She has discovered her hands in the past two weeks and spends long stretches of time staring at them and turning them this way and that. She also spends a lot of time trying to get her thumb in her mouth but thus far it remains frustratingly trapped in her fist. She does slobber all over her hands and fingers though. She has also just in the last couple days realized that she has feet and legs. In the bath she was kicking and pausing to feel the water reaction. Today I put white socks on her and she went nuts kicking her legs and staring at her feet as they moved. It is pretty funny.

One thing she does that isnt new nor do I think it’s a concious thing – she pulls her hair. Since she had long hair at birth (it’s about an inch and a half long) she can grab a fistful. It seems to be a comfort thing she does, grabbing at her ear and hair when she is tired. She has lost quite a bit of her hair just from rubbing and such, she has a balding ring like an old man, and sometimes I worry that she is going to yank out a bunch more! I can’t imagine it feels good to yank on your hair that hard, but she doesn’t seem to mind.

She’s now soending half the night in the rock and olay I bought used – it is great, a nice angle for sleeping but without scrunching her up like the bouncer and swing do. I didn’t think I would need it to rock but it is extremely helpful. She doesn’t have to be fully asleep when I put her down at night, just sleepy.. I rock her and she’s out. Then I get to sleep for a few hours on my own before she wakes up. She’s been waking a few times a night to nurse, but falls right back asleep. I do change her diaper though because she was leaking..  the kid pees a lot.

I took her to the dr the other day because she has what is apparently a granuloma on her belly button – a piece of tissue still attached. The dr applied silver nitrate so hopefully that will take care of it. Oh and she weighed in at 11lbs 1oz at 7 1/2 weeks old. She is definitely a solid baby!

This morning while the kids were quiet and mostly occupied I made some calls with my phone. I set it on the table when I was done. Soon after it was time for Kate’s nap, so I walked her to her room and put her in bed.

We watched TV for the couple hours that Kate as asleep. Usually I have my phone next to me, but I didn’t this time and didn’t bother getting up to grab it.

When Kate woke up I was in the middle of nursing Ember so I let her wait for a few minutes. I heard her talking in her room, then thumping on her door, and I heard a heavy thump of some object hitting the floor. Ember still wasn’t done yet so my dad got up and opened Kate’s door to let her out. She walked out… and held out my phone. How the hell did she get it in her room without me noticing? And when?? Did I seriously put her to bed while she held my phone in her hands? Jeez.

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It is almost midnight. I am laying in bed typing this post on my phone while Ember nurses. (I am a great nursing multi-tasker.) Ember is fidgeting… I look down and in the glow from my screen I see two bright eyes staring up at me. Apparently I am distracting her from that sleep thing… though today has not held much sleep for her to start with. Guess it is time to turn off the screen and try to convince her to close her eyes.

I am exhasted, I am now driving back and forth, pumping and nursing and splitting my time between two kids. Ember is doing a lot better and was just taken off oxygen completely, which is a huge step. She may be coming home in the nexg few days! But everytime she has a great stetch with now issues she then turns around and has a de-sat or two just for fun. It is so frustrating. I really want my baby to come home!

I was discharged yesterday but decided to stay at the hospital in a free room as a “hotel guest,” something they offer moms in situations like this. I was going to stay just one extra night but decided to stay one more. I think it was a good decision. Kate is just fine with daddy at home, and I really appreciate the bonding time with Ember.

I love just holding her after she’s done nursing, staring at her and watching her cute little newborn faces. She is most definitely not Kate! She has a lot of different features, so I’m exploring all her little dimples and curves. She has a ton of long dark hair. I love stroking and playing with her hair, it all sticks up funny. I stare at her in wonder, how did she come from me? How was she just inside me mere days ago? She’s already changed in the last 3 days, looking less red, less squished. Even though she’s in the NICU I am grateful that I get to spend time with my little girl, bonding and falling in love with her. I don’t want to lose this time with her.

I also don’t want her to lose out on this time with me. She’s waking up a little more now rather than being asleep pretty much all the time. She looks up at me with her fuzzy grey-blue eyes, she pouts her little lip, she sticks out her tongue and roots around for mama’s boob. When she’s upset I’m there to hold her.

Getting off to a good start with breastfeeding was very important to me. We didn’t get to nurse right after birth and in fact we didn’t get to nurse until the following day. I wasn’t overly concerned, she had other needs to deal with right then. But happily when we did get the go-ahead to feed her she latched right on. I remember with Kate that even though she knew what she was supposed to do she wasn’t quite sure how to accomplish it – both of us were new and there was a lot of fumbling around the nipple. This one? Not an issue. And I’m not a newbie either, I’m sure that helps. I pumped off a little bit of colostrum but then just nursed her until I felt my milk coming in yesterday evening. Ember is extremely happy with the milk, and so are the nurses. She wasn’t peeing much before my milk came in, and while that’s normal in a breastfed baby they get worried about that in the NICU. Of course as soon as they brought it up I mentioned to them that my breasts were filling as we spoke and the next time I spoke to them they reported a giant poop and two good pees from her. :) So now I’m still nursing Ember every 3 hours, but then usually going back to my room and pumping off the rest. I’m building a stockpile for when I go home, since we don’t know how long Ember will be at the hospital still. I’m already pumping off 2oz each time after she eats (and at 3 days old she’s not eating that much per feeding!), I imagine I’m going to have to deal with oversupply for a while.

Kate is doing so well. She was a little hyperactive in the hospital, but then this isn’t exactly the most toddler-friendly place, she has energy to burn. She is happy to see mama for a while, she sits with me and we play games and eat food and she talks a lot. But she isn’t throwing fits when Den takes her home. That’s a huge weight off my shoulders! I think she’s actually enjoying having a lot of time with daddy, to be honest. She’s doing great with the baby, too. Today we told her we were going to go see the baby and she happily marched down the halls with us to the NICU. In the hall way in front there are big paintings on the walls of various jungle animals, and Kate gets so excited to point them all out to us. Then we get a sticker (on her shirt, identifying her) and we go wash our hands – that is awkward, Den has to hold her up while somehow scrubbing in himself and getting her hands and arms washed. Today when we got done with the hand washing Kate said, “Baby? Baby Emma?” and was all set to walk straight into the pod where Ember is. (And yes, she pronounces it emma. The b and r are apparently difficult!) She happily sat on the chair with me but was very impatient when we took time picking Ember up, she kept pointing and instructing us, “Baby!” When daddy brought the baby down to our level Kate waved at her, said, “Hi!”, petted her head, and then of course grabbed the blanket and tried yanking the baby into her own arms. Ummm, not so much, Kate! So it appears her main frustration right now is that she is not allowed to grab the baby and carry her around. ;) She did give hugs though. Then Den distracted Kate a bit while I started to nurse the baby. Kate had no issue with that, either. They did have to leave, but only because Kate was just too wired and wanted to run around and touch things. All in all I think it’s going very well! Hope it continues to go well once Ember is home with us.

I have pictures, but I’m not exactly sure how to post them from the tablet. I’ll see if I can figure that out next.

Update at bottom! I’m going to leave the original post I wrote, but after talking to the doctor I have some new very good info!

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I kept meaning to come here and post but then getting sidetracked by the million other things I’m trying to do.

So last I wrote that Ember had been taken to the NICU because of some breathing difficulty at birth and we anticipated she’d be back down in our room soon. That didn’t happen. The original issue was fluid in the lungs, she had apparently inhaled a bunch of it, and it caused a bit of a rough transition to the outside world. However while she was on monitors she had a couple of apnea spells – she stopped breathing momentarily, causing her oxygen levels to drop significantly.

[This paragraph is from what I gathered from a nurse. The doctor now tells me something different.]
I don’t know if I just wasn’t asking the right questions or just not with it enough or super positive thinking or what, but I still thought it was linked to the fluid and that she’d be off oxygen the next morning and that would be that. But she wasn’t, and everyone started talking about pumping and being released without her. It wasn’t until last night that I started asking more careful clarifying questions to understand. From what the nurse said it appears that the apnea is unrelated to the original breathing issue. In fact if she hadn’t had any problems at birth it’s pretty likely that no one would have noticed anything, and that could have been very very bad. They don’t know why she’s doing it, it’s usually something they see in preemies, not healthy full-term babies. All the labs that have been run showed no sign of infection, so that’s very good. It just seems to be a quirk of hers. A dangerous quirk. Yesterday she had two episodes, one of which she recovered from and the other a nurse needed to stimulate her to wake up a little bit and breathe. Again this morning another episode that required intervention. The nurse said that usually with the preemies they want to see the baby go a week without an episode before sending them home. Clearly you want to be really sure it’s not going to randomly happen again.

So that was all a shock to me. Here I was thinking she was just having some shallow breathing from the fluid and that once that dissipated she’d come right home. Now we’re looking at an unknown time spent in the NICU, I’m going home without her. They’re just watching to see how she does as they lower the oxygen she’s on. Basically she needs to stop having the apnea episodes. If she does stop doing it she’ll be able to come home. If she doesn’t… then we don’t know. They haven’t given me any indication of what they’re going to do next.

In many ways, yes, it’s a small thing that in a few weeks or months will be in her past. We are really glad it was discovered now and she’s in the best place possible for her. But it sucks. I’ve spent the last two days in a hospital room with no baby in it – that or trekking upstairs to be with Ember. I really really appreciate being able to hold her now (we couldn’t the first day), this all feels so surreal that only holding her and touching her and talking to her make it all make sense in my head.

The NICU is very good with breastfeeding moms. Ember wasn’t taking anything by mouth for a good 12 hours after birth, then I pumped and gave a little colostrum by dropper. Yesterday I was able to nurse for the first time and the girl apparently was born knowing how to do it, she was very happy when she finally was allowed to latch! (Before then when I held her she would root and stick her tongue out and squawk and squeek at me.) So now I’m nursing every 3 hours, which means I’m not getting much of anything done, much less sleeping. Last night was me sleeping for 1.5-2 hours, my phone alarm going off, me forcing myself out of bed, walking out of L&D, taking an elevator, walking down the hall to NICU, scrubbing in, feeding a baby who keeps falling asleep at the breast while I tried not to nod off, then going back downstairs and trying to fall asleep again despite all the loud hospital sounds. I did get some sleep. I am not continuing this forever, but I wanted to make sure she got all the colostrum she could while I was waiting on my milk to come in. It’s half in now, I was able to pump some to stockpile for when I go home. Then I’m going to be pumping at home and driving in to nurse and drop off the milk.

I know many moms have done this before and survived. I know we’ll get through this. This was obviously not what I envisioned. I had a nice easy pregnancy and birth, and who expects the NICU? She looks like a monster baby next to all the little preemies in there.

And then of course we have Kate, too. Yesterday was just not a good day for her, she was whiny and bursting into tears whenever I left the room, sobbing for mama. We took her to see Ember for the first time, which did not go as well as hoped for. She didn’t like anyone touching or disturbing the baby, and then when we picked the baby up she flipped out crying. Den had to make a hasty exit with her. Today was MUCH better though, I think she finally caught up on sleep. She was in a great mood hanging out with us for a little bit, and then going to see Ember again. This time since she wasn’t clingy and whiny she reacted very well. She pointed out the baby and her body parts (“Eyes! Ears! Mouth! Cheeks!”). She sat on my lap while Den held Ember. She petted her hair, talked some more about the baby (“Sleeping!”), gave her a hug. Even tried to give Ember a rubber ducky toy. So we were very pleased! Obviously her attention span is like 5 minutes long, she got bored and tried finding new fun things to do so then our visit was over, but that made me feel a ton better.

So that’s how it stands right now. I’m definitely sore – I forgot how sore your body feels after giving birth. My abs are killing me, birthing babies is quite the workout. And my lower back is twinged from the back labor and the crappy hospital bed, I need to see my chiro. I did get a tear and some stitches again (I did with Kate, too). I need to take it easy, which is very hard to do right now.

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Update: The doctor talked to me this evening when I was in there and what he’s telling me is much better! What they think she has is Transient Tachypnea. It is in fact related to the fluid in the lungs, it causes labored breathing and he says the apnea episodes (which I guess she doesn’t stop breathing entirely, just breathes very shallowly causing her sats to drop) are somewhat common with the condition. In any case he said today she was much improved and they expect to see her improve every day. He also said that this is a condition that should be short-lived and resolved by the time she goes home, that she won’t be going home on oxygen or anything. What a relief!

She’s still in the best place for her right now, we will get her through this, and we will bring her home.

Ember finally decided to join us in the big outside world! She was born at 2:52pm June 4th, after approximately 8 hours of labor. It was another pretty easy labor for me! She did surprise us all yet again though…. she weighs in at 8lb 13.1oz! Holy roly-poly. (In comparison, Kate was 7lbs.) She has a bunch of dark brown hair, big chubby cheeks, and I *think* she has Kate’s little mouth and nose, but it’s hard to say at this point, newborns being so smushy and all. Unfortunately she’s in the NICU overnight because she had some trouble breathing after birth – she was crying, but not pinking up very well. So she’s just on a bit of oxygen and hopefully will be down here with me tomorrow.

I’m working on writing out the full story… I had to keep reminding myself just to post the basics first so you all don’t have to wait a day, ha.

I feel so calm tonight. So quiet. I am finally watching the last few episodes of House and just finding it so heavy – a good distraction, one that reminds me of what is important.

I had two hours worth of 10 minute apart contractions this morning – the real kind of contractions, not the braxton hicks whenever-they-feel-like-it. But they stopped after I had to get up with Kate and get us fed and dressed. It didn’t upset me; mostly am very bouyed that something is going on now. It may be tonight, it may take days, but something is shifting. It brings with it peace.

As of midnight I will be 13 days “overdue”, 41w6d. It’s been such an odd time, these two weeks I didn’t expect to have. It’s strange going to parties that I expected to be bringing two children to, instead of a toddler and a very large belly. I am getting quite a bit of amusement from it, though. I get some very funny looks when I say I’m nearly 2 weeks overdue. The most interesting – and frequent – comment is, “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe your doctors are letting you keep going!” Sometimes it’s implied that the doctors are “making” me suffer. I point out that I requested not being induced, and furthermore I’m not actually miserable. Oh I’m big, I’m tired, and my feet hurt. I’m certainly at the end of my pregnancy. But it’s far from torturous. It’s just my mental state that was spazzing out (and not many people knew about that part).

Tonight Den rubbed some acupressure points on my leg, we had sex (again – yes, we’ve been trying that!), and I will turn on my HypnoBabies track. In the morning I will go in for a NST & BPP and then I’ll be calling an acupuncturist to try to get an appointment before Thursday. I did acupuncture during the IVF cycle I got pregnant with Kate – I can’t say it was the key factor, as I had gotten pregnant by IVF before, but it certainly helped relax me.

First pregnancy, a month early: “I have to sort all the baby clothes and get every piece of furniture set up and make sure the entire house is spotless before the baby even thinks of coming!”

Third pregnancy, 2 days overdue: “Hon, if I go into labor tonight you’re going to have to buy cat food.”

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Luckily I don’t have to deal with it too very much – my circle knows better than to actually call me – but emails and messages asking if there is baby news gets quite old. If there was news, I’d have posted it. I am not exactly a secretive person. I’m also a FB addict so family will find out as soon as anything happens. Though my mom still reminds me not to forget to call her.

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I am now 4 days overdue, but I am starting to have some more BH contractions, so that makes me think things are gearing up. It could be tonight or in 6 days, who knows, but I definitely feel better feeling something at all! This baby seems to be quite happy in there.

My temper has gone downhill too. That’s not really a good thing, but I’m just tired and cranky. Kate was for most of the day a really good kid. Until evening. That’s when she decided that the best way to get attention from mama – even though daddy was there with her, playing and interacting – was to jump on me, slap me, throw things at me, and touch things I told her not to touch. I remained calm (for the most part), but inside my head is a voice shrieking “Just don’t touch me!! Stop it!!” Grump grump. And then I feel bad because I want to spend time with her and I love her to death, but when she threw herself full-body on top of my belly while I was having a contraction, well, I just started a mental countdown until her bedtime.

I feel very tired, very worn out. Doing pretty much anything exhausts me. It’s all I can do to keep the dishes washed, Kate’s dirty clothes in the hamper. Forget picking up toys and making sure the washer and dryer don’t have crap piled all over them. And anything requiring bending over makes me kind of nauseated and light-headed at the same time.

I think I’m really moving into a mental space of “Want the baby on the outside now.” I want to meet her. I want to hold her.