Welcome to the World Avery James Hart

I finally got to meet my little Peanut, Avery James, on Aug. 21 at 2:37pm. As a writer, it's not often that I'm at a loss for words, but trying to describe the experience of helping my daughter through labor and the birth of her child leaves me struggling. How do you describe an event that is so horribly painful, frightening, beautiful and wonderful all at the same time? I've given birth to three children, but nothing could ever have prepared me for seeing one of those children give birth to her own child. And even though I've had three children, not once did I ever see any of them leave my body and enter into the world. So to be on this side of the table, so to speak, was a brand new experience. I really don't want to share too much about Amanda's childbirth experience because honestly, it's her story to share, not mine. All I can really say is that I feel that my skills as a parent were pushed to their extreme limits as I struggled to keep from being overwhelmed by the fear and helplessness that I felt as I watched Amanda go through her labor, knowing that, no matter how much I wanted to take that pain from her, I couldn't. In the end, all I could do was stand there and rub her back, hold her hand, breathe with her through her contractions and try not to break down front of her when she cried out "Mommy, I can't do this anymore. Please make it stop hurting. I can't do it." All my efforts seemed so insignificant in comparison to what her labor put her through. I will never forget seeing Avery making his entrance into the world. Feeling his tiny fingers curled around mine, just minutes after his birth, my heart swelled with love and joy knowing that I will be a part of his world for the rest of my life.

It's Time

In just in hour or so, Amanda and I will be leaving for the hospital, where her labor will be induced and little Avery will be helped into the world. She had a doctor's appointment this afternoon and her provider said it was time to get this show on the road (to paraphrase) and left the room for about five minutes and returned to say that she had scheduled Amanda to come in tonight to be induced. She said it just as casually as if she had merely scheduled her for a haircut or a manicure. I thought it was an announcement worthy of blaring trumpets, but that's just me. And then it hit me. Oh my god, this is really going to happen! My first thought was 'I'm not ready for this' but Amanda laughed and said it wasn't up to me. We went home and double checked the contents of Amanda's bag and Avery's baby bag and now, Amanda's taking a little nap to help boost her energy for this upcoming marathon. Me? I'm sitting here typing this blog post and watching a show on the History channel called "Big Foot: The Definitive Guide." Hey, we all have our ways of getting ready. It's hard to believe the next time I write a post, I will be a Nana. And my baby will have her own baby. And life goes on....

No News is Not Good News (But No Worries - the Baby is Fine)

Now all we need is Avery

Waiting for the arrival of a baby that is 7 days past his due date is certainly one of those events that negates the old saying 'no news is good news.' In this case, 'no news is definitely not good news.' Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with little Avery. All indications are that he's healthy and happy; perhaps just a little too happy in his current quarters which is why he's taking his time coming out. Amanda and I have both resigned ourselves to the fact that he's not going to make a natural appearance and is going to need to be coaxed out by the good doctors at Winn Army Medical Hospital. She has an appointment tomorrow, Tuesday, to find out when that's going to happen. Still, I find myself watching her closely whenever she says she's having some pain and I start my mental stopwatch to time her pains. It's good practice, if nothing else. I can't say I'm surprised Avery is taking his time. His mother was overdue, his uncle was overdue by almost a month, and Aunt Abby was a late arrival as well. So the precedent was already set. I had just hoped that Amanda would break that chain and go into labor on her own. In the meantime though, Amanda and I have gotten a lot done around her house and have completed some craft projects that have been sitting around for a while. So Avery's nursery is done - it just needs a tenant. As for me, I've been cooking and cleaning like a crazy woman, keeping up my gym routine by going to the Ft Stewart gym, and watching the Red Sox on TV - so essentially it's like I'm at home. It just helps keep my stress and anxiety to a manageable level if I can keep some kind of familiar routine. I honestly hope that I'm not going to have the time to keep up my blog posts because I will be busy tomorrow helping my daughter get through childbirth. We'll see.

Congratulations! It's a...

False alarm. I'm sure every woman who has ever been pregnant has had a false alarm. Those pains and cramps that you're convinced are labor pains so you rush to the hospital, only to be turned away and told to go home and come back when the contracts are regular and painful because what's you're experiencing is just a "false alarm." Today was my daughter's turn. I wasn't with her when she went to the hospital this morning at 7am. I was at her home, sleeping on her futon that has a depression in the middle of it as large as the Mariana Trench. I came out of a sound sleep when I heard my iPhone buzzing so hard it buzzed itself right off the coffee table. It was my daughter, informing me by text message that her sergeant was concerned about her abdominal pain and had taken her to the hospital, where she was hooked up to a fetal monitor. If that doesn't give your morning a kickstart without a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee, I don't know what will. Amanda said she had been having little contractions and some 'bigger' ones and that the doctor was going to look at the monitor tape of her contractions to see what the next step would be. Suddenly wide awake, I sat there with my cell phone in my hand, waiting for her next text. Was this it? Had my grandson finally gotten the message that we wanted him out and in the world? My stomach churned with a combination of fear, anxiety and excitement, only to have my hopes dashed 15 minutes later when I received another text from Amanda stating she had been released from the hospital because the contractions weren't frequent enough and that she was still only dilated to 1cm. She arrived home about 20 minutes later, looking exhausted and frustrated, and I promptly sent her to bed to rest. There is nothing more frustrating for a pregnant woman than a false alarm. I remembered back to when I was pregnant with my first child, my son Jason, and my own experience with a false alarm. My well-intentioned mother-in-law persuaded me to drink castor oil in an effort to get my labor going and it worked - for a little while. Four hours, to be exact, and my husband I shuffled up and down the halls of the hospital, me dragging an IV pole, waiting for the contracts to become more regular. They didn't. And I was home about four hours later and it was another three weeks after that the doctor decided enough was enough and induced my labor. Thirty six hours later I finally gave birth to my son - a strapping, 11-pound baby, who was born looking like a toddler.
Amanda and I  did some more walking today, had lunch at a great, authentic German restaurant in Hinesville (who would've thought) and capped off the day with ice cream, potato chips and a couple of movies on DVD. Tomorrow is another day.

And the Wait Continues

On Jekyll Island Amanda wrote her message in the sand. 

One of the nice things about hanging around with a hugely-pregnant woman is it makes me feel skinny. Not look skinny, mind you, but I feel, in my mind, that I'm just a mere wisp of a woman, compared to Amanda. The funny thing is, from the back, you would never know she's pregnant. But then she turns around...
I think back to my pregnancies and can't help but envy how great Amanda looks. With my first, Jason, I got so huge by the end that I couldn't even fit my feet into shoes and had to wear flip flops (not fun in Kansas in February) and even my maternity tops-which looked like they came straight from Omar the Tentmaker- were too tight to go over my massive belly. With my second one, Amanda, I actually didn't look too bad, up until that six month when I went from having a cute little "bump" to a huge watermelon (and it seemed to happen overnight). And then there was my third, Abby, and I was pregnant at the ripe old age of 36, which, in 1997, was considered a "late in life pregnancy." I see celebrities now in their 40s giving birth and it gives me nightmares. Why would I want to have a child that would someday take me to the movies where I would be eligible for the senior citizen discount while I'm paying for a child's ticket for them?
The other nice thing about hanging around with a pregnant woman is the naps. Amanda naps quite frequently (as she should) and I feel compelled to nap with her (not with her in the same bed - but at the same time, just to clarify). There's nobody to complain about the length and frequency of our naps and it makes me feel rather dog-like to just sleep whenever I want to. I suppose we should be enjoying this freedom to nap when we choose because once Avery gets here all bets will be off as far as regular sleep.
Amanda is now four days over her due date and we've started to resort to some of the more unorthodox methods to try to induce labor. Tuesday night we tried acupressure, which involved me pressing on different points on her feet. I have a "thing" about people touching my feet (I hate it) and I'm equally as uncomfortable about touching other people's feet (which I avoid at all costs) but since this was my daughter and grandchild we're talking about, I put aside my automatic "yuck" factor and gave her feet the appropriate pressure in the right places. No luck.
Last night we tried the "eat something really spicy" method and went to a local Mexican restaurant where Amanda ordered a spicy burrito with "extra spice." I hate to say it, but Mexican food in Georgia just doesn't compare to our Mexican food restaurants back home, which are totally authentic and not "Americanized" versions of Mexican food. It was nice to get out of the house and I enjoyed meeting some of Amanda's close friends, but as far as inducing labor - "Nada."
At Amanda's doctor's appointment on Monday the doctor told her that extreme weather, which causes changes in the barometric pressure, has been known to cause pregnant women's water to break. We've had three pretty intense thunderstorms in the last three days but the only thing those have caused is the humidity level to rise to even more unbelievable and unbearable levels.
So....we continue to wait....

Waiting for Avery

I will be the first to admit it. I'm not very good at waiting; especially if it's something I really want (like a new purse or new shoes). Usually, once I make my mind up that I want something, I will just go out and get it. No waiting, no telling myself I need to save my money and then I can go out and get it. Nope, I just go get it. That's why waiting for the arrival of my first grandchild is making me just a little bit crazy. Unlike buying something on Amazon, there's no expedited shipping available when it comes to the birth of a baby, no matter how much money I would be willing to plunk down if I could specify that I wanted him to arrive in 1-2 business days. My little Peanut will arrive when he's good and ready. I flew to Georgia four days ago to be there in time for his estimated arrival date of August 12. My daughter Amanda met me at the Savannah airport, hugely pregnant, her belly leading the way. After giving her a tearful hug, I put my hands on her belly and felt my grandchild move for the first time. Believe me, being a long-distance Nana is the worst kind of torture. As I felt him moving around under my hands I leaned over and said to her belly "Avery, Nana's here. You can come out now." Either my message got lost in a haze of amniotic fluid or he is going to be just as stubborn as his mother because to date, he's yet to leave the building and I think it's going to take an eviction notice of a dose of pitocin to get him out.
 In the meantime, Amanda and I have been able to spend some time together sightseeing in nearby Savannah (under the guise of doing a lot of walking to induce her labor) and I've had four days to acclimate myself to the South. Not only have I had to adjust to the god-awful humidity that is like swimming through water the minute you walk out the door, but I've also had to re-wire myself to move at a much slower pace to be in tune with all the folks who live here. At the risk of offending my few Southern friends by this observation, I would have to say that now I know why people in the South talk slow and move slow. It's the damned heat and humidity! I guess if there's any positive to this weather, it's that I can't tell if I'm having a hot flash or if I'm just sweating naturally. So my feverish and sweaty red face and armpit-soaked shirts that defy the strongest of anti-perspirant just seem to blend in with the way everyone else looks. If I'm this miserable, I can't even begin to imagine how uncomfortable my daughter must be feeling lugging around a stomach the size of a large watermelon.
 All things considered, she's being a good sport about things and even seems (or pretends) to enjoy the "tourist" things we've done since I got here. First on the list was Sunday brunch at Paula Deen's restaurant "The Lady and Sons." I was really hoping for a glimpse of Jamie Deen but no luck, so I had to content myself with indulging in the vast array of food on the buffet table. Fried chicken, pulled pork, mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, yams...the Southern heart-attack list goes on and on. Naturally, Amanda and I both took way too much food. She had the excuse of eating for two - I was just piggish and greedy. And as if the buffet food wasn't enough, there were homemade biscuits and pancakes delivered to your table, plus endless glasses of sweet tea. I was a little confused about what a pancake was doing on a lunch buffet and I'm sure I showed my "Yankee-ness" when I covered it with syrup and ate it like it was for breakfast.
 Of course we had to walk off this huge meal so we did some sightseeing in downtown Savannah and then headed out to Tybee Island (which really isn't an island so I'm not sure why they call it that) so that I could say hello to the Atlantic Ocean again. Funny, that even though it's still the Atlantic, it behaves like a totally different ocean down here. There are no big waves crashing into the rocks, no sharp smell of rotten fish or seaweed, just miles of white sandy beaches and gentle waves that just meander into the shore. Again, it's that slower pace - even at the ocean.
 After our trip to the beach we took in a Savannah Sand Gnats baseball game. I just loved the feel of the stadium and the cool logo of a sand gnat wearing sunglasses and swinging a baseball bat. I got my grandson his very first baseball - a miniature Sand Gnats one that I'm sure he could fit into his tiny hand (if he ever decides to be born).
 In between the sightseeing we've also spent time organizing her house and getting the nursery ready. While Amanda was at work today, I reorganized her kitchen cabinets and alphabetized her herbs and spices. This baby better get here before I'm forced to start on the medicine cabinet.