Thursday, June 18, 2015

Too Much Excitement, Too Little Sleep

I don't think it was quite so drmatic as this, but you get the picture.


I've been exhausted all day. Last night at about 1:30 a.m. Scott woke me up to say that Jillian was having contractions. He had dispatched his parents to spend the night because he didn't want me to be there all night by myself with the baby. i'm supposed to get to be in the O.R. when they deliver the baby, and he said he'd call me to come if it looked as though anything would proceed so  far, but I understand that if there's any sort of urgency in getting an almost-ten-week-early baby out, the very last thing in the world on anyone's mind would be to ensure that I was present. 

Scott said he'd call if there was any news. He didn't seem to realize that no news didn't necessarily equate with good news in our minds. Andrew slept, obviously, but the rest of us gave up on even trying to sleep after about 2:30. Even the next-door neighbors on both sides came over and sat up with us. No one called Scott because we didn't want to interfere with anything crucial that was happening.

When Nanny Helen arrived at 6:00 a.m., she immediately called Scott. He told her that everything was fine, that labor had been stopped after the second contraction, and that no membranes had ruptured. Jillian was being kept overnight as a precaution because of her history and would be home before mid-morning.

Nanny Helen spoke to him in a manner of which I had no idea she was capable. "You little bastard!" she barked at him. "Do you realize you have six people who have been sitting awake in your parlour (she always calls the family room "the parlour") since 2:30?"

Scott tried to talk his way out of it by saying that he had told us all to go to sleep and that he would call if anything happened. Nanny Helen not-terribly-politely explained that no news isn't necessarily good news and that if something very critical had happened he might not have had time to call.

Scott's mother cooked breakfast, which I could not eat because my stomach was upset. She and Scott's dad took care of the dishes while Nanny Helen got Andrew up. Nanny Helen told me to go to bed and to stay there until I legitimately felt like getting up. i stayed in bed until almost noon.

Scott and Jillian got home sometime between 6:30 a.m.and almost noon. I was sleeping too soundly to hear them arrive. Andrew was supposedly happy to see them but I'm not sure anyone else was. Actually no one probably blamed Jillian. She had been fighting off contractions.

I've been sluggish all day. I hope tomorrow is better. I'm a bit concerned this baby isn't going to wait around too much longer, but some things cannot be controlled. All I or anyone else can do is to  thank God for modern medicine. Babies who were barely if at all viable two generations ago now survive being born ten weeks early pretty much unscathed.




8 comments:

  1. I'm glad Jillian and the baby are okay. Sounds like Andrew may have a sibling sooner than later, though. Nanny Helen sounds like a trip.

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  2. Nanny Helen is starting to grow on me.

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  3. Sounds like you going to have even more sleepless hours to come!

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  4. At least your summer vacation is not boring! I came across this song that reminded me of you. It is Leader of the Band by Dan Fogleberg. His mother was a classically trained piano player and his father was the leader of a band and taught music in high school. The song is about how his father gave him the gift of a love of music.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsocZrEcp0Y

    Alexis, I am somewhat envious of how your parents made you gifted in music. To be able to play by ear is a miracle like having a photographic memory. Here is another song that you may like that is about the answer to everything. It is called Love is the Answer. Love is why people get married and have kids.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmZeMVcXUM0

    Also you may live an extremely long life. Insurance people have found that underweight people live longer than normal weight people. Also experiments with many different kinds of animals show that those that were restricted by how much they could eat, lived longer. Also for decades health experts have said that the less you eat, the longer you live. You used to have the nickname, Anorexia, right?

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    1. Yep. I was known by "Anorexis" by longer for than I'd care to remember.
      if being underweight is any sort of guaranteeor of longevity, I'll be around for awhileI

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    2. I like most of Dan Fogelberg's music. My favorite part to
      "Leader of the band," besides the words, is the brass chorale that plays as an interlude and again at the end.

      My dad plays and sings "Leader of the band" convincingly and well. The funny thing is that he cannot stand his father 9nor was his father a musician0. my father was somewhat flukishly musical. He has one brother who plays piano decently, and a couple of sigblings and his mom who more or less sing on-key, and then there's my dad.

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  5. At a food store, I saw an employee that looked like a very successful actress (and told her that) but could not remember the name of the actress. So I looked her up-- Summer Glau. She was was home-schooled from grades 3 to 12 to accommodate her ballet training.

    A broken toe ended her dancing career so she became an actress that has already made her much more money than a dancer would make.

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  6. As far as a broken toe ending a career, Joel Fuhrman M.D. is a famous doctor that has been on the Dr. Oz show. On that TV show he explained why medications do not work. When he was young, his mother went to an N.D. He fasted her for weeks and she got better.

    Before medical school, Joel Fuhrman was a champion ice skater. He broke his toe and doctors said that he would never skate again. He went to the same N.D. that his mother went to. This doctor fasted him for 42 days that is longer than Jesus fasted. He then won some skating medals. Imagine fasting to heal a broken bone!

    After that he became an M.D. but for decades has treated patients with fasting and a change of diet. He created the ANDI scale (aggregate nutrient density index) that Whole Foods uses. The highest food on that scale is kale. He has also been a vegan for decades.

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