July 2010 – Page 2

I am not a perfect mother. There. I said it.

Okay, I’ve admitted this before. Many times. Just over a year ago, I fed a not-quite-10-month-old Rebecca a Cheeto—but I got over it:

So much of the time, we mothers are quick to judge ourselves. Every time we don’t give our children what they want (even when we know it’s for the best) or aren’t 157% attentive to their needs, we feel as though we’re mean, bad, and ten kinds of terrible. If we don’t keep up on the latest trends—from Baby Gap to Baby Einstein, from Gerber brain-friendly organic finger foods to gerbera daisy hairclips to match every single outfit she owns—we’re bad mothers.

I anticipate the next few weeks will be among the most difficult of my life as a mother as all of us adjust to being a family of five. Today (day two of just me and the kids at home during the day), Rachel was pretty fussy. I ended up holding her nearly all day—which meant that Hayden and Rebecca spent most of the day in front of the TV.

Normally, one of the ways I measure myself as a mom on a day-to-day basis is by the amount of television my children watch. But today, I decided that it’s okay.

Watching television might not be the most productive use of their time (even if it is PBS), and yes, the APA says they should only watch two hours a day. I’m not really proud that they spent well over twice that with the television on today, but at the same time, it’s not worth beating myself up over.

I had to focus on one child’s needs a little more, and that meant I couldn’t be all my children’s cruise-and-entertainment-director every second (horrors). While I hope Rachel’s fussiness will subside relatively quickly, I’m sure it’s only the first time we’ll have to triage like this. And let’s face it, television isn’t the end of the world. So today I won’t act like it is, or that I’m a horrible mother for letting them watch both Super Why and Dragon Tales.

What do you need to forgive yourself for lately?

Rachel’s birth

After the concerns throughout my pregnancy, I did finally concede and agree to be induced the morning of June 7th—but I still held out hope that my baby would decide to come more than two days early, and save us from having to be hooked up to an IV, stuck in the hospital (and possibly even a hospital bed) for the whole labor.

Contractions woke me up at 4:45 on the morning of June 5. My mother had flown in the night before and thanks to flight delays and road construction, we didn’t get back from the airport until 12:30 AM. But Rachel decided to give me the first night of not-nearly-enough sleep that day. I tried to relax using some of the techniques from my Hypnobabies course.

Finally, I was tired of laying in bed, not sleeping. I woke Ryan up at 6:45 to tell him, “It’s baby’s birthday.” Because my contractions (“pressure waves,” as we say in Hypnobabies) intensified if I moved around a whole lot, Ryan helped to gather the last toiletries for my hospital bag and brought my birthing ball from the other room. I spent the morning in our room, sitting or laying on the birthing ball and reading or listening to HypnoBabies scripts—I even dozed off for a couple naps.

They say that for non-first-time-moms, you should head to the hospital when the contractions are 5-6 minutes apart and about 1 minute long. I hit that benchmark around 10, but didn’t feel like it was time to go to the hospital yet. Plus, I would have a set of 3-4 contractions, then stop for a little while. I worried they’d put me on drugs to try to regulate my contractions at the hospital, the same concern I had with Rebecca’s birth—and the reason why I waited until I was an 8 (90 minutes before delivery) before I was admitted.

In the early afternoon, things started to pick up. I still didn’t have a clockwork “schedule” of contractions, but I started to have clusters of contractions—several in a row, with peaks and valleys, but without letting up, for up to five to ten minutes. Again, just like with Rebecca’s birth.

I started to panic and knew I had to get to the hospital, sure I wouldn’t be able to make it without pain meds this time. Ryan tried to help me calm down, but it was hard not to panic in minute eight of a contraction! The car ride and walking about two million miles to the L&D admitting desk was not fun. As we slowly made our way down the hall, the nurse that met us asked if this was my first.

Thanks a lot. I thought I was doing well here.

They got me into a room and had me change into a gown. And then I proceeded to FREAK. OUT. I insisted that I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t have this baby naturally, I couldn’t keep it up. Ryan got me to lay down and calm down—and I instantly felt much better. I wasn’t comfortable by any stretch, but I wasn’t in the intense pain of just seconds before. It’s what Hypnobabies calls the fear-tension-pain cycle to a T. I was afraid, I tensed up, and it just made the pain worse.

So I laid down and the nurse came to check me: 9cm and my water broke (so there, nurse in the hallway). And I was ready to turn down an epidural, too. We started a script on my MP3 player and I was pretty set.

Good thing—my OB arrived in about 15 minutes and I was at 10cm. He pulled on a gown over his street clothes and said we’d push when I was ready. Which took maybe five minutes. A nurse and my OB commented at different points on how “controlled” I was (what they didn’t know…). About three minutes of pushing later, Rachel was born!

Rachel is one month old today! And tomorrow is our first day three-on-one. I mean all on our own, without any Nanas around for help.

Oh boy.

Blogging will probably continue to be spotty for a while, but one day we’ll find our new normal.