home safe

Day Eight, we arrive home with Ever Elizabeth. Tomorrow I'll write more. For now, I love you guys for your friendship and prayers and support. Ever is fine and I can't wait to spend the night in our bed.

Ever better

Hi Mr. Curry again. Ever is doing a lot better. She's doesn't need oxygen at this point just the pressure which is gradually being reduced. Maggie and I are exhausted and ready to come home. Hopefully it will be in the next couple of days if she stays the course. So hopefully this means there won't be anymore updates on here from me. I think I could write an entire blog post with the word "hopefully" in every sentence at this point. Hopefully everybody had a good New Years. See.

Ever Stable

Hi it's still Mr. Curry. Ever is in a holding pattern so to speak right now. She can't be without oxygen but her breathing has improved and she's nursing again. She's been about the same for two days now so we're waiting for her to start improving again. We wanted to thank everyone for the thoughts and support. We're going to be at the hospital into next week. I'll try to check back in this weekend.
Happy New Year from the Kaiser fourth floor Pediatric Ward! We'll be toasting our vending machine coffee to hopefully a healthier New Year.

Ever really sick

It's Mr. Curry. Just wanted to give a quick update. Ever has RSV. We took her to the ER Monday morning and she was quickly admitted to the hospital. Yesterday was horrible and scary. Today was better. The doctors think she "turned a corner" today. So we are feeling relief, with our breaths held. We're probably going to be in the hospital through the weekend and possibly beyond. I'll be home randomly over the next few days and try to give brief updates.

i've looked at love from both sides now

A hormonally charged Christmas, a Christmas with four children and one husband and two large shedding hairy flea-flurried dogs, with one grandma and one cousin and her husband and their little boy, with a sick Ever Elizabeth and a very tired and very grateful mom and dad. The older my children got, the more glasses of champagne I had toward the end of the day, as the kids dispersed to family or friends or visiting their biological dad; now I am full circle, back to abstaining from all alcohol, can't have eggnog because of Ever's tummy- or chocolate!- and so all the binging and indulgence was put aside for nurturing and refining. Although Mr. Curry had a few jack and cokes.

Christmas Eve Mr. Curry and I stayed up till past 1am wrapping presents, taking turns holding Ever as she snuffled and sneezed and snorted through her congestion, getting sentimental and morbid, reflecting on those we have lost and those lost to themselves, until finally I said We have to talk about something happy! And Mr. Curry agreed, and we sat in silence for a few minutes. Mr. Curry glanced at me, I glanced at him. We couldn't think of anything, we laughed. Ridiculous. We are so lucky, and so surrounded with and full of love; perhaps this puts into high relief those we have loved who are not, those we love... our minds wander to the lost and the hurting, like Mr. Curry's friend R. whose young sister died last month, and whose mother just had a stroke, and who spent Christmas Eve drunk and fighting with his wife, until he called Mr. Curry, slurring into the phone and taking him away from our gathering to try to encourage and support his friend.

Having babies does this to me, and to Mr. Curry- while we are intensely falling in love with our new, helpless and beautiful baby, we are more keenly aware of the other side of love, of pain, of suffering, not only far away and in mysterious homes, but in our own home, our families, our friends. I sit with Ever breathing noisily on my bare chest and the image crosses my mind of an infant left to cry in her crib, and I am seized in the chest and the throat with grief. It's unbearable, the things that happen to us feeling, sentient beings. And yet, there it is, to be borne. In the face of reality, we love harder and more pure, refine our daily lives, look to be better, more present, patient and teaching parents to our children, to love each other. Sometimes the love I feel is painful. It's so intense and bright and so soon after the birth of a baby, rides on the crest of an unstable wave, an anxious and yearning wave. As time goes by my body will adjust and settle and I will love from a better place, a place of more faith and trust and peace. The very act of loving makes us incredibly vulnerable...like a newborn. We cry and we desire and we feel safe or afraid, loved or abandoned, and there is no one on this planet who will not hurt us if we love them, because that is the nature of life. To accept, to amend, to cleave, to better ourselves- this is my marriage and my parenting, full of flaws and then amendment and healing, and it is more than enough. I wish the same for every person. For all of us to be loved.

There arose such a splatter....

Later Christmas day, all we did was laugh. I changed Ever's poopy diaper on the couch with a blanket underneath her. As I slid a clean diaper under her butt, a bright yellow stream of poop shot out over the diaper and onto the back of Ever's outfit, the blanket, and my pants. Mr. Curry handed me the wipes and we began mopping up. Ever lay naked on top of her poopy outfit, and I picked her up and handed her to Mr. Curry. He stood holding Ever under her naked butt and across her chest, and I looked up at him as he began to say something about a clean outfit for her when her tiny cheeks opened and to my horror a long glow in the dark stream of poop shot like a cannon out of her butt and flew across the carpet ( splat splat splat ) onto the cardboard boxes ( splat SPLAT! ) across my pants and the couch and finally, in a few grunted last shots, over the front of Mr. Curry's shirt. We stood there, dumbfounded and silent for a brief moment before busting up laughing. Merry Christmas!

Baby Sick

Ever Elizabeth 3 weeks old, Lola Moon 8 years

Ever has a cold, congested. We are using the bulb sucker and she is snuffling and snorting breathing through her tiny baby nostrils. Her temperature is normal. I'm worried because at her last baby checkup, the doctor scared me silly about pertussis, to the point where I received the vaccine right there and then, in hopes of protecting Ever from getting it. Apparently there is a huge outbreak in San Diego and it's been very bad for infants. It starts out, the papers in the doctor's office said, with a runny nose and cough. Exactly like the common cold. And then apparently progresses rapidly to 'serious'. Any advice? Comments? Information?

thank goodness we got our tree up before Ever was born...it's been a total joy to have it all this time home

Handing Over the Baton

Ever smiles a lot, and we kiss her A LOT

Lola, Ever and I trekked to Starbucks this morning. I stood in line and realized that both of my daughters were clean and dressed beautifully, Lola with a chic brown newsboy cap on and red Converse, and that I looked like I went naked into a closet filled with dog hair and ill fitting clothes, twirled around three times until something stuck to my body, and then pulled on uggs. My hair was disheveled and tied into a Napoleon Dynamite style side pony that was supposed to be a regular pony but somehow went sideways during the morning. I'm falling apart and chubby with stretchy stomach skin and puffy, dark eyes, and my daughter's are radiant, gorgeous and slim. The official baton handing over has begun. My dears, take my youth, take my beauty, take my composure and sure opinions about the world, take my pretty skin and slim thighs, just keep giving me your love and trust, and I will consider it the best trade I've ever made.

oh dear. is this real life?

Sister

A few nights ago, I left Ever and Lola alone in the bedroom for a few minutes while I took my vitamins. When I came back in, I found Ever nursing on Lola's top lip. Lola had kissed her when she was fussing, and Ever latched on...and Lola sat there, patient as a mother, and let herself become a human pacifier. The next morning, we found that Lola had a purple bruise on her top lip.

Wolfgang and Ever

Wolfgang on baby duty

Ever is, so far, an 'easy' baby, meaning that she's not colicky or generally miserable most of the time, is able to be soothed, nurses well, and cries only to communicate a need, which when met, ends the crying. Obligatory poop information: We are highly concerned with the color of her poop. Yellow is good. Green, according to my chart, means either a virus or lactose intolerance. I cut out all 'obvious' dairy, such as milk and cheese, but still some creeps in, and her poop was green, then yellow again, then green again twice, and now is yellow again. .....? I've taken her temperature a few days and it's normal. On that note, you'll be delighted to hear ( what? you aren't? ) that Ever grunts exactly like a little billy goat when she is pooping. It's really funny. She also has the habit of knocking herself out immediately after pooping. Grunt, grunt, baa-baaa, snooooze. She also has been spitting up some, twice enough to have to change her outfit. That seems really strange to me for a breastfed baby. The doctor said CSection babies spit up more because they aren't compressed through the birthing canal and their lungs are not aspirated. So they have more ick in their lungs. But Ever is over two weeks. We will see at her appointment. Since we are speaking of butts, Ever's is getting adorably chubby. What is cuter that a chubby baby butt?

We took all four kids out for the first time on Saturday night, to Mr. Curry's uncle's huge Christmas party. It was an awesome, full feeling to have our entire family in one car. Milestone.

I wasn't going to give Ever a pacifier until she was at least one month, but she is such a mouthy baby, and my breasts are getting so sore, that I did anyway. I am loving these BPA free, really cheap and cute pacifiers, minus the predictable fact that although we have FOUR, we can only find ONE.