Friday, May 19, 2006
the home stretch
Hi all. Well the baby’s room is just about ready, just have to haul a big ‘ol desk outta there, need help from a buddy who ALSO has to help me get a bunch of his crap outta our basement, but that’s another story. but the walls are painted, the crib is assembled and made, blankets, stuffed animals, cute little outfits hung in her closet, giant stuffed panda in the corner for company, there’s some knicks and knacks left to go, but we’re just about ready for the anticipated arrival.
An arrival that is approaching very quickly! Her due date of June 8 is officially less than 3 weeks away (2 weeks & 6 days)! Whoah. Wild. We are very much looking forward to meeting her.
Still haven’t told anyone about the DS portion of the story, we’re still positive in our decision that we should give her a chance to meet the family and cuddle up & charm the pants off everyone before they mentally put her in some category which will just be a small portion of who she is.
My wife’s sister was gonna be in town for the birth, but she’s not gonna be able to make it now, so it will just be she & I, which although the support would have been nice, the drama of having to go thru everything so close prior to the birth will thereby be avoided, allowing us to concentrate on meeting our baby, holding her, looking into those beautiful eyes, and getting to know her before we have to worry about factoring in the outside world into the equation.
One more minor complication has arisen. My wife’s been diagnosed with group B strep, which I guess is quite common (something like 20% of births?), and just requires that antibiotics be administered before the baby comes thru the birth canal. The antibiotics pretty much eliminates any risk to the baby from the strep (there’s no risk to Mom, apparently), and from what I’ve read, even without antibiotics, only like 1 in 200 babies are affected (ie get sick) in cases like this, the antibiotics being pretty much a safeguard measure to filter out the small remainder of risk. As with the DS, it’s nice to know in advance, but sometimes you think that the miracles of modern medicine, the knowing in advance of so many things, despite making the process of giving birth so much safer, give us so much information that can be so overwhelming. It makes you wonder how anyone gave birth 100, 200 years ago. They were ignorant and happy, but hey, infant mortality rates were much much higher. Guess you have to be grateful for the knowledge we are able to have nowadays, although it can make for a few anxiety ridden sleepless nites. Oh well, if ignorance is bliss, knowledge is ice cream. Er, or something like that.
Anyway, even though we knew it was a minor thing and very manageable (the strep diagnosis), it was still a little nerve racking to take, one more thing to worry about, but as with anything else, information, (irony alert!) while being something that can cause anxiety and grief, came thru in the clutch again, and after reading up on the strep, I think we’ve got it squared away and understand that it’s a very minor thing that just needs to be kept an eye, that odds are (99.5%!) that even without antibiotics, she’d be fine, but hey, let’s eliminate that .5% while we’re at it, long as it doesn’t hurt matters.
As far as the baby herself, all signs are pointing to her being very healthy, her growth is great, heart rate going strong, she’s still moving quite a bit, and 7 pounds already! (which was last week, probably gained a few ounces since then?) So, more than anything else, despite all the medical gobblydegook, we’re excited. We get to greet the baby (we have a middle name of Maria confirmed, still bouncing ideas for the first name, although we are almost sure we’ve got a winner) and hold her and kiss her and take her home & put her in her crib and play soft music for her and change her diapers and love her love her love her. Then, a week or two later, when family starts filtering in to visit & say hello, we think about how to approach the news. Bridges were made, after all, for crossing, not for standing on one side and worrying all night about getting across the darn thing. Not that there isn’t something to be said for at least kicking the rail to make sure it’s safe, though. And with that, I bid you adieu for the nonce. Be safe, good, and go hug & kiss your kids. Aloha.
An arrival that is approaching very quickly! Her due date of June 8 is officially less than 3 weeks away (2 weeks & 6 days)! Whoah. Wild. We are very much looking forward to meeting her.
Still haven’t told anyone about the DS portion of the story, we’re still positive in our decision that we should give her a chance to meet the family and cuddle up & charm the pants off everyone before they mentally put her in some category which will just be a small portion of who she is.
My wife’s sister was gonna be in town for the birth, but she’s not gonna be able to make it now, so it will just be she & I, which although the support would have been nice, the drama of having to go thru everything so close prior to the birth will thereby be avoided, allowing us to concentrate on meeting our baby, holding her, looking into those beautiful eyes, and getting to know her before we have to worry about factoring in the outside world into the equation.
One more minor complication has arisen. My wife’s been diagnosed with group B strep, which I guess is quite common (something like 20% of births?), and just requires that antibiotics be administered before the baby comes thru the birth canal. The antibiotics pretty much eliminates any risk to the baby from the strep (there’s no risk to Mom, apparently), and from what I’ve read, even without antibiotics, only like 1 in 200 babies are affected (ie get sick) in cases like this, the antibiotics being pretty much a safeguard measure to filter out the small remainder of risk. As with the DS, it’s nice to know in advance, but sometimes you think that the miracles of modern medicine, the knowing in advance of so many things, despite making the process of giving birth so much safer, give us so much information that can be so overwhelming. It makes you wonder how anyone gave birth 100, 200 years ago. They were ignorant and happy, but hey, infant mortality rates were much much higher. Guess you have to be grateful for the knowledge we are able to have nowadays, although it can make for a few anxiety ridden sleepless nites. Oh well, if ignorance is bliss, knowledge is ice cream. Er, or something like that.
Anyway, even though we knew it was a minor thing and very manageable (the strep diagnosis), it was still a little nerve racking to take, one more thing to worry about, but as with anything else, information, (irony alert!) while being something that can cause anxiety and grief, came thru in the clutch again, and after reading up on the strep, I think we’ve got it squared away and understand that it’s a very minor thing that just needs to be kept an eye, that odds are (99.5%!) that even without antibiotics, she’d be fine, but hey, let’s eliminate that .5% while we’re at it, long as it doesn’t hurt matters.
As far as the baby herself, all signs are pointing to her being very healthy, her growth is great, heart rate going strong, she’s still moving quite a bit, and 7 pounds already! (which was last week, probably gained a few ounces since then?) So, more than anything else, despite all the medical gobblydegook, we’re excited. We get to greet the baby (we have a middle name of Maria confirmed, still bouncing ideas for the first name, although we are almost sure we’ve got a winner) and hold her and kiss her and take her home & put her in her crib and play soft music for her and change her diapers and love her love her love her. Then, a week or two later, when family starts filtering in to visit & say hello, we think about how to approach the news. Bridges were made, after all, for crossing, not for standing on one side and worrying all night about getting across the darn thing. Not that there isn’t something to be said for at least kicking the rail to make sure it’s safe, though. And with that, I bid you adieu for the nonce. Be safe, good, and go hug & kiss your kids. Aloha.
