Swaddles and dummies and pumps, oh my!

I feel bad that this blog is getting shamefully neglected. We were both saying today that we’d like to blog more, but between juggling work and study and BB’s needs it’s proving hard to find the time. Add to that the fact that I, for one, am struggling to hit my stride as a “mummy blogger” and what you have is scant posting, my friends. I feel like a bit of an asshole posting about how fabulous it is to have a baby, because I know how many of you are still stuck in the hamster wheel of TTC hell. I also feel like an asshole posting about the hard stuff because somehow actually HAVING a baby feels like it invalidates the right to bitch. I’m sure I’m not alone in finding it difficult to navigate the transition. Guess I’ll just keep trying. Hey ho!

It’s been HOT here in the UK this last couple of weeks. We’re British, we don’t really do hot. We’re not equipped. Just like leaves on the line or the wrong kind of snow, extreme heat can also grind us all to a halt. Given that so much of the world manages to bring up kids in hot places just fine, I’m at somewhat of a loss as to why we struggled so, but a baby in the heat was hard. We couldn’t keep the bedroom at a sensible temperature, even with the fan that jay so valiantly dashed out to buy. BB had to just hang in his crib with only a nappy on. No swaddle. Added to that was the fact that, as his only source of liquid intake, my boobs were in great demand day and night, we all slept for shit and spent the days frazzled and fractious. We are mighty glad that the hot spell has broken and we’re back to sunny spells with passing showers.

In other news, now our boy is nearly 4 months old (what?!) we’re starting to think about weaning him off the dummy (pacifier, soother, dodie). He has it at night and for naps when we swaddle him, and we’ll probably carry on with that whilst he’s wrapped and can’t reach his fingers, but we’re trying to cut down usage where we can, so are trying to put him down without it in the first instance, or shushing him to sleep first. We’re making a concerted effort to try other things before offering it up during waking time too. Any advice on distraction tactics, or on when we should bin the thing for good. It’s been an absolute lifesaver for our sucky baby, but we don’t want him going to school still sucking on the damned thing!

Oh, and I had a present today. A new breast pump. Not that there’s anything wrong with the old one, but at least I’ll only need to sterilise half as often. I was given it by our local SCBU to help me in my new role as milk donor. Jay and I need to get back to trying bottles with BB, to free me up to go out and earn some cash now and again, and I figured if I was going to commit to pumping regularly, I could offer to share what I collect with the milk bank. Our friend just delivered her daughter who weighed in at only 4lbs. She’s stuck in special care and her mum is unable to nurse her. It got me thinking that donated milk could really make a difference to babies like her, so why not spare some. I’ll let you know how it goes.

vee xxx

How did it get to be a year ago?!

Calm yourselves, ladies. We aren’t up the duff for the second time already – BB is modelling one of the 20+ pee sticks that we used and fretted over this time last year.

Yeah, exactly one year ago we were totally in denial that BB had been conceived, and promptly had a huge pee stick fit, accompanied as ever by you lovely IVPers, who were far more able to see the second line than we were, and you told us so.

So how did it get to be a fucking year? I have no idea. This time last year we were freaking out every time vee went to the loo, hissing; “IS THERE BLOOD?” “NO BLOOD!”, and right now we have  a 15 week old baby who alternates between grinning beatifically and wailing pitifully when he remembers that he’s currently under the weather with a cough and cold, bless him.

So yeah, a lot has happened in a year. We couldn’t be more grateful for our son, and still can’t believe that A LINE IS A LINE and he is here. Trust me, we pinch ourselves daily.

So a lot is different now. We have nappies on our washing line and sick on our shirts.  Some things don’t change much though. The pain of trying and trying and trying is still with us, and so is the bitterness. It sounds ungrateful but at least I’m honest. They are fading, but once an IF, always an IF, I guess. It’s true what they say though – it’s totally worth it in the end.

And onwards and upwards. I really can’t tell you how much I’m hoping for second lines for all of you who’re still trying. A line is a line is a line, and there are enough fucking lines to go round us all, darnit.

Thank you for sticking with us through thick and thin.

xxxx jay

Home, sweet home.

Well, we successfully navigated our first long distance road trip, slash “holiday” with a baby. The word “holiday” earns its inverted commas by virtue of the fact that we remain unconvinced that any trip away with a three month old baby could be defined as a holiday in the old, there-just-used-to-be-two-of-us-relaxing kind of way. Really, given that many people never get holidays at all, we shouldn’t moan, but we certainly wouldn’t have chosen to put ourselves or BB through such a long journey for anything less important than his Uncle and Aunty’s wedding.

The wedding was a lovely affair. I managed to get through my reading in church without crying, which was an achievement, believe you me. I love to cry at weddings (a prize for anyone who spots the show tunes reference). BB was the ultimate star all day, snoozing through the service and most of the meal and happily playing family members ping pong for the rest of the day and evening. And now my little bro is a husband! Bless.

We did our best to chill for the rest of the week, enjoying the beautiful sandy beaches. It was all good, save for one trip that ended in a screaming, sobbing BB mess which subsided to catatonic shock, a quick nap, a feed and voila – reset and ready to go.

The journey home, lengthened not inconsiderably by my insistence on visiting a dear friend’s parents who were not nearly as local as I’d imagined, was certainly an adventure. One memorable pitstop involved

• getting my breastfeeding tits perved by a lorry driver who was hoping to use the layby we’d commandeered for his rest break;
• getting shat on by His Lordship – bad combination of a particularly violent expulsion of the lower intestinal tract, a loose nappy and no vest;
• scoring vomit all down the other trouser leg whilst cleaning up the aforementioned poo, then realising, whilst mopping it up, that the rest of it had formed a large puddle at the bottom of the car door tidy thing (jay wants to call it a glove compartment, but you know what she means);
• knocking over an entire can of Diet Coke whilst attempting to clean up all the other mess, all without water because we foolishly hadn’t packed any;
• trying to work out where to put our muddy dog in the meantime.

You have to laugh, right?

Anyhow, more seemly evidence of our adventures away can now be viewed at your leisure over at our lad’s picture blog. It was an adventure, but we’re glad to be home safe.

vee xxx

Three months old.

My darling boy,

You are now three whole calendar months old. Not long on this earth, but you have already learned so much. It seems such a shame that, in all likelihood, you will remember none of these joyous days of discovery and wonder.

I’m writing your monthly update this month because, rather slackly, I’ve yet to write one, and your mother is on my case to do my share. I haven’t even finished writing your birth story yet, but that’s another story. Of course, my share of monthly updating would fall on the evening of a day where our little family have been out walking in the Devon sunshine for four and a half hours. Well, you weren’t walking, of course, but we were. Though you are, of course, a genius, you’re not so advanced as to be walking yet! I’m tired and sunburned and a little tipsy – I’m on my holidays after all and now you are three months old and you go down for 8 or so hours at a stretch every night, so I know you won’t need a feed for hours. Thank you for allowing me the time and space to reacquaint myself with the joys of alcohol in moderation.

This last month has seen you really become much more aware of the world around you. You can’t bear to miss out on anything that might be happening around you. Whilst I am sure this is wonderful for your mental and physical development, it is not so fantastic for my nipples. Child, if you really need to look round at something whilst feeding, I wish you would release your vacuum-hold first, before twisting your little rubber neck!

This month has seen you master the art of holding your head up by yourself. You do this very well, even insisting on straining forward when placed in your car seat, buggy or bouncer, just to prove that you think headrests are for the weak. I must say though, in the middle of the night you are still my sweet floppy-headed baby and I love those nighttime snuggles.

Your smiles and giggles melt both your mummies’ hearts at every turn, especially those you grace us with when you first see our faces upon waking. We’re delighted you’re such a happy, smiling fellow and we’re forever calling each other to come and witness some random cuteness of yours.

We love you son, more than I think we ever thought possible, and we can’t wait to share each day with you. I miss your tiny newborn helplessness and at the same time relish your growing engagement with the world around you. I’m so looking forward to watching and helping you learn more about the world.

Mummy Vee xxx

More screaming.

Once again, our heartfelt thanks go to you IVPers for leaving comment wisdom on our last post. What we’d do without you, I do not know.

So, incorporating bits of advice into one giant (improvised) Hope This Fixes It feed, this morning, I used a faster teat, warmed it up beforehand, got BB laughing happily and then fed him in my office chair, because he has never been fed there before. He managed maybe half an ounce of half-hearted suckage without crying, then started to get cranky so I quit while I was ahead and let vee’s wonder boobs take over the show. We were triumphant and hopeful.

This afternoon? Not so much. Unfortunately that was because he was in a rotten mood, I think, and not even his beloved white noise could calm him down.

Fail.

Sigh.

The fight will resume after our week away, and if it doesn’t work, I am going to have to follow vee to a work gig she has booked for the end of the month, and wait in the car or something. Fun.

Meanwhile; more packing for the trip. Even less fun.

xxxx jay

I hear screaming.

This means we have Fucked Up.

And our solution to put things right did not work.

So now we need your solutions, please.

I have been expressing, on and off, since about 3 weeks in. At around 5 or 6 weeks, Jay gave BB his first bottle of expressed milk. So far, so good. We continued this for a few weeks, just the odd bottle here and there, maybe two or three a week. Then things got a bit sensitive around the feeding issue and for one reason and another we didn’t offer him a bottle again for a few weeks. Can you sense what is coming here?

This week, we have tried and failed to persuade our stubborn boy to take a bottle no less than three times. And it’s only Wednesday. All we’ve so far managed to achieve is to cause the poor wee mite to go purple and scream bloody murder, to the point where he’s too hysterical to even take the breast. Real tears and everything. His and ours.

Perhaps it’s the teat shape, we thought, so today Jay went out and bought some “natural shaped” teats and new bottles to go with them. Not that they look anything like my breasts at all, but hey. Same result. Perhaps even a slightly deeper shade of purple outrage.

I have generally tried to stay out of sight when Jay has offered a bottle, we’ve tried to pick times when he’s not too hungry and he seems to be in good spirits, we’ve cut down any distractions in the room, the milk is fresh and warmed. What else can we do?

Jay says she’s quite nervous of using the bottle, unsure of how far or not to push the teat in, for fear of choking him. Neither of us have much experience bottlefeeding babies, at least not in recent years. She has also been sitting in the “breastfeeding chair”, which maybe leads him to expect a BREASTfeed?

I’m always devastated to waste the milk – having warmed it, I’m assuming it’s not safe to keep and re-use. Really, the only winner in this is the dog, who keeps getting what’s been rejected on his dog biscuits. It it truly weird to give your dog breastmilk? I just can’t bear to chug it down the plughole.

Help!

vee xxx

Spinning

Firstly, many thanks to those of you who emailed and commented on my last post.  You were really helpful, thank you.  We did wonder if I had PPD, but I have kind of decided I haven’t because how I’ve been feeling is a little bit like how I felt when we were TTC… so perhaps it’s leftover spillage or something like that.

Whatever. I’d rather just do something about it than analyse it too much, so I went to my lovely local herbalist and she gave me some Rhodiola Rosea as a kind of upgrade from my St John’s Wort (which I’ve been taking for, oh, about a year, but doesn’t seem to be working any more).  Anyway, this RR stuff works a treat and I’m feeling a lot better.  I’ve also given in to another addiction of mine and booked an aromatherapy massage, using up the second of the two vouchers that my dear son gave me for my birthday.

So, all is good. Well, it should be anyway.

Because this week we are meant to be packing for our trip down south (which Google estimates will take 5 and a half hours, but we all know that travelling with a baby, a dog and a virtual office do not make for reliable arrival times, even if you’re planning on leaving in the middle of the night, as we are) and getting the house ready for the cat sitter and sorting things out for the wedding that we’re going to, AND we have accepted extra work to do BEFORE WE LEAVE.

I don’t think we ever blogged about our (lack of) maternity leave, which has it’s pros and cons – perhaps mostly pros, but not this week – in a nutshell, we both work from home, and sometimes we have very little to do, which means we get to coo and grin a lot, but we don’t get paid for it, except for a bit of state benefit and vee’s maternity allowance from another part time job.  Not too bad, except we’re both kind of on call all day every day, which is why we have to carry on working while we’re on “holiday” next week.

I digress. The point of this waffle is that our trip down south to watch vee’s brother and his gf get married (somewhere miles away from where they, or any of their friends/families, live) is sandwiched between two different, demanding clients, with a three month old baby and several other clients to think about too.  Today was … interesting; kind of like baby ping-pong, as we both scrambled to do whatever we could do with our computers, in between reminding BB that he has two SAHMs even though they spend a good amount of time in their office, and trying to explain that his screaming all afternoon wasn’t really fun.

Tomorrow is a new day. Tomorrow, we have a plan. Ha!

Stupid? Possibly. I am just very glad that the RR works.

xx jay

PS: Olive is a genius!

Quick question…

… please don’t read too much into this, but does anyone know anything about postnatal depression in relation to non bio mothers?

Any references/info would be gratefully received.

Ta!

jay xx

Chronicling Pride

As I said to vee on Saturday, I never imagined myself to be pushing a pram around a LGBT Pride festival, but there I was, and having a great time at it.  You can kind of chronicle my life by my Pride attendance, actually, from the PVC and tight t-shirts I excitedly donned as a giddy teenager, to the cynical gaze I employed later on as Pride became Mardi Gras and the politics faded away like a strangely distant memory that begged to return.

I digress. Today is Blogging for LGBT Families Day and here’s our contribution:

[Happy family photo sadly now removed for privacy reasons.]

So there we were, with BB who slept blissfully through a lot of it; when he was awake he just drooled and giggled as he usually does, unaware of where he was and why he was there. In fact, we need not have been there at all, as we spent a lot of time sitting on a small patch of grass talking with our new-found mummy friends who have a baby just a month older than BB, and we could have been anywhere in the world, really. But we made up the masses, sitting right next to a banner that screamed “GAY“. And we were proud.

And here endeth my waffling Pride chronicle.

xx jay and LGBT Family xx

Still alive. Again.

Yes, we are the world’s worst bloggers, and for that we apologise. We so didn’t want to be the TTCers who had a baby and then disappeared down a hole, but somehow we managed to fall into at least a small ditch-sized dent of earth. All is not lost, though, because I have taken daily photos of BB, well, every day, and have just posted a few up here. So, if you’re ever wondering if we’re alive, you can usually tell from BB’s blog.

If you weren’t wondering, and if you’d just like the lowdown, here are a few SHG-stylee bullet points (because we love SHG, and bullet points):

• I don’t know about vee, but I am ridiculously behind in my blog-reading and my email-replying-to.  It feels weird and kind of disconnected, somehow, so I am planning to do a bit of a binge later if we can con BB into lying peacefully for about an hour.
• This is largely because the weather here has been brilliant recently, and here in the UK, that means you Must Go Outside as much as possible. Well, it does for us, anyway. We go on an hour-long ‘family walk’ almost every day, along with the dog, who thinks BB is the bee’s knees. He isn’t wrong.
• BB finally met the rest of my side of the family (except for my sister who’s abroad at the moment, sadly), who were all very impressed by his “sturdiness” – my family like sturdy – and it felt less weird than anticipated to meet my brother’s second baby who is younger than BB… you know, the one who was conceived when their first was only about 4 months old, the fertiles. Strangely, no weirdness. Instead, we marvelled at her spindly little legs, admired her wise face, and freaked out at how bizarre it was to hold a baby who was WEARING A DRESS.
• In similar Normality Rocks fashion, we actually craved pineapple the other day, and have voluntarily eaten two pineapples since BB was born. There is hope, people. Take it from us.
• Daily, we thank our lucky stars that BB is largely an easy baby who doesn’t cry very often. He’s doing good, and can hold his head up well by himself already at 10 weeks old. People keep asking us, “have you got him into a routine yet?” which drove me mad until I realised they didn’t mean “have you made him follow a timetable yet?”, but more kind of, “is life at all manageable?” – to which the answer is yes. We kind of mix and match and make it up along the way, but are fans of slings, swaddling, SSHHing (thank you, thank you, Michelle and Jen), at the same time as embracing prams, baby gyms and well, whatever works.
• BB’s favourite things at the moment are fresh air, his feet (which he is forever looking for), baths and breast milk.
• Speaking of which, I’ve done a bit of bottle feeding of expressed milk, which was not my favourite thing, but hey, whatever. I’ve only had one breastfeeding-themed meltdown since I last posted about that, which is something of an achievement (the fact that it was at 5am is irrelevant) and I’m feeling a bit more at peace, generally.
• We have a love-hate relationship with cloth nappies… kind of a long story, but after being convinced that we were doing it wrong, we alternated between cloth and disposables, then went to see a local cloth nappy expert who told us we were doing it right, and that BB’s nappy rash won’t be too bad as he gets older. Whew. Now, we’re using a mixture of fleece liners and disposables and a variety of cloth nappies, to see what works.
• As I said, we like to mix and match.
• I think that’s all I can squeeze out for now.
• Oh, and strangely, I feel as if I’ve known BB for years. How is that possible?!

Finally, we note that Bri and oneofhismoms have both cleverly asked their readers to tell them what they wanted to read about… if it’s good enough for them, it’s good enough for us.

So: what the hell do you want us to blog about?  We’ll try to oblige.

xxxx jay

Two months old.

Dear Bonus Ball

You are two months old today, although yesterday I trawled through your many outfits and picked out some 3-6 month clothes that fit you already. Soon, you will be towering over me, demanding money for DVDs and iTunes vouchers. That is a very scary thought, although we are very proud that your Mummy Vee’s boobs are doing their job and your waistline is expanding nicely (as evidenced in today’s photo).

In fact, somehow you have managed to grow just as big as your cousin R, who is over a month older than you. All the ladies on your Mummy Vee’s side of the family had a long conversation about that last weekend… I’m just glad you were too young to understand it because you might have been a bit embarrassed. Instead, you and R had a kickfest on your favourite new gym… maybe next time, you will win.

I digress.

We’ve been busy in the past month; you’ve been to the local Lesbian Parents Group, although you slept the whole time, and to our NCT class reunion which your mummies were brave enough to host.  You slept most of the  time then, too. That is fine, but I do hope that in future, you’ll open your eyes a bit more, just to show everyone how amazingly beautiful they are.

Oh, and you’re a total rock star at night time, and usually sleep for 6 hours at a time. I shouldn’t have said that though because every time we tell people that, the following night is chaotic, with flying vomit and stuff. Oops.

You also love laughing a LOT, which is one of the most amazing, cutest things I have ever seen, so I’m kind of addicted to making you laugh as much as I can. Luckily, you don’t seem to mind.

Every day I love you more and more than I ever thought possible. Also every day, I take a photo of you for your daily photo blog – just to embarrass you further, I’ve made a little button for our blog, so that the IVP ladies can click on it and see what you’ve been doing if they want to.

I’m off now to squish you…

xxxx Mummy Jay

PS: Mummy Vee is working on Part 2 of your birth story, which she promises to finish before you’re in school.

Bonus Ball blogs…

Ooh, I know. I’m a little bit young to be blogging. But my mummies said I had to, and a boy has to do what his mummies tell him, so here I am.  Because I’m a bit young for long words and stuff, this is going to be a photo-heavy post of photos of ME.

So I wanted to say a big THANK YOU to you lovely IVP ladies for being so nice to my mums over the years. When I’m a bit more grown up, I want to meet all of your babies and wreck havoc with them. I also wanted to say thank you to some of you for the very cool stuff you sent me…

Here I am wrapped up expertly in one of the swaddles from Michelle and Jen (I’m not trying to work out how to escape because I HEART swaddles):

And here’s my bottom in a fetching purple nappy from K77:

In this one, I’m modelling a seriously cool Morrissey vest from oneofhismoms (probably smiling a bit too much for Mr M’s liking, but hey, I’m a baby), while reclining on the snuggly blanket that Lizzie made me. Hooray!

And finally, here I am waiting to grow into this excellent babygro from Shrike and Whozat – shouldn’t be long now:

Aren’t they kind? And aren’t I HANDSOME?! If you’d like to monitor my handsomeness, you can see my daily photo blog here. I’ll get my revenge on my mums one day, trust me.

Time for bed!

Bonus Ball xxxx

That old, familiar feeling.

The bitch is back.

Yes, I’ve just got my period. How the fuck is that fair? I bled for nigh on 4 weeks after BB was born. He’s not yet 8 weeks old and I have my period!? I make that a period break of approximatly zero, not counting the pregnancy. Boo, hiss.

I knew it was coming. I was pretty sure I was ovulating ten days or so ago.  When I wiped I came away with what certainly looked to me like FM, and I’ve spent long enough looking for that stuff to know what I’m talking about. (See, it didn’t take long before I started talking vaginal discharge again).

I was hoping, given that I’m breastfeeding, that it would hold off for a while yet. I guess not. Is menstruating again likely to affect my milk supply?

Worst of all, seeing that sparkly, sperm-friendly fluid and that red, red blood has made me feel infertile all over again. I feel a little sad.

vee xxx

And this is why breasfeeding is dangerous.

Vee: I just almost smothered our child just now.

Jay: What?!

Vee: Yeah. My boob’s in his mouth, see, and then I leant over to bite his nails and realised that the rest of my boob was blocking his nose. Oops.

Jay: Oh, my god. [Typing]… I just blogged that.

Vee: Oh. [Stares thoughtfully] Well, can you add that I can’t help it? They’re G-cups now. They’re a bit out of control.

Jay: OK. And would you like to share anything else with the IVP?

Vee: I’d like to thank them for their thoughtful comments on my last post.

Jay: And mine, too. They’re nice aren’t they, the IVP?

Vee: [Nodding solemnly] Yeah. Proper nice. It’s so good to have people that we can tell stuff to when we can’t tell anyone else.

Jay: Yeah. Like when you have non-bio / other mother / CO-MUM (! I like that!) rage. Or when you nearly suffocate your baby with your G-cup.

And now for some rambling non bio crazy…

OK, so vee just shared and I (jay, obviously) have stuff to share too (and I will share with you, too, OOHM, if you email, because it has taken me all day today to just write this).  Maybe this is all a bit much sharing of the sad kind, but sometimes you just have to purge.  So here goes.

“Non-bio” makes me think of washing powder, but if pressed, I will use it to refer to myself as the non-birth mother because technically, it is what I am. Maybe I haven’t blogged this before [?] but I was actually brought up by my non-bio mother, because my birth mother died when I was very young.  This in itself is bringing up some weird issues now that I am a mother too, even though I have dealt with her death… vee and I knew this would happen, and it’s sort of manageable but stings sometimes, like a cut does when you put antiseptic on it.  In the same way, it’ll fade.

Trust me.  I am a therapy veteran. I know my mental health better than I should, perhaps.

But that isn’t what I wanted to blog about.  I would use the term “other mother” but it makes me feel kind of secondary, and technically, we are both Bonus Ball’s other mother anyway.  As I said to him the other day, “Hey little lad, I’m your mum. And your other mum.  And she’s your mum too.  And your other mum.”  The poor kid is going to be giddy by the time he can talk, albeit grammatically correct.

Whatever you call it, being the non-bio mum kind of sucks sometimes.

Don’t get me wrong.  I love my boy more than I can ever explain, and the same goes for my wife. I do everything I can do for BB.  I change most of his nappies. I dress him.  I SHH him to sleep.  I make him laugh.  I make it better when he cries. I take zillions of photographs of him. I absolutely love being a mother.

But I cannot feed my child and sometimes that kills me.

Vee has been pumping and freezing milk for a while, mainly because she wants me to have the opportunity to feed him too – at the moment, we’re both SAHMs who work from home; another post for another day – but also because it will allow her to actually leave the house for X amount of time if and when she needs to.  However, I’ve given him two bottles so far and didn’t really like it.  It definitely wasnt that “special time” that breastfeeding is meant to be.  I didn’t really like it because vee felt weird and looked upset, and because BB much prefers the boob – and fuck yeah, I would too.  A boob is way nicer than some specially moulded plastic and rubber-type shit any day.

And yes, I have tried comfort nursing, but I am talking nutrition, people.  I could breastfeed, but only started to entertain the idea when it was too late, and now, I’m too busy with nappies and SHHing and whatever else to induce lactation. So, I’ll just have to live with that.  Mostly, it’s OK but sometimes it’s not.

That’s life, I guess?

While I’m on the rant, I might as well add that I am sick to death of people commenting to me that BB looks like vee, when he looks nothing like her (OK maybe they have the same colour eyes, and similar lips, but that’s where it ends).  She agrees with me on that point, and if they DID look more alike, I wouldn’t be jealous or anything; that’s not what this is about at all; besides, vee is very gorgeous indeed, so that’d be great.  It’s just that – like vee said – if they were the spitting image of each other, would be understandable if people uttered stuff without thinking, but they really aren’t.

Somehow, it feels kind of rude, a bit like unneccessarily reinforcing the fact that we aren’t genetically related.  And, like many other weird parenting issues, it does make me wonder if I’ve ever offended someone similarly, because I’m one of those people who loves staring at kids and working out which bits of their faces came from which parent.  But if both of their parents are women, maybe you shouldn’t say anything? Especially not if one of those women is prone to extreme grumpiness?

So, like my Dad often used to say to me as a kid, if you’ve got nothing to say, don’t say it.

This has turned out way longer than it was meant to.  I do apologise. Please ignore me and go back to whatever you were doing before.  For the most part, life is good, and for that, I cannot be more thankful.

Beer. I need beer.

xx jay

Bereft

This feels like a bit of a weird and insensitive confession to make, given how many IVPers are still trying and hoping for a baby,  but once Bonus Ball was born and my hard baby bump was gone, I felt devastated. Don’t get me wrong, I was beyond delighted that my little baby boy had made it safely out of my body and into my arms, but I missed that bump something savage. I couldn’t bear to look at pregnant women, not even in magazines and I cried myself to sleep hugging my empty, flaccid belly more than once. I suppose I could rationalise by wondering whether it was a reaction to losing the one part of this whole process that I HAD been successful at, or that I was mourning the fact that I’ll likely never experience another pregnancy, but honestly, this feeling didn’t feel rational in any way whatsoever. It was raw and animalistic. It passed in a week or so, but while it lasted it was intense and deeply unsettling.

Has anyone else felt similarly after the birth of their child, or am I just odd?

vee xxx

Birth Story, Part 1. Late.

I (vee) am so annoyed with myself for not putting down in words the story of BB’s birth sooner than this. I had great intentions of capturing the raw emotion of it all, hot from the hospital, but having a new baby to look after kind of distracted me there for a while and now… well I can still *remember* what happened, but I can’t really *feel* it any more. Not as powerfully. But we’re here now and I don’t get a redo, so here goes.

I don’t remember much talk about pre-labour from our NCT classes, and certainly nothing prepared me for the run-up to labour that I experienced (endured?) but the first indication we had that something might be underway was on March 10th when I saw a little bloody show and experienced some minor contractions through the night – strong enough to wake me on occasion . Those contractions continued on and off during the 11th, 12th and 13th March, initially feeling like bad period pains and eventually hurting enough to scare me to hospital, despite their irregularity. I tried to persuade jay to sleep as much as she could during those nights, as I knew she’d need her strength to get us through what was to come. The pain was far worse when I was lying down, making sleep nigh on impossible, so by the time we rocked up at the Midwife Led Unit at around 1am on 14th March, I was already pretty tired. I vaguely recall us sitting in bed for hours beforehand, dozing between contractions, me squeezing jay’s hand each time to prompt her to write down the time. We were finding those pieces of paper with contraction timings on all over the house for weeks afterwards! Finally, enough was enough and we headed in. Jay carefully negotiated the late night drunkards, staggering home with their chips, finally on the journey she’d learned to drive for.

On arrival, the midwives on duty were unimpressed with my lack of regular contractions and tried to persuade us to go home and wait it out a little longer, but I quietly dug my heels in and we were grudgingly hustled into room and left to our own devices. As we’d walked up to the entrance, a car had pulled up outside in a most dramatic fashion and some poor bloke leapt out to assist his heavily huffing missus into the building pronto. Following them was someone else in a similarly advanced stage of labour, so all hands were busy elsewhere. At some point, someone found the time to come and examine me, declaring me to be a disappointing 1cm dialated. She then did a stretch and sweep (surprisingly bearable, despite the name), proudly announced that she’d stretched me to 4cm and left. We paced and danced and huffed and moaned and talked and watched the clock. We heard babies being born on either side of our room.

Eventually, things in the unit calmed down and I was allocated someone to check on my progress. Donna was young, but reassuringly calm and knowledgeable. The contractions were still not regular so we got down to a bit of nipple stimulation (jay and I that is) and accupressure that jay had picked up from my acupuncturist especially for the occasion. This certainly made the contractions more intense, but did nothing for establishing any rhythm. It also made me swear at my wife. I think this was the only time though. Donna suggested another examination mid morning, with the accompanying suggestion that if things had not progressed there was nothing they could do for me at this stage so it might be better if I went home. Seriously sleep deprived and in considerable pain, this reduced me to tears, as did the news following the internal that I was still only at 4cm. They relented and let us stay.

Soon after this, I decided to stop being brave and rip into the gas and air. Much though the massage and accupressure that jay had been administering had helped (when I wasn’t barking at her to back off, which she took very well, I must say) they just weren’t cutting it for me any more.  I’d also declined it thus far, and tried to last out as I was worried that, given that established labour was yet to start, I’d be peaking to soon to tuck into it just yet, but the contractions were now so intense that I needed some help to get through them. My mum and dad showed up at some point, but it clearly upset my mum to see me hurting, and neither of us were really comfortable with them being there while I laboured – I needed the quiet. There was obviously not going to be baby-news any time soon, so they went off again.

Both baby and I were being intermittently monitored the whole way through and at this point, Donna picked up that my heart rate was climbing worryingly. Initially, she wanted to bring down one of the consultants from the Labour and Delivery Unit upstairs in the hospital, but an older midwife suggested a warm bath might bring it down, which it did, though annoyingly the warm water seemed also to slow the contractions. I was ordered out of the water and jay laid into me with the evil acupressure points again to try and rev things up.

And on it went. My abiding memory of this period is of a long, rambling conversation going on around me that I was only intermittently involved in. I also recall being rather demanding and contrary, ordering jay to fetch this, do that, stop the other. She was certainly long-suffering, my jay, and fulfilled my every whim with no flicker of irritation.

During Saturday afternoon, Donna suggested I try the birthing pool. I had wanted to used the pool to labour and deliver in, but thus far had not been allowed into it as I had not progressed far enough. They usually like women to be at least 5cm dialated before getting into it, but because of my high heart rate, I got the go ahead anyway and ohhhh, it was bliss. The contractions (yes, still irregular) were so much more manageable and the time between contractions was much more comfortable and relaxed. My heartrate went back to normal. Only problem was that the warm water again caused the contractions to become even more irregular. Ordered out of the water once more, they picked up, as did my heartrate.Back in and they tapered off. Rinse and repeat.  In retrospect, this heartrate thing should have been scary, but I felt like I was in very safe hands so it didn’t worry me. If it scared jay, she did a good job of hiding it. Finally, around 5pm, I was given another internal by Donna who broke my heart a little, having to tell me gently that I was still at 4cm, but she could now feel hair – Bonus Ball’s hair! OMG! – indicating that my waters had broken at some point. The contractions were still irregular and, out of the pool, my heart rate was still abnormally fast during them – around 140. Sadly, she felt there was nothing more she could do for me on the Unit and strongly recommended that I transfer to L&D where my heart could be monitored more closely and where they could help get labour properly started.

Typing that has upset me, but I recall at the time feeling quite matter of fact about the whole thing. I had spent what I felt was an eternity trying to get things going, I was exhausted, we both were and we were no further forward; the decision was easy for us – it was time to let go of the idea that this would happen without intervention. Thus it came to pass that me and my portable Entonox canister were wheeled upstairs to The Land of Big Interventions……

(Part 2 to follow. Hopefully before Christmas!)

vee xxx

Party, my crib, 4am!

He’s a bit of a raver, our boy. Last night, after his 3:30am feed, he discovered, upon being put back down in his crib, that if he kicked his legs and waved his arms really vigourously, all at the same time, he could make his mobile move ALL BY HIMSELF! How exciting this revalation was to him, I cannot tell you. Much smiling and even more thrashing ensued. Until 6am, when one very sleepy mummy finally figured out that a swaddle might be a good idea. He was asleep before his second arm was wrapped!

Tonight, our plan is in place.

vee xxx

One month old.

Dear Bonus Ball

You are one month old today – something that both pleases and saddens me and your Mummy Vee, because it means you aren’t really a newborn any more – so I have decided to jump on the internet bandwagon and write you a letter.  I will explain what a bandwagon is when you are older, but don’t think I’ll ever need to explain what the internet is, because we are going to bring you up to be a total geek, with the IVP and G00gle as kindly old auntie-types who know everything.  That should be fine, as we are also going to make sure you get lots of fresh air.

I digress. I am sleep deprived. In short, life has not been the same since you arrived… that’s putting it mildly, actually. You have made our lives complete in ways that we never expected. You’re the baby we always wanted and sometimes feared we’d never have. You fill our hearts with joy and love; you make me smile even when I’m in the worst mood ever. Always.

We’ve learned so much from you too. Thanks to you, we now know how far poo can travel before it lands, and we know that we can spend an entire day with your sick all over our t-shirts before we even notice. We also know that when you’re angry and don’t want your nappy changed, you’ll stiffen your long legs and scream so that it’s impossible to remove or add any items of clothing. You seem rather advanced for your young age. You are brilliant.

I’m really glad that we’ve been documenting your life with daily photos, but don’t think you wil be so glad when you’re a teenager, especially not because today we dressed you in pink. Just be grateful that I couldn’t find a bunny suit for you to wear at Easter.

Every day we look at you in wonder and think you can’t possibly be ours and we have to give you back to some very lucky people at the end of the day, and then we remember that you ARE ours and WE are the very lucky people, and we can’t believe it.  It’s true.

I love you with a force that is strong and deep and neverending. It is fiercely protective, and if anyone ever challenges that, I will rip their heads off (it’s probably not a good idea for you to do anything like that, though, because you might get into trouble).

I’ll explain trouble another time, because I need a nap now.

xxxx Mummy Jay

P.S. Mummy Vee is working on your birth story, but it’s taking a long time because you’re always eating. That’s great.

Full circle.

Remember this post?

Today’s version:

Um yeah. WOW.

xx jay

PS: Many thanks for the BB IRL name reassurance! I feel less crazy now.