Welcome to the World

This is not the birth story I’d hoped for, but it was perfect in its own way.

On Tuesday, March 26, I had an appointment to see my OB. She checked me over and said that things still didn't look like they were advancing. She told me that we would see each other in a week if nothing happened sooner. It was then that I mentioned something that had been bothering me all morning: I had barely felt any movement that day. At almost noon, and especially after sitting still in the waiting room for a while, this was starting to become a concern. I also had woken with the vague sense that the baby hadn't moved all night either, though whether or not this is true, I have no idea. My doctor also seemed a bit concerned, so she told me to go have lunch and come back in an hour for fetal monitoring.

When I got back to the clinic, they strapped some monitors around me and gave me a button to press every time the baby moved. We could hear his heart beating on the monitor. The doctor told me she was going to lunch and she’d be back to check on the results in 45 minutes. For the first 15 or 20 minutes, we were relaxed, listening to the baby’s heart, chatting and laughing. After a while, my lower back started to hurt. I was really uncomfortable lying on the exam table. I didn't want to mess up the test, but eventually caved and asked Cris to help me find a more comfortable position. Nothing helped. Deep down, I knew that the only thing that would help was to get up and walk around.

The pain subsided after a minute, but came back even stronger. By the third time, I started to ask myself: are these contractions? I’d had a couple of mild contractions earlier on, but they didn't really feel anything like this. From everything I’d heard, I guess I was expecting labor to start slowly, but these were the first contractions I’d had all day. My doctor had just told me that she didn't think I’d be ready at least for another week.

The doctor came back and confirmed my suspicions. I was 2 cm dilated. She told me we should plan to get to the hospital around 8 pm. That was at about 2 or 2:30. As we were talking, she and I both noticed that the contractions were already getting closer together. Based on that and how intense they were, she said to keep an eye on things and go to the hospital sooner if we needed to.

At home, we packed for the hospital…. Well, Cris packed; I sort of stumbled around helping, telling him where to find things, moaning. I took a shower. That helped a bit. I timed my contractions for a while: 40 seconds long, every two and a half minutes. We were all packed and ready a little before 7 pm. I decided that it was time to go.

When we got to the hospital, I was 6 cm dilated. The room they brought us to was super cozy. It already had a little bassinet in the corner. There was something really uplifting about seeing my baby’s little bed when I walked in the door.

My doctor was attending another birth, so the nurses called her with updates on my progress. Since I was still a little sick with the flu, she told the nurses to give me IV fluids. Now, lying down is really not a great position to be in for labor. It’s much more comfortable to be up, moving around, changing positions than stuck on your back. However, lying on your back is a favorite position for putting in an IV. Unfortunately, I have the world’s most invisible veins. This results in a lot of misses when it comes to drawing blood or inserting IVs. Normally being stuck with a needle multiple times or having it wiggled around in my arm is enough to piss me off. On this occasion, I was perfectly willing to tolerate as many sticks and jabs as it took, if only they would just hurry the hell up. With each contraction, I felt more trapped and agitated. All I could do was breathe and try to tune it all out.

Cris, the doctor and the nurses alternated rubbing my back during contractions and cheering me on. Time became a meaningless concept, as it seemed to stretch on forever and fly by all at the same time. I tried to stay focused on what I had to do and breathe.

At 8 cm dilated, the doctor came back in and checked my progress. The baby should have been pretty far into my pelvis at this point. He hadn't moved since that afternoon when I was in her office. We decided to try breaking open the amniotic sac, figuring that maybe there was a lot of liquid and not enough weight on the baby to help him move down. When my water was broken, I tried to push the baby down. It was like trying to push a house off its foundation. The doctor asked me what I wanted to do, and I told her that as long as the baby was still okay, I’d like to wait a bit longer and try some different positions. At this point, I was pretty sure I knew where this was going, but I wasn't ready to give up yet.

She got out her little doppler wand to check on how he was doing. He was not okay. Every time we’d heard his heartbeat, it was like a little hummingbird heart. This sounded more like someone with hypothermia. I felt my breath catch in my chest and then several things happened simultaneously. “Vámonos,” I said in a surprisingly level voice. The doctor got out her phone and started calling people to come in for the surgery while reaching back in to try and change the baby’s position. Cristhian was frozen in place, ready to pounce the moment someone said “go”.

Fifteen minutes later, I was in the operating room down the hall. Everyone was prepping for surgery. They shaved my bikini line, put in a spinal block and painted me with disinfectant. As one of the nurses was swabbing my abdomen and legs, the spinal block started to kick in and it felt like little strokes of electricity up and down my skin.

They put up a curtain, so I couldn't see what was happening, but at some point they were pushing down on my abdomen to get the baby out of the incision. I was rather surprised by how much labor was involved. I felt like I could hardly breathe for a second, and then I heard little baby sounds. The anesthesiologist called the time of birth, 23:12. All I wanted was to see and hold him. Eventually the pediatrician brought him over to me, but only for a moment.

Nearly two hours passed between when he was born and when they had me stitched up and back in my room. At that point, the baby was pretty hungry. The pediatrician had suggested giving him a little bit of formula, but Cris asked him to wait and let me feed him as soon as I could. Had the c section been planned, I probably would have been able to feed him sooner, but as soon as they had me back in bed, my doctor came in and helped me get him latched on. Given that it was our first time and I could hardly move, we did alright, but the latch was pretty bad.

If I had it to do over again, I would have had more conversations with my doctor about what to do in case of an emergency cesarean. We’d talked about skin-to-skin and nursing right away, but in the chaos of everything that happened, Seamus ended up spending his first couple of hours under the heat lamps. He ended up getting pretty cold and almost certainly would have done better snuggled up with his dad’s body heat keeping him warm.

My birth experience wasn't perfect, but I’m really happy with how it turned out. My doctor and my husband both advocated for me throughout the process. There is a small chance that I could have had a vaginal birth if my water hadn't been broken, but it’s very likely that things would have gone the same way or gotten even more dangerous.

The hardest part of this process has undoubtedly been the recovery. There are times when a medically assisted birth is necessary and I think that my case is a good example of that, but I would recommend avoiding it whenever possible. What I've gone through in the couple of weeks since my baby was born has been far more painful than anything I experienced during labor. The only thing that makes it all worth it is my healthy, happy, beautiful baby boy.

The Final Descent

Just when I began to feel I would have to choose between eating and breathing, I woke up one morning to a pleasant surprise: my belly was a little lower than it had been. I looked down and it seemed a bit further away. I double checked in the mirror, but had to confirm with Cris before I was entirely convinced. My belly was definitely dropping. I took a deep breath and it felt easier than it had in weeks.

There are some definite advantages to my new body composition. In addition to no longer feeling like I’m going to suffocate, I can finish a normal sized meal, I've hardly had any heartburn and it’s much harder for Baby to get his/her foot wedged under my rib cage, though not impossible..

However, as with all the joys of parenthood, there are some drawbacks. The further baby gets from my rib cage, the further she/he gets into my pelvis. This is good. It means we’re getting closer to B-Day. But it hurts like a bitch. The weight of baby on my lower abdominal muscles and pelvic bone is like a constant workout. When I get up after sitting or lying down for awhile, I feel as if I’d been going hard on the thighmaster and bicycle crunches. Not that feeling you get right after you work out, but the one you get the next day after your body has had a chance to realize what you did to it.

Now that space is at a premium, Baby can’t move around as much. But head movements, however slight, are all up on my cervix. Years ago I had to have my cervix biopsied to double check some abnormal cells. This is a comparable feeling. When baby hits a nerve, it’s like a bolt of electricity running through my vag. It’s worst when I’m walking, which is something that I've been trying to do as much as possible because it helps prepare Baby and Momma for labor.

At this point, Baby’s arrival is just a matter of time. One way or another, he/she’s gotta come out within the next few weeks. So far, I’ve managed to keep my skin intact, but I’m starting to feel like my muscles are tearing apart. I’m really hoping for sooner rather than later, or at least before anything breaks. But if Baby still has important things to do before birth, I guess I’m willing to wait.v

The Countdown

Okay, this blog post has taken an absurd amount of time for me to write. My brain no longer functions in any sort of way that seems to make sense to other human beings, but the baby gets me. Do you think that’s part of the biological imperative?

Now that we’re far enough along that baby could easily survive outside of the womb, I’ve started to relax a little. Only a little, but it’s something. Parenthood is stressful as fuck. Just keeping another little human alive seems pretty daunting, but I also have to keep her/him healthy, safe, fed, clothed, happy (relatively), and all of that without losing him/her/my mind. Jesus.

I don’t think it helps much that our upstairs neighbor had to have a cesarean 3 weeks ahead of schedule because she’d been losing amniotic fluid for god knows how long and the baby was at risk when they finally realized. Seriously? How many minor tragedies can be avoided in the span of 9 months? Life is a damn miracle.

A couple of months ago I read a ton of shit on pregnancy forums about “nesting”. This is the process that expectant mothers are supposed to go through to prepare their space (read: life) for the new baby. I came across this because a bunch of women with similar due dates (April) were all starting to do it. MONTHS AGO. Am I the only person in this forum who has bought almost nothing, doesn’t have a space cleared out, hasn’t put together contraptions and furniture, or stockpiled diapers?

Now that we’ve had a baby shower and got a bunch of baby swag, I have finally started eyeing a space in the closet that I think I’m gonna clear out. But that’s it. I’m just thinking about it. And what if the baby is born tomorrow? Well, then I think Cris is going to have to come back home at some point to do laundry ‘cause we ain’t even got shit washed yet. And I think I’m okay with that. Because what if I go on leave next month and the baby doesn’t come for another couple of weeks after that? What the holy hell am I going to do with all of that time if everything is done?

The one area of my life that I have been frantically preparing for B-Day is work. I pretty much started the year prepping materials and plans and diagrams in the event that a sub had to step in unexpectedly early. I mostly started early, though, because there is just a fuck ton to do. I would rather leave someone with all the tools they might need to succeed than just let them figure it out on their own, especially if I’m coming back within a few months and would only have to clean up after the experiment. The only problem now is that I still don’t have a sub… for the second time. Twice I’ve had someone accept the job only to later turn it down because they’d found something else. I get it. You get offered a job that doesn’t start for a couple months and something else that starts now comes along, of course you’re gonna take it. But have these tricks not heard of a telephone? Call somebody and let them know if you don’t want the job anymore. Because when you said you would take the job, I stopped looking for someone else!! The last person didn’t let us know that she wasn’t taking the job until the first day she was supposed to show up to train. Come on. I think the solution is to give my classes via skype from my bed. I’m giving jobs away here, but if no one wants them, fine!

Six weeks until baby comes, four until I go on leave. I’m counting the days. Each morning I feel a little heavier, or look a little bigger. I’m not so much “expecting” a baby in the modern sense of the word so much as I’m “esperando,” the equivalent in Spanish. Waiting. Waiting for baby to drop into position. Waiting for a sign. Waiting for this part of the journey to be over and the next to begin.

Ninja baby and ziplock bags

The first time I felt little Baby kick, it was pretty weird. Pretty soon I got used to his occasional movements and it was reassuring, an affirmation that he was still doing okay in there. Now he moves around so often that I’m sure I would start to worry if a whole day went by and I hadn’t felt him even once.

From what I’ve heard, some babies are more active than others. It may have just as much or more to do with the mother’s body than the baby’s actual movements, but I’ve had some women tell me that they didn’t feel their babies kick very often. In the same way that before Baby kicked, I wasn’t really worried about him kicking or not, if he’d never kicked much, I don’t suppose I would want him to kick more. Now that he does, it just seems normal that he should continue to do so.

And, man, does he kick. I’m actually looking forward to my next ultrasound, hoping to get some good movement while we’re watching, because my imagination is starting to run wild with the things I’ve felt. He’s big enough now that he can simultaneously hit both sides of my abdomen. Sometimes it’s a series of hard jabs. In which case, I’ve found that I can calm him down by moving around a bit. Other times I feel more of a pressure, like he’s trying to stretch out my uterus to make more space.

Some of my most common fantasies about his activities include mixed martial arts or acrobatics training, swimming and dancing. I have a feeling that this kid is going to cause some trouble in the next few years. I imagine turning my back on him for only a second and finding him scaling the dresser drawers just like his uncle used to do.

The strangest and probably least expected thing for me about Baby’s daily yoga practice is not how it feels, but rather how it looks. I don’t know why it never occurred to me that I would be able to see him moving from the outside. It just didn’t. When I was first able to feel the kicks, everyone I talked to sprang this news on me, but it wasn’t enough time to process before it actually started happening. That’s some really exorcist shit to see a little creature moving around inside your belly.

I get the feeling that Baby is not a big fan of flying, especially the landing. He’s been particularly rambunctious today, and it kinda felt like he was trying to make a break for it as the plane landed in Houston. He started to get a little buck when we landed in Omaha, but I did a little dance and he chilled out. I can’t say I blame him. I find travelling to be pretty uncomfortable myself. On the bus from Xela to Guate, I had to break out the trusty ziplock bag to vom. While the “morning” sickness subsided a couple months ago, the motion sickness is still on in full effect it seems. I remember when I was little EVERYTHING gave me motion sickness: cars, planes, trains, milk. I think I spent more time throwing up as a kid than anyone I know. As I got older, it never went away, but it got more tolerable. Now I feel like I’m starting from scratch again. I guess parenthood is the second childhood. Baby, all I’m gonna say is that you just better be cute.

The Belly Project

Ever since starting the secret baby blog, I've really started to miss my regular blog. I guess it's true: You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone. Luckily, I'm inconsistent enough with my blogging that my absence went completely unnoticed, but now that the news is out, I'll be moving all of my blogging- baby and otherwise- back here. Let's be honest, though, pretty much everything worth writing about at this point is the ten extra pounds sitting on my bladder.

The growing belly is a magical place. I'm not totally sure how it works, but one minute I'm sporting the tiniest of bumps and the next I look like I'm smuggling a beach ball. I've definitively reached that point where, even at its smallest, I often get confused looks from Guatemalans on the street that say: Who knocked up the gringa? But, somehow, I had imagined the growth process to be more linear. This is more of a two steps forward one step back type deal, though.

At my checkup last week, I had gained ten pounds since getting pregnant. Baby also looks almost two weeks older than he really is. (We're not finding out the sex until the baby is born, but I'll be using male pronouns. Most of you know that I'm not one to use male pronouns as default, but I had a dream and you can't prove me wrong yet. I wish there were a pronoun specifically for babies that meant: Who cares what the sex or gender of a person who has yet to form an identity is.) I realized after leaving the doctor's office that when Cris and I met a few years ago, I weighed about what I do now. So why do I feel huge now if I felt normal then? My theory is this: When I weighed ten pounds more a few years ago, it was a well-distributed ten pounds. Everything was bigger head to toe. Now, the only parts that have grown are centrally located. My hips have spread a little and my boobs have gained half a cup size, but most of that weight is all in my abdomen.

The result of such concentrated weight gain? Well, for one thing, it's a constant battle to keep my posture. I often catch myself with my back seriously arched and the belly all out there. Also, unlike normal weight gain, my abdominal wall is seriously stretched out. The muscles still work, just not in all directions. Particularly my lower abdominal muscles are unable to move in a crunch type motion. Since I have no desire to do crunches, that shouldn't matter, right? Well, think about all the positions that the easiest way to get out of is with that very movement. Now imagine (or try if you’re adventurous) getting up from one of those positions without using your lower abdominals. For the most part, you can get up by just swinging around to the side, no problems. But once in a while, something impedes that motion. Some of my more amusing solutions to this problem have been Cris having to pull or push me and, my personal favorite, the time that I had to roll sideways onto the floor to get off the couch. In my defense, I had my legs elevated and the position was deceptively easy to get into. So far, this has only provided a few moments of hilarity for Cris and I, but as the belly grows, I can only image this situation becoming more comical, and with any luck, my evil genius of a spouse will manage to get you all some evidence of it.

Tres Metros Sobre Twilight

My husband and I watched Tres Metros Sobre Cielo (Three Steps Above Heaven) over the weekend. After hearing about it from all the teeny boppers, I decided to find out what it was all about. One of my students is doing her compare and contrast essay on this and Twilight, and after seeing it, I feel like the comparison is apt.

It's a Spanish flick about a school girl named Babi (pronounced BAH-bee, María Valverde) who falls for the bad boy, Hugo, or H as he prefers (pronounced AH-chay, Mario Casas). Though we never see H shoot himself up, it is pretty evident to anyone over the age of 15 that he is on roids for, like, the entire movie. He's a complete asshole, but somehow Babi, who at first seems like a sane human being, falls for him. Basically, if you found Twilight unfathomably hilarious, you must see this film.

I'm gonna go ahead and put a huge SPOILER ALERT here. If you want to be surprised by the LOLs, stop reading and go watch a pirated copy of 3MSC, as the kids call it, and come back later. And believe me, as the plot does not follow any logic known to the rational human mind. The only thing predictable about this movie are the eye rolls you will certainly be experiencing.

Okay, so at first you think that H is out of his mind and Babi will see right threw him, but after calling her ugly, crashing a party she's at, throwing her in the pool in a white dress, chasing her through the streets on his motorcycle, beating up her ride and scaring him off so he could give her a ride home, stalking her, breaking into her house, and coercing her to take off her clothes in exchange for a ride home; he finally wins her heart.

From this point, you may think that H is going to mellow out under the calming influence of Babi. You would be wrong. One day, he gets a bug up his butt to go to the beach. He meets her at school in the morning and convinces her to ditch. Hey, at least he didn't kidnap her. Unfortunately, Babi is spotted leaving by a strict teacher and threatened with expulsion the next day. Her rich-as-fuck parents make a generous contribution to the school, though, so it's all good.

H to the rescue. When Babi tells him what happened, he takes it upon himself to play the hero. H and his friend, Pollo (Álvaro Cervantes) kidnap the teacher's dog and threaten her not to give Babi any trouble. H exhibits many of the typical abusive boyfriend signs: Each time he roid rages out, he does something nice for Babi to make it up to her. In one such instance, he freaks out and takes his bike down a winding highway at breakneck speeds with Babi on the back screaming her head off. To make it up to her, he breaks into a house at the beach and the two of them start playing house there.

There are several moments in the film where the viewer may be completely convinced that the plot is about to take a moralistic turn. Is this really an admonishment against destructive relationships? No! No it is not. She forgives him. Every time. When she does finally break it off, it seems almost unrelated to the fact that he's been manipulating and abusing her.

The only moral I could manage to draw out of this story is that if you are a controlling, crazy parent (Babi's mom), your kid might rebel by almost getting herself killed by her psycho boyfriend on a regular basis. Another weird twist of events, though, is when her father goes to tell H that he can't see Babi anymore. H manages to charm the father to the point that I was left wondering whether the father wanted to make out with H.

There are so many more bizarre moments in this movie, that I couldn't even begin to cover them all here, but I've made a little synopsis of the plot in cartoon form with the basics. You have to see it for yourself. You will laugh so hard you may pee yourself. The shit that Babi does in this movie make Bella Swan look like the poster child for healthy life choices. H is Edward without the guilt complex or practiced self-control. In conclusion, fear for our youth.

Well, here we are again... wasting my time. I just read (skimmed) a history of the internet. Like I give a damn. That was my limit. Time to retreat back to my blog.

So, I can't figure out if this is a moment of culture clash, my inner type A taking over my life, or what; but today has been an exercise in shaking my head in disappointment. I just can't seem to wrap my brain around the idea that a group of adults, supposedly responsible for the education of young people, can actually allow themselves to lose control of a situation on a massive scale.

Let me back up: We've been taking yearbook photos recently. They're really rather cute, but a huge waste of time. If you tell the teachers what you want, when it needs to happen, etc; then we should be able to organize everything and it takes less time, right? Not according to the computer teacher who is, at least in name, in charge of these photos. No, it's better to just call everyone out of class and have them mill about for 40 minutes while they could be learning things until they decide to take the picture. Because THAT makes the most sense. According to our natural teacher instinct, we even attempted to facilitate the process, but since we were all going on differing perceptions of what needed to be done: chaos ensued. Really, the icing on the cake is when the students groan and say, "This is just going to be a waste of time, though." Yeah, I know.

I think what really gets under my skin is this:

"La no planificación es la planificación al fracaso." Which for my monolingual readers (what readers, haha) is "Not planning is planning for failure," and this is something that has been used to admonish teachers at my school time and time again. So why doesn't it apply to the administration/coordination when it comes time for them to plan things in advance? I think that the following cartoon illustrates fairly well the answer.

And the history/overview of the internet for those of you who are new here:

Open publication - Free publishing - More diplomado