The Unexpectedly Scary Story of Aurora

“Was I in the box?”

Annabelle has asked that question no fewer than 50 times in the last six months. We pause for a moment every time before we answer. “No, hun. You were born two weeks late. Aurora was in the box only because she came to meet us early.”

The box is an incubator, of course. Aurora spent 12 days in the NICU in Cambridge — 12 long, frustrating, hopeful days — before she came home. She got excellent care, plumped up like a champ, and hasn’t returned to the hospital since. But it made us realize how difficult the second time around can be sometimes. How certainty and confidence can turn to chaos in a moment. How scary having a baby can be.

Like most experienced parents, we were pretty sure of ourselves going to our second set of pregnancy appointments. (It was challenging to get to that second set of appointments, but that’s a story for another time.) Bridget was putting on weight in the right places, had some unique cravings, and felt pretty tired. We had been here before. Every appointment with the OB followed the same general structure:

“Feeling good, Bridget?”

“Yup, I think so.”

“Any questions?”

“No, not really.”

Done. In fact, while I made sure to attend every appointment when Bridget was pregnant with Annabelle, I skipped a few with Aurora. I was there for the important ones — hearing the heart beat for the first time, the ultrasounds, any time we did have questions — but Bridget went solo on the mundane visits.

But then things took a scary turn.

Around 30 weeks into the pregnancy, Bridget’s blood pressure started to rise. A lot. She was swelling up, too, in a way that didn’t seem normal and had headaches and flashing lights in her vision. She called the doctor, who told us to come in and then to get ourselves to the hospital, fast. Scared and nervous on a cold February night, we made our way to the hospital and up the elevator.

But then Bridget’s blood pressure went down. They told us to sit tight for a bit, fed us, and we joked about how we managed to get a date night out of the chaos. We went home, breathing a collective sigh of relief.

We lived life gingerly in the coming weeks, nervous that something else would happen. We took things one day at a time, excited to see 31 weeks, 32 weeks, and 33 weeks in the rearview mirror. Bridget kept going in to get her levels checked and we kept crossing our fingers. Bridget’s swelling continued, but since she was pregnant (that’s what happens, right?), we didn’t worry too much.

Then came Monday, March 7. Bridget got a call early in the morning about her protein levels. She was off to the hospital again, telling me on the way that they were worried about pre-eclampsia. While she rushed to Cambridge, I rushed to Google and then jogged down Mt. Auburn Street to meet Bridget. We held hands as she laid in another hospital bed, happy to hear that the baby was doing fine.

Bridget was sick, though, they said. The baby would really have a tough time going through a typical delivery, so the word “C-section” hit our ears for the first time. The word “emergency” was whispered, too. I can’t imagine what went through Bridget’s racing mind, but she somehow found the wisdom and calm to make the difficult decision to go into surgery.

I sat in the hospital room by myself in my oversized scrubs while they prepped Bridget. I stared at the wall with tears in my eyes. I hoped. I’ll never forget the 10 minutes of waiting that felt like 10 hours.

I walked in, smiled at Bridget, and said empty positive things that people say in those situations. I was scared. She was scared. This was our second time around with this baby thing, but it felt much, much different and, well, terrifying. We squeezed the life out of each other’s hands until we heard the first cry, which was loud and wonderful.

Aurora, who hadn’t been named yet, was very little, but she was also very healthy.

Which brings us back to the box. At 4 pounds and 8 ounces, Aurora was far from the smallest baby in the NICU. We counted our blessings, knowing that other Moms and Dads had much longer roads ahead. And we were thankful to live where we did, in a place where our harrowing adventure was “just another day” for the healthcare team.

Annabelle visited her sister in the box and asked a lot of questions, of course. “Why is she in there? Can I touch her? Why not? Will she always be in there?” And because she’s at the age when she repeats things, she’ll almost certainly ask again, “Was I in the box?”

And we’ll pause again. And then we'll
answer her.

Seven Months-ish

Everyone says the same things about having a second child:

• “Parents are way more relaxed about them …” 
• “They don’t get as much attention as the first child …” 
• "Parents don’t worry as much about germs, colds, and scrapes …” 

Everyone says these things because they are true. At least that’s what Bridget and I have found. We know what we’re doing (sort of) the second time around and it’s virtually impossible to provide the same attention when there’s a toddler running around the house. We do our best and we love our little Aurora more than words could describe, but we’ve failed her in one critical area:

Monthly milestone stickers.

Those big, colorful sticky numbers you put on a baby’s onesie. You know the ones. You carefully place the number on the baby’s stomach and then take at least 7,500 pictures trying to find the perfect one to share on social media. Is she smiling in this one? Is the light perfect in that one? What if we sat her in that enormous chair? Could we hang her from the ceiling?

(On a related note, it's always interesting see the number of "likes" decrease over the months. The one-month photo: 100 likes. The three-month photo: 30 likes. The seven-month photo: "Ugh. You again?")

Sure, we’ve taken Aurora’s first six pictures – one per month – but we’re nowhere near the right day. Like, not even close. The one-month photo (somewhere close to April 7) wasn’t bad, but it was all downhill from there. The two-month photo was a week late, the three-month photo was two weeks late, and the four- and fifth-month photos were essentially in the same photo shoot. The seven-month photo, now 16 days late, will materialize any day now.

For Annabelle, we took the photos on. the. exact. day. We may have even tried to do it at the exact time of her birth, just so we could capture the exact moment when she went from an eight-month-old to a nine-month-old. (Such things are very important, you know.) Why was it so important to take the photo on the exact day? Who knows? I forget what life was like with one child just like I forget what life was like before children. (Well, I remember, but it seems like someone else’s life.)

Whatever the reason, we found it to be really important for Annabelle. And now, before the Internet and God, I’m writing that we can do better. We must do better! We have five more chances with Aurora. Five more opportunities to capture her completing a big monthly milestone. We are going to take photos 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12 on the 7th of every month. Let’s do this!

Now, if I could just find Aurora. She was just here a minute ago …

300 Apolitical Words on the Election

Donald Trump is a disaster. He's a thin-skinned, egomaniacal bag of hateful wind who capitalizes on people's fears and anxieties. No matter your political leanings, he is the wrong choice for any elected office in the United States, including hall monitor at your local high school. Frankly, I wouldn't trust him to walk my dog or separate my recyclables.

Hey! The headline said this post was apolitical. That means non-political, dummy. Those 60 words are full of political opinion. 

Yes, that's true. I could argue, of course, that this election goes far beyond politics. I could argue that Trump is such a steaming pile of baby diapers that those 60 words were more about good vs. evil than anything else. Instead, I'll just say that the 300 apolitical words on the election start ... right ... Trump sucks! ... now:

Annabelle and Aurora have no clue that one of the most important presidential elections of my (and probably your) lifetime happens in just a few weeks. They don't know who Donald Trump is. They don't know who Hillary Clinton is. They sure as heck don't know who Gary Johnson is. (This is particularly true for Aurora, who, at seven months, doesn't know much of anything yet. She's especially ignorant about third-party presidential candidates.)

They don't know and they don't care.

But I do. As you can clearly see from my first paragraph (which I won't repeat in any way for the rest of the post), I have opinions about the race. Most people do. But this race and this hopeful outcome means more than just who will sit in the Oval Office.

It means hope and opportunity -- for every little girl.

I'm sure you've heard this line of thinking before. I'm not breaking new ground here. But it's pretty amazing when you stop and think about it. Not even 100 years ago, women couldn't vote. Now, one is poised to become the most powerful person in the world. It's groundbreaking, ceiling-shattering, and, well, just great.

Women can do (and have done) almost anything men can do. Go to space? Check. Take out the garbage? Check. Be the sole breadwinner in a family? Check. Play professional basketball? Check. Be President of the United States? Not yet.

Rah, rah, feminism. Blah, blah, you're just saying this because you have two daughters instead of two sons. 

Absolutely not. I'd feel just as strongly if I had boys, dogs, or cats. (Note: I hate cats.) When I see that electoral map under Annabelle's paint brush in the photo above, it gives me hope that someday she'll be looking at a TV screen filled with blue and red with her name on the ballot. Is that likely? Of course not. Is it possible? Check.

Also this:

Dress-ing to Excess

Lately, no matter what we're doing, Annabelle needs to wear a dress.

Going grocery shopping? Dress. Going to the playground? Dress. Going out back to splash around in the pool? Dress? Taking a tub? You guessed it.

Okay, so that last one is an exaggeration, but not by much. For the past several weeks, Annabelle, my "this T-shirt and shorts are fine, Dad" girl, wants nothing to do with any article of clothing unless it's a dress.

This is challenging for me. Why? Mostly because dresses are not practical, at all. It's like driving a minivan around a city.

Like a lot of males (not to generalize, but I'm going to do just that), my feelings on outfits are as follows: Wake up, wear something, stay in said something until something dictates a change (playing a sport, going out for a nice dinner, going to bed, etc.). That's about it. I would never just change in the middle of the day -- especially not if I were wearing a perfectly good, weather-appropriate outfit. Why not? Because I'm not insane.

Annabelle, on the other hand, revels in such insanity. Take the 60-second video below, for example. Somehow, by some miracle, we coaxed Annabelle into wearing a T-shirt and pants because it's fall and it's no longer 80 degrees outside. Then, less than an hour later, this happened:

See what I'm dealing with? How do you reason with her? I'll give you three chances to guess what she was wearing soon after I hit the "stop" button on the camera.

The other problem with this whole "wearing dresses all the time" thing is laundry. Only a few dresses will work, as you know if you have children. Annabelle has 20 dresses, but 17 of them are "ugly" or "not cute" or "too stripy." (I'm fairly certain that last one isn't even a word.) That means we wash three dresses constantly. And, if we do an outfit change like in the video above, we have twice the amount of laundry.

The whole situation, as you can see, is wildly out of hand. If you have any suggestions, I'm all ears. Yell loudly, though. The washing machine is loud.