Giving birth another try
I had high hopes for my second go-round at giving birth. First off, I hoped giving birth would happen closer to my due date, which was Sept. 20. Then, I hoped that I would actually go into labor, and actually joked around with coworkers about working up until my water broke at work. I also hoped to give birth naturally (even with some concession to having an epidural, if the pain got really bad), because I did not have fond memories of recovering after my C-section with Michael.
So much for all my hopes. I never thought I’d be a multiple C-section mom, but here I am. As they say, the goal of every birth is a healthy mom and a healthy baby, so you gotta roll with the punches.
Another adorable baby boy
This will not be a long blog post, as I still feel as though someone ripped out my stomach (oh yeah, in a way someone did…) and I’m perpetually light-headed and headache-y from having not eaten anything for, oh, 36 hours or so. Babies are great, but dude, whoever thought up C-sections really wanted to make giving birth a truly lasting, painful experience. Anyway, Christopher David Powells was born at 8:20 p.m. on August 22, 2011, weighing in at 4 pounds, 5 ounces and measuring at 17 inches. Even as things didn’t go as I’d hoped — like my hope for a VBAC down the drain, for example — at least I didn’t need magnesium sulfate, which even my Ob-Gyn agreed was a nasty medication.
So, here I am, 1st day post-partum. I haven’t eaten anything solid yet, unfortunately, but I am no longer chained down by my catheter or the massage socks (that’s probably not the term for them — they are sort of like leg warmers that massage your calves to prevent blood clots in your legs). I’ve already taken a lumbering, somewhat ginger lap around the post-partum ward, and I’m hoping, hoping, hoping I’ll get breakfast tomorrow! So, in the grand tradition of not posting early baby pictures of my kids on Facebook, here are a few photos of my little Chris.
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Scratch the easy bed rest
I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is, I didn’t kill the phalaenopsis orchid plant I got for my birthday back in May. I was a little worried that I had, because I’d left it in the car when we’d gone to lunch that day, and all the leaves had gotten burned. But, happily, it bloomed this week. My mom would be proud. Not that I nearly killed an orchid plant, but that I managed to get it to bloom again. The orchid also gives me an opportunity to break up all the text heavy posts, lately.
Bed rest, the sequel
As much as I tried to do things differently this pregnancy, I still got the same result — a sudden onset of high blood pressure, protein in my urine, indicating pre-eclampsia, and a bed rest order. Sigh. But there are some differences this time around, especially since I know what to expect.
First off, at my last ultrasound (I’ve had a bunch this pregnancy, partly because of doctor changes, but also to closely monitor the baby’s growth), the doctor calculated that the baby is weighing in at 4 pounds, 4 ounces. That was just last week, 34 weeks. The baby’s a little smaller than usual, but he’s bigger than Michael was at this point, so to me, that’s good news.