Amanda's Australian Story - Homeschool Blogger

We Had A Ball

Fri, 8 Aug 2008 02:30:00 -0500

If you want to see what we did last Saturday night, follow this link.

I Am Moving

Thu, 7 Aug 2008 19:31:00 -0500

Hello to all my Homeschoolblogger friends. Just letting you know I have decided to move over to Blogspot. I will still post here occasionally, and, of course, I will still visit my friends. But mostly, I will post on the new site. Here is the link:

Amanda’s Australian Story

Birth of a Baby

Wed, 6 Aug 2008 18:32:00 -0500

Sunday — Day Four

This morning was quiet. I did a load of washing and waited for John and the children to come in after church. I started to feel a bit jittery, like I had low blood sugar. Lunch was a welcome sight when it arrived. I had just finished when my visitors came. I was looking forward to their visit, but now I found myself irritable for no reason; at the time, I thought it was caused by a lack of sleep.

The visit had to be cut short and John promised to return later in the day. He phoned Mum and Dad to tell them not to come because I needed to sleep. The contractions I was having didn’t really clue me in to what was coming. I know my waters had broken and we were waiting for a baby to be born, but that didn’t mean I was in labour, even with all the other signs.

I knew if I mentioned the contractions to the staff, they would whip out the CTG machine again and it wouldn’t behave the way it should, again. I opted to keep quiet and hope it would all go away. John came back at 5.30pm. He wondered why I was acting so strange, I thought after 11 labours together, he should know why I felt the way I did. Why can’t husbands read minds. It would make it all so much simpler.

After being assured, earlier in the day by my favourite midwife, that I wouldn’t need another CTG if I was having contractions, I opted to let the staff know what was happening. The obstetrician came in and ordered a CTG. Why did I think I could get out of it? It reminds me of the machine that goes ‘ping’ in the Monty Python skit, useless, but used nevertheless. Of course, it didn’t shed any light on what was happening, so she did an internal. I was 2cm, exactly what I was when admitted four days earlier. She gave me a few options, one of which was to stay where I was in the Antenatal ward and if I had the baby there then so be it. I liked the sound of this one, so I went back to bed and tried to sleep.

After about an hour, I couldn’t stay in bed any longer and tried leaning forward over the bed for comfort. That didn’t work, so I tried the shower. John came in to check on me, he had been asleep until he heard the shower going. I don’t know how long I was in there but I got to the point where I knew if I was going to move up to delivery suite it had to be soon. John got a wheelchair and I jumped in. Normally I would be able to walk up there myself, but this time the contractions were so strong I felt stuck and unable to move.

We arrived to a sea of faces, two of which I knew quite well. Sue was the midwife who cared for me after Grace was born and Nicki was with us for Grace’s birth. It was lovely to see familiar faces. Victoria was on her way. Sue strapped the mobile CTG on me and I had a cannula inserted for the antibiotics. The obstetrician asked to do another internal, but I declined. I knew I was in labour even if my cervix said something different; they can’t always be trusted you know; then it was straight into the shower.

Victoria arrived and we decided to call Ingrid, a friend who was to be my doula (a birth helper). While we waited for her, John and Victoria rubbed my backed and directed the hand held shower nozzle on my lower back while I swayed from side to side. In between contractions, they continued to rub and I rested sometimes on a chair. Ingrid arrived and took over from Victoria. We continued like this, for I don’t know how long. After a while I couldn’t take it anymore, the pain in my back was constant. Even between contractions the pain was there. The baby wasn’t posterior, but it sure felt like he was.

“I want an epidural.”

John reminded what I thought about epidurals and that I would regret my decision, but at that point, I was ready to kill anyone who stood in the way of that blessed pain relief. I wasn’t sure how I would move from where I was when the anaesthetist came, the details didn’t matter to me. I was scared to move away from the shower but I knew I needed to try something. I paced madly around the room, oblivious to anyone. I felt a change while I walked; I knew I was almost fully dilated. I tried hanging from John’s shoulders and then a trip to the toilet. I just wanted to sit and ‘enjoy’ the break I was now having from the contractions. Usually, when I am fully dilated, the baby is born straight away. This time, everything was slow. Baby didn’t decide to come down for what felt like an age. I lost all thought of the fact I was even having a baby. I was caught up in the present, and it felt like an eternity.

When baby did decide to make his move, I wished he hadn’t. I birthed every inch of him, slowly. He was only 8lb 7oz, but he felt like the 11lb baby I birthed all those years ago. I don’t normally scream, but scream I did, and unashamedly.

He was born and I held him close to me, telling him to cry. I needed to hear him. After giving birth to a baby born in silence, any sound is a welcome sound.

I told myself I was never doing ‘that’ again and I carried him over to the bed. The neonatal doctor checked him over, suggested he be taken to the nursery. I declined, the doctor left. I lay back while John and I enjoyed meeting our baby.

I didn’t have an epidural, I had a baby instead, and he is lovely.

Michael is now 7 weeks. The first four weeks are a blur due to the expressing to keep his weight up. He lost almost a pound in three days and it took weeks to get it back on him. In the last few weeks everything has settled down nicely, and we are enjoying every moment we have with such a precious little bundle.

More Ice!

This baby business is serious business.

And baby makes 12 (including Grace).

Another Link

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 22:20:00 -0500

Nine kids, 12 years and 30,000 diapers later and all I am sure of is how much I don't know about parenting.

"My honest apologies to any moms out there who I have carelessly given advice to and who have been hurt by my immaturity. They are your children, entrusted to you by an all knowing God to whom you (not I) am accountable. Forgive me!"

You Raise Me Up � Secret Garden

Sat, 26 Jul 2008 05:27:00 -0500

You Raise Me Up — Secret Garden

Large Families and What They Wear

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 22:50:00 -0500

What I'd Like For You To Know: A Mom Of Many

I like this lady’s post. Have a read if you would like to know more about large families.

Preschoolers and Survival

I remember someone asking and being amazed that I dressed the way I did AND didn’t work outside of the home.

Terrific Toddlers Give-away!

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 20:17:00 -0500

Terrific Toddlers Give-away!

Now, here are the rules for the give-away. In order to be in the running to win a free copy of this book, you need to leave a comment on this post, just telling me something you love about a terrific toddler (or toddler-to-be) close to your heart, before the 6th August…

Visit the above link to leave your comment.

Part Three

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 20:09:00 -0500

Part Three — Michael’s Birth

Day Three: This day was a lot quieter because it was Saturday. Many of the regular staff aren’t on over the weekends; staff like dieticians, or other not-so-important people. I welcomed the break in activity. I did speak to few extra doctors though, which was reassuring. I liked the way they didn’t panic and were happy to wait until the baby was ready to come in his own time. I had another CTG, and yet again, the machine didn’t behave. Ordinarily, this would have meant another one in the afternoon, but this time I got out of it because the doctors were there and said the reading was fine.

Often pre-term babies require nursery care and a drip to stabilise their sugar levels. The drip usually contains either formula or glucose water. I was hoping we didn’t have to go down that route, so part of my daily routine included expressing colostrum to give to baby instead. Twice a day I would collect a few drops of pure gold and store it in the freezer for future use. Fortunately, newborns don’t need massive quantities each feed, because I never did manage to get a great deal expressed in the time I had before baby was born. For some women, re-lactating is easy, for the unfortunate few, it isn’t so.

John worked a few hours in the morning and then brought the children in to visit. The visit went as you would expect with a lot of children in a confined space; they came, they saw, they conquered, and subsequently were taken home. No, really, they were well behaved, considering. The ice machine was a big hit, as was the buzzer to call for the nurse. You’d think we’d have learnt from last time, but when that nurse popped her head in the door and asked if we needed anything, I just thought she was being nice. I mean, I didn’t think one of the kids had pressed the buzzer. I am so naive; you would think I’d know better.

The privacy curtain has more uses than an adult can imagine.

I loved having the children come and visit. We decided that after the weekend we would have one of the older girls drive in each day with two of the younger children, so they could spend the morning with me. I was looking forward to it. Running a house from a hospital bed ain’t so easy, especially if the children aren’t even with me.

Later on when everyone had left, I walked up to the laundry room (it was close by, so I wasn’t breaking the rules leaving the ward, really). A father was leaving the post-natal ward with his two little girls after a visit with their mother and the new baby. The two-year-old cried and cried for her mummy. It broke my heart to see the quivering lips and falling tears. It was enough to release the floodgates. I cried just as much as she did. I knew just how she felt.

I wondered if the kids missed me as much as I missed them. I know Lily did. She sucks her thumb. She only started when she was two, after seeing a little friend do it. Well, she liked it and has continued since. The funny thing is, she likes to play with hair while sucking, it doesn’t have to be her own necessarily, it can be someone else’s, if they don’t mind having it pulled out at the roots. Since most people don’t like that kind of pain, she has been limited to pulling her own. I gather she spent a lot of time with her thumb in her mouth while I was gone, because when I came home, she was bald on one side of her head.

The girls left me a mini DVD player with a couple of movies to watch. Though I still didn’t feel like watching anything, I thought it might help me get to sleep, so I put on Joseph King of Dreams after dinner. My favourite part of this retelling of Joseph’s story is the song David Campbell sings when Joseph is in prison. I won’t bore you with all the lyrics, just the chorus.

You know better than I
You know the way

I’ve let go the need to know why
For you know better than I

I think I was still emotionally unstable at this point. I mean, who cries through a kid’s movie? Maybe it had something to do with the lack of control I felt at being in the hospital; not knowing what would happen, when baby would come, or how long I would be separated from my family. Whatever the reason, I was definitely on edge.

The midwife was due to do my observations and I wanted to look semi-normal, so I went and washed my face in the bathroom. After using the facilities, I noticed some bright blood on the toilet paper. I already had a pinkish loss, but this was different. I thought it was important enough to mention to the nurse, so I hit the panic button. I mean, I literally hit the panic button. I didn’t realise I had until three, very out of breath midwives came running into my bathroom. The look on their faces made me aware the button I pressed wasn’t the same colour as the other nurse buttons in the room. This one was bright red with URGENT written above it. I don’t know how I missed that. They did look relieved that it wasn’t an emergency, and after I apologised profusely, they departed from me on friendly terms.

The doctor came in to have a chat about my concerns and I had another CTG. I was very close to asking for a caesarean (most of my babies were born at home - I'm just mentioning that in case you think I ask for one everytime). After Grace’s birth, to me, blood means placental abruption. The doctor reassured me though that it was just my cervix continuing to change. I couldn’t go back to the movie after they left. I tried to sleep, but that couldn’t be done either.

Suffering for the Sake Of�

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 05:53:00 -0500

Suffering for the Sake Of…

Hope is a very good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

May take a while to download, but it’s worth the wait to see what Joni Eareckson Tada has to say.

The Latest

Tue, 8 Jul 2008 20:35:00 -0500

Michael’s Update

Our visit at the hospital on Monday went well. Michael’s bilirubin levels have just started to drop, which means his liver is working fine. Now, all I need to do is increase the amount of milk I am supplementing and he should get over this little hiccup quickly. My niece has offered to give me some of her expressed milk to help me achieve this. This is an answer to an unspoken prayer. She is an angel!

I will get back to Michael’s birth story soon.

Love

Amanda