8 weeks already?

I have been a very neglectful blogging mother. I guess I can't even call myself a blogging mother when almost two months lapse between posts. I didn't even post to announce the arrival of another cousin, Mr. Nathaniel Robert Buker, who made his appearance June 28 -- 3 days before his scheduled c-section and 10 days before his due date! Here's a photo of Jenni's boys -- William, Jonathan, and new Nathan. When we went to visit, Jonathan kept telling us that "thems babies match." It was so precious.


Motherhood has been quite the rollercoaster, which I knew it would be. Most days consist of just trying to make it through. Now that Aly is awake a lot more, I do my best to keep her entertained. We'll go from bouncy chair to tummy time to this awesome animal tunnel to swing to just walking around and looking at stuff. I wish I could take her for walks during the day, but it's too darn hot!

I took Aly to a company picnic to show her off, and I was asked what surprised me most about motherhood. I didn't have an answer at the time. After the picnic, I went to visit Melissa, who used to work with me at Goodwill, and she asked the same question. After some thought, I came up with an answer.

What surprised me most was the overwhelming emotion that comes over me when my baby is hurt. While we were in Massachusetts for Nathan's arrival, Jonathan was showing Aly a toy. He is always so gentle with her, but on this occasion he flipped the toy out, and the hard plastic hit her in the forehead. Without thinking, I said, "Don't hit her!" and she immediately started to cry. Jonathan went running to his room and cried too. I couldn't go console him and tell him she was fine because I was also crying! I couldn't control it. Aly stopped crying after 30 seconds, but I cried for 5 minutes. I just went into the bathroom for privacy and let it all out. A few days later, Aly had her 1-month checkup and had to get a shot. The shot went in, she screamed bloody murder, and I almost lost it again. I guess it's a good thing Jonathan had accidentally hit her, or I would have lost it in the doctor's office. It is so hard to see your baby in pain, and I had no idea how hard until now. I hear it never gets any easier.

One of my favorite things about being a mommie is seeing my baby happy. She has started smiling and cooing a lot more over the past week, and it just melts my heart. She woke up at 5:30am the other morning bright eyed and bushy tailed, and she was smiling and cooing at everything. I told her she's lucky she's so darn cute, because I sure didn't want to be awake that early!

People often ask me how Aly is sleeping, so I'll touch on that too. Her pattern has been to take a nap around 7pm and then stay up till 2am. When she finally goes to sleep, she gives me a good 5 or 6 hours. She wakes to eat, then sleeps another 2 or 3 hours depending on the first stretch. Since I return to work in 3 weeks, I'm trying to adjust her schedule so that she goes to bed at a more reasonable hour. For two nights, I was successful and she went to sleep just before 10. She wasn't pleased with me screwing with her schedule though, and she got back at me the following night by staunchly refusing to sleep. I finally got her to give me a 45-minute stretch in her swing, then she was awake for 45 minutes, then she gave me the best gift ever: 7 hours and 45 minutes of sleep all at once!! I told her she made me so happy. I wonder if she'll continue with such long stretches or go back to 5-hour stretches. Only time will tell.

Speaking of sleep, it's 3am and she is asleep and I am not. What is wrong with this picture? Goodnight, moon!

Aly has arrived!

My baby girl, Alysse Vienne, was born June 1, at 10:40 a.m., weighing 8 lbs 3 oz, and measuring 20.25 inches long. She has a full head of brown hair and beautiful gray eyes.


Okay, those are the basics, now for the full story of her lightning-fast delivery… (Warning: there is plenty of TMI to go around in this entry.)

Sunday night, I was in the Due in June 2009 chat on CafeMom and getting jealous of the ladies who were getting induced on Monday, so I whipped up a castor oil milkshake and downed it around 11 p.m. I didn't have any trouble with it before I went to sleep. Every time I woke up to pee, however, I also went diarrhea, which came out as easily as pee. Fun stuff. When I woke up at 8:25 a.m., I figured the castor oil hadn't helped me go into labor since I didn't wake up ready to go. Or did I?

I went to the bathroom, then got back in bed, where my water promptly broke at 8:30 a.m.! The water was brownish-yellowish like my diarrhea, so I was confused by it at first and was unconvinced that my water had actually broken. Mom told me to call the doctor, but I wanted to wait to make sure I was really in labor.

Shortly after my water broke, I began feeling very intense, timeable period cramps. I had expected contractions to hurt all over — not just low in my abdomen — and I thought I’d be able to see my belly getting hard and going lax. When I realized the cramps were coming and going, I thought I’d better time them. I used a web site called Contraction Master because I couldn’t focus on a clock and remember details. I soon found my cramps were lasting 45 seconds to a minute and coming every two minutes. At this point, I realized I had to call the doctor.

I made that call at 9:15 a.m., and they got me an appointment to come into the office at 10:40 a.m. to get checked out and make sure I was progressing. I didn’t want to get to the hospital only to be told it was false labor or to come back later when I’d progressed more. In any event, the contractions got stronger and stronger, and I decided I couldn't wait for the appointment. I told my mom we needed to go, so she was rushing around getting everything we needed to take with us and I was sitting on the toilet refusing to move. It was the most comfortable place to labor.

We left the apartment around 9:45 or 10 a.m. (I’m not sure, as I was preoccupied with the pain), and my mom drove at 85 mph the whole way, with my contractions getting worse and worse all the way. Mom was telling me to breathe through it, and I was screaming at her that I couldn’t and to stop telling me what to do. That reallyfreaked Mom out, because she realized I was in transition.

We were still 15 minutes from the hospital when I felt the urge to push and wasn't able to pant through the contractions. I was screaming and hanging from the oh-shit bar, totally freaking out my mom, who was going faster and faster and passing a cop! The cop ignored us (probably because he saw I was in distress or maybe he wasn’t on duty), so we just kept on going. My mom almost stopped at the side of the road to deliver my baby, but I screamed at her to keep going.

As we pulled up the entrance, my dad was walking up to the hospital (my sister had called him) and my mom asked him to park the car so she could get me upstairs. She was planning to abandon it at the door if he hadn’t been there. She got me a wheelchair and got me into the elevator, and then accidentally got off on the wrong floor. She was looking all around going “Where do we go??” and other people realized I was in labor and told us to go up one more floor. They even rode in the elevator with us despite the fact they were going down.

We got to the desk around 10:30 a.m., and they gave Mom paperwork to fill out. They saw me bearing down during a contraction and wheeled me off, leaving Mom at the desk. They wouldn’t let her back with me until she’d signed everything, and she still has no idea what she signed. I was by myself in the room with the nurses, who were trying to get me to get out of the chair and into the bed, but I was in the middle of a contraction. They were screaming at me, pulled the little lamb I was choking to death out of my hand, pulled my shirt and pants off, lifted me onto the bed, draped a gown over me, pulled my legs back, and checked me. I was complete, and they told me to push. My mom got there at that moment and held my left leg, while the mean nurse held my right leg and some annoying other nurse was stroking my head and telling me “You’re doing great, ma’am.” I wanted to swat her away, but I was too busy grasping the rails and trying to push.

I told them I wanted an epidural, but they said it was too late. So I pushed with two contractions and got her head out, and the doctor told me to stop pushing. My baby wasn’t crying and I didn’t know what was going on. They were trying to suction her, but someone hadn’t put the suction thing together correctly. She also had the cord wrapped around her neck once, which they had to remove before I started pushing again. I was so freaked because I didn’t know what was going on, but I was relieved at the same time because her head was out and that insane pain was gone. Finally they finished suctioning and told me to push, and with my next contraction, she was out! They put her on my tummy only for a second, and then whisked her away.

I was so confused. Why didn’t they let Mom cut the cord? I kept saying, “But she wanted to do it…” and they said they had to get her checked out right away and there wasn’t time. There was meconium in the amniotic fluid, probably because of the castor oil, and she needed to be thoroughly suctioned and evaluated. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, they brought her to me and I got to see my angel for the first time. I think my heart stopped — she was just the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, and she was mine!

I really think my grandmother had a huge hand in making Aly's birth possible. She passed away June 1, 2008, so it is a very important day to me. She had labors just as quickly as I did, and she didn't even need to push when she had my dad. She just uncrossed her legs in the wheelchair with my dad and out he popped. They had to cut off her stockings to get him out! She would have gotten a kick out of my birth story and how much it was like her. I’m sure she’d be telling everyone she met for years to come about Aly’s grand entrance, and she probably is doing just that wherever she is, and smiling down on me and my beautiful little girl.

Enjoying "kangaroo time" with Aly.

Mammie and Jonathan say hi to Aly.

Aly spends some time with her grandpa.

Aunt Jenni is totally in love with her new niece.

Aly has Uncle Rob wrapped around her little finger.

Getting instructions from a doctor.

Aly gets her first bath.

She doesn't enjoy baths very much.

Mammie did a great job bathing Aly, even if Aly doesn't look happy about it.

Teaching Aly to surf the web.

Welcome, cousin Michael!

Well, Aly's twin cousin Michael wasn't supposed to say hello to the world until June 3, which is when Aly is due to make her appearance. But, well, nature had other plans. Amniotic banding caused his right arm to stop growing after his elbow, and lately it was cutting off his nourishment from the placenta. If he'd stayed inside his mommie even one more week, he would have died. Thank goodness for modern medicine. The little miracle baby was born six weeks early and is obviously a fighter!


Michael Allyn Dimock joined this world on April 22, 2009, weighing in at a whopping 3lb 11oz, and measuring 16 inches in length. He was breathing on his own, but it was labored, so he is getting a little supplemental oxygen. He started getting jaundice today, so he's under powerful heating lamps with his little baby goggles on (it's like he's in a tanning bed). He's feeding through a tube, but his intake has already doubled per feeding since yesterday. He's a good sucker and loves his pacifier. His mama, my sister Rachel, will be leaving the hospital tomorrow, but Michael must stay in his current accommodations until he holds his body temperature on his own, feeds without a tube, and breathes without oxygen. It'll probably be a few weeks yet, but I'm positive he'll be just fine. He's such a strong little guy. I can't wait to meet him!

Third Trimester Pains

I have always been a huge whiner, and people get sick of it, so for the most part I've tried not to whine to excess during this pregnancy... but... UGH! I am in so much pain!!

I think the relaxin and the weight gain have finally caught up with me, because my knees, hips and back are killing me! My knees are especially noticeable for the first time today. I have bad knees (had surgery on the left one when I was 15), and the last time they felt this bad was when I was in Ireland in September after walking around Dublin for a week (just ask Meg about all that whining!). I feel like I need to get a brace for both knees and apply heat therapy to all my joints. Tylenol never works for me, so I'm not bothering with it.

I REALLY hope this pain does not last the remainder of the pregnancy. I may only have 5.5 weeks left, but that is 5.5 weeks too long to go without narcotics for this kind of pain! Somebody shoot me!! I think I'll start researching ways to self-induce...

Baby shower fun! x2

I had my second baby shower on Friday, which means I'm all done now. Next week I'm going to hit the baby stores with my dad (who hasn't gotten me anything) to pick up items I still need... like more bottles, bath time stuff, diapering accessories, etc.

I had such a blast at my party. I had one of my pregnant sisters in attendance (the other is on bed rest in Illinois), my 3yo nephew, my grandmother, my mother, my bro's gf of 6 years, and my three best friends from different eras of my life (high school, college, and my first job). I enjoyed the intimate gathering, the games (and I usually hate baby shower games), and of course the gifts. I got quite a haul considering the size of the party. Below is a sneak peek of one of the games we played. You can see all my pictures on facebook.

Fun Photoshoot!

A freelance designer I work with on and off is also a part-time photographer, and she wanted maternity shots for her portfolio... so I got tons of awesome artsy photos taken of me for free! So far she's just sent me a few of the photos, but I love them. I can't wait to see more and more and more and more! Too bad she has more to do with her life than sift through all the pics and retouch them. I suppose I'll get all the good ones within a few weeks, but these were my sneak peeks. :)

I'm 31 weeks, 4 days.

View more photos on her blog.

Baby shower fun!

Well, I had my first baby shower over the weekend. It was thrown by my coworkers, and spouses and rugrats were welcome. It was sooo much fun. There were five children, but I swear it seemed like 20, especially when two were screaming at the same time. Seeing all these little ones, when two years ago only one of them was even born, made it really hit home for me that I'm going to have my own little girl very soon, and she's going to grow up very fast! Here's a link to my facebook photo album. Check it out to see how much fun it was. There are plenty of cute baby pictures to oo and ahh at. :)

Below are a few of the gifts I received. I loved everything I got!

Gorgeous hand-made quilt from Andrea:

Hungry Catterpillar stacking rings was the hit of the party with the kids:

I am going to have to get a smaller size of this adorable 3T dress. I can't wait 3 years to put Aly in it:

PINK butterfly dress. Mom will love putting Aly in this: