Thursday, July 31, 2008

And then there's Maude

(I'm sorry; I couldn't resist)

Photobucket
(Sfrajett has all the pictures on her computer; I just have this one from my phone. What you can't see is all her dark, dark hair. More soon.)

So that was much harder than I expected . . .

Birth story in a sec, but first, much thanks to my friend Luches for updating the blog while Sfrajett and I were in the hospital.

We just brought our precious little firecracker home from the hospital yesterday, after 96 long, long hours in the postpartum ward, surrounded by well-meaning, but bossy, nurses, each of which knew exactly how to turn little Miss Maude into the latched on baby of my dreams. Funny how forcing a screaming baby's head onto your nipple doesn't make for a calm, productive nursing experience. But more on that in another post. So we were there for four days post-delivery because, after having maybe the easiest pregnancy ever, I had:
  • 24 hours of labor,
  • 2 1/2 hours of (hard!) pushing (Sfrajett's theory is that our ob/gyn played sports at some point, and approaches the delivery room with the affect of the coach. Me, I'm a pleaser, so I do well with coaching, and when I doctor I already hugely admire encourages me to push harder than anyone's ever pushed before, all I want to do is please her. So really, please believe me when I say I was in the last six miles of the marathon for these entire 2 1/2 hours)
  • an emergency c-section.
Turns out little Miss Maude was way too big for me. Well, really, it was her gigantic 14 inch head that was too big. After all that pushing--I heard the doctor telling the nurse they were "productive" pushes--baby's head still wasn't quite in the birth canal, only the elongated cone my productive pushes had been making out of the back of her head. The only way I was going to deliver her vaginally was via forceps and I knew that that would mean a lot more tearing, possibly a broken collar bone for baby, maybe a broken tailbone for me--a lot of distress for both of us. So the decision to go with the c-section was an easy one. Twenty minutes later I celebrated my baby's birth by throwing up some vile, bubbling green anti-acid medicine they'd made me gulp down on the way to surgery. As the doctor pulled baby's gigantic self out of little me I could hear her saying something like "wow, that was the right decision."

Sfrajett will write a more thoughtful post about the birth experience, if she ever puts the baby down, because she experienced it much more than I did. I just wanted to check in and thank you all for your beautiful messages of congratulations, and let you know that we're all doing fine here. I'm just glad it's over, glad I have Maude safely here in my arms, glad I have a partner who's a fiercely protective, tender, passionately devoted parent, who can make me laugh in the middle of a sleepless night with her sweet and goofy lullabies, and whose arms never seem to get tired.

11 Comments:

Blogger Earnest English said...

Congratulation, Margo! Thanks so much for finding the time to post -- especially when recovering from a C-section!

Maude's adorable!

9:43 AM  
Blogger Michael LeVan said...

Beautiful!

I'm glad you made it through all the last-minute changes. They always seem to look cute and calm when they arrive via c-section.

10:37 AM  
Blogger gwoertendyke said...

she's so beautiful....good for you margo, and gf, who i know makes everything seem possible.

big babies are so adorable! i can't wait to see her hair...thinking of you so much.

xo, aw

12:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wow, congratulations from us! We're so happy for all three of you. Beautiful baby -- and now the real adventure begins!

2:02 PM  
Blogger Hilaire said...

As Earnest says - thank you so much for posting even after your major surgery! She's beautiful - you three are amazing.

9:50 PM  
Blogger NotesFrom2Moms said...

she is absolutely gorgeous.

7:02 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sooooooo adorable. I could just schmush her.

Congrats on getting through it!

7:02 AM  
Blogger What Now? said...

Goodness -- too much excitement! Sorry that you didn't have a calm delivery after your calm pregnancy. I'm glad everyone is home safe and sound.

10:53 AM  
Blogger Margaret said...

Congratulations! What a beautiful baby.

4:30 PM  
Blogger Clancy said...

Oh, I'm so happy for you! I had a c-section too, back in April (my blog is at culturecat.net), and I had forgotten all about that horrible medicine. It tasted like rotten eggs covered with a ton of salt.

4:32 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

That was a beautiful narration. I thank you for sharing your experience and look forward to more posts from you.

This is Joshua from Israeli Uncensored News

6:01 AM  

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