Cinnamon

Did you know that cinnamon is pretty much awesome? I really didn't. I ignored all of the advice to use more cinnamon until four days ago. Changed. My. Life.

So, you may or may not know... but I am a type 2 diabetic. Or I was. We can debate that later. I consider myself a reversed diabetic. That doesn't mean life is the same way as it was before I was diagnosed but it does mean that I'm not worried about checking my sugars as often or feeling the dread of being on the verge of insulin dependency. My a1c is a 5.7 which is barely in the pre-diabetic range and that is down from 6.6 the test three months before. 

My secret is simple. I eat an average (notice I said average) of 60g of carbs per meal and 30g of carbs per snack. I also eat around eight times a day. If I'm hungry. I eat. I'm breastfeeding so I eat more calories than I would otherwise but I stick within these guidelines. Doing all that dropped me from 6.6 to 5.7 but my fasting number in the morning is still out of control at an average of 130. 

That's when my midwife suggested cinnamon. How come the endocrinologist didn't suggest this while I was pregnant, I will never know. I struggled a little to find the best way to ingest the 2 tsp daily at bedtime. Coffee had been suggested but just before bed sounds like a terrible idea. In a glass of milk, I couldn't get it to mix right and it clumped to the top. Toast. Tried that. Did you know 1 tsp of cinnamon on a piece of buttered whole wheat toast STILL burns? Nope. Me either. I tried baking some apples with the cinnamon and some butter. I am not sure if my apples were bad or if I did it wrong. I probably did it wrong but that was a big fat nope. Finally I tried a smoothie. 

• Just 2 tsp of cinnamon
• your favorite vanilla flavored protein powder (I like   Creamy Vanilla Profit) 
• 1 tsp of vanilla extract
• a handful of ice cubes
• couple drops of liquid sweetener. 

Blend and enjoy. 

So a couple things this picture doesn't mention? It helps with inflammation also. Or so my midwife said. I'm not in flames so I'm not sure ;)

Simply incredible

Life has been so busy this week.

The Fall semester started. I'm working a part time job. I have a three month old. I started a five times a day workout routine so that I can be healthy to get pregnant again and I attend four different mommy groups, plus help run a mommy play date group. Busy busy. So I've been stressed to the max this week. I can't seem to keep up on my homework and I have approximately 72 hours left until it's all due for the week. I'm not even close to done.

But I'm sitting here with my textbook in my lap watching my son sleep in his swing with his favorite toy (his Wubbanub) on his tiny little lap and I can't help but wonder why me? What did I do so right to deserve this precious little life? How did I earn this? How do I earn another? How do I not mess this up?

I can't even draw a stick figure correctly. How did I make this precious, beautiful, incredible little boy? And further more, how is it that I can nourish him without spending a dime when so many other moms have such a hard time doing so? I'm counting my blessings for sure tonight. Especially watching his little angel face.

Huge personality, Small kid.

My 3 1/2 month old is starting to really show his personality. He's a goof ball and I LOVE it. Weighing in at just over 13 pounds, he has the ability to totally tickle me senseless with his little grins, giggles and yes, raspberries.

He's also a prankster. Probably on accident, but maybe not. It never fails. I will change his diaper and then on the way back to our playing perch on the couch I will feel another wet one. And I'm not talking number one. My son loves to dirty his diapers, particularly if it's within two or three minutes of being changed.

I don't mind all that though. His little precious face is enough to make anything better right now. I love being a mommy, especially for this little boy. When he's not sleeping, he's steadily blowing raspberries and I can't capture enough pictures or videos of it. Maybe they just aren't the RIGHT pictures or videos. So I'm scouring the internet for free resources on photography. I came across a 12 week program that you download PDFs for. Interested?  There is the link Two Peas Photography Link

Shall we learn together?

Wedding

So, it's been a few days. I apologize. My sister got married yesterday. It was a great ceremony.

I was kind of concerned about how much fun I would have given that it was a camouflage themed wedding... Outside... In August... In Mississippi. With a 3 month old infant. But we both had a great time. Well. I say that but this is what happened. My husband ended up watching the baby for most of the day while I photographed the preparations, the rehearsal and the wedding. It was really nice though, despite the heat. Very well decorated, just with camo where most women would pick a color... Her colors were lime green, hazard orange and camo. The food... To. Die. For. Seriously.

Now it's time to cut, crop and enhance pictures so my gorgeous, newly last named sister will have pictures to go with the memories she will cherish for always.

Because we live in Indiana, that meant a ten hour car ride. Each way. My son is breastfed so that ten hours actually looks more like thirteen or fourteen because we have to stop every two hours to feed him. He did surprisingly well with the car, knowing that he does this really cute thing where he screams bloody murder at every stop light. Since it's mostly highway, he only screamed when we put him back in the car seat after feeding him and would stop as soon as we got moving again.

He was, of course, a complete ladies man at the wedding. Even at three months old, my son has charm. And drool. Lots of drool.

Such a blessing to witness her wedding to a wonderful man. Wishing them happiness and bliss for the rest of their lives.

Teething

So, unfortunately there has been a lot of funny stuff that has happened in the past 13 weeks. You miss all of it. I can't make it funny again.

We're going to just have to start from today. And that's okay because I can fill in some holes as I remember them.

My son is 13 weeks as of tomorrow. Quick, do the math. That's 3 months and a week. He needs to stop growing already. It's making mommy sad. Either that or he needs to start pulling his weight around here and mow the lawn.

I'm mostly kidding about the lawn.

My son has started teething. I'm sure of it. He's been gnawing on his hand a lot recently and drooling more. I figured he was gearing up for some teeth but I also figured that I would have another month or so before that happened. Mom Fail.

Today I have him swaddled up and sleeping on my bed while I fold the laundry. I need to get caught up before I leave town in two days for my sister's wedding in Mississippi. (Yes, I packed enough diapers for the kid. We'll be gone for 4 days, I'm sure 68 diapers will be enough)

He wakes up and is hungry so I nurse him. While he is nursing, he starts pulling his ear and unlatching to relatch again or act like he can't find the milk source. I somewhat casually make a mental note that maybe he is teething and ignore it.

Within an HOUR he is screaming inconsolably and I'm frantically running around the house looking for my teething necklace for him to chew on. Where did I put that thing? WHY DID I TAKE IT OFF?!

I gather EVERY single teething toy in the house and take it to my room. Every. Single. One. Nothing. He's nt chewing on them. He's just crying. I'm feeling pretty frantic and awful at this point. I was determined that I wouldn't be the mom that dosed her kid up. No other choice. He needed relief. So I changed his diaper, gave him a dose appropriate for his weight and went back to hanging out with him on my bed.

After the dose I nursed him again and I could tell a difference when it started kicking in. He started nursing more normally again. And, in classic baby style, he ended the nursing session with clamping down (ouch), straining... and then dumping a big load in the freshly changed diaper.

Thankfully he is sleeping in my lap right now, and I am sane enough to tell you all about my now somewhat laughable time skidding in my socks through my house searching for something to soothe my son. It's funny because it's not still happening. Also, I'm hoping that last teething ring is under the blanket somewhere and not going to be found with bare toes in the middle of the night.

Next mom fail for today. My son is sleeping in my lap... and I'm starving. It's not even worth moving him today.

Birth

Gosh, where to start right? Well. Lets start with a birth story. Everyone loves a good birth story.

No? That's okay. I'm going to tell my story anyway. And then we can  fast forward. Sorry but this first one, will be a long one. Stay with me. I'll get more entertaining later but I need to get this down before I forget all of the details.

It was a Monday. Very boring. Went in for my NST (Non-Stress Test) and gave up another urine sample. I swear, you learn to pee on demand when you are pregnant. Also you drop your pants a lot more too, but that's for another post.

As per usual, my son did not want to cooperate with the monitor. I even drank 12 oz of juice in the waiting room. So our NST took over 2 hours, again. Then the doctor had us wait in the exam room for almost 45 minutes... Again. Going to my prenatal appointments was definitely an all day event. I was just starting to get hungry and annoyed when she came in and checked me. I was dilated to 1cm and about 50% effaced. GREAT news. I'm at 39 weeks and I'm so ready to not be pregnant anymore. I just wanted to meet my son!

We left and my husband and I headed to the Chinese buffet for dinner. We were meeting some friends there. As we sat down to eat my doctor calls me and asks me to come in the next morning and take another urine test. I agree to it, pretty much use to her calling at all hours and asking me to do tests that always turn out normal.

8am the next morning, my husband and I head to the doctor's office and I pee on demand again. As I'm waving goodbye to the nurse, she stops me and tells me that I'm suppose to stay until the test results are done. Wait... what? Can someone tell me what is going on? We wait for a few minutes and the doctor comes in and tells me there is protein and I have to be admitted so she can induce me. Silly pregnant lady is excited. That means a baby right? We're going to go have a baby!

I ask her if I could go home, eat breakfast and get my bag. Nope. Husband can go home and get my bag. I'm not allowed to eat. So much for my big plans to attack a Taco Bell crunch wrap for breakfast. So my husband goes upstairs to Labor and Delivery with me and helps me get all settled into a room before he leaves to get my things.

When the nurse comes back to hook me up to the NST monitor I ask her what is going to happen. She tells me that we're going to start me on Cervadil for 6 hours and then check me before starting Pitocin. That doctor will send me home in 48 hours if I don't have the baby by then. We're already at 9am now. We finally start the Cervadil at 11am and honestly, I don't even really know that it changes anything. At 6pm my nurse comes in and takes out the Cervadil and checks me, I'm at 3cm and 75% effaced. It's working. While she was checking me, my nurse accidentally broke my water, so I'm definitely here until I have a baby now! The on call doctor wants to wait and see what my body does on it's own.

So I go to sleep. Bad move. No one told me I should have used that opportunity to get up and move around and walk or shower or get in the tub. So I sleep. In all honesty, I am exhausted at this point because I haven't been allowed to eat all day.

I wake up every so often with the contractions and they offer me some IV painkiller, since I'm also hooked up to two IVs. I accept and go back to sleep. When I wake up again it's morning and I'm still contracting and still hanging out in bed. I've been checked again and now I'm at 4cm. We've slowed down a lot. They start Pitocin at a 1, I have no idea what this means. Every hour they increase the number. At some point the contractions are so terrible that I beg for an epidural. We're at 5cm when I get it. Eventually I'm at a 16 for the pitocin, I think. They keep checking me and some times I've progressed and sometimes not as much. Around 5pm they check me again and I'm at 8.5cm finally. I've been in and out of sleep all day with the painkiller they gave me and now that I'm at 8.5 I'm excited. This is great news. Except that it's not. My doctor comes in around 7pm and says that I've been running a low grade fever, despite being given tylenol. When did I get tylenol? I don't remember. And she says my son's heart rate has been accelerating. She wants to move me to the OR for an emergency c-section right away.

I'm DEVASTATED. I don't even know if I can stress that enough. My entire goal was to push out a baby boy and have this natural high adrenaline rush while they put my baby on my chest and I smile up at my husband all sweaty and tearful. That's not how it's going to go. They have me sign  consent forms and I am wheeled down the hall. My husband isn't allowed to go with me yet. I hear them tell him on my way out that if I fall asleep they will not allow him in the room with me. So I make my number one goal to stay awake.

It doesn't seem like it takes long but they inject more drugs into my epidural and transfer me to the operating table. I'm being prepped and it doesn't seem to take very long before my husband is with me again. (If you ask him, it was a lifetime. I believe him.)

I feel myself starting to drift and my husband does a great job of keeping me awake. Apparently we have the same goal. I feel a tug and then my doctor says "Oh my God, look at all that hair!" -- I can only assume she's talking about my boy so I smile. I can't see my son though. She starts to stitch me back up  and I feel pressure while she's closing me. Wait -- Why isn't my son crying? Why haven't I seen him? How long has it been? I start to feel panic rising in my chest like vomit. My husband is looking around the curtain at the nurses. They're doing something with my son but neither of us can see. Finally I hear his cry but it's short lived.

At some point my husband is handed my son and he's just so perfect. He shows him to me and I'm crying. We made that. Then a special care pediatrician comes to talk to me while I'm still being closed up. Apparently my son's first APGAR score was a 2. This means he had life threatening issues and needed medical intervention immediately. His next (5 minute) APGAR was a 5, which is better but still not a great score. At ten minutes they scored him as an 8, which is healthy. Then he was swaddled and handed to my son. She explains all of this to me and tells me that when his cord was cut, his sugar dropped and he stopped breathing but he should be fine now.

I'm moved from the table back to my bed and my son is handed to me. They wheel me back to my room and my bedside nurse asks if I would like to breast feed my son. OF COURSE! Please. Show me. We get him to latch (like a champ!) and after two suckles, he starts turning blue. The nurse lifts his arm and drops it. He's limp. She grabs him from me and calls a code into her voice paging thing. She says there is a NRP in my room and says "ALL call" -- Within SECONDS my room is flooded with nurses and doctors. Seconds.

I have to pause here because this part of the story is hard.

It takes 25 minutes for them to get my son completely resuscitated. The whole time I'm a wreck watching from the other side of the room. Nurses rotate out talking to me and keeping me calm. My husband is sitting on the bed beside me.

He is stabilized and whisked away to the special care nursery. I'm informed later that he will be transferred to NICU at another hospital (Riley Children's) but they will bring him down before he goes so that I can see him again. Keep in mind, I have only seen him for a MAX  of ten minutes now. I'm dying inside.

That is it for the birth story. But I would like to mention here that my son is beautiful, he is perfect and he only spent seven days in NICU before being released home. We feel like three of those days were not really needed but CYA days for the hospital.