The Bauer Confidential

As I watch Jocelyn rolling hither and fro, pivoting on her belly to reach this toy, stretching out her arms to grab the kitty’s tail, I ponder what her life will be like.  What will she remember about her childhood?  Though there are a few exceptions, it seems remembering things before age three or so is pretty rare.  As she jabbers away, exercising her verbal muscle, growing by the minute, I can’t help wondering, when she grows up, what will be her earliest memory?  This of course made me think of my earliest memory.  There are two that I think must have happened around the same time, so I’m not sure which is the earliest.  The first is really more like a snap-shot in time, I’m not quite three years old and I have a pair of cow-boy boots I love to wear, but they’re too small for my ever-growing feet.   Undeterred, I wear them on a walk with my Dad.  Of course they hurt my feet and soon I can’t walk, so my father lifts me up on his shoulders and carries me the rest of the way, I remember looking down at the top of his head my cow-boy boot clad feet dangling over his shoulders.  This memory has a strong emotional component, whenever I think of it, I feel safe.

The second memory is in my bedroom at about the same time (at least I think it was).  A neighbor girl who is a little older than me is playing with me in my room, and she finds a pair of safety scissors.  She uses these scissors to cut my hair, practically scalping me, as she cuts in big chunks down to the roots.  I remember my mother’s face, pure horror, when she finds us.  Apparently I took the hair and hid it before we were found, stashing the evidence beneath my favorite blanket in an old stone crock which my mom didn’t find until some months later.  I guess even then I knew I was in trouble.  When I think of this memory, I can’t help but laugh, I know my mom was very upset when this happened, but now as an adult, it seems comical.

Since I know Jocelyn isn’t going to remember this part of her life, I’m busy trying to build memories for her.  Taking lots of pictures, breaking out the video camera, just letting her be a baby.  And I’ll keep remembering moments, like when she had her first solid food and the melodic sound of her sweet baby laugh.

Hurry home, look what’s waiting for you!

And, you know how when you asked me this morning if I was going to bake you a cake and I said no?  Well, it wasn’t lie because I’d already baked you one.  Since you said it’s OK to celebrate a little, we’ll be grilling steaks and eating chocolate black-out cake.

April bought a cute dress for Jocelyn’s first Easter.  We even went to Church, and Jocelyn was perfect.  Afterward, we walked up to a park to take some pictures, but having missed her nap, Jocelyn’s smile was a bit elusive.

A picture of perfection those two!  After an afternoon nap, we tried to get more pictures of Jocelyn.

She can stand for a bit (with some assistance).

Like I said…only for a bit.

We’ve had visitors and we’ll be having more in honor of Jocelyn’s arrival. My Dad and Cindy were here to meet our little girl last week. It was great having them, gave me an excuse to cook some yummy food. It rained a lot, welcome to an actual rainy season in the bay area. We didn’t do much but visit and fuss over the baby. She’s growing like a weed, at her last pediatrician’s appointment she was in the 90th percentile for both height and weight. Jocelyn is also a particularly strong baby and developing perfectly. Our only complaint is she’s not a very good napper these days and that makes her a bit grouchy. I think we’re going to break down and get a rocking chair; I’ve been having pain in my left shoulder which I think is from holding and rocking her in my arms while standing. Having Dad and Cindy here was great, Jocelyn likes to be held pretty much all the time so having a couple extra sets of arms was a lot of help. So any other visitors who want to come and hold the baby to give me a little break, please be our guest(s)!

Photos taken January 25, 2009 at Live Oak Park, Berkeley, CA.

More about Wordless Wednesday here.

Growing up, Christmas always meant two things: 1) Cold and mostly snowy days and 2) the promise of family and gluttony.  Moving to California has negated most of that.  The weather is chilly, foggy and rainy, but mostly Berkeley isn’t a very festive town.  There are some lights haphazardly placed on random trees, and really that’s about it. I do have my immediate and loving family of April and Jocelyn.  Jocelyn is doing well, except for some gas issues which makes her very fussy, unable to sleep, and keeps her on the edge of a full blown crying fit.  April has discovered a way of holding her that helps relieve some of the pressure, and we bought some baby “gas-x,” and hopefully that will alleviate some of the pain.  This leads me to another reason why the Christmas spirit hasn’t taken over the Bauer apartment,  taking care of a 3 1/2 week old has left us too exhausted to think about it.  I’ve tried pretty hard though.  I got the Christmas tree up, lights up, stockings are hanging from our nonfunctional fireplace, and most of all, I’ve been listening to Christmas music for spirit enhancement.

Inspired by afreeman, I thought I would give my Christmas Music list that I’ve been enjoying this year.  This version of Blue Christmas, was introduced to me by Velma, and I can’t seem to find out who performed it.  So if Velma or Mark or anyone knows, please let me know.  Thanks

“Blue Christmas” – ???

“Lonely Christmas” – Ben Folds

“Home For The Holidays” – Perry Como

“You Gotta Get Up” – Five Iron Frenzy

“Come on! Let’s Boogey to the Elf Dance!” – Sufjan Stevens

“No Christmas For Me” – Zee Avi

“Let It Snow” – Michael Bublé

“Someday At Christmas” – Jack Johnson

“O Come, O Come Emmanuel” – Sufjan Stevens

“Here It Is Christmas” – The Old 97’s

“Winter Wonderland” – Liz Phair

and finally

“Suddenly This Christmas” – Loudon Wainwright III

There are some other songs that are also on my play list, but this will be enough for this year.

We are lucky to have a lot of great people in our lives, and it seems to me that more than a few of them are particularly talented in a variety of crafts.  Nothing brings out crafty-talent better than the impending arrival or birth of a baby.  Jocelyn has been the recipient of a number of really beautiful hand-made items, and I feel it would be a shame not to show them off here.

The first item is a play-mat type blanket made by my mom.

Next are three (yes, three) blankets crocheted (they could be knitted, I can never tell the difference) by my mom.

The last three are on the same blanket, but I just wanted to show you all how cute our baby is.

This next blanket and cap was crocheted by Matthew’s mother.  The cap is a bit too large, but she’ll grow into it!

This cute blanket and cap were knitted by Matthew’s Uncle Leslie.

This sweater was knitted by Matthew’s old bench-mate at Mizzou, Nicole.  A little big yet, but not for long.

This quilt was made by my good friend Velma who has made lots of beautiful quilts and other cool crafts.

Here is the woman herself, with her hands a bit full during a recent visit to our place.

So we’ve been home with the baby for more than a week now.  We expected sleepless nights and crying, but the beginning was much harder than I imagined.  The problems stem from some issues we had in the hospital.  My advice to anyone planning a hospital delivery, even if you think the hospital’s policies are in sync with what you want, have a specific birth plan and/or a doula.  We were told in our prep classes that the hospital operated in a specific way that was in accordance with what we wanted, but when it came time to have the baby, the hospital staff did not do what we’d been told they would, which left us angry and disappointed.  The actual birth is a bit of a long story, and maybe someday I’ll write a post about it here, but I’m just not up to it now.

Having a baby the day before a major holiday is also not such a good idea, if you can help it.  The hospital was short staffed.  There was no lactation consultant or “baby and me” class while we were there.  We were told that all the nurses were trained to help you establish good breastfeeding, I’m pretty sure this was a blatant lie, that or the nurses were too busy to care (there were 35 other babies born in that hospital that day).  From the classes we took I knew what I should do, but putting that into practice is another thing entirely.  The nurses pretty much just tried to shove as much of my boob into the baby’s mouth as possible.  This is a bad, bad thing.

I’m amazed that people survive stays in the hospital.  Hospitals are not restful places.  The fold out bed Matthew was sleeping on was covered with that crackly vinyl material you see on school buses.  So every time he moved, it sounded like he was rolling over on a pile of paper bags.  And every time a toilet was flushed in our vicinity it sounded like a miniature explosion.  So when the Dr.s cleared us, we went home, since were getting no rest and very little help at that hospital.  But once we got home the breastfeeding didn’t improve.  It was very painful and Jocelyn seemed to be crying constantly.  Every time I tried to feed her she would just fall asleep and then be inconsolable about 30 minutes later.  By Friday things were getting pretty desperate.  A home health nurse was supposed to come visit us at home, but we didn’t hear from anyone.  I knew I needed to talk to someone about the breastfeeding so Matthew called the hospital and got a hold of a lactation consultant.  We rented a pump, got some advice, and things improved a bit.  On Saturday we took Jocelyn to the pediatrician’s office to check her weight.  She had lost more than the 10% they consider normal.  We got a call later in the day from one of the Dr.’s at the office (our Dr. was out of town) and he said we needed to supplement the breast-feeding with some formula.  This helped quite a bit.  The home health nurse came on Sunday and she was helpful as well with lots of tips for feeding and general baby care.  Monday we saw a lactation consultant and our pediatrician.  The Dr. said Jocelyn looked great, she was gaining some weight back.  The lactation consultant was a tremendous help, and we went to a follow up on Thursday which was also helpful.  Jocelyn didn’t like to open her mouth very wide, which makes proper latching-on pretty difficult and she tended not to feed very vigorously, quickly falling asleep.  The lactation consultant helped us a lot with those issues.

Things are getting much better.  We’re still supplmenting with some formula using this tiny tube attached to a syringe or normal bottle feeding.  I’m pumping between feedings to try to get my milk supply up so that I’m making enough.  I’m taking herbs and drinking “Mother’s Milk” tea.  I feel like it shouldn’t be this much work!  This is definitely one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.  There were times when I felt so defeated, like a complete failure, a terrible mother.  More than a few times I’ve wanted to throw in the towel, say screw this breast-feeding thing and just give her formula from here on out.  I know all the advantages that are touted about breastfeeding, but do those things out weigh a mother’s sanity and a baby getting enough food?  We’ve invested a lot of time, effort and money into breastfeeding and I’m feeling quite a bit better about it and am hopeful that we may be able to cut out the formula soon.  But when she cries at 3am, formula feeding seems like a better option.

My family

(taking a much needed nap)

Jocelyn Patricia Bauer

Born November 26th (4:57am)

She’s a bigg’n at 9lbs 4ozs and a hair over 22 inches long

I haven’t got that many good pic’s of her yet, but I’m sure there will be many soon.