A Tale of Two Mamas
Trying to keep someone IN timeout
Archive for Life and Death
April 29, 2007 at 10:35 am · Filed under Life and Death
Saturday Morning.
We woke up fairly early–around 6:30–because we were still on NY time. We just had an extended nap. We all washed up and went downstairs to see if anyone was awake. We were happy to be able to wear shorts–it had just snowed back home, and wearing long pants and long sleeves on the plane was torture.
We said good morning to my grandma (Ama, in Chinese). The second she saw me, she started crying. It’s like I’m a constant reminder of my mom, and her loss of my mom; the suicide attempt, her broken body. I cried too–now that I’m a mom, I can imagine my grandma’s pain. I don’t know what I would do. We then introduced her to Graem, who was being shy. Graem made Grandma smile, which made me feel a little better–that she’d accept Graem, and that her pain was eased if only for a moment. Shawna introduced herself, and my Grandma was accepting enough. We found that all of my relatives were kind and accepting, and allowed Shawna into the family–one less thing I had to worry about. Read the rest of this entry »
April 28, 2007 at 8:22 pm · Filed under Life and Death
Thursday and Friday
Morning came pretty quickly, but I felt pretty rested–I got to sleep in til around 6, which was later than I was waking up at home, so that was good. We were able to shower and eat breakfast and pack the car at a leisurely pace. Shawna had to make a last minute run for some hair clips for Grammy, as we’d forgotten ours.
Dennis kept me posted on his passport progress–he was able to get to Norwalk, CT right as the passport office opened, and was pushed to the head of the line. As we drove to JFK, he called us to let us know that he was on board and would have a passport by lunchtime. He had purchased his own ticket separately on Orbitz for around $1500. Read the rest of this entry »
April 23, 2007 at 4:40 pm · Filed under Life and Death
Wednesday morning, ~6:30 AM.
Since I wasn’t going to work, I finally gave myself the luxury of sleeping in. I reset the alarm to around 6 AM, because I wanted to make sure I called Dennis to see if he could get his expired passport situation straightened out.
I couldn’t really sleep in too late–my body has become so adjusted to waking up really early for work. I started to try to take care of a couple of things in preparation for leaving, but couldn’t really focus, and it was too early to be productive. I settled all our bank accounts, made some transfers and payments in anticipation of not having internet access and being able to do them while we were gone. I doubted we would have a moment to do so anyway.
I tried to call Uncle Bobby, but was only able to leave him a message that we needed tickets for the three of us, and I could give him my credit card, and to ask what the carseat situation would be. (It turned out that the seat we got was not FAA-approved, the airlines don’t really care anyway, and in the Philippines, three-year-olds ride on mopeds piled with 3 or 4 people–no helmets, of course. We basically ended up with an extra piece of luggage). Read the rest of this entry »
April 23, 2007 at 4:00 pm · Filed under Life and Death
(I am writing these posts in retrospect, figuring that some documentation, though late, is better than none.)
Tuesday night, ~9:30PM.
Graem was being a pill, and was extremely tired (as was I), so I decided to head up to bed early with her. She had finished her ba-ba and was crying, when Shawna came upstairs to tell me Uncle Bobby was on the phone. I was frustrated with Grammy, and asked her to tell him I’d call back. Grammy quieted down after a few minutes, and Shawna came back upstairs. She told me that I needed to call my uncle back, it sounded urgent. I ran downstairs to get my cell phone and came back to bed. As I was dialing, I told Shawna, “I bet my mom died.”
When I got a hold of my uncle, he told me. I was sort of surprised, but had been waiting for this call for years. For a while, I felt nothing–didn’t know what to do or say, or know what I was about to undergo in the next 24 hours. I asked what had happened–my uncle said it was a stroke. I would get the details later from my Uncle Fred. After a brief discussion, and trying to reach Dennis, I hung up the phone. At that point, I think Shawna said, “You have to go.” I asked her if she would come with me. She said of course.
We called back Uncle Bobby, and got into a more detailed discussion–we patched in Auntie Cate, Uncle Fred, and eventually Dennis. Dennis was shocked too, and when we talked about the trip to the Philippines, he was immediately on board. Uncle Fred wanted to know the details of how soon we could get there–all the funeral arrangements were obviously a pressing matter. We told him we had to work on it, but that we couldn’t leave the US any sooner than Thursday EST. We all discussed passports, how we didn’t need visas, and other logistics. I was so thankful that we had just received Grammy’s passport on April 13.
It wasn’t until I hung up the phone again that it started to hit me. My mom was dead. It was such a weird and surreal sensation, and would continue to be. It still is every now and then when I have the realization. The rest of the night consisted of more calls back on forth on logistics of when we could go, who could go, and how the heck were we gonna pay for this.
At some point, I called Kim–I feel a bit of a connection with her over the loss and re-loss of our mothers in bizarre ways. She was obviously very kind, but as I started to talk to her more, the loss hit me harder. It felt like I was going into shock–I got the chills and was shaking a bit. Not to mention the crying–not overwhelming, unable-to-talk crying, but just sobbing. I told her that I was exhausted and going to have a long night, and was not looking forward to waking up at 4:30 the next morning to leave for an 18-hour day at a design charette. Immediately, Kim said, “Are you crazy? Don’t go to work!” The idea hadn’t even dawned on me: I asked her, “What am I going to do anyway? I can’t make any travel plans yet, and I’m not going to be walking on a plane.” Kim said, “You have two options. Stay home and cry, or go into work and settle your projects because you’re going to be leaving for at least a week.” Again, I had not had the presence of mine to think of either of those two options–and of course I chose the latter. Shawna agreed with me, she pointed out that she was going to be subbing, and Grammy was going to school.
At some point that night, Grammy wasn’t sleeping, and there were no more decisions to be made, nor actions to take, so we slept our last night in our own bed.
December 31, 2004 at 11:31 pm · Filed under Actual posts about being moms, Life and Death, Milestones
As you may have guessed from the lapse in entries, Baby Graem decided to join us! The story goes…
10:55 PM Monday Night: We were watching an episode of “Baby Story” on TLC. I had been avoiding these shows both before and during the pregnancy. I finally agreed to watch this one episode. I was just finishing snack #3 for the evening, some makeshift chicken parm. Mom #1 had just delivered her fourth baby at 9 lbs. 12 oz. — I was ready to pass out. Mom #2 wasin the process of pushing her baby out, and I noticed I was really wet all of a sudden. I told Shawna, “I think my water just broke”–she didn’t believe me! I stood up and felt a trickle go down my leg. When Shawna realized that my water really did break, she rushed to call the midwives. Of course the only thing I could think of to do was run to the bathroom, take off all my clothes, and ask Shawna what to do! She told me to sit on the toilet and just wait.
The midwife on call told us to try to wait it out at home for as long as possible–at least an hour, and to continue timing the contractions. I sat in a warm tub, with Shawna on the phone with EVERYONE, and timed contractions. They continued to be 5 -6 minutes apart, but were Braxton-Hicks. After about 45 minutes of doing this, we decided to head to the hospital. Shawna decided the best thing to do at this time was clean the house, as my shoes were filling with water!
12:30 AM Tuesday Morning: We arrived at the hospital, and got hooked up to the monitors. They confirmed that the contractions were still mild and 5-6 minutes apart. We tried to get some sleep.
2:30 AM Tuesday: Contractions started getting stronger, so the nurses gave me Nubain–helped me go to sleep.
8:30 AM - 12:30 PM Tuesday: The Nubain totally zoned me out until around lunchtime, and I was in and out of consciousness. During awake moments, we went walking through the hallways to try to get the contractions going. Kim stopped by to see us, and took some video before she had to leave for a meeting. We hoped she would make it back in time for the delivery. We went to the cafeteria for some lunch, where we picked up tons of macaroni & cheese, which I had been unable to eat for the latter half of my pregnancy, due to the gestational diabetes.
1:30 PM Tuesday: We were getting bored and nothing was happening with my contractions, so we asked if we could start the Pitocin. The contractions started getting stronger within 30 minutes. As they started to hurt more, I tried a couple of other positions–sitting on the toilet, and sitting on “The Ball.” This was fun for about two contractions–it was too uncomfortable for my back, and the fetal heart monitor wouldn’t read.
~3:30 PM Tuesday: Contractions were getting stronger, about an 8 on the pain scale. I was ready for the intrathecal, and we thought, “Oh, good thing we’re having the baby during business hours, the anesthesiologists will be nearby.” Actually, it meant that they were all in surgery! It took almost 45 minutes for the anesthesiologist to get there, by which point I was swearing like a sailor. After I got the intrathecal, I was able to sleep for a good twenty or thirty minutes.
4:40 PM Tuesday: They told me that I’d know when it was time to push, and in fact, I did: it felt like I had to pass the largest bowel movement! Kim arrived just in time from her meeting to start filming (we didn’t need all the cussing and swearing in our video). I could barely feel the contractions through the intrathecal, but waited for them to actually push. The midwife set up a mirror so I could see the progress of the delivery, which really helped. Both Shawna and the midwife could see a little lock of hair sticking out.
4:58 PM Tuesday: Graem Avery Chiuten-Black is born! As soon as her head was out, the midwife let Shawna step in and pull her out. At that point, we still didn’t know if she was a boy or a girl, until Kim asked! We both looked down and Shawna said, “It’s a… girl?” We were both surprised but elated.
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