One Week (and also 13 days) and other stuff

Gentry:

• Eats every 2 hours or so, day and night. 
• Sleeps very well (either in the crook of my arm or swaddled in the pack n play napper)
• Pretty much just east, sleeps and is content and awake. He is super easy and super content. 
• Is growing because he is fitting ok in 3 month clothes (length, not chub - he is pretty skinny still)
• Does tummy time pretty happily
• Is going to be one tough dude. Older brothers are not gentile like older sisters - we try to be careful but he does get poked and roughed around by Barrett
• Still in the jerky infant phase, moves his arms and legs with little to no control over movements
• Seems to have a bit of a cold, maybe. Is kind of "snorgely" and stuffed up sounding
• Content being held by anyone
• Cries very loudly when he wants something (food) but quiets right down when he gets it

Gentry + Barrett (this blog is not about sugar coating)

• 2 is WAY harder than 1. The transition to 1 seemed pretty ok, pretty easy at times. Sleep deprivation, lack of showers, etc - yea it was hard. But I could sleep when the baby slept (if I wanted to, not that I did), I could just sit, I could set him down and do stuff. Having an infant + a toddler? Mayhem. Craziness. Whole-new-ballgame. 
• I thought Barrett was an easy baby. Turns out, he was not. Gentry, easy. Barrett...looking back, in addition to his dairy problem, I am almost certain he had colic. He cried a lot. He needed to be held all the time. He pretty much only liked being held by me. I remember struggling to take a shower or eat or anything. He was very difficult to nurse for the first 5 or so months. Gentry? Set him down, hand him off, swaddle, unswaddle...he is just content. Shower? Sure! Cook? Absolutely! Clean? No prob! - oh wait. Except for that busy toddler part...hm. Nevermind. I will just be unshowered, uncooked, uncleaned for...um. Ever. 
• Did I mention that 1 was way easier? Let me tell all you 1 child families who thought 1 was a hard transition - who thought the sleepless nights were hard, who thought getting anything done or getting out of the house was hard. 2 is no joke. The good news is, I am used to being chronically sleep deprived (if you recall, I have not slept through the night since before Barrett joined us and he is almost 20 months old) so the good news is, I am not really bothered with not sleeping. And yes, I am super loser - I go to bed at 8:30 and get up at 7 or 8, whenever Barrett gets up - which equates to probably 6-7 hours of actual sleep. But there is no part of me that is willing to sacrifice any sleep for a stupid TV show. Sorry network TV. 
• The bad news is - having an infant and a 20 month old is CRAZY. I don't know if an older sister would have been easier because girls are more gentile and into things like babies - but my sweet, compliant, easy going toddler definitely is a little more defiant, I wanna do it myself, whinny, grouchy, etc than he was. Maybe this was on its way anyway - but it hit right when Gentry came home. And from what I know about toddlers, 20 month olds are not capable of being jealous. But something is certainly going on. I spend a lot of my day reminding myself to be patient. Be patient. Be patient. Be patient. Repeat repeat repeat. 
• People constantly remind me that the boys will play together and long term, it will be great. Right. I know. But short term (and I think we are talking a year at least), the is HARD. That's right. No lies. This. Is. Hard. When it was just Barrett, I was easy going mama. I was even tempered mama. I was just the kind of mama I wanted to be. As a mom of 2 (with newborn) I am patience tested mama. I am easily thrown over the edge mama. I am short tempered mama. I am every kind of mama I never wanted to be. And I am hoping that I can either reign this mama in, or that eventually things WILL get easier and I will be back to the previous mama. 
• When you have your first, people ooh and aaah. People come over. People wanna meet the baby. People are so so so excited. When you have your second, people mostly don't seem to be interested. Meh, it's the second. If you were expecting lots of drop ins and people wanting to see you or people wanting to see the baby or whatever - don't get your hopes up - or you may be disappointed. Or maybe I send out "don't visit us" vibes. Either way - it's definitely not the excitement of baby 1. Not trying to be a downer, just being real. 

Me:

• I gained way less weight with this pregnancy (yeay!) so while at 2 weeks out I was down to 160 with Barrett, this time 1 day shy of 2 weeks out I am down to 145.5. That is what I was when I got pregnant with Barrett. Wow. (I still have lots of work to do but yeah!)
• Im sweating like crazy at night, just like I did with Barrett. 
• Breastfeeding is going well. I was a bit engorged at the start but we are on track now. 
• 1 pair of prepregnancy jeans fit. Few shirts fit because my boobs are huge. 
• Mood wise, I am pretty good. Other than being overwhelmed by having 2. 
• Sleep is good - but that's because I am used to not sleeping (ha!)

Birth Story - Gentry

I really went back and forth on whether I wanted to do a VBAC or whether I wanted to just do a scheduled C-Section. Ultimately, the decision came down to the following factors -

• I would have to go into labor spontaneously - family and personal experience showed that I would possibly even go a full 2 weeks past my due date and then I would have had to have a C-Section anyway. 
• I have big babies
• I have no idea why Barrett didn't come on his own and ended in a C-Section - size may or may not have been a factor. 

So we decided to go with May 8. My doc was on, it sounded like a good day. 

Nick, my sister Ali and I arrived at the hospital at 6am. They took us back to the room where the did all the C-Section preparations - clean stuff, IV, baby monitor, etc. - then we waited. At around 7:45 my doc came and chatted and asked if we had any questions. Then I walked down the hall with my doc into the operating room. It was large and cold and sterile and there were about 4 nurses and my doc and the assisting doc, Doctor Olmstead. She was nice. They had me lean forward for the spinal then lay down, get the catheter (ick) and they began to administer different drugs. Some made me sick, nauseous, numb, dizzy - it was like an endless cocktail of different stuff. Nick and Ali both got to come in. Ali took pictures, Nick sat by my head. Ali took pictures of EVERYTHING. She kindly separated the pictures in a folder on my external hard drive for ones that most people would never want to see - but it was kind of unique to get pictures of that I suppose. 

The doctors worked their magic. I guess I had several dips in my blood pressure which had to be corrected by more drugs. Once they were in, it was determined that I had an enormous amount of amniotic fluid. Turns out Gentry had a swimming pool in there. No wonder I ended up so big. The doctors all commented on how much there was. Then they pulled little Gentry out (at the time he did not have a name) and he cried LOUDLY. The little guy had some lungs on him. He got weighed (8'5) and then they put him on my chest because he was having some trouble getting the fluid out of his lungs. I heard the doctors say things about the fluid, about suction, and then something about a mild hemorrhage. Apparently, I lost a lot of blood - and about 10lbs of fluid. They took G out of the room to clean him up and took me to recovery. 

I was dizzy and had to lie flat. My blood pressure was super low. Like super low. I get the idea I was in recovery for a really long time. I started to get sick and threw up. Just as I began to throw up, the babies nurse came in and said that G needed to be on my chest because he wasn't doing very well. My nurse said I needed time to get better and as the nurse for G was leaving she made a comment about it being very important that the baby come back to be on my chest. I tried so hard to stop throwing up, tried so hard to tell them to just bring him in if it was needed. My nurse made them wait. Then they finally brought him back in to the recovery room - He was placed back on my chest again. It was awkward to hold him with my IV's on my back, with low blood pressure that made me so dizzy. 

Eventually, I think 3 hours after his birth, I was taken back to my room. I was still flat. I had to nurse G for the first time on my side because every time I raised the bed even a little, I got dizzy and my blood pressure went back down. I spent the better part of the day laying down.

It's amazing how fast you forget things. Was it day 1 or day 2 that they took the catheter out, the IV's out, allowed me to eat? It has only been 9 days and I already forgot. 

Barrett was scared of the bed (I think). He didn't really want to get up and cuddle with me. He played and was happy, but really not interested in being near the bed. 

Ali stayed overnight with me while Barrett went home with Nick. During the days, Joni (Grammy) took Barrett and kept him busy (and he had his first overnight with Grammy on the following night!). On the 9th, I was feeling much better. I got some sleep, took a shower, got up and walked around. By mid-day, the nurses were hardly coming in and Ali and I really felt like it was a bit dumb to be in the hospital. I asked my doctor if we could go home. He said if I was feeling up to going home, no reason why not. So just like that, we went home. All together, I was in the hospital for 36 hours. Not too shabby. 

So just like that, there were 2 little boys under 20 months in my care. So far, G is a super easy baby. He sleeps, he is content, he nurses well, he will let anyone hold him. I am easing into life with 2 kids. Life with 2 young (basically babies) deserves a post by itself. 

Updates on Life Spring 2013

I have been a bad blogger. But the weather has been gorgeous which isn't particularly typical of late April / Early May so I feel like I have an excuse. Still. Time passes quickly and without any kind of update, I find it easy to forget little things. Like these:

• Barrett loves spoons right now. He carries several of them around with him almost all the time. He knows which drawer they are kept in and will open it up and reach (because he can't see in) and try to get a few of them to carry around. He then uses them for all kinds of things. Eating, digging outside, just carrying them. 
• Barrett also loves rocks and will pick them up from our gravel area on our driveway or in parks or anywhere else. He will frequently find ones that he deems good enough to hold onto and will hand them over to me for safe-keeping. 
• Barrett loves trucks, tractors, equipment, backhoes, etc. He will play with the toy ones inside and out and spends a lot of time near the mini-excavator in our backyard hoping that someone will run it with him. He knows how to put the key in and turn it to "on" but can't start it yet. He knows that the red lever needs to go down for it to operate. 
• Still not talking. I have a suspicion that he is trying to say "mini" when he points out any equipment he sees in a book or magazine. He says uh-oh, yea and while I am sure he can still say it, he hasn't said hot lately. 
• I am veeeery pregnant and while I am a whole 20lbs lighter this time than I was with Barrett, I am very uncomfortable and at my "38 week" appointment (I think I am mis-dated and was actually at 39 weeks 2 days) I was measuring "generously" as my doctor put it. He wouldn't even tell me. I know that at "37 weeks" I was measuring 42...so perhaps I don't really want to know. 
• C-section date is still May 8 and knowing that in my family, the women hold onto babies for like, ever...I have no hope that this minion will come early. 5 more days of being suuuper pregnant, suuuper huge and suuuuper uncomfortable. Then I will just have to get used to having 2 littles around, which I am sure will be challenging. Have I mentioned how much I dread breastfeeding again? I did it for a year with Barrett and for all intents and purposes, it went well. I just don't enjoy it. But I do it because it's what you do. So, gulp. Here we go again. 
• Barrett is napping 100% of the time in either his stroller (bob) if we are here at home, or in the car seat if we are on the go. He no longer uses the infant car seat...mostly because we need it for little #2. 
• Speaking of sleep. I go to bed with Barrett almost every night at 8:30 (Im pregnant, give me a break) and he generally gets up for the day between 6:30 and 8am. No, he doesn't sleep thru but he wakes 1-4 times to eat and then back to sleep. Maybe someday...
• I worked my very last day yesterday...and I have no idea when the next time I will work is. (other than doing books for Bezates Construction). It's really weird to have an indefinitely last day. I love working for the social aspect and also for the accomplishment of it but I also love spending time at home with my little guy. I hope in the near future to have a similar situation as before, work 2 days and home the rest of the time, but if that doesn't work out, I am super happy just being home with my kiddos. We have bull intentions of spending many days at Stafford Hills club swimming in the pool and generally enjoying the outdoors. I am hopeful they have swim lessons this summer for the little guys. So excited!!
• I am getting better and better at sitting back and just enjoying/cherishing life and enjoying the little things. Our backyard really is becoming a sanctuary as we complete various projects and as the trees and plants we planted begin to mature and grow taller. I am learning that sometimes it is nice to just sit back here and enjoy the quiet, enjoy what we have worked so hard on. I need to do a post on what we have done but it includes concrete, stepping stones, fences, trees, plants, a fire pit table top, etc. We are still working on getting some grass down and a sprinkler system, which will allow us to just sit back and enjoy it. Our to do list is getting shorter and shorter. Also, we are almost ready to submit plans to the county to build a shop back here! Very exciting because Nick really needs one. And so does my garage. I am hopeful that in no time, I will be parking my car in the garage :D
• Anyway, that's kind of us in a nutshell right now. Nothing earth shattering, but life is good - uncomfortable from being so pregnant - but good. 

Boring post. No pictures. Sigh. Maybe next time.