Noah’s First Food Adventure from Chantelle Finley on Vimeo.

1. My Mom was right. About ALL of it. Damn.
2. Being vomited on is no longer enough of a reason to change my shirt.
3. I’ve dirtied a dish just to put it in the dishwasher so I wouldn’t feel guilty about running a completely empty dishwasher just to lull Noah to sleep.
4. I tried baby formula to see what it tastes like. It tastes like barf.
5. Going pee now counts as my “me time.”
6. I once ran the vacuum for twenty minutes to soothe Noah before I realized I could have actually vacuumed the floor during that time. By then he was asleep, so I didn’t bother.
7. I count doing laundry as exercise. Well, it should be; there’s so damn much of it now.
8. Sometimes I forget to turn off the transmitter end of the monitor in our room once Noah  starts crying during the night and I don’t feel as bad about it as I should.  I know that it would wake up Adam while I tried to calm Noah down, but if I’m up, he can be too.
9. The cat once licked his head for twenty minutes and I counted that as his bath for the day.
10. If I have to use the bathroom while I am out with Noah in a carrier and have no where to put him, I have to pee while he is still in his carrier strapped to my chest. Instead of feeling weird about this, I feel kinda proud that I can manage it.
11. When talking to Noah all day I use the word “Mommy” a lot in the hope that I’ll win the “What Word Will He Say First” contest.
12. Mini Wheats is classified as complex dinner preparation these days because you have to add the milk.

Oh crap. I just ruined the “wordless” part, didn’t I? Ah well, I never was good at being wordless.

Via, Found by Adam

I had to take the pictures while he was sleeping because it’s the only time he sits still long enough to get a clear shot.

Thanks to Aunt Sara and Uncle Matt for Noah’s cute new hoodie.

Here’s Noah, freshly hatched (and looking quite pleased with himself) beside a picture of my Mom’s brother Harvey, who also has Dedo’s smile:

And here’s the little hero beside an old pic of my Mom:

See? The same smiles! Like they know something you don’t. And, of course, here is Adam and Noah, both taken at two months old:

He has so much of Adam in his face that it is nice to see some glimpses of my influence.

]]> http://sixthandelm.com/2009/chipping/feed 0 http://sixthandelm.com/2009/trust-me-im-a-doctor http://sixthandelm.com/2009/trust-me-im-a-doctor#comments Mon, 21 Dec 2009 05:05:30 +0000 http://sixthandelm.com/?p=1233 Noah has a bit of a cold, so I asked Adam to pick up some Saline solution so I could clear is nose and help clear up his congestion. I asked him to get unmedicated drops since you aren’t supposed to use cold remedies on babies and a mist wouldn’t help wash out the gook. I wanted to make sure he got something suitable for use on small babies, but didn’t realize I may have told him the specifics a couple times too many until he returned home.

Me: “Did you get them?”

Adam: “Yup.”

Me: “Did you get the right kind? The ones for ba —”

Adam: “Saline rinse, drop form, unmedicated, mild solution,  recommended for occasional nasal congestion. And there’s a picture of a baby on it.”

Me: “Oh. Well, good.”

I’ve started this post about 12 times, but I’m finding it hard to describe what’s going on using regular words. I need better words. I thought about making up my own words, but then someone pointed out that ALL words are made up words and I was so busy thinking about that idea that I forgot that I was supposed to be writing about the thing I didn’t have words for in the first place. But it’s a good story with a happy ending, so I’ll try to tell it with my inadequate vocabulary nonetheless.

On Monday, October 19th, I was 35 weeks and 4 days pregnant, and after a difficult pregnancy and over a month of bed rest I was ready for the pregnancy to be over. Apparently, so was Junior. Exactly half an hour after I had made up the crib as the finishing touch on his nursery I felt my water break. Of course. I should have known he’d be early; he’s a Finley.

Less than an hour after I arrived at the hospital (followed closely by Adam after an 80$ cab ride from downtown Toronto) I was being prepped for surgery. The baby was transverse breech and a c-section was the only safe way to deliver him, but it was all happening so fast that there wasn’t time for me to get nervous about my very first surgery. A few key phone calls (“Mom! It’s time!”) and one spinal anesthesia injection later, it was go time.

Adam did get to come in to the OR with me, but I don’t remember too many other details of the surgery. I was awake through the whole thing and I do remember the awful tugging pressure and the shadows through the paper barrier of the two doctors pushing and pulling and coaxing the little one out. I also remember squeezing Adam’s hand for the ridiculously long second it took for our son to take his first breath. Thankfully, he was just as shocked by his early birth as we were, and after a few seconds he voiced his discontent with a nice healthy wail. He was held up for me to see and I was a little too overwhelmed for eloquent speech at the time, so I just said “Oh! He’s cute!” The nurse laughed at me and said I sounded surprised about that but it was really the only thing that came to mind.

Then the nurse asked us if we wanted to take a picture of him while he was “brand new” and it was then that Adam and I both realized neither of us had brought a camera, which is rather ironic since Adam is a photographer and I dabble in it for a hobby. He snapped a few pictures on his iPhone before Noah was taken away to the nursery and he had them up on Facebook before I was even out of surgery.

Despite being almost 5 weeks early, Noah Joseph Finley was born a healthy 5lbs, 11oz and only had to spend three nights in the special care nursery at Credit Valley Hospital because he was premature. Once he was born I don’t remember the rest of the surgery to close my incision, or even the hours in recovery before I could move enough to go see Noah in the nursery. I do remember holding him for the first time. I’ll never forget that.

Noah has had no problems from being a preemie (unless you count being ridiculously tiny and cute a problem). He is a very well-tempered child, sleeping nicely between feedings at night and quietly observing everything when he is awake during the day. And he is almost an exact replica of his father – so much so that not one person who has met him has failed to comment on it.

He’s perfect. We’re so happy. We’ve been waiting for you for a long time, little one.

I thought I knew what I was in for. You get pregnant, you have all the pregnancy symptoms people talk about and then at the end you painfully push out a crying baby. But every day I think of about 800 new questions and I can’t understand how my Mom survived a pregnancy without trusty Google to hold her hand.

The majority of my questions run along the lines of “is this normal?” because there are LOTS of gory symptoms you never heard about in Gym class and some that even the baby books don’t cover. Is it normal for blue veins to appear all along my torso? Is it normal for my nipples to look like that? Is it normal to throw up only when I eat something orange-coloured? The shared stories and anecdotes on the various pregnancy forums and medical sites have been beyond helpful.

Being a first time parent also leads to many questions asked of my friend Google as well. What is the difference between the free prenatal classes at Peel Region vs the expensive ones at the hospital? What the hell is a birth plan and do I need it? Is a TENS unit for pain relief any good in labour or is it not strong enough? What kind of stroller is best? Do we donate the cord blood to research, or a public bank? I counted and I have already Googled 14 things just today.

One thing I want to pass on here, though, is that even though Google may be a wealth of information, I know I cannot take anything I read on the net as fact. There are some questions I need to save for my Doctor alone (when he isn’t whirling in and out of our 3-minute appointments), but Google has helped me find some truly great pregnancy forums and hear stories of real deliveries and connect with others in the same boat as I am, which is a comfort I can’t imagine doing without.

How has the Internet helped or changed YOUR birth experience? Or did you give birth before the advent of the mighty web and how did you cope? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.