The Last Oymester April 7, 2011

hello my beautiful faithful readers.

this pregnancy has flown by, though at the same time, I feel as though I have been pregnant for about 1000 years.  In the last few months and weeks, as my belly grows ever larger (I keep thinking that’s impossible but somehow it keeps growing), I find myself looking at Yona and thinking back to her birth and I can’t believe I’m about to have another baby!  Yona is now this little chatty person, talking non-stop, potty-trained, with a great sense of humour, and a really funny and goofy personality.  I wish Mike and I could just repeat everything we did with Yona and apply it to Baby #2 because everyday, we have an exchange that goes something like this:

Mike:  “I love this little girl.”

Sarah: “I know, she’s so awesome.”

Mike: “She is so funny, and brilliant, and clever!”

Sarah: “I know, I can’t believe we made her.”

Just kidding.  even though we really do say these things to each other, we know that as much as we want to celebrate our unbelievable parenting skills, Yona’s amazingness is mostly just luck and those magical, inexplicable qualities that make us all unique individuals which make Yona so incredible.  Sometimes I wonder how I will have the capacity to feel the same way about another human being the way I do about Yona, and then I remember feeling those same reservations before Yona came along, and even after she was born- they contributed to the process of us getting to know and love each other, watching her grow, experiencing our own growth as parents, all three of us in a continuous journey of change.  We have such a nice dynamic, the three of us, which is about to change.  we will all need to redefine what our family looks like, and will each need to incorporate this new little member into our fold, individually and collectively.  Yona will be a big sister, and Mike & I will suddenly have two children.  So hard to believe but at the same time we are incredibly excited.

so Mike and I have nicknamed the last trimester the “Oymester” because literally everytime I sit down, stand up, or extend myself physically in any way, I say “Oy!”.  (Even if you are not Jewish or familiar with Yiddish, you should adopt the word “oy”.  it’s very satisfying).  This week the Oymester has taken on a whole new meaning.  We had a beautiful day on Saturday in the sunshine- I even went on a bike ride with Mike and Yona to the Wychwood Barns (though I couldn’t make it up that Christie hill!).  On Sunday morning, very early, I woke up with abdominal pain and couldn’t get comfortable.  I initially thought I might have had the flu, but as the day went on, I realized the pain seemed to be really acute and localized to one spot.  eventually, we made our way to the hospital, and after many hours in the emergency ward, some courses of antibiotics, an IV and a few ultrasounds, it was confirmed that the pain was from an inflamed appendix.  Before we knew it, we were told I would need to get my appendix out, which also meant I needed to be transferred to another hospital with an Obstetrics ward because having an appendectomy also meant a risk of preterm labour.

At 34 weeks, the baby is luckily far enough along that one can feel reasonably confident that it will be ok if it needs to be born early.  but i really didn’t feel ready for that and mike and I both hoped that everything would go well and this baby would stay inside a little longer.  Suddenly we found ourselves having conversations about what we would need to do if the baby came that night, what needed to get done, who we should call, what we would do with yona.  then the anxiety- would i need a c-section?  how would have a premature baby affect nursing?  what about work?  what about school?

thankfully, i was transferred to sunnybrook and eventually (at 4 am!) was wheeled into the OR, where my very inflamed-about-to-burst appendix was removed and thankfully, Baby Zelcer Noble is perfectly fine.  I had to stay in the hospital until Tuesday evening in the high risk obstetrics ward, but little baby was great the whole time.  My midwives have privileges at Sunnybrook and they were super supportive. 

So now my Oymester has reached a whole new level, as just the act of coughing, sneezing, getting up, lying down, and walking are much more painful.  it seems to be easing up day by day and my hope is that little Baby stays in there for a while until I have my strength back for labour. 

What an unexpected series of events but hopefully we will have smooth sailing over the next little while until life changes…again.

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