Snacking, Stacking, and...Sleeping?

Sleep, I think....


I just don't understand. Why do pregnant women have to have insomnia? It completely goes against what we are supposed to be doing, which is resting, apparently. Here I am, at 1:30 AM, up and at 'em. Doing what? Organizing DVDs. Who does that?? A person with a bad case of nesting.

And it's hilarious, because OF COURSE my toddler did not nap today and OF COURSE I woke up at seven in the morning and OF COURSE I just happen to be eating the entire tube of Pringles at this same moment as well. I go through spurts of wanting to snack for hours. I will literally stand in my kitchen, stare at the food, pick something out, stand there and eat it, then repeat. And when I'm all done, I feel guilty. Just kidding, I feel no guilt. Just indigestion. Which, in my opinion, is worse.

Now, I need to vacuum the couch. But that will wake up the finally snoozing toddler. So, that will have to wait until the sun comes up and the hubs goes to work. Which, I also have to do tomorrow afternoon. So I probably should get some sleep. After I finish stacking these DVDs in ABC order...

What is it about pregnancy which makes us nest? I don't recall nesting when I was pregnant the first time. But I also was on bed rest, so maybe that makes a difference. It takes a lot to get myself to fall asleep without making some sort of list, mental or physical, for the next day. Or adding something to the whiteboard, or just simply pushing a chair back into place before I can breath a sigh of relief and resign myself to bed. It's like someone took my OCD and put it on absolute overdrive.

The hubs can't complain, why should he? I literally do everything. And not because I want to. I HAVE to. He can't fold laundry, he might do it wrong. He can't wash the dishes, he might do it wrong. He can't even clean up the living room without me rearranging something afterwards. So, I've told him to hold off while I am still up and running, and not bed ridden from either a C-section scar or a 4th degree episiotomy, and playing mommy the milk cow for another year.

For those of you who saw my adorable toddler in his apple costume, that did not come without a price. Yes, it was homemade BUT the stuffing from it is literally all over the apartment. I vacuumed up a ton this afternoon, and now it's once again found its way back to the carpet somehow.

 

 

Yes, he is so sweet, kissing that more than likely covered in pesticides pumpkin. Or, as he calls it, "mumkin". Seriously, where do these kids get this stuff? What is a mumkin? He probably thinks I look like a pumpkin, so he blended the words "mom" and "pumpkin" and is passive aggressively insulting me because he didn't get his tenth cookie after lunch that one day.

 

 

So, I am due in exactly one week and three days and have not much to show for it other than my extreme size increase in the waist and abdominal area. I still have to do a lot. A LOT! Like, my hospital bag is packed. I know women who have had their hospital bags packed since they got their BFP.

 

 

I guess I should go to sleep now, I mean, it is 1:46 now...

 

Maybe one more level of Candy Crush. 

Raising a Healthy Toddler

Toaster Strudels, it's what's for dinner!

So, my almost 20 month old has learned several new words in the last few weeks, including "cookie", "apple", "banana", "doggy", "tree" and "meow". "Apple" is the favorite, he literally says it one million times a day. His favorite song in the world is "I Love Apples." Youtube it, it's a one hit wonder.

It has literally become an obsession. He calls anything that is round, red, and shiny an apple. Pumpkins are apples, peaches are apples, strawberries are apples. I'm almost afraid to take him to Skytop Orchard for fear of him spontaneously combusting at the sight of all those apples.

But, I am taking it into account that Isaac says "apple" so often. I think that it shows he has a somewhat healthy diet still. Sure, we all have that golden 12 months where they will eat anything you shove in their mouths just because it's different than formula or breast milk they've been having every single day for months. But, eventually, that ends. Yes people. It ends. Go ahead and tell me all day long that your 11 month old eats pears, sweet potatoes, and peas all day long with a smile on his face. I'll say right back that my almost two year old had Cheetos and pink lemonade for lunch, and that your time is going to come, too.  Oh, and that he watches two hours of Modern Family a day because I am going to throw myself off my balcony if we have to watch Backyardigans one more time.

But really, he does eat pretty well. He drinks his milk, he likes water. Juice doesn't really happen often. He loves fruits and pasta, and doesn't get too many sweets or salty things. But forget veggies. We can worry about those in about fifteen years. We don't watch that much TV. But your options are limited when your home is under 1000 square feet and your yard is a parking lot filled with energy drink and alcohol fueled people driving to work at all hours of the day, and you share a car with your husband and he's gone to work five days a week. And it all starts over once he gets home, and I have to head to work. It's a pretty unfortunate cycle at the moment.

But Isaac loves to run and kick a ball when we do get the chance to go to the park or go on walks at the track. He's actually pretty good at dribbling with his feet, I think he might be a soccer star at some point. Or the first male Rockette. He loves being outside, loves animals, and can identify trees and the moon. So that tells me he gets enough time outside to be a normal, happy toddler.

I just wonder what is going to happen when this new baby comes (less than four weeks, people) and we have a long, dark winter of being locked inside 24/7 because I refuse to get intermixed with germ filled people with a newborn baby with me. Isaac was lucky, he was born in the late winter and at the end of flu season. His daddy is going to have to kick in a take him to the park while me and newbie stay tucked inside safe and sound until March.

So, I guess what I am saying, is relax. All moms know this. Sometimes, your child is going to refuse the fois gras you spent ten hours making for dinner, and ask for a toaster strudel instead, and be honest....you will end up giving it to them.

This is going to be a long one...VBACS and C-sections, my story.

Hum-dee-dum, being pregnant and all that...

So, 32 weeks pregnant as of tomorrow. I haven't looked at, or thought about, this blog since I was 13 weeks pregnant. I deserve an award for being noncommittal, I swear.

BUT, I did manage to do three loads of laundry this week, scrub both of my bathrooms clean and somehow keep my kitchen looking acceptable.

And now is the part where I don't know what to say.

What I have learned so far during this pregnancy, is that the smell of Styrofoam can make me hungry, that VBAC is a scary term, and that c section scars can stretch and itch worse than when you purposefully roll in a bush of poison oak. My iron level is at a not so great 11.4, and dropping. And keep that red meat away from me, I'll just take some spinach drenched in olive oil. And a chocolate milkshake. I haven't gained a pound in about two months, and that I don't mind so much. I also have a new stretch mark, beautiful. I was wondering when you would show up. Baby boy is already head down, and I get Braxton Hicks from simply breathing in too fast, so hopefully that is a good sign that labor will progress on it's own this time.

More on VBACs...

I had a C-section with Isaac. I was 40 weeks and 1 day pregnant when they started my induction. I had to be induced because of pre-eclampsia. My blood pressure was dangerously high, and the baby had to come. I was given Cervadil at 6:00 pm. The nurses asked me if I had eaten anything, and I told them I had cereal for lunch. Well, that sent them into a frenzy of getting my Chick fil a and thirty minutes later I was extremely full of greasy food and getting nervous. Why did I need to eat? Puh-lease. This labor will be 8, maybe 10 hours long. I'll be laughing it up, slapping down some good ol' hospital food here in about half a day, with a newborn baby boy snoozing away in his plastic cage next to my bed.

Contractions started intensifying around 8:30 pm. What did NOT help, of course, was the constant chart reading done by my father and now husband. "Oh, oh! Here comes a big one! Oh wow, that was a huge one, it said 10! 10 must be the highest, right? I mean, come on. Did that hurt? Oh. Now it's over. Oh, another one! Only a 6, you probably didn't even feel that one. You're doing so good. I bet you're already six inches dilated."

Try centimeters, and no. I wasn't even at 1/2 cm yet. Let's just say they both got a stern talk from my mother that encouragement is encouraged, spectating is not. Enough with the commentary.

Fast forward to 1:30 am, when a giant flood decided to wake me up. I had been sleeping for about an hour when gallons of liquid started coming out. I called my mom from the waiting room, I paged the nurse, and we were whisked off to Labor and Delivery from triage. Everyone was getting so excited. I remember the nurse's exact words were, "things are going to start moving so fast now!"

Yeah, okay.

My contractions were getting pretty painful, and I was at about 3 cm at this point. 8:30 am they started giving me Pitocin, and gave me an epidural as well.

10:00 am, no change.

12:30 pm, no change.

2:00 pm, no change, but lots and lots of vomiting. How great.

5:00 pm, no change.

Very discouraging, I must say. And I was getting irritable, exhausted, puffy, and frustrated. The OB came in, and announced that I had three hours to get going, or they would be forced to do a C-section. I was horrified. Was I seriously not progressing? What was taking so long?

8:00 pm marked a turning point. I was at 5 1/2 cm. But time was still running out. My epidural was failing, and I was in lots of pain, not mention exhausted beyond belief. It had now been over 24 hours. My water had broken, and infection was imminent. The OB was generous and gave me another two hours.

At 10:30, everyone was in the room. My mom, Nathan, my sister, my grandma, aunts, doctors, nurses. My dad had run out to get my step mom and I needed him there before they took me to the OR. I had 15 minutes. I was weeping at this point, broken by the fact that my body had completely failed me. What woman takes 27 hours to labor, and not even get to transition? Nathan was paled and exhausted too. He had to leave the room for a moment when they made the final decision to open me up. He didn't imagine this outcome, either.

Nathan scrubbed up, and I had to leave my family behind. I remember the white ceiling above me as they rolled my partially numb, swollen body into the OR. A team shifted me onto the operating table. I didn't move, I stared at the ceiling, a panic attack coming at any second. My heart rate was being played somewhere in the room, and the doctor had to tell me to breathe and calm down several times. I just told myself over and over to breathe in and out. I felt a strong tugging as they began. It is a violent surgery if you can feel that through all the morphine and who even knows what else they give you. I had no drugs to cloud my brain, so I remember everything perfectly. Nathan sat at my head, and whispered words of encouragement, but he was just as scared as I was. It took what seemed like hours, but at 11:09 pm, on February 28th, 2012, Isaac came into the world. I heard a squealing and what sounded like a little baby pig on the other side of the room, and there he was! They brought him around for me to see. He was perfect. His color was beautiful, and he had no bruising and a perfectly shaped head. The first thing the nurse said was "he's got mommy's nose!"

Nathan left to go to Isaac's side at that point, and they still had to sew me up. I asked about ten times if it was over yet, could I hold my baby. I didn't get to hold him until about an hour later. I wasn't the first person to touch him, talk to him, or anything. I didn't get to nurse him, no skin to skin. I had to wait until we were in the recovery room to get my moment with him.

The recovery was awful, and I refused drugs. I only took Motrin as a pain reliever. I was going to tough it out. I felt like I had to. Which was stupid mommy martyrdom at it's best, I now realize. No driving for two weeks, walking more than ten feet was grueling, and I had to put Isaac down after holding him ten minutes because it was just too much weight to have my back support.

So here I am, almost 19 months later, and I am doing it all again. But I am hoping for a healing experience. I want to try to have a VBAC. And I realize it is risky, yes. But I need a positive labor and delivery to erase the traumatic and literally scarring labor and delivery I had with Isaac. And yes, I know, all that matters is that the baby came out healthy. No. Don't tell me that. It's easy for people to say that, but they just don't know the emotional and physical repercussions a traumatic C-section can give someone. It is something you literally have to experience for yourself. Which, I would not wish on anyone.

If this VBAC fails, I will not beat myself up, I will not be down on myself, I will know I tried. I already have accepted the possible repeat C-section, and if it happens, it happens. God ultimately knows what He wants for me in the end. He has given me a healthy pregnancy so far, with way less stress and sickness and so on. I can't ask for more than that at this point.

Sorry for the somber tone of this post. I only had a limited amount of time to type it. And now I have to end it, because I just heard a giant diaper explosion occur over the baby monitor, and I have to go clean up what MIGHT be a catastrophic mess.

l8rz, cheese gr8rz!

Oh, another one?!

Oh, I see....those two lines on there O.o

So, I know I have not blogged in about a month maybe. Could be longer. I have no idea. Half my brain has gone out of the window and so has my postpartum body. But hey, that's cool when you are a day away from 13 weeks pregnant, the second time in under two years.

So, I finally announced on Facebook about my second (albeit, surprising) pregnancy. So, I guess that cat is out of the bag. Birth control is NOT 100% everyone. It just isn't. So there.

So I guess you might want to know how I found out. Or you might not. But I am going to tell you anyway. 

It was February twenty sixth, and I had eaten some spaghetti for dinner.

When I think of spaghetti, I think of Kevin from The Office episode where they are different races.

 I make killer spaghetti, with some of that Prego sauce. (haha, oh, the irony. I think..) After Isaac had gone to bed and me and Nathan were winding down with some good television, I had bad indigestion. Out of nowhere. I never get indigestion other than when I am pregnant. You know, that one time I was. I don't know why but somewhere in my brain, a switch went off and I just knew I had to get a test. Auntie F was due around the twenty eighth, and I was not breaking out like usual, I was not climbing the walls with anxiety like usual, and there was no constant throwing of pottery and mugs at Nathan's head the week before. 

So, a quick run to the 24/7 CVS down the road, and I found myself dipping the test into a clean baby food jar fifteen minutes later. (we threw the jar away after, you freaks) And, I kid you not ladies and that one weird man that reads this blog, the second line appeared in about thirty seconds. 

Well, I had no idea what to do. I mean, Isaac was only almost a year at this point. My mind instantly went to ruptured uteruses and exploding placentas and any other extremely unlikely thing to happen during a second pregnancy so close to the first. So, I calmed down (on the outside) and casually laid the test down next to Nathan's arm and just sat on the couch. 

His reaction was as follows.

So, dear people. That is how we found out. A little indigestion can go a long way. In this case, nine months, which it better not this time. I mean it, baby number two!

My Kid is Better than Your Kid

BLOG ANGRY!!

Just kidding. Well, not really. I guess what I am trying to say is that I am blogging while experiencing some raw emotion here, and I will try my hardest to not channel it so severely that you never want to read again because I am whiny and emotional.

But the thing is I am whiny and emotional, so why are you reading this again?

So, my almost 13 month old hardly stands alone. Why stand when you can crawl at rocket speed to get to your toys (like, you know, outlets and cords and stuff.)? Why take the time to learn to move in a new way when you already go fast enough doing your crawling thing? Mommy and Daddy will pick me up at moments notice (guilty, yes, I know), so why waste the time?

Waste the time baby, please learn, because Mommy is going crazy waiting for you to take steps, or at least stand more than 10 seconds at a time! I see nine month old babies running around, and I am just like: "Are you serious right now?" Then shove it off with the typical thought: "Oh, come on. I don't want to be chasing that baby around all the time. He can take his time." Then the next minute I am at his side screaming and jumping around like a Russian ballet coach "Step! Step now! Now! Again! AGAIN!"

OK, so I don't scream. But I do say some things encouragingly at a normal volume.

Going to story time at the library or any other mother-baby event always has it's over achievers.

"My son Hamm walked at 9 months, and started writing cursive at 15 months."

"My daughter Sheila started memorizing and reciting the U.S. presidents at 21 months."

"My twins started their own secret language at 2 months."

"My son started creating his own clone at 17 months."

"My daughter has already created a car that runs on her dirty diapers. It doesn't have very good mileage but it's better than gasoline! You know, gotta be eco-friendly..."

And so it goes.

I try not to be the bitter mom who is secretly wishing their child will show some hidden talent that makes them a viral hit then suddenly, you are all millionaires. I really do try. I only attempted to get Isaac to climb to the ceiling using nothing but his hands and feet twice yesterday.

But I guess, everyone needs to accept their child's accomplishments one at a time, no matter how far apart or close together they are. Whether they walk at 20 months, talk at 15 months, or start gymnastics at 6 months. We love them, right? :)

Cold, maybe?

OH, THE SNOT!

Seriously. Gross, son. I just saw a huge yellow drop of snot get wiped onto his forehead while I tried changing the poor thing's diaper. I think Isaac might be getting a cold. Might being the main word here.

He goes through these spells of allergies occasionally, and every time it still makes my heart race, and I have the same conversation on the phone with the poor on-call pediatrician at three thirty in the morning.

"Hello, is this Quinlyn Grush?"

"Yes, my name is Quinlyn. And my son is hacking up snot and screaming and holding his breath and he looks kind of pale and then if you put him into another light he looks red and if you hold him up against a window he turns pale again, and his temperature was 99.7 five minutes ago but an hour ago it was 99.4 so I would say that is a significant increase. And he makes this awful 'Eeeehhhhhhhhwheeee' sound when I put him back into the crib, and shakes his fists around and starts crying. But it sound more high pitched, but then gets all moany.  And I am pretty sure I saw him swallow the same air as this guy smoking about a week ago..."

"Ok. Now could you leave a message for the nurse stating what is the matter with your child?"

And so it goes. So I am sure tonight will be no different.

Catching Up...

WHERE HAVE I BEEN???

So I just realized that I made this blog a long, long time ago. It's funny because I just spent about $15 on a new blog, which I also planned on using (but knew I wouldn't) to blog in. So I guess I will catch everyone on up with my life thus far...

So Isaac turned the big ONE on February 28th. He missed leap year by about fifty one minutes. I wanted to hold him in, you know, make him special and have a leap year birthday, meaning he would be forever young as Rod Stewart would have wanted him to have been, but the OB's scalpel was a little bit more persuasive. 

So we had the fancy-smancy birthday soiree at my grandmother's house. (You would not believe how much she charged me to rent) and it went over extremely well. As well as it can go when the father of your child rips open a gift more excitably than the birthday boy, thus jamming his elbow into said birthday boy's face, ending in a fit of tears that lasted the rest of the two hours of the birthday party.

Lots of gifts were given, including diapers, wipes, books, toys, and one very special gift, a book of fairy tales written by my older sister. Did she tell anyone she was writing a one hundred or more page book? Nope.  It ain't no thang. She does what she wants!

But seriously, it put me in tears, making my guests feel seemingly more awkward than when Isaac, the birthday boy, was crying, and no one put me over their shoulder and patted my bum to make me feel better. Oh well, I did it to myself later.

So the cake was, shall I say, the best cake ever made. Me and my sister (the unknown author) made our attempt at making a Yo Gabba Gabba cake. And let me tell you, I have never seen such artistry. 


And being the wonderful mother I am, I have no pictures documenting this party. So when I tell Isaac about it when he is older, there will be included a special appearance of Justin Bieber, a few ponies given out, and of course only the finest catering known to man. 

But, I do have some beautiful pictures of my sweet baby on Valentines day.

And my two babies' reaction to what we call "snow" in South Carolina.