The Midnight Meltdown

In general, our daughter Rachel is an amiable, cute as can be, well behaved little girl. Until it is time for us to go to bed, that is. The change in her sleep schedule has roughly corresponded with my going back to work and she seems to have an uncanny sense for adjusting her volume according to how tired her parents happen to be at the time. A more polite child would tone it down a bit when her mommy and daddy kiss her goodnight and turn off the light. Not our Rachel though. She will not immediately launch into a full blown tirade. Usually she will wait about ten minutes or so, so she can be most likely to catch us when we are drifting off to sleep. I see this as quite ingenious on her part as this tactic increases the shock value of the first scream ten fold. We have learned quickly that the first scream will never be an isolated incident either. At this time of day we can count on it quickly snowballing into a unholy and demonic tirade.

Bree has bourne the lions share of the burden of trying to get Rachel to sleep during these epic nocturnal outbursts. For that I am extremely grateful. Her bossum often seems to provide the only solution on most of these occasions. The problem, however, is that even the bossum itself is rarely a quick fix. Feeding takes time, and even when Rachel drifts off to sleep and she goes back into her crib, as soon as she realizes it is dark and that nobody is holding her, she inevitably restarts the process.

We have worried that our little girl will be one of those babies that you can't put down because they always want to be held. So we consider whether or not to try to break her of this early on by putting her down in the bouncer or putting her to bed when she is sleeping or is very calm. The thinking being that this will make her more accustomed to being in a position where we are not cradling her. But then, we think that hey, this baby isn't even two weeks old yet! Why shouldn't we be holding her all the time? Babies like to be held. After all, they've spent most of their time, thus far, snugly tucked away in a nice, warm uterus. So it should be only natural that they would want to held all the time. But how much holding is too much? I guess this is just one of the many questions that we will struggle with over the years that will someday seem inconsequential. For now, we just want to do the right thing were we can strike that happy balance between her needs and ours.

As with this morning, when the alarm clock goes off at 6:30 after being awake most of the night, I'm sure it is only natural for me to want Rachel to be able to lay happily and quietly in her crib regardless of whether or not she's sleeping. I know that that is not realistic, and I don't hold it against Rachel. In fact, this evening, she has been more angelic than she has ever been since she was born. We gave her a bath and slicked down her natural mohawk. Best of all she smiled at her daddy. That smile has a way of making everything else that happened the night before ok. If she doesn't hold a grudge, I guess I won't either.

As an aside, after my alarm went off this morning, the radio was playing for a long time without my fully waking up. The DJs were discussing the recent news that Sarah Silverman and Jimmie Kimmel had broken up. When I finally woke up, I realized that I had incorporated this discussion into my dream. I dreamed that Jimmie and I were buddies and that I had to go talk to him about what had happened between him and Sarah. In real life, I really don't care, but I awakened very concerned for him.

Rachel's First Outting

On this past Saturday morning as the temperature here in Denver was climbing steadily toward the hundred degree mark, we decided that it would be a good idea to take our daughter Rachel on her first outting to the mountains. After all, she was 10 days old already and hadn't even been outside the Denver city limits yet. Bree's mom was in town also and we thought it might be nice for her to get out into the high country while she was here in Colorado, see some scenery, and get out of the heat for a while.

Rachel performed admirably as I hoped that she would. Her older brother Owen, had always seemed to like riding in the car for whatever reason, which made it much easier for us to take him places. However, I have heard that this is not the case with all babies, so I was admittedly relieved.

So it was a day of first for our new daughter, for not only did she make her first trip to the mountains, but she also paid a visit to her first brew pub when we were in Nederland. Some people may not consider that to be such a momentous occasion, but considering my Milwaukee/German/beer guzzling heritage, I can't pass up taking special note. While there wasn't much beer guzzling happening on this particular occassion the Rueben was passable and they served an interesting 3 bean baked bean dish as a side.

After lunch we spent some time going through some of the little shops in town and had a cup of coffee outside by a train car turned coffeeshop. Instead of coffee, Rachel opted for some fresh milk. We took the long way back to Denver and went through Gold Hill. Gold Hill is a wonderful little town tucked away in a valley on a dirt road several miles west of Boulder. There is one tiny, rustic general store, and the old restaurant was recently reopened, but other than that there are not really any specific attractions. What is cool about the town, though, is that it is made up mostly of the original old log cabins from the mining days which are now long-past. The population seems to be a mix of hippie artist, escape the city types along with a fair number of curmudgenly long time residents. It is my understanding that the one room school house in Gold Hill is the last functioning one room school house in the state of Colorado. Rachel appeared impressed. Like her father, she already seems to have a melancholic affection for a past she never knew.

Will Work for Smokes

Some time ago I had decided that it would look good if I put in a stone wall with a raised flower bed along my south fence in the backyard. So recently, Bree and I made a trip up to Lyons, where the good sandstone is quaried , and placed an order for a full ten thousand pounds to be delivered the following week. Half of the stone was devoted to building the wall. The other 5000 pounds is still stacked next to the garage and will be used to build a patio area.

As with most of my projects, this wall and flowerbed turned out to be more work than I had originally anticipated. Hauling the stone in from the alley, leveling the plane, and stacking the stones to construct the actual wall had been a pretty grueling task in and of itself. Almost every day lately we have had high temperatures in the 90's, which has not make things any easier on those of us choosing to engage in strenuous physical activity during the afternoon hours.

A couple of days ago I finished up the wall. So now all that was left to do was to backfill it with dirt. The wall was actually a little taller than I had originally anticipated and it was clear that this was a job that was going to take more than a few bags of topsoil from the Home Depot. As luck would have it, a crew had started digging the foundation for a new duplex on a vacant lot up the block earlier this week. I took it upon myself yesterday afternoon to go over and ask if it would be ok to take some of the dirt away for my own personal use. I got the permission, although I'm not so sure that the front end load driver who gave me the go ahead had any authority to do so. He just said that if I had a well barrel to go ahead and help myself. While I don't actually own a wheel barrel, I moved quickly to borrow one and was at work within the hour loading the sandy soil up with my shovel and pushing the loads unsteadily through the alley down the block to my back yard.

By the time I had hauled eight loads, I was soaked with sweat and had that nagging feeling again that I had bitten off more than I could chew. For all the work it felt like I had done, it hardly seemed like I had made a dent in the job. As I was shoveling the sandy dirt for my 9th load, a scraggly looking guy approached me holding a beat up old utility bucket and glass squeegee asking if I could use some help. I looked him up and down. He was a tall, lanky white man wearing a dirty white t-shirt and a pair of tattered shorts. I noticed immediately that he was missing a couple front teeth, but he did not smell bad at all, certainly not in comparison to the overpowering aroma of dog shit that was wafting from across the alley from somebody's backyard. As for the teeth, I wondered whether or not they had disappeared as a result of poor dental care, or if I was looking at a case of meth mouth.

My first response was to politely decline his offer. Oh that's not necessary I told him, but all the while while thinking, 'hmmm, could this guy actually do the work?' He was pretty wiry looking and this dirt was really heavy. The man was persistent though. He told me he was only trying to earn a few honest bucks, just enough to buy a pack of cigarettes and he said he wasn't the kind to be standing out on street corners looking for handouts. He chuckled and said "I smoke Spirits (American Spirits), and they're over four bucks a pack now." I'll admit thought that this was funny that he should say that. For a guy so obviously down on his luck, that he should be picky about the brand of cigarette he was saving up for, and because it is a brand I myself am partial to myself, I agreed to let him do some work. After all, anyone who smokes all natural cigarettes with a picture of an Indian on the pack can't be too bad.

He introduced himself as Mike and told me he was from Ogden, Utah. As soon as I handed him the shovel he threw himself into the work. He started off at such a pace I worried he would wear himself out right away in the heat. Mike told me that he had worked construction for years, so this was no big deal. "What's up then?" I asked. "Why are you out on the streets? What's going on that you're out trying to wash car windows and not working?"
"Well, I was having some problems with my old lady, he replied, and just one thing led to another. We were camping one night up in Ogden Canyon and we got to fighting. I got up and told her I was going to the liquer store, and well, now here I am. That was five weeks ago now."

I walked into the house where I found Bree vacumning. She saw how sweaty and dirty I was and asked how things were going. "Great! I hired a homeless guy to finish it up for me." I announced. I could tell that Bree didn't share my enthusiasm. "You know Elizabeth Smart was stolen by a homeless man" she pointed out. "Well yes, now that you mention it. Well, maybe just keep the house locked up when we're out there." I grabbed a bottle of water out of the refrigerator and went back out to help out and do some other work in the yard.

A couple of hours later Mike had just about finished the job. I was amazed. Not only had he done all the work, but I'm pretty sure that he finished it up in a lot less time than it would have taken me. He had worked like a horse. Before I paid him I talked to him a little bit more about his situation and how he came to be doing what he was doing. I asked if he ever worked day labor through one of the many agencies in the area. "No, not really, I like to get up a little later in the morning." He said, "I don't really need to be in this situation right now. I tell myself I'm out here learning how to be humble." he paused "But really that's a bunch of bullshit, I guess what it comes down to is that I'm just being mean." He went on to say that he had been talking to his old lady on the phone a couple of times and had told her that he would be going back, but he was just going to make her wait a little longer. However, as far as Mike was concerned, he was not homeless at all, he was living in a tent he had set up in a friends backyard, so things were pretty good. However, things apparently were not always so good. He told me that he had been homeless here in Denver for two years a while back. What he said next surprised me. He basically explained that he had been homeless for so long because he had gotten strung out on drugs and had "gotten too comfortable. They make it too easy to be homeless here in this town. They give you food, clothes, a place to stay, you really don't have to do anything. It would be better if they took some of that money and made people learn a trade or something."

Too easy to be homeless? No incentive to find work? The concepts he was expressing didn't sound like what I would have been expecting to hear from someone, who by most standards, was pretty down on his luck.

I handed him $25, which was much more than he had asked for. He thanked me and said that he thought that was more than fair. All he was looking for was a little cash in return for some honest work. In fact, this was going to cover his expenses for the rest of the week. He smokes about a pack a day, and of course, he does like his morning Starbucks he said with a smile. We shook hands and I wished him luck. $25 well spent, although one of these days I'll have to write about how I feel about the regressive nature of taxes on tobacco products.

Welcoming Rachel Alexandra to Our Family

For years now I have been pretty sure that I have wanted a daughter. Three days ago that desire came to fruition when a beautiful little girl came into this world at 9:30 in the evening on July 10th. For my wife Bree, it was a long pregnancy, somewhat longer in fact than what she had been anticipating. Through most of the pregnancy she and her doctor's had set her due date to be June 22nd. The official due date was later pushed back to June 29th based on the early ultrasound results. However, the of June came and went with no baby. So almost two weeks later, when my wife seemed to have given up almost all hope of ever going into labor on her own, we went in for a scheduled induction at the most unpleasant hour of 5:30 AM. My suspicion is that the medical staff doesn't want its patients overly alert or energetic so that they will be bothering them will all sorts of questions or requests.

At 10:30 in the morning, after several hours of sitting around and waiting, the doctor finally came in and broke Bree's water bag in the hopes that that alone would send her into labor. In many cases this is supposed to work, particularly with women who are as far along as she is and who have already borne one or more child. But as with the last time Bree's water broke when she had Owen, she did not go into hard labor afterwards. This was a disappointment as Bree and was hoping for the birth to be as natural as possible. So at about 4:30 in the afternoon the doctor's started a slow pitosin drip.

Shortly after five, when Dr. Elizabeth Warner, her primary Ob/Gyn arrived. She came in and after a little small talk proceeded to deliver a very tough love speech to Bree and myself about the risks involved in starting a chemical induction at this point. The primary issue involved the increased risk for uterine rupture in patients who have undergone previous c-sections. While we were both somewhat aware that there were some increased risks involved, neither of us were thinking that the risks were anywhere near as significant as what she was now describing. I think we both came away from this meeting with the doctor feeling more than a little disheartened. There is no question that we both felt that the prospect of Bree's having to go through another c-section was now greater than ever. And while I had been worried about some sort of catastrophic incident before, our talk with the doctor only made my concern much more acute.

The turning point seemed to be about the time when our doula, Becky, arrived around 5:30. She and Bree had been working together for quite some time preparing for this day, and to be honest, I had been hoping for some time that she would get there to add another perspective to what was fast turning into a very stressful situation. Becky's presence seemed to have a positive affect on my wife almost immediately. Becky's attitude was positive from the start and she was able to give Bree the honest and caring encouragement that she was needing desperately at this time.

Amazingly, as Bree's outlook seemed to improve, she also began to have some serious, get down to business contractions beginning around 6. She also began to feel very sick to her stomach and was spending more time in the bathroom. At first, I did not even recognize this as the actual labor kicking in, but Becky assured me that everything that we were seeing were good signs and that she remained confident that Bree would be able to do this on her own, without surgery. Becky was confident in her role as birth support. She was like some sort of touchy-feely field general directing my to rub my wife in places where she should be rubbed, hold heat packs to her back, hold her hand when it needed holding and to get ice from the ice machine down the hall to make ice packs to cool her forehead. All this time, while I did what she asked of me, I remained focused with hawk-like intensity on the baby's heart rate monitor. At one point, while Bree was in the bathroom, I noticed a sustained drop in the heart rate, where the rate dipped to around 70 or so beats per minute. This is considered dangerously low for any baby at this point in the delivery. I went immediately to the nurses station across the hall to request that somebody check on my wife. At the same time, the doctor and nurse, rushed into the room from across the hall where they had been monitoring. They basically dragged Bree off of the toilet and back into bed where they could make sure that they were getting an accurate reading on the baby. Thinking about this now, the memory seems almost hazy and dreamlike, but at them time this incident was absolutely terrifying and intense.

From here on out the order was for Bree to remain in bed where they could make certain that the monitors were all in place and were functioning accurately. The doctor checked her dilation level and found that she was at 9 centimeters. I was amazed because only about a half an hour before she had been dilated to only 6 cm. A series of hard retches in the next few moments put her at the full 10cm and the time for the honest to goodness pushing was on.

After only a few the doctor pointed out the baby's dark hair barely visible down in the birth canal. A few pushes after that the amount of hair I could see had increased to the size of about a half-dollar. Things progressed very quickly, even though Bree was obviously in a great deal of pain. She screamed and cried and at one point begged for an epidural, but Becky sitting close at her side somehow convinced her to continue. I'm afraid, that if I as the husband had tried to tell her at this point that she didn't need any pain medicine, I might have been spending the rest of my life trying to live it down.

Even at this point I was not so sure that she would be able to deliver this child without surgical intervention so I was very relieved when Dr. Warner announced that she was confident that the head was past the pubic bone. The head looked like the top of a beer can covered in wet black hair as it slowly inched its way out of my wife. When the whole head was finally out the doctor grabbed on to it and began pulling on it very hard. I was afraid that she would break the child's neck. But from here on out, it was only a couple of minutes before Rachel came out. Although Bree maintains that this was actually the most painful part of the process, as the shoulder, hips, knees and feet passed through her with their uneven surfaces. She was all purple and wasn't breathing when they first pulled her free from the birth canal, so they promptly cut the cord and took her over to a nearby platform where after sucking some fluid out of her throat, our daughter took her first breath and let out her first cry.

The relief I felt at this point can not be overstated. The nurses checked her out and everything looked good. Furthermore, until now, we had not know the sex of the baby. Through most of the pregnancy I had been thinking it would be a girl, somehow I was expecting to see a penis and scrotum when this baby was finally pulled free. I looked closely, but there was none, which was still fine with me. I miss my son every day more than I can express sometimes, but I am grateful to have a little girl in my life and expect that she will grow into an incredible person who my wife and I can have endless fun raising. Once again, I am proud to say that I am a father, a proud father. This little girl is so lovely and already is showing her own personality.

We celebrated tonight with a bucket of fried chicken from KFC and a bottle of Alsatian Riesling.

Soon I know it will be time to feed again so I need to get some sleep and be ready.