Rebirth

I've been going through a sort of rebirth as a Christian, wife, mother, and woman in general over the last few months...

I downloaded an app on my phone "Daily Bible". It gives me a daily verse, and an option for reading through the Bible plan. I've enjoyed taking a few minutes before the house wakes up to read, pray, and meditate on the Word.

LJ and I purchased three books last night and at least I am chomping at the bit waiting for them to come in the mail. Two topical studies (one on parenting and one on couples), and a book going through history and geography of the Bible. The big question: where do we start?!

I've never been a "good" homemaker. I knit, sew, etc. etc., but I am a lousy housekeeper. I am kicking my own bottom (we've had to stop saying "butt" in the house) into gear using "Large Family Logistics" as a resource. Slowly but surely I am getting into a stricter routine of housekeeping, homemaking, and getting everything presentable. I'm cutting down on clutter. My mom will be coming over to help me get rid of all of the kids' baby clothes that I've held on to for years. Many I've already gotten rid of, but some I have held on to for nostalgia or some meager hope of a future fourth. While I know that will never happen biologically (unless God intervenes), it may not even happen through adoption. My three are fine with me though, and I need to cut the clutter out of my life.

I'm taking more time to read to the kids. I homeschool Arianna (and occasionally let Jonas and Josiah sit in on it too until they get bored), and usually I let LJ read each unit's book. I'm starting to get into a habit of reading more to the kids. More Bible than the homeschool Bible time and our family Bible time. More books casually read than with Daddy. I want to be that mom. I want my kids to remember me reading to them.

I've also dug my "crunchiness" a little deeper. Before our trip to Colorado (see Help For Arianna for more info on that) I purchased some herbal books. I have fallen in love more and more with herbalism and herbal healing. God has given us a beautiful world, and we have natural gifts that He has given us that can work amazingly with our body systems to mend bones, heal disease, and improve our quality of life. I have used several herbal remedies and plan to do more. I have joined the "nopoo" movement as of tonight. I will write more on that soon too! I have seen an improvement in my chronic pain issues with the use of more herbal remedies as well as removing toxic chemicals from items I use in my daily life.

So it's a new me. More natural, less clutter, more devoted to God, my husband, my family, and myself than ever before.

Adventures in Co-Sleeping Volume I

I love co-sleeping. I'd say 95% of the time it helps us get more sleep. We have an open door policy at our house. If Mommy and Daddy's door is open, the kids are welcome to come into the bedroom. Often I've opened the door as we're getting ready for bed (we usually watch TV/play xbox in the bedroom at night) and Jonas will be there, pillow in hand.

Like I said, 95% of the time we get more sleep. They come in, slide in bed next to us, and fall asleep.

Then there's the 5%. Last night was the 5%.

So, around 4-5AM, I was nursing Josiah who had woken up. I was about to fall asleep when Arianna comes in the room. She insists on laying next to Mommy. So, she gets halfway on the crib and our mattress and starts to go to sleep. Then enter Jonas. He wasn't happy that his sister had taken the spot on the crib. That was HIS spot, and he made sure everyone knew. So, I scooted her over more on the mattress, and he snatched the crib's blanket and laid down. Which, naturally, caused her to melt down because she then was left without a blanket. Does she want the big comforter that Mommy and Daddy were sharing? No, no she does not. She wants HER blanket. I tell her to go get it. "BUT I'M TOO TIRED!"

At this point, Jonas is sitting up, irritated that his sister isn't content with him getting his way. Now, you may be wondering if the baby is sleeping through this. No, no he's not. Is Daddy? Why yes, yes he is. Grrrrrr.....

(**Disclaimer: I love my husband. He works long, hard hours in a very physically demanding job in the Florida heat and humidity. He deserves to sleep through the night. However, nights like this are when I need a little support.)

I wake Daddy. He goes to get her blanket, she lays down, then Jonas and Josiah refuse to go back down. Daddy takes Jonas, I nurse Josiah a bit longer, then switch to pacifier when he doesn't want to nurse. I hold him in the crook of my arm until he falls asleep. He's just almost asleep, as I am, when his left arm flies up and smacks me across the face... Did I mention I had a headache too??? Well, now it was worse.

I waited until he was good and asleep, transferred him from my arm to the bed, rolled over and looked at my cell phone. 5AM. Yay.

As I kissed LJ goodbye this morning, I said, "They had better sleep past 8!"

The time is now 8:13. They've been up for approximately 45 minutes.

This is the rare experiences with co-sleeping. Like I said, 5%. Attachment parenting (really, parenting in general) is about taking the good with the bad. Enjoying the fun and not pulling your hair out during the frustrating moments. The usual mornings, when we wake up to the baby nursing, the other two quietly asleep in our beds, and not remembering any of it happening, are reward for the bad nights. The big reward is how close we are to our kids. I wouldn't change it for all the sleep I could get!

Bradycardia, One Year Later

As long as I live, I will always remember May 30-June 1, 2011. I don't remember what we did on Memorial Day that year. I just remember sitting in the evening, feeling extremely exhausted, more so than five days after my other children were born. More than exhausted, I felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest. This pressure often came with breathing difficulties associated with asthma, but I wasn't having an asthma attack. On a whim, I took my blood pressure. It was fine, but my pulse wasn't. I knew immediately that a pulse in the 40s was dangerous. I called my OB, curious if this was a post-op danger (I still had moderate-heavy bleeding). In the time I was waiting for her to call back, I continued to check my pulse. Sitting: 38. Standing: 42. I ran around the apartment for two minutes and took it again: 55. I sat down again: 41. I was scared. I told LJ that we needed to be ready to go to the hospital. He thought I was exaggerating, but started getting the kids ready.

When the doctor called me back, she wasn't sure what to tell me. She suggested I go to urgent care or the hospital. Hoping to avoid taking my newborn to the hospital, we loaded the kids up and went down to the urgent care center. (Hint: if you are trying to figure out whether you should go to the ER or urgent care, go to the ER. Don't waste time. If your doctor's office is closed, urgent care is great. It's not a substitute for the ER).

At the urgent care center, I was treated by a less than sympathetic nurse practitioner. She refused to let my husband and children come back to the room. I had to leave my husband, 5 day old, 2 year old and 3 year old in the waiting room. She left me, undressed, in the room for about fifteen minutes. Without pads, milk was pouring out of me. I was in tears, scared out of my life. The medical assistant came in and did an echo. She left, and I heard Josiah screaming in the waiting room. I got dressed, walked down the hall and took him so I could feed him.

The nurse practitioner came back in and said, "We are going to call an ambulance to transfer you to the nearest hospital." I said, "No you are not. First, tell me what is wrong with me." She said, "You're having bradycardia, and you need more tests run." I said, "Well, I want to go to St. Luke's." She said, "The ambulance will take you to the nearest hospital, which is Shands." I said, "I'm not going in an ambulance." I walked out of the room, in tears afraid of what was going on. At the time, I had no clue what bradycardia was. All I knew was "cardia" which meant heart. Something was wrong with my heart.

Being the natural, calm, collected, easy-going person I am, I immediately began to think I was dying, that I was going to leave my husband a widower with three small children, searching for donor breastmilk, homeschooling them with the help of my mother, lonely and not having a clue about things like how to wash cloth diapers, how to wrap the Girasol wrap, how to tell the doctor not to retract the boys' foreskins, which vaccines have what in them and why we say no... I was so scared. I wanted to get out of there as soon as possible and get to the ER. They made me sign out AMA (Against Medical Advice). We left, and called my mom to meet us at the hospital.

We arrived at St. Luke's, my mom took the older two, and LJ, Josiah and I went in and checked into the ER. Apparently, when you say "bradycardia", people move fast. We barely spent five minutes in triage. Before we knew it, we were in a room, I was hooked up to a heart monitor, I had x-rays done and we were waiting to meet the doctor. He came in and told me my heart was enlarged. He wanted to do a CT scan with contrast, but to do so I'd have to stop nursing my baby for 3 days. WHAT?!?!?! My exclusively breastfed (EBF) baby. The baby that has never taken a pacifier or a bottle. My FIVE DAY OLD CHILD. The child I was planning on breastfeeding AT LEAST until he was two or three??? STOP? NO WAY! I told the doctor there had to be another way to get the images they needed, that I was not going to stop breastfeeding for that long. He left to go talk to the radiologist. 

I broke down, crying my eyes out over my baby. My sweet, adorable, breastfeeding at the time, baby. I couldn't imagine not breastfeeding him for three whole days. I couldn't imagine not breastfeeding him for 3 hours! The head radiologist came in to talk to me. He said it was at least 24 hours I'd have to not breastfeed, but they would get me a pump and anything I needed to keep my supply up. My mom made a supply run to the house and WalMart for frozen breastmilk, the laptop, bottles, pacifiers, then met up at the hospital. I nursed Josiah until they took me to CT. I cried sobbed all the way there. They had to calm me down so I wasn't shaking during the scan. During the scan, I could hear my heart racing in my ears. I looked up at the heart monitor. 50 BPM. Not your typical I'm-scared-out-of-my-mind heart rate. I made a decision in that machine. Breastfeeding wasn't the most important thing in my life. LIFE was the most important thing in my life! I would find breastmilk. I knew friends who breastfed. I had a handful I would be happy to let wetnurse my baby. I knew of Human Milk 4 Human Babies. My situation was exactly what HM4HB was set up for! And, if push came to shove, I would make my own, organic formula as a last resort (the way formula was created to be).

When I came back from CT, my baby was asleep in my mom's arms. I told her to take him home, and I would work on finding more milk for him. I sent messages out to my local ICAN group, the HM4HB Florida page, and a local mom's group. My mom stayed with us until they admitted me and put us in a room. I kissed my sleeping baby, afraid that was the last time I'd see him. My mom left.

We attempted to settle in for the night, but it was quite difficult. My heart rate at its highest was still too low to be acceptable to the heart monitor. It was always flashing a bright red light and beeping. The nurse immediately turned the alarms off, and eventually just turned off our monitor. I tried to sleep. At 7AM, my hospital phone, cell phone and e-mail was flooded with offers for milk for my baby. One of those close friends I mentioned offered to wetnurse. A few friends and strangers offered to pump. One friend in particular saw my posts, got in the car with her mom and two littles of her own and drove over an hour to get a gallon sized bag of frozen breastmilk and a gallon of frozen raw goat's milk to my mom. My baby had milk! And just in time too! My mom told me that Josiah finished my last bag if milk when Jessica drove up! I rested that morning knowing that God provided. If I couldn't breastfeed my baby, someone would!

I met with a cardiologist. He said my heart's enlargement was normal for a woman less than a week postpartum. He said my heart rate got down to 35 during the night, and we needed to do whatever we could to get it up again. Already prepared for the medicine he was going to suggest (thanks to my awesome doctor in the ER), I had already contacted the Infant Risk Center regarding the safety of the suggested medicine and alternatives. He agreed to the safer alternative, and we started on that, a diuretic for the water retention, and got a sonogram of my heart.

Then we waited. The medicine to get my heart rate up caused a horrible migraine. They gave me medicine for that, and in between sleep and pumping, LJ and I watched Bones on my laptop. That was the longest 24 hours of my life. I didn't even want to call my mom. I knew if I did, I'd hear my baby, and they'd need to sedate me. I was a hormonal mess.

We went to sleep that night and slept better now that the heart monitor wasn't beeping nonstop. My heart rate had returned to normal. When we woke up the next morning, my mom was already on her way with my babies. 24 hours had came and gone, and I was ready to see my baby! At discharge, my cardiologist said I needed to continue to pump and dump for 3 more days. I laughed. I asked him why, and he said the medicine we used needed to be out of my system... after already switching to a safer medicine for breastfeeding?? I told him I'd take it into advisement... as I was latching my 1 week old baby on.

Once again, I was wheeled out of St. Luke's Hospital in a wheelchair with a baby in my arms... We went home and rested.

A year has passed, and I can still remember the pain I felt of having to kiss my baby goodbye. I really thought I was dying. I thought I wouldn't be able to breastfeed again. God is good, and he answered my prayers with a resounding "YES!" Josiah started breastfeeding again with no problem, and he is still breastfeeding now at 1 year and 5 days old. More than that, those two days were the ONLY time he took a bottle! Ask my mom! He still takes a pacifier, but we didn't re-introduce that until he was 3 months old and started teething and was hurting Mama. Also, my heart has never given us any more issues. The cardiologist said it was caridac fatigue from childbirth. If we weren't "done" before, we are now!

I remember the pain, but I also remember the relief. I remember how great it felt to get all those phone calls and e-mails offering breastmilk, wetnursing, pumping, etc. You ladies know who you are, and you will never know how much you all mean to me. Jessica, you may mean the most to me because you barely had a yes and you were on the road bringing my baby the food he needed! I love you all! 

For more information on donating breastmilk, please search for your state, province or country's Human Milk 4 Human Babies page on facebook, twitter or e-mail them using the Human Milk 4 Human Babies website at www.hm4hb.net. 


**ETA: I checked with Infant Risk and several other sources, and I did *NOT* need to pump and dump for 24 hours! I asked about the specific isotope, and they said 4 hours max with most if not all of them! So, live and learn, and move on. I'm just thankful our breastfeeding relationship wasn't sacrificed!**

So there's me...

My name is Becca. I'm pushing 30. I grew up in sunny Florida. All over Florida, actually. Everywhere except the Panhandle. My parents moved around a lot when I was a kid. When I was 12, the same year I put on my Lord and Savior in baptism, my grandfather died and my parents moved up to Jacksonville to be closer to my grandmother.

We started going to church with Edna. She is a really sweet older woman who loves hugs! She had a grandson, LJ, that would visit occasionally. After he would visit, she always told me, "I want you to marry my grandson someday." I had to admit, he was quite cute. He was also very shy and wouldn't say much. I didn't think he'd ever be interested in me!

Time passed, I graduated high school, went away to college for a year, but decided to move back home. About the same time, LJ started coming to church on a regular basis. We started hanging out in December. By the end of January we were dating, and by March we were engaged. We married in September of the following year.

Look at the babies!! This was us the Easter after we got married.

A little over two years later, we were surprised and thankful to be expecting our first child. Arianna was born in July. Almost a year exactly after Arianna was born, we found out Jonas would come in February. We thought our family was complete.

LJ, Jonas (14m), Arianna (2y9m) and I on the Monorail to the Magic Kingdom, April 2010

Not long after that picture was taken, I had a wombache. I wanted another baby. LJ and I discussed this for about 30 seconds, then decided we wanted to try for a third child. Thirty seconds after that (give or take 28 days), we were pregnant! Josiah was born via a vaginal birth after 2 cesareans (VBA2C). To read about his birth, check out my other blog at Road2VBA2C.

Mommy's littlest man! This was taken about 1 hour after birth.

Five days after Josiah was born, I had the scare of my life. I was extremely fatigued, retaining water, and felt horrible. I took my blood pressure, which was fine. My pulse was not. When you go to the ER with a pulse in the 30s, they tend to work on you pretty fast. Fast Forward two of the worst days of my life (away from my newborn, pumping and dumping milk, horrible headache from medicines to get my heart working right), they assumed it was fatigue from childbirth. So, ready or not, we were done having babies!

I don't think we could ask for more wonderful kids!

I couldn't ask for better kids. They are my life, my world, my reason for dragging my butt out of bed in the morning. My blog is called "Attached To My Kids" because that is what I am. I don't work outside the home (although I am actively looking into non-pyramid scheme ways to make money from home without sacrificing time away from my kids). I homeschool (at least I will--Arianna starts kindergarten this fall). When we go out, we usually all go out together. Except for my weekend trips to the grocery store. Usually I like to go by myself. It's clearing. When we're all out together, I'm usually wearing the baby. I breastfeed. Josiah turns 1 this month, and I don't plan on stopping any time soon! Our boys are intact (uncircumcised). We co-sleep. This means that on any given night, we have between 3 and 5 people in our bed before morning. The older two typically start out in their bed, but sometimes end up in our bed. The baby is still nursing, so we have a crib/co-sleeper next to our bed for easy access during the night. He is quite accustomed to waking, crawling over to me, nursing, and falling asleep next to me.

So now you know me. You know my reasons for living. Welcome!