Dillards 90: Degrees, Exams, Vacations and Vaccinations, Oh MY!

[viii]

48 minutes ago, feministxtian said:

Report to the hospital on this date and time and w/in 90 minutes you had a baby! 

This was one of my good friends. With her first child, she was in labor for 40 hours, trying to deliver him vaginally and finally needed an emergency c-section. Fun fact: the doctor said we can do the c-section now or wait three minutes and do it so he's not born on Christmas Day. She chose to have a Boxing Day baby. For her second child, she planned her c-section and walked in and got her baby. Huge difference in recovery between emergency c-section and planned. 

[arareyeah]

My Big Sis had relatively quick and easy vaginal birth with her first. Water broke at 4AM, baby out by 7AM, and that's with waiting for the doc to come because he was on vacation. The second one, she came for a check up and already 2cm dilated. And it stayed there, nothing changed even after being induced. 48 hours later, emergency c-section. She found the recovery is much easier for the c-section compared to the vaginal birth. For her third, planned c-section all the way.

Even gave me an advice if I ever get pregnant and the doc said to get induced, hell no, go straight to c-section  The pain of being induced is not worth it, she said. 

[GreenBeans]

1 hour ago, Honey Beach said:

I was so grateful to have her and she was healthy, we both were doing well, did not care about vaginal birthing. But, I have friends who cried and cried in the delivery room after being told they would need a C-Section. I just did what the doctor thought was best for baby and me.

Same for me! All I wanted was a safe, healthy birth. A doctor actually laughed when he asked me about my plans for the birth, music, scent, water birth etc. and I was like “I’m not here for the spa experience and wellness treatment, just make sure he gets here safely!”

So don’t get me started on home births and birthing centers… when things went downhill during my birth, it literally took less than 5 minutes from the decision to go for a c-section until I was wheeled into surgery. My husband hardly had time to get ready. I could tell the doctors were getting slightly nervous and stressed, but I knew they deliver thousands of babies per year, including really risky, complicated births, so I was sure they knew what they were doing and had all the necessary equipment. Baby boy had a newborn infection with risk of sepsis, so was checked by a pediatrician immediately after birth and received IV antibiotics straight away. We both had to stay in hospital for another 5 days, but thankfully had no lasting issues. I don’t know what would have happened if I had attempted a home birth.

[CanadianMamam]

20 hours ago, AussieKrissy said:

I never get the gender preference snark  

I solidly believe it's  human nature to want what you want and if you don't get it to be disappointed. 

Neglecting or making that baby suffer in anyway shape or form because it's not your preference, now that is a whole kettle of fish  

I have one, I wanted a girl I would have been sad not to get a girl. If my six year old was a boy right now, would there still be a lingering desire or would I be content? To add a sister I don't know but i do know I would love that boy just as much as my daughter. Bec

I have two boys and then had a girl. I wanted theee kids, my husband wanted two. If baby #2 had been a girl, we would likely have two kids beceuse I would have probably given into my husband's desire to stop. However, I both wanted 3 and desperately wanted a daughter, so I felt I need to go for at least one, hopefully both those things. If we'd had a third boy, we still would have been done though. 

I did feel a lot of pressure with my 3rd pregnancy, not only did I desperately want a girl a lot of our friends and family were all "hope it's finally a girl, etc." 

I think the main reason I wanted a daughter is that I am incredibly close to my own mother and I wanted that same relationship. I love my son's but they do defintirly gravitate towards their dad for some things, especially my oldest.

My mom wanted a daughter for the opposite reason. She had a horrible childhood and wanted a chance to be the mom she'd wished she'd had, to have that mother-daughter experience she missed out on. 

[SassyPants]

When my OB asked me my birth plan 35 years ago, I remember saying exactly this: “healthy baby, healthy mom.” 

[JermajestyDuggar]

I think my major plan was laboring at home for a lot of the early labor. And I did that with my first. I laid and moaned for hours and hours until I finally went to the hospital. I’m private about my moaning 🤣 But my second was too fast so I barely labored at home at all. When I gave birth to him, I screamed in front of everyone since I couldn’t get an epidural. I was a hot mess. I had wanted an epidural in my birth plan but that went out the window. 

Edited March 2, 2022 by JermajestyDuggar

[karenb4729]

22 hours ago, Shouldabeenacowboy said:

The birth discussion is making me remember the conversation I had with my OBGYN when I was expecting my son. 
Dr: “Have you thought about your birth plan?”

Me: “Excuse me… my what?”

Dr: “Your birth plan. You know, your preferences for labor and delivery.”

Me: “ I guess I plan to get the baby out fast and safely?”

Yes, I was clueless 😉. We had a good laugh though. I’ll say my plans didn’t change even after he explained all to me, maybe I refined it a bit, but at the end, all I wanted was a natural as possible, with immediate intervention when medically necessary (deferring to him). He was an awesome OBGYN, sadly he retired.

 

Hahaha, I did the same thing with my second child - there was a big age gap between the first and second and birth plans apparently the thing to have when I had my second.  I said nearly the same thing.

[NotQuiteMotY]

10 hours ago, viii said:

Probably because a c-section is an invasive surgery and recovery can be awful. Health wise, vaginal births tend to be much better for you but thank goodness we live in a time and place where c-sections exist for mommas and babies alike. 

This. My preference was not to have a c-section with my kids largely because of the recovery, especially with the later ones where I already had at least one toddler at home. Even with the first we were planning at least one more and the possible complications for later pregnancies can be nasty.

That said, my "birth plan" amounted to "1. Have both me and the baby safe and healthy. 2. Avoid a c-section if possible while still achieving #1. 3. Try not to have an epidural, because needles in the spine and the possibility of spinal headaches freak me out."

5 hours ago, CanadianMamam said:

I did feel a lot of pressure with my 3rd pregnancy, not only did I desperately want a girl a lot of our friends and family were all "hope it's finally a girl, etc." 

Honestly, I had two boys and then a girl, and while I wanted a girl (same reason: I have a great relationship with my mom that I wanted to have with a daughter) I got so sick of everyone else telling me that they thought it was a girl, that they were hoping I had a girl, etcetera, that I almost wanted it to be a boy instead just to stick it to the world. Especially because there was also something pretty neat about the idea of a houseful of brothers! It's a lot of very odd pressure, more so when it's definitely your last child.

Edited March 3, 2022 by NotQuiteMotY

[Chickenbutt]

Many years ago here on FJ, I voiced my desire for a boy grandchild and got my ass handed to me. Nice to see we have evolved. 

[AussieKrissy]

16 minutes ago, Chickenbutt said:

Many years ago here on FJ, I voiced my desire for a boy grandchild and got my ass handed to me. Nice to see we have evolved. 

I think I would want a boy grandchild because  I have a girl but then again I think I would love a girl grandchild who would be very girly because I did not get a sterotypical girly girl 

In the end I will be happy if my girl is happy and healthy and if she doesnt have any I will feel a loss but be happy I have her. 

[Chickenbutt]

MY DIL was pregnant at the time.....she had a girl. I have 3 granddaughters, and love all of them to pieces. Wouldn't trade them for any boy in the world. And I still have hope with my younger son and his wife. lol

[Cam]

When I was pregnant, my siblings barely made me feel like it was anything special. A few were miffed that after a decade of living away from them, I was finally moving forward leaps and bounds, had married a good man, owned a home and now had a baby on the way. I was over 30 so they’d written me off as a nut case spinster. Btw, does anyone else’s family members constantly predict the future like that? “She’ll never get married!” “He’ll end up a drunk just like his dad!” “ She won’t ever hold down a job!” “He’ll always be fat!” It’s continuous with several of my siblings.

No fancy prep for me when I was pregnant. At 7 months, I called the doctor’s answering service early one morning thinking I was having Braxton Hicks contractions. The service quickly contacted the doctor and I was told “get to the hospital”. I was quite surprised by the immediate attention. I delivered my son three hours later!

In contrast, my niece and her husband (both highly educated, successful people) hired a doula who would be with niece when she delivered at the hospital. A week before her due date, niece wasn’t sure what strangeness was going on with her body, so she called the doula instead of the doctor. Doula came to the house and pissed around with the “not sure” mentality so long my niece ended up delivering on her bedroom mattress with the help of paramedics! It was rather traumatic for my niece. To me, the doula failed. When they called her, she should have said, “Call your doctor and let’s meet at the hospital” rather than pop on over to their house!

 

Edited March 3, 2022 by Cam

[HeartsAFundie]

My son was 9 days late and clocked in at one ounce shy of 11 pounds.  It was not an easy delivery or recovery by any means and I was told by my OB-GYN that if I ever got pregnant again, I would be highly monitored and would most likely be scheduled for a planned C-Section.  I had no issue with a future C-Section and fully expected I would have one with my son when delivery stalled out at the end (he was ultimately a forceps baby).

Regarding the baby's sex, I had a feeling throughout my pregnancy that he was a boy and was 100 percent fine with it.  I always thought I wanted girls from the time I was a child, but after teaching second grade for three years while in my early 20s, I realized how much fun in class the boys were and that I might ultimately be more cut out to have sons.  (Of course if my son turned out to be a daughter, I would have been perfectly fine with that too. 🙂)  

   

[GuineaPigCourtship]

I had hoped for a boy, but I was so sure she was a girl I couldn't imagine anything else by the time I got the confirmation. No regrets here! 

And I tried to keep an open mind and not to read too much about labor and delivery. I ended up with a non emergency csection for failure to progress and was fine with it. I had a sore throat this past December which was worse than my recovery (it was pretty bad, though). I was fortunate.

[GreenBeans]

42 minutes ago, HeartsAFundie said:

Regarding the baby's sex, I had a feeling throughout my pregnancy that he was a boy and was 100 percent fine with it.  I always thought I wanted girls from the time I was a child, but after teaching second grade for three years while in my early 20s, I realized how much fun in class the boys were and that I might ultimately be more cut out to have sons.  (Of course if my son turned out to be a daughter, I would have been perfectly fine with that too. 🙂)  

We found out early in the pregnancy. It mainly helped in narrowing down names. We didn’t really have a preference, but now that we do have our little boy, I couldn’t imagine it any other way. But I couldn’t imagine him being a boy with a different personality, either. He’s just him. And it’s so much fun to witness how an ultrasound picture and the vague idea of a baby turns into a real, one of a kind person! Babies are cute, but now that he’s a bit older, starting to talk and express his thoughts, it’s the best!

I’m hoping the Dillards will stop at 3 kids. There’s only so many hours in a day, and it’s not just about feeding, clothing and educating your kids properly. The more kids you have, the harder it gets to see each child individually, notice all the little things, and make sure they feel absolutely safe, taken seriously and loved unconditionally. It takes time to build up that sort of security in a child. We are hoping to do that for our little boy, because in the long run, resilience will benefit him more than learning obedience.

[just_ordinary]

I will definitely try a vbac- but honestly if I compare my recovery from a c-section to the vaginal births around me I am tempted to go for a planned c-section. Yes, you are definitely worse in the first two weeks regarding your ability to walk and lift. But most of my vaginal delivery friends had definitely longer lasting problems with healing up than me. From a long term perspective- I was up and running after 6 weeks (even though it took around 9-12 months to complete loose the slight numbness around the scar, but if it had stayed it wouldn’t have bothered me), while many weren’t completely back to before even months afterwards. 
Now, I definitely don’t think you should get yourself cut open if you don’t have to, but recovery after birth is very individual and from my very subjective experience there is no real benefit from delivering vaginally. I don’t doubt the statistics but in the end you never know at what end you come out. So everyone should birth however they want, but I am always sad if people are devastated when it ends in a c-section. It’s not your fault, you did all you could (I think that’s a big part of the mental struggle, feeling as if you weren’t able to do it and „failed“. Especially if it wasn’t a massive emergency).
What might distort my experience slightly is the the fact that here many fathers take parental leave (25% in 2020). Most do at least 1-2 months after birth and again a bit later (often take over settling them into nursery). The average timespan for fathers taking parental leave is 3,7months as a whole. 
So having your partner at home definitely makes for a smoother recovery in my opinion.

 

Re: Jill‘s pregnancy. I get having a sex/gender preference. For yourself as the parent! If you have one for others that’s just weird in my opinion. Why would anyone wish a certain sex on others? Most people have children because they want children not because they want specifically a male or female offspring. 
I also don’t think we will see much more growth from Jill and Derick in terms of getting more liberal and open. They have come further than I thought they ever would though.

I couldn’t care less if Derrick actually gets to practice law or stays a paralegal or whatever. What bothers me about him, is that he has a tendency to create a victim narrative for him. I doubt he takes failing well and will find others to fault for. The two best things he did was getting Jill into real therapy and pushing education for his children. He only pulled his family from tv over his money rows with JB. If it would have really been about public exploitation they wouldn’t have an Insta and YT account. Because those boys were/are most definitely a big part in their business model. Without the money disagreement, I doubt he would have ever said anything. He also only openly addressed the Josh situation after it was clear the Duggars couldn’t wiggle themselves out of it. He is opportunistic and thankfully right now those positive changes suit them. 

So, I get praising them for what they changed for the better, but people are getting a bit far in their praise. Maybe they surprise me again and will grow much more. I will be happy to praise them then but not beforehand.

[feministxtian]

2 hours ago, HeartsAFundie said:

Regarding the baby's sex, I had a feeling throughout my pregnancy that he was a boy and was 100 percent fine with it.  I always thought I wanted girls from the time I was a child, but after teaching second grade for three years while in my early 20s, I realized how much fun in class the boys were and that I might ultimately be more cut out to have sons. 

I would have kept having kids (if my finances permitted) if I could have been guaranteed boys. They're fun! I now have 8 teen boys in my class now and I love it. I'm waiting to see what happens if I have co-ed classes in the fall. Right now the boys are quite snarky at times and from my experience, girls don't do too well with that. 

[Marly]

7 hours ago, Chickenbutt said:

Many years ago here on FJ, I voiced my desire for a boy grandchild and got my ass handed to me. Nice to see we have evolved. 

If I remember correctly though, you wanted a boy grandchild specifically 'so the family name could live on'. Which is an incredibly outdated and patriarchal belief. Girls have names too. They can 'carry on the family name' too. 
I don't mind if someone has a preference for a boy, but if that preference stems from the infuriating belief that only boys can carry on the family name, then yeah, that's a no for me.

[viii]

5 hours ago, Marly said:

I don't mind if someone has a preference for a boy, but if that preference stems from the infuriating belief that only boys can carry on the family name, then yeah, that's a no for me.

Exactly; I have zero issues with gender preference and gender disappointment. However, the reasoning plays a huge part in it. When my sister was pregnant with her twins, we were hoping for at least one boy. My dad grew up with two sisters, I have two sisters, my one sister already had a girl... our family was sorely lacking in boys and we thought it would be so fun to have something different. She had a girl and a boy. 

I have four niblings now - three girls and one boy. It appears boys are always destined to be outnumbered in my family! 

[Chickenbutt]

5 hours ago, Marly said:

f I remember correctly though, you wanted a boy grandchild specifically 'so the family name could live on'. Which is an incredibly outdated and patriarchal belief. Girls have names too. They can 'carry on the family name' too. 
I don't mind if someone has a preference for a boy, but if that preference stems from the infuriating belief that only boys can carry on the family name, then yeah, that's a no for me.

True. And I still do. If you don't agree, so be it. 

[Meggo]

10 hours ago, just_ordinary said:

 

Re: Jill‘s pregnancy. I get having a sex/gender preference. For yourself as the parent! If you have one for others that’s just weird in my opinion. Why would anyone wish a certain sex on others? Most people have children because they want children not because they want specifically a male or female offspring. 
 

I think I only "wish" for someone if they have a string of girls or boys. Then I kind of wish - after three boys, they get a little girl. Just because. I had a friend who had three boys (and then a vasectomy) and got pregnant. She didn't even find out the gender because "I have boys - that's what I have" and then she got a little girl. It's just fun to shake stuff up. 

I just wanted a baby and a child - didn't care if Baby was a boy or girl. And Hubs and I have talked about this - we really don't think we'd have done much different had our son been a girl. She would still be hanging out driving heavy equipment with Daddy (just like our son) and LOOOOVE cooking with Mom (just like our son). (he also loves mopping and none of us are sure where he got that from...) 

[SassyPants]

1 hour ago, viii said:

Exactly; I have zero issues with gender preference and gender disappointment. However, the reasoning plays a huge part in it. When my sister was pregnant with her twins, we were hoping for at least one boy. My dad grew up with two sisters, I have two sisters, my one sister already had a girl... our family was sorely lacking in boys and we thought it would be so fun to have something different. She had a girl and a boy. 

I have four niblings now - three girls and one boy. It appears boys are always destined to be outnumbered in my family! 

I only have brothers and my brothers only have boys. I have a boy and a girl, and 1 granddaughter. My mom has 7 grandkids, 1 girl, the oldest, and 6 boys, and 1 gg daughter.  My youngest brother has 3 sons. His wife is the oldest of 7 girls and no boys.

We have a  male friend who was child #8 (of 14, old time Catholics) and the first son. He has seven grandsons and zero granddaughters.

Streaks are fascinating. 

 

[Meggo]

1 hour ago, SassyPants said:

I only have brothers and my brothers only have boys. I have a boy and a girl, and 1 granddaughter. My mom has 7 grandkids, 1 girl, the oldest, and 6 boys, and 1 gg daughter.  My youngest brother has 3 sons. His wife is the oldest of 7 girls and no boys.

We have a  male friend who was child #8 (of 14, old time Catholics) and the first son. He has seven grandsons and zero granddaughters.

Streaks are fascinating. 

 

I knew someone who said they hadn't had a girl baby born into the family in like - three generations. How is that even possible? Like - the two brothers I knew - each had all boys (one had 1, one had 3)... girl babies just didn't happen in their family.

[HermioneSparrow]

16 hours ago, NotQuiteMotY said:

Honestly, I had two boys and then a girl, and while I wanted a girl (same reason: I have a great relationship with my mom that I wanted to have with a daughter) I got so sick of everyone else telling me that they thought it was a girl, that they were hoping I had a girl, etcetera, that I almost wanted it to be a boy instead just to stick it to the world. Especially because there was also something pretty neat about the idea of a houseful of brothers! It's a lot of very odd pressure, more so when it's definitely your last child.

Basically me with my daughter. Everyone was telling me it was a boy. That they hope it was a boy because my parents had two girls and my grandma had seven daughters, that my dad deserved a boy grandchild, that my husband would LOVE to have a boy to play basketball (my husband played in college) as if girls can't play basketball (hubby is thrilled to have a girl), that I was pissed. I really had the feeling it was a girl since I found out I was pregnant and honestly I didn't care for either sex because I just wanted a healthy baby and it just doesn't matter to me but people were incredibly rude and annoying. 

When I announced it was a girl no one told me anything else thankfully because I was ready with my box gloves to punch everyone who dared to express any disappointment. 

[shesinsane]

9 hours ago, Marly said:

[snip]
I don't mind if someone has a preference for a boy, but if that preference stems from the infuriating belief that only boys can carry on the family name, then yeah, that's a no for me.

My friend's father is an Orthodox Jew who serves as living proof that fundamentalists are a problem, no matter what religion the follow.

He firmly believes that women have their place, separate (and unequal) from men. He has 10 grandchildren, all girls. And all those girls' moms are done having children. 😆