Debut of Mr. Silas

Because Zoe and Paul had both arrived a little before their respective due dates, I fully expected our most recent addition to also debut a bit before expected. As such, I gave Dan a bit of grief about scheduling an out of town interview on March 17, knowing I was due on March 20. The day came and went, with not so much as a contraction in sight, and I got a bit of grief for prolonging the job hunting process. Soon Dan was on vacation and seemingly a bit annoyed that we had moved his vacation to accommodate my due date and his time was being wasted. Our little bundle of joy continued to sit tight past his due date as we approached the long string of interviews scheduled for what was supposed to be my second week with the baby. On Wednesday, we decided to take steps - Castor Oil. A most unpleasant experience: there were contractions, I suppose, but it could have just been the serious gut-cleansing because they stopped as soon as the oil began to wear off. The midwife on call said she'd be happy to induce me after the day of awfulness, but we'd lost precious time and didn't want to risk a prolonged induced labor.

So Dan went off on another interview as we approached a week overdue. We went through our normal school routine, exhausting though it was at this point. Nanna came over to hang out with the kids and make things run a little more smoothly. We even went to Fun Friday at the library as we usually did, but with no big change in things. As Dan flew home Friday into Saturday, I got a few of my first contractions. By morning, I let Dan know I'd had a little hope and we decided to go forward with our plan to induce on Saturday morning. We got the kids up before dawn, got them into the car in their jammies, with the promise of a box of waffles when they got to Nanna's. Paul didn't let go of those waffles from the moment I attempted the bribe until Nanna cooked them.

After a quick breakfast, we headed to the hospital. We got into the triage area pretty fast at 10am, but waited until noon for a room to become available. Inductions, even past due date, are lower priority than folks in active labor. With no contractions to speak of, I was at the bottom of the list. Once we had a room, we got started on the antibiotic and pitocin. Ahh, contraction medicine...I did not miss it. I had gotten hearty doses of the stuff after Zoe was born in an attempt to stop the bleeding. This lovely bag of gut-wrenching evil would be my companion for the next 24 hours. I started this scene with 4cm dilation, so knew it could be a long haul to 10cm. Dan and I hung out in the room for a while, chatting. Another check- not really exciting progress, so let's break the water. Some more time with weak contractions, sitting on the exercise ball and chatting away. Eventually, contractions got uncomfy enough to ask Dan to hook up the TENS machine. Things were then pretty bearable and we continued to talk about travel plans, who was coming when to help out, etc.

Eventually the midwife and nurse returned - apparently her other patient had delivered successfully and she could turn her attention to me. We all sat around as talking as the contractions continued to strengthen. It was weird, though, because everyone kept looking over my shoulder at the machine measuring the strength of my contractions.
    "Did you even feel that one?"
    "Yeah, and it was a decent one."
    "You didn't even flinch."
    "I did feel it, though."
I felt like I was the star of my own episode of Nature as my audience watched the line on the monitor and then glanced at me to check my reaction. Eventually, I started to feel very shivery and the contractions became more distracting, so I lay down under the covers for a bit. The midwife checked - 6cm at about 6pm. Ugh! These contractions were painful. I couldn't do another six or eight hours of this. Then, inexplicably, the midwife asked the nurse to get the delivery kit opened up. A few minutes later, she asked if she could check what was taking so long, with a hint of urgency in her voice. Someone came and opened the kit. After that, I was pretty much in the zone, so don't recall too many specifics. I had made what is likely an unusual request to take things very slowly during the delivery process. I had powered out Penny and Zoe in a hands and knees position, giving myself some nasty injuries each time. Paul I delivered on my side very slowly and his delivery was pretty problem-free. This time, I delivered on my back, I think I responded appropriately to requests to pause or push a little, and thankfully avoided any serious injury to myself.

I soon (6:44pm) had a little boy plopped onto my chest - his hands slightly blue, but otherwise pretty active and awake. Dan said he had a heart-stopper on his end of things (he often watches the emergence since I'm pretty ok during the pushing part of the program) because Silas emerged totally blue, with the cord wrapped around his neck twice. The midwife adeptly released the cord upon exit and soon had the little guy breathing fine. However, Dan emphasized again that he did not wish to return to the delivery room for fear of losing someone.

Recovery went well, but the late hour of delivery meant a two night stay at the hospital. A nice respite for a newly minted mother of four. I was beginning to fear that they wouldn't let us go at all, though, because Silas absolutely refused to pee. He was a little jaundiced the second morning and the nurse thought perhaps a bit dehydrated. So we went on a serious breast feeding campaign and by lunch time had a nice wet diaper to show for it. Yay! We were cleared for take off.

Because Dan had already taken off for his next interview, we had actually left our three little dears with Aunt Rose, Aunt Helen and FCOR John. She'd had a crash course with Dan on their schedule. We simplified things by keeping Paul out of school for the day. Dan gave a driving tour of schools and other important landmarks. But they were all on their own for that first day and I can only imagine how much fun that was. After Girl Scouts, Aunt Rose ventured into Brooklyn to pick up me and Silas. So that's Silas' heading home outfit - perhaps convict stripes shouldn't have been my first choice.

We had an uneventful journey back to Staten Island, where I just caught Penny as she was drifting off to sleep. Everyone else had somehow managed to get to bed already. Kudos to Aunt Helen, who was our holding down the fort person, while Aunt Rose explored the neighborhood via trips to schools, etc. Nanna came over to visit the next day (seen here shadowed by photographer Penny's finger). The rest of the week was nice and quiet, without visitors, which is honestly how I like it. We then ventured out to Easter dinner at Dan's uncle's house for Silas' second big field trip since going home. There, he received a warm welcome, with lots of comfy shoulders to sleep on. Thus did Master Silas Prodeep debut to his New York family!

The Neglected Passenger

The other person who seems to have been overlooked over the past few months is our lovely little passenger. Perhaps she (January is a "she" month) hasn't been making enough of a stink to get her own entries! The biggest challenge she has posed has been getting to the midwife, and even that isn't too terrible. I'm going to the same folks in Brooklyn, but now we're a one-car household so that trip gets to be a little more fun by public transit. I was pleasantly surprised to find that there's a bus two blocks from our house that goes straight to the sonographer in Brooklyn. To get to the midwife is just a quick hop on the subway from that same bus line. It takes 90 minutes to the midwife, but that's just because the bus hits every light on Hylan Blvd, making the ride there an hour or so before I even hit Brooklyn. Once they get the promised green light coordination on the bus, surely that will cut down the ride time. 

The length of the ride makes it a little tough to have an appointment and get Penny to school on time. She's half-day in the afternoon, so I have to figure out how to swing all this, get her to eat lunch and get her to the school door by 12:50pm, all without a car. A quick, timely appointment at 9am at the sonographer works, but the midwife only does afternoons and I'm not keen on spending rush hour on the bus (hate to think how long that ride would end up being). Mom has conquered her fear of driving to our house to help out - she's willing to come as long as she can leave her house after rush hour and return home before dark. She can then drive Penny to school (because she can't walk the half mile to the school). Of course, all bets are off if it's raining or snowing. We've been lucky so far. Thankfully, pre-K also has some bonus days off, so I'm hoping to schedule some of my appointments on those if possible. I'm not looking forward to the last couple of months where they're likely to send me for weekly monitoring in addition to the usual midwife appointments. I don't want to have Penny missing a ton of school just because I have to sit hooked up to some silly monitors for 20minutes while I take a nap. 

I went for my 20 week sonogram this week and everything checks out ok. Our lovely little dear spent the entire exam with her foot on her forehead, which made the sonographer's job extra challenging. The sonographer joked that the baby might have a future in gymnastics. I had to shift my position a bit and poke her quite a lot to finally convince her to straighten out so we could get a picture of her spine more clearly. She eventually cooperated, so I don't have to go back for another round of sonograms for some time. Yay! The ride may be simple, but the scheduling where I have to take Penny's, Mom's and Dan's schedules into account just to ensure I can make it and Penny doesn't miss school is a bit of a headache. 

Found one!

One of my ongoing stresses in pregnancy has been finding a hospital and care provider that would give me anything mildly resembling the experience I had delivering Penny in England. In England, the default was for my checkups to be done with midwives and delivery in hospital to be handled by midwives. OBs are only called in upon request, for high risk or when something has already gone wrong. When I go to the hospital, I was asked what position I felt comfy in- birthing ball, chair, floor, squatting, bed, whatever I wanted- and they'd supply that setup. I chose hands and knees on floor. Since Penny was already crowning, there wasn't much chance for an epidural, but lots of other options were pushed rather than that so the mom could be mobile.

Here in the US, when I described being on hands and knees on the floor, it was instant shut down from every care provider I talked to. The floor is dirty- no duh, they didn't have me down on the linoleum! Having gone to see a high risk doctor, some midwives wouldn't even consider taking me on because they ONLY deal with low risk deliveries. Most midwives here seem to do home deliveries or simply assist with ye standard in a bed deliveries.

I really wanted to stay on Staten Island for delivery since Penny seemed pretty fast, but my hospital options were limited (two hospitals). The rooms in my nearest hospital were so small, Dan would have had to stand through the whole delivery because there was no room beside the bed for a chair, let alone room for me to walk. The doctor I was seeing didn't work at the other one, plus I don't feel like going back to where we lost Augustine - not that it was their fault, but the big delivery room is exactly the room where I delivered last time. Plus I don't want to risk running into the less than stellar bedside manner of my former care providers in that scene.

So I broadened my search to Brooklyn. I emailed the one- uno- free standing birth center in the city to see if they knew someone who would give me their style of delivery in a hospital setting. The birth center makes me a little nervous because I want to be able to shout and get an OB. There, you have to drive yourself to the hospital if things aren't going to plan. They were kind enough to refer me to two midwife practices- one that takes my insurance and another that will work out an out of pocket payment plan for delivery costs (that doesn't include all the hospital and other peripheral costs). Since we're not made of money I went to the one who takes our insurance.

The midwife I met with seems very reasonable and nice. She didn't listen much, but tried to provide an overview of their experience and philosophy. Their practice has worked at NY Methodist Hospital for around two decades. When they're not being midwives, they're labor and delivery nurses at this hospital, so they're well-integrated into the culture there. They know which staff mmatch their philosophy and which to avoid. They consult on cases like mine with the chief of labor and delivery, so they've got reliable backup in case something comes up. They reviewed my history before they agreed to take me on. The major condition they imposed was that I had to go on baby aspirin immediately. I'm not thrilled about that because there are potential risks, especially later on, but it's minimally invasive as things go.

I get to go for lots of regular sonograms to check fluid levels and growth, but that likely would have been true for whoever I saw from this point in the pregnancy. Just stuff to be on the safe side. It cuts into reserving my time to spend with the baby when she comes, which is frustrating. I don’t have much to begin with. But what can I do? I'm back in the US where our system doesn't value having parents raise kids instead of daycare doing it. I've already been told that I can't exceed three months off, even with unpaid leave. Bit of a ripoff, if you ask me. Especially since a coworker got unpaid leave so she could stay with her baby for six months. Not sure why I get the shaft. Maybe when the HR director gets back from her month long vacation I can ask her.

So I've at least found care providers who seem aligned with what I want and potentially a hospital I can live with. I haven't figured out when to leave work or how long because it all seems to short compared to the time I had with penny. I can't fathom commuting to Brooklyn with a little one at home who's not sleeping through the night. Not to mention that my commute is so long i'd have to feed or pump immediately on either end of it. Something about the whole process seems very wrong indeed. Why is our system so designed to make women miserable? Why can't I have the fulfillment of gainful employment AND of taking a bit of time off to welcome a new family member?

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Picnic in the park

We had yet another fun weekend with extended family on Sunday. This week, we celebrated an adult cousin's birthday by heading out for a picnic after church. Though originally scheduled as a NJ picnic, we took about two hours to prep and folks weren't up for another one hour drive before we opened our no longer steamy vats of fried chicken, biscuits and other goodies. So we took the opportunity to visit one of our local natural playgrounds, Wolfe's Pond city park. The threat of storms any minute kept the table competition minimal and we thoroughly enjoyed quite the banquet.

After our meal, the boys (including our guest of honor) enjoyed passing around a football, kickball and a couple of frisbees. It was kind of fum keeping so many projectiles in the air simultaneously. Aim was such that everyone got a solid running workout from the afternoon. Even my mother-in-law got in on the frisbee action at some point.

Penny was beside herself to see a real frisbee in action. Previously, she had only seen the on the Wii Sports Resort game as a little disk you throw to a puppy to catch. Whenever she managed to snag the frisbee, she would toss it to me, tell me to pick it up in my mouth and return it to her. Sometimes I'd be the retriever, other times I tossed it to her and she returned it to me via her mouth. The evil and infectious laughter was too cute. At one point, Daddy threw it to her from across the field. It was an excellent shot from a fair distance and I keep wondering whether she planned to try catching it in her mouth like the puppies on the game do. Regardless of her plan, the frisbee made its way inexorably toward her head until it came to a jolting halt on the bridge of her nose. Thankfully we were outside, otherwise the collective gasp of shock would have sucked all the air out of the room. And she needed all the air she could get for that first ear-shattering wail. She pinned her hands to her nose so tight I couldn't properly assess the damage. Dr. Dad crossed the field in a heartbeat, but was no more successful than I, so I set him to work on a teeny little ice pack back at the cooler. The novelty of the ice pack was almost as effective as the numbness it was intended to induce, because Penny stopped crying as soon as it touched her nose. She looks a little stunned in this picture, but I think that's more lack of nap than injury related because it was taken an hour or more after the incident.


Penny did recover completely. It was actually somewhat fortuitous because previously she had been so excited to play that she skipped eating. Her recovery period was spent catching up on lunch/dinner. Later, she rejoined the frisbee game, though everyone threw well away from her or tried to convince her to go to the playground. So there is no permanent frisbee-phobia affiliated with the event. Dan, I think, continues to feel pretty bad as there's a respectable visual reminder and it causes flashbacks to a certain previous frisbee victim. I tried to joke with him that he was just helping her have my nose (somewhat off-center due to a sporting accident of my own in my youth).

In other news, our 17 week checkup went lovely. A certain little someone enjoys squiggling away from the doppler, so it took a while to get a heart rate reading. She's doing well so far, though. I think Dan officially agreed that he didn't want to find out in advance, which is a nice relief because I wasn't sure logistically how I could maintain ignorance if he knew. It just seemed like it would have slipped out at some point. It's hard to verbalize why I don't want to know, but based on Dan's description of his reasoning, we're pretty much on the same page.

I was a little weepy at the appointment because it was the first time I've talked with the doctor about the delivery room. Even when I was pregnant with Augustine, the thought of delivering the standard US way was very stressful for me. I just hate the idea of being confined to a bed for hours on end when I could be doing useful things to help the process along and make it easier on myself and the baby. I don't understand why I have to go to a crunchy granola place to get what I want instead of a hospital, where they are better equipped to handle complications. Dan was reading one hospital's description of their midwife services aloud and just interrupted himself with a "...let's see if they can mention "low risk pregnancies one more time." I don't relish diving into the search for the right delivery location/care provider all over again. Plus, my current doctor was awesome about listening to me and recognizing what I was actually asking for. He didn't call me a nut (like my previous nyc midwife did), tell me it was absolutely inadvisable, just that hospital restrictions would make it tough for me to find. He recommended some good places to start the search. I like him a lot, so it seems a shame to ditch him. I really want someone whom I know at my delivery, though, and as THE guy who handles high risk deliveries, there's just no way to guarantee that. We'll see how the search goes and he will stick with me until we find what makes the most sense.

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