It’s a very cold, raw Memorial Day weekend here in Providence. We’re barely in the 50s today with off-and-on rain. I’m cuddled up in the lounge chair watching the Bruins v. Rangers game on TV with a plethora of coffee to keep me warm. I’ve heard rumors that Monday will be nice around here – here’s hoping!

May has not been the best of months for me, and I’m glad it’s coming to a close. I have just over a week left of my maternity leave – I return to work on June 4th, and my feelings are mixed about it. Maternity leave has been a confusing time for me – both slow as hell and passing in an instant at the same time. Part of me is completely not ready to go back to work. I’m exhausted and stressed with trying to figure out motherhood, along with the recovery of what’s happened over the last twelve weeks (or honestly, everything since last July). Part of me is SO ready to go back to work and rejoin society again. Newborn baby stage really is an incredibly isolating thing. I’m surprised how much it has affected me – I tend to be a bit of a homebody and love to spend time on my own… but I suppose when it’s forced time at the house with no real way to get out because of a very young infant, it was a bit paralyzing and incredibly stifling.

As I mentioned, May hasn’t been the best of months. The month started with a 5 am trip to the Emergency Room for another strong gallbladder attack. Only this time it wasn’t just a gallstone making irritation in the bile duct – I’d developed pancreatitis. So for the next four days, I was admitted as an inpatient to the same floor of the hospital I’d been on only seven weeks before when having Max. The first 36 hours were spent being forbidden any food or water in an attempt to let my pancreas and my liver rest and reduce the inflamation. Then I was on a clear liquid diet for the remainder of my inpatient time. I’m completely truthful when I say that I was thankful to see jello. The worst part of being in the hospital was the first night. The doctors ordered an MRI to see what was going on with my gallstones to plan how to proceed. Since the hospital only has one MRI machine, they do the inpatient MRIs overnight. I was wheeled down around 12:30 in the morning and had the WORST claustrophobic panic attack of my life when they tried to put me into the MRI tube. I absolutely lost it – completely over the edge, sobbing and irrational about the damn thing, convinced that I’d never be able to get better because I couldn’t face getting in that tube. About three hours later, the aide came by again to attempt to bring me down for the scan again, and I was still crying and not doing well. The nurses suggested administering a dose of ativan (an anti-anxiety medication) to help me get through it. I agreed to try it, even though I doubted it would work. Thankfully it did and they were able to get me through the MRI with me stoned out of my mind. Once they’d received the MRI results, the decision was that I needed to have my gallbladder taken out as soon as possible, and surgery was scheduled for Monday.

I was released from the hospital on Sunday to go home for a night, rest, shower, and spend some time with Max. On Monday afternoon, I had outpatient laproscopic surgery to get the gallbladder out. The surgery itself went well, but I was in recovery for a few hours due to my oxygen level staying low. I tried to stay calm about it, but with everything else that had happened, I was a bit weepy in the recovery room. I’m sure the nurses thought I was a bit… off… but I just couldn’t help it.

During this entire hospital adventure, my mom was in town. She’d originally planned to only be up for two days, but ended up staying for a full week to help Erich with Max. She suggested that I go back down to Pennsylvania with her after my surgery to relax and recover, since she already had another trip up to Providence planned for May 18th-24th for a cruise around the south coast islands. I agreed and spent about a week and a half at her house, visiting with family and introducing everyone to Max. I also learned a lot of baby techniques from my mom – we gave Max his first real bath (as opposed to the sponge baths he’d been getting for the first month and a half), we developed his bedtime routine, and got him accustomed to sleeping in a bassinet in an attempt to start transitioning him from the swing he’d been sleeping in since day one. I didn’t sleep all that great while at Mom’s since I was on the couch and on overnight baby duty for all but one of the nights, but I had a good time seeing everyone. My youngest cousins had a blast with Max, and I finally got the opportunity to spend more time with them than just a quick chaotic night at my wedding or during the holidays. I also got to see my Uncle Ray, Aunt Ann, and cousin Laura from my dad’s side of the family – they came over to my mom’s one afternoon, which turned into an unplanned blending of the divorced family again briefly as my mom and grandfather caught up with them. My mom hadn’t seen Laura since she was a little girl. It always catches me by surprise at how weird having my mom and dad’s family together feels. My parents have been divorced for 24 years now, and I’m so used to them being completely separate.

I have a bunch of photos from the visit to get up on my Flickr account. That may have to be my Memorial Day project.

Anyway, we returned up to Providence last Saturday. Mom and her longtime friend/former boyfriend Barrie went on their cruise, and I settled back into motherhood at home to start my last days of leave. Max got his first vaccines on Monday. We went up to Boston to show Max off to my co-workers on Wednesday. And tomorrow my mom will head back home to end what has been a very, very strange month.

The good thing is that at the end of this, I’m okay and recovering from my two bouts of major surgery in eight weeks, although I’m a little shaken by it all. I did finally accept that I’m having some postpartum depression and am getting help for it. Max is doing great and growing quickly. As of his doctor’s visit on Monday, he was 13 pounds, 7 ounces and 25 inches long (7lbs even at birth and 20.5 inches). He’s now sleeping in the crib full-time and has a solid night routine. He’s not sleepning through the night yet, but we’re doing stretches of three to four hours at times. At ten weeks, that’s not that bad.

But I’m glad May is almost over. And I’m hoping that I won’t experience another month like this in my lifetime.

No grizzly details here, but still… this is the “how Max came into the world” story for my own family history… scroll down to the bottom for photos and the basic vitals details.  :)

Life takes some funny turns when you’re pregnant.  You know how websites emphasize that you should have that overnight bag packed and ready to go by week 36, because you never know when you’re going to the hospital?  Yeah.  They’re not kidding.   I’d like to add a little bit of advice to that – bring it with you to any doctor appointments starting at week 36, because you really never know.

The last few days of my pregnancy were a bit of a whirlwind.  On Thursday, March 7th, I worked at the office but left a bit early for two back-to-back appointments at the hospital – one for an ultrasound to double-check Max’s weight and that everything was going okay, due to my gestational diabetes diagnosis.  Immediately following that appointment, I went upstairs to Labor & Delivery for a Non-Stress Test (NST), which involves relaxing on a delivery bed with the baby heartbeat monitor for a minimum of a half hour, tracking how often the baby moves and also taking my vitals to see how baby’s responding to pregnancy.   The NST kicked off a series of events in my case – Max was doing great and passed the test with flying colors.  I, on the other hand, did not.  My blood pressure was high and all over the place.  My doctor then ordered some blood work and a urine test, both of which came back with some borderline iffy readings.  I was sent home to do a 24-hour kidney test to check for protein in my urine and was told to reschedule my prenatal for Monday.  Depending on the results of the kidney test, I was told to expect that I could be induced as early as Wednesday.

Meanwhile, poor Erich was sitting down in the hospital parking lot with no news as to what was going on.  I’d told him I’d be done with the second test by 8 pm, and it had passed 9 before I was able to leave the hospital.  In the whirlwind of events, I’d forgotten to bring my cell phone to the bed with me, so I had no way of updating him on my status, and he was a bit panicked with the text messages.  When I finally was able to leave and met with him in the parking lot, I filled him in and watched the reality bomb drop.  I was a bit shell-shocked, too.  I mean, yes – here we were at 37 weeks.  It’s not like Max’s arrival was that far off regardless.  But suddenly, we were looking at possibly less than a week.

I worked at home on Friday as I did the kidney test (fun fun) and let work know I’d also be home on Monday since I had to reschedule my doc appointment.  Thankfully I’d brought a good amount of stuff home to pass the two days.  Throughout the weekend, I came to terms with the idea that I was going to be induced.  Erich thought I was crazy and that I was over-reacting, but this time, I absolutely knew it was going to happen.  Here I was – 38 years old, obese, with a gestational diabetes diagnosis and now possible symptoms of at minimum prenatal hypertension, and at worst pre-eclampsia.  I was going into my 38th week of pregnancy.  Max was at a safe gestational age to deliver.  For me, this wound up being a no-brainer.  I was going to be induced, both for my safety and his.

Monday wound up being a normal work day, with my prenatal appointment scheduled for 4 pm.  I went through the day, got a bunch of stuff done, and then headed off to my appointment.  With that “I just knew” feeling sitting in the back of my brain, I put my overnight bag for the hospital in my car just in case.  My appointment went quickly – a review of the tests, which came back with mixed results.  My blood pressure was still a bit high, and the doctor decided to send me directly back to the hospital following my appointment for a follow-up NST and blood work, just to see where things were at.  So I sent Erich a quick text message to let him know what was up and drove over to the hospital, a mere 2 blocks down the road.

And this time, I made sure to keep my cell phone next to me.

A few things were happening now that hadn’t been at the last NST on Thursday – first, Max’s heart rate was a lot higher.  He was very active, but his heart rate just seemed to stay elevated the entire time.  Mine was also higher, less stable, and oddest of all – completely different when taken on the left side of my body vs. the right.  By 8 pm, the nurse came in with the hospital johnny and let me know I was staying “for a while.”  The on-call doctor would be in within the hour to examine me and see where things were at.  I let Erich know he should head down.  The doctor arrived and did the physical exam.  Due to the combination of all of my tests, my doctor and the on-call doc had decided it was time.  I was getting induced not on Wednesday, but starting Monday night.  Since I was only a centimeter dilated, the process had to start with an attempt to ripen and dilate my cervix using a foley catheter, and then in the morning, I’d be given the pitocin to induce contractions.

The next several hours were awful.   I was in a ton of pain, experiencing what can only be described as the worst menstrual-like cramps I’ve ever experienced.  They were completely random in duration and timing.  Some would pass quickly.  Others would build, start to die off, then go through a huge ramp-up.  I was given two separate doses of Ambien to help me sleep (the first didn’t work), plus an IV dose of some pain medication which immediately made me all woosy.  But thankfully, the combo worked – and I did get a few hours of sleep.

My doctor came to check on me in the morning around 8 am.  By that time, I’d received my first dose of pitocin and I was dilated about 3 centimeters, but my body wasn’t really responding well to it.  He went over my symptoms and confirmed that I did have pre-eclampsia.  With another physical exam, he expressed concern about my ability to deliver Max naturally and recommended we go forward with a c-section.  The Thursday ultrasound had placed Max’s estimated birth weight at over nine pounds.  My blood pressure was still all over the place.  And when he did another physical exam, he expressed concern that I might not have a large enough pelvic opening for such a large baby.  That final detail was what sealed it for me – I wanted no part of pushing for hours and hours, only to have Max get stuck and have to go in for an emergency c-section anyway.  Erich and I agreed – going immediately into the Cesarean was the best choice for us.  After all – healthy baby and healthy mom were the only important goals here.  We called my dad to give him the information, and he talked with my OB/GYN.  My dad, who’s a semi-retired OB/GYN himself, told me that based on all of the facts, he completely agreed it was the right call all around.  The pitocin was discontinued, and I was left to rest comfortably until it was time to prep for surgery.

I was wheeled into the OR around 11:20.  For those who don’t know about c-sections, the patient is fully awake during the procedure (unless there are other special circumstances).  I was given a spinal block to numb me from roughly the bottom of my ribcage down.  Erich was given scrubs and sat next to me the entire time, for comfort and support.  My arms would absolutely not stop trembling the entire time.  While I was numb to pain, I could still feel pressure… and felt a TON of pressure as they worked hard to get Max out.  He was pretty determined to stay in there.  At one point, I swore that the doctors were using some sort of a horrific wine corkscrew device on me – it just felt like my insides were being twisted to extremes.  Turns out that they had to use the suction device to get a hold of Max’s head to get him out. Either way, it was scary and I was crying and just wishing for it to be over.

And then suddenly, it was – and I heard baby cries on the other side of the room.

Max entered the world at 11:45 am on Tuesday, March 12th.  He weighed 7 pounds even and was 20.5 inches long.  After they checked him out, Erich brought him over to me (while still in surgery) so I could see him for the first time:

Our first family photo,around noon on 3/12/13.

I spent a couple hours in recovery, holding Max and attempting to breastfeed him as I regained feeling in my legs. I was told that I’d be in the hospital for the next four days, and that I’d be confined to bed until at least the following morning. A few extra details about what was going on with Max in utero confirmed that the c-section had absolutely been the right decision, and that it would have been the outcome regardless. And I’m relieved that I’m completely comfortable with it and don’t have any of the feelings of regret or that I missed out by delivering naturally. My goal was accomplished – I had a healthy baby, and I was coming out of my pregnancy in good shape, too.

A bit before 3, I was wheeled out of Labor & Delivery, pressed the official “new baby” button on the wall, which played Lullaby throughout the hospital, and was wheeled to my private room on the maternity ward. My mom arrived at the hospital that evening. We updated family with the news, and over the next few days, Max met his paternal grandparents, had a whole slew of tests done (including tons of blood sugar sticks, because he was hypoglycemic for a while), and spent essentially the entire time in someone’s arms.

We headed home from the hospital on Saturday and into this whole parenting insanity that’s exciting and overwhelming and exhausting. I’ve had a few emotional breakdowns from being overwhelmed, but they’ve been few and far between compared to just sitting and staring at this little baby in my arms in wonder and awe. We’re doing great (albeit a bit sleep deprived)… but the cats are looking out for me:

Colley was happy to help with my spare hand. Jack wanted to make sure my legs stayed still to support Max. (or so they tell me)

While I still don’t want to ever endure pregnancy again, I’m completely in love with this little guy.