Clancy's View

Sleep Deparvayshun…

…seems to affect your spelling abilities. The funny part is my mother had to tell me I’d misspelled Miracle – I didn’t even notice it. (Previous post title – since corrected.)

A friend and co-worker had been telling me for some time that the secret to inducing labor was Chinese food. I told Mrs. Clancy about this advice and it’s been a running joke between us. Finally, last Friday we got up the courage to order some Chinese take-out. She ordered Hunan Chicken, extra spicy. Ten minutes after finishing her dinner, Mrs. Clancy’s water broke. Our little joke suddenly became very real. Mrs. Clancy has been preparing for this moment for months. Despite that, we still had things to get in order and it took us longer than expected to get out of the house. But we finally did get out and only had to turn around once because *I* forgot my Palm and without that wouldn’t have all the phone numbers I would be needing soon. We got to the hospital around 8:30 PM. They shuffled us off to Triage and when the nurse came to collect us, Mrs. Clancy stood up and retrieved the towel she had been sitting on. The nurse noticed the towel and asked, “Did you bring that with you?” “Yes”, we responded and she went on to explain that the towel is what they refer to as a “positive towel sign” and that it was usually an immediate ticket upstairs (to labor & delivery). Despite our “positive towel sign”, we still lingered in triage for a while before they shipped us up to our delivery room. Contractions started around 10:00 PM and quickly grew in strength. Mrs. Clancy had decided that she wanted to attempt this venture naturally and declined the first and all subsequent offers of an epidural. Our baby Yoda was being obstinate (just like mommy and daddy) and was constantly moving away from the fetal heart rate monitor. We were also having problems with the contraction monitor moving as well, so it wasn’t too long before the doc and nursing staff had her wired. By 3:00 AM, the contractions had intensified and labor wasn’t progressing quite as fast as we’d hoped. Mrs. Clancy finally relented and called for the epidural. As she would later confess, she was more worried about that needle than the she was the labor pains. She held onto my hands as the Doc fixed her up and I regained feelings in my fingers about the same time the epidural kicked in. After that, we turned down the lights and tried to get some rest. That didn’t last long. At 8:30 a new doctor came on shift and she said that we probably should wait a few more hours, but she was fairly confident that in a few hours we’d probably still be in the same position as we were now – having to decided whether or not to call the “c.” After a few moments of deliberation, Mrs. Clancy decided that we should just go for it. We hadn’t had any progress for 4-5 hours and it didn’t seem likely that we would. The time had arrived.

For reasons I’ll never be able to explain, I stood by my dearest wife’s side, held her hand, and watched most of the procedure. Wow. All I can say is that I’m glad that they had a sheet up so she couldn’t see it. After what felt like forever, the doctor withdrew a bloody baby. Someone said “it’s a boy” – I was looking, and from my angle I thought I was seeing boy parts (the sex organs are extremely engorged at birth). Then someone said “It’s a girl” and I looked again and saw that it was in fact a girl. I looked down at my wife and repeated – “it’s a girl” and she just burst into tears of joy. As long as I live, I will never forget that moment.

After being cleaned, tested, poked and prodded, a nurse finally handed the most beautiful little girl over to me. I held her for at least 20 minutes before the docs finally got Mrs. Clancy stitched & stapled back together again and I was able to pass her to her mom.

The last 6 days have been a blur - and I’ve been able to string more than 2 hours of sleep together! As for Mrs. Clancy… well, that’s another story entirely.

As for the secret of Chinese food – I’ve thought about it and concluded that its not really a secret – I mean, how can 2 billion Chinese be wrong!

Our Miracle

Daddy's little Girl
Born Aug 20th at 9:27 AM
7 lbs 7 oz - 21 1/4 inches long

Things We’ve Learned – So Far!

Well, we’re still waiting… These last weeks are soooooo is LONG!!!

Mrs. Clancy’s Doc visit this week went well. Baby still hasn’t moved down much, but things are still progressing. The official due date is next Wednesday, and the Doc said that if we make it to the end of next week without Yoda making an entrance, then we will be scheduled to induce on Saturday morning. So, thankfully, there is an end in sight. But we’re still hoping that it happens sooner…

Anyway – I promised more original blog product, so I thought I'd share some of the things we’ve learned along the way.

• By the 16th week of pregnancy, you should be making a decision on nursery furniture. I’m not sure why, but for some reason, I can walk into a car dealership and special order a custom made car and take delivery much faster than you can order a crib. 10-14 weeks is a typical wait time on nursery furniture. (Ours took 11 weeks, and when we got it there was a problem with one of the drop sides. We’re still waiting on the new drop side.)

• Technology is wonderful. It’s possible to know the sex of your baby by the 12th week or so. Don’t do it. Trust me, there is absolutely no need to know. Seriously – why do you want to know? Do you think the kid is going care what color the walls are in the nursery? Or the color of the stroller? The car seat? And, how many outfits do you need, and how long do you think it’s going to take your newborn to grow out of them? Besides, the baby’s going to be wearing white for the first 3 months anyway, and nothing they wear will last more than 4 hours before needing to be changed.

  We have two different “coming home” outfits. One for a boy, one for a girl. They cost maybe $5. Mrs. Clancy got to shop in both the little boys and little girls section. (Of course, we have lots of unisex outfits too – they weren’t hard to find. Or really very necessary. But don’t tell Mrs. Clancy I said so.)

  People always look at us strange when they ask and we say we don’t know. And then we wind up talking about it for a couple of minutes after that. It’s a lot more fun this way, trust me. Besides, there are too few “good” surprises left in the world.

• You need more than you think. You probably won’t need everything you’ve bought.

• Read this. It has very helpful.

• Everyone will tell you to sleep now (before the baby). Ask then how. We haven’t figured it out either. Personally, I think it’s your bodies way of acclimating you to the new sleep pattern – you know, the one where you won’t be getting a good nights sleep anytime within the next, oh, 21 years!

Our Wonderful Language

We now take a break from the ‘Baby Blog’ to instead post a funny email received some time ago. (More original blog product coming soon.)

Why The English Language Is Hard To Learn

1.) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture.
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
7) Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) After a number of injections my jaw got number.
19) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.
20) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
21) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?

Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.

We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?

If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth?

One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices?

Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend, that you comb through annals of history but not a single annal?

If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?

If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?

Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they are absent? Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever run into someone who was combobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable? And where are all those people who are spring chickens or who would actually hurt a fly?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out, and in which an alarm goes off by going on. English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all). That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it.

Angels

While I can’t say that I subscribe to any specific religion at the moment, I do have a profound sense of “faith” – a sense that there exists in our lives something beyond what our five senses can experience... something “bigger”. And I believe in angels. This is why...

My grandfather, dearer to me than I could ever even begin to explain, passed away on the day after Thanksgiving last year after a long battle with lung cancer. It’s a truly evil disease, for it robs its victims of the most basic human dignities, and can even deny them simple comforts such as the memories of a life well-lived. Such was the case with my grandfather. Clancy and I got to tell him of my first pregnancy, and he was able to experience the anticipation of his first great-grandchild for a few short, precious weeks – but by the time I miscarried, he no longer remembered that I had been pregnant. The disease had overwhelmed his mind. My family agreed to keep our grief to ourselves, for we knew he would be devastated if he ever realized that he had forgotten something so important. I did, however, make one request of my grandfather shortly before he passed a couple of months later – I asked him to always be my babies’ guardian angel and to help them find their way to me when it was time. There was absolute peace and love between us in those final moments, and I looked into his eyes as he flew away from us.

The week after my grandfather passed, little Yoda was conceived. He was a man who just got things done.

Oh, and my due date... two days before my grandfather’s birthday. I doubt anyone will be surprised if little Yoda chooses that day as a birthday too.

Yoda Update II

This poor, neglected blog has slide back into its usual neglected state. It’s not that I don’t want to write – I really, really do, it’s that I’m a fat, lazy slob. OK, maybe I’m being too harsh. I’m not always a slob. Anyway – I check the stats and know that I have some faithful who still check in from time to time and for that I thank you. And I owe all of you a Yoda update, so here goes…

Mrs. Clancy is 38 weeks along today. About 4 weeks ago, her doctor expressed some concern that the baby was feeling “a little big in there” so she sent us off for another ultrasound. The next week at the ultrasound, the Doc there measured, checked, poked and prodded and found that the baby was head down and in position to be ready to start heading for the door. The Doc also concluded that the baby was in fact quite big in there – 6 lbs, 6 oz worth – a good 2 lbs more than should normally be expected in the 35th week. The problem is that ultrasounds at this stage are very unreliable and have an error rate of plus or minus 2 lbs. So it was still quite possible that the baby was the expected 4 lbs 6 oz, but it was also probable that the kid was already a monstrous 8 lbs 6 oz! Suddenly Mrs. Clancy was all worried about having “a big enchilada baby everyone would read about in Yahoo News!” – (direct quote) (The link is to an even bigger baby as the Big Enchilada has already be surpassed.)

After the ultrasound, Mrs. Clancy’s Doc informed her that although the baby may be big, she didn’t really want to put too much faith in the ultrasounds and since that baby was still really high she didn’t want to schedule anything just yet – the plan was to just sit tight and see what the baby wanted to do. So we did. Meanwhile, Mrs. Clancy read everything she could about induction and concluded that she wasn’t really interested anyway. Apparently, forced inductions rarely work out and they wind up taking the baby C anyway. So instead, we’ve been talking to Yoda non-stop encouraging our dearest little one that it’s time to start moving down.

We don’t know if it was the talking, or just a factor of time, but as of this mornings Doc visit, I am happy to report that the baby has started to move down. Which is good considering we’re just 2 weeks from the scheduled due date!

So we’re officially excited. Of course, we’ve been excited for a while, but now I know for sure that each time I feel my cell phone vibrate, it could mean something so very, very life altering is really, finally about to happen...

More soon.

Waiting...

More info soon...