a hard day with a good ending

Warning: LONG LONG POST :)

Yesterday was my birthday and I wish I could say it was easy, happy and full of sunshine and unicorns. Instead, it was full of doctor's appointments, rushing around, lots of pain, discomfort, a screaming baby and a breakdown on my part. But, like I said, it ended really well and there were some great breakthroughs as well.

On Thursday, I got hooked up to a Holter monitor for my heart. When having my c-section, I had a bout of ventricular tachycardia, which can be a possibly life threatening event. However, they really believe it was a random occurrence brought on by the suddenness of the surgery, my anxiety level and, in my opinion, the drugs they gave me to stop my contractions (which they told me would make my heart race like crazy...) Even though they did several rounds of tests and believe I'm fine, they wanted me to do a 24 hour monitor to make sure. This means that I had to have five electrodes and a monitor unit strapped to me for a whole day, while trying to manage a new baby and breastfeeding. On top of that, I had to write down every time I ate something, went to the bathroom, had an "extreme emotion" (laughing, crying, fright, etc.), took medication, breastfeed, drank caffeine and any other event which might be reflected in a change in heart rate. It was really rough, especially since Story kept on trying to pull out my nodes all the time while breastfeeding.

And on Thursday, Story had a rough night. She started crying at about 11pm and it went on through the morning, until about 10 a.m. with a few pauses in between. Neither Tim or I could figure out what was going on. I kept feeding her, we changed her, tried to put her down for naps and nothing worked.

So my birthday morning started out with a cranky baby and these itchy nodes on me that made life annoying. Still, I fixed Tim and I some pancakes and bacon while Story was in her bassinet, because I just needed some time to myself. Then, it was on to the pediatrician for a check up. Good news is that Story is gaining weight, which means her feedings are going well. And the pediatrician gave us some great advice about sleeping and acclimating her to night versus day. She told us to establish clearly that day = being awake: loud tv, cleaning, talking, friends/visitors, only allowing short naps for Story, etc. Night = low lights, soft tv if anything, winding down and putting story in her crib to sleep. I asked her about crying, because Story would cry the instant we put her in a crib. The pediatrician said that letting her cry is fine as long as we're sure all her needs are met... that babies need that to settle down and learn coping. We decided to give it a go.

After this appointment, we headed up to Annapolis to drop off my Holter monitor and get my prescription for UTI meds. Yup, I have a UTI. I believe I got it from the hospital, since there were a few times when my catheter bag needed to be refilled/was backed up and it took forever for a nurse to respond. On one occasion, the nurse was like, "oh no, it's draining fine," and I responded, "no, I can feel it backed up, my bladder feels like it's a strained balloon... Please dump the bag for me." Anyways, I now was dealing with c-section healing and an inflammed/painful bladder. JOY :) So, I was given meds from my ob/gyn to solve the problem, but I had to pick them up.

Upon picking them up, I found out they suspend your employee pharmacy card when you're on leave at the hospital I work at. It would have been nice if they'd let me know that. Instead, here I was with no cash, just my employee badge/card and a diaper bag. Thanks to a kind stranger, I was able to pay the $.70 for my prescriptions and get some relief. I'm so glad there are kind souls left in this world.

By this time, it's 12:30 p.m. or so and I'm starving. But we wanted to eat/be stationed at home, so we traveled back home. On the way back, we went by Trader Joe's to get me some cranberry juice and snacks, then on to the liquor store for my birthday treats- a bottle of nice red wine and some pumpkin beer. Even though I'm still on meds (though I stopped taking my percocet b/c I was disturbed with how it might effect Story), I had decided to delay my motrin so I could have a glass of wine. We got to introduce Story to our local liquor store owner, whom we adore, and he was just thrilled to see her. Then it was on to home.

Next commences hours of screaming baby, episodes of "it hurts when I pee," and extremely exhausted Tim and Brooke trying to cope. Because of stopping my percocet, I was in so much pain from my incision and the UTI. Delaying the motrin didn't help either. And I was on about 3 or 4 hours of sleep, so the world was foggy and horrible. Around 4p.m. I had an extreme breakdown. I couldn't stop crying because I felt like I was the third wheel in our family- Story seemed to be so much happier with Tim than me, I was just a set of milk bags who had no idea how to comfort her, I was unable to do so many basic things still because of my healing, I couldn't sleep through her wailing in her co-sleeper and I just felt like everyone would be better off without me. I admitted to tim that I felt so stressed that I felt like I was letting him and Story down.

He immediately told me to go take a nap while he took story on a walk around the neighborhood. He told me that my feelings were totally normal and expected: it was a combination of hormones and baby blues, that I was doing so much better than I thought and that neither of them were let down. He reminded me that Story sometimes will only calm down for me, that I am great at feeding and taking care of her, that I help support him by constantly telling him how wonderful he's doing. He also reminded me that being in a lot of pain makes every task that much harder. That keeping my calm is that much harder because I'm dealing with healing and pain management as well. It made me feel a lot better, though I still cried myself to sleep once they left.

Once dinner rolled around, about 7ish, we decided it was time to put Story in her crib and take a stab at acclimating her to night versus day. It was hard to hear her cry through the monitor, but it only lasted about 30 minutes before we heard her calm down and then it was quiet. She was actually sleeping! We both couldn't believe it. Even though she would only do it in a few hour spurts, she was beginning to get used to her crib! It was the first good turn of the night. Then, we started getting Trick or Treaters. Watching Tim's delight at giving them candy was awesome. It was also great to imagine next year, when I can take our little Story around for first Trick or Treating! I had my glass of wine and started to chill out a bit.

But I was still in so much pain. I could barely get up and down the stairs because of delaying my motrin. Tim finally looked at me and said, "you HAVE to start taking the percocet again, Brooke. I know you don't want to, but you've been so stressed and in so much pain since you stopped that you're breaking down and that's not good for any of us. Your ob/gyn gave you this on purpose, because it's better to manage your pain and be able to be a good mom than to deny medication and be miserable." I finally gave in and it was the best choice. Within an hour, I was feeling so much better and was totally unphased by Story's crying and could deal with her with compassion and kindness, instead of crying and self-blaming. I don't want to take these for too long, but at least for the next week like they suggested.

So, the night did end on a good note. Story slept in several 4 hour blocks through the night, she's happy and alert today, I've finally mastered cluster feeding and I feel refreshed and pain-free. I don't know if this will last, as it seems every time we have a pattern established with Story she changes it up, but I hope so! I feel like I made it through a really rough patch though and was able to learn some really good lessons about myself- I can't ignore doctor's orders because I think I should be some superwoman who can just live with pain. That doesn't make me a better wife or mother. And I have to be able to put Story in her crib and walk away sometimes. Monitors exist for a reason. And maybe what she needs is some alone time to decompress.