1 month

Judah had his 1 month check up today. He's 5.7 pounds and 19 inches long now. The doctor said he was focusing well and he'll follow you with his eyes but only for about 45°. He had to get a shot so there was 15 seconds of crying after that. The doctor said everything looks great so I'm a happy momma! Right now he's my complexion it's fun to see him get darker and darker. The skin on his face is peeling now so all that hair covering his face that made him look like wolverine is slowly going away.

At 3 weeks I transitioned Judah from eating every 2 hours (sometimes 3) to eating every 4 hours (sometimes 3). My mom had to convince me I wasn't going to starve him and he'd let me know if he was really hungry. The longer breaks between feedings have been wonderful. Once I even slept for 5 hours straight. That was some good sleep.

Judah's a good baby, I think I'll keep him around for awhile.

First father's day

As you can see by the bright eyes in the picture, Judah's eye infection healed up. We've been making him wear mittens most of the time now until he learns not to put his fingers in his eyes.

MrC and I went to the Wharf with my dad yesterday morning and got a bushel of crabs for a father's day feast. MrC had never been to the wharf so I knew my dad would delight in going with us and talking MrC's ear off. Then my dad showed MrC how to steam crabs. MrC got dressed for war. He had on his work boots, a work out shirt, and he folded his pants up like he was really about to do something intense.

My SIL and niece came over to bring MrC a strawberry shortcake and stayed to watch How to train your dragon. They both lost their fathers, so I think they just wanted to be with family yesterday.

Weekend Activities

I thought I posted this last night. Guess I fell asleep sooner than I thought...

Friday Judah's eye was draining liquid. Then it started swelling. Then it was draining puss. It was disgusting. His doctor said they couldn't fit him in on Friday, but they really wanted me to get him checked so they told me to take him to urgent care that day. So I called urgent care at 4. They said be there at 5 for paperwork and his appointment would be at 5:20. At 5:19 the nurse was coming in to check my baby. His temp and weight were fine (he was 4 pounds 15 ounces) so we waited for the doctor to check his eye out. When the doctor touched his eye to look in it, grossness came out so he ran to get swabs to do a culture. He decided it was an infection so we have drops for his eyes now and they'll call us with the culture results tomorrow to make sure these drops are going to get the job done. We were out of there with the prescription by 6. It was a delightful experience. Poor Judah is now confined to mittens because he sticks his fingers in his eyes constantly and that's probably how they got infected. 

Saturday morning we went to our house inspection! We go to closing on June 30. We're so excited. The inspection went well. We get the full report by Wednesday, but the inspector didn't find anything major wrong with the house. The inspection took almost 3 hours, and the dude was thorough as heck. MrC was following him around talking his ear off the entire time. I got tired after the first 2 rooms and kept sitting down not paying attention. I just need to wash the house down to get rid of their germs and grime and the house is move in ready. 

I want to have a "Life is Sweet" dessert party for people to come see the house and see Judah, but I don't know how quickly we'll be able to do that. The house needs some landscaping. I don't think I'm ready to actually plant anything, but if we pull up the weeds and add some fertilizer, then I think we'll be ready for guests. I apologize if this post isn't coherent, I'm quite tired, but I'm too busy watching the game and folks have been over here visiting all day so I haven't slept. Judah should be waking up in a minute so after this next nursing session I'm going to go to bed. 

Labor: part 3

I opened my eyes at 6 a.m. and asked what was going on. Then I started moaning in pain. I was so freaking out of it. The nurse magically appeared by my bedside and she said she wanted me to sit on the ball to help move my labor along. The contractions were even more intense than before, and I didn't think that was even possible. When the contractions were coming I didn't want to hear any talking or any noise. It was so funny because the contraction would start, MrC would say something and I'd look at him and hiss  "shut up!" and then when the contraction was over I'd apologize. Once, he wouldn't shut up, so I hit him. Yep, I was delightful!  After the contraction was over I caressed his face and apologized, but everybody realized they needed to be quiet when I was going through. Whatever anybody had to say wasn't important enough for me to listen while my insides were being squeezed. The nurse put me on the ball and MrC sat behind me holding me. The nurse told me to do a deep moan every time a contraction came. My goodness, that worked. Then she told everybody to just talk me through the contraction. They would look at the screen and see when it peaked and tell me it was almost over and I was coming down. That was really helpful too, I liked knowing once the peak passed.My ma said my eyes rolled back a few times and she thought I was going to have a seizure, lol.  I couldn't stay on the ball long because the monitors were going crazy and the nurses watching the screens were getting nervous, so she put me back on the bed. I didn't feel like being flat so I got on all fours and told her I really wanted to push. Everybody came over and held me and I remember saying "I've got to change my mindset, because right now I feel like I can't do this." Once I said it aloud, I was able to cope. I kept telling myself the intensity will soon be over. Childbirth does not hurt, it's just tiring. And that I could do it. The nurse came over and checked me when I finally got in the bed correctly and I was 9.5 centimeters dilated. Her eyes got wide, she pushed the button for the nurses to come running in and they called my doctor. Nobody expected this to be happening right now. Lights flew on, equipment was wheeled in, and they told me I better not push. Once I realized that I was in such discomfort because the end was near, it didn't hurt anymore.  I was able to relax because I knew my body listened to me.The on call doctor came in and checked me and broke my water. It made me laugh. Then I got the sillies. Every time I moaned I reminded myself of the episode of "My Wife and Kids" when Michael told Calvin to just say "Mmmmmm, is that right?" whenever his wife talked, so that's what I kept doing. After every moan,  I would laugh, point and say "is that right?" 

Nurse: Hey, that sounds like pushing. I told you not to push

Me: It is pushing, I feel like pushing so I'm going to push

Nurse 2: Lawd! Let me put on some gloves in case she shoots this baby out

On Call Doc: *I'm not delivering this baby, goes and stands outside the door*

Nurse: Your doctor is coming, just wait

Me: You guys are more than capable of delivering this baby, let's just do this. 

Nurse 2 took the position of standing by my HoHah watching me, but nobody in the room would touch me. Then I ripped off my clothes. Why? Cuz I felt like it. They kept trying to cover me and I kept swatting them away. It was much more comfortable to be free. I also started randomly praying. I said a prayer that the delivery would be quick, Judah would be healthy, and some other random stuff. My doctor came running in the room mad as heck. 

Doctor: Nobody even told me she was in labor

Nurse: Nobody knew she progressed really quickly! She was asleep. 

My doctor sat down at my HoHah, and a person grabbed each leg.

Nurse: When the contraction comes, go chin to chest, hold your breath and push.

Me: ok *tried it* oops, wait, I messed up, let me try again. *tried again*

Doctor and Sister: His head is coming out!

Nurse: Do you want to see.

Me: Ewww, no. I took my glasses off an hour ago, I have no desire to watch this part *pushes again*

Doctor: Ok, wait for the next contraction to push

Me: I don't want to wait, can I just push now?

Doctor: You can do whatever you want

Me: *pushes*

Everybody: You're done!

Seriously, from the time I got off the ball to the time I pushed him out seemed like 5 minutes but I guess it was at least 30 since he wasn't born until 7:02. At some point somebody put a towel over my boobs, I guess they'd had enough of my peep show. They didn't give Judah to me right away because they didn't expect him to be so tiny. They did some quick checks on him and cleaned him up before giving him to me. I got to hold him for a while and then MrC and the nurse wheeled him to the nursery. We started laughing with the night nurse because I told her she was going to be there when I delivered and she did not believe me when I first said it. I thanked everybody and my doctor disappeared (she was in a funky foul mood.) The day nurse came in and apparently they had been talking about me. 

New Nurse: Girl, I heard you're a rock star!

Me: Who me?

New Nurse: yeah you. Did you go to any classes?

Me: No, I read some books

New Nurse: What books did you read, we need everybody to act like you

Me: *looking confused* Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and Supernatural Childbirth. They talked a lot about the mental aspect of labor and delivery

New Nurse: *writes them down* Seriously, we need every mom to be like you. You did awesome. 

Me: Oh, well thanks. Can I order breakfast now? 

And that was it. My mom said that she was getting mad at everybody when they wouldn't just deliver me when I was clearly ready. She didn't want to fuss because she knew that would bring me stress. She thinks everybody was scared of my doctor and that's why they refused to touch me. Maybe they were all offended by my nekkidness. In the end it didn't matter because all was well, and I could totally do this 3 more times as long as I get to visit heaven's relief section for a few hours break!

Sleep and smile

My sweet baby

Labor: Part 2

We got to the hospital and I went to check myself in. The lady looked at me and said she thought I forgot about them and wasn't coming. There was another couple sitting there waiting to be checked in and we started talking and joking around. Her doctor made her come over because her BP was really high and they were going to induce her too. She was maddddd about it. We talked for a good little while over some delicious free fruit punch from the nourishment room. Eventually we each got put in our rooms and I got started with my nurse. Everybody kept asking me if I was dilated. Was I supposed to watch a you tube video and be checking myself nightly? I had no idea so we had to wait for my doctor to come check me. My first nurse was quite lovely! I let her know she didn't need to explain anything she was doing to me, just tell me to look away and handle the business while I'm distracted. She did a great job with the IV stuff and getting my blood drawn. My doctor came in and checked me. I wasn't dilated at all so she was going to start the cervix softening medication. It's a shoe string that she sticks way up in your HoHah. Wayyyy up there. I was not pleased with her big ole fingers digging around in there. She got me started on that at 2:30. MrC and I were just chilling in the room watching tv and hanging out. They said I could eat so I ordered some dinner and we sat around and waited. 

That evening my night nurse came. She was a black Christian lady that served in the military and was so friendly. By then my ma had come to the hospital so we all just sat around and talked. I decided that I really liked her and I wanted her to be my nurse when I had Judah so that meant he needed to be born before she got off at 7:30. I had a little talk with Jesus and Judah to let them know the plan and then I went back to relaxing. The contractions started to intensify and come a lot more frequently by 10pm. They had to come put me on oxygen because Judah still wasn't digging the contractions. They were coming every 2 minutes I was getting uncomfortable. My ma and sister went upstairs to go nap. MrC cut on my worship music and we spent some time praying and reading scriptures. I had some frankincense and sweet almond oil that MrC rubbed on my back to help alleviate the pain. I even had him hook up my diffuser and put in a "chill pill" oil mix to help me calm down. After we finished praying I decided to try and get in a little nap. I put on my eye mask and sprayed my pillow and sheets with lavender to get some rest. Maybe around 1 I started getting REALLY uncomfortable and asked MrC to tell my ma and sister to come back down. I was at the point where I just wanted to cry. They kept asking me my pain on a scale of 1-10 but I have no idea what 10 pain feels like so I didn't know what to say. Thankfully I was on twitter and half my timeline was up with me :) Everybody was offering encouragement and helping me understand pain, lol. I felt like I was being dramatic and I refused to be one of those hollering women on tv, so I was just trying to deal with the discomfort.One mom said to me "the moment you feel like you're about to jump out the bed to escape the pain, that's when you're ready. Don't be afraid to ask for pain medication. It's ok. Your body is working really hard." My nurse kept saying the same thing. Since my labor wasn't started naturally, the medication was fighting with my body anyway, so the pain was going to be a little more intense. I started throwing up but I really enjoyed that part because I felt great after it. MrC was holding my bowl, my ma or my sister would rub my back, and then MrC would ask questions like "when did you eat ham?"  At 2:30 they took out the cervix softening medication and I had an hour before they would start the pitocin. I looked at the nurse and told her I didn't want to feel contractions that were worse than what I was currently feeling and I wanted an epidural. She told me it was too early and checked to see if I had dilated any. I was 1 centimeter dilated. She had to stick her hand allllll up in there because Judah's head was so low and he was blocking what she needed to check. She told me she'd have to sit me on the ball a little later to try and get my body going because it was going to be a while, but once I started Judah would probably come quickly because of his position. I decided to stop tripping and remember the stuff I read in my birthing books. I needed to calm the heck down, so on my hour break, I took a shower. 

The contractions were SO intense by now and 1 minute apart. MrC sat outside of the shower and I sat down in the shower and we both fell asleep. When I would wake up I repeated to myself "this is what your body was created to do. God knew what he was doing. It's not pain, it's just intensity. Stay calm, your body will respond as it should." I refused to think any negative thoughts that would hinder my body from responding as it should. When I finally got out of the shower MrC gave me a rub down with sweet almond oil and I got back in the bed. At 3:30 the nurse started the pitocin. And I'm pretty sure I blacked out. I have no recollection of 4-6 a.m. I might have died. Or maybe Jesus took me to heaven to give me some relief. I have no idea, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't in the room anymore. 

Labor: Part 1

Alright, here's my labor and delivery story :) It's long. Well it's not long, but I'm feeling talkative. I'll post it in parts.

Picture this: Sunday, May 22, 2011. My parent's house. Late evening. 

Ma: Why don't you have pants on?

MrC: We aren't at home, put your pants on!

Me: But it feels like Judah is about to fall out of my va.gin.a. It's uncomfortable with pants on, so I took them off.

MrC: You're nasty

Monday Morning. The Count's apartment.

I was feeling so lazy Monday morning. I was hoping to be in and out of my doctor's appointment really quickly. Got there and passed the first series of tests then went back for the non stress test. While hooked up to the test I had a contraction. Judah did not like it at all. His heart decelerated after the contraction. The nurse went and showed StalkerDramaDr. StalkerDramaDr walked in 5 minutes later and said 

StaklerDramaDr: Well, MrsC, we're going to go ahead and have this baby today.

Me: What???

StalkerDramaDr: Yeah, you're at 36 weeks. We see the fetus didn't like the contraction and at this point we don't want to risk anything. Let's just get him out healthy. Head on over to the hospital. 

Me: Well alright then.

Nurse: It might not be today, induction can take awhile. Tell your family not to rush

Me: Shooot, if I have to be there, they have to be there too. I'm calling them right now.

Me (to front desk ladies): Well guys, I guess this is goodbye. It's been real, I'm about to head over and have the baby *waiting room of pregnant women look up at me in a panic*

FDL: Awww! We're going to miss you. You've been one of the most bubbly pleasant patients we've had in along time. We'll miss seeing you every other day. 

Me: Thanks for all your help these past few months. I appreciate y'all.

Then I got in my car and called MrC.

Me: Hey babe, we're about to have a baby

MrC: Whatt?

Me: Yeah, she told me to go to the hospital now. Judah didn't like the ONE contraction I had during the test.

MrC; So what are you about to do?

Me: Go home. I got stuff to do.

MrC: I knew it. I'm on my way

Then I called my momma:

Me: Wanna meet your grandchild today?

Ma: Whattt?

Me: Yeah, I'm about to get induced. Well after I go home first.

Ma: I'm on my way.

So then I went home. And proceeded to tweet about it. And make pulled pork sandwiches and french fries. And send my time sheet in to work. And dance nekkid in the middle of the floor (of course that's when MrC came home and demanded I get focused.) And then I took a shower, shaved, exfoliated, and greased myself up. By the time I finished that my ma was there. I danced around for a bit more and then we headed over to the hospital.