Since Juan's arrival, the days and nights have run together, the weekdays feel like weekends and dates have ceased to be of importance. Bathing is not a priority, and neither is sleep, though both would be a breathe of fresh air. The first week was a breeze. sleeping 3 hour stretches, no real crying or complaining to mention. We thought we had gotten lucky and had skipped all the sleepless nights that all new parents remember with a wincing look in their eyes. But the honeymoon is over and the roller coaster ride has begun.
The song, "Up all night, Sleep all Day" comes to mind.
Little Juan, or Nickie, or Johnny, or whatever you want to call him, as he is a buffalo of many colors, is a delight. He is beautiful and growing fast. (eating like a champ!) He has already, in less than a month, reached 10 pounds, and we estimate he gains around 50grams each day. Needless to say that most of the clothing we received as gifts he has already outgrown. He smiles frequently and grunts and growls like a feral cat if you try to kiss him while he is nursing, and is already showing signs of a very strong personality. (was there ever a doubt?)
After everything was said and done, he ended up being born an Aquarius, in the year of the ox, in the element of earth.
The Ox or the Buffalo sign symbolizes prosperity through fortitude and hard work. A person born during this year will be dependable, calm and methodical. A patient and tireless worker, he sticks to routine and conventions. Although he is generally fair-minded and a good listener, it is difficult to make him change his views as he is stubborn and often has strong prejudices.
This child will not be a crybaby. He is unusually tough and can endure hardship. A rugged individualist, he tends to begin speaking late and would rather settle arguments with his fists. Stubborn and unyielding, he can turn the house upside down when he puts his mind to it. He is not the fussy type but will be adamant about the few concessions he demands.
So far, all of this has rung true. He is not a crybaby, he simply wants to be held, and lets it be known...not by crying but by grunting and sputtering, turning red, and then finally screaming until his little fists tremble. hahaha oh what awaits me!
He has nights where he sleeps like a champ, and others where WE don't sleep but an hour or two.
We have enjoyed these last three weeks tremendously, and none of us are looking forward to Monday when Claudio has to go back to work. We have filled the days with firsts: first baths, first day at the river, first bottle, first doctors appointments...etc and we will be sad to see the vacation days go back to routines, though, it will be a mere three days until my mommy arrives for 2 weeks, so the depression will be covered up with excitement.
So here are a bunch of photos of Juani's first month of life. Enjoy!
Everyone that has ever given birth, and even those who haven't, will tell you that it is the most painful and yet most incredible experience of your life. The cliche phrase, "You must learn for yourself," rings very true in this situation. I consider myself to have a very high threshold for pain, both emotional and physical. This, I suppose, I have my father to thank for, as I remember complaining as a child about the pain of a scrapped knee or bumped head only to find his comforting response of, "the pain is all in your head," on the other end. WELL Dad, let me tell you, some pain MIGHT be in your head, but the pain of giving birth falls into a whole category of it's own.
Saturday, February 6th, 2010, around 9pm, I was making dinner. We had some friends over and there was about an hour to go on the veggie lasagna I was preparing. I began feeling a sensation that was not painful, nor bothersome, but sort of weird, and asked my friend Valeria to time what I was feeling. "Could it be contractions," I thought?
After about an hour of this dull sensation vibrating through my pelvis every 3 minutes, I decided to tell Claudio what was going on. I calmly walked into the dinning room where he was enjoying a cold beer with his best friend Walter and announced, "I would like you to stay calm, and continue to enjoy your beer, however, you should know that I am having contractions, and have been having them for about an hour now. We are going to sit and eat calmly and then, wash the dishes, if, by the time we are finished with all of the above, I am still feeling what I am feeling, we will need to go to the hospital, as I believe I am in labor." You should have seen Claudio's face!!!!!!
We ended up doing exactly that, we enjoyed a fantastic dinner, I ate extra thinking that this would be a good idea, as I was sure I would not be eating for at least another 12 hours...bad idea by the way.
And by 11:30 the contractions were still 3 minutes apart, but increasing in strength...we got in the truck and made our way to the hospital. Upon checking in, I was only 1cm dilated so they sent us to a private room to hang out in until I was a bit more advanced.
The doctors say that first time labors dilate at about 1cm per hour, and there is really no way to speed this up, so anyone that says they had a 2 hour labor is a liar. The doctor on call, however, mentioned that I was having very strong contractions which would speed up the dilating by just a bit, and by 2:30am I was 4cm dilated and in so much pain each time a contraction came that I began to question my sanity for wanting to do this whole thing without the help of pain killing drugs. "Who am I, I am no hero, I have nothing to prove to anyone," I thought to myself. I looked at Claudio around 3am, contractions measuring 220 on the scale of I don't know what, and said, I don't think I am going to be able to do it without the epidural. Now, for those of you that know me best, this was probably one of the hardest things for me to admit, 1 because it meant that I had to swallow my ego and admit that I was weak and 2 because I was so adamantly against the use of the epidural from the get go, this meant accepting something I hated.
When my obstetrician finally arrived, he took one look at me and without consulting me further, merely said to the nurse to his right, "get the anesthesiologist." I did not protest, but rather just accepted his demand.
Here is where everything slows down. They pricked me and plugged me with the epidural, and I lost sensation of not only the contractions but my entire lower body. I couldn't feel whether I had to pee or not, I couldn't feel my legs and feet, and we soon realized that my contractions had slowed to a stop and I had stopped dilating, slowing us down by about two hours.
Finally, around 6am, the baby was crowning and we we began pushing. This is when we ran into problems and I began to thank my lucky stars that my doctor had suggested, or rather insisted upon the epidural. They cut a small slit to help the baby come through, though try as he may, he was stuck. He had gone in at a 45 degree angle, making it impossible for him to come all the way through unless he rotated to a face down position.
It was at this point that Claudio, AKA Negro, began gagging. His knees had gone weak with witnessing the blood and liquid (feces, urine, ambiotic fluid etc) coming with each push. He kindly thought to excuse himself for some air when my doctor looked up at him and said, "oh no you don't, Negro, you are white! You won't make it as far as the hallway, just sit down where you are." And he did as he was told.
Finally after a few more good pushes, my doctor looked at me and said, "The baby's heart rate is going down each time you push, that happens sometimes when the head is positioned wrongly in the canal, (it also happens when the umbilical cord is wrapped around the baby's neck) so I am just going to help you get him out of there ok? What he meant by this was, we are going to move to another room where he would then employ the use of the forceps. (click here if you are not familiar with this archaic mechanism)
And my genius of a doctor held up to his word. In less than 15 minutes I was holding my beautiful baby boy, unscathed by the likes of what looks like a second world war torture weapon. And the moment when they said, "It's a boy" was every bit worth waiting for
For quite some time now, I have been kicking around the idea of painting some sort of a mural in the baby's room. Vacillating back and forth between animals and natural landscapes, underwater and jungle scenes, circus and farm settings, and anything else you could creatively imagine on the walls of a baby nursery. Finally, however, I came to my decision.
What better than a tree to symbolize life? And not just any tree, but a magical mystical tree with colorful leaves?
I am quite pleased with my decision, and perhaps at a later point I may add a few animals, but for now, I am going to leave it at this...
