Dan and Em's Blog

Hello little Liam!  We are so glad to have you.  The month since you came into this world has been the busiest one I’ve had yet.  So quickly you have shown us that you are your own person — the tools and tricks we learned with your brother are not the same as those we need for you.  You are so wonderful:  sweet, accepting, aware . . . happy.  And you sleep!  Hooray and thanks for that! 

Your arrival was so anticipated.  Even before we knew you, we loved you.  We couldn’t wait for the exciting moment where you would join us.  And you so promptly arrived right on your due date (I can tell you’ll be taking after me in that regard).  Your actual arrival was maybe a bit TOO exciting, however.  The moments after your birth were the most frightening and stressful of my life – a strange experience when mixed with the joy of having you here.  It was so hard to see you struggle so much in your first moments of life.  I wanted so much to hold you and comfort you, but I couldn’t.  In that first moment, I already loved you so much it amazed me.  Our first days together were hard.  I wanted peace and comfort for you, but those were hard to come by in the first few days.  You were certainly loved, though!  I was there with you every moment I could be.  And you were so loved by everyone.  Your family came to visit even though they couldn’t see you.  Everyone supported us however they could so that we could be with you.  And the wonderful nurses and doctors loved you and took care of you when we couldn’t be there.  Although it wasn’t the start I would have planned for you, you could not have been more loved or better cared for, which makes me happy and incredibly grateful.

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My darling child, I love you so much. With every day that goes by, I am so grateful that you are in my life and that I have the wonderfully good fortune to spend so much time with you every day. You are truly an amazing joy to be around. You are so smart and strong and loving. I love you so very, very much. It is hard for me to believe that you are two already. It is startling how rapidly the time passes. You are quickly leaving your babyhood behind and becoming a wonderful little boy. (Of course, you are still my baby – I still call you that, and I suspect that will be a hard habit for me to break, so forgive me in advance.)

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My darling son, it is shocking to me that an entire year has passed since the morning you came into this world.  Your first year!  What a wonderful one it has been, but it has passed so very quickly.  Already you are walking, and starting to talk to us.  We only understand a few of your words so far (“mamamama” — which can either mean me or food, “dadu” — for your daddy, or sometimes your grandma, “da!” — for “I want that!”) but you are working very hard on beginning to communicate with us (and we are working very hard to keep up).  It amazes me how much has changed in the past year.  One year ago today was only our third night home with you from the hospital.  I’m very proud of myself, and of your dad — we’ve learned an awful lot in the past year, and we’ve gained a great deal of confidence.  But mostly, I am proud of you.  You are growing into such a lovely, sweet, smart little boy.  It is hard to believe that is has been a year already.

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I had a lot of mixed feelings coming up to my induction.  I was very excited about the impending birth of my son, but I was a little bit disappointed to have missed out on the experience of going into labor on my own.  Leading up to the night I was to go to the hospital (July 17) I kept hoping I’d go into labor spontaneously, but it didn’t happen.  There was, of course, a lot of anticipation and excitement anyway.  I was honestly a little relieved at not having to worry about my water breaking in public, or going into labor and not being able to reach anyone, or having my baby on the side of the Dulles Toll Road in rush hour traffic.  Once I accepted that I wasn’t going to go into labor on my own, I started to hope that once the induction had been started, the Cervadil alone would be enough to start my contractions, so that I would at least have some of the experience of going into labor spontaneously.

We went to the hospital around 8:30 Thursday evening.  We were shown to our room — lucky number 13.  I’m not a superstitious person, but it actually occurred to me to ask for a different room.  It seems to me that maybe they should skip room 13 on the labor & delivery floor, kind of like skipping floor 13 in hotels.  I decided I was being silly, though, and joked a bit about being in room 13 coupled with the full moon!  I sat around for quite a while, waiting while Dan went and checked us in officially.  Eventually, the nurse came in, hooked me up to a bunch of monitors and got the induction officially underway by inserting the Cervadil, at around 9:00.  (That part wasn’t very exciting, though, because nothing really happens at that point — it’s a bit anticlimactic.)  The nurse took a medical history that took FOREVER.  It wasn’t that big of a deal for me (just kind of boring) but I can imagine it’s not a lot of fun to go through that for someone who already is in active labor.  When the nurse checked me, I was the same 1 cm dilated I had been at the doctor’s office the week before.  I was disappointed — I had been hoping that I would be one of those fortunate people who show up at the hospital halfway to having a baby without even knowing it.  No such luck!

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There is no way I could have known what it would be like to bring you into the world, and into my life.  In just one moment, everything about me changed.  My priorities shifted.  You became the center of my universe.

I look at you and I can’t believe the love that I feel for you.  I love you completely, and without any conditions or requirements.  I will love you every day for the rest of my life.  You don’t have to do anything, be any kind of particular person, or accomplish anything for me to love you or to be proud of you.  Unconditional love is something that I now understand, because I have it for you.  You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in my entire life.  I love you more than I knew I could love (and I’m pretty good at loving!).  You are perfect, exactly as you are.

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Well, I have one week left.  Or less.  My labor will be induced next Friday, July 18, if baby hasn’t come before then.

Because of the gestational diabetes, I knew I wouldn’t be allowed to go beyond my due date.  But my due date is July 23.  They couldn’t schedule me anytime the week of July 21, so July 18 it is!  The absolute latest this baby could come is July 19 (if they induce the labor on the 18th, but it takes until the 19th for the baby to be born.  That’s it.  Wow!

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I’ve written about a lot of different aspects of my pregnancy, but I haven’t talked a lot about this yet:  I am so excited about the imminent arrival of my son.  Of course, I still don’t feel ready — I’m not sure it’s possible to feel completely ready — but I think we’re now prepared enough that we can start to get really excited.  We have a lot of the laundry done, the bassinet is almost ready, the car seat base has been installed.  Those are a lot of the big things.  Now I feel like we can focus on his arrival.

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I’ve now made it to the 36 week mark in my pregnancy.  No doubt about it — I have a month (or less) to go.  I’ve been dealing with gestational diabetes since the beginning of May, and so far, it’s really not that bad.  Now, I’m not saying that’s the same experience everyone is going to have.  I know that different people have different levels of insulin resistance in pregnancy, and some have a much harder time than I have had managing their gestational diabetes through diet alone.  But at least for some (including me) it’s really not that bad.

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This past weekend, I attended my 10 year college reunion at Sweet Briar College.  I had a fantastic time!  It was such a great opportunity to see some old friends and to relax.  I also got to spend some much needed time with my husband in a beautiful setting.  It doesn’t get a lot better than that.  Sweet Briar’s campus is amazing.  I was so lucky to have been able to spend 4 years of my life in such a lovely place, and I was glad to go back.  It is more serene, bucolic and peaceful than almost any place I’ve ever been.  I didn’t fully appreciate how centering the campus is while I was there, but going back gives me a new perspective.

I remember distinctly my first visit to Sweet Briar when I was a high school junior (in 1992).  The campus won me over immediately.  It was like no place I had ever been.  I had visited Ivy League schools and colleges of the Seven Sisters, but Sweet Briar beat them all.  I was instantly attracted to the idea of spending 4 years there, but I thought it would be silly to choose a college based on setting alone.  But then the people that I met there really sealed the deal for me.  When I was in school, I made some of the best friends of my entire life at this beautiful place, and it was so great to go back to the place and the people.

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