Distraction

Being busy is good.

When I am busy, I don't have to think. I can just flip on autopilot and get through my day.

I get up. I go to class. I do homework. I study. I parent my two-year-old. I run errands. I visit my newborn in the NICU. I go to clinical. I come home, eat dinner, go to bed. And then tomorrow I do it again.

But sometimes, idleness sneaks up on me. And usually I am not even idle, I am just doing something that doesn't require me to use my brain much (like driving or taking a shower), and my thoughts catch up to me all at once.

It's in those moments that I realize I am scared.

I think that a lot of people expect this to be easy for us. If I am honest, we have had considerably less support this time around. Yeah, we have done this already. Yeah, we know roughly what to expect. But, damn if it isn't hard anyway.

If you asked me if I was overwhelmed, I don't know that I would say yes. But if I really think about it, I would say that the reason I am not overwhelmed is because I simply don't have time to be. Good or bad, that is what it is.

Still, I am losing a lot of sleep these days. Not bringing your SECOND baby home with you is just as hard as the first time. Maybe harder even, because you prayed every night and you wished on everything anyone ever considered lucky to wish on that your other babies wouldn't have to go through all the tough things your first baby did. When you realize that it isn't going to work out how you wanted it to, your heart breaks all over again in all the familiar places it broke before. And my heart is breaking in new places to think there may not be babies after this to pray for.

Let me tell you... my heart really, really hurts.

Thank God I am busy.

Round Two

Here we are. Again. And I cannot begin to tell you how much it sucks.

I was at the hospital for my Pediatric Nursing clinical when I got the call.

"Mrs. Hileman, this is Jennifer from your OB's office. Your test results came back. Your liver enzymes are extremely elevated. We need you to go to labor and delivery. Now."

I was only 32 weeks pregnant.

This is not a new phone call for me. In fact, it was nearly identical to the one I received a little over two years ago. Something about that just isn't fair.

After a few days of back and forth and doctors trying decide the best course of action for us, it was determined that our baby would need to be delivered. I was hoping to have a similar experience to the labor and delivery I had with Spencer, but the cards were just not in our favor. After my little bean flipped from head-down to breech (not once, but twice) in a matter of 24 hours, my OB told me I would need to have a c-section because she just wasn't a "stable lie". Sunday July 1st at 10:30 am Sydney Leigh was born. 3 lbs 14 oz, 16 inches long, and every bit as beautiful as we thought she would be.

I have to tell you that this experience really made me feel out of control. I wasn't ready yet. I really believed that I was going to carry this little bean to term with no problems, and then that dream was ripped away from me with virtually no warning. The itching started and three days later I had a baby. Via c-section. I almost felt like I was completely disconnected from the whole experience.

 After having delivered a baby vaginally in the past with fairly few complications, having a c-section is almost... unsatisfying. I don't know if I can really explain it. I don't feel like I did the appropriate amount of work to have birthed a baby. Though, I can assure you that the amount of work that is in my future will make up for it.

Now, I am being hounded by relentless inquisition about my future baby plans. Everyone wants to know if we plan to have more. Some people just assume that we will be done now. "A boy and a girl! How perfect, since you are done!," they say. And yeah, part of me wants to agree. I have two healthy babies that are perfect. Sydney is obviously in the NICU, but she is healthy and strong. And Spencer is this amazing two-year-old who is more than anyone could ever ask for in a kid. But, a part of me isn't ready to face the prospect of being done having children at 22. Part of me thinks that more babies might be exactly what I want. Every where I have looked this past week, families surround me and they all have more than two kids. And, to be honest, it hurts my heart a little bit.

I had a truck full of boys this afternoon. Spencer and Mark's three youngest brothers. They were laughing and playing while I drove and I couldn't help but imagine what my life could be like with a few more kids in it. Something in me aches a little bit to have that big family. And at the same time, I know that I can't be that selfish. I can't put another baby through this. I honestly don't know if my body can go through this again. I don't know if you all know this, but you kind of need a liver to live.

I think my plan for now is to give it to God the best that I can. To love Spencer and Sydney as well as I can. I graduate in 5 weeks. Sydney will be home by then and then our family can begin to really be a family. And if it is only us for the long haul, so be it. I just have to remember that nothing is too big for my God. And that what I have is beautiful, just the way it is.

Metamorphosis

The Bug just had his 18 month appointment at the doctor. He got his last vaccine until he is 5 and he doesn't have to go back to see the doctor (unless he is sick) until he is 2... Yes. 2. That appointment can take forever to get here as far as I am concerned.

He weighs 24 pounds and is 31 inches long. Compared to the 4lbs and 17 inches he boasted as a newborn, it's unbelievable. I just can't believe we are here already.

I remember looking into his little incubator in the NICU, thinking he looked so small, so fragile. I couldn't fathom how this tiny creature could possibly turn into a healthy, chubby child. Honestly, looking at pictures of him as an infant, I have difficulty believing it is the same individual. He was so brittle we were afraid he would simply stop existing. So, we monitored him and we checked on him 3 billion times a night while he slept... And now we pretty much parent by the philosophy of "If you hear a loud crash somewhere in the house, go see what he fell off of or pulled over". He runs around, climbs things that are much too tall for my comfort, falls... hard... only to promptly pop up and continue on his toddlerish terrorizing of my house and sanity.

He has made a complete metamorphosis into a child that will not be labeled "premie" forever. He will continue grow and to develop skills and language and social abilities. His "two month deficit" will be far behind him and it just won't matter anymore.

Honestly, it already seems very far in the past to even me. I remember it, but at the same time, I forget. I often forget what it was like in those early days, looking into his little face, willing him to grow and eat so that we could leave the hospital. I forget what it was like to not get any more than two or three hours of sleep at a time, though he was sleeping through the night, because I was afraid his little lungs would stop expanding and his little heart would stop pumping. I forget tiny premie diapers and how he used to swim in newborn clothes. I forget so many of these things when, at the time, I never thought I would be able to forget, to move on from the heartbreak of having things not go anywhere close to planned. My world was rocked and I thought that I might stay there, curled up in a ball of eternal vigilance motivated by a fear of germs and SIDS and whatever disabilities might befall my son because of circumstance. But I am stronger now. We are both stronger.

Perhaps I, too, have emerged from some sort of metamorphosis.

Fungus

Two years ago, Mark and I got a really nice tax return because we bought a house. With some of that tax return, we bought a washer, a dryer, and a couch. Why? Because at that time we were living in a house with no washer, no dryer, and a second- (or third-... or fourth-) hand couch. Barbaric, I know.

Anyway, I was so excited about my new washer and dryer. They were front-load with the little windows you can see in... so exciting for someone who hasn't run their own household for very long... well, maybe exciting for anyone with a household. But that isn't the point. The point is, they were new, and shiny, and environmentally friendly... and I could finally do laundry in my own house without having to worry about Mark's grandmother sneaking down to the basement to fold my underwear when I wasn't looking.

Flash forward two years: All of my laundry smells. Especially my towels. And for some reason, no one else can smell it in the clean laundry but me. Last night, I presented Mark with a towel.

Me: "Smell this!"
Mark: "It smells like a towel..."
Me: "Uggggggghhhh."
(We have had this conversation about towels, blankets, wash cloths... you get the picture.)

So, I finally got on Google... my worst enemy and best friend. And Google told me that I might have *gasp* mold in my washer.

I marched straight into my laundry room, whipped open the washer door and... lo and behold. THIS is what I found. 

 

ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? OMFG!!! DISGUSTING!

I am now on a quest to get rid of this. Any suggestions? Tips? Aside from crawling under a rock... but that is SO what I want to do...

Unicorns and Meat Cleavers

Currently, I am doing a clinical rotation at a psychiatric hospital. Every week I am either on an acute unit (where the people are psychotic, but could possibly be released into the community after treatment), a forensic unit (in which the people are either Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity or being restored to competency for trial), or an adolescent unit.

The acute unit is full of very sick people. The adolescent unit is full of children that have behavioral issues beyond the scope of most parents’ imaginations. But the forensic unit… that unit is full of people who have committed crimes. It is full of people with antisocial personality disorders (sociopaths, for those not on the up-and-up with cutting-edge psychiatric terms) who couldn’t care less about your or your feelings… and, honestly? It is my favorite unit. As long as you can accept that these people don’t give a shit about anyone but themselves, it is a very interesting learning experience.

Whenever I am talking to these people, though, I can’t help but wonder about their lives. What led them to where they are? What kind of a childhood did they have? What are their parents like?

And it all brings me back to those age-old debates about “nurture vs. nature” and the “chicken or the egg”. Sure, dude killed a bunch of people… but he was abused by his dad from the time he was born. Was he destined to be this way? Or was he molded by his childhood into what he is now? Do you learn to only care about yourself as a way of survival? Or do you only care about yourself because your DNA is programmed that way? Are we shaped by our pasts? Are we pre-determined to be “good” or “bad” from birth?

I, of course, don’t know the answers to these questions. I do know that my sister and I were raised by the same two people and we have the same DNA, but we are very different.  As different as night and day. I know that my husband and his seven brothers and sisters were raised similarly, and they are all individual and unique. Not one of them the same as the other.

I think not knowing which factor is more important sort of scares me for my son. I mean, I am by no means a perfect parent. And I will never be. But, to some degree I feel like it doesn’t really matter what I do. My son will make the choices he is going to make no matter how I raise him.

That’s right. I could surround him completely with love and butterflies and unicorns… and he may still grow up to be a meat cleaver- wielding crazy person.  And that just sucks.

Too Big

Being a working mom is difficult. Being a working mom AND a student is next to impossible. I am not saying that my workload is so unbearably heavy that there is no way I can stand up under the weight of it (though it is pretty friggin hard). I AM saying that I miss things. And, frankly, it sucks.

I wasn’t working or in school when Spence was in the NICU and I stayed home with him for the first four and a half months of his life. When I went back to work, my baby was barely succeeding at tummy time. He hated being on his belly and I was afraid that he would never lift his head up on his own. And then, one day, I picked him up from whichever grandparent was watching him and he was rolling over, lifting his head, doing tiny baby pushups. Before I knew it, he was crawling. And I felt like I missed it all. 

I went back to school in January. And my little man was learning how to eat solid foods. He had serious tongue-thrust issues and he gagged on anything that had chunks. And then, one day, my mother-in-law was talking about how she fed him a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup for lunch. I just don’t know how that happened.

And now today, my husband informed me that he got Bug to take a few steps to him when he picked him up from the in-laws. I cried in the car on the way home.

I feel like my son’s childhood is already whizzing by and I am missing it. I question whether I really am making his life better by finishing school or if he would be better off with me by his side every day. I wonder if it is selfish of me to want to be there for all of his firsts, to want to hold onto his babyness with both hands as long as I can because I am afraid I am going to blink and it will be over.

Truthfully, I feel selfish. I feel like I should take pride in my son’s advances. I should be thankful that he is healthy and happy and beautiful in every way. But, sometimes, I just want to freeze life… just for a little while… so I can get in some extra snuggles with my already-too-big-to-be-believed baby boy.

Always Naked

It has been way too long since I have posted here. For that, I apologize. I have to tell you, though, that nursing school has consumed my life. Add to that working part time and taking care of a one-year-old... and my dance card is full. Still, I want to make an effort to post here more. I have been getting this urge to document my son's early years in as many ways as I can... and this counts, right?

I am going to write about something happened tonight that will disgust most of you. This is not for the weak of stomach or sensitive of heart. You have been warned.

The Bug has a very serious rash on his bottom. In fact, it has progressed to be almost two open sores, one on either butt cheek. I hold myself extremely responsible for this, even thought i did not occur while he was in my care. I feel responsible because I am busy. Because I am in school. Because that's how you feel when things happen to your kid when they aren't with you. Guilt is a mother's best-known companion. That concept is pretty messed up, but still true.

Anyhow, the point of that little tangent was to lay the foundation for why my son was diaperless. I was letting his butt wounds air out a bit. And, truthfully, I have never met another child that loves to be naked as much as my child. Seriously. Always. Naked. When sans diaper, Buggy often pees on the floor. The good news is, I have laminate floors. The bad news is, the kid pees like every five minutes. Still, cleaning up little puddles of pee doesn't bother me much and he never poops.

That is, he hadn't pooped. Until tonight.

I was in the kitchen making dinner and Bug was playing on the floor in front of the cabinets when, suddenly, I hear the telltale grunting noises of an impending poop. Oh. No. Not now. No, please not now. But it was too late. I was running for the diaper and the poo was running down his leg. My child busted a grumpy right there on my kitchen floor... and stomped in it. So, I scooped him up and tossed him in the tub. With clean child tucked under my arm, I returned to the kitchen to clean up the offending mess... only to discover that the dog had done it for me. Ok, yuck. But it get's worse.

I replaced Buggy back on the floor with some cheezits, still free-cheekin' it. He had to be done pooing after the massive crap that had just come out of him... right? I tossed him some cheezits and went back to cooking... until I started to get whiffs of dookie. I turn around to find that, not only has Bug pooped again... but, to my horror, he has dipped his cheezit in the poop and has managed to stuff it in his mouth. I can feel the room spinning, the earth stop its rotation for a moment. He has poop smeared ON. HIS. MOUTH. It is stuck IN. HIS. TEETH. Ultimate mommy fail. Honestly.

Commence whirlwind of numb bathing and cleaning. He is now sleeping soundly and he smells wonderful. I, however, will not be able to eat for weeks.