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Hello, my dear blogger friends.

Baby C is doing really well these days! He lost a significant amount of weight after he came home, thanks to the fact that he preferred to sleep instead of eat and the fact that my ni*ples turned into blistered, bleeding sores. But we stuck it out and his weight is on the rise now. At 7lbs, 13 ounces, though, he is still thin for his age. But Mr. LIW was underweight until college so I assume Baby C will follow in his footsteps. At least it doesn't appear that we will have to worry about childhood obesity.

Speaking of weight, at least the pain of nursing was balanced by the fact that 20lbs melted off of me within a few weeks. I am getting used to the jiggly belly but I need to lose another 8 pounds before I can fit into my non-maternity pants. Luckily, my non-maternity jeans fit because they sit on my hips. As for other clothes, I may be in maternity pants for a while.

Taking care of Baby C has been much easier than recovering from childbirth. He's a generally happy baby and usually sleeps for a good 4-hour segment until the wee hours of the morning. I never know what I will deal with after midnight - one to two hour naps - but I have learned to go to bed early to take advantage of some uninterrupted sleep. Mr. LIW helps out alot on weekend nights so that I can get a normal night's sleep, which is awesome. Baby C takes much shorter naps during the day unless he is being pushed around in a shopping cart so I don't nap much. But, with Mr. LIW's help and incredible patience, new motherhood isn't as tough as I had feared.

As for my recovery, well, I have decided not to tell the entire birth story because it's so painful to think about. Here's a brief summary. Basically, the prostaglandins I was given to induce labor led to unrelenting and excruciating back pain, which I endured for nearly 24 hours. Baby C was facing up so his skull was pressing on my sacram. The contractions were frequent enough to go to the hospital that night and I stuck to my natural chaildbirth plan until the next afternoon when the contractions became more intense once the midwife broke my water. Baby C was in NO hurry to arrive and my progress was painstakingly slow. Thanks to an epidural, I was able to get some rest. If it wasn't for that, I never would have been able to deliver him v*ginally. At one point, we thought his head was stuck and I was told to prepare for plan B. But, thanks to my sheer stubbornness and the patience of the midwives, I was able to avoid a C-section. Baby C's heart rate never indicated stress, so I was resolved to hang in there. But there were many - and I mean MANY - dark moments. So much so that I believe I have a mild case of PTSD from the experience. The staff agreed that back labor is the worst and that they expect women to resort to pain relief in those situations because there is no relief otherwise. I was prepared to stick out the pain in 1 to 3 minute segments but not to have CONSTANT pain and then contractions on top of it. Anyway, I am proud of myself for sticking it out and glad that Baby C turned his head in the 11th hour and came out healthy. I would have preferred not to have to push for four hours (talk about requiring every ounce of strength I have ever had) but I am told I was lucky to endure only second-degree tears from so much effort. Only now, though, has the perine*l pain/discomfort almost fully subsided, though. I didn't realize that I was going to be so uncomfortable for so long. And that my IBS would be screwed up for so long as well.

So those first two weeks at home were an absolute blur. My sensitive skin proved to make bfing torturous but, once again, my stubbornness shifted into gear and we made it work. Baby C is instatiable much of the time, though, so we do occasionally supplement with formula, especially at night. I am proud that we have made this work and that I can bf with minimal discomfort now.

Just as I was starting to feel better, though, I got a dreaded phone call. I learned that I had been laid off. My company laid off 20% of its workforce because it lost so many clients due to the freefall on Wall Street. I had worried that this would happen since so many of the agency's clients are VC-backed. Since I had so few clients left, my head was on the chopping block. For those of you who have been following this blog for a while, I have taken this hard. Job searching again? ARE YOU F*CKING KIDDING ME???? What is the universe trying to teach me here? I am not warming up to the need to sell myself once again.

The SVP, who is my mentor of sorts, assured me that performance was not a factor. And finding out who else had been laid off validated this. And he is helping me tremendously in my job search. I have a couple of leads already - one reached out to me directly (and the SVP happens to have a friend who works there), another through a recruiter - so there's progress. I have a couple of initial phone interviews set up for the next couple of days but I am SO unmotivated. I feel so demoralized and simply don't have the energy or the drive to sell myself AGAIN. I will do my best for sure and I hope that my feelings about this process don't ruin my chances. Luckily, the company is sticking to its promise to pay for my maternity leave so I will get paid through the end of this year and could probably receive unemployment starting in January. We can't afford for me to be unemployed much beyond that but I am hoping to be home until February. Of course, if a relatively decent job comes up I will have to take it. What choice do I have? This economy is dismal so I need to take any good job that is offered to me. I would love to get back into government but there are simply no jobs in that arena. I just hope that my new job has great benefits and is even more supportive of working remotely. One of my leads appears to offer these perks so maybe it will work out? I honestly have trouble getting emotionally invested in any of these opportunities. And I can't shake off the fact that, though I did great work and received such awesome feedback at my company, I was still disposable. I need to become one of those people who works simply for a paycheck!!!!

I will post updated pictures of Baby C soon. I still can't believe how beautiful - and BLOND - he is. He doesn't look as much like Mr. LIW as I thought. I think there might actually be a little bit of me in his face. He is starting to smile now, which makes me wonder if there is anything more awesome in this world!!!!

Thanks to all of you for your wonderful congratulations!! Mr. LIW and I enjoyed and appreciated them.

XOXOXO