From about mid-pregnancy I felt like things were going to be different with Vaughn. Of course a lot of things were the same, and a lot of my predictions were way off (I really thought it was a girl and I thought I was going to avoid the gestational diabetes this time around, ha!). But I started saying early on that this baby was going to come a little early, and on his own time. It's one of the things I hate most about the diabetes... no doctor wants to let you go past term for fear of a giant baby or other complications.
So a lot of my hopes for this pregnancy hinged on going into labor on my own. I never got to experience that with G, and although his birth wasn't bad or traumatic, it wasn't what I wanted either and I switched to a midwife this time in hopes of having fewer medical interventions in birth. I'm not quite up for a birth center or home birth (maybe if I were younger) and I wasn't entirely confident I could manage without pain medication - but gosh darnit, I wanted a chance to do things my way!
As my pregnancy progressed, I learned I was growing another boy and I was eventually diagnosed with GD again. My diet was slightly different this time and I worried I might end up on insulin, but I got it together and controlled my blood sugar with diet alone. I saw a perinatologist on a regular basis and ultrasounds showed the baby was fairly average in size. My most exciting moment came around 35 or 36 weeks when my midwife checked and I was already starting to dilate. Not much, but certainly more than I ever did with Greyson.
At some point I realized my expectations were pretty high and my window of opportunity for birthing was pretty narrow. Mike and I were invited to a wedding the weekend I was 38 weeks along. We really wanted to be at that wedding and we had dozens of old friends in town that weekend for the festivities. I told anyone who would listen that the baby was free to come anytime after May 15. My midwife shared her vacation plans, and she was going to be out of town for my actual due date. But since I was already progressing, we didn't think I would go that long. My perinatologist suggested I could go to 39 weeks but he'd like to see me induced if I went any longer than that. So the baby had a one week window, and I figured that was probably too much to ask. I thought he might show his sense of humor by arriving on Friday the 13th (the day before the wedding).
At my last visit with the high-risk doctor, he suggested that this baby might be a little bigger than Grey, but still in the normal range. The worrying part was that while he was measuring overall in the 50th percentile, his head was measuring in the 90th! Just what I needed to hear as I tried to approach this labor with no fears. At the midwife (at 37+ weeks) I learned I was almost 3cm dilated and I started to take evening primrose oil. Late that week I saw some more (too graphic to discuss here) signs that things were progressing, but nothing imminent. My parents came for a visit and to watch G while we attended the wedding. We had a great time and visited with friends and family all weekend.
Did I forget to mention that during all of this (when I wanted nothing more than to be washing baby clothes, organizing the nursery and freezing meals for after the baby arrives) we had a minor plumbing/laundry emergency that necessitated ripping up my entire kitchen and laundry room floor, going a day without water in the house, and spending a week watching my house be dismantled and reassembled by my husband? Happy Mother's Day to me! Things were finished just in time for the wedding weekend, which turned out to be our last weekend as a family of three.
Saturday, May 21, 2011
Dear Vaughn,
I'm emotional just sitting down to write this. It has been a joy getting to know you over the past three and a half days, little Vaughn. It's always so hard to imagine that the little bean growing inside you is a real person, and then you meet them and fall in love so fast and so hard that you can't imagine life without them. I'm already that smitten.
I'm remembering how the adjustments begin, how we stay up all night with you one night and expect the next to be the same - but you've got your own schedule and it changes daily. You have been strong-willed from the beginning, arriving so quickly the nurses were still getting the bed ready as I started to push, and the midwife had to scramble to get dressed in time. You were early to feed, and then cluster feed to get my milk in, you were ready to leave the hospital in a day, you passed everything with flying colors. Your fingernails were so long and delicate when you were born it looked like you had a french manicure.
Your arrival was so unlike your brother's, and yet you are so much alike as newborns. Your hospital photos show almost identical babies, your birth weight was the same, and your hair is so similar. But I don't know what to expect from you, you will surely be your own little man. I cannot wait to see you grow, but I know I must savor these early days of falling in love, painful as the sleepless nights and cracked nipples may be. You're my baby, my little Vaughn, and we all love you so much already. You tolerate your big brother's kisses and hugs, the photos your dad takes as you sleep, your mama stroking your soft hair as you nurse.
The thought of taking care of a newborn is exhausting in theory. But knowing it's for you, I'm buoyed and sure that we can handle it. I can't wait for your next three days, and the next three, and the next. Before I know it, you'll be three years old like your brother and I will look back and cry again as I read this.
Vaughn Ryan Mulvihill
Born 5/18/2011 6:44am
7 lbs, 13 oz, 21 inches, huge head
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
