I can't believe it but tonight is our last night as the parents of one child. Tomorrow at 1:30 we go from parents of one to parents of three! I am nervous and scared and excited. I cannot wait for the surgery to be over and to be holding my little boys. Today flew. I tried to have a relaxing day, but it went so fast. We had last minute chores to do, laundry, grocery delivery, and some bill paying. Now since we have picked Gavin up from school, it feels like the night is flying. Soon it will be his bedtime. I wish I could get him to hold still for a minute and give me the hugs and kisses I want, but he just doesn't see why he needs to hold still. I just want to savor my last hours as just Gavins' mom. But the energy of a 5 year old and the donut I let him have afterschool as a treat, wins out and I am left begging for kisses!
I wish I knew what tomorrow was going to bring, besides two new additions. I wish I knew if Owen (my twin with the clubfoot) was ok in every other way. I wish I knew if the c-section was going to hurt. I wish I knew if the twins would enjoy sleeping like their mama. I wish I knew if Gavin is going to be over the moon about them.
Tomorrow I become the mom of three boys, two of which are twins. I feel like I am embarking on a journey, one crazy journey. I can't wait to see what life brings us next!
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Friday, March 19, 2010
Maternity leave has begun!
From today at 3:30 until August 2, 2010, I am off from work for maternity leave. Now it feels like 4 months will take an eternity. I am sure once the twins are here it will fly. I am looking forward to having a good portion of the summer off. I think it will be great to be home with Gavin and the twins and have that time to spend together as a family. Nick is off for most of the month of August so that is great too. We both will get lots of quality time with the kids. It will be broke time, but quality time. I plan to frequent my moms pool and get a park pass for Westchester County so I can take him to the kid pools and parks. We will do a lot of walking. A lot of playing in the backyard and a fair amount of sitting in the A/C. G can ride his bike a lot while I push Caleb and Owen around in the stroller. By July, the babies will be 3 months and easier and more fun. I remember by 3 months with Gavin, I felt like I mildly knew what I was doing when it came to him. I wonder if there is a learning curve with twins. At some point in there, we will hire a babysitter and hopfully she will help out too. Between taking Gavin out or keeping the twins so I can take him to a movie or something, it will be helpful. I hope we find someone soon. We are supposed to meet with a couple of people this weekend, so maybe we will like some of them. And then I have another project...decorate the basement! I am looking forward to that. I am going to scour the craigslist free section and hopefully get some good finds. I need a couch, tables, dresser or wardrobe. I will buy couch covers and new bedding for the full size futon we have. I eventually will need a queen size bed for when the family comes to visit. I want a fresh coat of white on everything. I have rugs to put down there and a shower curtain and mats. So with a little help from craigslist, I can furnish the place and the live-in nanny will feel at home. A trip to the Christmas tree shop will get me dishes and glasses for down there and we are all set. All in all, I am looking forward to the summer!
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Nostalgic for summer vacations past...
I woke up today thinking a lot about Rhode Island. When we were kids we rented a house every year in Charlestown, RI. It wasn't on the beach, but it was only 5-10 minutes away and it was within walking distance of a little inlet or bay area that we used to walk to at night.
Today I find myself missing everything Rhode Island or at least what Rhode Island means to me. I am pregnant so I think its fairly normal that the first thing I thought about was the warm, cheese danishes from the Charlestown Mini Mart. Maybe you don't think you would find the most amazing cheese danish you ever had at a mini mart, but you are mistaken. They make them fresh in the morning and you literally have to get there early, like 6-7am and wait in line to purchase them. They are phenomanal and luckily I have always had a father that was awake at around 5am, so we were guaranteed to get some.
I also remember perfectly, the house that we rented and its familiar smells as we unpacked for our week and sometimes two weeks each summer. The wood stairs brought you upstairs in the house to the kitchen, living, dining room area which had this almost 70's yellow and cream tile that was covered in sun spots near each of the sliding deck doors that led to a huge wrap around deck complete with hammocks and plenty of seating areas. I learned to iron on that deck one year. There wasn't an ironing board and my dad taught me how to iron on the deck rail on top of a towel. Ha, thankfully, I have since forgotten how and now my husband does it.
I remember my sisters and I spent many nights sitting watching black and white Elvis movies on the small TV in the livingroom because there was no cable. This of course was after we would walk or drive down to the Tropic Frost, which was named Anderson's when we were very young, for some of their homemade ice cream. We would sit and eat our cone at the picnic tables on the side before we started our trek home.
Misquamicut beach was the beach we frequented as kids because there was a boardwalk and lots of stores to occupy us when we would eventually want to go home. My dad could live on a beach and now both Carla and Alyson could too. I am a little more like my mom, I get sun poisoning and need an umbrella after a while. However, mom and dad or as we got older, the three of us girls would walk down to the board walk area and get soft coffee ice cream cones and explore the stores. It would buy my dad another hour or two at the beach where he would sleep as he turned black.
Another beach memory I have is of my parents listening to Bob Marley or Peter Tosh on the little radio we brought every year while playing scrabble. In the early years my dad would sport a speedo and my mom a string bikini. They were young and so were we. Thankfully, our father got out of that habit as we got older and more embarrased! There are whole Bob Marley albums that remind me of the beach and my parents.
On our way to the beach we would stop at the corner deli, which is not really on a corner at all. We would order our sandwiches topped with the best creamy italian dressing we have ever had. The dressing is so popular that in a recent trip to the Corner Deli, the owner would not give me extra dressing, despite me asking for it and offering to pay for it, as it was almost time to close down for the season and he needed to get through the day with what he had. I wasn't thrilled. Anyway, us girls would always get IBC rootbeers in the dark brown glass bottles. If it wasn't for the dressing we probably would have gone elsewhere, but we can't find it anywhere else!
At night we would go to the nearby towns. In Narragansett, we wandered the stores and walked along the wall next to the ocean. In Watch Hill, we rode the old fashioned carousel with the rings and ate ice cream sitting on the wall next to the bay. For as long as I can remember I always walked to the back parking lot behind the carousel and would stand at the chain link fence and watch the lighthouse spin its light into the water for the boats.
When we needed a break from the beach, mom and dad would take us to the Umbrella Factory which is a collection of stores on a dirt pathway through gardens that ranged from art to antiques. Back then and this could be accurate now, there was the reggae store (Small Axe) where you could buy jamaican things including music which my parents loved. There was a store where there was nothing but toys, old fashioned candy and stationary where us girls could browse for the day. And oddly enough there free roaming peacocks and sheep you could feed for a quarter. For some reason, I hated the Umbrella Factory as a kid and would protest our trip there, however, to this day, I cannot figure out why. Most likely, I wanted to spend a quiet afternoon on the couch with a Babysitter Club book!
And I remember Theatre by the Sea. Where my parents would drop us kids off for an afternoon of theatre, usually involving puppets, while I believed they were going off to spend the day at the nude beach, which I coined the "n" beach early in life. We were appalled and did not want to go to Theatre by the Sea, but we were not going to sit on the bathing suit side of the fence while our parents bared it all on the "n" beach. So the theatre it was!
Lastly, there was Daddy's Bread. The only place I have ever been that runs a business on the honor system. You pull up to this little white house and walk in the front door. There are bakers racks of fresh baked bread and a note that basically tells you, you are being trusted to put the money in a hole cut out of a desk. There is a book left for you to sign and tell them where you are from if you would like. Each year we would go and get a couple of loaves and eat them for breakfast over our week there. I always wondered if anyone was dishonorable while there and I always worried that if they could not hear our dollars dropping into the hole, would they think it was us? In any event, we enjoyed every bite of that bread.
Today I miss Rhode Island. I would like one day to take my growing family there for a week to a house we find, close to the beach and recreate for my kids all the things I loved when I was kid.
Today I find myself missing everything Rhode Island or at least what Rhode Island means to me. I am pregnant so I think its fairly normal that the first thing I thought about was the warm, cheese danishes from the Charlestown Mini Mart. Maybe you don't think you would find the most amazing cheese danish you ever had at a mini mart, but you are mistaken. They make them fresh in the morning and you literally have to get there early, like 6-7am and wait in line to purchase them. They are phenomanal and luckily I have always had a father that was awake at around 5am, so we were guaranteed to get some.
I also remember perfectly, the house that we rented and its familiar smells as we unpacked for our week and sometimes two weeks each summer. The wood stairs brought you upstairs in the house to the kitchen, living, dining room area which had this almost 70's yellow and cream tile that was covered in sun spots near each of the sliding deck doors that led to a huge wrap around deck complete with hammocks and plenty of seating areas. I learned to iron on that deck one year. There wasn't an ironing board and my dad taught me how to iron on the deck rail on top of a towel. Ha, thankfully, I have since forgotten how and now my husband does it.
I remember my sisters and I spent many nights sitting watching black and white Elvis movies on the small TV in the livingroom because there was no cable. This of course was after we would walk or drive down to the Tropic Frost, which was named Anderson's when we were very young, for some of their homemade ice cream. We would sit and eat our cone at the picnic tables on the side before we started our trek home.
Misquamicut beach was the beach we frequented as kids because there was a boardwalk and lots of stores to occupy us when we would eventually want to go home. My dad could live on a beach and now both Carla and Alyson could too. I am a little more like my mom, I get sun poisoning and need an umbrella after a while. However, mom and dad or as we got older, the three of us girls would walk down to the board walk area and get soft coffee ice cream cones and explore the stores. It would buy my dad another hour or two at the beach where he would sleep as he turned black.
Another beach memory I have is of my parents listening to Bob Marley or Peter Tosh on the little radio we brought every year while playing scrabble. In the early years my dad would sport a speedo and my mom a string bikini. They were young and so were we. Thankfully, our father got out of that habit as we got older and more embarrased! There are whole Bob Marley albums that remind me of the beach and my parents.
On our way to the beach we would stop at the corner deli, which is not really on a corner at all. We would order our sandwiches topped with the best creamy italian dressing we have ever had. The dressing is so popular that in a recent trip to the Corner Deli, the owner would not give me extra dressing, despite me asking for it and offering to pay for it, as it was almost time to close down for the season and he needed to get through the day with what he had. I wasn't thrilled. Anyway, us girls would always get IBC rootbeers in the dark brown glass bottles. If it wasn't for the dressing we probably would have gone elsewhere, but we can't find it anywhere else!
At night we would go to the nearby towns. In Narragansett, we wandered the stores and walked along the wall next to the ocean. In Watch Hill, we rode the old fashioned carousel with the rings and ate ice cream sitting on the wall next to the bay. For as long as I can remember I always walked to the back parking lot behind the carousel and would stand at the chain link fence and watch the lighthouse spin its light into the water for the boats.
When we needed a break from the beach, mom and dad would take us to the Umbrella Factory which is a collection of stores on a dirt pathway through gardens that ranged from art to antiques. Back then and this could be accurate now, there was the reggae store (Small Axe) where you could buy jamaican things including music which my parents loved. There was a store where there was nothing but toys, old fashioned candy and stationary where us girls could browse for the day. And oddly enough there free roaming peacocks and sheep you could feed for a quarter. For some reason, I hated the Umbrella Factory as a kid and would protest our trip there, however, to this day, I cannot figure out why. Most likely, I wanted to spend a quiet afternoon on the couch with a Babysitter Club book!
And I remember Theatre by the Sea. Where my parents would drop us kids off for an afternoon of theatre, usually involving puppets, while I believed they were going off to spend the day at the nude beach, which I coined the "n" beach early in life. We were appalled and did not want to go to Theatre by the Sea, but we were not going to sit on the bathing suit side of the fence while our parents bared it all on the "n" beach. So the theatre it was!
Lastly, there was Daddy's Bread. The only place I have ever been that runs a business on the honor system. You pull up to this little white house and walk in the front door. There are bakers racks of fresh baked bread and a note that basically tells you, you are being trusted to put the money in a hole cut out of a desk. There is a book left for you to sign and tell them where you are from if you would like. Each year we would go and get a couple of loaves and eat them for breakfast over our week there. I always wondered if anyone was dishonorable while there and I always worried that if they could not hear our dollars dropping into the hole, would they think it was us? In any event, we enjoyed every bite of that bread.
Today I miss Rhode Island. I would like one day to take my growing family there for a week to a house we find, close to the beach and recreate for my kids all the things I loved when I was kid.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Thursday, March 11, 2010
20 days and counting....
Ah, this is the second time I am going to write this post and it better post this time! Anyway, 20 days and counting. Our boys will be born on March 31, 2010 via c-section. I am scared. Of the c-section, of the recovery and mostly of having three kids. Most parents get to ease into three. Have one, have two, toss the idea around and have three. Not us. We go from one to three in mere minutes. It still seems a little surreal. And I know that there are many joys to come, however, I am scared. I realize that sometime in the next 20 days, I will have to put my big girl panties on and get over this fear. But for now, I have a lot on my mind. Sleepless nights, clubfoot, countless doctor appointments, two babies crying at once, trying to breastfeed two, Gavin gaining two brothers and losing the undivided attention of two parents, the poor dog and what place in the family she takes while all of this is going on and the sleepless nights. What? It deserves a second mention. I also cannot wait. 20 days seems so soon and yet, each day takes an eternity to pass. I can't wait to hold them, smell them, watch them sleep (please God, let them sleep), watch Gavin become a big brother, to become closer as a family because of them and us going through this experience together. I love them so much already. I am going to miss this pregnancy. My pregnancy with Gavin was so hard that I could not wait to get him out and be done. But this is different, maybe because there is two in there, maybe because a twin pregnancy doesn't happen everyday, or maybe because I finally got to benefit from that pregnancy glow and shiny hair! I don't know. However, I do know that there are 20 days left of Nick, Sara, Gavin and Lola. It makes me a little sad. We are a tight unit. I know we will just be a bigger, tighter unit, but this is all I have known for a long time. Now only 20 days until we meet Caleb Collins Sedey and Owen Collins Sedey.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
My first appointment with the Pediatric Orthopedist...
What a day yesterday was. I got up, which that in and of itself is a miracle these days what with the current hip, back and leg pain. Oh and the pressure. I get ready for work, get Gavin ready for school, we leave and do our morning routine which consists of driving to school while chatting about various subjects. It happened to be birds and nests. Gavin thinks we should name all the birds we see and try to keep track of them so we know where they are. I will keep you updated on how that goes! Anyway, I drop him off and head to work.
My first appointment with the pediatric orthopedist at the NY Center for Clubfoot at Hospital for Joint Disease is at 1pm. I leave my office at 12:15. I arrive on time or even a few minutes early. I sign my name on the sign in sheet and I am number 8 on the list. I do not know the relevance of this yet, but oh do I find out! I sit next to a tired looking couple with twin girls! The babies are so teensy. I suddenly feel so overwhelmed by looking at this couple. I feel like I already know what they are going through and in reality, I have no idea yet. I feel relieved because the other doctors I spoke to have told me that clubfoot is common in twins, but I did not really believe them and not for any reason, but I felt like they were trying to calm my fears. Anyway, I am in this waiting room with many babies, probably about 6. There are also 8 children there ranging from 2 years old to 12 years old. I find myself staring at all the kids feet and I cannot see one thing wrong with them. They all wear different shoes and no one seems to have a gait problem. There are a couple of teenagers or young adults that have visable issues and I wonder to myself, if they had early intervention.
I watch as the babies are called to the back. The twins are gone and I wanted to follow them. I wanted to watch their appointment and endlessly bombard them with questions. Instead, prior to their leaving the waiting room, I asked how old they were and asked if anyone was sleeping in their house. They are 11 days old and no, no one is sleeping. So I left them alone. I sit and wait. And sit and wait and sit and wait. I hear the receptionist saying tha two people were just squeezed in and did not have appointments, but they needed casts so they took them. She apologizes to no one in particular and maybe to herself for the craziness of the day. I am hot and I feel my cheeks are burning. I am hungry and I am thirsty. I sit for two hours and when I am on the verge of a mental breakdown (mostly due to the fact that the woman next to me has been singing the theme song to Bonanza for literally 1 hour straight to her granddaughter) they call my name. They made a mistake. I should have been called first so I could watch the appointments. They are sorry. I am upset, but what can I do. I am not coming back on a different day. There is only so much I can take.
I meet the doctor. I like her. She is clearly in a rush. She doesn't want to discourage me from asking all my questions and I do, faster than I would like, but I get them out. She wants me to meet the twin parents and the parents who have a baby who is on his second cast. I do go in the rooms. I see the casted babies. I ask a few questions. I am so exhausted at this point that I am not even sure what I want to know. Mostly, I ask how the baby did, how the baby slept after, if they thought the babies were in pain.
As I leave, I feel overwhelmed still. I feel like every Tuesday I will be in a mad dash to hurry up and get my name on the list early. I will be there for a long time. I feel like I have no idea how I could possible ever bring the two babies by myself. Tuesdays will be hectic and we will be tired and it will be a long day. I feel fine about the doctors capabilities, but I felt fine about those after I researched them to no end.
In the end, I am not sure I feel any better than I did before I went to the appointment, but its all certainly more real. I am glad I met the doctor, saw the office and have already learned that if you are not number one on the waiting list, you will make your life hell. I suppose, that information alone is invaluable!
My first appointment with the pediatric orthopedist at the NY Center for Clubfoot at Hospital for Joint Disease is at 1pm. I leave my office at 12:15. I arrive on time or even a few minutes early. I sign my name on the sign in sheet and I am number 8 on the list. I do not know the relevance of this yet, but oh do I find out! I sit next to a tired looking couple with twin girls! The babies are so teensy. I suddenly feel so overwhelmed by looking at this couple. I feel like I already know what they are going through and in reality, I have no idea yet. I feel relieved because the other doctors I spoke to have told me that clubfoot is common in twins, but I did not really believe them and not for any reason, but I felt like they were trying to calm my fears. Anyway, I am in this waiting room with many babies, probably about 6. There are also 8 children there ranging from 2 years old to 12 years old. I find myself staring at all the kids feet and I cannot see one thing wrong with them. They all wear different shoes and no one seems to have a gait problem. There are a couple of teenagers or young adults that have visable issues and I wonder to myself, if they had early intervention.
I watch as the babies are called to the back. The twins are gone and I wanted to follow them. I wanted to watch their appointment and endlessly bombard them with questions. Instead, prior to their leaving the waiting room, I asked how old they were and asked if anyone was sleeping in their house. They are 11 days old and no, no one is sleeping. So I left them alone. I sit and wait. And sit and wait and sit and wait. I hear the receptionist saying tha two people were just squeezed in and did not have appointments, but they needed casts so they took them. She apologizes to no one in particular and maybe to herself for the craziness of the day. I am hot and I feel my cheeks are burning. I am hungry and I am thirsty. I sit for two hours and when I am on the verge of a mental breakdown (mostly due to the fact that the woman next to me has been singing the theme song to Bonanza for literally 1 hour straight to her granddaughter) they call my name. They made a mistake. I should have been called first so I could watch the appointments. They are sorry. I am upset, but what can I do. I am not coming back on a different day. There is only so much I can take.
I meet the doctor. I like her. She is clearly in a rush. She doesn't want to discourage me from asking all my questions and I do, faster than I would like, but I get them out. She wants me to meet the twin parents and the parents who have a baby who is on his second cast. I do go in the rooms. I see the casted babies. I ask a few questions. I am so exhausted at this point that I am not even sure what I want to know. Mostly, I ask how the baby did, how the baby slept after, if they thought the babies were in pain.
As I leave, I feel overwhelmed still. I feel like every Tuesday I will be in a mad dash to hurry up and get my name on the list early. I will be there for a long time. I feel like I have no idea how I could possible ever bring the two babies by myself. Tuesdays will be hectic and we will be tired and it will be a long day. I feel fine about the doctors capabilities, but I felt fine about those after I researched them to no end.
In the end, I am not sure I feel any better than I did before I went to the appointment, but its all certainly more real. I am glad I met the doctor, saw the office and have already learned that if you are not number one on the waiting list, you will make your life hell. I suppose, that information alone is invaluable!
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