it’s fun to learn!

so, we’re a few days into this parenting thing, and all in all, not so bad.  we brought an eternal being into this world; regardless of any complaint against the hardships of parenting, the simple fact of his eternality is enough to qualify as a really unbeatable trump card.  awesome.

things we’re learning:

x. babies are really cool.  everything they do is fascinating (even colicky things–how in the world can they sustain that kind of wailing?  i mean, seriously, that takes a lot of energy!).

x. our baby is flat cute.  just look at him:

 

 

 

 

x. black tar baby poop (BTBP from here on out; AKA: meconium, or, first few days of frightening digestive production) is not fun to clean up.  good thing it only lasts the first couple of days…  we broke down and bought a pack of disposable diapers for the occasion because we ran out of samples (i sent off for every newborn disposable diaper sample known to the free world so we could make it through the first poops because i heard about the BTBP in advance and really didn’t want to have my nice cloth diapers permanently stained from the get-go.  we ran out in a day.  that stuff just kept coming…).

x. not having visitors in these first days has been more than a blessing to this family.  we asked our friends and family to give us one week before coming over to meet the baby so we could rest, heal, and maximize on learning how to best love and serve our son and each other.  a week gives ransom time to figure out how to go about life a little bit outside of the womb and gives mom and dad the best odds for discovering how to handle life as a larger family unit.  it also quite practically translates to we don’t have to expend our energy on other people (or on being presentable and having a mildly presentable house) in a critical time of needing to expend that energy on baby, spouse, and self (delivering a human wreaks havoc on the body… it takes considerable time and energy to recover).  we get to learn ransom’s cues and needs and how to console him (or just love him through the inconsolable times) and ransom gets to learn that he has two very reliable and familiar people who are devoted specifically to his care.  it works for us.  amen.

x. we have incredible friends and family who are honoring our aforementioned boundary, and we are thankful beyond measure.  even the folks who have run errands for us or brought us food have been exceedingly kind to simply serve us in this time, somewhat from a distance, and to them we are also quite grateful.  we feel loved and blessed and privileged to know such a great bunch of folks.

x. we’ve discovered the beauty of the self-swinging baby chair.  thanks jameses; it’s the gift that keeps on giving…

x. the mail doesn’t come on sundays.  i thought i knew this, but went after the mail twice this afternoon thinking the mailman just hadn’t come yet (we get mail way late in the day in general, so it’s always a gamble to go out to the mailbox before nightfall).  apparently, i am having trouble determining days.  they all seem to run together since i’ve been up with the kidlet all night long since he got here.  we’re praying tonight is different.  and if it isn’t, maybe i’ll go out and try to check the mail again.

x. darin and ransom cuddle a lot.  often they are snoozing.  it’s really precious to stumble upon.  i love that my husband loves his son.

 

 

 

 

x. speaking of sleeping, God was really thinking when he set up woman’s hormones in regards to post-partum.  until last night, i had only had 2.5 hours of sleep since tuesday morning at 5:30 a.m. when sporadic but painful contractions woke me and kept me up.  that’s a lot of days without sleep.  last night, i finally got a few hours rest after getting ransom calmed down.  regardless of the sleep i had, i pretty much didn’t even notice the lack thereof until we added up the hours.  i have all these crazy mom-hormones making me all wakey.  it’s awesome, in the very truest sense of the word.

x. the phrase “sleep when the baby sleeps” has yet to work for me.  ransom sleeps something like 16 hours a day.  when he sleeps, most of the time i am completely incapable of following suit.  i’m just not sleepy.  logically, sleeping when he sleeps is reasonable.  it just doesn’t tend to happen in the real for me.

x. colicky nights are not fun.  discovering new ways to console our son is, however, vastly entertaining.  it’s like having this super-intense puzzle to solve every night so far.  thank God for the prayer room webstream and our friends on the nightwatch who are still standing on the wall night after night.  it’s such a joy to be one click away from corporate worship and intercession in the privacy of our own home (that sounds so strange… because it is.  i love technology.).

x. the moby wrap is stinking great.  i am doing laundry tonight while simultaneously carrying my son.  i can’t think of a better way to enable a SAHM to do her jobs around the house than hands-free baby carrying…  fun!  plus, it’s always fun to say “look, ma–no hands!”

 

 

x. i realized today that i can’t eat food like pancho’s or chipotle again for a long time because of what it will do to my son who essentially eats what i eat, yet lacks the bodily maturity to handle much of my favorite fare.  i’m sad.  oh, breastfeeding woes (this is actually the least of my breastfeeding woes, but the rest of them are soon to work themselves out).

x. my parsley plant died.  i didn’t so much learn that as simply notice it just now and decide it to be worth sharing.  i’m really bad with plants… i should try a cactus.

anyhoo, that’s all for now.  i reckon i ought to post the birth story soon.  i actually could do it now.  it’s pretty short.  here goes:

5:30 a.m. tuesday may 12, i wake up feeling pretty darn miserable.  realize it’s a serious contraction.  figure “well, this is fun.  hope it’s a false alarm.”  my due date was a week away, and most first-time moms have their babies late, so i wasn’t counting on anything happening in particular.

day goes by, contractions keep on gaining intensity and frequency and we realize i’m in early labor… so we go to target and world market to get a few random things and because walking felt better than sitting and i was relatively restless.

get back from target and live life for a few hours before it hits me that i should probably actually look at a clock for a few of my contractions to see where i’m at in the labor process.  started counting at 7:15 p.m., they were ten minutes apart.  at 7:35 p.m. they were 5 minutes apart (that fast) and dang painful.  we called the midwife on-duty at 8:35 p.m. (wound up with cathy instead of debbie, but no big, cathy was still a God-send) when contractions were between 3 and 5 minutes apart and 30-100 seconds in length (those 100 second ones were ridiculous…).  cathy said to call her back when the pain became “unbearable”, so we waited another hour until it was hard to breathe or move through a contraction and then called her back.  we had a 30 minute drive to account for, so i told her i’d really like to go on and come in.  we got the go-ahead.  off we went.

got to the birthing center about 10 p.m.  labored in the water birth tub for a while until it hurt too bad to stay in there (hard to explain, but i’m glad i got out when i did…  could have stayed, just didn’t), then had a real fun time getting over to the bed because i was already in transition and movement was all kinds of taxing.

a bunch of pushes and pain later, it was 12 ’til 12 and cathy says “it’s twelve minutes to midnight; are you wanting to have this baby today or tomorrow?”  to which i said, “i don’t really care anymore; i just want it out!” and kept on pushing.  11:59 p.m. he popped out.  thought i was going to die.  then i saw life.  all was better.  baby was with us.  and he’ll never have a friday the 13th birthday.  impeccable timing.  hallelujah.

there you have it.  i’m going to bed.  good night.