Sleep

Now when I write about sleep just days after having a newborn baby, I'm supposed to write about how I miss it and lament that I won't be able to sleep for another 6 months, blah, blah, blah. But actually, this is different.
I had a horrible time with my first two children. In addition to being up all night, my body refused to take naps. I might go rest in bed, but nothing would happen, and then I'd eventually just get up again. I'd go to bed at my normal time, get up every couple hours all night long, and then just spend the day in a fog of exhaustion. After a few weeks, with both girls, I'd reach a point where my body was so exhausted that I'd have about a week of insomnia. Not only could I not sleep during the day, but my body would refuse to sleep at night, too. I felt awful emotionally and physically, and I was really REALLY not looking forward to having another infant.
So this time we came up with a strategy. I'd been taking little catnaps most afternoons since coming to Brazil. I'd go read stories to put Naomi down for her nap, turn on a movie for Penny, and then keel over on the couch and snooze for a few minutes. Sometimes I'd hear the movie the whole time, but sometimes I actually fell asleep. Part of me was feeling guilty for letting her watch so much TV every day (because she'd usually watch in the morning, too), but I started noticing the value in my actually falling asleep.
Thankfully, in the five whole days since William was born, I've been able to sleep once or twice during the day-- actually falling asleep! It might just be for 10 or 15 minutes, but the reset and recharge makes all the difference in the world.
And then there's the question of my bedtime. For the first two girls, I'd just stay up until my regular bedtime, about 10:00. I'd usually put the baby to bed earlier than that, then when she'd wake for a feeding, I'd just go to sleep with her after that.
This time, though, I realized that I need to go to bed earlier, when the kids do. I value my couple hours in the evening, just to read, surf the internet, watch a movie, or just put my feet up. But I value my sleep even more. So I made the conscious decision to go to bed when the kids do, or right afterwards. It's been about 9:00 every night, and I feel fantastic! Physically, I'm still recovering from having a baby. I move slowly, and I'm still healing. Mentally, there's still a little bit of pregnancy-brain, where I can't think of words, my train of thought changes constantly, and I can just tell I've been sleeping in 2-hour spurts.
But the exhaustion isn't there. The frustration of not being able to sleep despite my needing, wanting, and craving it isn't there, either. I'm mostly able to be patient with my kids, mom, and husband (although Naomi still wakes up at 6:00 and won't let anyone but me take her to the bathroom.... grr!) (She was better this morning, though).
I think I can do this. My mom will be here a few more days, and then my dad is coming for a week or so. Then Kevin will take a few more days off of work, and after that I think real life will resume again.
Though really, I feel like it's already started.

Well, that wasn't the birth plan!

When Penny was born, I went to the hospital at midnight, labored there with an epidural, pushed for three (!) hours and then she was born at 10:45 AM or so. Naomi was even more exciting. Once the contractions were 5 minutes apart (at 4 AM), we went to the hospital. I checked in, settled into my bed, and they slowed and then practically stopped. She was born 12 hours later at 4 PM. Both times we had hours and hours to wait and twiddle our thumbs.
This is my frame of reference.
I had a bunch of contractions on Saturday night, which then stopped once I went to bed. On Sunday night (the due date) I was pretty sure that would be the night, so we shipped our girls off to sleep over at a friend's house, and then nothing happened.
Then last night, Monday night, contractions started and kept going very regularly, getting closer together and stronger. Textbook.
We had our friend, Shirley, come over to watch our girls again, and then at about 11:00 we all lay down to rest. The contractions were like 5-6 minutes apart, but not wanting to spend 12 hours laboring in a hospital bed, I went to bed. I figured they'd slow down like the other night, or essentially stop like when Naomi was born.
90 minutes later I woke up to STRONG contractions. They were strong enough that I realized if I'd been in the hospital, I'd have wanted my epidural already. Three minutes later, there was another one. I needed to probably wake Kevin up at this point. So I did, and again at three minutes there was another.
Then I got up.
Gravity's a funny thing. Each contraction then took about 1 minute 30 seconds each, and they were less than 2 minutes apart. Like 1:45. So in my spare 15 seconds, we woke up my mom, got our stuff out the door, down the elevator, and then my water broke in the garage downstairs.
As soon as my water broke, I couldn't help but push. I've watched enough TV to know that you can breathe through them to keep from pushing, so for the entire 10-minute drive to the hospital, I was alternating between breathing, hyperventilating, and pushing, despite my best efforts and my mom's coaching from the back seat.
At the hospital, I ran in and told the nurse that I was having a baby NOW. She got me a wheelchair and hurried me towards the doctor. I guess she hurried well enough, but she wasn't exactly Mr. Toad on a wild ride. They really didn't feel the same urgency as I did. The doctor casually got up from his desk and walked with us into triage. I struggled onto the table, and the doctor started listening for the baby's heartbeat. Well, I was finally at the hospital, with a doctor and nurses, so I kicked off one flip-flop, pulled one leg out of my pant leg and started to push.
Thanks to gravity and speed bumps, the baby was already crowned and ready to go at that very moment.
Thanks to my mom, I know exactly what happened. "Oh my gosh, there's a baby!" "There's the head!" and, "There's the baby!"
It took about that long, and I was holding a slippery, purple, healthy baby. Eventually they got the right clamps and stuff to cut the cord, and then a couple minutes later, Kevin came running down the hall and into our little room.
"Wow, he's here already!"
It took about 3 minutes from when we got to the hospital to when I was holding little William Lowell Fisher in my arms.
I guess if you're going to do it without an epidural, that's as long as it ought to take.
I'm glad my mom was there. Kevin had to go do paperwork and deal with bureaucracy for over an hour and a half. My mom held my hand and took care of me while everything got finished up.
I'm glad the baby came with no complications. No one was really ready for him, and I could tell that our ER doctor didn't deliver babies every night. But everything went smoothly-- as well as quickly.
I'm really REALLY glad Kevin had the foresight to rent a car from the Embassy for the night. Waiting for a taxi would have changed this story dramatically.

William Lowell Fisher

Bookends

It may have something to do with the fact that I'm quite large these days 

Almost as big as I ever get

but my kids are learning that if I tell/ask/command them to do something, I'm hardly ever going to follow through with them if they decide not to do it. It drives me a little nuts that they just blatantly disregard me, but it's as much my fault as theirs. I'm trying to be more consistent.

So if you can imagine, it wasn't all peaches and cream today, especially with Naomi. She's two. She loves to whine. She loves to disregard whatever I say and then wait for my reaction. Well, she got some reactions today.

But instead of it being a horrid day, the moments that stand out for me were the first and last moments of our day. 

We got up this morning, and I read the "news" about Prince William and Kate and Baby George going to New Zealand. (Hey, I need to keep current on world events!) There was a photo album that I flipped through while Naomi read over my shoulder. She asked about the baby, and then asked, "Is that you carrying him?"

I've never been mistaken for Kate Middleton before, but I really don't mind!

And then at the end of the day, I piled up all the plates and managed to completely clear the table after dinner. I cleaned them into the trash and then dumped them into the sink. Then I wandered off to go sneak some Easter candy. When I headed back into the dining room, there was Naomi, scrubbing the crumbs off the cleared table. She was using the right washcloth and doing an excellent job! I was shocked that she did it without my asking her, and that she was actually doing it well. I was almost ready to cry. But since I'm 39 weeks pregnant, that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone.

We have sweet moments throughout the day, and I was glad to have these special two as bookends for today.

Funny girls

A few months ago, when we were still in the US, my children discovered that I'm hilarious. I was driving, and the two girls were behind me. Penny mentioned ice cream, so I asked her, "You don't like ice cream, do you?"
She was immediately confused and offended, so I had to explain. "Sometimes I say things like that just to be funny. It's called a joke."
We repeated the conversation a few times, and eventually she thought it was pretty hilarious.

So now that I'm getting huge, Penny's favorite joke is a "tummy joke." This is when I get up from the table, rub my tummy, and say, "Woah, I ate waaay too much pizza!" (or whatever).
Penny laughs and laughs and says, "No Mommy, that's a joke! You have a baby in your tummy!"
Then she asks me to tell another tummy joke, at which point I really have nothing to say. It will be a while until she understands comedic timing.

One afternoon we made some delicious cookies, and as the girls and I sat around the table to eat them, I whispered to Penny that, "We should tell Dad they taste yucky, so he won't want to eat any."
Penny laughed. "No Mommy, that's a joke!"
Then she wanted me to tell another "person joke."
She's pretty funny in her own way, too.