Wordless Wednesday

He's fired.

The Shrimp woke me up at the butt crack of dawn to eat. I was nursing him in bed half asleep when some explosions went off in his diaper and I suddenly felt my stomach and thighs get all warm. Figures. Shaun had put a disposable on him, which I HATE because he ALWAYS leaks out of them. He smiled a blissed out smile as I pulled him away from me and found myself covered in orange sticky crap. He was covered too. So were our sheets and comforter. I yell for Shaun to help and he brings wipes then proceeds to dry heave and thrash around on the floor half laughing and half gagging. I'm wiping the kid off when he pees all over his face and the bed. I pick him up to get him out of the mess, thinking he's empty and I'm safe. No. He pees, again, all over me, my lap and chest.

I decided we both needed a bath at that point, and he didn't object (in fact, he was just chillin' the whole time looking at me like he wasn't naked and we both weren't covered in poop and pee). I laid him back down to go start the bathwater and he proceeded to barf all over himself.

At that point there was not much I could do other than take a picture and submit it to www.shitmykidsruined.com. So I did. And the owner emailed me back wanting to know if they could have my permission to use the picture in the book they are publishing in November. My kid will be famous for his trifecta of nasty.

And he came crashing in...

Liam's birth was THE most amazing thing I have ever done in my life. I've always kind of thought it was cliche when people said that giving birth to their kid was one of the most incredible and meaningful things they have ever done, but now I know it's totally true. Holy freaking shit it's so true. I sit here now with him sleeping on my lap and I can't stop looking at him. That body came out of MY body. I perfected that. In 9 freaking short months. And I deserve something so perfect? No way. But I got it anyway.

Here is the story of Liam Michael.

Wednesday, July 28th Shaun and I spent part of the day at my parents house after we had closed on the house that morning. My mom ordered Chinese for lunch, and after I ate it started saying that Chinese food induces labor. Thanks mom. Shaun and I left and went down the street to Cabelas for ammo/camping crap/whatever lame stuff he felt the need to look at. Got some pizza and went home. About 2 hours later I was sitting here on the couch on the computer when I felt this weird cracking/sharp pain in my lower abdomen. I sat for second wondering what the hell that was but then went back to reading what I was doing since it was gone. Then there was a small gush and a, “oh shit, my water broke!”.

I was IMing Tiffany and just said, “my water broke, talk to you later” and signed off, haha. Shaun was there in the room playing Battlefield and had to kill some guy really quick before jumping off. We both have problems. lol.

So then we’re just standing there in the middle of the room looking at each other going, “now what???”. A mixture of shock, disbelief that it was actually happening, laughing that after all that, he WAS going to be born on my birthday (it was 9:15pm when my water broke, so I had to assume he’d come after midnight...) and sheer excitement.

I decided right about then that I had a million things to do and I was not about to give birth without having them done. I guess my nesting comes a bit late. So Shaun duct taped a towel to me diaper-style so I looked like Baby Huey and I cleaned the guinea pig cage, cleaned my closet and boxed up everything, wiped down the bathroom, and finished packing my bag. Then I called my mom and texted a bunch of people that I was in labor and would keep them updated. I was a huge failure after that because there were several people that wanted to come to the birth and uh, for some stupid reason I thought I would be able to text from the car when on the way to the hospital. Yeah right. I don’t even think I knew what planet I was on at that point.

The contractions started as I was packing my bag and got intense pretty fast. We attempted to time them but they were so close together one just ran into the other. I know that should be a sign that I should have headed to the hospital, but when I checked myself I was only about a 3 and they honestly weren’t jaw dropping. I had to focus and detach a bit but no biggie. Shaun eventually threw the damn Labor Coach book in the trash and we just winged it.

By 11pm things were still intense. I had this overwhelming urge to be outside and not wear shoes. So I’m pacing the driveway in circles like a stray cat with my Baby Huey diaper while Shaun is calling his parents, his teacher to tell him he wouldn’t be in class tomorrow, and our midwife, Lisa. She didn’t answer her phone, we were assuming she was sleeping like a normal person not in labor would be. I went inside and took a shower and as I was getting out I had another huge gush. This time there was a bit of meconium in it. I’ve seen meconium water, and this did not look like it, but it was definitely something. I wanted to stay home as long as I could but after a few more gushes with that green stuff, I decided we should go. Shaun took a shower, and by the time he got out I was pacing the living room and I don’t remember much after that. Apparently he chased me back and forth in the living room with pants, begging me to put them on and I kept running away from him. He finally managed to get me in the car and we went to the hospital.

We were in triage for about 2 hours, and they finally moved us to a room at about 1:30am. Shaun called my parents to tell them to come, and let his parents know we were at the hospital. I had some nurse I did NOT like at all. Not sure why, she was just very impersonal and kept messing with me when I was having a contraction. She’d get all pissy when I wouldn’t answer her question and would keep asking it over and over. I’d finally bark the answer at her when the contraction subsided. Lisa was not the one on call and hadn’t called Shaun back. Tiffany, another midwife that I hadn’t met, was the one on call and they said she was 40 minutes away. Ok, no problem. The contractions were unbelievable...they had been about 30 seconds to one minute apart the WHOLE time so I was getting tired of not having a break. I didn’t want to know how dilated I was at that point, but found out later I was at a 5. The nurse came in two times in the next 3 hours, other than that I was on my own except for Shaun and my parents, who had arrived. I wanted to get in the tub, but the nurse said not until the midwife got there because I’d “go too fast”. Shaun said, “well where the fuck is the midwife? It’s been 3 hours!” and the nurse goes, “like I said, she’s 40 minutes away.” NO ONE HAD CALLED THE MIDWIFE! I was too deep into myself to freak out but I guess Shaun and my parents both freaked out on her and she went to call.

About 30 minutes later the nurse came in and told me I could get in the tub. Holy sweet relief it was awesome. I closed my eyes and when I opened them, Lisa was there. I swear it was like Jesus himself had walked through the door.

Things got tough in the tub but Lisa kept me focused and breathing. I started to panic and try to climb the walls because I was overheating and felt like passing out on top of the pain, and Lisa told me it was time to get out and have a baby. I said hell no. lol. Her and Shaun had to coax me out of that tub and I still pitched a fit. They got me in the bed and there was no way I was going to be able to deliver on my hands and knees like I originally thought I'd try to do. I was way too tired. So on my back I went and proceeded to scream for another 10 minutes while waiting for a damn cervix lip to get the hell out of the way. Finally I couldn’t stop myself from pushing, so that’s what I did. I don’t remember a lot about it, but I remember having a hard time pushing through the pain. I was having a hard time getting his head under that pelvic bone, so he did a lot of peekaboo with the top of his head. I finally decided I’d had enough. I remember everyone going “Look! His head is staying, he’s so close!” and I said “No, I’m holding him there....aww shit I lost him” as my muscles gave out and he sucked back in again. I remember Lisa laughing. Finally I managed to get him through and he started crowning. Pushing felt so good...I guess because of the pressure relief. But I was turning gray and my eyes were swelling shut from pushing so hard and I remember drifting away and thinking I was dying. A beam of sunshine was coming in from the window and landing directly on me. I found out later everyone started crying because he was born into a ray of sunshine, but there I was thinking I was seeing the white light of death, lol.

A few minutes later, after an hour and a half of pushing, Liam was born into Shaun’s hands. That sweet relief of him leaving my body was incredible. I don’t even know how to describe it. I started crying and saying, “I did it! I told you I could!” over and over. Shaun put him on my chest and unfortunately my eyes were so swollen I couldn’t see much but Liam grabbed my boob and that’s all it took. He was mine.

He hung out for a bit till the cord was done pulsing, then Shaun cut it and they took him to be weighed. I remember all of a sudden looking around and the room was full of people and I had no idea where they had come from or how they got there. Apparently I was saying hi to them while pushing, and Shaun’s mom was holding my leg (not really what I had wanted but apparently I didn’t care, lol). Lisa later told me I was the most polite laboring woman she had ever met. I guess I was weakly joking with people the whole time, asking to please have some water and thank you for getting it for me, and when I was pushing I was telling my dad to get a drink and sit down because he was looking too pale and that there was a granola bar in my bag he could have. Who knew? I thought I’d be a total bitch but apparently I get all nice when I’m feeling like dying. Everyone was crying after Liam came out and Shaun completely lost it. I’ve never seen him cry, and I will never forget that moment and him running and flinging himself on me and just sobbing.

The second day he still had no name. Finally Shaun and I were laying on the hospital bed staring at him and Shaun said, “He does not look like a Declan at all. It’s crazy. He’s totally a Liam.” After 7 months of obsessing over the name Declan, that’s all it took. So the Shrimp was named.

And that’s the story of Liam.