100 Word Wednesday: Lesson Learned

Monday 7:30am > Plumber came to fix some issues I’ve been avoiding for months…

Old gas lamps lines holding up our cloffice conversion (November 2012):

Janky-bungeed-to-the-wall gas line for nonexistent kitchen dryer (May 2012):

And the worst offender…kitchen faucet with no water pressure (October 2012):

{ Upped photo contrast, water flow still invisible! }

Reason for delayed call to plumber? We tried everything to fix faucet and couldn’t.  Worried that kitchen issue would cost $$$ to repair ancient piping.

Plumber fixed all 3 issues in 45 minutes, cost $65.  Kicking myself for waiting soooooo long!  Lesson learned.

Happy Mother’s Day

Last year was a hard Mother’s Day for me as it quite nearly marked the two year anniversary of my estrangement from the woman who gave birth to me.  On that day, and on many others throughout the year to follow, I deeply mourned the loss of my mother.  And not just the one I had, but the one I dreamed of having as well.  It was the saddest, most devastating, realization that I could never have the mother I so desperately wanted.

Not in a million years of hoping, not on a thousand lucky pennies tossed in fountains, and not through a single quiet prayer.

Today marks the first year that I celebrated Mother’s Day as a mother instead of just as a child.  And on the surface, this day didn’t feel any different than any other day really – it was just a simple celebration that consisted of eating dinner party leftovers and trying to soothe a fussy Ev who stayed up way too late last night.

But now that I am alone with my thoughts, listening to a fussy Ev who is fighting sleep with every bone in her tiny baby body, I realize that this Mother’s Day does indeed feel different.  It’s a quiet difference, a subtle one.  One that I might not have heard had I not taken this hour to just be alone for the first time all day.

In the photo above Ev is wearing the outfit my mother wore home from the hospital in 1950 and that I wore home from the hospital in 1986.  In the photo above Ev is wearing a family heirloom that ties together three hopeful first time mothers, three bitty babies, four generations of women.  Strong women, proud women.  Stubborn women, flawed women.

Much like Ev fights succumbing to the dark of the night, I fight succumbing to light of forgiveness.  Much like Ev fights accepting the close of the day, I fight accepting the start of a new one.

I very much doubt that my mother will be the mother that I want or that I need.  And I have worked for two very long years to accept that I was asking someone to do something that they simply could not.

What I didn’t expect, what I didn’t see until today when I cloaked my daughter in 60 years of hope, is that perhaps my mother can be something that Ev wants or that Ev needs.  It’s a thought that is both enchanting and terrifying.  It’s a thought that would require a great leap of faith on my part.  It’s a thought that could mend hearts or break them.  It’s a thought that I didn’t expect that at all.

Not in a million years of hoping, not on a thousand lucky pennies tossed in fountains, and not through a single quiet prayer.

Happy Mother’s Day to the ones that were, the ones that are, the ones that will be.  Happy Mother’s Day to the ones that weren’t, to those that aren’t, to the ones that never will be.

I love you, my darling girl!

100 Word Wednesday: Getting back to normal

You know you’re making a full recovery when you get back to your normal routine.  For me “normal” includes a weekly trip to the Goodwill, something I hadn’t done in the past 2 months…

Lots of treasures this trip – bird print, new feather-filled pillow, an awesome lamp, clothes for Ev (4 weeks and she’s already in size 3-6 months!), a metal “e” for her nursery, and birthday gifts (not pictured).  I definitely depleted my thrifting budget, rollover funds included.  We’ve also been dumpster diving a good bit.  Trash amnesty day = great finds.  Normal feels so good!

P.S. Liney, I don’t know if you read my blog but if you’re out there, Happy 18th Birthday!!!  I can’t believe my little baby sister is know legally considered an adult.  I thought the last 4 weeks flew by with Ev but in your case I blinked and you went from 9 to 18 in seconds.  I love you most dearly and I can’t wait to see you in a few weeks.  Love, love, love you! <3

Happy 1st Birthday, GUG!

A year ago today I wrote and published my very first GUG post.  A whole year ago!  And man, oh man, so so so much has changed.  May 2012-May 2013 has been by far the most milestone decorated year for the two, well now three, of us (plus Pepper)…

John moved to the Midwest and I followed him with all our belongings several weeks later.

John got an engineering job and I transitioned out of the work force and into the home force.

We celebrated our five year wedding anniversary.

We found out we were going to have a baby sometime in late March/early April 2013.

We adopted a crazy cat and re-named her Pepper (because Kimi is a terrible cat name!).

We took on a tremendous amount of home improvement projects.

We paid off our remaining student loans ($50k in 2 years!).

We bought our first house from John’s parents.

We co-hosted our very first holiday dessert party.

We sent out our very first holiday card.

We entertained our very first house guest.

GUG celebrated it’s 100th post (!!!).

We welcomed our daughter into the world.

It’s amazing, and slightly overwhelming in retrospect, just how many firsts we celebrated last year.  And these just weren’t little firsts.  No, sir!  We went all out and racked up as many momentous ones as we could.  I can’t imagine that May 2013-May 2014 could possibly be nearly as eventful but we already have some exciting things lining up…

We are about three weeks away from hosting our first post-baby house guests, my two sisters.

We are less than a month away from celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary.

And, we are one car payment away from owning our car outright.

When I started this ol’ blog I had no idea what its “purpose” would be or even what I would write about.  And while I still have no idea what GUG’s purpose is or even what I might continue to write about, it has been really neat to chronicle the past year…and to go back and read all about it.  I never thought I’d be a journal-keeping kind of gal but that’s exactly what blogging has turned into for me

So, Happy 1st Birthday, GUG!  You have been an unexpected surprise in my life, as have all of the supportive readers that tune in regularly.  Here’s to another year!

We Made It

Initially I was going to wait until I wrote a bit more about Everly’s birth story but I don’t like this part quite as well so I thought I would just get it out of the way right now.

About thirty minutes after Everly was born I suffered from a postpartum hemorrhage.  I lost about a quart of blood and my blood pressure dropped to a very dangerous place.  The attending nurse got the bleeding under control with a shot of Pitocin and I was stabilized with oxygen, fluids, and maybe something else.  I don’t remember all the details because I was unconscious for most of this time.

Immediately after Ev’s entrance into the world, she was placed on my chest for about half an hour.  I felt so amazing and so proud of myself for achieving my goal of a natural delivery and so excited to finally meet the relatively anonymous Baby H.  John rushed out to show a picture to his mom and sister who were camped out in the waiting room.  It was just so perfect and just what I had hoped for.  I was excited for him to come back so that we could take a shot of the three of us, our new little family.

Then it starts to get fuzzy – my brain, time, the order of things.  The last thing I distinctly remember was my midwife calmly explaining to me that I was losing too much blood and that I needed a shot of Pitocin to help stop the hemorrhaging.  My mind was a blur – Didn’t I just give birth?  Why did I need Pitocin?  Was the baby still inside of me?  Was I just dreaming?

I told the nurse I couldn’t hear anything and then at some point, what felt like years later, I felt myself floating up to the bright white surgical lights someone had switched on.  I remember asking if I was dying.

I wasn’t.

Or was I?

It’s all so…not there.

I was all so…not there.

But John was there.

John was right by my side the whole time, holding our less-than-an-hour-old baby girl kangaroo-care style and providing her with the skin-to-skin contact that I was unable to give her.  I can’t imagine how John must have felt, watching me go into shock while the nurses whipped into a calm frenzy of medical activity.  Holding our baby that didn’t even have a proper name yet.  It makes me tear up when I think about how scared he must have been, how alone he must have felt.  I didn’t realize until much later how bad things looked for a brief while.

And he stayed right by my side until I came back around.  Eventually I was propped up a bit and Everly was placed in my arms so I could feed her.  I was so weak that I couldn’t even hold her up and a nurse had to help me, had to hold her to my chest because I had no control of my arms.  At first they thought it was because I had such a physically demanding labor but later, after I passed out again, they ordered some blood work and decided that a blood transfusion was in my best interest.

Within 12 hours of giving birth and losing a quart of blood I was receiving 2 units intravenously.  We still hadn’t updated long distance family and friends.  We still hadn’t gotten to take our first family photo.  John was sleeping by my side in a fold-out bed and Everly was staying in the nursery and was brought to me every few hours so I could feed her.  The nurse still had to hold her for me.

I remember thinking there was no way we could go home.  No way I could care for a baby.  A baby that I couldn’t even hold without assistance.

But by late Friday evening we did go home.  I held my sweet baby and walked very slowly from the labor wing down to the front entrance where John was waiting with our car.  He strapped our little Baby H into her car seat, as she protested quite loudly.  We made the quick drive home and by the time we pulled up to our house Ev was fast asleep.

The first week at home was the hardest and John took charge of everything, leaving me to rest and feed the baby.  Last week he went back to work and some days it took everything I had to make it until 4:00pm when he would return.  This week, as the doctors predicted, I have felt more energetic and things are kind of falling into place over here.  And three weeks from now I should be feeling mostly back to normal, just in time for my two sisters to visit.

The good news is that we made it.

We made it through a relatively typical pregnancy.

We made it through 11 days of waiting past my due date.

We made it through a natural labor and delivery (!!!).

We made it through a post partum hemorrhage and a blood transfusion.

And today we made it three whole weeks.

Three weeks of diapers and feedings and nappings (or not).

Three weeks of bonding as a family and learning about our new girl.

Three weeks of slow recovery and physical limitations and frustration and exhaustion.

Three weeks of Everly Frances.

Our little girl (!!!).

We made it.

And we always will.