.dizziness and dishes.

So, pregnancy is as fun as ever. Woke up this morning with a little bit of extra time to snuggle with my handsome husband but, oh wait, no, I lost everything including my shoes instead. Being thankful for the little things, I was able to make it to the bathroom sink in time. But no matter, moving on. Except that moving on proved to be difficult this morning as the room, the hall and the stairwell all swirled around me in a twirling vortex of vertigo. I had to laugh. I didn't have time for this.

Captain blessed me by taking a work-from-home morning, having started the habit of bringing his work laptop home in the evenings. This was very helpful as he could carry Wee Bud up and down the stairs while I climbed up or down on my hands and knees like a three year old. Swaying unsteadily, we made it through the first few hours of today and I am starting to feel better. At least the floor isn't moving at the moment.

I am just not one of those women who enjoy being pregnant. Everyone talks about the glowing skin, the lush hair - I get the random upchucks, adolescent complexion and the ability to shed hair like a show dog. Whatever.


And in other news, I have a love-hate relationship with dishes. I love the satisfaction of an easy start-to-finish task such as emptying a sink full of dirty dishes and then wiping down the counters. Dirty. Clean. Start. Finish. I love it. What I don't love is how often I have the opportunity to enjoy this task. Where do all of these dishes come from??

It's a Wednesday morning. Captain is getting ready to head back to the office as it has been close to an hour since my last "whoooaaaa" and steadying wall lean. This Sprout in my tummy is happy and healthy and, from the sound of it, so is the darling girl upstairs who just woke up from her nap. I am blessed.

.the Roger Banister effect.

Yesterday, I listened to a podcast on VBACs sent to me by our doulas. I found it informative and encouraging. It sparked my interest to look up successful VBAC stories though at the time it was more for curiosity's sake than anything else.

That afternoon, while feeding Wee Bud her afternoon snack, I turned on the radio and caught the last few minutes of a program. The host was saying something about the Bannister Effect and apparently was getting blank stares by the others in the studio. He went on to explain that the Bannister Effect is based on Roger Bannister, the first man to run a sub-4-minute mile. In 1954, when Bannister ran one mile in 3.59 seconds, it was generally thought to be impossible for the human body to run a mile in under four minutes. Bannister proved that it wasn't and dozens of other runners went on to run sub-4-minute miles in the following years. It is now considered a standard time for serious runners. The host's point was that it took one person showing that it was possible for others to be able to accomplish the same feat. The program ended, and my heart and face both turned upward in a smile, thanking a loving Father for giving me encouragement from random places.

When I put Wee Bud down for her next nap, I pulled up the internet and typed: "successful VBAC stories after cesarean due to failure to progress". I found numerous sites and have been reading through them ever since. Each successful story feels like a grain of rice on a scale in my heart, tipping it's way from doubt to hope. No, no one's story is going to be the same as mine. No story that I have read has been the same as any other. But there is hope. This is possible.

I may never run a four minute mile, but by God's grace I can bring this little Sprout into the world without the need for surgery.


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Side note: the stories that I have read have been encouraging but there has been one so far that has caused tears to form in my eyes. It was just one little piece of the story but my heart resonated strongly with it. I wanted to include the excerpt here:


"Dr. N arrived at my side a couple of minutes later, checked me, and then very calmly said, 'Well..., you’re definitely fully dilated, so bear down whenever you get a contraction, just like you’ve been doing.' Oh. My. God. I choked up, grabbed his hand, and said through my sobs, 'Dr. N, I have been waiting for so long to hear someone say that to me! Thank you, thank you, thank you!'"   (http://community.babycenter.com/post/a18423245/birth_stories?cpg=2)


This can be me. My body is able and, more importantly, my God is able. I trust Him fully with whatever the outcome.

.11 Months? when did that happen?.

Our Wee Bud is almost 11 months old. 11 months old tomorrow. Which means she's almost one year old. One year old in a month and a day.

When did this happen??

Our little girl is not so little anymore. She finally started gaining weight steadily at six months and is now in the healthy upper twenty percentile for weight. She's crawling quickly, babbling constantly and eating whatever we offer. And a few things which we don't...

Oh yes, and we're pregnant again. And Captain received a much-deserved promotion. And we bought a townhouse. And a dog. And a minivan. And did I mention that we are pregnant again? All of that took place in the span of eight weeks. What a wonderful whirlwind.

With this second pregnancy, I was just as sick for the first trimester as I was when pregnant with Wee Bud. It seems to last forever but in truth it's only about six weeks of really intense nausea and vomiting and then it tapers off after 12 weeks to just occasional, random darts to the bathroom to lose whatever could possibly be offending the little life inside of me.

Another little life. I'm being given the gift of co-creating once more. It's an honor for which, now that I'm no longer weak-willed and puking, I am incredibly grateful. Captain was very gracious during the six weeks as he listened to my repeated bemoaning that I could never, ever, do this again and he'd better decide what gender he wanted and be praying hard cause this was never, ever going to happen again. And I meant it too. Funny enough, we're now at 14 weeks and I'm back to being fine with however many children God should choose to give us.

I don't see how Wee Bud could know what is going on seeing as how she still has lap room, but ever since we became pregnant she has become more snuggly. I am not minding it.

Last night we met with our doulas and are delighted to have them partner with us on this journey. One of our doulas is actually the nurse from our birth story who has become a very dear friend. It was a text from her (during the six weeks of "never-again"ing) that gave my heart the courage to assert my desire to attempt a VBAC. You may or may not understand this feeling, but after our birth experience with Wee Bud it was tempting to not even dare hope. To just schedule the cesarean and a pedicure and not face the possibility of hope, expectation, disappointment, failure and loss. Speaking with the doulas last night, I realized that there is a part of my heart which, much like my abdomen, bears a scar from our experience. No, it's not an open wound. There has been, by God's grace, a healing. We are praying and believing that the uterine scar will be a place of strength and not weakness. Now I am praying that the scar on my heart and emotions will be the same. Thankfully, these wonderful ladies (not to mention my amazing Captain) are on board with helping me process through whatever emotions may rise to the surface as we continue on this journey. Though I haven't blogged in a while, I realize that this journey may be similar to paths that others may find themselves on. Consider this blog and the random posts to come as broken twigs. I can't tell you that the way I will take (or have taken) is the right way - but as I travel on, I'm sure hindsight will offer a lot to ponder over.

So there you go. We're pregnant. I have a dog sleeping at my feet and an almost one year old napping upstairs. The laundry is going and dinner is planned. The windows are open and I spent a little time in the sun. Life is not perfect, but on days like this, I don't think I could ask for anything more perfect for me.

.no longer the nanny.

Wee Bud is five and a half months old now. Our lives were changed when we put her on a schedule. We are not fanatic about it but, my goodness, it has been a life saver! Wee Bud responded to it almost immediately and became happier day and night. She was sleeping through the night within a week. It was almost as if she were wanting some amount of predictability and when we gave it to her she was delighted. Having been a nanny for years, I was used to parents telling me their child's schedule. It was easy for me to keep the child on that schedule. Once we had Wee Bud though, I found myself wondering, who gives me the schedule? I had no idea. 

I voiced this to my friend, who I happened to have nannied for in the past, and she looked at me with astonishment and something like amusement. "You are the parent now," she told me. "You set the schedule."

This simple obvious truth revolutionized my approach to Wee Bud.

I was no longer the nanny. I was the parent. I knew how to care for children. I now have the additional task of training them. 

We put Wee Bud on the schedule. Within a week, we allowed her to cry herself to sleep. (That was a torturous night with divine benefits that I will have to address in another post.) 

With having a schedule, our child is happier. We are happier. Our home is happier.

I feel like I am required to put something in here like "every child/parent/home is different." And you already know that to be true. But just because everyone has different cars and driving styles doesn't mean that basic road rules are different for everybody. Just something to consider.

Ah, she's awake.