Reintegration

On Monday, January 14th, my life was forever changed.  On that day, our little one was born.  Just shy of six pounds and utterly adorable, the hospital staff referred to her as, "Peanut" throughout our two-day stay.  I'll continue referring to her by the moniker, or "P," on this blog. 
  
I've been working on writing her birth story with hopes of posting the events of the past few weeks chronologically.  But I've fallen behind.  There are so many things I've been experiencing as a new parent, so much about which I've wanting to write, and the days keep slipping away into timeless cycles of nursing, changing, rocking, and sleeping.  Today I decided to forget chronology.  I'm going to go ahead and start posting again, and will work on finishing the pending entries when I can.  Here's where I am today. 

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With the exception of two car service trips to the pediatrician, I haven't left our apartment at all in two weeks.  Not even to step outside the building and breathe the frigid city air.  I've been living in a secure little indoor bubble with Peanut.  While it's been fun getting to know her and quite a privilege to have the time and space to adjust to life as a parent, I have become increasingly stir-crazy.  Not doing anything remotely related to my "regular" life - working, walking, taking the subway, having dinner with friends, running errands - has only reinforced the bubble and made me feel like I'm living in some alternate reality.  My life as a parent hasn't yet connected with the rest of my life at all.  I've subsequently been in a weird emotional space where despite the fact that my life is entirely changed, time feels oddly suspended.

Tonight, when S came home from work, I left P with him and walked to the grocery store in a first step toward reintegration.  The store is only five blocks away, but it was the first time I walked anywhere at all since giving birth, and it felt like a huge accomplishment to make it there.  Given that I'm still recovering from the delivery, am in pain, and am pretty slow-moving, I walked at about half my typical pace, meaning that I was constantly in the way of pushy commuters and rambunctious children on the sidewalk.  It was a scary experience.  I did my best to avoid getting shoved while simultaneously reminding myself to breathe and release tension in my body every few steps.  Step, step, breathe, lower shoulders.  Step, step, breathe, move neck from side to side. 

I finally made it to the store and walked the familiar path down the aisles.  Past the organic fruit and vegetables, through the shelves of bread and cheese, over to the tea and tortilla chips.  Though I was walking excruciatingly slowly and my maternity coat was hanging shapelessly off my non-pregnant frame, I felt as if nothing in my life had changed.  Scooping rolled oats from the bulk bin into a plastic bag, it was hard to remember that I'm a parent, and that everything is different.  I was simply back in my "regular life" compartment.  Even though I couldn't have even been at the store without having S available to care for P at home.   

As I handed my purchases to the cashier at the store, she looked at me and exclaimed, "did you have your baby?!"
"Yes," I smiled.
"I thought I didn't see a belly any longer!" she said.  "What did you have?"
"A girl," I replied.
"Oooh, congrats.  That was fast!  Even though it probably didn't feel that way to you."

On the contrary, I thought.  It was fast.  In the blink of an eye I got pregnant, grew a baby, and birthed her.  I anticipate this precious time on parental leave will go by even faster.  It won't be cold January forever, P will grow bigger and stronger and I'll be able to take her outside for walks and eventually, even to the grocery store and on the subway.  Reintegration will happen and I will have the opportunity to be a parent with a full life both inside and outside our apartment.  I imagine I'll even think back to this weird bubble-time somewhat wistfully, wishing I could have more opportunities to be stashed away with P for days on end, just she and I, cuddling and singing and gazing at one another in awe.  For now, I'll welcome the little chances I can get to step outside, breathe the air, and stretch my limbs and brain cells just a bit.     

New Year's Rituals

Since I've been with S, New Year's Eve has become one of my more favorite holidays of the year.  I love new beginnings, fresh starts, opportunities to revisit old goals and set new intentions.  Typically, S's mom spends the holiday season with us in the city, so we usually take her out dancing at a low-key venue with salsa music.  Without the pressure to have to find some fabulous party or over the top way to ring in the new year, the occasion has really become simply an opportunity to spend time together, and for reflection and ritual.

This year, S's mom postponed her visit until after our little one is here.  So the two of us went about marking the occasion a little differently.  We began our preparations for 2013 over the weekend, by scrubbing down our house.  We cleaned out the freezer and sorted through the piles of baby stuff we've accumulated during the past few months.   On New Year's Eve, we started the evening by doing some of S's mom's favorite activities in the city, including visiting a famous Christmas tree, getting champagne truffles, checking out the holiday storefront windows, and going to a gorgeous cathedral to light some candles and say a few prayers.

We spent the later part of the evening having dinner with friends, and at midnight we ended up watching fireworks at a local park.  In a new ritual for me, our friends provided us each with 12 grapes, and instructed us to eat each one in the first 12 seconds after midnight while making a wish for each month of the new year.  It was fun to challenge myself to conjure up a different wish for each grape.  They mostly came to me in the form of single words.  I was overwhelmed with excitement, knowing that 2013 will be the year that we will begin our journey into parenthood.

On New Year's Day, we welcomed another new tradition when we cooked and ate a delicious dinner of black eyed peas with brown rice, kale and beets, a meal that is supposed to bring prosperity and wealth.  We capped off the week with our third annual new year's decadent pancake breakfast with one of our dearest friends in the city.

We constructed a start to the year with many, many opportunities to put wishes and hopes and dreams out in to the universe.  Maybe that's because there is so much uncertainty in our lives right now, so much anticipation and excitement and fear and a lack of clarity about what our lives will look like in just a few weeks.  I have no idea how my birth process will go, what will happen when our child emerges into the world, how being parents will impact us as individuals and as a couple, what it will be like to reconfigure our identities and our schedules and our priorities.  All I really anticipate is our lives are soon to be flipped upside down.  Even ordinary things like going to the grocery store or making plans to grab coffee with a friend won't look the same.

I'm ready for my life to change, and have been for many years.  So many of the parents I talk to tell me that being a parent is an amazing, hard and wonderful experience.  I'm ready to grow, I'm ready to be challenged and stretched in 2013.  Hopefully all those wishes we sent out will be there to protect us in the process.  

Full Term

Yesterday marked another pregnancy milestone.  I am 37 weeks pregnant.  Full-term.  I'm grateful to have made it to the point where our baby will now more likely be able to easily adjust to life outside my body.  It brings me much relief.

At 37 weeks, I'm having weekly appointments with my OB.  Yesterday's appointment confirmed that my cervix is still closed.  I'm feeling some mild cramping throughout the day - not quite Braxton Hicks contractions, more like menstrual cramps.  I'm continuing to sleep pretty well, am peeing ALL the time, and between heartburn/nausea and my stomach being pretty compressed, I'm having a hard time eating.  Still trying to get through with small meals and snacks throughout most of the day.

I feel huge.  Now when I rub my hands over my hard belly, all I can feel is limbs.  Baby body parts, pressed up tightly against the sides of my gigantic uterus.  When the baby moves, I feel less of a kicking motion and more of a hard poking.  Sometimes my belly looks lopsided.  It's kind of hilarious to envision our little one all cramped up inside.  It makes me think about our almost 5-year old godchild, who arrived two weeks past his due date.  When you ask him why he came out so late, he says, "it was cozy in there!"  I hope our little one is feeling cozy, too.

I'm starting to imagine what it will feel like to look at our baby for the first time.  To feel his or her skin on my skin.  To hear him or her cry.  I wonder what it will feel like to hold our baby.  I've always felt uncomfortable and nervous holding other people's babies, but I have no fears about holding my own.  I think I will be able to do it with some degree of confidence.  I'm eager to kiss our little baby's head, to rock him or her in my arms, to feel the little hands and little feet.  Until now, these things have all felt pretty theoretical.  They still do, in some ways.  But our baby shows up in my imagination more concretely now then even a week ago.  I'm starting to feel ready.