Happy Valentine's Day!

I got a note from daycare last week saying that all the kids were supposed to bring valentines for their classmates on Monday.  At first I thought it was ridiculous (and still do) that we're already doing valentines, given that these kids are two and can't read, let alone write, their own name.  And then I decided that if we were going to do valentines, we were going to do them ourselves.  So Saturday morning, Ollie and I sat down and made his valentines.  The poem was crafted collaboratively (Oliver contributing content, while I constructed the actual text -- note the near rhyme in the first stanza -- typed, printed, cut, and glued), and Oliver decorated the insides.  He had an assortment of stickers, including zoo animals, dogs, birds, trucks, and tools, and chose the last of these for his own card to keep.

At the moment, Ollie is still down for a very long nap, having woken up today with a fever of almost 103.  The Tylenol has helped him feel a little better, but it's obvious when it wears off and he starts feeling badly again.  He's still a really good kid, even when he's sick -- lucky for me, since Wes was working today.

So here's Oliver's Valentine's Day wishes to all of you -- friends and family.  Hope the day is as special as he is.

Stats

Emmeline had her 4 week appointment with the pediatrician today.

Height: 21.5" (75th percentile)
Weight: 8 lbs., 13 oz. (45th percentile)
Head circumference: 14 1/8" (25th percentile)

Next appointment in four weeks, when it's time for her next immunizations.

  

On pregnancy, the second time around

I said throughout my pregnancy that this time was harder, and now that Emmeline is here and almost four weeks old, I can look back and confirm that it was definitely a different experience that with my first.  I'm sure this is no surprise to anyone who's had more than one kid, and it's something that shows up on a lot of "what to expect the second time" lists.  I felt like this pregnancy was, more or less, just something to get through.  It was still special, it was still wonderful -- I just wished it'd lasted half as long and I could've skipped the part with Roy (who still hasn't gone home, I'm dismayed to say).  I loved, for the most part, having a posterior placenta and getting to feel her so much more -- except the nights that kept me from sleeping.  I loved getting to see Oliver experience the pregnancy, or whatever he thought it was, from his perspective.  I loved finding out it was a girl and getting to buy pink and purple clothes and redecorate the nursery.  But I didn't love the pregnancy the way I did the first time around.

When I got pregnant with Oliver, I was just excited to be pregnant.  The fact that I got to have a real live baby at the end of it was something I got excited about later.  This time, I just really wanted another baby.  The pregnancy was something I had to go through to get it.  I hope that Wes and I will be able to have more children, and if and when I get pregnant again, I will be thrilled.  I will get excited about the second line on the pregnancy test, feeling the first sensations of baby moving, seeing the heartbeat on the ultrasound, finding out the gender, washing and folding tiny baby clothes, and gearing up for labor.  But I think next time I'll, hopefully, realize that it's just going to be a little different and enjoy it for the differences, not expect so much of it and myself, I guess.

The one thing that isn't different, of course, is the joy and excitement of having that next baby, bringing her home, and folding her into our life.  Second pregnancies might not be as exciting as the first, but no doubt that second babies are.

A consumer reviews

Nashville may be Music City, but it also hospital central.  There are several large hospitals here, and several hospital corporations (that own hospitals nationwide) are based out of the area south of Nashville.  Vanderbilt is the academic medical center in Nashville.  It's where the most critical patients go, where the research happens, and is commonly where people go for advanced types of care.  But for things like childbirth, most women head to Baptist Hospital.  It's a newer hospital with more updated facilities.  Academic hospitals like Vanderbilt, which house the NICUs and handle the most complicated pregnancies, often treat every pregnancy as though it were a potential disaster rather than something normal, so a lot of women choose to go to a nearby private hospital that are more "childbirth friendly" for uncomplicated pregnancies.  In Charlottesville, many women -- even the wives of UVA doctors -- went to Martha Jefferson to have their babies.  Here, it's Baptist.  When I got pregnant, I talked to a lot of women who'd given birth in Nashville, and pretty much all of them had gone to Baptist.  The one woman who'd recently birthed at Vanderbilt wasn't happy about her experience.  But our insurance covers best at Vanderbilt, and given my history and the fact that I was using a midwife, Wes and I agreed that we would go to Vanderbilt.

And for anyone out there wondering about the same things, can I just say, Vanderbilt was great.  I have absolutely no complaints and actually found my experience there to be better than what I experienced at Prentice, which was brand new and beautiful when I gave birth to Oliver.  My midwives were supportive without being pushy the day of the birth.  I checked in with the midwife on call, Melissa, on Thursday morning to let her know I was laboring and to see when I should come in.  She reassured me that I could stay home as long as I felt comfortable, even with my GBS+ status.  When I called the triage nurse later that day, she offered for me to go to the hospital or come in to be checked, and really left the decision completely up to me.  And when I got the hospital, L&D was already expecting me and had a room ready for me to go to.  The nurses who took care of me were kind and thoughtful and respectful of the fact that I was yes, a laboring mom, but also an intelligent women who didn't need to be coddled.  We laughed about some of the questions they had to ask, and they praised my demeanor through the contractions (though I'm sure they do that with everyone).  When the anesthesiologist came in to talk to me about pain medications, she started by saying that she'd read my birth plan and knew I wanted to go natural, but explained that she needed to get a consent ahead of time in case there was an emergency.  And that was how pretty much everyone was -- informed and supportive but not pushy.  It seemed like everyone had actually read my birth plan, contrary to everything I'd ever heard about having a birth plan.  And people respected it but also made me aware of my options.  They knew I wanted no separation of care.  They paged our pediatrician so Wes could talk with her about treatment for the aplasia plus untreated Strep B.  They sent in a lactation consultant each day just to check on me since they knew I was breastfeeding.  No one pushed me to send her to the nursery so that I could sleep.  No one casually suggested I give her a bottle of formula.  They were very respectful of our wishes are parents.

I'm sure the reason some people don't go to Vanderbilt or hospitals like it is the presence of residents and medical students, but with a midwife I got to skip out on all that.  And in fairness, the rooms aren't nearly as nice as what Prentice had or what presumably Baptist has.  They're a little small for a bed, cot, bassinet and all the people who come and go.  The bathrooms are a little run down, the shower makes you claustrophobic, and the towels a dinky and well used.  But for the couple extra thousands dollars we would have paid to go to Baptist -- compared to the $0 we paid to deliver at Vanderbilt -- it hardly matters.  I truly felt like I had the birth I wanted to at Vanderbilt, and it was nice being "in house" at the place where Wes works and I study.  And hey, Emme had no complaints.

A rolling stone gathers no moss

Ollie now loves the "merry-go-round" at the zoo.
He asks for it all the time!

Ollie, Emme, and I went to the zoo again this morning.  As I was packing the kids and the stroller back into the car, I realized that Emme is now 3 weeks, 3 days old, and she's been to the zoo -- twice (though I see in looking back at the blog that Oliver went to the zoo at 3 weeks, too).  She's had breakfast at the Cracker Barrel, hot chocolate at Starbucks, lunch at Frothy Monkey, dinner at Cheeseburger Charlie's, shopped at Target and the mall,  spent some unknown number of hours at Lowe's and Home Depot, and been to three doctor's appointment.  No wonder the kid is so tired.  No wonder I am.

Sweet Emme

Tiny dancer