The Small Family     

I am pretty much ready to scream at our blog right now. Honestly. I debated not even posting it at all that this point, because it has given me SUCH a headache this week. After five days of it being down and then hours spent on the phone, I FINALLY got it working--only to have it delete everything I redid when I hit a keyboard shortcut that I use many times a day in Microsoft Word (and that out of habit I used in our blog--not knowing that apparently in our blog software, that same keyboard shortcut erases EVERYTHING you've done).

But I will try ONE MORE TIME to get the darn thing working. And let me just say that the post I prepared on Sunday was actually very upbeat and cheerful, but by this point I am just downright ANGRY about all these stupid computer problems! (I need to just have the baby. I have clearly reached the surly stage of pregnancy, where I get angry about everything. Don't even ask about my throwdown with the librarian at the Clayton library this week...)

Deep breath. Okay. Let me start typing what I just spent 45 minutes typing AGAIN. For the third time.... And let me not curse Yahoo Small Business web hosting for the remainder of this post, though I am surely cursing them right now!

I was going to just post my nice blog from Sunday once the site was finally up and working, but a lot has changed this week, so I might as well give you the latest and greatest. It has not been a restful week around here, which probably explains some of my surly attitude. Big news is that Garbanzo will no longer be arriving the good old-fashioned way--instead, he will be arriving by C-section on the 15th, 16th, or 17th, if not before. (Or I suppose maybe after if Kaiser doesn't get around to calling me back with my C-section appointment...grumble, grumble.)

Some of you already know the story, but for those of you who don't, here it is. Wednesday morning I had a routine 37-week appointment scheduled. I actually thought I was going to miss it, as a certain blonde gremlin managed to kill my car battery, so when we tried to leave the house Wednesday morning, the car was dead. (Said gremlin had popped my back hatch without my knowledge the day before, and so the dome light in the cargo area was on all night and killed the battery.) I wasn't too upset about missing the appointment, as all my appointments have been fine, but in retrospect it's a good thing that AAA showed up quickly to jump my battery, allowing me to make it to my appointment just a couple minutes late.

I went in and saw a new doctor, and she cheerfully announced that she was going to do an ultrasound to confirm the baby's position. I was delighted at the chance to see the little guy again, but very surprised because Kaiser is notoriously stingy about ultrasounds: you get one at 8 weeks and one at 20 weeks, and that's it. So she wheeled in the machine, and I prepared to say hi to Garbanzo. And I did get to say hi--but we were in for quite a surprise. The hard little bump on my right side is actually not his bottom, it's his head! He's breech! The doctor and I both thought he was already head down and engaged, but no--he's breech. And, further surprise: My amniotic fluid is low.

So the doctor called a specialist (perinatologist) to consult, and that doctor said she should send me over to Labor & Delivery for a follow-up ultrasound and a possible C-section that day. What?? I went in just expecting to hear the heartbeat and be told that everything as A-OK! Suddenly, I had to think. I had Theo at preschool, needing to be picked up in 90 minutes. I had Chris two hours away at work. I had my in-laws over an hour away. And I wasn't allowed to leave the hospital. I quickly called Chris's Dad and asked him to go get Theo. I called the preschool and told them that Chris's Dad would likely be late, as he had to pack his bag and pick up Chris's Mom from school on the way out--could they keep Theo late for me? I called Chris and asked him to come to the hospital, as the doctor sounded fairly certain that I'd be having a C-section that day. And then I walked down the long hall by myself to Labor & Delivery, trying to be calm but feeling pretty darn nervous and lonely. I hadn't hugged Theo goodbye! Chris wouldn't be there for close to two hours! Ugh, this was not in my plan!

I got to L&D and got set up for a non-stress test and a second ultrasound. The non-stress test was fine--the baby was "doing beautifully." The second ultrasound, too, turned out okay. Amniotic fluid should measure between 5 and 25 cm. During my first u/s, I was at 4 cm. During the second, I was up to 6. (Apparently if the baby pees or shifts position significantly, fluid levels can increase.) So I was now out of the "danger zone," but there was still the question of why my fluid was low--rupture in the membrane, perhaps? If that was the case, I needed a C-section that day.

Normally it's a pretty simple process to check for a ruptured membrane, but we had a couple of extenuating circumstances, so it took a while to find a workaround. By then Chris had arrived (thank goodness!) and my father-in-law was on his way to get Theo (thank goodness!), so I felt a bit more settled. But still--what was going on?

Well, they don't think there's a leak in my water. (The test isn't 100% accurate, but it was far better than nothing.) So really, it's anyone's guess as to why it's low...but because it is in the "safe" range now, they decided not to do the C-section that day after all. So, after five hours, I was discharged and sent home. What a roller-coaster of emotions, though--first I assume everything will be peachy keen, then I hear the baby needs to come out via C-section that day, then I hear that he needs to come out via C-section--but in two weeks! Ugh...

For those wondering, he's probably breech because of the low fluid. And I'm not a good candidate for an external version (where they attempt to manually turn the baby to the head-down position) because of the low fluid. From what I have learned, a C-section really is the safest method at this point--babies who go through a vaginal delivery where there's not enough amniotic fluid present are more likely to have complications such as the umbilical cord being compressed during delivery. So it's actually a blessing that for whatever reason, the doctor I saw decided to randomly do an ultrasound, even though they don't normally do them at this stage. If she hadn't, I would've gone through heaven knows how much of labor without knowing that he was (a) breech and (b) lacking enough fluid for me to necessarily safely deliver him.  (A few people have asked me, "Doesn't Kaiser do an ultrasound to check the baby's position when you go into labor?" The answer is no--they don't. Breech accounts for only 3-4% of full-term babies, so I guess they just assume the baby is in the correct position. And many women have internal checks during labor, but I don't...in no small part because with Group B Strep in your system, it's better to avoid checks as much as possible, because they can introduce bacteria into the birth canal.)

So really, although the day was very stressful, I think it was actually a blessing. Now we know what we need to do: We should have a perfectly safe delivery and healthy baby; he just needs to come out via C-section instead of vaginally. Not my favorite option, but far from the worst news!

And so, without further ado, here is last week's blog:

My day trip to San Francisco last Sunday was lovely! I did indeed have the Nutella milkshake, though the waiter suggested that I add peanut butter to it as well, which I did--and it was divine! Best milkshake I’ve ever had. I felt sick for 24 hours after (stupid dairy!!), but it was worth it. I also had a delicious cheeseburger and some beer-battered jalapeno pickles--yum! Amber and I decided to see Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close afterward, and I really enjoyed it. Not an easy movie to watch, by any means, but a very good movie. I was actually very surprised that the young star of the movie didn’t get an Oscar nod--he was fantastic. And although the subject matter was kind of heartbreaking (the boy loses his father in 9/11), the story was actually uplifting in the end. I’m not sure I’d go so far as to call it a feel-good movie, but it didn’t leave me achingly depressed or anything--it was actually very good, and I left happy with the ending. And I’m told that Chris and Theo had a relatively nice day while I was gone, too--started out rough due to the aforementioned acting out on the part of the young blondie, but Chris said things improved significantly after lunch, and they had a nice rest of the day together.

Theo and I also had a grand time at music class this week, as usual. The new instrument this week was a child-sized cello, which Theo thought was pretty cool! He also had a fun time on the keyboard this week--Jon hauled out an old Scorpions song from my youth, and it was hilarious to see a bunch of three- and four-year-olds jamming to “Rock You Like a Hurricane.” (Also amusing to watch Jon ad-lib some “clean” lyrics for a song that’s actually not terribly appropriate for young kids in its original incarnation!) Theo really got into the song and was playing the keyboard like a true rock star!

One neat thing I learned is how much of these music lessons Theo is actually taking in. Very often, Theo appears to be off in his own world--he’s so busy in his own brain that you often don’t know quite how much he’s actually listening to what you say. But then he’ll come out with something very detailed and complex that we know he must have learned at preschool, and we'll think, “Hmmm, he actually is listening more than he lets on.” But because we’re not at preschool with him, we just assume that’s where he picks this stuff up. However, I am at music class with him, and so I see him sitting there, appearing to be half engaged and half in Theo World…and then he’ll come home and rattle off exactly what Jon said. So I know that despite him looking halfway disengaged, he actually is listening and retaining what’s going on. In his own Theo way, he has listened to and processed quarter notes, half notes, flats, sharps, the key of C, the key of D, piano (soft) playing, and forte (LOUD!) playing. Because we’ve only been in class a few weeks (and some of these concepts are new), I’ve realized that it’s not so much the repetition, necessarily--he really just does listen even when he looks like he’s not.

So why do I think this is neat? Well, to be perfectly honest, because it reminds me of me. :-) I once went back through my old progress reports from elementary school, and I was aghast to see that one of the teachers had suggested that I might be retarded. (Yes, that’s the word they used--I’m not just being horribly politically incorrect here.) “What?! “ I asked my mom. “How could they think that?” And my Mom confessed that I used to sit in class with my mouth hanging open, and I really did look kind of “retarded.” (One of my great uncles--NOT my favorite one by any means!—once made the same assessment. Good to know how I looked to everyone else, eh?) For the record, I was actually daydreaming--I was really bored in school, and I would make up fantastic stories in my head and get so involved in them that I was quite off in my own world. But yet I learned--my daydreaming never seemed to interfere with me absorbing the material. And so I kind of laugh that my kid is doing the same thing. I don’t actually think Theo looks “retarded” by any means, but he is very often off in Theo Land, and you have to work to get his attention. But it’s good to know that even if he seems to be floating out in the poppies, he’s actually listening and retaining things. I guess he just multitasks that way, like his mama. :-)

We had a nice weekend with beautiful weather, so that wrapped up our week in a good way! On Friday evening, Theo and I drove down to Walnut Creek to meet Chris for dinner. I suggested we try a fairly new Turkish restaurant that was getting good reviews, and oh my--we were not disappointed! I think the food was every bit as tasty as our beloved Turkish restaurant in Roseville, although the staff wasn’t quite as friendly. (They weren’t rude--the man who ran the restaurant in Roseville was just a particularly nice guy.) I was trying to take it easy on food, as I had been sick several times earlier in the day (late-pregnancy woes…), so I just had a Turkish salad with grilled shrimp, but it was absolutely delicious. Chris had kebabs (lamb and chicken) with rice and grilled veggies, and they, too, were delicious. And the three of us split a cold appetizer sampler platter, which we all loved. (They didn’t have a kids’ menu, so the appetizer sampler was the most Theo-friendly thing on the menu. He loves pitas and hummus and chickpeas and such, and it had all sorts of yummy little delights he could eat--and we figured we’d just eat whatever he didn’t.) Theo did exceptionally well at the restaurant (see, it’s not all bad lately, even though the  little turkey has been…well…a turkey a lot lately!), so we treated him to a mini-cupcake at Kara’s for dessert--and of course indulged ourselves as well!

Chris’s mom and sister threw me a small, informal shower on Saturday, so we went down to San Jose for that. I requested that they keep it very small and low-key, so it was just a couple of Chris’s aunts and cousins, as well as his grandma, and we had a nice afternoon. I got some adorable new outfits for Garbanzo, a few giftcards that will come in very handy, etc. Meanwhile, Chris and his dad took Theo on a few errands and out to lunch, and then they returned home so Theo could play with Nik (who by that point had come over after his nap).

On Sunday, we had a lovely 68-degree, sunny day, so we decided to check out the Little Farm at Tilden Park. Tilden is a big regional park in Berkeley--it spans many, many acres and has a botanical garden, a train, an antique carousel, a couple of playgrounds, a reservoir, etc. You could definitely spend all day there and not even cover half of it. Because I’m pretty far along and not walking terribly long distances at this point, we opted to just go to Little Farm, which is (as you might expect) a small farm for kids. Theo got to feed some goats and calves, as well as see chickens, ducks, cows, etc. And afterward, we decided to skip over into San Francisco for a seafood lunch at the Ferry Building. I looked longingly at the oysters on the half shell, which Chris promises he’ll buy me as soon as I have the baby and feel up to a trip over there, and opted instead for a fried-oyster po’ boy. Chris had a grilled swordfish sandwich, and Theo scarfed a bunch of French fries. (Yeah, yeah, not the healthiest lunch ever, but…) When we got home, Theo demonstrated his superb tricycle-riding skills for Chris, who hadn’t yet gotten to see them firsthand. And, we took the pugs for a walk down our local walking path, which Theo and the dogs both enjoyed. All in all, a very nice day.
So that’s the news from here.