A different child

I've been thinking about Olivia a lot lately. I think her birthday coming up is starting to weigh on me. How have we survived two whole years. There are moments when I flashback and am right there in those dark moments again. I hate that our very brief time with our daughter was overshadowed by the worst moments of my life. But then, I guess we are lucky we had any time with her at all. Blech. Most of the time, I'm okay. I can talk about her and what happened without getting the slightest bit teary eyed (usually). But every once in awhile, more often lately, there are moments when a flashback hits me and it's like those early days when it was so hard to even breathe, to even want to breathe.
I found this description on this blog http://webhome.idirect.com/~pandora1sama/observtn.htmlthat explains it so well:

So does having a healthy baby help the grief? Yes, it does, but not quite in the way you might think. You hold your baby close, and as she does something, or looks like the baby you lost, oh so vividly, you remember your lost little angel again, and you feel that pain afresh.

I realized after a while, that we still have so much grief inside us that we couldn't let go of, until we had Madoka. It is not so much that the empty space in your heart is filled, for one child can never replace another, but that you can grieve a little more, and in grieving, experience a relief from all that pent-up pain that you didn't even realize was still there.

When I put Madoka in some of the sleepers Rhiannon had worn, it was a bittersweet experience. It felt good to see a live baby in them, after all, and yet, I found myself asking, "Why couldn't I keep them both? Why couldn't Rhiannon be a sweet toddler now, watching her new sister with awe?" When yesterday, Madoka grew out of the smallest sleeper, the only one which fitted Rhiannon's tiny birdlike body perfectly, I felt good--it was a rite of passage--now I know Madoka's going to make it. And yet, I was sad...Rhiannon will never, never grow bigger. And I know I'll keep that sleeper, always, in remembrance of Rhiannon. 
Lucas is getting so big, so fast. I am loving every second with him, I know how quickly and easily it could be gone. I wish I could slow down time, just a little bit. You would think that being home with him all day, every day, I would have my fill of him....but no, not really. He sleeps through the night now consistently, and I really miss our 3 am feedings. (I won't live to regret saying/thinking that. And I expect that he won't sleep through the night forever. I would have done anything to get up in the middle of the night with Olivia. So even when I'm really tired and don't feel like getting up, it's pretty easy to suck it up and cuddle the baby that we are lucky enough to have.

The same person who wrote the excerpt I quoted also wrote this poem which has been published in a book and a few other places:

A different child

People notice
There's a special glow around you.
You grow
Surrounded by love,
Never doubting you are wanted;
Only look at the pride and joy
In your mother and father's eyes.

And if sometimes
Between the smiles
There's a trace of tears,
One day
You'll understand.

You'll understand
There was once another child
A different child
Who was in their hopes and dreams.

That child will never outgrow the baby clothes
That child will never keep them up at night
In fact, that child will never be any trouble at all.

Except sometimes, in a silent moment,
When mother and father miss so much
That different child.

May hope and love wrap you warmly
And may you learn the lesson forever
How infinitely precious
How infinitely fragile
Is this life on earth.

One day, as a young man or woman
You may see another mother's tears
Another father's silent grief
Then you, and you alone
Will understand
And offer the greatest comfort.

When all hope seems lost,
You will tell them
With great compassion,
"I know how you feel.
I'm only here
Because my mother tried again."
-Pandora Diane MacMillan

Baby wearing and cloth diapering fails

So Lucas is a pretty mellow baby unless he's hungry or tired 90% of the time.

There are two things, though, that really piss him off.

#1 is being in the car when it is not moving. This most especially includes brief stops such as red lights and stop signs....traffic and drive thru's make him absolutely irate. (Guess he's impatient like his daddy- there was a time Joe was so impatient we could only eat at places that take reservations/call ahead seating...even now, forget it if there's more than a 15 min. wait.)

#2, which I had an inkling of but really confirmed last night, the kid is absolutely against being 'worn.' I have a sling and Beco carrier, these things:

So we had briefly tried the beco out and Lucas cried so I thought maybe we were doing it wrong or there was a trick I was missing. So we went to a free babywearing class and as it turns out, the kid is strongly opposed (I'd say irate) about being worn in carriers of all kinds and all positions. They suggested we keep "working on it" but I thought the look they gave me was "don't hold your breath on that". So there was a big fat waste of money. I still love the idea of it, the execution, not so much. Guess I'm destined to be lugging around heavy carseats and strollers. I'm going to still try to try it, one lady gave us a good idea to  try it outside, the only problem with that is that it's 200 degrees outside. So, maybe when/if it cools off a little. I won't be too heartbroken if we don't ever use the sling much because the lack of fabric and buckles and straps makes me a little nervous, and I got it for cheap on ebay, but that Beco was expensive and the pattern we got for it is even called the 'Lucas' pattern...so hopefully Lucas will change his mind about being worn.

Cloth diapering has been going relatively well. I found a diaper that I liked and bought a lot of them (Bumgenius pockets and all in ones- they are super easy and not as bulky). So we were using them pretty consistently until I noticed that Lucas's diaper area was a little red and irritated looking, not exactly a diaper rash but not his normal skin tone/color either, Joe even though it might have just been from where the diaper was pressing against his body so I gave it some time to see if it went away...no such luck. I put a disposable diaper on him after his bath and the next morning it was all clear. Apparently some babies are sensitive to the micro-suede fabric (it feels felt like) in those diapers and it looks like my baby is one of them. Too bad it wasn't until after I had built my stash of like 20 of those diapers that I realized it. So now I have a large stash of diapers that I'm afraid to use. Luckily, I can get diapers that are similar (and cheaper even!) which have a different fabric that goes along the baby's bottom. It's just annoying because I thought we finally had a really good "diaper stash" and they were diapers that I liked and Joe likes (Joe has been surprisingly onboard with all aspects of cloth diapering so long as he doesn't have to wash them, he's totally comfortable changing them and putting them on, which shocked me.)  And now it looks like I need to get rid of most of them, I may hang on to a few and use them intermittently, he doesn't seem to get too red after just one diaper, it's just when he's been wearing that diaper all day. So anyway, now I have the hassle of selling them (most of them haven't even been worn yet or just worn once) and trying to figure out what will work that we like. So I'm not liking cloth diapering that much at the moment, although I do like that we've been using the same pack of disposable diapers for a week and a half and probably can make it with this pack for another week (we put him in disposables at night and when out and about and when he looks like he's starting to get a little red because no regular diaper cream in cloth diapers- it ruins them.) Anyway, I'm still going to stick with it,it just got a lot more complicated.

Besides me wasting money on cloth diapers that won't work and carriers that make our baby scream like someone cut his leg off, we are fantastic. Tonight is a daddy and Lucas night while I go to support group, I'm really looking forward to getting out and hanging out with adults for a couple of hours without the baby in tow. Joe's not so much looking forward to it, but I have my mom on standby if he needs help. So it should be fine.

Vacation and videos and missing Olivia

And we're back.
Vacation went relatively well. Lucas was pretty much perfect, I fed him about an hour before meals and so he either slept or entertained himself in the stroller by playing with his hands and staring at lights while we ate-like this:


Yes, that actually was at lunch, and yes, that's what he did for about 45 minutes.
He was pretty cooperative about just hanging out or sleeping during a lot of the activities too (Bingo, talent show, karoake).
We took him swimming 3 times, he's mostly ambivalent about it..not exactly laughing and smiling in the pool, but not crying or fussing about it either, just sort of chilling like the pretty mellow baby he is.

(Disregard Joe and I arguing. For the record, Lucas did not go under water.
In the last week or so, he's started smiling ALL the time in response to things. We are loving it. And he's also started "talking" a lot more. And following us with his eyes if we are talking and move.


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We ended up being in the same cabin, but the opposite side, (there are 2 sides, they share a porch but that's about it) as we were at 2 years ago when I was pregnant with Olivia. So on one side, 1`1I was pregnant, and the other, there with Lucas. (We've been going to this place since I was a baby and these were the only 2 times we've ever been in that cabin.) And there were toddlers everywhere, it seemed. It was just very bittersweet, being there with our (perfect!) baby and missing our other baby who wouldn't really be a baby anymore. There was a toddler girl who was 16 months old (the same age Olivia would have been if she'd been born in January when she was due), she had hearing aids and was at the developmental level of a 6-8 month old (crawling, not close to walking or standing on her own yet, not speaking at all, etc.) because she was very premature. I was dying to know how premature and why but never found out or even asked. But she was a stark reminder that even if Olivia had lived, we wouldn't have been back here with a normal toddler and baby. Joe and I had a sobering moment on the drive down as we barely fit everything in our car (in fact, my parents had to take the stroller for us), that we would have never fit if we'd had a toddler too. It pretty much sucks...all the should haves. Not that we aren't thankful and blessed and enamored with Lucas, but, she's still not here, and it still sucks, even after all this time. It's weird, I feel like I have to acknowledge being happy and thankful for Lucas now, every time I mention missing Olivia, as if it's greedy to want to have both our kids here. It's not something I dwell on often anymore (the should be's), but every now and then, it hits me.

There were several times in the few days we were on vacation that someone asked my mom if it was her first grandchild. And every time, she said no, that we had a little girl who died right after she was born so this was her second. I'm not positive that she said that just because we were right there or if she always does, and it shouldn't really matter, since sometimes I just say "yes" when asked that because it's just easier than getting into it with a stranger and talking about babies dying ALWAYS makes the conversation awkward. I've made peace with the fact that I don't have to tell every random person who asks (first if we have kids, now if lucas is our first) about Olivia, and it's not really fair to expect my mom to have to do that either, but I've got to admit, I was really really glad she did. Perhaps she saw the stricken look on my face when the question came up. Of course that question did...it always does..it's meant to be idle smalltalk but really it's a crappy reminder that we will never be normal again. You can't win with that question- you either tell the truth and make it awkward and maybe cry, or tell a lie/ answer evasively and then feel like an ass for denying your child/pretending like they never happened. Before it was "do you have any kids?" and now it's "is he your first?" which is even harder to answer because when I was asked if I had any kids, I could assume/pretend they meant living children and say no and feel okay about that, when I didn't want to get into "well, our baby died". But "is he the first?" doesn't really leave room for that.

Anyway, Olivia has been on our minds a lot, not that she isn't always, but we really felt her absence as much as ever, this last week.

Aside from missing her, vacation was decent. I read a couple of books while feeding the baby and taking naps with him. It was nice to not have to cook or think about food, or have to clean up. But it will never quite be as carefree as it used to be...too many memories and should have been's lingering.

cloth diapers and mostly pictures

So I made my first cloth diaper purchases and am prepping them to try out tomorrow (we're trying out flips and econobums after a ridiculous number of hours of research).  I only bought enough for maybe a full day, just to see how I like them, if it goes well then we'll get more. (I'll buy enough for 2-3 days so I don't have to wash them every day.) I have 4 covers and 8 inserts and really should mainly just need to buy more inserts. Inserts are like the baby cloth diaper equivalent of maxipads, they even make disposable options (which are crazy overpriced), so you usually can use the same cover without washing it every dirty diaper, just change the insert and put in a clean one, put it in the cover, snap the diaper on, and there we go. So far, I'm impressed with them, they seem thick and absorbant and soft, so hopefully it goes well. (Laundry should be easy while he is breastfed only because everything dissolves in water, so you just rinse in washer, wash, and dry, basically. It will get slightly more work when he's eating other food but we'll cross that bridge later.) I'm told that cloth wipes are just as easy but I'm trying to venture into just one thing at a time. The good news is that the resale value is nearly the same price as buying them new, so if this doesn't work out, I can resell them and we won't be out a lot of money, but hopefully it works out.

Now for pictures as promised:

 Unhappy baby 7 weeks old and one of my fave outfits (that we did not buy), too bad I waited so long to put it on him because he probably won't fit in it again.)

He's getting more hair and plenty of baby fat. Also, he looks more like my sister,dad, and brother than Joe or me. Hard to believe this is the same kid who earned us an extra day/night in the hospital for losing too much weight, don't think we have to worry about that anymore. (I'm a little worried that his pedi is going to say he's getting too big and stop feeding him so much, because I don't want to make him obese but I also feel like a hungry baby should be fed, blech.) I think he mainly looks like a healthy chubby baby but I know I'm biased.

I can grab dangly things! (Maybe on accident but it sure looks intentional.)

Another outfit I loved but it was a pain. Collars+neckless babies= annoying

And these would be the 0-24 month sunglasses. At first he was bewildered, then he turned his head and the sunglasses stayed plastered to the side of his head so the strap was across his face and that ticked him off.

And this was tonight:

Please disregard all the crap on the end table. All 3 of the boys in the family napping. Yes, Koda likes to sleep under the recliner when it's reclined, and yes, he's had it shut on him accidentally a couple of times, awhile ago, so he moves pretty fast out of the way when he senses movement. This is Lucas's favorite way to sleep though he's gotten a lot better about sleeping in the rock n play which hopefully won't give him a flat head.

Koda moved but made sure he'd still be in the picture, neither Joe or the baby even stirred (though i did turn off the flash.) Now I'm just hoping I won't be paying for their 3 hour evening nap in the middle of the night.) I did finally take the baby and wake him up with a diaper change (oh did that tick him off, not that I blame him but it was necessary) and fed him for a few minutes before he fell back to sleep.

Anyway, that is all for now. I may not have time to blog for the next couple of weeks because we need to get our house clean for my sister to come stay with our dogs while we are on vacation, plus getting ready to go on vacation is a bit daunting, so I may be MIA for a bit.

A kind of quick one

A couple weeks ago, Lucas started sometimes giggling in his sleep. He did it one day and has done it a few times since, but not that often. Today he's been sleepy (and when not sleepy, HUNGRY, guessing this is a growth spurt), and this afternoon he giggled in his sleep, and just now he did it again. I know it's probably gas or some other lame biological reason and not really that he's laughing, but I like to think that Olivia is visiting him in his dreams and they are playing. And since I like that thought so much, I'm sticking with it.

I need to post a picture of him that I took yesterday in his sunglasses. They are too big and ridiculously cute and he was pretty tolerant of them.

Please send good thoughts and prayers to my blogger friend Rebecca who lost her daughter Lily a week from today, last year at almost 23 weeks. She is pregnant with her rainbow baby, a boy, and is in the hospital with severe pre-eclampsia at 31 weeks. There should be a rule that rainbow baby pregnancies are drama free, but alas, the universe is far from fair.

And, I hate pre-eclampsia. I always get so frustrated when I hear of someone new who has it, especially early and/or severe, because we should have had a cure for it so long ago. Women and babies shouldn't still be suffering from a disease that has been around since the ancient Greeks. Olivia and so many other and women shouldn't have died because of it. That people still get sick, that there is still no cure, that there is not even really a decent treatment other than delivery...just makes me so frustrated and sad and angry.

Anyway, it's way past my bedtime.

Father's day 2011

Holidays are still as weird as ever.

Mother's day was pretty much a blur this year, just trying to survive and get a handle on things, but now we are settled and it's not blurry, so technically this wasn't the first holiday with our rainbow boy, but for all intensive purposes, it felt like it.

Joe had to work today, so I sent him a happy father's day email, and this afternoon found us in kmart looking at cards and trying to figure out presents before he got home. I ended up getting him a card from me and a card from the baby (I've given him a card from the dogs before Olivia). It definitely struck me, how much easier it is to do something like that. I think part of it is time and part of it is Lucas, last year there was no way I could have looked at father's day cards in the middle of a store without breaking down...this year...it was bittersweet.  I imagine all the holidays will be. It's so nice to have Lucas to focus on, last year was all sadness and grief and what-should-have-been's, this year there's so much more with the sadness, but then there's still guilt for not being as sad, too. It's just a weird disconcerting mix.

Another thing throwing me off is our vacation in two weeks. It's at a family resort place a couple of hours away off the river, we've been going there with my extended family almost every year since I was preschoolish age. The last time we went there I was-towards the end of first trimester pregnant with Olivia. My days were spent napping, reading, lounging around while eagerly anticipating how fun the next summer would be with our baby. We didn't know the baby was a girl yet, but somehow in hindsight my plans were all for Olivia. Last year we didn't go, the thought of it was unbearable, plus Joe had a new job and I was in the midst of fertility treatments. This year we are going, and with a baby, but still, not how it's supposed to be...this year should have been with a toddler and baby and maybe we would have been so overwhelmed with two kids under 2 that we would have skipped it. And, there aren't many people left we know who don't know what happened (or never knew I was pregnant anyway), but over the years, we usually end up there the same week as the same other families and got to know them fairly well, there was so much talk about my pregnancy and babies and plans for the next year with them. So I'm wondering if they'll be there...will they remember I was pregnant 2 years ago and wonder what happened, will they ask my parents, will they forget her,too. and a million other thoughts.  Anyway, it's complicated, still.   I'm glad we won't be staying in the same cottage as we did two years ago, at least.I'm nervous about how it's going to go with the baby since the meals are at set times and he eats randomly and often and I'm not comfortable nursing in public- luckily he takes bottles just fine but I think it's going to be a lot more work than relaxing. We've debated not going, going for the full week, and settled on going for 3 nights. I'm still not sure about it, hopefully it will be easier than I expect.

Anyway, besides all of the conflicted emotions and missing our little girl as always, we are fantastic. Lucas has gotten to where he'll sleep from 9/10 until around 3. When he's finally changed and finished eating by 4-5, he's ready to party like a rockstar, staring at me with his big blue eyes wide open and ready to play, so he's still kicking my butt in the mornings a bit, but also I love every second of it and wouldn't change it for the world. He still eats a lot but everyone was right, it does get easier, MUCH easier, although I had a bout with mastitis which wasn't so fun (complete with fever, chills, weak, etc), luckily it coincided with Joe's days off so it wasn't as bad as it could have been.  He'll be 2 months old on Wed which makes me sad, he's getting so big and growing up so fast, but also so excited for the milestones ahead.

Boys' night

Tonight I am headed to The Hospital (where my babies were born + high risk doctor is + support group is), to work on father's day cards/presents for the baby loss dads.  I wonder how many of the dads will shrug it off or even be annoyed about the reminder. Oh well. I'm looking forward to a few hours out of the house and talking to people. But I'm going to miss the baby like crazy and I'm anxious that Joe won't make sure he's breathing often enough.

A few days ago, Lucas was asleep in his swing (a rare moment, he prefers sleeping arrangements of the human variety and often wakes up if he finds himself asleep on a non-human surface.) Joe and I were watching the Whale Wars marathon on animal planet (that show is surprisingly addicting, if you aren't familiar with it, it's people on boats trying to foil Japanese whale hunters, a million times more entertaining than Moby Dick.) Anyway, I kept glancing over at the baby every 2 minutes, I'd stare at him until I saw his chest visibly rise or a foot move or some sign of life, then return my attention to the tv. I decided to take a nap and catch the rest of the episodes on dvr, and I asked Joe to take over making sure the baby was breathing every few minutes. He looks at me, looks at the baby, and frowns, "How can you even tell?" hmph. Lucas ended up waking up anyway and it was a moot point.

 But Joe's not quite as paranoid as I'd like him to be. Though he did admit to me he likes when the baby cries (especially in the car) because then he knows he's okay. That's one thing I hate, being in the car alone with the baby (especially when it's hot and it's hard to tell the temperature where he is). We have a mirror but its crap. And a baby breathing alarm that attaches to his diaper and supposedly goes off if he stops breathing, but after 15 false alarms the first time we tried that (our first week home), i gave up on it. so instead, when i'm stopped in the car, i reach back and nudge him until he stirs or moves (he always sleeps in the car). When both of us are in the car, I still usually ride in the back with him. Yep, me=crazy.

 But on a brighter note, I bought the Angelcare monitor system when I was pregnant and figured out how to install it in the bassinet. (We thought it wouldn't work because there's no solid surface under the mattress except a net and poles, until I read some suggestions of people who had put a box between the netting and mattress.) So last night I finally tested it out, first not putting anything in it to make sure it would go off when it didn't sense movement, it did. Then I put the baby in it and there's a movement indicator green light on the monitor that flashes every few seconds when it senses movement.  It worked very well, and I relaxed and tried to sleep with the baby in his bassinet next to me, and he slept for about 20 minutes until he realized he wasn't asleep on a human and protested the gross mistreatment. I'll consider it a success and work on gradually getting the baby to sleep there. But I've got to say, that's the best baby product ever. If we can get the other monitor to work right it would be useful too (like when he's asleep in the swing, etc.), but I'm a bigger fan of the angelcare because now that its set up, we don't have to mess with it except to turn it on. (The other one you have to mess with for every diaper change, plus the false alarms are pretty unsettling.)

So anyway, I'm feeding the baby before I leave and there is about 10 bottles worth of milk in the fridge and 50+ in the freezer, the baby is good with bottles and his pacifier, so they should be fine for a few hours. But I'm really glad to be not working because I'm barely comfortable leaving him with Joe for a couple of hours.

Everything else is going well, except I have an oversupply of milk that comes out too fast and makes the baby swallow too much air and so he gets gassy and uncomfortable a lot lately, poor little guy. We've tried a few things and mainly what has worked has been making sure he burps well (which is tough to get him to do) and lots of gas drops. This morning I gave him a drop after he ate and before he got fussy/gassy and it was our best nonfussy morning in a week. I'm curious to see how he'll be tonight after getting bottles. But we're kind of limited on solutions and apparently babies usually end up adapting eventually to the milk flow, so I'm hoping it will get better on it's own and we'll do drops in the meantime and if the bottles make it better, maybe mix in a few more bottles of pumped milk too. (For some reason, it's always worst in the morning and not very bad in the evening, my guess is because I'm not that great at diligently burping him at 4 am when we're both half asleep, and so by 7-9 am he's uncomfortable.)

The dogs, well Koda our husky, is getting much more comfortable around the baby. Yesterday I helped him pet Koda and Koda licked his foot. And he usually lays pretty near wherever the baby is. (I never leave the baby near the dogs unsupervised, even though I don't *think* they'd do anything, they are dogs and it's not worth the risk.) Rogue is afraid of him (especially when he cries) and pretty much keeps her distance, which works too, she takes awhile to warm up to anyone, so hopefully she'll come around but we aren't going to force it.

Lucas is awake so much more and we've started doing real tummy time. He's good at lifting his head up from the ground and he's starting to notice a bit of the world around him. (He's still pretty oblivious to the dogs, even when koda licks him.) He smiles randomly and has laughed a few times and looks around all the time. He also followed Joe with his eyes the other day when he walked away after talking to him. It's pretty amazing (and sad but mostly amazing), how quickly he's already changing.

Time for me to start getting ready to go.