It's all baby all the time here at the moment. I feel like I'm slowly emerging from the baby fog. Though I wonder how we will go next week when Chris' mum leaves... We're gonna have to cook and do our own washing again Eeeek! So there's nothing too thrilling to share except I'm reading Jane Austen's Persuasion, Jasper is growing and getting chubbier by the day and Chris is flat out at work. Anyway, gotta go, feeding time...

I've started to feel a little bit creative again with ideas for a felting project, some little paintings and some more stitching floating around.

Time and energy are in short supply, but I love to dream up ideas, so I'm pretty happy anyway.

Jasper turned 4 weeks old today! Time is moving swiftly and while I love to watch him develop and grow, I also want to treasure and relish every moment.

I thought I'd quickly pop in here and throw up a picture of some stitching I've been doing recently. The cross stitch is something I started this week as I decided I wanted to make a wrist band/cuff to help me remember which breast I need to feed Jasper with at the next feed. (I've found an old friendship band which is doing the job in the meantime)

I'd envisaged a narrow band with a simple, but effective repeated motif, but something happened and it turned out sort of random and a little too wide perhaps. I think I need to introduce a different colour in there to liven it up too, so we'll see how we go.

The other piece was stitched by me a few days leading up to giving birth to Jasper. Today is the first time I've looked at it since then.)

I used a few new-to-me techniques: Whipped running stitch stacked next to each other in the radiating triangles and I also stacked chainstitch to create the long brown rectangles and to strengthen up the outer part of the centre circle.

I don't have a plan for how to use this piece. I'd just done teeny tiny doodle that I liked and then just launched into it while beached on the couch watching daytime TV... Ellen, Dr Phil, The View and Oprah (who seemed to have an unhealthy obsession with amputees the week I watched). Thankfully I don't feel bored enough to watch these shows regularly... I'm not even sure if we get those channels out here in Jabiru anyway.

Chris goes back to work on Monday :-( I've loved having him with us and would love it if he was here all the time... but someone's gotta bring home the bacon. Chris' mum (Grandma) is coming to stay tommorow (yay!!), it'll be great to see her and I hope she enjoys spending some yummy grandma time with Little J.

Simple things that gave me pleasure today:

A vase full of Bouganvillia from our garden

Folding washing.  All those squares of fabric... muslins, wraps, facewashers, towels, bunny rugs.  I'm a control freak about it as I've worked out the way I like to fold and stack each sized item. So this is my job.

Conversations with old friends.

A sleep in with Chris and Reuben (who had somehow snuck onto the bed and we didn't have the heart to get him off).

Jasper latching and feeding well.

A visit with the local midwife who somehow new the details of Jasper's delivery and was (as always) a kind and gentle.  

Chris the master of nappy changing, car seats and baby cuddles.

A sleeping baby. 1 week and 2 days old.

Warning: this post describes a birth and contains some information which some may find too intimate or just too much.  That's ok, I won't be offended if you just skip it :-)

While watching the football on the telly on Friday night (8 May), I had a few contractions which felt different from the braxton hicks episodes that I'd had before; the contractions had a more distinct start and finish and it was mainly pain in the back like a period pain.

At about 9 (I think) I started to think that maybe it was for real.  They started to get very regular so I timed them on our i-touch and they were between 5-7minutes apart.  I needed to go to the loo urgenlty during a few of the contractions and the mucous plug came out at the same time.

I sent Chris to bed for some sleep at about 11pm because I had a feeling that we had a long night ahead of us.  Then I rang the hospital to let them know what was going on and that I was happy to stay where I was.

I was in the shower/bath for about an hour then got out to time the contractions again for around 45mins, they were 3-4mins apart by that stage, but still managable. I called the hospital and they suggested that I could come in to be monitored.

We got there at about 2am and they put me on the CTG and did an internal.  I was just under 3cm dialated, the midwife said that that the internal might get things going.  She also asked if anyone had mentioned the size of the baby (no they hadn't, so I had assumed he was average), because she thought he'd be big and also that he was posterior, which got me a bit concerned because I've heard that they are hard and long labours. She said that they sometimes turned around.

Anyway, I wasn't very dialated so they gave me the option of going home or staying, they would give me a sleeping tablet and painkillers to help deal with the first part so I chose to stay.  

Which was lucky as my waters broke almost immediately after I got to my room.  I reckon this must have been at about 3am. The contractions suddenly got very intense and close together.  I was moved to a birth suite where I hopped in the shower.  I found that the only position that worked for me was leaning with my hands on the sink with Chris pointing the water at my lower back. I would sort of rock from one foot to the other through the contractions.  

It all gets a little hazy after that.  I threw up at one stage and they got me out of the shower and gave me a shot of pethadine and got me on the gas.  The gas was great as it regulated my breathing, especially lengthening out the exhale. Chris and I aren't sure if the pethadine had any effect.

They got me up on the bed for an internal and told me I was 7cm dialated.  I laboured on the bed on my side for a little while and it was extremely intense, I felt like I desperately needed more of a break between contractions.  I asked for an Epi and they said they'd need to do another internal to check my dialation.  I didn't feel like I could cope with the pain of laying on my back for an internal so I kept on labouring through a few more contractions.

When they did manage to roll me over to do the internal they found I was fully dialated and I was told to start pushing (I think this must have been at about 5:30am, so I had gone from 3cm to 10cm in 2.5hrs which I'm told is very fast).  

It felt a lot better to be pushing than just breathing through the pain. I remember being on my back with my legs up pushing against the the midwives and thinking that I hadn't planned on giving birth on my back.

After a short while I became aware that the heartbeat sound from the doppler they were using was very slow.  And that my obstetrician was having a discussion with another midwife. The obstetrician then came over and told me that we needed to have an emergency c-section because the baby was in distress and he wasn't progressing down through my pelvis with the pushing.  

So I agreed, and they went to call in the surgical team in (poor people being called in to work at 6am on a Saturday morning!!).  In the meantime, the contractions continued to roll on as they prepped me for theatre.  I got mixed messages about whether I could continue to push, I really wanted to because it felt better to push than not to push.

I got wheeled into theatre, I think I screamed the place down and almost gripped my midwife to death while they tried to get the spinal block in.  I had about 4 contractions roll through while I was meant to be curled over and perfectly still.  This was really hard and probably the worst part of the whole labour.  I just desperately wanted it all to stop.

Once that spinal block was in, my legs started to feel warm and heavy and immediately all the pain disappeared.  I suddenly became very chatty and I noticed that Chris was there looking very sexy in dark blue scrubs.

I talked my way through the entire procedure about anything and everything, the anesthetist's children, stories about people I knew from uni ... probably every topic under the sun except the fact that at that very moment I was having a baby.

I did notice when they took Jasper over to the resucitation table and we were very concerned as there was no crying or other baby noises.  He was a dark purple colour.  We asked if he was alright and they said yes, but were very intent on him for ages, it wasn't a panicky atmosphere, but it felt like they were concentrating very hard on getting Jasper going.  On his crib card it says that his Agpar score was 5, then 8.

Eventually they bought him over to me and put him on my chest.  I couldn't really see him over my boobs and I couldn't feel anything because I seemed to be numb up to my neck!  He didn't have a suck at this stage even though they tried to get him on, he was most likely affected by the pethadine which I'd been given during labour.... back before we realised how fast it would all happen.

I don't think I'll be keen to go through another labour, it was far too painful and out of control.  I'd probably elect to have caesars if we have more babies.  But that's a thought for another time.

Everything has been wonderful since the birth, Jasper is a big healthy baby and Chris and I have fallen totally and deeply in love with him.  I've been very happy with the care we have recieved in hospital, I couldn't imagine a better, more supportive start for our new lives together, Chris has been here the whole time sharing in Jasper's care and generally looking after me.  

We're likely to be discharged tommorow morning and I can't wait to get home!

We are happy announce the safe arrival of Jasper David Jennings.  Possibly the most delicious baby ever!

Born via emergency c-section at 6:20am, 9 May at Darwin Private Hospital. The labour was pretty intense but, as everyone says, the memory of the pain does fade quickly.  I'll put together a seperate post with the gory details later.

He's a big 'un at 9pd 6oz, 54cm long.

Yesterday was the due date.... but the only baby I got to hold was this little 2yo crocodile.  His skin was SOOO soft and cool to touch.

I've been in Darwin now for 2 weeks.  The first week I didn't cope too well as Chris was still in Jabiru and I was worried about what would happen if I went into labour while he was there.  Anyway, things are just better when he's around, so I've perked up since he's been here.

I've been reading to fill in the time.  I read High Noon by Nora Roberts, I was expecting something like a bigger, better romance novel, which it was, but it was also quite violent with lots of shooting and death and the sexual assault of the main character... I didn't expect that at all.

Then I read Marley and Me by John Grogan.  I really liked this book about a guy, his family and his labrador. It made me miss Reuben who is waiting it out at a boarding kennel. 

And last night I finished Barbara Kingsolver's book The Poisonwood Bible.  Another good choice for me :-)  I really love another one of her books The Prodigal Summer which I've read a few times.  

I was talking about The Poisonwood Bible with Chris the other day and he said, "oh a woman's book"  Huh?  It's just a bloody good book and I think it could be enjoyed by both genders!!  Then I asked him if he had EVER read a book by a woman.  He could only think of one, and that was they biography of Deny King "King of the Wilderness".  I don't think that really counts given that it was written about a man and a pretty tough one at that! 

How annoying!  I've hooked up with a sexist reader!  Though I suppose I shoudn't be suprised since his taste falls squarely into 2 catagories: Science Fiction (but NOT fantasy), and non-fiction.... generally really thick books about world war 2.

So the wait continues.  Today I read that 75% of babies are born after the due date and my obstetrician told me the average baby is born at 40 plus 3 days.  So why don't they just give us that as our due date then?  Buggered if I know!

 

Our baby is due in just over 4 weeks, which means I only have 2 more weeks before I leave home to wait for his arrival. Excitement and nervousness is building, but I've also been very lazy and haven't packed a single thing.  I've got my fingers crossed that I'm not caught out.

I'm thinking and moving very slowly at this stage.  Probably a combination of hormones, lack of sleep and the physical reality of growing a baby.

So the yellow and white quilt hasn't progressed much and in reality it may not be completed before I go, it just depends on how I feel in the coming week.  But I have sketched out a few ideas and browsed through my yellow fabrics.  

I had initally dismissed this fabric as 'too orangey', But it really is a beautiful colour and I think it's strong enough to provide a striking combination with the white.  So this is where I'm headed at the moment.