Purposefully Lost

I haven't written in my blog for so long and the more I don't write, the more I don't want to write. But today, right this moment, my 11-month-old son inspired me to break the no-writing strike. After a week and a half of first taking care of a sick baby then taking care of a healthy baby while being sick myself, Hubby left for yet another business trip today, and to top it off, it's raining cats and dogs today, which means we are couped up in the house with the heater on making my stuffy nose more dry and crackly. But the day hasn't been as bad as it's set up to be. My angelic son took a morning nap for one and half hours with zero crying when I put him in his crib. He played with his toy for a brief moment then all was quiet. Sweet. Then he woke up, not crying, but cooing. He was looking out his glass sliding door where the blind is partially open, staring at the rain coming down on the deck. I scooped him up and kissed him all over and he let me as opposed to shoving my face away. After I changed his diaper, I fixed him a quick, but nutritious lunch (brown rice, avocado, sweet potato, Bragg Liquid Amino sauce all mashed together) and he ate most of it. After lunch I washed his face and he "brushed" his teeth and here is the kicker, he has been playing with his toys, not the blinds and electrical cords, but with HIS TOYS ALL BY HIMSELF FOR THE PAST 45 MINUTES!! I'm over at the computer from where I can hear him banging on his bongo drums, pushing the buttons on his music stand, and occasionally when all is quiet, I peak around the corner and see him patting or biting one of his stuffed animals. I wished I had a phone with a video camera, but I don't. Nonetheless it was just too precious of a moment for me to experience it alone, so here I am blogging it.

Now when I'm having a bad day with my baby, I can read this blog for perspective.

A little while ago, the little one crawled over looking for me. He was hungry. He wanted to nurse, and after reading a couple of books, changing his diaper, he is back in his crib for nap number two. I was afraid I might have jinxed myself by calling him an angel baby, but again, he is playing and talking (a lot of avah's, yeh jeh eh, da da da, wa wa wa, ema's) and getting ready to put himself to sleep for the second time today. Wow! Yes, there are actually days like this for a newly stay-at-home-mom. It's perhaps how we can get through the early years of raising a child.

I arrived at work five minutes early at 8:25am for the first time in a long while. I was one of the first persons to arrive and from my office window, I could see my colleagues trickle in. Since I hardly arrive to work this early, I don't normally see my coworkers at this time of the day, and I learned something new about a few of my coworkers' morning pick-me-up habit. Besides the typical coffee and tea to begin the day, I see people with diet Coke, Red Bull, and cigarette. Hard core, I think. And my morning git up? dark chocolate.

Today my love for JT is bursting out of me. It had been a steady buildup to this moment. Lately, I just can't get enough of this little one. He is hilarious and affectionate. He pulls off the nipple in the middle of a feed to give me a huge smile, then resumes nursing. When he wakes up in the middle of the night crying, I go to him and hold him and rock him. He rests his head on my shoulder and melts into my arms; his crying subsides and his slow, rhythmic breathing fills my ear. He twists and squirms as soon as the diaper comes off. Putting on a clean diaper is like wrestling with a slippery seal. His little, plump bottom thrusts upward as he twists and struggles in my hold, and I just can't stop myself from kissing his smooth bum while juggling to keep him from rolling off the changing table. He wants to touch and taste everything. He observes the people in the room, one person at a time, taking each person in. Sometimes he gives them a slight, crooked smile before turning his gaze away. Other times, he beams a full-blown smile and prattles (usually for young, pretty women who smile at him). He wants to partake in all the conversations and be included in the goings-on of our household. He is the center of our home, the source of joy and love in our family.

At JT's 4.5 month check up two weeks ago, his pediatrician said we could start introducing him to solids. So we jumped right on it since around this time, JT started to show keen interest in what we were eating. In fact, he would stare at our food and his eyes would move up and down so intently as we scooped food into our mouth. Now when he sits with us at a meal, we give him something to suck on like a peeled cucumber or give him his own food.

Since it's peach and nectarine season, we started with these fruits. Umma scrapes a little of the juicy flesh in a tea spoon and he opens up wide. He chomps on it, moving the food from the front to the back of his mouth, swallows, and opens his mouth wide for the next bite. When it's all gone, he fusses and stares at where the bowl or fruit was, wanting more, but we are starting slowly, giving him about one tablespoon at each feeding and feeding him twice a day. After a week of a single fruit diet, Umma started mixing banana with peach or nectarine, and he loved that even more. After a couple of days, she added a little bit of avocado into the concoction for a balanced diet. He absolutely loves these fruit purees. Next week, we're going to move onto vegetables. Thinking of starting with some pureed carrots.

What amazes me is that from this tiny addition of fruit to his diet, JT's poops transformed from breastmilk-only poop, which is practically odor-free and runny, to poops that closely resemble real human poop, as in stinky and of guacamole texture. And the quantity! I can finally understand what parents mean by a blowout. A bowel movement after a couple days of no pooping would definitely blast his poop out the back of his diaper. It's time to move him up to the next size in his cloth diapers, but now I'm thinking it wouldn't be a bad idea to implement elimination communication, soon, really soon. From the signs he is showing so far, I think JT is going to be a mighty eater. And if he takes after his father, he'll relish pretty much anything we give him, which mean even bigger, stinkier poops are headed our way.

Video

JT is rolling from his back to his tummy like a champ. This past Monday, he just rolled over all by himself and when we all got excited, he wanted to roll some more. The problem is he can't go from his tummy to back yet, so one of us has to reset him on his back. As soon as he's on his back, he swings his legs to the side and the rest of his body follows in one quick swoop. He has a look of surprise or it could be waiting for our praise and cheer. Once he gets our praise, he works on freeing his arms from under him and with each arm successfully freed, he gets more excited cheer from us. He looks mighty content with himself once all is complete. Once on his tummy, he plays for a few seconds before complaining. So we set him on his back again, and swoop, he is back on his tummy. It's so damn cute.

This morning, as I was rushing to get ready for work, I could hear Umma playing with JT in his room. He was rolling again. I felt a tiny pang in my heart knowing that I wouldn't be around to witness all his first developmental moments of his first year.


Video

Babies too young to hold themselves up, like rag dolls crashing onto each other, while parents stand on guard ready to catch any falling baby. Too cute! Too funny!

There has been a lot of discussion around sleep training among the group of new moms whom I've known since we were pregnant and attending prenatal yoga. I chimed in on the discussion. This is what I wrote:

Two weeks ago we started sleep training and have had to tweak it a few times, and I'm sure we'll keep making small adjustments. JT has gone from sleeping anywhere from 6-12 hour stretches at night. When we started sleep training, we moved his bassinet into his own room, before he slept in our room, but in his bassinet. Although, many nights, we brought him into bed with us after he woke up in the middle of the night to nurse him then just let him sleep with us until morning.

We decided it was time to sleep train because none of us seemed to get restful sleep when JT slept with us in our bed. (I didn't find snuggle time in bed all that wonderful. Frankly, I just want to get sleep and bond with my baby during awake hours.) He slept more soundly when he was swaddled and in his bassinet. My husband and I definitely slept better when there wasn't a squirmy baby in between us. Plus, when JT was 3 month-ish, his bedtime routine dramatically changed. Before we bounced him on the yoga ball and nursed him for 30ish minutes before he fell asleep. But suddenly it was taking way over an hour. This went on for a month. We decided it was time for a different way to put him down.

Two weeks ago when we started sleep training, we just jumped right in. We let him cry. He cried for 45 minutes the first two nights. Third night, 20 minutes. And subsequent nights, 5-ish minutes. He woke up four hours later wanting to nurse then slept until morning. Then we tried not feeding him when he woke up at night and just rock him back to sleep. He started to sleep through the night (10-12 hour stretches). But one day I noticed he seemed clingier than before. I sort of freaked, but I'd like to think I investigated further, rather than panicking, on sleep training, observing his behavior, and soul searching about what feels right for me.

About ten days in, he "regressed". He cried for over 30 minutes at bedtime on top of his seeming clingier during the day. I wondered if the transition was too abrupt. I scaled back on my approach. Now, I don't let him cry for more than 5 minutes before I go to him and talk/sing to him without picking him up. This would not have worked when we were rocking/nursing him to sleep, but now he stops crying and smiles when he sees me without my having to pick him up. I feel comfortable with this, a combination of comforting him and helping him to learn to self-soothe. (I did notice this morning, though, that when he was going down for his morning nap, he cried, which he has never done. He has always fallen asleep quietly for his naps by himself, which made me wonder if my going to him every 5 minutes at night is teaching him to cry for me whenever it's time for him to sleep. Oi!)

So the dance goes on. Someone's pediatrician said it's two steps forward, one step back when it comes to sleeping, eating solids, and potty training, and that's reassuring. I'm sure there will be more tweaking in the near future. For now, everyone is getting (enough) rest and I feel (emotionally) comfortable with our set up.

Once I shared the above information on the message board, I was annoyed for days. I don't exactly know why, maybe I was afraid of being judged. No one directly criticized me, but when most of the other moms described a no-cry sleep method, I imagined them cringing at the thought of me letting my baby cry, even for five minutes let alone for forty-five minutes! Or maybe I regret having let JT cry for 45 minutes. My feeling this way, I realize, totally contradicts my previous post on trusting my decisions/instincts as they relate to my baby. In theory I understand that there simply isn't one right way to parent and that there are bookshelves full of books on parenting and on sleep training and as a parent we have to find the method that best fits us. It's an overwhelming task, yet it's the most important job I'll ever do in my life. There has been lots of inner turmoil these days for I want to make maybe not even the best, but good decisions for my baby, but how do I know I am when this is all so new?

The world of parenting is slowly unfolding before me. Now that the ordeal of having given birth to a new life is behind me, I'm beginning to wonder how the heck I'm supposed to be the nurturer and the guiding light to this new person. Me? I need nurturance and guidance myself! How am I supposed to provide this for my baby? I know trepidation comes with the territory of parenthood, and I'm feeling it full force.

About two weeks ago, we decided to try the cry it out method for putting JT down at night. Around his hundredth day of life, he began to really resist going to sleep at night. He was doing fine going down for naps, but as soon as evening arrived, he wanted nothing to do with going to sleep. It was taking over an hour of rocking, nursing, singing, bouncing, before he would succumb to sleep. This lasted about a month before we decided it was time to do something about this. Instead of following JT's cue for when to put him down, we designated 7-7:30pm as his bedtime and made sure he was fed, bathed, and swaddled by then. After that, we put him in his bassinet, kissed him goodnight, and left his room. The first two nights, he cried for 45 minutes, and I mean screaming, shrieking, balling, whimpering, rotating through them for 45 minutes! He would get quiet and we all hoped he was giving up and going to sleep when another bout of screaming would begin. This was terribly hard on all of us, as expected. Umma was the first to break and cried on the third night of listening to JT cry. The urge to dash to his side and scoop him up was so great, we had to distract ourselves by going outside for fresh air or watching t.v. The third night, his crying time decreased by half. In subsequent nights, he cried for roughly five minutes.

So we thought the worst was over and bedtime would be a walk in the park moving forward. Fast forward a week and there's a new challenge. JT's usual naps were a bit off one day so that he woke up from his afternoon nap earlier than usual. He had been up for over two hours when around 6:30pm he started to show signs of tiredness. Dinner was ready and Umma said to put him down early. I had just finished nursing him, so without much thought, I swaddled him, kissed him goodnight and put him down. Nick came in to the nursery and asked why I was putting him down so early. I said he looked tired. JT cried, as expected, when he first went down. But as we ate dinner, he continued to cry. I started to wonder if I had put him down too early. I wondered if he had been properly burped. Maybe he had gas pain. I became annoyed that I had listened to Umma without thinking it through. Nick's asking me why I was putting him down early cycled in my head. I couldn't concentrate on dinner, I was listening to his crying and mechanically chewing my food. Nick and Umma could sense my uneasiness and the mood at the dinner table was uncomfortable.

After thirty minutes of JT crying, Nick, sensing my mood worsening, asked if he should go pick him up. I immediately said yes, that maybe he had gas and needed to be burped. We both knew that if we intervened, we could be encouraging him to regress. I didn't care. Nick picked him up, and JT stopped crying. Once he was calm, Nick put him down and said goodnight. JT immediately started screaming. I said maybe I didn't feed him enough. Let me nurse him. By now, it had been one hour since I originally put him down. He was exhausted. He nursed for a bit when his eyes started to close. I put him down. He screamed for a minute then passed out.

The next night, we followed our night-time ritual and put him down at 7pm. He cried for thirty minutes. I fully understand that our intervention--twice!--the previous night had set him back. It taught him that if he cries hard and for long enough, we will come to him. I realize that by picking him up the previous night, I was trying to ease my anxiety and that I was second guessing myself. All this had made it harder on JT; he was getting mixed messages. I've learned that the right decision is the decision I make for my baby and not what some parenting book says or what other parents have done. First lesson in parenting: I need to learn to trust myself that I'm making the best decision for my baby.

Following the Korean tradition, we celebrated JT's one hundred days of life with the customary festival foods and lots of photos. Umma and I donned our hanbok, Auntie T put together the sang, and the three of us women cooked for half a day in preparation. Daddy enjoyed the food and Baby tolerated us fussing over him and taking a bazillion photos. I thought our ancestors marked this day as significant because often babies died young in the olden days that living to one hundred days was cause for celebration. While that might be partly true, I realize now that our wise ancestors knew that one hundred days postpartum is truly a major milestone for both baby and mom.

The uncertainties and fears, the new daily routine and interrupted sleep, the delicate dance of getting to know a new human being, the helpless newborn, the bewildered new parents, all of this smooths out around the hundredth day. I feel like a different person from who I was just a couple of months ago. In the beginning, I was going through the motions to meet my baby's basic needs, but deep down, I was freaked out. Now, I feel so much more relaxed and comfortable being a new mom that I often find myself happy and giddy. I'm sure having time to get the hang of this new life and also the hormones leveling out had a lot to do with it. JT, too, seems like he has adjusted to his new life outside the womb, being familiar and secure in his surroundings.

For example, before he took nursing quite seriously, latching on at each feeding like he had been starved and sucking like this might be his last meal. Now days, he delicately takes the nipple into his mouth, taking his sweet time, and when someone in the room is talking, he'll pull off to look at the speaker, then return to the breast. He eats nice and slow, setting his own pace. Also, his once clenched fists are open and exploring, often pulling on my shirt or stroking my neckline.

I feel like developmentally, he is going to explode out of the gates any day now. His body is constantly in motion, grabbing, kicking, reaching, rolling from back to side, lifting and resting his head, and the sweetest thing is that he started to rest his head on my shoulder when I'm holding him; he cuddles instead of holding himself erect. Equally heart-melting are his laughs, little sounds of joy instead of only the toothless smile that he flashed so often when he was younger. And finally, he has learned to put himself to sleep. We no longer rock or nurse him to sleep, we swaddle him, lay him in his bassinet, say goodnight and leave. He cries for a minute, and sometimes prattles for a while, then falls asleep.

Around the hundredth day, life as we know it is coalescing nicely.

It's all about the baby these days, not surprisingly. Has it already been three months since our little JT arrived? I only know how much time has passed because my three-month maternity leave is coming to an end. One more week then I leave my little bundle of happiness with his grandma from Korea. Knowing he'll be with Halmoni while I'm at work makes the separation a whole lot easier.

There's just too much to write about so I won't attempt to describe what life has been like since our baby boy joined us. I would, however, like to write about the birth, especially before my memory fades. Strangely, though, as much as I want to write JT's birth story, I've been having an emotional block around it. It was single handedly the most intense experience of my life. Anticipating the magnitude of birthing a baby, I chose zero medical intervention so that I could feel and be present for each moment. I had read women describe their birthing experience as empowering, as a moment of profound connection to the universe, as a moment they transformed from woman to mother--a kind of a right of passage.

I wanted to experience them, too. Did I? Not quite. There was no Ah-ha moment. I didn't burst into tears of joy and overflowing love when I saw JT for the first time. I was just numb, through and through.

I labored calmly and vigorously at home for as long as I could, enduring the contractions, not fighting them. I allowed one contraction to come over me then readied myself for the next one. I breathed deeply and relaxed my body between contractions as best as I could. Nick squeezed my pelvis which alleviated the pain significantly. When the contractions came closer together and became frightfully painful, we headed to the hospital.

But before labor started on this day, Friday, April 8, 2011, I was already nine days past my due date. I had been having Braxton Hicks contractions for many weeks prior to my due date, and it was confusing as to know when the real contractions would start. I had high false hope every day leading up to my due date, starting from the 37th week, that this would be the day I would meet my son. When my due date came and went with no changes, the waiting game intensified. Soon thereafter, I started to have menstrual like cramps at night--one of the signs that labor could start, only to wake up in the morning with nothing, as if I had dreamed my having the cramps. Each day dragged on in slow motion and my stomach continued to extend farther from me. Physically things were manageable, but emotionally, I was fragile. I shut down inside as to keep the anxiety at bay.

Few days before I went into labor, my mucus plug dislodged while I was taking a bath. This was truly exciting--a concrete sign that labor was imminent. Then more days passed quietly. In the midst of these terribly long days, on Saturday, April 2, the home of our neighbors two doors from ours burned to a crisp. I remember I was trying to nap while Umma and Nick were out in the backyard gardening in the late morning when I heard glass shattering one after another then the alarmed voice of a neighbor shouting FIRE! I didn't believe what I was hearing. I was tired and lay still for a few more minutes when I heard more glass shattering then Nick yelling for me to get out of the house. I ran out to see 20-30 foot flames, burning wild with eucalyptus trees all around. Only one house stood between the flames and our house. I started shaking and crying as I supported my enormous belly with both hands.

When I checked into triage, I was 6 cm dilated. Once we settled into our Labor & Delivery room, the contractions became so intense and frequent, I hardly had time to catch my breath between them. The pain, concentrated in my right lower back, was so overwhelming, all I could do was to wring the bars on the side of my bed and scream. I couldn't pull it together long enough to try to utilize any of the coping tools I had learned and practiced in prenatal yoga.

In the hospital, labor progressed rapidly. From the time we checked in to the time our baby was born, it took six hours. The first hour I remember. We were in triage and I changed into the hospital gown, the admitting nurses checked me, put in an IV, started the antibiotics since I had tested positive for Group B Strep, we waited for my midwife, Lindy, to arrive, my labor and delivery nurse came and introduced herself. I endured more contractions, squeezing Nick's hand or whatever I could get my hands on. When we got the green light, my birth team slowly shuffled to our room.

In our room, I got on the bed. I tried different positions, but none felt right. I tried being on hands and knees (it was too hard to prevent my back from caving in), I tried the tub (water was not hot enough and made me shiver and tense up), I tried squatting (legs were too weak and wobbly). The only position that I could bear the contractions in was side lying. With each contraction I wrung the sidebar of the hospital bed, and occasionally released a blood-curling scream. My midwife and the attending nurse helped me bring my sounds deeper down into my core.

Lindy told me later that I went from 6 to 10 cm in about three hours and pushed for about two hours. I pushed lying on my right side. I tried switching to the other side, but my right lower back felt like it was going to snap. I stayed on my right side, with Nick pushing on my left leg, Umma rubbing my lower back, and Lindy at the foot of the bed. The nurse moved around the room, mainly administering the fetal monitor and sort of being in my way, as well as typing on the computer--I guess she was logging the progress, but it was distracting.

At some point, Lindy said if I felt like pushing, I should. So I did. It felt better than just laboring. During the pushing stage, my team and I got into a rhythm. As soon as I felt another contraction coming, I threw back the blanket, grabbed my bent left leg and pulled it toward my chest with Nick's help, and pulled on Nick's jeans with my right hand (surprised I didn't rip them). Umma put pressure on my lower back, Lindy pressed and maneuvered her hands down below. I pushed for two to four breaths before collapsing onto the bed. At which point Nick sat down on a chair, Umma repositioned the blanket over my naked body, and Lindy took her hand away and relaxed. When the next contraction swelled up, I would throw back the blanket, grab my knee and everyone resumed their position, and we all repeated the process over and over.

For couple of hours, I pushed and pulled on my leg, Nick pushed my leg, Umma rubbed my back, Lindy massaged my perineum. I hunkered down and let out long, guttural sounds with a few high-pitched screams sprinkled in when I felt especially frustrated and the pain unbearable. Besides Lindy, the rest of us could not see progress being made. Then she announced that she could see the head. Nick and Umma looked. They couldn't tell what they were looking at. It was, apparently, a quarter size of the top of the baby's head. They told me the baby was coming. With each push, the black head appeared in the quarter size opening, and with each rest, it receded. Later, Umma and Nick told me it was frustrating to see the head recede after each push, but they kept telling me that the baby was coming.

Suddenly, the baby's head went from the size of a quarter to a baseball and Lindy told me to reach down and touch his head. It was warm and slimy and wasn't motivating for me as it's known to be. I could only focus on the contraction and pushing at hand. I couldn't allow my mind to open up to anything beyond that immediate moment.

Lindy told the attending nurse to call the nurses who come in just for when the baby arrives. Everything picked up pace from this moment. I could feel burning so intense I knew I was tearing. But I didn't care. Lindy said to stop pushing and take short, quick breaths to let the baby's head slowly stretch the opening as to reduce tearing. That was too hard. I said I had to push. There was no way I could change gears and stop pushing at that point. My body wanted to push, so I let it.

It burned like hell down there one minute then a slimy, warm baby landed on my bare chest the next. JT immediately released his soft, rhythmic cries. It was the sweetest sound I'd ever heard. I remember Nick saying, Our baby's head is cone shaped. Indeed, his head was pushed in on one side and the top reached up into a point. His body was clean and his coloring a healthy pink. His face was swollen, especially around the eyes. In fact he couldn't open his eyes until the following day for they were so swollen. JT was plump. He was solid. And he was hungry and he had the sucking powers of an industrial grade Hoover (more on breastfeeding in another entry).

It's been six weeks since I started writing this blog entry. I've been back at work for a month and a half now, and I've been working on writing JT's birth story on and off all this time.

Already memories of much of the physical pain has subsided. My fingers and hands are still weak and arthritic from wringing the sidebars on the hospital bed with strength that wasn't my own. My lower back is weak and feels misaligned from having back labor. In certain yoga poses, like bending forward with my legs wide apart, air rushes in where it doesn't feel good. After riding my bike for ten minutes, I thought my pubic bone was going to split. These physical changes are the lingering reminders that I pushed out a 9lb. 8oz. baby.

And emotionally? I still have amnesia around the birth. I'm happy that our baby was born healthy and strong. I'm happy that the birth went smoothly and there were no medical emergencies and that I was able to have the hoped for birth without medication. I'm happy that Nick and Umma were there for the birth, both playing an integral role. I'm happy that JT continues to be a thriving, happy, healthy, calm baby. I'm happy that Umma is here for so many reasons: to bond with her first grandchild, to help me recover from birth with her amazing cooking and general wisdom, to love and laugh with our baby and someday to teach him Korean. I'm happy that Nick has jumped right into fatherhood with ease and confidence, changing diapers, bathing, putting down baby to sleep, and giving him the occasional bottle when I pump. So many things are unfolding as I had hoped for, yet my heart remains closed, for now.

OK, who am I kidding, I can't stand it anymore! Baby, please, please, get moving. When the due date came and went last week, I wasn't too surprised the baby didn't come, though I was a little disappointed. And the few days immediately afterward, I was still OK, staying relaxed and busy. But now that it's been a whole week, I'm really getting impatient. I had crazy dreams last night about waking up to find my belly half full and was stricken with worry. I thought I had lost my amniotic fluids or part of the baby. I kept dreaming weird stuff like that, I guess I'm starting to worry.

A couple of days ago, the baby did drop a bit. His little feet aren't kicking the crap out of my ribs anymore, the kicks are farther down maybe an inch or two. I had slight lower back cramps again this morning after getting them one night about a week ago. I remember thinking then that by morning I'd be in full labor, but the cramps disappeared. The baby is moving less. He must be running out of space. As my mother-in-law said, he must be a butterball by now. Great, the thought of pushing out a Michelin baby is just what I need.

A part of me knows that the baby will come when he is ready and that that will be soon. I know that he HAS to come eventually, but each day of waiting is becoming longer and more tiresome.

One of the ways we are passing time as we wait for the baby: nursery decoration projects. This is a butterfly mobile hanging from a stick on fishing lines above the diaper changing station. It seems to do it's job; I've caught Umma sitting in the nursery a few times mesmerized by the gentle movement of the butterflies.

All materials were found around the house: the colorful cardboard paper from Giggles gift box, butterfly template from online, fishing line from hubby's fishing gear bag, and the stick from the backyard. I got the idea from a nursery design website.

Next nursery project is to make a canvas growth chart to measure our son's height from age one to ten. I got this idea yesterday when we were at Rockridge Kids buying a few last minute things like bottles, an elephant pacifier, Sophie the giraffe teething/squeaky toy, and the cutest owl bookends. We went their with the intention of buying a wall clock, but didn't find one we liked and ended up with all this other stuff. We've done well so far restraining ourselves from buying every cute little baby thing, so we splurged a little. Even though the things we bought yesterday are really adorable, they also have a functional purpose, which makes me feel less guilty in regards to mindless consumerism. How is that for self justification!

Our baby's due date came and went without the tiniest sign of his being ready to leave the womb. I had hoped that he would be a couple weeks early--as I'm sure most pregnant women hope for, but it looks like we are part of the statistics of first babies, especially boys, taking their sweet time. It's a strange head space to be in these last few days leading up to the due date and then now. A wide range of emotions and thoughts weave in and out of me daily with intense anticipation constantly lurking near by.

How do I describe how I feel these days? On the one hand I try to remain in the present moment, relishing these final days of quiet, time for myself (lots of it), and preparing in terms of making final touches in the nursery and around the house as well as for how our lives are about to change completely once the baby arrives. The first type of preparing is easy enough--straightforward, but the second type of preparing is vague and unclear. No matter how much I hear from others or I tell myself that life will be wholly different, that I'll fall in love in a way I've never loved before, they are hollow words at this point. No matter how much I try to stay calm and busy instead of succumbing to the waiting mode, a part of me knows I'm trying to fool myself into believing something that's forced. No matter how many times I've heard that during the first two weeks after the baby arrives we'll barely have time to come up for breath, I don't really believe it, I think it's an exaggeration, and I just want the baby in my arms, now! (If you ask me a week after the baby is born how I feel, I'm sure my perspective will have changed thoroughly.)

So this is how I manage my time these days, pretending not to be waiting, walking to try to get the baby to descend into the pelvis, eating nutritious and yummy food, sleeping whenever I feel tired, reading as much as I can, decorating the nursery, going to prenatal yoga, hanging out with Umma and Hubby, and all in all enjoying this time, though I'm a bit bored and a bit anxious.

Hubby and I went back and forth about giving our baby a Korean or an English name. He preferred an English name since our son will be raised in the US, and it would be a lot easier for everyone to say and remember an English name, but I preferred a Korean name since both of his parents are from Korea originally and our son will have his father's Anglo last name, I felt it important that part of his name reflect his Korean side. At first I was uncomfortable with our son having an Anglo last name when both of his parents look fully Asian. But I also realized that his having his father's last name is significant as the name carries his father's personal history.

We settled on a Korean first name, my Korean last name as his middle name, and Hubby's German adoptive last name as his family name. Looks like the confusion around one's name as it relates to one's identity that's prevalent among transnational adoptees continues on into our son's generation. Our son will have the option, of course, when he is older, to choose or alter his name to suit how he identifies himself.

With that decided, next we searched for a Korean first name that not only we liked but that was also relatively accessible to English speakers. We asked my umma and two older sisters for their input. We created a short list and tested out the ease of their pronunciation on Hubby. After several months, the whole family agreed on a name that we like in terms of the way it sounds, it's meaning, and the baby's father says it perfectly.

But decisions around our son's name doesn't stop here, however. Now, Hubby and I are in disagreement about the spelling of the Korean name. He prefers the English phonetic spelling that is most conducive for English speakers whereas I prefer the current transliteration of the Korean name that follows the standardization of Korean words written in English. Hubby is concerned our son's name will be mispronounced if we follow the standard transliteration and our poor son will end up having to explain and teach the correct pronunciation all his life. I, on the other hand, feel that our decision shouldn't be based on making English speakers more comfortable and that using the correct transliteration reflects the period in linguistic history when our son was born.

I guess we'll know the official spelling once the baby is born and we fill out the birth certificate, which, I hope, will be this week!

My fingers are stiff and brain is slow from not having written in a while. I've been wanting to keep steady updates of the pregnancy, but between a full-time job and pregnancy discomforts, it has been a struggle. Nevertheless, I'm happy now to be seated in front of my blog to write.

As of last Wednesday, my baby is officially full term, and he could be born any day now and no one would intervene. Our midwife thought maybe the baby was head up two weeks ago, so we got an ultrasound done. If the baby were head up, we'd have had to have an external version at 37th week. I don't know what his presentation was exactly, but the morning before the scheduled ultrasound, I swam for one hour, having heard that swimming helps baby's turn right side down, meaning head down. The ultrasound confirmed that our baby is head down and anterior, meaning facing backwards, which is ideal for smooth birth. So, he is locked in position (although there is always a chance of the baby flipping up from now until due date, but only a slim chance) and now I'm waiting for him to drop down into my pelvis, which is another sign of the baby preparing for takeoff.

These final weeks have been definitely the slowest. I feel as if I've been pregnant for years and with the end so near, I'm getting more and more antsy. Not to mention starting two to three weeks ago, the sheer size and weight of my belly and the forward pull has shifted my center of gravity, off-centering my balance and perpetually straining my back muscles. Movements are slower, I've got the pregnant woman's waddle, and I've succumbed to using the block in yoga--I just can't reach the floor in poses where I have to bend over my belly. Sleep has been elusive, getting up to pee two to four times a night, turning from side to side and readjusting the myriad of support pillows before settling in again, blowing my nose frequently, and, of course, dreaming non stop about everything and nothing. Between all this, I search for sleep.

Yet, despite all these third-trimester discomforts, today I feel pretty good. I had a streak of bad days, tired and irritable, for a good month, but now I feel good. I started my maternity leave week and a half ago, I've been swimming at the new pool in Point Richmond that's beautiful and chlorine free, I've continued my prenatal yoga practice, and perhaps best of all, my umma arrived from Korea at the end of February and she has been nothing but nurturing, comforting, and fun. We swim and cook together, talk for hours on end, and fantasize about what her first grandchild will be like and look like. The baby's father is so proud and happy these days. He strokes my belly every chance he gets and asks how's my son today? The baby recognizes his father's voice and gives him a few playful kicks. Lucky boy. He is coming into a nest so full of love.