1. After I gave birth, I was SO PARCHED I ate cups full of ice cubes because I couldn't drink water. I normally HATE eating ice. I never do it. But I was so thirsty it was the best "water" I ever had.
2. I had never felt so damn tired and heavy in my life as I did after giving birth to the boys. I don't know if it was the anesthesia or the effort or both, but man was I pooped and I felt like I weighed 400 pounds on that operating table!
3. The look of panic (!) on my OB/GYN's face when I delivered Adrian and we all realized I'd need a C-section was priceless. I knew what she was going to say, and I actually said something to her like, "I know I need a C-section. It's ok--just get this baby out!" She looked relieved and jumped to it.
4. There was a frightening moment before they did the C-section on Sebastian where his heart rate dropped and one of the nurses said, "We need to get his baby out NOW."
5. Marcy called Adrian "fiesty"the first time she ever met us, and I said to her, "Now that's a euphemism!" And she deemed Sebastian's curl "the Satan swirl" that first week, too. She was right on!
6. We almost were convinced to transfer the boys to Newton-Wellesley once they moved out of the level 3 NICU. But we loved Marcy and Judy so much after just one week, we refused to move them. I'm so glad we didn't!
7. I think I still can recite the entire BWH menu by heart.
8. They let me back into my room CWN 856 even after giving birth, when I should have been sent up to a labor recovery floor (the 8th floor seems to be more for people on bed-rest...). The nurses were so kind to lobby to keep me there since I'd already been there 6 weeks. I'll be forever grateful to them. Melinda was the nurse on duty the night I came back to my room and she was the one who helped me learn to pump (super important for those preemies).
9. The constant beeping and stimulation in the NICU is imprinted in my brain like a song. As scary as all the beeping and noises were at first (the machines beep when the lines that monitor breathing and heart rate drop off the babies' bodies), they became almost comforting after a while. One my last few days visiting the NICU to see Adrian, I was actually purposeful about taking in my surroundings and trying to remember the sights and sounds of the place.
10. I will forever associate ABP's Harvest Pumpkin Soup with my bed rest. It was such a great treat to get food NOT from the hospital after a while!
11. The chaplain used to come visit me on a regular basis! I am not religious, but this chaplain was young-ish and very nice. We just hit it off. She'd come by to check up on me and to chat for a long time each week. She brought me cookies one day and halloween candy another. I forgot to get her contact info... :(
12. Carlos didn't believe I was in labor when I was finally actually in labor! We'd had so many false alarms and he had a dream that I was going to have the boys on 11/27. He was so convinced his dream was prophetic that when a friend called me to come visit right in the middle of when I was in labor, Carlos told her to come!! I had to yell at him that I was IN LABOR RIGHT THEN and that, while she could still come, I didn't think it would be the best use of her time!
13. The day after the boys were born my family came to meet them in the NICU. It was like 60-something degrees at the end of November and we were out on the roof deck of the NICU. I hadn't been outside in 6 weeks, and it was like heaven!
14. My Auntie Mimi bought me a philosophy gift set while I was on bed rest. It was the Amazing Grace scent. It will always be my favorite perfume/lotion smell because I will forever associate it with the boys' arrival and my stay at the BWH.
15. Despite the stress and the scariness of the time, those 6 weeks at BWH and the 2 months we visited the NICU after were some of the best days of my life. So hard to explain why, and I doubt I'd say the same if things had turned out differently. But they were absolutely magical days...and despite being an obsessive worrier and neurotic, anxious person nearly all the time, I was completely calm when it mattered the most. I don't know where the strength came from, but looking back, it was like an out-of-body experience.
16. My brother cooked us a lasagna. The next day, Carlos had appendicitis. And my brother cooked Thanksgiving dinner and brought it to me...and I went into labor on Black Friday. Watch out for his cooking!
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