Tuesday, February 18, 2014

The Babies!!! - Part 3 of That Tummy Topic

You can find part one here, and part two here.

So, I left off my last post with my due date for Ruby.    She was due June 2, 2010.  We waited, and waited.   I watched those home water birth plans get flushed down the toilet.    She was a full 2 weeks late, and let's just say that things did not go well.   There was a lot of fear, a lot of trauma, and a lack of care.     Luckily we're both OK, but I was damaged.   Really, quite damaged.      There is a whole long story that could go here, but since I rambled so much in my last post, and Ruby's birth is really a story of fear, humiliation, more fear, pain, exhaustion, fear, and pain, did I mention pain and fear.  I'll leave it alone.

I had surgery when Ruby was 8 months old and that helped a lot, but I was still in pain until after Jude was born.   My lovely OB raised her eyebrows, gave me a look of "what the heck is that" and went to work.   After Ruby my recovery took a little over a year and I was still in pain.   After Jude, my recovery was done in 6 weeks.  It really took the whole 6 weeks and it wasn't fun, but it was done, and I felt truly pain free.   Jude birth was GLORIOUS!  It was a fully medicalized hospital birth.  I had to be induced early because I had cholestasis.  I knew what was going on.   When he was having heart rate problems they were on it.   I was not afraid.   I did have an epidural, and it was a pretty awesome epidural.  I could feel everything, but it was not painful.   Pushing with Jude took 45 minutes.   Compared to the 2 1/2 hours for Ruby it felt so fast!  I felt awesome, so happy.   Jude's birth was really wonderful in every way.  I wouldn't change a thing (except maybe the recovery time).

My back started really going out when Jude was a few months old.    I would kink something, or pinch something and end up a pretzel.   It wasn't that uncommon.   I could tell my posture was different.  I knew my abs weren't what they used to be.  I knew my back problems were likely due to a weak core.    I didn't stand as straight anymore.   In particular, my shoulders rolled forward.  I have never had posture like this.   I grew up having people comment on how good my posture was.  I knew it was terrible now, but I didn't really know how to fix it. 

Jude also just did not sleep in the beginning.  I spent 2 or 3 hours every night sitting slumped but upright in a very uncomfortable chair, patting him and shushing him and rubbing his back for him to sleep.  He would sleep, but woke up every 15-20 minutes crying and I would pat and rub and he would go back to sleep....often with some farts :)    At 7 months old Jude started sleeping 7pm to 7am and he's still a sleeping champion!   We have a terrible time with him once it a while...it lasts about a week, we think we can't go on, then he goes back to 7-7 sleepy bliss.  That boy is like sleeping magic.  

I got pregnant with Olive when Jude was about 4 months old.   Luckily it wasn't too much longer before Jude started sleeping through the night!    Olive's pregnancy was an easy one again.    Ruby's was great, Jude's was terrible, Olive's was great.   I'm blaming the boys  :D  Just joking.

I had cholestasis again, so Olive was a c-section as she was breech.   I clearly can't position a baby properly, as both Ruby and Jude were posterior babies...but at least those two were head down!

So, I had the c-section.   That sucked.  I hated the actual c-section.  The first 4-ish days of recovery sucked too, although not nearly as bad as recovery after Ruby's birth.    Then I started to feel a lot better.   I have to say, the c-section was BY FAR the easiest recovery I had.    BY FAR!  YAY! SUNROOF EXIT FOR THE WIN!!!

Gosh!   Get on with the actually tummy course woman...sheesh...

yeah...sorry... who knew I'd ramble like this.   Next post...promise!  

Go to Part 4 here 
Go to Part 5 here

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