Giving birth was never something I feared. I knew it wasn’t going to be all rainbows and pink fuzzy bunnies; there were likely going to be tears, sweating and even some yelling. No matter how many horror stories you hear or images you see - while watching those baby story TV shows - nothing can actually prepare you for what your body will go through.

One would normally have anxiety about the unknown, right? I fear my anxiety is far worse this time since I know more about what I’m in for - which I pray is not the same as the last.

Pregnancy with Carter was a breeze. I was content and just delighted with the fact I was going to be a mommy. The entire nine months seemed to be perfect: no complications, little complaints - it was practically test book perfect.

Then labour.

4:45am, of my due date, August 21, I woke up with pretty strong contractions and by noon I had bared just about enough of what I could and we headed to the hospital, but not before I insisted that Mike stopped to get money for parking. God knows why I thought we would have to pay to enter the lot.

From our arrival at labour and delivery to about 2 hours later, I had progressed 2cm… seemingly, everything was right on track for Carter’s arrival that evening. I was able to have an epidural almost immediately, which I was so grateful for, but by 4pm I was noticing my ability to feel contractions was returning on my right side, and increasing steadily. No amount of moving or twisting would relieve the pain. I remember begging for the anesthesiologist to come back and do something about it and my requests being met with contemplation and delay. Not until the tears began would they do anything about my requests.

I must tell you, I know now that my pain tolerance is not as high as I had thought. I mean, I can handle being banged around a little and can take my share of friendly beatings. But the pain of labour? Not for me. I am practically incapacitated by menstrual pains, so this? This was no walk in the park for me.

Once the anesthesiologist came back to adjust the catheter things seemed to be back on track.

But I was wrong.

My epidural ceased to work at all, and wouldn’t that be the time the anesthesiologist would be called into a C-section? Perfect. From then to whenever she should come back, I was forced to go natural.

Tell me? Why do they insists on lying about how long the wait is going to be? How does that ever help the situation? They should be like pizza delivery - 40 minutes or it’s free or something like that. 40 minutes and then you get an extra hit of any drug of your choice.

After the contractions came on full force and I could feel everything, I had the nurse kick everyone out of the room.

Including Mike.

Then I waited.

And waited.

Tune in tomorrow to find out if my nurse survived…

I had a snow day today. Not that there was TONS of snow, but the perfect combination of snow and ice plus a husband stuck out of town which made it impossible for me to get out of the driveway and on my way to work this morning.

Carter and I hung out in our pajamas for the morning playing with his building blocks and train table. I normally shy away from being any form of entertainment for my child, I’d rather he develop an independent personality and have the ability to entertain himself. Though, with this new baby on the way, I’ve been feeling a little melancholy about the idea of having to share; normal feelings, I know. I just feel that I haven’t given Carter enough of the one on one time that he deserves and now it’s going to be cut back more when the baby gets here.

We snuggled, shared grapes and laughed at each other’s silly faces all morning while many of my adult counterparts struggled through the miles of horrible traffic and frigid temperatures.

Snow days rock!

During nap time I was able to have time to sit down and complete a design for a very patient client. A wonderful, caring and sympathetic lady who let me delay her design until I was feeling well enough to get back at it. I can’t tell you how great it felt to put my mushy mom/pregnancy brain to work again. I can’t get enough of the challenges of troubleshooting during designing. I just wish that my skills were strong enough to get me some full time work in the field. I fear that if I was to try and take designing on as a full time job, the stress of finding work and paying the bills would ruin it for me. I enjoy that I don’t rely on the income and that I can take my time making sure that it’s something I’m proud to sell someone.

I am feeling more and more like my old self these days. I can’t even explain what a relief that is!

Soother, binky, dummy, doh-doh, pacifier, or sooie (sue - e) as we call it.Either way, they are no longer used in The House of Me. Carter has been nearly two weeks Sooie free in preparation for his move up to the Jr. Pre-school class at daycare. Surprisingly, it was not as difficult to get him over it as we had initially thought it would be.

Nights where he would NOT sleep without Sooie. Nights of screaming and crying and carrying on while we withheld the wondrous sucking apparatus. That’s what I envisioned. I was terrified to try and start the extraction process, but it seems that we’ve let it run it’s course and he no longer asks for it. Simple as that.

As you scoff at me and the simplicity of the situation, I’ll let you in on what we did - completely un-choreographed.

One day I put him down for nap sans Sooie. He kept insisting for it, not wailing and carrying on as I suspected he might, but insisting nonetheless. I had no idea where a single Sooie was and just didn’t want to look for one because I’m so damn lazy. I told him that I would look for one and be right back.

I lied.

I just left and didn’t return.

He fell asleep.

Following Christmas holidays, when Carter returned to daycare, they didn’t have one there for him. At nap time they simple told him; “Mommy forgot to send one today.” and so he put his little head down and slept.

No qualms.

There has been no request since.

Don’t hate me just yet, it’s just luck I think. The next kid will be a complete nightmare.

For those that don’t do the transition as well as Carter has (so far) there are other rituals that parents may follow to empower their children to feel as though they are the ones making the decision to forego the soother.

One thing that I learned about, which I thought was totally fun! and awesome! was the Pacifier Tree in Denmark.

The Pacifier Tree, originally uploaded to Flickr by peff.

There is a tree where children come with their parents to give their Sooies to the Pacifier Fairy - a kind of closure for the children I suppose.

What have you done to get your little one to give up the pacifier?

Look for the follow up in a couple days where I’ll tell you about MY transition from thumb sucking.

I still remember it well, since it wasn’t that long ago.

I don’t know what’s worse, that I was giddy with excitement at the sight of this lionfish, while at the Shark Reef in Vegas, because it reminded me of Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo…

Or the fact that I even knew that this was the fish from Deuce Bigalow…

It’s been one of those days.

I was barfed on by my toddler in a packed restaurant today. I believe that needs no further explanation, though might be a funny post once I’ve had more sleep and feel less like a bag of smashed assholes.