Caleb's Arrival 05/27/11

Yes, I realize now I am a bit of a drama queen. May 26th was Caleb's due date and I was fretting so much about him being late and having to be induced and I felt like such a failure. Yes, pure silliness I know but you can't always control your emotions. By Thursday at lunch I was resigned to the fact that I would have one more week of being pregnant and would have to be medically induced to have the baby. I wasn't happy but I was content in having at least a timeline. Thursday I felt fine. Picked Abby up at school and came home. I was on the computer working on DBC and at 4:04pm I had my first contraction. I brushed it off as a fake one, not getting my hopes up for nothing again. From 4:04pm to 6:15pm they kept coming about every 17 to 20 minutes. They weren't painful though so I figured false. From 6:49pm until 8:24pm they started coming about every 10 minutes. I was still skeptical because they really weren't that painful. I could talk and walk and everything even in the middle of a pain. I called the hospital and they said to give it more time. Since my cervix had been stimulated by the Dr on Wednesday it could have brought on fake contractions which may very well go away. So we waited. From 8:24 until 10:30 contractions came every 5 to 7 minutes. By 10:30pm they were quite painful. We decided to go to the hospital. I was still trying not to get my hopes up. We got to the hospital and I was examined at about 11pm. I was 3 centimetres! Yeah, he was on his way. At this point the contractions were so bad I couldn't function. By 12am I was asking for the epidural! I actually don't feel bad about this. Even with all of my talk about having a natural birth I was in so so much pain I just couldn't take it. And at this point I just wanted my son, I didn't care about doing anything "the right way." Just get my kid! By 1:30am I was in my delivery room and drugged. The epidural only froze my right side (funny cause with Abby it only froze my left side). So, unfortunately I could still feel everything on my left. It hurt, a lot. Hubby and I tried to relax and we basically just waited. We listened to his heartbeat and talked. Hubby had a nap and I played games on my cell phone. By 7:45am I was fully dialated. Now, it was just waiting to see if I felt the urge to push. At 8:30 I started to get the urge. It took me 4 contractions and 20 minutes. Once I realized it was now soley up to me I went into Mommy Warrior mode. Apparently 20 mins is a short time for pushing but I was a champ and got him out!! I could hear hubby choke up when his head came out and then again when his body emerged. Hubby cut the cord and then I heard Caleb cry! I just kept saying over and over in my head "Praise God he's alive, he's alive, he's alive." They passed him to me and I could barely hold back the tears. I must have repeated "he's alive he's alive" in my head about 100 times. I was so happy and shocked at the same time. A part of me was still not quite believing things would go well. But they went perfectly. 17 hours and 46 minutes of labour. We spent Friday at the hospital. We were home by Saturday around 1pm. Caleb is really only put down when we're having dinner. Big Sis is totally in love and is such a huge help, getting me my phone or a diaper or trying to be quiet when he's sleeping. She is so excited and can't wait to take him to school and show him off. He's such a blessing and we are so happy.

He's Here

Caleb has arrived safely! Will post the details when I have rested and filled with caffeine. Important thing is that he is now home and in his little bed right now!!

Some Randomness

I just wanted to share a few things today.

This first one is a post written by a BLM. It was shared by another BLM blog I follow and I went and read it and it just moved me so much. And rang true. I think we can all relate to what she is saying.

The second is a teaser. My "blogerversary" is coming up and I'll be launching something special. I've been thinking of ways I can do something more for all the BLM's out there who read here or stumble across here and have finally thought of something. So, please look back on June 21st for full details! I am really excited to have finally made a decision on what to do.

That's it for today. I'm trying to be more relaxed and take things in stride. I had a full day of self pity yesterday and am trying to look on the bright side of things today. It's been a rough week from Monday til now but I know for 100% that next week at the latest I'll be bringing my boy home so life can't be that bad right? For now I've just got to get over myself and my own expectations...I am way too hard on myself...and look at all of the positive things that are happening right now.

Thanks to everyone for reading my whining and self pity! I know I probably get some eye rolls but your support is much appreciated.

My Sweet Girl

My Abby did the sweetest, most touching, best big sister ever, thing today! She picked one of those weeds, the furry type that you blow on and make a wish. She picked it and I said "now you have to make a wish" and so she took a deep breath and says "I wish Blaine could come back." My heart broke in so many ways, overwhelmed with love for her and sadness that she would ever have to make a wish like that. Thankfully she is almost 100% recovered from our incident yesterday. Her arm is still a little sore but other than that she has bounced back. Kids are so resilient. If someone asks about her arm she just says "a crazy lady threw me." I'm afraid it will take me a bit longer to get over what happened. I just can't get over the image of my little girl's body being tossed to the ground right in front of me. I keep thinking of all of the things that could have happened and thank God they didn't. It's sad to me that I have to be so vigilant just walking down the street from getting a donut. It's not like we live in "the ghetto." We live in a fairly clean part of town, as far as big city areas go. I guess these types of people can be anywhere though. And my husband says it's so random and so unlikely to happen that it will most likely not happen again. You don't get struck by lightning twice right? We lose our child at 17 weeks and 3 days for no apparent reason, a rarity, I think it's 1% of the population that this happens to. My daughter is randomly attacked, another rarity. So, why haven't we won the lottery yet? How come the only rare things that happen to us are the bad ones? Well I guess that's not completely true but sometimes it feels that way.
In Caleb news, there is no news. I have symptoms on and off of approaching labour. STILL NOTHING substantial though. I wish I weren't so impatient. I'm trying to enjoy this time with him and I will miss all of his movements and playtimes in my belly.

Scary Scary Day

In a topic completely unrelated to babies I had an incredibly frightening experience today. Abby and I took a walk over to the drug store and coffee shop. We got some drinks and donuts. We had just started to walk home and out of nowhere this lady walked up beside us, grabbed Abby and literally threw her. It took me about two seconds to process what had happened and I was completely shocked. I picked her up off the ground and I just kept saying "oh my God oh my God." Abby is fine, she scratched her elbow and was shaking with fright but other than that she is okay. The lady didn't say anything, didn't stop, just kept walking. A couple ahead of us saw what happened and the girl came over. She watched Abby while me and the boyfriend followed the lady. I think he could see I was very close to killing the woman so he took my phone and talked to the police while I went back to the girl and Abby. The police came rather quickly and took our statements. They caught the lady, thanks to the guy who followed her until they got there, and arrested her for assault. My husband got there quickly and calmed me down. I have never sworn at someone the way I swore at this lady and I am thankful I'm pregnant because if I weren't it would have ended quite differently. I had to squash my desire to kill her and remember that I had to protect Caleb also. It was a very scary, shocking experience. I've never even witnessed something like that nevermind been a part of it. You always hear that random violence occurs but you never really think it will happen to you. The lady was obviously crazy and the police said pretty much the same thing. When they arrested her she really had no idea what was going on. The police were really nice and good with Abby. They took her picture and a picture of her elbow. I am thankful that's all that was hurt, we were right by a cement post and one of those bumper things for cars in the parking lot, and I kept thinking if she had of banged her head it would have been a very different story. We might be in the ER right now. Instead she is safe here at home and mostly back to her normal rambunctious self.
It was a long day. I am thankful to God for watching over Abby. Maybe he sent Blaine down to protect her little head from bumping the post. Right now all I want is for Caleb to come out so our little family can all be cuddling on the couch.

Painful Memories

I have a pain in my right side. It is the exact pain in the exact spot that I had the weekend before I went into labour with Blaine. I wonder if it is a sign that I will be going into labour in the next few days. This does not feel good. I had forgotten that during labour I will be experiencing the same physical pain I felt one year, one month and one week ago. When I had this pain before I ignored it thinking I had just hurt a muscle working out or something. It wasn't until after that I thought it must have been the first sign. And now I have it and it's bringing up a whole bunch of memories I don't want to have right now. If not in the next few days, then at least in the next week I will be having the same physical experience I had before, although worse this time as Caleb is full size and Blaine was so very miniature. I don't know why I never thought about this before or thought about how it was going to make me feel emotionally. It honestly just never crossed my mind. It's making me want the drugs. Forget about natural birth I can't live through that without falling apart emotionally. Or can I? I don't know. I do know with Blaine I gladly allowed the dr to numb me with morphine. This pain in my side has brought up so many memories and grief and self doubting. I can't even be excited right now that it may very well mean the onset of labour. I did say to hubby last night that I would most likely go into labour on Sunday since it was a Sun with Abby and a Sun with Blaine. It's not the physical pain I'm afraid of, never have been, I'm a tough cookie. It's the crap that's going to come with it. All of the memories I have tried to put away this past year. You do your best to remember the good times and forget the bad.

Anxiety and Lunch

Today Abby had a field trip with her school. It brought up a big memory for me. Last year her field trip was on April 13th. So, while we were having Blaine at the hospital Grandma was getting her ready for a trip to the science centre. Getting up with her this morning brought up those memories. And then I felt a little, okay a lot, of anxiety leaving her at the school and coming home by myself. The anxiety passed quickly but it made me think of Blaine all morning. How much I miss him and how much we've missed out on.
Had lunch with another preggo BLM today. It's strange I never really thought of her as a BLM and it didn't even really kick in until after we had left each other. I realized I had mentioned Blaine several times and not mentioned her baby. I felt really bad so I sent her a FB message to let her know I was sorry and if she ever wanted to talk about it I was here. I was just a little self absorbed at lunch because it was nice to have another preggo woman I could comfortably talk to about everything, well not everything cause I don't want her to think I'm psycho but most things. This is someone I know IRL and doesn't have anything to do with the community on here. We've never actually talked about my loss or her loss before. It just came up because we were talking about babies and pregnancy. I'm hoping I didn't upset her or offend her. After all this time in dead baby land it's still hard to gauge what to do and say. Some people handle things so so so differently.
Still no news on the Caleb front. Abby has given him the 23rd as a deadline. lol. She says I should go into labour no later than Sunday and he has to be born by the 23rd. No idea why this date is significant to her but this is what her beautiful 6 year old mind has decided. Personally, I'm ready right now!