Lyra's Birth Story

I believe that when I wrote out Adriana's birth story three years ago, I established that I am prone to Oversharing On The Internet, as well as Using Many, Many Words. So if you read that one and thought it was perhaps a bit Too Much Information, may I suggest some alternative use of time on the web? Because, look, some things just don't change.

On New Year's Day, Adriana was ill, and spent most of the day throwing up and sleeping. By dinnertime seemed fine, but I knew we had a rough night ahead of us because of how much she'd napped. I tried to go to bed at a decent hour, but as I lay there in the dark, telling Brian what needed to be done before the baby's arrival (and determining that I would be ready to go into labor by Wednesday night, giving me five full days to get everything accomplished), I began to panic a bit, and it was close to midnight before I slept. And at 2:30 in the morning Adriana awoke demanding food.

I knew her body needed to make up the calories she had missed out on during the day, so I was sitting on the kitchen floor with her while she ate a banana and a slice of bread with butter, when I realized that my Braxton-Hicks contractions were seeming a bit stronger. I glanced at the clock when one came. When the next one hit 10 minutes later I wasn't suprised, and the next one was exactly 10 minutes after that. I thought about my labor with Adriana, about how I had gone for several hours before finally admitting I was in labor. I wasn't quite ready this time to admit that that was going on, but I knew it was a possibility. Adriana finished her snack and I got back into bed with her, but she wasn't interested in sleeping. I watched the clock while I snuggled with her and rubbed her back. Finally at 4, with the contractions coming anywhere between seven and ten minutes apart and Adriana insisting that she wasn't sleepy, I decided to wake Brian. I was tired and if this was really labor, I needed to rest while I could.

Brian got up with Adriana and told her that when she was tired she could get back into bed and cuddle with me. She insisted I sleep in her room, and I couldn't see any reason to argue. I got into her bed and tried to doze while listening to Brian quietly telling her stories on the couch. I think I slept, and I definitely got some rest, but I also couldn't keep my eyes off the clock for a good part of the time. I would close my eyes and try to doze, but I kept peeking up at the clock, memorizing when one contraction had started and anticipating the next one. By 5:30 they were coming steadily seven minutes apart and I gave up on sleeping and got out of bed.

Adriana had fallen asleep on the couch beside Brian as he told her stories. We started to get ready. I had begun to pack a hospital bag a few weeks before. I had managed to put in a few of the things I would need after the baby arrived--a going home outfit for the baby, a couple of receiving blankets, and a tube of lanolin--and I set about adding in the things I would need during labor, as well as other things for after the birth. It occurred to me at that point that although I'd made plans for Adriana's care while I was in the hospital, I hadn't actually done any packing for her, so I grabbed another bag and threw in her special blanket and doll, her current favorite book, and enough clothes to get her through in case I had a c-section again, although if we were gone that long the plan was to have her stay at home for most of the time.

At seven, we started making phone calls--the doula, to give her a heads up that we'd been needing her before too long (Brian told her the contractions were "seven to fifteen minutes apart," and I corrected him sharply), a local friend with whom we planned to drop Adriana off (who was just back from Christmas with her family in Europe with two jetlagged children of her own--who better to offer an extra kid to?), and the friends who would be caring for her until we were back at home. We then spent a little less than two hours packing bags and tidying the house, stopping every five minutes so that I could breathe through contractions and Brian could apply counter pressure to my low back. Because I was having back labor, just as I had with Adriana. At one point I thought about consulting Dr. Google about this--did it mean the baby is posterior? Is all back pain in labor really back labor?--but I stayed away from the computer, figuring that this time I knew more about what I was doing, and I was feeling the contractions in my belly as well, which hadn't happened with Adriana.

We called Eva, our doula, again, this time to ask her to come over. My friend Trine offered to have her husband come pick Adriana up, but I wanted Brian to drive her over. I couldn't imagine Adriana walking out of our house without us willingly, even with the father of one of her friends, and the idea of Brian buckling her into their carseat and watching her drive off seemed similarly traumatic. (It turned out that Trine thought Brian was leaving me home alone in labor.) I woke Adriana and told her what was happening. We'd been over and over the routine for a few days; sometimes she would ask me to tell her what would happen, and sometimes she would recite it herself: When Mama goes to the hospital to get the baby, Daddy will take me to play with Matilda and Baby Nora, and then Helen and Sami will come get me and I can play at their house and sleep there, and then Mama and Daddy will come get me and we all go home with Baby Sister. So she cooperated well with getting dressed, although we were fighting a bit (as usual) about brushing her hair when Eva let herself into the apartment.

Before too long, Eva was really encouraging Brian to get going with Adriana. I knelt down to hug her goodbye and tell her I would see her soon. Everyone had told me how big she would seem once I had the baby, so I tried to memorize the feel of her little body. And then she went out the door with Brian and I began to cry, because there she was walking out the door in her little blue sweatsuit, with her special blanket and baby doll in a backpack, brave and happy, and I was the one who was scared and crying. Eva hugged me, and another contraction hit and I had no choice but to move on, because I had learned with Adriana, and even before that, when I'd had a miscarriage, that the only way to get through contractions is to focus on them.

I did find this time, maybe because I was actually admitting I was in labor, that I could use imagery to help myself relax, but it wasn't that I was ignoring the contractions. I would stop talking, stop whatever I was doing, and breathe deeply and let a relaxing image fill my mind. So I guess I wasn't focusing just on the contraction itself, but I wasn't exactly trying to get my mind off of it--just let my body relax enough that I could cope with the discomfort. Leaning forward seemed to help, too, so I would lean over the table or the bed or the arm of the couch and while either Eva or Brian pushed on my back, and I would close my eyes, take deep breaths, and focus on one thing. Then the contraction would end and Eva would give me some water or Recharge to drink and we would talk casually until the next one hit. Sometimes they came very close together. "Shit, another?" Eva exclaimed in surprise at one point while Brian was taking Adriana to Trine's. And that contraction was hard to get through because that was somehow extremely funny to me, and I was laughing instead of focusing on the pain.

Eva suggested I get into the shower, but I was hesitant, and she said we could go to the hospital instead and maybe try the shower there. I dreaded going to the hospital at all, but I also thought it might be better to get the drive over with--the sooner I did it, the further apart the contractions would be, so the fewer I would have to have between home and Kaiser. I also remembered that the midwives had clinic hours in the afternoon, which meant if I arrived too much later I would have an obstetrician attending me instead (I was not thinking clearly enough to realize that there were no clinic hours on Saturdays). So Brian loaded our bags (and the infant seat, which I'd meant to install before the baby came) into the car, and I arranged myself uncomfortably in the passenger seat. As we pulled out of our parking place, I remembered that I was supposed to call the hospital to tell them we were coming, so that they could have a room ready for me. Brian stopped the car in the middle of the parking lot and called. After a few minutes of him talking to the nurse on the phone, I got frustrated and told him to just drive while I took the phone. I grabbed his cell phone and immediately moaned into it as another contraction hit (Brian laughed about that later). I gave the nurse the information she needed as Brian headed up towards the freeway.

We pulled up in front of the hospital just before 11, and Brian grabbed one bag out of the car while I leaned against the car through another contraction. Someone saw us and came out of the hospital with a wheelchair, but I had just spent nearly 20 minutes sitting down and didn't want to have any more contractions in that position, so we waved him away. Eva came up from the parking lot and we went up through the hospital to Labor and Delivery, with me stopping to lean against the wall for contractions a few times on the way.

Once we were in our room, the nurse I'd spoke to on the phone gave me a hospital gown and a specimen cup and sent me into the bathroom. Brian and I looked at each other, and he said something about our having just given up control of the situation, but I went into the bathroom with Eva and I did as I was told, and Brian went to move the car.

When he got back, the nurse was trying to put the external fetal monitor on me, and I was giving her a hard time about it. She explained that it was policy to do continuous monitoring, and that I would have to sign a form in order to avoid it. The midwife came in then, and, after she and Eva greeted each other in surprise, since they knew through a mutual friend, we told her that we didn't want the continuous monitoring. She asked that we let them get "just one good strip," and sent someone to get the form for me to sign. The nurse fitted the belt around me, and then we could hear the baby's heartbeat. I did like the sound, but the belt was uncomfortable (which I didn't remember from Adriana's birth, but I had been in labor for 24 hours by the time I got to the hospital with her, so I was pretty out of it--and I got an epidural not too long after I arrived so it hadn't been uncomfortable for very long) and I was glad to have it gone after the nurse had entered all my information into the computer and she had her strip that recorded my contractions and the baby's heartbeat. The midwife, Sheri, checked my cervix, and declared me six centimeters.

Another nurse drew some blood, inserting a heplock into my wrist at the same time, just in case I needed an IV later. They put a rubber glove over that hand so that I could get into the shower without getting it wet. The nurse had a few more forms for Brian and me to sign, but soon after that the room was down to just Brian, Eva, and me. Eva started the shower for me, and I went to stand under the hot water. I was in there for an hour, trying different positions on the shower stool, standing and leaning against the wall, and holding onto the bar on the wall to support myself during squats. That bar was exactly what I needed--it gave me something to grip as I did a series of squats through each contraction. I must have looked ridiculous, but suddenly the only thing that made sense to do during contractions was to raise and lower myself, just as we had in my prenatal yoga class. I joked between contractions that my quads would be killing me the next day and that I would have bruises on my back from the counterpressure, until I couldn't even joke between contractions anymore. Brian brought me more of my Recharge, and I looked at him as though he were crazy, because he was handing me something yellow in what appeared to be a specimen cup, and he told me what it was so that I would drink it. Something about the way I was gripping the bar was bending the heplock in my wrist, so that it was hurting, and I found myself focusing on that instead of the contractions. I began sitting down between contractions and caught myself nodding off a few times. Eva and Brian chatted with one another and took turns pressing on my back, and for the most part I tuned them out and usually wasn't even aware who was the one supporting me.

There were times in the shower when I considered giving up on natural childbirth and requesting an epidural. I never mentioned it out loud, and instead talked myself silently through it, reminding myself that I wouldn't be able to move, that the last time I had had one I had also ended up with a c-section. Sometimes that wasn't quite enough. Sometimes I would have to ask myself, "Do you really want to have to admit afterwards that you gave up?" And it was that worry, the worry about the injury to my pride, that kept me going. ("Women have their own kind of macho," Brian said, when I told him about it later.)

Once I was out of the shower, Eva offered to go get Sheri so she could check to see what kind of progress I was making. Brian and I both hesitated. It was only one o'clock, so I hadn't been at the hospital all that long, and we were remembering labor with Adriana, and how discouraging it was after several hours of labor, some of it very intense, to discover that I'd only gained one centimeter and hadn't actually reached transition. So we resisted the idea, but only for a little bit. I was hopeful that something was happening, and it also just seemed like something to do. Sitting there waiting for the next contraction to hit, and leaning against Brian through the pain was actually kind of boring. I wanted something to happen. I suppose I hoped she'd tell me I was fully dilated and that I was going to have a baby any second now.

Instead she told me I'd progressed one centimeter.

She offered to break my water for me, telling me that that sometimes would make things progress more quickly. I declined, not wanting to have any unnecessary interventions. I went back to sitting on the edge of the bed between contractions and experimented with different positions to get me through them. I tried listening to music, but several songs into the playlist I'd made of relaxing music, I gave up. I liked the music between contractions, but during I found that it distracted me from focusing on the contractions when they hit. I put the iPod aside and just perched on the edge of the bed, standing and hanging on Brian during each contraction. Half an hour of that and I asked that Sheri break the bag of waters. I wanted things to progress, and again, it just seemed like something to do.

Around two o'clock, I started wondering how long labor would go on (which strikes me as funny in retrospect, given how short the labor had been compared to my experience with Adriana) and was back to considering whether I could actually manage labor without an epidural, Sheri checked me again. I was dilated to nine centimeters and feeling the urge to push. She told me I could bear down a bit with contractions to see what happened.

For the next two hours, I pushed with contractions. It was harder work and I already felt tired, but it also was exciting and a bit energizing. My memory of those two hours is hazy and scrambled. I know I was surprised to find that, as much as it was a relief to feel that something was actually happening, time was also moving more slowly: sure that I had been pushing for an hour, I looked at the clock and discovered it had only been ten minutes. I know Eva and Sheri were having me move around to try different things. I knelt on the bed and leaned against Brian, and then the back of bed was raised up so that I could lean face-first into it, and I tried that, as well as the hands-and-knees position I had already tried laboring in. Finally, Sheri had me try sitting and leaning against the back of the bed. I resisted, but she and Eva seemed to think that this would help, and I did what they suggested. I know that at one point someone confirmed that the baby was posterior, but that later on they said they could see her turning. And I know that at some point I became very noisy, basically yelling my way through contractions. I felt a little silly when I was resting, but then another contraction would come and I was grit my teeth and yell through it. And then, as many of the contractions ended, I would protest that I couldn't do it. Brian, Eva, and Sheri would tell me that I could, and sometimes that informed me that I not only could I do it, I was doing it already. I still hadn't full dilated, but Sheri was holding my cervix back, which also helped me focus my pushing.

Soon they were telling me that they could see the baby, that her head was "right there." "She's right there," Sheri kept promising me. Eva looked and assured me that this was true. But then it went on and on. Finally I gave up listening to them when they told me so. But there came a point when someone told me the baby was almost there, and I started to say that they'd been telling me that for well over an hour when Brian interrupted me.

"A bunch of people just came into the room," he told me. Until then we'd been attended just by the midwife and the same nurse with her obnoxious fetal monitor (she didn't try strapping it to me again, but would periodically use it to listen to the baby's heartrate). But suddenly there were half a dozen more people in the room, and we began to realize that now they were serious. I felt myself become self-conscious for a moment, but contractions and pushing left room for no other thoughts in my mind, and soon I was able to tune out the fact that they were there, focusing just on the sound of Eva's voice.

Eva was the one coaching me through the last stages. "Don't yell with the next contraction," she ordered me at last. "I want you to put all your energy into pushing, not yelling." And she had me grab onto my knees and pull them toward me as I pushed, and not yelling seemed like the hardest thing ever. She told me I was doing great and to do the exact same thing for the next contraction.

"I can't," I told her. "It's too hard. I can't do this anymore." I was exhausted and the burning feeling that came from all the pushing seemed like too much.

"You can," she assured me, with Brian echoing her. And then she told me. "You are going to pull on your knees and not yell, and I'm going to count to ten and you are going to push the entire time I am counting." At that moment I wasn't thinking about the fact that I had told her when we first met with her about hiring her as my doula that I probably needed someone to boss me around during labor, but looking back it seems as though I was right, and that she was good at doing exactly that. Because when the contraction came a moment later, I pulled my knees and didn't yell, and pushed as I listened to her count to ten.

"She's right there," Eva said again.

"She's not, she's not," I said. "This is too hard. It's taking too long." But another contraction came, and Eva counted, and I pushed. And then I rested for a moment and protested again.

Everyone reassured me again that I could do this, and someone asked if the baby had a name. I hesitated, not sure if we should tell anyone before she was born, but Brian told them, and several people in the room were saying "Lyra!" as I pushed with the next contraction, and then something changed and the burning feeling was gone and Sheri was telling me that I could reach down and feel the baby's head.

I don't remember pushing any more after that, but a moment or two later, Sheri was lifting a wet little Lyra onto my belly, and my hands were on her and I was holding onto my own little baby.

I was in such a haze, then. I didn't hurt anymore and I had a baby, and I felt so good.

Brian got to cut the cord, and I heard someone saying that the baby had been born at 3:57. I was given an injection of Pitocin to help deliver the placenta. I asked to see the placenta, and Sheri asked me if I wanted to keep it, and I told her happily that I was not that much of a hippie. But then it's even more of a blur than the end of the labor. We were covered in towels and blankets while I marveled at how tiny Lyra seemed, and someone laughed and said that she was a big baby, and Eva told me that yes, she was small compared to Adriana, but she was not a tiny baby by any means. Everyone in the room was guessing that she was at least eight pounds, and when they finally took her from me to weigh her and she was eight pounds one ounce. I had some second-degree tears, and Sheri stitched those up while I chatted with her and Eva (and asked if I could go home soon), and Brian stayed close to Lyra while she was examined in the corner of the room. I felt exhilarated and almost drunk--I couldn't stop talking and I kept asking to hold the baby again and apologizing for all my yelling and wondering when we could go home. (The answer to the last one was that I probably could go home that evening if I wanted to, but it was a much better idea to stay the night and get some rest, and they would discharge us first thing in the morning.) I kept asking to have the heplock removed and was told that it needed to stay in until later that night, in case I hemorrhaged and needed blood; I assured them I had no intention of hemorrhaging this time around, but that was disregarded. Eva got me drinks and snacks, and I realized how thirsty I was. The baby was cleaned up a bit and then wrapped up tightly and we had a chance to nurse. More and more people cleared out of the room, and I asked Brian for his phone, so I could call our parents. The nurse who had come in to give Lyra a more thorough bath knew exactly where we'd gotten the name, which I thought was nice, even as I wondered whether my baby needed to be scrubbed so thoroughly right then.

About two hours after the birth, I was seated in wheelchair and Lyra was placed in my arms and we were wheeled up to the maternity ward. Brian went with the baby while the pediatrician in the nursery examined her, and a couple of nurses got me settled, while I explained that I needed food and to have my heplock removed. And finally it was just Brian and Lyra and me in the little hospital room, all settling in for the night, and everything seemed so easy.

Me, Lyra, and that awful heplock.

Happy Valentine's Day

And, for comparison's sake, here is Adriana 0n her first Valentine's Day:

One month (and a few days, because honestly, I have TWO now--nothing happens on time)

Coming home with a new baby a month ago seems so far away. Was it only a month? Really? But then again, I can't believe it's been a month already. Lyra seems so big already, so much sturdier. We all seem to be getting used to having her here. We are finding a sort of a rhythm--albeit a chaotic one--as a family of four, and it's hard to remember exactly how things worked before she was here.

In some ways, she is very much like Adriana. I suppose all newborns are mostly alike--they sleep, they eat, they poop. Lyra looks looks like Adriana did as a baby, with chubby cheeks and her head of wild, dark hair. Like Adriana, she's happiest when she's being held snug and upright, close to us in a pouch or wrap. She doesn't seem to be as big a fan of being swaddled as so many newborns I know. If we swaddle her up in a blanket, she usually fights her way out of it quickly and then calms down. And like Adriana she so far seems to refuse to be very regular in her eating and sleeping patterns. But there are differences, too: Adriana screamed about baths for at least the first month (enough to traumatize Brian enough that after the first few baths, he didn't give her another for a good year and a half). We put a fussy Lyra in the tub when she was a week old or so, and remembered that my friend Lyndelle had suggested making Adriana more warm and secure in the bath by putting a washcloth over her body. I did that and Lyra instantly calmed down, but I think it was just being in the water that was calming for her. Now popping her in the tub is the quickest way to make her a happy baby. She waves her arms and legs around while I pour water over her, and just generally seems content.

She is spending more time awake now, and she seems unhappy about it. I had forgotten how much new babies sleep, and spent the first couple of weeks wishing Lyra would wake up more so that I could see her eyes and maybe interact with her a bit. But now that it's happened, I'm unsure what I was thinking. Interact? She doesn't do much when she's awake. And when she is awake she's mostly fussing for something. Still, we do get to spend some time playing with her little hands and feet and tickling her cheeks and chin to get her to make funny faces.

She is growing well. She has been a good nurser from the beginning, but I was still anxious about her weight gain, so I put her on the scale when she was two weeks old, since we were at the pediatrician's office for Adriana's three-year check-up. At that point a baby should have regained her birthweight, and since that was all I was really hoping for, I was pleased to see that she was 12 ounces over. She still seems like a little baby to me, having been born three inches shorter and almost two pounds lighter than her sister, but Lyra is finally filling out the clothes that fit Adriana at birth. And I can already see her emerging from what a friend called "the potato stage:" she tries to hold up her head (and is sometimes successful; she gives little smiles that at this point I think are real; and I watched her eyes track the cat all the way around the edge of the cosleeper last night--all little things, but things that weren't happening a month ago. Then I watch Adriana jump off the couch and give me my line in the game she wants me to play with her and it's so strange to remember that she was a little lump like this once, too, and to imagine Lyra in a few years as an active, creative little girl. I'm looking forward to that day, but for now I'm mostly enjoying this feeling of having a newborn again. This time I am so aware that it's not going to last long.

Three

Sunlight and singing

Lyra Noelle

January 2, 2010

3:57 PM

8 pounds, 1 ounce

19 inches

i love you much(most beautiful darling)

more than anyone on the earth and i

like you better than everything in the sky

--sunlight and singing welcome your coming

although winter may be everywhere

with such a silence and such a darkness

noone can quite begin to guess

(except my life)the true time of year--

and if what calls itself a world should have

the luck to hear such singing(or glimpse such

sunlight as will leap higher than high

through gayer than gayest someone's heart at your each

nearerness)everyone certainly would(my

most beautiful darling)believe in nothing but love

-e.e. cummings

Blog? What blog?

Since it's been three months since I last managed to post something, I thought I'd hand over the story telling to Adriana. I've been trying to transcribe some of her stories as she tells them to me (when she'll let me get away with it), and this is one of my favorites of the ones I've gotten so far.

Once upon a time Adriana and Douglas and Sam and Elena and Matilda and Jacob all ride on their bikes to Eagle Park. And they go on ladders and slides. And then they dig in sand. And Adriana has red shovel and Matilda has yellow shovel and Sam has blue shovel and Elena has purple shovel and Jacob has black shovel and Douglas has pink shovel. And they dig big hole and make big tunnel. And then climb down tunnel. And at bottom tunnel there cave. And in cave there little monkey. Little like hummingbird. Little blue monkey. So little. And monkey want us paint cave. So we paint pictures on walls. Butterflies and balloons and elephants. And we paint those things on walls. And then little monkey give us mangoes. And we eat mangoes and then we climb out tunnel and find all the moms. And moms give us pizza and bath and then we go to bed. The end.

All fall down

Last night at 9:30, when all the other two-year-olds we know had probably been in bed for sometime, Adriana was still running around naked after her bath. All day long she'd been practicing a little stunt from her gymnastics class, and I was trying to get her to demonstrate for Brian. She never really did, but we learned two important things about her philosophy of falling:

1. Brian warned her, "You'll fall on your head." She explained to him, "No fall on head, daddy. Fall on bottom. Fall on head hurt."
2. Somehow she ended up standing on his hand, playing a game they were making up on the spot. She would jump off, and he would lift his hand just as she did, getting her a little further into the air than she would on her own. She would fall (onto her bottom!) and giggle and do it again. At last she did it and landed on her feet. We applauded her, and she said, "Ana no fall. Ana do one more time and fall." And this time she made sure to fall. It's more fun that way, you know.

I'm sure our downstairs neighbors just love us.

Not so sly

Upon hearing Brian turn on the bath, Adriana shrieked, "No take bath! I hide." She had been sitting with me on my (unmade) bed, and she pulled the sheet over her face and laid down, leaving her hair and hands sticking out. When Brian came in and saw what she was doing, he asked loudly, "Where's Adriana?"

She popped out from her hiding place. "Here I am! Peek-a-boo!"

Monologue

From the backseat of the car:

"Baby no walk. Baby no talk. I help give baby bath. Dry baby off. Comb baby hair. Baby wear PJs. Baby have mom-milk. Ana gentle with baby. Give baby kiss. Want baby NOW."

It's going to be a long six or seven months, but at least Adriana seems excited about getting a sibling.

Dat word

One afternoon, Adriana and I sat in front of the fan, reading stories and trying to stay cool. When we finished one book, I was feeling silly, so I scooped her up into a big squeeze and gave her a noisy kiss on the cheek. "Smoochies!" I said to her.

She pulled away and looked at me. "Mom! Day dat word 'gain."

"What word? Smoochies?" I gave her another kiss, and she giggled.

"I wike dat word." And she pushed her face against mine. "Moo-mies!"

First memories

When Adriana first brought me the picture of her friend Sam and asked for a story, I was surprised by how much she remembered about last Christmas. I told her about all the children visiting Santa, and she obviously remembered not wanting to be left alone on his lap. And then she told me that Santa brought her a stroller for her baby doll, and that after Christmas, daddy threw the tree off the balcony (better than tracking needles all through the apartment when dragging it out the front door). I was surprised that she remembered so much, but it's obvious that certain things make strong impressions. Brian and I talk sometimes about what will be Adriana's first memory, and it's tempting to think that these fun memories she has of Christmas will be the ones that stick.

Recently we had a borrowed alphabet book that had a picture of an x-ray for the letter X. We read the book over and over, but after a few days, she stopped me from turning to the next page. She studied the picture and said, "Ana get x-ray."

"You did have an x-ray. Do you remember that?" It had been a couple of months since that had happened, and she hadn't mentioned it since, so I was surprised to hear her say something about it.

"Ana sit on table," she reminded me. And then her voice turned worried as she turned to face me, reaching out to grab my arm. "Mom stay with Ana."

I told her that she had been a big girl, and yes, I had stayed right with her the whole time. And I reminded her, just as I had at the time, that Curious George had had an x-ray too. She nodded and let me go on with the book, but as long as we had that book, we had the same conversation whenever we reached that page, and sometimes she would bring me the book just so we could look at that one letter together.

Then we returned the book, and we didn't talk about the x-ray anymore until this past week, when she wanted to read Curious George Goes to the Hospital. We reached the part of the story in which George is getting the x-ray. The man with the yellow hat was given a yellow lead apron to wear, and at that point Adriana said, "Mom wear blue one." She was right. I was given a blue one when she had her x-ray. I was amazed that she remembered that little detail, but it had clearly been an important event, even though she was so good and calm and seemed totally unfazed by it as the time. We went through the conversation about the fact that I didn't leave her several times, and I did my best to reassure her, as she seemed so worried. Later that day when she wanted to read the story again, though, she didn't comment at all on the x-ray. I hoped that she'd gotten the worry out of her system, but on Thursday when an unexplained limp she'd had over the weekend returned, I began to worry. Everything looked fine, but her limp was so noticeable and she was complaining that her leg hurt, so I was leaning toward taking her to the doctor to have her take a look. But I worried that even though I was certain it wasn't broken, the doctor would want to do an x-ray to make sure, and it would be more traumatic this time because this time she would be healthy enough to panic.

Luckily the doctor quickly realized that the pain and stiffness were in Adriana's hip and diagnosed her with toxic synovitis--some inflammation in the hip probably caused by a virus. No x-ray was necessary, and we were sent on our way with instructions to give her some Motrin if it seemed to be bothering her.

But then I ran into another one of Adriana's memories, but this one didn't surprise me at all. On Sunday I had given her some Motrin to help with the pain, and when she didn't want to take it, I promised her that she could watch Elmo on YouTube afterwards. When we got home from the doctor's office, I told Adriana she could have some Motrin for her leg, and she agreed. But as I came towards her with the medicine, she took a step back, and said "Elmo" in a very firm voice, making sure I knew exactly what would come next.

29 months

It's like we have an honest-to-goodness little person around here. I mean, Adriana's only three feet tall and can't quite break 27 pounds, but the way she interacts with us, with the world, seems every day less babyish, less, toddlerish, almost more like a real kid.

Her vocabulary continues to grow, and her pronunciation is improving to the point that people other than her parents can understand her. She is shy at first with most people, but eventually she warms up and it's hard to stop her from talking. S sounds and K sounds still come out as Ds, Ls are replaced with Ws or Ys, and R is pretty much non-existent. She still often tries to use only one syllable for some words--"baby" is just "bee"--but she is attempting longer words. I am charmed by her pronunciation most of the time: "chey-ees" for cherries, "eh-deent" for elephant, and "wah-mey-on" for watermelon. I've been trying to get her to say her whole name, and she'll repeat it after me, syllable by syllable, but then when I ask her to say her whole name she grins and says "Ana Roof!" She does continue to sign a bit, but usually only for emphasis or when she thinks we don't understand what she is saying (I wasn't home one evening and when whining for Mom over and over didn't work, she tried signing it, to make sure Brian really understood what she was asking for). I do occasionally ask her to sign when I don't understand what she is saying, and even if it's not a sign we've used before, she'll attempt it. Sometimes that's useful, as when I didn't understand that she was saying "telephone" and she held a hand up to her ear. But sometimes she just wiggles both hands around in front of her and grins at me.

She is also starting to sing. She's always liked to listen to music and be sung to, but she has never attempting to sing along, either with me or with a recording. But about a month ago she started requesting particular songs more often, and while she still doesn't sing along with me, she does sometimes just begin singing on her own. Usually she just picks one or two lines of the song and belts them out at full volume with little attention to tune (she does have good rhythm, though). She also fills in lines to songs, so that whenever we sing her current favorite, "Little Red Wagon," she likes to pick who fixes the wagon and with what tool. Or food. That wagon gets fixed with a lot of french fries and ice cream, although maybe that's because her knowledge of tools is limited. After hammer, wrench, and duct tape have been used, it's clearly time to try something more creative. Along with the singing comes dancing, which she's always done a certain amount of, but now she makes up little dances to go up with little songs that she makes up. "Happy food dance! Happy food dance!" she sings, as she stands on her step stool to eat a meal (which she prefers to sitting in a chair, and I don't think it's worth a fight), bopping from side to side. Or she stands in the kitchen, bouncing up and down, making her sign for noodles with both hands and singing "Noo-oo, noo-oo, noo-oo," as I make ravioli for lunch. After using the potty at her friend Jacob's house the other day, he taught her the potty dance, and soon both of them were scampering their feet and punching the air with their fists, chanting "Adriana go potty!" over and over and over.

Her sleep and eating have improved immensely lately, much to Brian's and my relief. I think the eating in in part a growth spurt, and in part the fact that I have pushed her a little bit towards weaning, and that the sleep has improved as a result. I was tired of being asked to nurse for a few minutes every hour, especially in the afternoons, so one day when she asked, I told her that she could nurse this once, but after that, no more until bedtime. She accepted this deal, and when she asked a little later for some more and I reminded her of our bargain, she nodded and didn't ask again. Suddenly our pattern was nursing when she woke up in the morning, once more between that time and nap, and then again at nap. The same pattern followed in the afternoons, with wake-up and bedtime nursings, and one in between. And then she dropped the mid-morning nursing on her own within a week. The mid-afternoon one is still there a few times a week. I realized that while our mornings are pretty busy, with gymnastics and school and whatnot, in the afternoons I am busy tidying the house a bit and fixing dinner, and Adriana was often asking to nurse in order to get my attention. Once I started including her more in what I was doing, instead of trying to get her to play by herself, she stopped asking nearly as much. I do think she was getting a fair share of her calories from milk, because the weaning coincided with a much greater food intake--she eats three full meals every day now, plus snacks. And as a result, she wakes only once most nights now, usually sleeping from nine to four, and then going back to sleep until seven or eight. At first this seemed to limit her napping, but now she is back to regularly sleeping for at least any hour in the early afternoon, which is a relief. We can get her to bed earlier if she doesn't nap, but I'd rather have the break during the day while Brian's at work.

One of Adriana's favorite activities now is cooking. Now she helps cook dinner most nights, pulling her step stool into the kitchen to observe what I'm doing. I measure out rice and water, and she pours them into the rice cooker and then pushes the button to turn it on. As I cut up vegetables, I push the stems and peels aside, and she moves them into the trash for me. She picks the leaves of the herbs off of their stems so that I can mince them. She takes a turn mixing ingredients or whisking eggs, and I guide her hand as she grates cheese. She seems to feel proud when she helps, and when she isn't eating at dinner, just reminding her that it's something she helped prepare makes her more willing to eat a bit more. She loves to have treats--french fries, cake, and ice cream are favorites--but for the most part she is a very healthy eater. She eats lots of vegetables--chard, eggplant, asparagus, zucchini, and bell peppers are gobbled up, but I think she would live on blueberries and cherries if I would let her. She already has broader tastes than I have, though; she has lost her willingness to eat spicy foods, but she does go for mushrooms, olives, and goat cheese--three foods that I have never been able to develop a taste for.

Adriana's imagination has just exploded in the past few weeks. She plays games of pretending, informing me that I am a baby, and she gives me a bath, puts me in pajamas, and tucks me into bed. Or, when she catches me reading on the couch, she wraps a throw around my waist, tells me I am a bird and she is a mom bird, and flies off to get me some bugs to eat. She began bring us a pictures of one of the little girls from play group and asking us to "Read Sam," so we would tell her stories about her adventures with Samantha. First I started with true stories: the picture was taken the day some of us took the kids to the Stanford Shopping Center to see Santa, so I told Adriana about all the children waiting to see Santa, playing ring-around-the-rosy together, and eating lunch at the Peninsula Creamery. Soon, though, the picture was a jumping off point for any number of adventures, with Adriana providing most of the details. "Once upon a time, there were two little girls, named--" I say, and she shouts "Ana and Sam!" and so it begins. "One day, Sam and Adriana decided to," I continue and pause, waiting. And Adriana picks whether the two girls go to the park or the beach, and continues to fill in details from there. They often climb trees and ride their bikes, and french fries and cupcakes make frequent appearances in the stories. In one of my favorites, the first one where Adriana totally took over the story and filled in all the details, she and Sam rode their bikes to the park where they climbed a tree. They climbed and climbed, and when they got hungry they ate apples in the tree. Finally they climbed so high they had reached the moon. My friend Mark was there, living in a sand castle, and he gave the girls french fries and ketchup, and then made a vanilla milkshake for them to take home to their moms. They flew home in a blue rocket. Sometimes I do try to take control of the story. Adriana began one recently in which she and several of her friends were digging a hole at the park and it was so deep they fell in when they tried to make it bigger. I took over, sending the children on an adventure through the tunnels until they reached a gigantic tropical cavern. I described birds and flowers and waterfalls, and a gigantic, ferocious looking beast that was playing a sweet melody on a flute, and just when I had another one of these beasts enter, Adriana decided she'd had enough. "The children turned when they heard a noise, and they saw another one of the beasts coming toward them," I said, and she interjected. "With plate of cupcakes!" Which wasn't exactly where I was going with the story, no, but who am I to argue?

Little Baby's Santa Cruz Adventure

The thing about doulas is they are right and you should do what they tell you to do. Even when you had your baby almost two and a half years ago. When I wrote about Adriana's favorite doll last month, our doula, Pam, commented on the post, telling me to have a spare or two. But did I listen to her? Of course not.

On Saturday we went to Santa Cruz for the day. We ate at Walnut Avenue Cafe, walked around downtown, rode the carousel, played on the beach, and stuffed ourselves with sweets. It wasn't until we were getting in the car at the end of the day that I noticed that Little Baby was no longer with us. We hadn't taken the doll to the Boardwalk or the beach, so I assumed that it been left in the restaurant that morning, and since the restaurant was closed, I figured I had no choice but to head home and call in the morning to see if they had it. I worried about it all the way home, rolling my eyes at Brian when he asked, "Am I a jerk because I don't think this is such a big deal?"

After a bath and a story, I laid down with Adriana to nurse her to sleep and she asked, suddenly, "Little Baby?" (Well, more like "Yih bee?")

"Little Baby decided to stay in Santa Cruz and play a little more. She wanted more pancakes, and to ride on the merry-go-round some more. She'll be home in a couple of days," I lied, without even thinking about it. I watched Adriana's face crumple and she reached toward me for a hug. "Little Baby," she wailed in my arms. It was funny to realize that for the most part she cries because she is angry, frustrated, or hurt. When she cried out of sadness it was a very different thing. I assured her over and over again that Little Baby was having a grand time in Santa Cruz, and finally Adriana settled down to nurse.

It was when we were lying there in bed that I realized that I had seen the baby after brunch: we had walked down to the end of Pacific Avenue to show Adriana how to whisper at the Parabola. She had set Little Baby down on the bench there while we were playing. Since we'd gone from there to the car to head to the Boardwalk, that was where the doll had to be.


Last known sighting of Little Baby.

As soon as Adriana was asleep, I was on the phone to the Jamba Juice right there by the bench. A young man told me that no one had brought the doll into the store, and then he humored me by going out to check, but the doll was no longer there. I gave Lulu Carpenter's a quick call too, but no one had brought the doll inside there, either.

What was I to do? C'mon, I clearly had only one choice: I went online and ordered an identical doll and checked the box for two-day shipping.

For the next couple of days, Adriana would ask for Little Baby, and we would tell her stories about what her doll was doing: eating more mouse-shaped pancakes at Walnut Avenue; riding the carousel at the Boardwalk, eating ice cream and candy at Marini's, and building (and stomping on) sand castles at the beach. "She'll be home in a few days," we promised. Soon Adriana was telling us about what Little Baby was doing.

When we got home from our playdate on Wednesday afternoon, there was a small box in front of the door. Adriana ignored it and went inside to play. I slyly opened it in the kitchen, put the doll back out on the doormat, and then knocked loudly on the door. Adriana came with me to see who it was, and when I opened the door she cried, "Little Baby!" She grabbed the doll, and carried her into the house with glee. She sat on the floor to study the doll, which is when I noticed that this doll's eyes were blue instead of brown. Adriana didn't seem to care though; she was just pleased that the baby had found a new hat while she was on her adventures, since her old one had been lost months ago.

We went out to dinner that night, and Little Baby came along with us, although I was nervous the whole time that she'd get lost again. But Adriana was so glad to have her lovey back, that I couldn't say no, especially when she kept saying, "My Little Baby come back!" She was so happy , and I was so pleased that I had pulled it off, that she thought this was really her favorite doll, back after a little adventure in Santa Cruz.

After she'd had her bath and we'd read a couple of books that night, we settled into her bed.

"Want my new little baby," she told me, searching for her doll among the blankets. Maybe I'm not as sly as I thought.

Spring break

Looks like somebody wasn't ready to get up after all.

Good thing it's spring break and I could let her sleep in.

27 months

I remember reading somewhere that the period from 18 to 22 months was a challenging age. That was reassuring to me at the time: I wasn't the only one struggling with how to parent my child at that age, and there was a light at the end of the tunnel. And it really was true. Around the time Adriana reached 22 months, things did seem remarkably easier. I feel that in the past few weeks we've reached another challenging age, and I am starting to wonder if these things go in four-month cycles. There are more days lately when I feel my patience wearing thin. I wonder if it's just me--am I not eating right, not getting enough sleep--or if it's something about Adriana. It's probably a little of both, although I think there's more of the latter. She's testing limits right now, and getting frustrated with them. She pours a cup of water on me--because she wants to see what will happen, because it might be funny, because she can--and then throws a tantrum when I refuse to give her the cup back. She puts on her shoes when I ask her to do so, and then kicks them off as we are about to head out the door, smiling her most charming smile as I grit my teeth because we needed to leave five minutes ago. They are nearly all just little things, but over the course of a day they start to add up and by Friday afternoons I am usually watching the clock, counting down until Brian gets home. 

It's a good thing she's cute and clever to make up for her shenanigans. She gives me a tight-lipped smile, sticking out her chin, when she knows she's been mischievous. She bounces and moves from side to side very solemnly when we ask her to dance. She throws kisses to people when she says goodbye. She knows nearly all of her letters (X is usually confused for a K), and shouts them out when she sees them. She surprised me by spelling out "Petsmart," reading the letters on the big sign out from the of store, although she did call attention to the 'A' several times as she went along--it is her letter after all. She recognizes numbers and will point to the one you ask her to, but she doesn't label them the way she does letters, instead just pointing them out as "number" when she sees them. 

She talks constantly. It's not exactly that I wish she would stop talking, although the thought has crossed my mind when I've heard, "Mom, now!" a few too many times in one afternoon. Even though she likes to have what she says repeated back to her, she is usually content to babble to herself, and that's what she does as she rides on the back of my bike or in the car, and when she is drawing or playing with blocks on her own. She labels everything--"blue car, white car, purple truck," she says as we walk through a parking lot--but she is also really beginning to speak in sentences now, more than just the three- or four-word commands she's become an expert on. "I put my new shoes on my feet," she told me a couple of weeks ago, and when I looked she had indeed put her new sneakers on. Each word is it's own exclamation, so instead of a natural sounding sentence, there's a very staccato feeling, but she is very excited to be telling me everything, so it is fun.

I've been particularly interested lately in watching her friendships develop. At this age they are mostly too young for anything beyond parallel play and fighting over toys, but she does take an interest in what the other children in playgroup are doing. And they do interact beyond the little squabbles: she runs to greet her friend Samantha with a hug when she spots her at the park, and when her friend Douglas comes over to play they go straight for her bed, where the alternate between jumping and snuggling down to pretend they are sleeping. 

She seems so grown up these days. Part of it is that she's just getting big. Her pants all seem a little too short, and she outgrew her shoes rather suddenly a few weeks ago. She fell asleep in the car on the way home one day recently, and as I carried her snoring up the stairs, I realized that even with her head resting on my shoulder her feet were dangling all the way to my knees. But it's also her personality. She remembers more things, and talks to me about the things we've done. She gets herself out of bed after her nap a lot of the time, instead of crying for me. There are times I miss having her as a baby, but this imaginative, funny little girl is a pretty good replacement.

Lovey

Adriana has two baby dolls. One is about ten-inches long, and has a plastic (but phthalate free!) head and limbs and a soft body. The other is completely soft, with a stitched on face. When I bought that doll at Christmastime, I thought it would be a nice toy for Adriana to snuggle with, since it was so soft. But the first baby is by far the favorite. She does like the second baby--its shirt and diaper are easily removed, so it is good for really playing mommy. But Adriana is nearly as content to mime a diaper and outfit change with the doll she calls Little Baby. I think soft face that so enamored me is actually what turns Adriana off. She has definitely shown a preference for dolls that look more like real babies; at the little school we go to, she shuns the Cabbage Patch Kids and dolls that look like older children in favor of the dolls with baby faces. Plus, its smaller size makes it perfect for cradling in her arms to pretend to nurse, or to have tied to her with the scarf that she likes to pretend is her own little Moby wrap. And so it has become Adriana's constant companion.

I did try to encourage a "lovey" at one point, maybe about a year ago, offering Adriana a stuffed monkey that a friend had given me in college. Adriana does adore the monkey, and he has been a favorite at times. But she has never been attached to him the way she is attached to Little Baby. The doll comes to the grocery store and the farmers' market, to the doctor's office and to friends' houses. It has played hide-and-seek in Dolores Park and listened to stories at the Red Rock story hour. When we get into bed at night or naptime, Adriana makes sure she has Little Baby, and she holds the doll to her chest for milk as she rolls towards me to nurse. In the night when she wakes up, she sits up and finds Little Baby again before settling back down to sleep. It's sweet to peek in at her and see her sound asleep with her doll clutched tightly in her arms. 

I do live in a bit of fear of losing Little Baby. When we're out and about with the doll, I constantly check to make sure Adriana still has it in her arms or that it is peeking out of the pocket on the diaper bag. It has become a family joke to place the blame for missing items on the cat, and Adriana accepts this for a lot of things, but I think if Little Baby were to disappear, there would be trouble.

Diaper bag packing FAIL

As we were leaving the farmers' market, Adriana announced that she had a dirty diaper. I knew I had exactly one baby wipe in the diaper bag and that I would have to be efficient, but when we got back to the car it seemed her announcement had been premature. Still, she was a bit wet, so I put a fresh diaper on her and we went on our way to the park. But as we were leaving there, she made her announcement again, and this time it was clear that she meant it. There weren't any families we knew at the park, but I headed over to one group of moms and explained my situation, and they laughed and one gave me a few wipes. And then we headed over to the restaurant for lunch so I could use the changing table there. And so I was standing there in the restroom with Adriana on the table when I discovered that the diaper I'd put on her at the car had been the last one in the diaper bag. Hedging my bets, I put Adriana's pants back on her and headed back out to the table outside where Brian and his parents were waiting for us. I explained what had happened and we all laughed, and Brian headed up to Longs to buy a pack of diapers. 

Everything was fine until Adriana announced, "Pee." 

"Should I take you to the potty inside?" I asked her.

But then the expression on her face changed. "Pee," she said with more urgency. And then my father-in-law pointed out the growing puddle beneath Adriana's chair.

Honestly, I think these were the kind of mistakes I was supposed to make when she was a few weeks old. Shouldn't I know to check what I have in my bag before leaving the house by now?

Guess what she hears me say a lot

Whenever we read The Runaway Bunny, Adriana points out the mom and the baby on each page. She'll make other comments about some of the pictures, too, but those vary from day to day. Except for the picture that shows the mother bunny as a mountain climber, climbing to her little bunny who has become a rock high above her; when we reach that page, Adriana tells me the same thing every time:

"Baby," she points. "Mom. Baby! Get down!"

I guess she knows what happens when babies climb up too high. And I suppose I should be glad I only have to pluck her off of the kitchen table and the back of the couch, and occasionally climb up a tall play structure at the park when my baby is making me nervous. 

There are certain things I look forward to when it comes to Adriana growing up. For instance, I'm excited about her new interest in toilet training, and it will be nice when I don't have to have an eagle eye on her as she climbs things at the park. But it will be a sad, sad day when she figures out that simply because she runs to a tree and turns her back to me, she is not actually hidden. 

Portrait of the artist

Adriana loves to draw. The MagnaDoodle I bought last fall for a long car trip was a fantastic investment, and crayons and paper can occupy her for a long time--she often sits in the kitchen and draws while I fix dinner in the evenings, and when we flew to Florida last month, she spent more time drawing on the flights (and in restaurants and in her great-grandfather's house) than pretty much anything else.

She'll bring one of us her MagnaDoodle, or hand us a crayon when we're sitting with her while she draws, and ask for a picture of a flower, a monkey, or herself. Brian and I are not exactly artists, but our skills are enough to impress a two-year-old. But I found it frustrating to constantly get these requests. Even if we were sitting together, and I wasn't using the crayons to occupy her so I could get something else done, I wanted her to be the one drawing. Who cares if she can't draw a cat? She can scribble, right? So I draw her the giraffe she asks for and tell her to put on the stripes, or make the main part of the requested 'A' and she can put the line through the middle. But then she is back, asking me to draw a picture of her in her flower shirt holding her baby doll, or a monkey holding a balloon in a tree. 

Now I think all that watching was good for her. On Saturday night, Brian's parents babysat while he and I went out to dinner. When we got home and were sitting around talking, Adriana got out her MagnaDoodle and began to draw. er scribbles have changed a great deal over the past few months. Instead of covering a piece of paper in one color, she changes color often (making sure to tell me with each change what color she is using). She went from short little marks to longer scribbles to very specific little "designs"--she makes rows and one-inch high scribbles, for instance. But now we were seeing another change. She carefully used the "pen" to make a potato shape and drew a lot of lines coming out from it. Then she erased it and as she started again, I asked her what she was drawing. "Ana," she said. And there was the potato shape again. She drew two squiggly lines out from the side. "Arms," she told us and then "Wegs," when I asked her about the two squiggly lines that came from the bottom. The two lop-sided circles inside the top of the potato were eyes, of course. And then she made a similar, smaller drawing right beside her--her baby, she told us. 

It's such a funny little milestone, and yet it was the one I've gotten most excited about in a while. Putting on her own socks and shoes is quite nice, but this, to me, showed more than just an improvement in her coordination. It somehow made her seem more grown up, in spite of her footed pajamas.