A Mother's Love

Love is an interesting word. It can have so many meanings. You can love pie or cake. You can love snowboarding (which I do) and tennis. You can love mini cadbury eggs. You can love shopping, etc. Then the meaning goes deeper when you start saying you love your family. That is definitely a different type of love than a love for hobbies, food, etc. Then it goes even deeper when you love your spouse. That right there is where you think the ultimate love ends. But it even goes deeper. This is where a mother's love kicks in.

You see, when Clint and I were just married, and I would think about having kids I was like "No way, not yet!" Whenever I would see/hear about new moms and how they get pee and poo on them, how they never get sleep and the kicker: not getting to eat a hot meal because that is always the time when your baby wants to eat, I thought I could never do that. I really thought that I was too selfish to give up all that.

But then I made the decision to be a mother. This type of love is something that you can't completely understand or grasp until you actually become a mother. The moment that you see your tiny baby (which was my case, because I had to be stitched up before I got to hold him), or in other cases the moment that tiny infant is placed in your arms you understand a new meaning of love. At that moment nothing matters. The fact that you know from that moment on your not going to be getting the same amount of sleep as you were before or the pee or poo getting on you- it doesn't matter.

So I was 39 weeks and I went to my weekly prenatal visit hoping that something was happening. You see, nothing was happening. The past visits when the doctor would check me, I was not dilated, and only 50% effaced. Well, nothing had happened. I thought I was going to be a week overdue, and even then I thought they were going to have to induce me. But afterwards she said she wanted to do an ultrasound to check where the baby was. It was then that we found out that Jonas was being naughty and disobedient! He was breech. She checked to see how much fluid I had in me, and there wasn't enough to flip him, which meant only one thing: C-section. Hallelujah!!! Thanks for that kid being naughty! I was so ready to be done being pregnant. So we scheduled the C-section for that Thursday, March 31, 2011 at 7:30 AM, which meant we had to be at the hospital by 6:00 am.

Thursday came, we went to our room and suited up, filled out paper work, had my IV hooked up, and whatever else they did. Funny thing, the mom of one of my students was my nurse at the time. She made sure I was ok with it, and that it wouldn't be weird, but I was fine with it. Another funny thing - I was missing parent teacher conferences (wahoo!) to have my baby. So she said that was our PTC. Ha ha! Anyways, she helped with the delivery. I was taken to the surgery room, got my spinal block, which numbs you immediately, different than an epidural, and had the sheet put up, catheter put in, and whatever else they did. I couldn't see at this time and I was really freaking out because with a spinal block they numb you pretty much from under your breasts downward, so my arms felt tingly and I felt like I couldn't breathe, but I could. So while I was freaking out, Clint tried to comfort me, and about 10 minutes later I heard the doctor say "It's definitely a boy - There's the legs" and I didn't even know they had cut me open yet! I didn't feel a thing! So they showed me cute little Jonas and he was adorable! He had so much hair and he was a good color and crying well, and all that. He recieved an 8-9 out of 10 on the APGAR scoring - for any of you who know that baby stuff.

Anyway, I was stitched up, which took the longest time out of everything they did. Clint held Jonas after they cleaned him off and weighed him. He was 6 lbs, 14 oz, and 18.5 inches long. Born at 8:04 AM. It probably took about 30 minutes to get put back together. I was taken back to my room, fed Jonas, the nurses did stuff (I don't remember, Clint and I were focused on our baby)

Then I was taken to my recovery room where Clint and I stayed for 3 days. It was a long 3 days of learning how to nurse Jonas, changing diapers, nurses taking vitals of both Jonas and I, taking lots of pain med, walking without hurting, sleeping, watching conference (a little atleast - I slept through most of it) etc, etc. Then finally we came home on Sunday.

For a week it's been an adventure of adjusting to life with a baby. But like I said before, even though Jonas wants to be fed right when dinner is brought to us, or if I get pee or poop on me, or if Jonas pees on his clothes and I have to change his clothing for the umpteenth time, or even if I change his diaper and immediately after I get the clean diaper on, he decides to poop again and I have to do it all over, even if I have to get up every 3 hours in the night to feed him, or even if he doesn't want to go to bed and is fussy till midnight (last night) I still love him and nothing else matters. All I want is for my baby to be happy. All I want to do is comfort and cuddle him and kiss his cute little cheeks. A mother's love is something that I didn't understand until now. It's a completely selfless love.