Par For the Course

Hello Dear Boobjuicers and Friends!

Both kids are napping at the same time! I should do the dishes. Or take a nap. So I'll write a blog entry. That makes the sense.

Enjoyed nursing on the Portland Streetcar this morning. Two men were brave and made smiley eye contact. Good on ya, fellas! Then we nursed in the dentist's chair during a cleaning - a bit tricky to be sure but preferable to having Jackie scream the house down. This led me to think once again of wacky nursing locations. I'm pretty sure the dental chair is my wackiest one - share yours with me in a comment! Which led me to think of locations - like blog locations. I'm probably not making the best use of blogger, but I wonder if there is somewhere more interesting to host my approximately twice monthly musings? It would also be fun to have more pages on a website - list of articles, list of places that are boobjuice friendly, topic-specific lists of links, lists of products I've found interesting/helpful. Perhaps I'm just feeling a bit listless... Ugh, sorry. Had to do it.

I have a plugged duct again. Usually these clear up on their own as long as one keeps on nursing, but this one is being stubborn. I've tried hot showers and baths, pumping, and yes, folks, I even managed to self nurse a bit to see if I could clear it. I feel pretty weird admitting that, which means everyone else probably feels even weirder, which means this is yet another subject around nursing which needs to be taken out of the closet and aired out. But anyway it didn't really accomplish anything. I also read at Dr. Newman's site that he has had success with localized ultrasound for clearing blocked ducts. Hm, what is ultrasound? Really high frequency vibrations. What else do we have around the house that vibrates? Suffice to say I don't think it worked. The thing that worked the best was going to bed and nursing side-lying until we both fell asleep. The nursing and the sleeping and the position probably all helped. Next step is some supplement starting with an L that my dear Dr. Rachael suggested. Ooo, I'm very linky today.

Pumping is going pretty well. Sukie and I are getting along. Currently I'm only running her off her internal rechargeable battery to see how long it takes to run it down. I'm planning to bring her to Indiana (visiting the in-laws) on the 8th though, so that experiment may get interrupted. Basically I don't want to go a week without pumping, just to keep supply up. I haven't decided what to do with the collected milk - will probably FedEx it home to my sister to put in the freezer. I've told a lot of breadwinning mamas to do that, so maybe I should try it to see what I'm getting these ladies into. Another possibility is to put it in the in-laws' freezer and Craig's list it for a local mama to pick up. Not sure if she would want to bother for what will probably be 9 ounces, though. Means a lot to me, but if you're going to the trouble of finding a donation and trusting a stranger, you probably want a bigger haul.

Post-partum anxiety is still a rat bastard and should be bitchslapped. I'm trying hypnotherapy. I found the hypnobirthing class did a great job reducing anxiety surrounding the birth, which went great, so why not? I know cognitive behavioral therapy is supposed to be very effective, too, but it sounds like a lot of work, and mamas, I am a busy busy lady!!! So far I like my new therapist, but I've had to bring Jackie each time, so we haven't gotten to the hypno part yet. After this week we'll probably try leaving her at home with Daddy, and the pumped milk stash as a back up. Good practice for going back to work. So I better go through the equipment in the cupboard - I bet all the nipples have aged past usefulness. Silicone is mortal, it would seem.

I go back to work 12/19, for three days a week, and 1/3/12 full time. This seems like an ideal way to ramp back up to the breadwinning. I also have the best boss at the kid-friendliest company on the planet. Okay, maybe not *the* kid-friendliest. But they let me use their dedicated lactation room at my second interview, and they throw an annual Hallowe'en party for the company kiddos. So when I said I wanted a little more leave than what was paid for, NiceBossMan said, "Just put it on the calendar so I know when to expect you." Ooo, which I haven't done yet, oops. Two other local mamas I know are not so lucky - one is going back full time from the get go (although perhaps no one suggested the "start back on a Wednesday" trick?) and the other only gets six weeks. The latter is criminal. The leave, not the mama. She seems very law abiding. But the Family Medical Leave Act promises 12 weeks, although not paid. Perhaps this is a financial decision and 6 weeks is what her company pays for. I can't imagine trying to show up showered, dressed, and coherent at 6 weeks. Tell me your return to work stories, mamas!

Ah, hubby is home. Maybe I'll go try to look useful, or take a nap, or help put groceries away.

Much love,

Suzi

Me and Sukie at the Crack 'o (three hours until) Dawn

Hello Dear Boobjuicers and Friends!

It's 4:45 here in Stumptown, and of course pitch black out. I'm up with the other dairy farmers, pumping and hoping that I get to finish before Jackie wakes up hungry. Okay the other dairy farmers probably aren't worried about the baby cows waking up. And they are probably outside in the chilly air, so really I have it good.

Long-time readers may recall that I named my previous breastpump, a Medela Pump in Style, Bessie. Well, for reasons to be explored in another entry, Bessie has been put out to pasture, and I now have Sukie, a Hygeia EnJoye... something. There's a number after that. But it has an internal, rechargable battery, which is good, because I couldn't find an extension cord this morning to be able to plug it in to the fancy child-proof socket covers that Hubby has diligently installed throughout the living/kitchen/dining/playroom. (I did mention our current apartment is rather... efficient, didn't I?) Anyway, I was tearing around like a madwoman looking for where the heck Hubby has stored the extension cords and getting more and more upset when I realized, hey, this thing is supposed to be able to run without being plugged in. Which it is now doing like a little champ next to me as I type. And I'm sure Matt put the extension cords somewhere very sensible, which is why I can't find them in my anxious pre-pre-pre-dawn state. Or better yet I probably put that one somewhere and forgot. Or Kiddo relocated it to under a cat. Who knows. But the whole thing made me super anxious.

Okay, yes, I have post-partum anxiety and everything makes me anxious. But for some reason pumping tends to make me anxious, even when I'm not as anxious about other things. For Robert, I sort of constantly had barely enough milk in the fridge and freezer, and just when I thought I'd caught ahead, he'd have a growth spurt, or Matt would start feeding him another half ounce in a feeding, and the supply would disappear faster than donuts in an office kitchen. Add to that the 45 minute commute on the LA freeway (45 minutes was in good traffic) and the last round of PPA, and the whole experience was less than spa-like. I think mostly I'm just worried about having enough. It's also sort of unrelaxing that things aren't in a routine yet, I just have to hope that I'll wake up before Jackie's hungry in the morning enough times to collect enough before going back to work. I'm not getting the sort of amounts that I used to get at my early morning pumping sessions, or even that I got when I first started pumping this time. Probably just a normal function of supply waxing and waning, and how long ago I nursed, and being tired. As a "trained peer counselor" I have lots of places to look for ideas on that. But it makes me anxious too. (I hope it's not a difference in the pump... seems unlikely as this thing is working fine and I got more at a couple sessions.)

As much as I like to march around advocating for pumping and working outside the home, I gotta say, it's no picnic, and I totally want to acknowledge that for any other mamas feeling the same way.

I hear Jackie again... better proofread and get things wrapped up here with Sukie.

Much love,

Suzi

A Month Already?

Wow! That went kinda fast. By way of a boobjuice update, Jackie is gaining weight nicely and going through diapers like a champ, so the most important things are all good. But the yeast is still with us. Grrr. Nothing like last kiddo, but not fun. When let down feeling changed from achy to prickly (it's hard to write a blog entry while pointed towards my husband's computer showing The Hulk. Edward Norton is a genius. I swear watching him eat breakfast cereal would be interesting.) Anyway, as I was saying. When I felt prickly I said "oh no you DIDN'T" and called my physician. After discussing my case history with Robert, she said she ordinarily wouldn't skip to fluconazole (diflucan), as being the Big Guns, but given my history, she would be willing to do so. I said I wanted to nip this sucker in the bud before it spoiled all my fun. So guess what I've got? Yep. Seven days into the prescription with a refill for seven more on the way. Not. Messing. Around. Plus I think the topical anti-yeast salve I was using was making my nipples itch. So I switched to coconut oil. I love coconut oil. I use it on baby bottoms, on mama nipples, and there's a really tasty recipe for a spread made out of coconut oil in Hilary Jacobson's Mother Food.

Supply seems to be fine, which is nice. I want to get the pumping going now before my supply calms down from that after birth make milk and lots of it reaction. But I don't want to freeze milk with yeast in it. So I've pumped and dumped a couple times, which sort of breaks my heart, but I'm not getting that much yet anyway. Soon, though, yeast or not, I'll want to start freezing to build a stockpile for my return to work.

And then more broadly - it's easier the second time around, or it has been for us. Some of that is likely just knowing what we were in for. Some of it is being able to relax and enjoy, and having (so far knock wood) a much milder case of post partum anxiety this time to spoil the fun. And Jackie seems like a pretty easy baby so far, although of course she has those afternoon/evening fussy periods where she wants to nurse all the time but won't stay latched on. My midwife suggested putting her in the carrier and going for a walk, so next time we'll give that a shot. Last night when it happened, my brother in law took her and I got to go take a hot bath. Ahhhh.

Which brings me to the biggest thing that is making it easier this time around. Help. My sister and her hubby are in our building. One time when Jackie was about a week old, Cathy came downstairs and just did the dishes. It was the day before my birthday, and that is the best birthday present I've gotten in a while, I must say. Friends have stopped by with food. And I got a birthday check, which I promptly turned around and spent on post partum doula services. This was a stroke of sheer genius. My birth doula also does post partum doula work, so she has been doing most of the hours. She comes over and does dishes or folds laundry or holds the baby so I can take a sitz bath (ah, hemorrhoids...) But she's also a mama and a lactation-friendly source of lots of interesting info on birth and new parenthood. So we can talk about yeast or is this a plugged duct or whatever, and she checks in on me and is smart about what to look out for in a new (again) mama.

If I was composing my first baby registry today, it would have way less stuff, and more services. Lactation consultant, doula services, massage, house cleaning... that's my latest splurge by the way. I am determined that we are going to clean up our own mess on an ongoing basis, but we had gotten far enough behind and are spending so much of our not-holding-a-kid time on laundry that I went ahead and had a service come in once to get us caught up. I figure it will be easier to try to keep it that way than get it that way. Not easy, mind you, but easier.

So that's the haps from boobjuice central over here. In a final note, recently heard from Mama Suzi to her eldest: "That's right. We don't put stickers on Mommy's nipples."

Much love,

Suzi

Not. Messing. Around.

Hello Dear Boobjuicers and Friends!

My little nursling is sleeping (for now) on my lap, and I am typing with my arms awkwardly aloft over her, laptop on my knees. We'll see how long that lasts. I still want to write up a comparison of the care surrounding a hospital birth and a birth center birth. But first I wanted to share some steps I have taken after Jackie's birth to make sure things go as well as they can.

Robert and I had latch challenges, yeast, and post partum anxiety (well me not him on that one) and this time I am determined to nip all that crap in the bud. After Jackie was born it looked to me like her jaw was pulled back a bit, which I suspected was contributing to our latch problems. So I got her some cranial sacral therapy - on her second day of life, in the birth center, from a fabulous woman who came the same day one of the post partum doulas called her. This made an immediate, visible difference in several ways, but we still had latch problems. So I had a lactation consultant come see us on day three, again, still in the birth center. Interestingly, she teaches latching totally differently from the woman I saw in Southern California. Could be a change in standard practice, or regional, who knows. But her way is easier, and is working pretty well now. She also suspected yeast and got one of the midwives to confirm this diagnosis. So I'm on crazy amounts of probiotics, and grapefruit seed extract, and Jackie's on probiotics too. The LC came to my home a few days later for a follow up. This has been tremendously helpful, and we are doing much better.

Then about a week, maybe nine days in, I noticed I'm scared of the balcony again. Smells like post partum anxiety. I am not having this crap this time thankyouverymuch. I immediately called my acupuncturist's office and got a next day appointment. It's helping too, and interestingly, the hypnobirthing techniques really help me to push the crazy thoughts away more effectively than I could before. I also discussed my placenta medicine with him and got dosing instructions. Yes, you read that right. Placenta. As in, I had that thing cooked, dehydrated, powdered, and encapsulated, and I'm swallowing it. "Eeeeew!" right? Well, not to me. Most mammals eat the placenta as sushi right after birth. This is much more innocuous - it actually looks a lot like the grapefruit seed extract capsules. And traditional medicine practices have used it for millennia for post partum anxiety and depression, to boost milk supply, and even to treat menopause. Frankly at this point if someone came up with some studies to show that PPA could be warded off by wearing banana peels in your hair, I'd be happy to give it a shot.

"Geez, Suzi, what did you spend on all this?" Well that's a good point. A non-trivial amount, although the cranial sacral was complementary with the massage that was part of the stay at the birth center (which is SHEER GENIUS). It's more than worth it to me. But then I am in a position to say that. A lot of women in this country don't have the option of just picking up the phone and calling some specialist at the first hint of trouble. And that doesn't feel right to me, particularly in the case of the lactation consultant. Some insurance companies will pay for LCs, and a lot of hospitals offer support in the form of one hopelessly overscheduled RN who is an IBCLC as well. I think we can do better. Every mama deserves a doula, an LC, whatever the heck it takes to ward off PPA and PPD, and a massage. And ice cream. This is one of the many, many ways we can, without guilt-tripping anyone, improve breastfeeding rates in this country, not to mention women's health generally.

Spread the word.

Much love,
Suzi

Jackie's Birth

Hello Dear Readers!

This is a totally unapologetic, no goo censored version of my birthing of my daughter. Uncensored. Meaning don't read it while you are eating. And I've sort of barely proofread it because I need to go pee before my little blessing wants to nurse again! But I wanted to get it written before more time had passed.

Much Love,
Suzi


I woke up with more frequent practice surges, and they felt more like menstrual cramps than their predecessors. After some standard morning routine stuff, I called my doula, Carissa, and described what was going on. She thought they were early labor, but of course that could go on for a while. I said what I wanted to do was go to the grocery store and then have a quiet afternoon, maybe watch a movie. Carissa thought that sounded good, it was a nice morning, and we could check in later.

The surges got a bit more intense while I was grocery shopping, which kept me focused, which is good because I am usually a grocery store dawdler. Not this time, boy howdy. By the time I reached the checkout counter I was needing to belly dance through the surges (subtly, I hope). I of course got the slowest checker in Oregon. By the time I got home I was glad I didn't have to drive anymore. I came in the door (with only the two lightest grocery bags) and said, "I think this baby's coming." Matt leapt into action. I asked him to call Erick to come get Robert, then go get the rest of the groceries (he very wisely put the meat straight into the freezer), and I went off to call Carissa again. Then I called Melissa, my lead midwife. She agreed that it was early labor but pointed out that it could go on for days or even stop. I felt skeptical.

I went to the bathroom, needing to poop, but not able to sit still enough on the toilet to accomplish this task. Cloth diaper mamas are not afraid to poop on a bathmat! Thank heaven. Carissa was getting ready to come check on me, and thankfully I had suggested that she call before actually getting in the car, because by the time she did, I had decided to go to the birth center. Katherine, assistant midwife, asked if we could give them half an hour - "Probably?" the idea horrified me but it probably took that long to get clothes on and get me and the stuff down to the car. A slightly bewildered neighbor held the elevator for us and let us go ahead, probably not wanting to see my water break in the elevator (fair enough!), wishing us good luck. Walking was hard but sort of felt good, in fact moving around felt better than not. The car ride was challenging. I rolled down the window a bit for the air, and Matt got us there in less than ten minutes (LOVE Portland). Apparently I was screaming through surges (well I'll say moaning really loudly) on the ride, too, with said window open. (Um, Hi Portland! We love you…) We pulled up to the birth center and Carissa opened the door. I yelled through another surge and Carissa took my hand and said, "That's the last one you have to do in the car." Hallelujah!

Getting up the stairs to the front door was interesting. We were in a downstairs room, for which I was grateful. I don't remember a lot of the sequence of events from this point. I know I was leaning on the tub, listening to it fill. I remember crawling into the tub. The water was pleasant, but not the Nirvana of Comfort I had built up in my mind (apparently for some mamas it is) and I couldn't really find a position that felt good. I tried a couple, sitting cross legged and leaning on the edge of the tub, laying back on Matt. The surges were very powerful by this point, and I was trying to keep my tone low as I moan/screamed through them. I also did a lot of squeezing Matt's extremities, apparently cutting off circulation to his hand a couple times but mostly favoring forearms and calves. I remember asking if my body could do this without my brain, and being reassured that in fact it would do so better. "Can we take my brain out and put it in the fridge?" I think I asked. Because really, it wasn't that the surges hurt, so much as that they were so powerful and overwhelming that I just wanted to let them happen without having to be present for them mentally. This, of course, is the point of hypnobirthing, but having spent the first five centimeters in Fred Meyer, I missed my chance to really establish that great hypnotic state in which I would be able to let the surges wash over and past me like an ocean wave. But who knew this would go so fast!

So at some point we got out of the tub and tried the toilet, sitting forwards and backwards. Not comfy. So we moved to a birth stool. I don't remember when we started pushing, I think in the tub, but on the birth stool we were PUSHING. I was instructed to pull down with my arms and push through the surges. This felt counter intuitive - I wanted to push up with my arms. Neither way was doing the trick. I felt the baby's head, and then again a while later, and it hadn't progressed since moving to the birth stool. "She's stuck!" I wailed. "She's not stuck." Katherine assured me. "She hasn't moved down any." "Then it's time to change position." They put me in the bed on my back with my knees in the air. This felt MUCH BETTER. it helped the pressure on my back (not like back labor but not yummy), it slowed down the surges a little bit for a while, which was a pleasant rest, and my pushing felt different.

At some point in the tub I had complained that I didn't want to scream any more but it didn't feel voluntary. I tried singing/harmonic chanting through them, which helped some. I tried saying, "yes," to encourage my brain to accept the surges as a good thing (I got this from a home birth mama years ago, felt goofy but helped for a bit). Well, by the time we were in the bed pushing, there were wild banshee screams coming out of me and I had no say in the matter. My throat was getting tired, even though I was sipping Gatorade or water between every contraction. While I was on the birth stool I got hungry (recall I didn't get lunch after the grocery store - thank goodness for that medium decaf mocha freddo I had while shopping!) The midwives offered me food but I found it difficult to believe eating could be a good idea. Wasn't I supposed to be vomiting? So at this on the bed pushing like heck phase I said, "I'm running out of steam." "Then you need to eat." A popsicle was selected as most appealing to me - it was probably the best popsicle I ever ate. Carissa fed me bites between contractions.

The pushing was making progress at this point, and the feeling would change and the reaction of my Birth Posse (Hubby, three midwives, plus doula equals birth posse!) would change to let me know we were getting somewhere. At some point they offered me an oxygen mask, not insisting but suggesting, with which I was happy to cooperate. The decelerations in the baby's heart rate were acceptable but getting more pronounced and I wanted to do anything necessary to help her bounce back as fast as possible. The mask was hot and I didn't like to wear it during surges/pushes, but I put it back on or asked for it back between. This was when "sleep breathing" to let go of the surge became really helpful, the baby's heart rate reacted to my deep breathing fairly immediately. Soon she crowned, and I could feel her head coming out. The stretching became burning, and I felt some tearing. "OUCH!" at the end of push moans. Technique says slow down to let your perineum stretch more and I remembered this but I needed to be DONE and was okay with the discomfort.

Then her head was out! Yay! So why wasn't I done? Well, she was facing to the side. Left side, specifically, which makes sense because sleeping on my right felt best for most of my third trimester. Also, her hand was up by her cheek. So pushing out her shoulders was as hard or maybe harder than pushing out her head. Katherine took her hand and pulled her arm out (I think, I should verify with Matt) and then YAY! There's a warm, gooey baby on my tummy!!! The relief I felt from the surges being done was immense. I had spent a lot of time in the labor telling myself this was just a moment in time, it would be over soon, etc., and here it was, done! Baby! She felt just right resting on my heart where she belongs. The midwives were happy with how she looked and was sounding and everything, and I was over the moon. When the placenta came out I got another big surge (not nearly as big as the ones that got the baby out) and a gush of warm jello-like feeling and liquid, and then that was it. Done. I birthed my baby out my vagina without any meds (which is ONLY because I was in the birth center because I almost asked for them at least a dozen times but the thought of the trip to the hospital stopped me) just like I wanted. Several times during the experience I thought to myself, well if THIS is what I was missing it was silly of me to be so upset about how Robert's birth went! But now I am so grateful for this birth experience. When the midwives told me Jackie was 9 pounds 3 ounces I was astounded. I don't know how many times after that I said "Nine pounds?!?!?"

I needed stitching up, but they wanted to feed me first to get my strength up and let the swelling go down a bit. "Oh okay," I murmured skeptically, and then, "OOOooo, pasta!!!" I munched my way through half a (massive) serving of veggie lasagna from Pastini, which was delicious. Soon they got me up to go pee - I had gotten to the birth center around 2, and Jackie was born at 5:24. The labor was so lightening fast that I didn't manage to pee - even when I was laboring on the toilet I couldn't get the pee to come out. About 2/3 of the way to the toilet I got woozy, and when they sat me down I realized I was going to faint. I woke up to Melissa holding me up like a teddy bear, saying "are you with me Suzanne?" I dreamt during the faint and woke up with a song in my head that I had heard on the radio on my drive from the grocery store (dancing on the edge of the Hollywood sign…). Still no peeing accomplished. They put me in a wheelchair and got me back to and into bed. I lay there feeling like maybe I ate more lasagna than was really wise for a while, but eventually felt better, and we got me onto a bedside commode. PEEEEEE! Seriously you know that scene in the second Austen Powers movie where they get him out of cryosleep? Lots and lots of pee.

Now it was time to stitch me up. I was super apprehensive about the lydocaine, and asked Susannah (apprentice midwife) to pet my head and chat with me to distract me. It wasn't too bad, a couple of the shots in the perineum were pretty stingy but it was much better than when I was 15 and needed stitches in my face from a fall. Katherine stitched me up while Melissa watched, and Melissa praised Katherine's work, which made me feel good. They used purple thread, which amuses me because they know I like purple. Another trip to the bedside commode and it was time for sleep!

More thoughts later on the stay at the birth center, etc.

Introducing Nursling #2

Hello Dear Boobuicers and Friends!

I only have a minute, but I wanted to announce that I am once again officially a boobjuicer, as Ms. Jacqueline made her debut Sunday 9/18 at 5:24 pm. She was a whopping 9 pounds 3 oz and was born super fast - I woke up feeling like something was different, figured I had tons of time, went to the grocery store (in retrospect, this was perhaps an error), and came home feeling like, nope, this means business. My cervix disappeared fast but we had to push for a couple hours, and she came out sideways. So if anyone would like to explain to me how exactly I pushed out a 9 lb baby sideways with no drugs, I'm all ears. Holy crap. Anyway I'm feeling pretty good - sore where you would think I would be sore after that, couple stitches, but waaaay better than 2 days after a c-section. Which is not to frighten anyone, a c-section is totally survivable, but this way is easier afterwards, I will say.

And in case anyone is wondering if you can have latch challenges on your second kid, yes. Yes you can.

More later, I hear baby noises.

Much love,
Suzi

Busy Gestating.

Hello Dear Readers!

The entire month of August escaped me with no blog entry. Not that I didn't have anything to say, mind you (that pretty much doesn't happen, you will no doubt be shocked to hear). But I have been so busy preparing for the arrival of Blessing #2 that the month came and went and all the blog entries just rattled around in my head making me just that much more scattered and confused. Plus hubby is shooting a documentary, and my mom came to visit, and we all went to the beach (I think I'm supposed to call it "the coast" now that I'm an Oregonian but it hasn't sunk in yet) and oh, yeah, there's that job thing, with the 40 hours per week and the paychecks. Kind of important. All of which is going on while I am all big and pregnant and tired. But all this sort of pales in comparison to the todo list for this baby.

Here is the stuff I'm doing, or supposed to be doing, just to prepare to have ProtoPerson exit my uterus:

Yoga
Walking
Hypnobirthing practice - solo hypnosis with audio files, practice with husband, listening to affirmations, birth breathing practice
Make birth music mix (Hubby is on point on this one, being as he is the King of iTunes)
Perineal massage (massage is not always relaxing, I must say)
Kegels
Practice belly dancing
Pack birth bag

And then we still have prep for the actual baby:
Boil diapers (bought a massive pile of used Fuzzibunz off Craig's List - yay - but want to sterilize)
Bring new dresser in from balcony where it is outgassing (mmmm, pressboard) and load mass quantities of washed, folded hand me downs into it (currently they are in piles on my dresser, the new changing table, etc...)
Finish washing new baby clothing received
Set up loaner arms-reach cosleeper (thanks Mama G!)
Make dinners for freezer to help with crazy first weeks of life
Review stuff needed list and obtain (I think all we have left is a pad for the new changing table, and frankly I'm tempted to use old towels this time around...) (and yes, we needed a new changing table, to have one in our bedroom given that Robert is still in diapers. But I got it used from Craig's List, too.)

And things I'm doing to try to get the apartment in order before baby arrives:
Finish purging boxes of paper brought down from storage unit
Organize "desk" (now a vertical shelf unit, since all I ever do is pile it with stuff and then use my laptop at the dining table anyway)
Update mint.com, sort out budget
Shampoo carpets (okay, to be fair, I'm making Matt do this one, but I gotta get all my stuff out of the way before he can get it done).

In comparison, here is Mother Nature's todo list for birthing and motherhood:
Have sex
Wait nine months, eat a lot
Breastfeed, cuddle, eat more

Sometimes I wonder if I'm missing the elegant simplicity of this process.

Meanwhile I have my first live phone service session for the Nursing Mother's Counsel tomorrow. Woohoo! I did message checking for a week in August, and got zero messages. None. Which apparently happens sometimes, but I was disappointed. So now I have to be brave and start with live phone calls. But I'm pretty excited.

And lastly, check out this radio program from last year's Big Latch On PDX. You can hear me right near the beginning, and around 15:30 too. The whole thing is terrific though, give it a listen.

I hope you are all enjoying the last hurrah of summer before school, fall, etc.

Much love,
Suzi