Hellllloooo Ladies!!

Lets just say that the last month has been interesting and entertaining for Justin and I.  Once Oliver became a toddler his social butterfly tendencies and personality have come out full force.  Oliver has always been interested in other people and has never minded being held by unfamiliar people.  Now that he is starting to make different sounds and can change the volume and pitch of his voice he enjoys using it.
We recently returned from our first family vacation out in Estes Park, Colorado.  Oliver spent the hikes in a carrier on our backs.  I think he thought it was a throne.  As soon as we hit the first trail Oliver started his welcome wagon routine.  He "talked" to everyone he saw.  He was so excited a few times that he sprayed the back of my neck with spit after demonstrating his outstanding raspberry blowing abilities.  He kicked us, pulled our hair or hats, and screamed in our ears in his excitement to see all these people.  If someone did not acknowledge him he would stare them down until they were out of his field of vision.  He would eventually pass out and take a nap, usually about 10 minutes before we arrived at our destination.  After his brief catnap he was refreshed and ready to continue his greetings.
Fast forward to this past Sunday.  Oliver pulled out all the stops to impress the 7 month old little girl sitting behind us.  She was very serious and unimpressed with Oliver's efforts.  As soon as she and her mother sat down behind us Oliver's eyes lit up.  He got a HUGE grin on his face and began "talking" to her.  She did not respond.  He started his peek-a-boo routine in an effort to win her over, once again he fell flat.  He decided that perhaps she just hadn't heard him so he increased the volume.  Again he got nothing from her.  He was getting desperate.  He figured that he might as well show her his A game and show her just how much he can drool while eating crackers and talking at the same time.  She was unimpressed.  He tried to give her a dose of her own medicine and ignored her for a whole 5 minutes (yeah that would show her!).  Finally he couldn't stand it anymore and whipped around and stood holding onto the back of the pew staring at her and showing her all of his teeth and proceeded to grind them together in his effort to impress her.  He ran through his act again only at a much, much louder volume.  I think his plan was to wear her down over time.  My husband and I tried to distract him and keep his professions of love to an inside volume.  He would not be deterred and we began to sweat and think about taking him out to sit in the library for the remainder of the service.  Then a lovely distraction happened and the offering plate was passed.  Oliver was enthralled with the ushers and could not take his eyes off of them.  Ahhhh sweet silence.  Once the offering was done it was game on again.  Thankfully the service was almost done at that point.
I think Justin and I will have our hands full when our social butterfly gets older and can walk.  I would advise parents to lock up their daughters. 

Happy Birthday Baby Boy!

Dear Oliver,
One year ago today you entered this world.  It was not how either of us wanted to start off our relationship.  I so wanted to snuggle and kiss you and let you know that all was right with the world.  Unfortunately, you went from me to a plastic box.  Your daddy was so proud to have a son, and walked with you to your new home.  We both had to wait to have those special Hallmark moments with you.  Perhaps Hallmark should develop a line of preemie cards to celebrate those unique preemie milestones. 
I was allowed to hold you long before I worked up the nerve to kiss you (I was so afraid of giving you germs).  Your daddy and I were terrified of you getting sick, you were so tiny and fragile, but you had a feisty side.  You were such a strong boy through all those weeks laying in your fish tank and hooked up to various noise makers.  You took all those needle pokes, ultrasounds, and eye exams in stride.  I felt like I needed to witness these events as they were part of your story.  It made me ache inside to hear you cry in protest and pain and know that I could not comfort you. 
I know in so many ways you were so much stronger than I was.  Most days I just wanted to grab you and take you home and forget about the nightmare our life had become.  You had so much to overcome and you did it!   
You came home and did wonderful.  You kept daddy and I on our toes.  Daddy and I love to give you snuggles and kisses.  Your personality is coming out everyday and we love to watch you explore your world. 
We are so glad that we were chosen to be your parents.  Your daddy and I have loved to watch you grow and change in this past year.  You are a true survivor and have shown us just how precious life is.

We love you so very much,
Mommy and Daddy 

Moo

A few months ago I submitted my story of my breastfeeding experience to a blog I follow.  You can check it out here.   I wrote it on a whim and didn't really think that it would be selected.  Well it was, and I was excited and nervous I hadn't yet opened up to others about the struggles I was going through.  Writing this post was my first step towards starting this blog.  The feedback was positive and I heard from many mothers who had similar experiences and thought they were alone.  The most important thing for me was a feeling of letting go of some of the baggage I had been dragging around.  I was in therapy at this point, but writing this really helped me feel like healing emotionally was possible.

An Empty Tank

Jean Watts

When a woman embarks on the adventure of pregnancy she never thinks about the struggles she may face.  I was that woman, I had visions of a natural childbirth and a baby that would latch on and start nursing within moments of birth.  I had plans to breastfeed my baby for at least a year, because that is what the women in my family all did.  Unfortunately, that easy natural birth was not to be.  I began having complications at 20 weeks and by 21 weeks was on hospital bedrest an hour and half away from home.  I delivered my son, Oliver, at 27 weeks 4 days by emergency C-section. 

My mindset had to suddenly and violently shift, I was no longer pregnant and my focus was now on producing milk for my tiny son.  I remember being propped up by my mother and a nurse to start pumping hours after the c-section.  I was determined to provide milk for my child.  I was terrified about my son developing NEC and knew that preemies that were formula fed had 18 times higher chance of developing this devastating infection. 

I had visions of producing gallons of milk for him.  The reality of my supply slapped me in the face the next day.  I would hook myself up to the pump and think about my child and hope for the milk to flow.  I was unprepared for the few drips that deposited themselves in the bottles.  I felt like my body had let me down on so many levels.  I was unable to carry a child to term, and now I was struggling to produce milk for him.  Matters were further complicated by a nasty infection I was fighting that had caused me to deliver early, each time I spiked a fever my already meager supply went down.  It would take a day or two for it to return to “normal” which was only at the most a half ounce from both breasts.  I was also concerned about the massive amounts of antibiotics and pain medications in my system being in my breast milk.  The doctors and nurses all assured me that they would not hurt my baby but it still worried me.  My life revolved around pumping every 3 hours round the clock, I had a love hate relationship with my pump.   

The lactation consultants were my angels, one in particular kept a close eye on me.  They followed all the NICU moms who were pumping.  They introduced me to the lactation room once I was finally discharged.  It took me a few weeks before I was fully comfortable pumping with other women in the room.  The lactation room was somewhat of a haven from the craziness of the NICU.  It was dimly lit and quite.  The women I met in that room became my support network.  We were all going through the same things and understood the emotional rollercoaster when you have a baby in the NICU.  It also showed me how low my supply was when compared to the other women.  I discussed this with my lactation consultant and embarked on a new adventure of trying to increase my supply.  I started taking fenugreek, keeping a log, hot showers, massaging my breasts, eating oatmeal, and drank a few beers, kangarooing when possible, and power pumping.

The addition of power pumping made for interesting evenings.  I would watch late night television and I would pump in 5 to 10 minute increments for one hour.  Power pumping gradually increased my supply and after a few weeks I was able to pump about 2 ounces each time.  It was a slow increase but an increase none the less; my son was getting breast milk for half of his feedings.  I was hopeful that I would be able to increase enough so that he would not need supplementation.  My other goal was that I wanted to have a supply so that when my son was strong enough I would be able to nurse him.  I desperately wanted that experience.

The day finally arrived when his neonatologist gave the okay to nurse my son one time a day.  I was beyond excited, but very nervous.  I had never breastfed and didn’t know how to start, plus he was still on oxygen and had an oral gastric tube.  His nurse called the lactation consultant to come and help me.  I was told to not get my hopes up since he was still so little and had all the tubes which might affect his ability to sufficiently suck.  The lactation consultant came for his next feeding and helped me position my son and he did the rest.  He surprised us all by latching on like a champ.  It was a wonderful experience and felt so much better than the pump.  Everyone said that once he could nurse my supply would increase, unfortunately that did not happen.  I still nursed him whenever I could, but mostly had to pump when he was in the NICU.  He was on a high calorie diet so we had to fortify the breast milk to 27 calories.  Once he was discharged I would nurse him then offer him a bottle.

At my 6 week post partum visit my midwife prescribed Reglan to help my supply.  The medication worked for me but unfortunately I also suffered from some of the side effects mostly horrible anxiety.  I took the medication for two months and then decided that I needed to stop taking it since I was not sleeping due to the anxiety.

Ultimately I was able to give my son 5 months of breast milk before my supply dried up.  It was a difficult and sad decision to stop nursing him.  I still wrestle with my feelings of failure and inadequacy.  I know that he got breast milk when it counted the most, and he is now a healthy, thriving, formula fed little boy.  Someday I will be at peace with my struggle.

Does time REALLY heal all wounds?

In two short days Oliver will be 11 months old.  I keep thinking about how I am feeling.  Yes, the acute phase of the "wound" is over.  BUT there is still pain associated with it, especially when someone pokes at it.  I find myself thinking of how a wound heals thin scab, thicker scab, pink new skin, and finally a firm scar.  I think right now I am in between the thin scab and the thick scab.  When you push on it or pick at it, it hurts and sometimes bleeds.  Yesterday I found my "wound" bleeding a bit.  I was looking through a catalog of cloth diapers and all the babies were super cute and super chubby; typical Gerber babies.  Some were so chubby that they looked like the Michelin man.  I always thought that I would have one of those babies.  Let me tell you that my genetic pool is filled to the brim with big, strong, German stock.  Yes, I know that Oliver still has the potential of truly expressing those genes.  It is just hard to see that when he still fits nicely into 3/6 month shirts, he does wear 9-12 month pants but only because we use cloth diapers so his bum is fluffy.  Just a warning, if one more person tells me that I am lucky because Oliver will get the chance to wear out his clothes, I will scratch your eyes out.  I did laugh a bit when his pedi told me to limit his formula intake so that he would eat more solids.  Personally, I feel that Oliver eating some extra calories is not going to harm him.  I make his food and I try and give him higher calorie foods, not that he always eat them.   
I was reading the Baby 411 book last night and there is a section about preemies in there.  I am seriously, seriously hoping that what I read was a typo.  The author wrote that parents should not worry since most preemies catch up to their peers by the time they are 1 year old!!!  Ummmm....Most preemies I know barely catch up by the time they are 2 years old.  It has been my observation that more of the preemie population catch up by the time they enter kindergarten.  Some of the micro preemies take even longer, and some do not catch up at all.  It is the general rule of thumb that preemies are given a cushion for looking at their development until they are 2 years old.  After working in peds for 8 years I found that for preemies born before 30 weeks that 2 year mark is not enough.  We have to take into account that when this magic cushion was put in place micro preemies did not survive.  As an OT I had many discussions with parents of preemies about how once their baby turned 2 they may suddenly see a significant delay on paper.  Most of these children did keep following their own developmental curve so in fact I feel they were not actually delayed.  Perhaps we as a population need to take another look at how we evaluate  the developmental milestones of our preemies.  Is it really fair to assume that a baby born at 34 weeks and a baby born at 24 weeks will both acquire 2 year old skills at the same time?  The answer is simple, NO.  It is my hope that in the near future the medical community will acknowledge this and make some changes.

So I am wondering, how much time will it take to heal my wound?  I operate under the assumption that the larger the wound the longer it will take to heal.  Some wounds never fully heal and some heal on the surface but still cause pain.  I worry that this wound will keep reopening and will never fully heal.

Reflections

As some of you are aware today marks the day I was admitted to the Antepartum unit at OSF last year.  I was nervous of this day, I wasn't sure how I would feel.  Last year this day was so charged with raw emotion and terror. There are a few days this summer that make me slightly apprehensive, the big one being Oliver's birthday.  I had discussed this with my therapist during my last session with her.  She suggested acknowledging that there is still some residual sadness, but to not allow myself to dwell on it.  I will admit that this morning I got a little teary thinking about what happened last year.  After that brief moment I decided to continue with my day.  There was laundry to be done and a little guy to take care of.  Oliver and I also took a bike ride to enjoy the sunshine.
As I was reflecting on things this morning I remembered some silly things people have said to me over this past year.  My favorite is: "I could NEVER be on bedrest for 6 weeks!  I don't know how you did it.  I would be going crazy."  I still get this response when people find out about my bed rest.  I just smile and tell them "Yes you can and you would."  I know that I did not go crazy because I went into survival mode.  Basically, my brain shifted gears and took all that junk that I couldn't deal with at the moment and put it away for me to process much later. 
I could not have imagined how different and yet the same my life would be.  There is no way you can go through an experience like this and not be changed.  I acknowledge that I needed a lot of help to get through this past year.  I have learned a lot about myself and other people.  I have moved through different stages of grief.  I now feel like I am at a place of acceptance about what happened to Oliver.  That doesn't mean that I don't still feel sadness and guilt, I think there will always be some of that, but I have been able to let some of it go.  I still hold my breath each time he is placed on a scale, hoping that he is gaining weight at an acceptable rate.  I feel a sense of relief each time he does something new.  At the same time I still watch him like a hawk for atypical movements and behaviors.  I also still check on him every night before going to bed to make sure he is okay.  I am slooooowly relaxing about him and sitting back a bit so that I can enjoy him in all his baby glory.  It has taken me a year but I am really looking forward to the future with Oliver and Justin.  I am enjoying doing "normal" kid things with Ollie: bike rides, swimming, playing in the sandbox, reading books, sitting in the grass, blowing raspberries on his tummy, and getting slobbery kisses.   
This time last year I could not let myself dream of these things. 

Perhaps I should stop watching documentaries

My husband and I recently subscribed to Netflix and I am addicted.  I love finding all these documentaries and I cannot get enough of them.  Well last night I found The Business of Being Born.  It was a movie I had been wanting to watch for awhile.  I thought it was a great piece of work with a lot of good information.  I was not prepared for all the memories that washed over me when I was watching it.  It brought me back to the place I was a year ago, pregnant and planning on an unmedicated, midwife assisted birth.  As I sat there I couldn't help but feel a sense of grief over the way my birth happened and all future births will have to happen.
I totally identified with the woman in the film who wanted a home birth and ended up with a section due to her baby being breech.  Her baby ended up in the NICU due to growth restriction.  She discussed her struggles with bonding and difficulties with breastfeeding.  It was refreshing to hear someone give voice to those feelings that so many of us NICU mamas feel and don't talk about. Breastfeeding in the NICU is EXTREMELY difficult.  I will get into that in a different post.
Don't get me wrong, I know that the only way Oliver was coming out was through my abdomen.  I am not in denial about the seriousness of the situation that caused him to be born that way.  I know that it was written in the stars that this was the path he had to take to come into this world.  If he had arrived any other way then he would be a different person.  Due to the type of incision I had to have all future babies will have to be sections as well.  Sometimes I feel like I almost have to justify why I had a section.  I have to remind myself periodically that there was no other option.  Positionally there was no way he was coming out and his butt was acting much like a cork in a bottle.
I have already written about how I let my fear get in the way of making better decisions.  I know so many women who let fear guide them in their decisions about their birth plans.  As a society we let fear influence a majority of our decisions.  Fear of pain, fear of being sued, fear of the reactions of others, fear of the unknown, fear of loss of control.  It is a shame that we as a country have go so far away from letting women's bodies do what they were designed to do.  Sometimes you can intervene too much.  It was not that long ago (my mother's generation) that women were tied down during labor.  Talk about not being helpful and how degrading. 
So perhaps the medical community needs to take a deep breath and take a step back and support women in their decisions to have a more natural experience.  As a society we should be preparing women more for labor to help take some of the fear away from giving birth.  I remember discussing birthing classes with my midwife and she told me that the one offered through the hospital was more designed to teach women how to be good patients and not how to birth.  I feel there is something very wrong with the fact that a "birthing class" would not properly prepare a woman to give birth. 
As a society we seem to be losing touch with the natural rhythms of our bodies.  Births are primarily done in a hospital setting on a strict timeline.  Breastfeeding is still not fully considered the norm.  Look at it this way if there were no doctors or hospitals babies would still be born.  If there was no more formula, babies would still be fed. 
Okay stepping down off the soapbox now.

To everything there is a season

Lately some events have occurred that have both saddened and given me peace.  It has really brought the concept of life seasons into focus.  Two very dear people in my life have recently departed this world.  My grandfather and a good friend.  Papa had been slowly approaching the end of his life for sometime.  As it was clear that he would not be with us much longer I made in effort to take Oliver over to see his great grandfather.  We would usually stop in to see he and my grandmother after our morning workout class.  I always found it amusing that Papa thought that he had gotten to hold Oliver at one time.  He was very shaky and weak so we didn't let him hold Ollie.  He would tell us from time to time "I've held him, but Anna hasn't."  It was almost like the child's chant na na na boo boo at my grandmother.  We just let him think that he had held Ollie because really what was the harm in it.  Papa was adamant that he did not ever want to be put in a nursing home, and he got his wish.  He was able to stay at home with 24 hour care and in the end hospice became involved to keep him comfortable.  He died early one morning in his home with his wife and two of his children and a daughter in law by his side.
One of my cousins took a picture of Oliver and Papa the day before Papa died.  Papa was in his bed and my mom had put Oliver in bed with him while Papa was eating a banana.  Bananas are Oliver's most favorite food and he did not feel it was fair that Papa got to have one and he didn't.  So in those last few hours of life Papa and Oliver shared a banana.  It is a wonderful picture and I am so glad to have it.  It was such a special moment that at Papa's funeral the pastor talked about it.  How in that one instance there was the beginning of life and the end of life.  The taking of first breaths and the taking of last breaths.  The pastor discussed the sharing of the banana as similar to communion.
I have been forever grateful that Papa lived long enough to meet his great grandson.  I have discussed my fears in the early days of Oliver's life where I was not sure that he would be able to come home. 

This week we said goodbye to one of Oliver's "aunties".  Jan was a member of our church and for as long as I can remember she has been a friend of ours.  Jan was such a special woman and always so happy and kind.  Jan was part of the prayer group at church and also visited people who were sick.  She and our other friend Sunny made the trip down to Peoria to see me before Oliver was born.  She would send me cards in the mail as well during my time in pregnant lady jail.  The thing that I will remember the most about Jan was that she was so excited and happy to hear of Oliver's birth.  She was the only one and I think it was because she knew that he would be alright.    Since she passed several people have told me that she was so excited to spread the word of Oliver's birth and just thought that it was wonderful that he was here.  That is not the usual reaction for a baby born so early.  Jan and Sunny came to visit Oliver in the NICU when he was about two or three weeks old.  My mom and Jan sat together beside Ollie's fish tank while I went and pumped.  When I got back I stayed out in the hallway with Sunny visiting with her and looking at mom, Jan, and Ollie through the window.  Sunny told me that Jan was so very excited to come down and see Oliver that it was all she would talk about for days leading up to the visit.
During Jan's funeral service Oliver was mentioned again.  During Jan's last few months my mom would take Oliver over to visit when I went to the Y.  The pastor discussed how holding Oliver would give Jan a feeling of peace.  I am glad that she was able to have some comfort in her final moments.  Once again I was presented with the dawn and twilight of life.  It is my hope that Oliver will be able to continue to provide peace and comfort to others as he progresses through the seasons of his life.