Mobility Anxiety! And the Blonde Baker!

I am excited to share my new blog with you! This whole parenting-triplets-thing requires serious baked good consumption, so I decided to channel all the time I spend baking, reading cookbooks and sharing treats with friends into a blog all it's own. Please come check it out- and try a recipe or two. (I also heard a rumor there is a picture of me on the About page. Just sayin'.) I am The Blonde Baker!

Back to our (semi-)regularly scheduled programming.

We are entering new territory here, folks. MOBILITY. Although the babies have yet to sit up without some major assistance, they are figuring out how to move. Quickly. Usually toward a sharp object or one of their sister's choking-hazardesque toys. We are entering an uncharted territory of "busy".

It is usually my mom and I (thank heavens for her!) all day with the trips and A, so we usually rotate who rushes upstairs to get ready or shower in the mornings. We take our iPhones and text if help is needed. Usually, things go fine, although I may end up holding two while pacing if they are fussy, or she could have to hold Cheeks while feeding Ace his breakfast. It's just the usual "double-arming-it" that we do daily.

Ace and O-Bear

Increasingly, the babies have been more and more content playing on the floor with lots of toys and one of us sitting with them. I usually have to adjust baby limbs so they don't conk each other in the face, sing songs with hand movements or pick up a fussier boy pretty much constantly. A few days ago, early in the morning, I was sitting on the floor drinking decaf, while A watched "Sesame Street" and the boys played. Pretty soon Cheeks became fussy and needed to be held, so I picked him up and sat him in my lap. Then A needed help in the bathroom, so Cheeks and I went to help her. By the time I got back, O-Bear had army crawled all the way to the ottoman and was half way stuck underneath it and Ace had rolled about 20 feet to the hardwood floor and bonked his head in the process. My mom rushed down to see what the hysteria was about, and all I could do was stand there, holding two crying babies, with a look of terror a glimpse of what was to come on my face: MOBILITY.

I believe the thought, "We are SCREWED!" ran through my head in stereo.

The new challenges now are not that they refuse to be set down, but that when they do, off they go in THREE directions! I knew this stage was coming, but I did not expect it yet! They cannot even sit up- what do they think they are doing, rolling/crawling/getting stuck already! We live in a three story home with hardwoods throughout the main floor and many a dangerous staircase entrance. The stairs need to be gated, the hard edges padded, and the choking hazards removed from the family room (by the way, all four-year-old girl toys are choking hazards).

Let the baby-herding begin!

Cheeks in the bath! Seriously, have you ever seen any cuter ones?

I almost just Googled, "Creative Blog Post Title"

Pathetic. Anyhoo...

Right next to the button I just pushed that says, "New Post" is the information that I have not posted since March 27! WHAT? (A very sheepish blush has overcome my cheeks...)

Needless to say, I am a bit on the busy side with eight month old triplets and our nearly four year old, but how can I continue to neglect anyone who still reads this crazy blog? This year has certainly been different from last. On Father's Day last year, we had a fun family brunch and relaxed all day. I was 16 weeks pregnant with my three perfect boys, and thanking my husband for being such an amazing Daddy to our daughter and daddy-to-be to our little guys. This year, we both had the luxury of a shower, made it through the day with three teething babies, a tyrannical almost-four-year-old and are currently trying to decide if we can stay up until 9 pm to watch "True Blood". Interestingly enough, I talked about that (most awesome of awesome) show last year. It seems some things never change.

Everything else does!

Some pictures and highlights to catch you up...

- We have three teeth among the boys, spread out over two babies! Cheeks and O-Bear, true to their identical twin-ness cut their first tooth within a week of each other, and now Cheeks has number two!

- Ace (always the rockstar nurser) has also become the rockstar eater! He eats three solid meals a day- homemade veggies or fruit and Yobaby, his fave. The other day, we were trying to entice O-Bear to just TRY some yogurt (It is sweet! And creamy!) while Ace ate some of his favorite pear-banana-peach blend that I whipped up. He saw us giving his brother yogurt and cried so hard and whacked his tiny, ineffectual fists on the tray until we shared the cultured wealth.

- Cheeks and O-Bear mostly make faces like you are trying to poison them when you attempt to spoon some goodness in. They really just want to nurse (ALL the time, which is fine by me) but are beginning to dabble in vanilla Yobaby. Only vanilla.

- They are all rolling everywhere, which scares and delights me, but are not sitting up. I really am excited for this so they can have a new view that does not include our ceiling and perhaps they'll be a bit more entertained when my mom and I try to pee/make dinner/take care of their sister.

- I have become obsessed with the only hobby that I can do at home: baking! I bake something (usually some delish cookie with chocolate in it) at least once a day, and have been on a cake kick lately. I am thinking of starting a baking blog, complete with fantastic (ha!) looking pictures of my creations and lots of recipes. It would be a fun thing to do from home, while babes sleep, and that is unrelated to parenting, nursing or multiples. As soon as I have my blog looking good and sweet, I'll share the url. Hopefully it will be a well-nurtured blog! (The best cookie I made this week: chocolate marbled oatmeal cookies. HEAVEN.)

Some happenings:

A, "nursing" her doll

O-Bear, who insists he is on his tummy at all times

We happen to be on the other side of the state with the kids (and my awesome mother, and my little cousin) in search of the sun, as it appears it will never shine again in Seattle. One of my assignments for the week: more blog-friendly pictures and another post. I promise one by Friday. Dang, I am getting ambitious around here...

I have a more serious and reflective post in the works, one that makes me all teary and sweaty, about the guilt I feel to not be the mom I was to my daughter, about how hard it is to see two crying babies and sometimes have to choose which one to hold, about how I still want to have a clean house and make dinner, which means sometimes I choose to do housework while my mom hangs with babies. It is all a recipe for guilt and anxiety for me lately, and I am working on being more forgiving and also trying to have quality time with all four of my children, each day. Even if it is only for one chorus of "The Wheels on the Bus".

I am catching up in my Google Reader while on vacation. Expect to see me in your comments!

Shameless distraction!

5 month-old bottoms!

I am hoping that helped you forget the fact that I have not blogged in over a month. A funny thing happens when I stopped pumping (!) and was able to nurse instead- no more laptop time. While this was my ultimate goal, I miss reading blogs from a screen larger than my iPhone, and really miss blogging regularly. Mid-year resolution: short and sweet updates.

The boys are five months old! The nursing continues to go well- we have not used a bottle in weeks and are not looking back. I am so proud of them! They love to nurse now, and I usually have at least one baby attached to me for the better part of the day. I think they each nurse around 10 times a day- maybe more. They demand feed at night, too, which is getting out of hand (since they wake up to nurse and promptly fall asleep after latching on) but for now, it works for us.

Everyone is growing- our Cheeks is still the largest at a whopping 13 pounds! He is on the chart for his weight without adjusting for prematurity. Clearly, his nickname still fits. He has become extremely vocal about everything. He coos loudly at himself in the mirror, grunts while I get ready to nurse him, and is the first to exhibit stranger anxiety with heart-wrenching wails. Luckily, he is never with any strangers for long, but even out in the community, he can be sensitive. He has a ginormous head that we are hoping rounds out a bit soon, but at least we know his brain is a-growing.

O-Bear is also getting so big! He is definitely our snuggler. Wherever he is, he reaches for his brothers and hooks arms with them. He will settle for just gripping their sleeve or hand if necessary, but he likes to be really linked in to his brothers. Lately, he has been bucking while laying on his back, with just his head and feet on the floor and boy, can he move! He basically refuses to roll from front to back (something his brothers love to do) and settles for sucking on his hand. Our O usually has a few fingers in his mouth and drool on his shirt.

Ace lives up to that nickname! He rolled over first and is working on back to front. While his Nanna was here, he laughed out loud many times for her and will now for us, if we kiss his neck noisily. He is sort of a boob hog and will cry when he sees his brothers eating until his turn. Ace continues to be super social and loves to be worn facing out in the Bjorn, so he can see the world. He flirts with everyone, with a wide-open grin and loves new people. He reaches for and holds toys, as do his brothers, and he has showed them how to mostly get toys to their target: the mouth!

So much to write about- more coming on nursing, "leftover" embryos, multiple parenting and other adventures! For those who still read- thank you! Better posts follow... but now, I must sleep for an hour before someone wakes up to eat.

Happiest Mommy EVER

I have so much to write about our adventures in breastfeeding over the last month. For now, I just have to share with you this:

The boys are all breastfeeding on demand, without any bottles all day!



You may be wondering how they got to being able to get all they need every three hours from nursing. The answer: they didn't! I gave up on that unnatural schedule and am feeding them when they are hungry, two at a time, for hours on end sometimes. They are simply not ready to nurse every 3 hours, so I am following their lead. Today I think I nursed each about 9 or 10 times ... but sometimes it was in tandem. I do not need to pump as often, and I am having the wonderful experience spending more time with my children and less time with my pump.

There is so much less crying (by them AND me) and much more bonding time. They nurse happy, smiling and cooing. I feel the same way.

I will write a detailed post about how we came to this awesome place despite our major setbacks and roadblocks. I feel so lucky to have all the support of nursing friends, experts and other triplet moms. I have learned more about the way the body makes milk, keeps a supply and the way babies, especially preemies, nurse since the boys were born. I am one of the lucky few who can, with effort, make enough milk for all my babies.

I have not felt this good in MONTHS. It feels so frustrating to know where you want to be but not be able to get there, and that is what the last weeks have been full of. Little progress, frustration by all and lots of crying on my part. What it took ultimately, was time, persistence
(bull headedness?) and support. We are here!

Details to come if there is interest!

The boys' other favorite new pastime is touching hands.

A Year of Tubeless, Volume 1

The next six months Tubeless in Seattle's first year will come later in the week. Thanks for reminiscing with me!

It has been one year since I began writing here!

When I decided to start the blog, it was from reading others, and appreciating so much that people could share their pregnancy loss, infertility and treatment stories and experiences so authentically. Hoping that it would be cathartic to me, and perhaps provide a tiny bit of insight to another person going through the pain of miscarriage and fertility treatments motivated me to start writing.

A great decision, it turns out! I have made so many friends and found such an amazing community that supports its members and is unbelievably welcoming to neophytes. I've read both joyful and heartbreaking stories of birth and loss, life and death. I have found myself less quick to assume I understand someone else's experience of fertility, pregnancy or birth after seeing into so many people's worlds.

When I started out writing, I was the mother of a two year-old girl who'd experienced the pain of three miscarriages, two after seeing beautiful heartbeats which eventually stopped beating. My OB had put me on Clomid after months of unsuccessful conception but did not monitor me at all. After nothing happened, we sought help at a big Seattle RE, moved to IUI's but then discovered my tubes were severely damaged (from a previous Pelvic Inflammatory Disease) and had to be removed. I was made "Tubeless" in December 2008. Of course, without tubes, IVF was the only option, so in February of 2009, I was waiting impatiently for an ovarian cyst to resolve so I could begin stimulation drugs for my first IVF cycle. I was in waiting-to-start and birth control purgatory and was so desperately hoping for a shot at another pregnancy, another child in our family of three...

Here is a bit of what each month over the first half of last year held for me:

February 2009: Crazy Infertile Lady's behaviors are revealed while I wait for an ovarian cyst that is delaying my IVF cycle to GO AWAY. Also, I share an Affirmation after Miscarriage.

March 2009: Eventful! I get to start my cycle, Retrieval goes well, as does the Fertilization Report. I develop Ovarian Hyperstimualtion Syndrome (OHSS) which almost causes our cycle to be cancelled and embabies frozen, but we still get to transfer and put back two blasts. The OHSS gets worse and I have paracentesis done to remove fluid in my abdomen. Oh: I also find out I am PREGNANT!

April 2009: We find out I am pregnant with twins! I lament how previous miscarriages can ruin pregnancies. I start spotting (which is the way two miscarriages began...) and find out in the ER that I am carrying triplets. PANIC and WONDER.

May 2009: We discuss the idea of reduction for about a second, and are extremely reassured by our amazing MFM (high risk OB, called a Maternal Fetal Medicine doctor). The first panicked call to said doctor occurs, and the fear of pregnancy loss and preterm labor commences.

June 2009: I whine about trying to be an energetic mommy while preggo with triplets and we are thrilled to discover that my belly holds three boys!

July 2009: I am put on strict-ish bed rest when my cervix starts to shorten, I count the days until viability, and post this priceless picture.

I am so thankful to have thoughtful, supportive readers, some of whom have become close friends. Thank you for reading and coming along for the ride through infertility, multiple pregnancy and triplet parenthood. Your supportive comments have lifted me up many a day.

Check back this week for the next six months which are full of worry, waist expansion and the birth of our boys!

Babywearing is not just for babies

As I have mentioned before, our daughter has had a hard time with the triplets' homecoming. OBVIOUSLY. We knew bringing three high-need preemie infants home to a three-year-old who is usually the center of everyone's attention would be terribly hard for A.

She went through many weeks of hitting, having accidents, not sleeping and generally regressing in every way she could, and attempting to get attention however possible. Even if that meant throwing a shoe at me while I was nursing Ace, or throwing a full cup of milk at Gramma who was changing a diaper. The list goes on, but the point is, things are better. She has become more accepting of the fact that we are often busy and we've become more creative at finding things for her to do, and times that are just for me and her, Daddy or Gramma and her, or other fun outings.

I have realized lately that she is really missing the amount of physical touch I used to give her. I am snuggly, cuddly and full of affection and right now I have a baby attached to my body several hours a day and a pump the rest of the time. I've noticed that I am craving that snuggle time with her, and am determined to get more. We have started going into a different room from the babies and reading together, or just laying on the couch and talking.

We wear the babies on our bodies in Bjorns, Moby's, or slings, as we did with A. She is a tiny three-year-old, so a month ago, I asked her if she wanted to ride in the Ergo carrier on my back, since she was feeling jealous that O-Bear was in the Bjorn, next to me. She climbed in and I wore her on my back while I made cookies. She laid her sweet blonde head onto my back and said, "Ahhh. Isn't it nice to be stuck together like glue again, Mommy?" MELT.

Again this week, she was wanting to be nearer to me, so my friend suggested some Ergo time. It is amazing what that does for her! We went on a family walk yesterday and I wore her on my back and O-Bear on my front, and this is what it looked like:



It was a gorgeous day, and empowering to feel I could meet her needs too. What a wonderful reminder that she is still very young and needs just as much touch, physical closeness and interaction that the babies do. I just have to be creative in finding that time!

3 1/2 Months!

If I show you a super-cutie-pants picture will you forgive me for not blogging in WEEKS?

Baby A, Baby B, Baby C (Scroll down for updated nicknames)

I hope that worked! As usual, our days are so full of feedings, pumpings, changings and snuggles, but that is no excuse for an extended bloggy absence. Or for my lack of commenting, but friends, I promise I am reading and will quit it with the quiet lurker behavior.

Updates, in list form:

- I must change the babies' silly and unfitting nicknames which I assigned (after surgery and with three newborns) in the NICU. The babies will now be known by nicknames that mean something and use their first initials:

"Cheeks" is Baby A. He is CHUBBY! Possibly our most high-need baby, requiring a lot of help to settle, sleep and eat. He also has the most gorgeous grin and coos loudly, especially at his big sister. He is not a fan of being in the car and has almost required me to run red lights to avoid stopping. Did I mention the cheeks? SQUEEZABLE and chunky. His twin is O-Bear.

"O-Bear" is our Baby B. I have always called him O-Bear. He is our little fighter who had NEC in the hospital and who has recovered his weight difference to pass Baby C and almost pass Cheeks! We have a harder and harder time telling them apart as he gains so well. He eats the most and is quite dramatic. If he coughs, or coos to much, he chokes on his saliva and lots of dramatic gagging ensues. He is flirty and bats his long and curled eyelashes at everyone while tuning his head to the side and saying "ah-goooooooo".

"Ace" is Baby C. He is not a twin, but knows he is a triplet. He is patient, calm and collected. He rarely cries and smiles all day long. He has dark hair and olive skin, while the twins are fair and blonde like me and my daughter. Wait for the best part: he nurses WITHOUT a supplement after, about every 3 hours during the day. Oh, and he nurses all night, laying next to mommy. :) He also has more strength and just seems older. He doesn't have some of the other preemie behaviors that the twins have, like over extension of their bodies and weak sucks. (See more on that below...)

- We are BIG! The babies are all 11 - 11.5 pounds and growing so well!

- STILL working on breastfeeding but these boys are getting no formula! I am pumping 'round the clock to ensure the twins have milk for their supplemental bottles after nursing and at night. Hate my pump sometimes, but it has enabled me to provide for them!

- The twins were seen by a Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) and both have weak jaws/tongues and are just not ABLE to get all they need from the breast... YET! I keep up with nursing each one at each feeding, and give them my milk in a bottle if we need to. I want them so badly to be able to do it, but they are not there yet.

- I have some amazing LLL friends who are keeping me sane, and one even brings me her own expressed milk on occassion. I call them crying, frustrated and they bring me back to the fact that I am nursing TRIPLETS and that is a wonderful thing. I am the luckiest mommy ever.

- I am coming up on my Blogoversary! A year-in-review post will be coming.

The Post About Breastfeeding

Breastfeeding! I never knew what a struggle it could be to get there with these boys. I nursed my daughter until 15 months when I weaned her to try to get pregnant (insert hysterical laughter here) as I was not ovulating or having periods while nursing. So I consider myself a pretty seasoned breastfeeder and can troubleshoot a lot of latch, supply or other problems. Nursing triplets, on the other hand, was something with which I had no experience. Preemie triplets? Uncharted waters.

The knowledge and experience about nursing I had before having the boys has served me well. I know that breastfeeding is a supply and demand operation. In theory, the more you tell your body to make (through nursing and pumping), the more milk it will produce. This, unfortunately, is not the case for everyone, despite best efforts, pumping and drugs to stimulate production. I am so far, lucky enough to be able to keep up, but that could always change. For now, I drink ridiculous amounts of water to ensure I am hydrated, and take 14 Fenugreek capsules a day. This is an herb that stimulates milk supply and can be found online or at any health food store. I get mine from Amazon or the grocery store.

We are still working to get the boys all nursing from the breast their "full" feeds, which for them is about 90 cc's, or just over 3 ounces per feed, seven times per day. If they are unable to nurse the feed, we supplement with a bottle of EBM (expressed breast milk). How do we know if they got their full feed? I am CRAZY like a fox and have a rental scale. Actually, it provides us with an amazing amount of information about their nursing habits. We simply weigh them before and after nursing, and each gram they gain translates into a cc. So if they gained 60 grams during feeding, they ate about 60 cc's or 2 ounces, which is 2/3 or their feeding. Of course, sometimes they are not as hungry, and sometimes more often, and we always have a bottle ready if they are hungry.

This way of feeding, scheduling a breastfed baby to eat seven times a day, sucks (no pun intended) in so many ways. Newborns should be breastfed on demand, and usually between 10-12 times per day. Our guys are 12 weeks old, almost 6 adjusted, and really should be eating about 10 times a day still. If they did that, they'd only need to eat around 2 ounces or so at each feeding, so that is probably what is developmentally appropriate. Because there are THREE mouths to nurse, and I still have to pump 7 times per day, they cannot be demand fed most of the time. In the evenings I cue feed them whenever they are hungry since we have an extra adult home and I don't have to pump one time then. Ideally, they'd all be put to the breast all the time, all day long, but there are literally not enough hours in the day for me to do that and pump. The other problem with it is I would pump my breasts empty and then be trying to feed a hungry baby who is not the most efficient nurser, as it is.

So a schedule it is. Right now, so they get the most practice, I nurse everyone at each feeding, and anyone who is still hungry will get a bottle of EBM. When we get to where they are all nursing well, I may only nurse two at each feeding while one has a bottle in the interest of time. We've chosen to start doing "AC/PC" or before and after nursing weights with our rental scale to get an idea of how they are doing. We'd like them to nurse 70-90 cc's or 2+ to 3+ ounces at each feeding.

While my little Elephant, our non-twin Baby C is doing an amazing job, usually getting 60-90 at each feeding and often going a whole day without a supplemental bottle, the twins have plateaued. They have made very little gain on the amount they can nurse in the last couple weeks, which is so frustrating! I really hoped they'd be off of supplements by now. So each feeding we weight Baby A, nurse Baby A, weigh Baby A and then possibly give a supplement. Then we repeat that three times. After that, I pump and we begin again shortly after. This process is obviously tedious but keeping logs of AC/PC weights, how much milk we use and how much I pump is really helping us see patterns, or in the case of the twins, a plateau. Part of the frustration is the lack of consistency: sometimes our Lion will take 50 and sometimes 15- it does not seem to have anything to do with time of day, nursing order or position. Their suck is not as strong, they are not as patient to wait for my milk to let down, and they seem to be easily frustrated. To have them push away from me and then latch on easily to a bottle feels hurtful sometimes, though I know it should not.

I've had my friend and lactation consultant out, and she thinks they just need to "grow up" a bit more until they can do it. Other multiple moms have said they need to be a bit older to truly have the ability to take full feeds. Other people have suggested that the twins could have tongue tie or another sucking problem and not be able to get more. This could require occupational therapy simply a few tweaks in bottle type to help them learn to suck better. I am getting referrals from our pediatrician today to be seen at Pediatric OT units at two Seattle hospitals. They evaluate baby's abilty to suck/swallow efficiently and their overall muscle tone which plays a part in nursing. I recently discovered I know a Pediatric OT and Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) who works with preemies who are learning to breastfeed. I have a phone call set up with her this weekend and cannot wait to hear her point of view, which may be different from a lactation consultant.

That is where we are at right now- sort of in a holding pattern. I am so grateful that my babies will latch on at all, and enjoy each second of nursing them. I am truly determined to make this work, but I had not expected we'd need to persevere this long. Were it not for my completely amazing mother, who helps me with each feeding, does the dishes and laundry and bottle washing, I would not be able to do this. If it weren't for my husband who encourages me, distracts our three-year-old when I am focused on a nursing baby and doesn't mind the pump and scale rental costs, I would not be able to do this. I am lucky to even have the chance! I have also met an amazing triplet momma who is nursing her trio and she has fielded long emails from me with so much support and kindness. I have an awesome LLL leader friend, one who is on her way and totally unwavering and a great LC to consult with. This is taking a village.

You, bloggy friends, are part of the village! Please let me know if you have any ideas, thoughts or questions about this major undertaking. :)

I think it is important to add our successes over the past couple weeks:

- No one needs a nipple shield to latch on!
- Two of the babies can nurse, laying down in bed with me. Most precious feeling ever.
- They don't cry before they even start as they used to scream and flail while trying to latch them.
- Baby C PREFERS to nurse :)

Part of the problem is a complete lack of info about nursing triplets. It is different from nursing twins or a singleton, and throwing the preemie factor in there makes it even more of a unique situation. I have had limited success in gathering resources about nursing triplets, but a good (and really the only) book about nursing more than twins is Mothering Multiples by Karen Gromada. For those of you expecting babies who are interested,some of my favorite resources about breastfeeding are KellyMom, a great general breastfeeding guide; La Leche League's site which has a good tool to finding local help; and The Nursing Mother's Companion by Kathleen Huggins.

Breaking my own rule

You know, the one about no pictures? I had to show off- my babies are getting big on my milk and I am so proud! How big? 9 1/2 to 10 pounds each!



A very long, overly-detailed and obsessive post about breastfeeding is forthcoming. These babies are amazing, and I am hoping I might be able to drop a pumping session or two soon as they take more from my breast and less from a bottle. Are you on the edge of your seat or what? I am sure you'd rather be watching "American Idol" auditions than read about nursing, but STILL. It occupies my mind, breasts and time 'round the clock, so what better to write about?

A Different Mother

I have been reflecting on the kind of mother I have become since the birth of the boys: decidedly different. The number of children born into our family 10 weeks ago has necessitated a busier, more multi-tasking, less present mother than I ever was with my daughter. These thoughts were not coming together in prose; a style departure is in order.

The day you emerged from me, you were pulled away.
Your tiny bodies were not laid on my breast.

I mothered you through thick plastic and
Hated the leaving of you in a place not your home.

Your three new lives broke me open into four pieces,
Each piece regenerating and growing stronger.
I am one mother moving in many directions, all at once.

I am less able to hold each of you, but able to hold more of you each day.
You hear my voice singing to you less, but hear me soothing your brothers constantly.
Does that soothe you too?

I am spread too thinly now, but wider, longer too.
Like spilled milk, vast and white, smoothing out the rough edges.

You, my three glorious boys have but one mother to nourish and nurture you
Whose body makes your milk yet cannot feed all of you at once.

I hope when your tiny hands touch, you draw comfort from each other and
You understand that I wish I could always hold you, always feed you, just us.

I learn from you each day how to make each moment, each interaction
Thick and warm and sustaining.

I am different this time, not ideal, but perfect for us, I hope.
You three are perfect for me.


Are you a different mother than you'd imagined? Are you still trying to become a parent? What is your ideal role? Do you have peace about your mothering?