We Can Work It Out

Work.

It was bound to come up sooner or later. K started back to work a month ago, and it’s been brutal. We’ve figured out that it takes at least 3 adults to take care of 1 infant. On the days K is gone for 8 hours, I’ve tried to wrangle friends to hang out with me and Josie. Sometimes it’s great; Josie is all smiles and naps. Other times she acts like these friends (sometimes the same ones!) are there to torture her and cries to look at them (which she can’t help doing over and over). I’ve tried going to “groups” but am often more exhausted from wearing and bouncing her the whole time than if we’d stayed home where I could be worn out in private (and cry if I want to).

I recently had the opportunity to take on a small freelance editing job. It was right up my alley. But then I had one of those days with Josie (actually two in a row); I was a wreck physically and emotionally (there’s nothing quite like when a baby finds her angry scream!). I ended up turning it down even though we could for sure use the money and I need to get back to doing what I like for work, rather than what I’ve been doing for 3 years (teaching online). The person said she’d be happy to work with me in the future, when I’m ready. But, of course, I still felt like a failure for turning down one little job and feel like it’s crazy to imagine there will be a time when Josie will “let” me work.

You see, our daughter will not nap, and now she’s gotten to waking up every, I don’t know, half hour to scream until I put I boob in it. If she could find it on her own and I could sleep through, that’d be great. But she can’t and neither can I. It’s constant waking…to the point of sleep deprivation torture. I know it could just be a stage or teething or who knows what. But it soooks! As I say often to K (it’s my postpartum mantra), this is unsustainable!

We’ve talked books and theories and timing and routines and swaddling and dangling from the ceiling, etc., whatever it would take to get her to sleep for longer stretches (even the old 2-hour ones we used to curse!). Nothing works, and I am sick of trying. We resorted to giving her the dreaded formula last night, thinking it would fill her tummy and help her sleep longer. Oh, no. She was on the boob right after. And on and off as usual throughout the night. So much for corn syrup! My mom being here right now is my only saving grace. And thinking that maybe, some month, Josie will change.

One piece of advice I’ve gotten recently that I do appreciate (however fantastical it is) is to do more self care and that this will somehow via magic unicorns and confetti translate to an easier go. So I got a massage last week. And another today. I’ve been in so much pain (just the regular body pain of having a baby, in addition to, of course, the special sliced and diced down-under kind), I have a hard time sleeping even when she is. Sometimes the pain killers help, but mostly I lie there thinking at the pain, “If I was really tired I could sleep through you!” I’m sure that’s it; I just haven’t hit rock bottom yet. Luckily, the massages have felt really good. The one yesterday was a sliding-scale Thai massage where the practitioner makes you into a pretzel and stretches out the tight spots. Hurts so god — a bit like fighting fire with fire.

Today I went to work on rebuilding my pelvic floor muscles and reconnecting my abdominals. I’ve been going once a week for over a month, and my diastasis has improved quite a bit. It’s still three fingers wide around the belly button area, but it’s much shallower all the way from top to bottom. I was expressing a little frustration to the pilates instructor I’m working with who said that as long as I’m nursing Josie, the relaxin in my system will keep things loose and my body won’t be able to “come back together” all the way. It was kind of good and bad to hear that. At first I thought, “Well, what’s all this working out for? How can I, or anyone, take care of a growing baby without certain muscles intact?” Then I thought, “Phew! I don’t have to get it perfect yet.”

Before I sign off, I want to introduce a new blog feature called FOG (Funny or Gross). When Josie was smaller and K and I were new to sleep deprivation, we thought we were the funniest people in the world. We’d make things up or just say (whisper) them on accident and crack up while trying not to disturb the almost-sleeping baby. As Josie is growing and doing more things with her body, I have to wonder: is that funny or gross? For example, Josie has been getting very good with her hands. I was leaning over and kissing her belly area when she hooked my nostrils with two of her fingers, bowling ball style, and pulled my face up to hers so she could eat it (my face). I thought it was hysterical. Later, when I was in bed, I moved my face muscles and felt my skin crack where the entire day’s saliva had dried. Again, I laughed. Am I still suffering from the sleep deprivation sense of humor? More FOG to come…

ch ch ch…

Josie is four months old. What?! I have a four-month-old daughter? Since when? Who is it? Is she related to the newborn I had?

There is a really tall baby that lives with K and I, and more often than not I find her sleeping in bed with us at night. She doesn’t sleep in the swing, and she doesn’t need all 500 Fleetwood Mac songs sung to her to get her there. Once in a while, I see a smile that I used to get my baby to make at the smallest provocation; this kid needs a lot more entertainment.

Unlike newborn sleepyhead, this Josie will not go quietly into a good nap. There is much crying, and often for little result. We can easily dance or swing her for over an hour just to get 10 minutes of unconsciousness out of her. The two ways we can get her to nap any longer than that is if K wears her in the Moby wrap and never stops moving, or if I lie down and nurse her to sleep.

She grows and changes, as does our hair. Mostly the result of many months away from a barber shop and lots of mother's milk.

She still cries at this, but once she’s asleep, I can keep her that way for almost two hours — as long as her arms are wrapped very possessively around the breast and I do not move one muscle the entire time. The whole operation’s awash if I adjust to relieve hip pain. I have spent 16 hours lying on my side some days. I would let her stay up all day and night if she’d be happy, but she kvetches all day when she’s tired.

I do not like to complain about her because it is clearly a parenting fault. Some of it is teething, too. Her breastfeeding issues largely cleared up after her frenotomy, but I don’t think there’s any minor surgery that makes a baby nap! We’ve bought the No Cry Sleep Solution, but of course we haven’t had time to read it. We’ve been told over and over that we have to make the call, and soon: either we let her cry it out a few nights in a row or we have a kid in our bed till 2020. We talk about it a lot, but neither of us are up for letting her cry for hours on end. I don’t know if it’s because of post-traumatic-birth syndrome or because we’re just wusses.

In spite of the fussy sleepiness, Josie is quite an amazing, silly, fun, and delicious kid. We love playing call-and-response cooing with her. She loves making us jump in surprise by suddenly wiggling her entire body on the changing table. She cuddles us really sweetly right before bed — if I put my head over her torso, she’ll wrap her arms around it (and then proceed to pull my hair). There’s so much more to say about our patootie, but there may be only seconds left of this miracle nap K snuck her into.

From Where I Lie

I am lying on my right side, propped up on my elbow and reaching over a sleeping/nursing baby with my left hand to type on my laptop which sits precariously on the pillow buttressing said baby’s back. If K hadn’t brought me my laptop, I’d be doing what I now do 75% of my day: wish the baby was either sleeping or nursing, wonder when I’ll lose all feeling and function of my supporting arm, stare at the invariably messy room, daydream about the food I can’t access in spite of insane hunger, try to wiggle into a less uncomfortable position knowing full well I will not sleep, wonder how I’ll ever go back to working — even part time, and will myself to not pick at the baby’s cradle cap. I also take several long gazes upon the most magnificent thing I’ve ever made. So know that I am not complaining.

Who could give this baby shots??

Tomorrow is the dreaded day. J’s first round of immunization shots. I wish I was one of those conscientious parents who research the heck out of things regarding their kids, but at best I’m shaping up to be the kind of mom that puts her faith in the research of others and who looks at the health care provider over serious under-eye bags of sleep deprivation and says, “Please just tell us what to do when.” So we waited till 3 months and are doing 3 immunizations in 3 installments. I wasn’t able to be in the room when she had her frenotomy; poor K had to do that one solo. But there’s no getting out of this… there are just too damn many shots! I know J is going to do well; it’s me I’m worried for. I’m still so hormonal that I can’t even listen to K describe a dream she had about another kid hurting J. Driving by a billboard advertising child abuse awareness brings me to tears.

I suppose before I sign off, I should mention that after two sessions of intense internal hemorrhoid zapping, I am feeling a lot better. The process is crazy and one I wouldn’t recommend for a good time but totally suggest if you need it.

Big Girls

Josie is 3 months old! Three months… the end of the 4th trimester… a magical time when everything gets easier. Or so say all the books and websites and people. Is it fun to lie? How does lying benefit them? I’m still reeling from the 12-weeks of pregnancy nausea lie.

In some ways, some things have gotten easier as J has gotten bigger. For one, she’s literally gotten bigger. She’s a whopping 11 pounds now (so petite!). A bigger baby with better neck control is simply easier to handle. She’s also more consistently sleeping in 3-4 hour shifts at night (knock internet wood). But we’re still struggling with nursing. It seems to be her belly upset that makes it hard almost every time. The obvious suffering is very hard to take emotionally (I’m talking about me here, not her).

Getting bigger has brought on a new hard thing. Namely, teeth. Who starts teething at 3 months?! My daughter, who now drools and sucks on everything she can. What she can’t get into her mouth yet for lack of motor skills frustrates the hell out of her and makes her cry. How can we manage teething before we’ve gotten a handle on nursing?!

I have also worn some big girl pants as of late. I sucked it up, so to speak, and began seeing a holistic pelvic care practitioner. What the heck is that? Well, it’s a modality in which the practitioner does internal (that’s right!) work to help increase blood flow to the organs and muscles of the pelvic floor. This encourages relaxation and healing, builds muscle strength and speeds recovery from difficult pregnancies or childbirth. Yo, I’m prime candidate material, no?  I kept putting it off because I thought it would be horrible for anything to be “up there” yet after so much cutting and tearing. But I went and it wasn’t so bad. It seemed to help, and I’m going back for more next week.

Now to the other hole… (you can always count on me to be frank about body issues on this blog). By doing some other bodywork, it became clear that my sacral and tailbone pain are not emanating from a compromised coccyx. So I must face the horrible fact that my hemorrhoids, which were bad in late pregnancy and ridiculous after the birth, just aren’t going away. Guess what? There’s a lady in town who uses electrical currents to remove them. One more appointment for me!

Lastly, we as a family have been struggling with the reality that I have zero of the core strength I need to carry and bounce Josie (major dancing and bouncing is the only way to get our joy bundle to sleep). It’s so hard when Josie is crying and I either have to pass her off to K, who has started back to work and needs some baby-free time, or I have to walk around bouncing her forever, which hurts a ton and then I’m crying. So, yesterday, we went to a pilates studio where the instructor specializes in mamas. She delivered some difficult news… she says I have some significant diastisis recti, which is the separation of the rectus abdominis muscle into right and left halves. This isn’t uncommon, but it’s gonna take a lot of work and time (once I have an operating pelvic floor) to get my belly mended and my core nice and strong.

“Big girls don’t cry,” huh? Another lie… and this time in song!

Seal Said It Best

We’re never gonna survive, unless…

Pretty much this having a newborn — a colicky one — is making me feel a tad nutter. Seriously, I’m completely out of my mind freaked out one day and elated the next. For example, the day I wrote my previous post I was coming off of three days of screaming. I am overjoyed to report that I am writing to you from day two of happy eating baby. She is sleeping and nursing (albeit only side-lying, but still) and only fussing a bit with each transition (i.e., from playing to eating, sleeping to waking, awake to sleeping, etc.).

Does it help an insane amount that it’s been sunny and gorgeous here the past two days? You betcha! I am not NOT meant to live in the Pacific Northwest. And yet.

Today we even got out of the house to go somewhere other than the grocery store! This photo depicts K and Josie at our walking-distance eatery — a capitulation to Josie’s desire for a cornmeal blueberry pancake.

See what I mean about the swingin’ mood? I should just be grateful for the great hours and days as they happen and not worry about the crap ones to come, right?

A shout out to Mama Universe for the spring weather and to our friends who have reached out to us during these first months with comfort and support. Thanks for knowing what we need even when we don’t.

Game of Life

The deed is done. I couldn’t be in the room, and I was still traumatized by being brought a bloody-mouthed baby after the procedure. She was inconsolable at first, refused the boob, but eventually took the bottle. That night was scary hard until a friend came by and did some cranial sacral work on Josie. She calmed down enough to eat and sleep a little after that. The next morning, we went to see the lactation consultant who suggested the frenotomy. She showed us how to stretch beneath the upper lip and under the tongue so that the wounds didn’t heal back into place. She also showed us some exercises to get J’s tongue moving around and strong. I wanted nothing to do with any of it.

We also played the get-her-to-eat-and-weigh-her-every-five-minutes game, which I hate. She never takes the boob well on command and so the weighing shows she eats very little. Then we get to hear things like “Well, she eats very slowly and on the lower end of what we like to see” or “Since last time she seems to have only gained a half ounce per day, and we like to see babies gaining about an ounce at day.” So what am I supposed to do with this information besides worry??? It’s not for a lack of trying! To her credit, the lactation consultant was very good with Josie and excellent about checking in and following up on questions. When I called her crying about my flow disappearing, she called back right away and talked me down. She definitely knows her stuff — even if I don’t like needing the help.

While I’m glad if the procedure makes her future life better, it doesn’t seem to have changed our feeding experiences… yet. She cries as much as ever when put to the boob and fusses on the bottle and pretty much the rest of the day too if not unconscious. I’m not saying we don’t get any smiles all day long, but she just seems despondent, miserable, hurting(?), etc. most of the time.

I feel like I’m in a video game where you have to bank a certain amount of energy by feeding this baby. The pitfalls are many. You chase the baby through the maze, and sometimes she stops and sips but mostly she runs away. And sometimes she eats but kicks and wiggles and fusses so hard that she is draining the energy stores as fast as they’re gaining. The worst part is that there isn’t a Game Over reset at the end of each day; you start out a little further behind all the time. The stress of never catching up, of never getting close to the minimum 24 ounces a day into the baby then depletes your own energy stores and that effects your milk supply. It’s a really shitty video game.

I can put this into perspective as well as anyone: we are not in a war-torn country, she does not have a hole in her heart, and we are still both at home with her. And yet.

I was so hoping against all the fear that the frenotomies would help immediately, that Josie would eat better, and all would be right with the world overnight. K and I look at each other sometimes, to the soundtrack of screaming, with such terror — it’s the complete responsibility and complete helplessness. We had heard there’d be months like this, but please… Seriously, please please please.

Snip It, Snip It… Good?

Oy.

It’s the first of many hard decisions we’ll have to make.

Josie has been having a difficult time with nursing lately. Her latch was getting weak and she would just fuss on the boob. So we called in an excellent, highly recommended lactation consultant, who took one look at her frenum or frenulum (the little band under the tongue) and said it had to be snipped. Mind you, tongue-tie, as it’s called, is hereditary, and I have it. I was never snipped and my mom says I was her best nurser. These things give me pause. But, and there always is one, she explained that it’s a quality of life issue. Apparently it can be part of why she has GI discomfort as well. She noticed that Josie’s upper lip is very tight, and recommended snipping the top frenum too because it could prevent a big split between her two front teeth.

The idea of anyone restraining my baby and cutting her makes me panic and makes my cortisol rise, which makes the milk stop flowing. This happened on Friday. We had nothing to feed Josie and resorted to buying formula (recommended by the lactation consultant in such cases). Thankfully, once I took a Xanax and calmed the eff down, the milk began to come back. I switched from Xanax to herbs and have been producing enough since. Thanks be to god we never opened the formula.

Josie will breastfeed, but only at night and only side-lying in bed. Otherwise, she’ll have nothing to do with it and I have to pump (we’re renting the hospital grade pump since my flow disappeared). Her snip appointment is this coming Friday, and I wish there was some other way. Part of me (a big part) is scared that it won’t make a difference, that she won’t be able to nurse normally and her reflux won’t improve. I hate Hate HATE the idea of causing her any pain (even though the consultant said it’s no worse than the pain of an immunization shot). Ugh!

The key to keeping her well fed, whether through nursing or a bottle, is to keep my shit together. The other day I heard of a woman who lost her 5-month-old. Apparently she suffocated in her crib. I completely lost it. That is my biggest fear. Probably all new mothers’. But I’m still so postpartum that I have the thinnest skin, and I’m anxious about how my milk flow will react to her surgery. Can I really keep popping the Xanax until my emotions regulate?

Bath Time (Video!)

All About My Daughter

Josie is 7 weeks old.

She’s about 10 lbs. now and at least 22 inches long. She’s already out of her 0-3 mo. clothes.

She seems to be retaining her blue eyes, which we have been seeing for longer and longer “play times.” If she’s in her bouncy chair or on her play gym, she focuses and bats at and pulls on the hanging toys.

When she stretches, which is often, she purses her lips and makes a sound I call her El Camino because it reminds me of tires on an old car screeching around a corner.

Josie cannot eat while working on a poop. She employs a kissy face that alerts us to this situation. She prefers to do her pooping on the changing table or when K is holding her in a sitting position facing out. Post-bath (in the towel) is another great time for a big poop.

Josie rocks the mullet: business in the front, party in the back.

She looks like my dad, whom she’s named after. My mom claims she looks the most like him of all their 15 grandkids.

Her eyelashes are very light; they’re long but curl up beautifully at the tips.

She’s starting to suck her thumb more — especially when my mom helps her find it.

She vocalizes occasionally, which makes me crazy with love.

With Mama at her first outing to the tea shop.

Of course there’s much more I could write, but my time is very limited. I’ll give a brief synopsis of what the past 7 weeks have looked like around here:

When the doctor discharged me from the hospital and said I should “take it easy” for the next 6 weeks, I did not understand what that meant. I knew I had lost a lot of blood and had a stitched-up undercarriage, but I assumed that after a couple weeks I should be taking short walks, bouncing my baby to put her to sleep, vacuuming, etc. If that’s all I’m doing, that, to me, is taking it easy. Well, apparently I wasn’t supposed to do anything at all for those 6 weeks but lie down and feed the baby. It’s no wonder that the healing process was frustrating me… I’d walk to the grocery store, slowly, and walk back only to feel terrible pressure and rawness down there for the rest of the day. I’d have to then sit for hours at a time while breastfeeding (or learning to breastfeed). In case it’s not obvious, I’ll tell you that sitting on a 3rd degree episiotomy and significant vaginal tearing from forceps is highly uncomfortable. At my 6-week postpartum check up, the midwife, who was at my birth and saw what all went down, said my healing will take more like 3 months than 6 weeks, and that I should only now start taking 1-block walks. I sure wish I had that info when I was sent home from the hospital!

With the help of K’s mom, our doula, a lactation specialist, and my mom (whose life we’ve taken over for 4 weeks!), K and I have been able to eek out a couple of hours of sleep between feedings throughout the night and into the late morning. Since I have not been able to sit on the bouncy ball to put the baby to sleep, K has has had to do all of the putting down. I just crawl off my donut and back into bed after each nursing session. So, we pass Josie off on my mom in the morning, giving me another hour of sleep and K another 2 to 3. A given day has my mom going shopping and cooking, K doing laundry, both doing dishes, and me nursing and doing sitz baths. We’ve been managing pretty well like this (save for my occasional postpartum breakdowns — I’ve had a hard time feeling like a prima donna and a sloth.).

But my mom must finally go home next week. What will we do? Survive? Become self-sufficient? Will it be possible if I’m still feeling less than capable? Tune-in for the next post, whenever that may be…

The Birth Story

The birth has been something I’ve tried not to think about because, though the greatest thing in the world resulted from it, the birth story includes some really difficult and scary scenes. People say it’s important to get it all integrated for the psyche’s sake. So I’ll do my best.

On Monday afternoon, Dec. 19, I had some stimulating acupuncture. Since I was already in my 38th week, we went ahead with some labor promoting (I won’t say “inducing”) stuff. At 6:20 a.m. on Dec. 20, I got up to pee (which I’d been doing several times a night for weeks), and what I assumed to be my mucal plug came out. I went back to bed and told K. From then on I began having contractions. Since we knew I would be in early labor for a while, we stayed in bed and I breathed through them. Then K got the Droid with the contraction app and started recording. She noticed that the contractions were presenting more like actual labor contractions than early labor. She called our doula, who said she’d get up, shower and come over. But during that time the contractions got much stronger, so K called a nearby friend and mom of 3 to come over while we waited. By the time the doula arrived, we were ready to head to the hospital. Quite uncomfortably, I began transitioning on the ride over and my water broke as we arrived. I couldn’t walk and it took forever to get a wheelchair.

By the time we were in the delivery room, I was fully dilated and ready to push. This was what I’ve since heard called a freight-train labor. For weeks I had been making iTunes mixes and gathering special comforting items to have at the birth, and K and I practiced the various positions we learned in our birthing class to be prepared for the hours before pushing would begin. None of it was used. Nothing came out of the bag. I pushed and it was the hardest thing I’d ever done. No pain meds, no tub. I pushed for a couple of hours, and the baby’s heart rate was monitored the whole time. Her heart rate dipped, and the nurse midwife called in the OB/GYN on call. He suggested we try a different position, and the heart rate returned to normal. We could see the head, and I’d keep pushing, but then the head would retreat. When the baby’s heart rate dropped again, the doctor came back and said it was time for intervention. I had been so worried about a C-section that I never considered what other interventions might be suggested. But even in my state (screaming like a lioness), I knew that the baby was almost out and a C-section would be going about things kinda backward. I was told that I would be getting an episiotomy and forceps would be used. I was a little dumbfounded because I thought I heard/read somewhere that my hospital didn’t do episiotomies anymore. There wasn’t really time to discuss it. The next thing I knew, I was in the O.R., and with only a few shots of local anesthesia, I was cut (3rd degree), the forceps were inserted, and the baby pulled out. I heard the doctor say the cord was wrapped once around the baby’s neck, and I could see a white baby being taken away. Then I had to deliver my placenta, which I was stunned by as it came out. It was huge and beautiful. K was staying with me while the doctor stitched me up. But then the doula came over and strongly suggested (without panic) that K go over to the baby. The doula stayed with me and told me to say hi to the baby who was on the other side of the O.R. I found out much later that the baby was unresponsive for 5 minutes, and the nurses were sucking major meconium our of her lungs. When K got over to her, the baby was blue. Once she started talking to her though, the baby began breathing and pinked right up. They brought her over to me and she nursed while my stitching was being completed. The most painful part of this was when the doctor pushed the packing inside of me. Had I had pain meds during the labor, I wouldn’t have felt it, but…

The baby was fine. I, on the other hand, continued to bleed. And bleed and bleed. In the recovery room, I turned paler shades of white while the nurses came in and out to change the bloody pads and sheets. One nurse suggested I get up and go to the bathroom, since a full bladder could be pressing on the uterus and causing the bleeding. Well, it was a good idea gone awry. The elderly nurse helped me roll over and stand up without a second to just sit and adjust. After 2 seconds upright, I fainted and apparently stayed unconscious for a while. Poor K was freaking and calling my name over and over. When I came to, I was all, “What?” But I realized I had started to dream in that short amount of time and was glad to be woken. All hell broke loose at this point. The nurses were freaking as if they’d never seen a person pass out before. They put a catheter in, but a full bladder was not the problem. They didn’t know why I was bleeding so much. They ordered 2 bags of blood, and I was told that after I got those transfused, the OB/GYN would be going back inside me to try and find the source of the blood loss. I was also told I would have to have pain meds this time — preferably a spinal. Having made it through to the other side with a healthy baby, I was damned if I was going to have a spinal. But after the options were discussed with the frat boy anesthesiologist, I agreed to the spinal. I was told that the doctor would have to go into the uterus to see if the bleeding was coming from inside there, and that I would not want to feel any of it.

After hours of waiting for the blood and then more hours of waiting for an open O.R., I was wheeled back in. The anesthesiologist overrode the OB/GYN to say K could not come with me. But my nurse midwife was there, and she was very comforting. The doctor added a few stitches to my vaginal wall where a lot of tears had resulted from the forceps; luckily he did not see any abnormal bleeding from the uterus. He did have to pack me with much more gusto this time to try and stop the bleeding, but thanks to the spinal I felt nothing but some pressure. Some hours later (into the next day), I was given another transfusion since I had lost so much blood. The OB/GYN came in and told me I had lost 40% of my blood volume. Yikes! That news put a lot into perspective for me. I realized just how scared K had gotten, and that brought back some memories of how scared I had gotten when she was so ill in ’08.

I was feeling and looking a lot better with the blood in me. Unfortunately, my blood count had not improved by the next morning, and the hospital likes to see good numbers. The new crew (doctor, nurses, midwife) thought I must be bleeding internally somewhere to explain the lack of improvement (again, just according to the numbers); they had no point of reference (except to listen to and believe me) that I was really doing better. They wanted to get the IV port reinserted, give me more blood, and do CT scans. This would involve getting the dye injection, which would mean no more nursing. K and I were at a total loss because we thought we’d be headed home that day. Luckily, the original OB/GYN happened to come by (on his day off — what a mensch!) to check in; we tattled on the new crew and he saved the day by setting them all straight. He said they must have forgotten that with blood loss like that, it would take 2 weeks to see the numbers improve and that we should go home.

I was still taking pain meds every chance I could, but we left the hospital two exhausted moms and a newborn with a paper prescription instead of pills. Once we got home K fell apart and could not for the life of her get to Walgreens to fill my Rx. We called a couple people over to run some errands and help us cope. Then it was my turn to fall apart. All the postpartum hormone stuff hit me at once and I was bawling about how much I loved the baby and couldn’t stand it. That kind of crazy got worse — a lot worse, with dreams you wouldn’t wish on a death row inmate — before it got better.

Jump to now. We’re at 4 weeks postpartum to the day. Josie is eating well, mostly sleeping, and getting bigger. She is unbelievably gorgeous and sweet. I’m still healing from the blood loss and episiotomy. I’ve gained a lot of ground on the blood count front, while the discomfort in my southerly tissues seems like it’s gonna take a while to resolve (much like the stitches to dissolve). We’re being battered by the lack of sleep — about an hour at a time here and there throughout the night, but we are doing much better, getting used to nursing, changing diapers, listening to screaming when there’s nothing we can do. And it’s all wonderful because we have, after all these years of trying, the best little baby in the universe.