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Pinky Ring

At our last visit to the midwife the day before Nou was born I weighed in at 185 - 60 pounds heavier than when I got pregnant. I was down to one skirt, one dress, a few tank tops, and my husband's shorts. My underwear was pinching my hips, digging into me so much as to leave deep red grooves in my legs by the end of each day. I was falling out of all of my tops and bras and my otherwise very cool maternity jeans were too tight at the low-rise waistband and I had not been able to wear my wedding ring for months already. I had nothing to wear and I was winging it every single time I had to get dressed to go anywhere;. There were a few tantrums, clothes were flung, tears of frustration were shed. It was just plain hard being that big, even if it was spread out over 69 inches.

Everyone told me that nursing the baby would melt off the weight; but they also reminded me that it had taken nine months to put it all on, it would take at least that long to work it all off.

So we birth the baby, and I know - I mean, I get that it's ridiculous to expect a flat stomach after carrying a growing baby for thirty seven and a half weeks. I know this. But I was not prepared for what greeted me the next morning when I undressed to get into the shower. There, above my hips, was a paunch so big Hamid and I mock panicked that there was another baby in there. I looked six months pregnant still and it scared the hell out of me. I grabbed the ream of flesh, shook it, cringed. It jiggled and I thought of 'The Night Before Christmas'. I cried. I prayed. I bargained with the Universe. Hamid poked the belly to confirm that it did indeed feel totally bizarre - all empty and squashy like that. It took almost a week and a half for my belly button to go back IN.

I still have a bit of a belly but I can at least feel my stomach muscles again and so am able to suck it in as best I can. Enough that I am willing to go out in public anyway... And it is melting off, slowly but surely.

Four weeks ago at a postnatal with the midwives I'd already lost 20 pounds. Now I suppose almost seven of that was Nou. At least two was the massive placenta I delivered (ick... I will share that experience in another, later blog post). And the rest, the other thirteen pounds, they just magically went away that first week. Thank goodness for small miracles.

We have yet another postnatal appointment later this week and I am so curious to know where I'm at now that I've been pacing the floors with a sometimes-fussy Nou. I think I must have walked at least ten miles this past week alone; figure eight-ing from the kitchen, around the foyer, up the stairs and back down again - over and over and over...

My goal is to have lost all this extra junk and have my wedding ring back on by Christmas...seems reasonable enough. In the meantime, this eternity band makes for a very decadent pinky ring.

Little Bird

I held you for 11 hours straight yesterday. I adore holding you - you are soft and pliable and you smell like love; there is a sweetness to you - a palpable yumminess. I happily give up showers and meals to waste hours and hours just watching you sleep, which you do quite a lot of, although less now that you're a good three weeks old and no longer the teeny, fragile, early baby that you were. I no longer worry that I'll hurt you or break one of your tiny bones when I pick you up but I am secretly afraid that the small fissures in your skull will never fuse...for all intents and purposes logic and the pediatrician say they will...I still measure their width and breadth each day with a gentle fingertip.

I have traced the perfect map of your face with my eyes a million times; I'm looking for pieces of myself, admittedly. The most of you is your papa through and through. You got the better part of the bargain there, to be sure but you have my mouth - or at least, the rosebud I was born with almost 35 years ago. I watch it open and close in a yawn that disappears your face for a moment - your little toothless gums reminding me we have teething to go through together this year. You wake up long enough to lift one eyelid, stretch your arms and legs from their lap nest (amazing how perfectly you fit there...we are yet like puzzle pieces, you and I) and dart your head forward, red-robin mouth wide open, into my breast in a wild pitch for lunch. You've been sleeping long enough that you must be starving but you cannot be bothered to open your eyes completely or meet your meal half way - you trust me to lift you and your little bird mouth into my arms and offer you what it is you're craving. And I do.

Batche Khoshgele

Mad Love

You are sleeping in my lap right now, curled up and mewling a bit at whatever it is you're dreaming of.
What do newborn babies dream of anyway?

Hamid and I went out the other day to pick up some necessities and left the baby with her adoring grandmother - it was the longest hour of my life and by the time we were on our way home I was practically begging Hamid to break the speed limit just to get me there sooner. It feels like Christmas every day - waking up (sometimes five times a night) to find this darling, tiny person, this most pure spirit, living our life with us. Of course, she's not even three weeks old yet and technically wasn't supposed to be here until two days ago but I cannot imagine growing tired of watching her, staring at her. Listening to the sprinkle of her voice. Or holding her while she sleeps... I even tasted her little fingers the other day - laughing at myself with Hamid at what a weirdo I am to be licking my child, but he confessed his own secret: he loves the smell of her breath. He huffs that baby daily, like the most beloved can of spray paint, taking in her quick, quiet, milky-sweet breathing and savoring it.

Girl with the most cake

I am not particularly good at typing one handed while breastfeeding a half-sleeping Nou, on two hours rest...but thanks to the magic of 'backspace', 'delete' you're none the wiser. It's also somewhat comforting to know that no one who reads this will have any idea that it actually took me nearly an hour to punch out these meager paragraphs... From the outside, I suppose my life looks much the same. Organized, or not-so-much, as it were...but certainly unruffled if the only place you look is here. I mean, there you have a quick post announcing Nou's arrival and one very sweet picture of a sleepyheaded baby. Easy - like Sunday morning - and voila a family is made. But I must come clean as now it's two full weeks since the birth of our little doll and I've said next to nothing, shared no real details, and only given a peek at who it was the universe so generously left for us to break our hearts over.

But my silence - it's certainly not for lack of anything to say, and it's not that her birth and moment-by-moment existence ever since isn't the most profound thing to happen to us; I guess I'm still processing the whole event. Waiting for a place of perspective, and perhaps an extra hour of sleep or two, not to mention two free hands (a crucial element for the free-flowing convergence of thought and type.) Idealist that I am, I'd honestly imagined myself propped up in the birthing tub (a Water Doula installed in our bedroom for the big event) with the laptop nearby, typing away between contractions...live blogging the birth of our child. Obviously that didn't happen. So I"m left to go back over the details of our natural homebirth in my mind with the eleven pages of notes (complete with timeline) Hamid sweetly penned during the hours of my labor as evidenciary support. I'm also spending an inordinate amount of time washing diapers and tiny clothes, gingerly clipping fingernails, massaging restless baby legs, and just generally fretting over the happiness, comfort and beauty of this little creature. Whatever writing I thought I'd be doing has been immediately usurped by her royal highness - and even if there weren't diapers and other immediate baby-needs I'd still spend 23 of my 24 hours simply holding her, staring at her, and marveling at her pure little spirit.

A peaceful, happy, even grateful sort of exhaustion has set in over the past two weeks. I've grown accustomed to responding to multiple midnight requests for food from the grasping little hands and mouth next to me in bed. But far from inspiring the oft-warned against post partum depression (otherwise known as 'baby blues') my tiredness has brought me all the closer to my own better half; unlocking tender things and pieces of myself I didn't even know were there. Hamid is used to the daily ritual of looking up to see my face inexplicably streaked with tears - he doesn't even ask anymore if I'm OK, because he knows I'm even better than just fine and that in a few minutes I'll look up to meet his gaze and eke out the only words I can manage in that blissful state of sheer love and gratitude: 'She's perfect...'

I've done better than that here, it seems - three whole paragraphs... it all amounts to the same two words though because she is....perfect. And I don't really care if I never have two hands to write with again. Holding Nou is the most fun thing. Ever.

Sleepyhead...