Mom’s Journal

Some of the names we talked about were -

Margo
Marjo
Greer
Mercedes Diamond
Reed
Colin
Sam
Max
Benjamin Moore

An ultra sound x-ray was done a week before my due date (April 30) to determine that it was only one baby. The baby was kicking so much it was difficult for the technician to complete the x-ray.

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Labor and Delivery

I started feeling a little sick on Sunday. May 1st. I could feel that the baby had dropped more than before. On Tuesday night I went to bed about 10:30. George had gone to a meeting at the hospital. I vaguely remember him coming in and showing me he had picked up our certificate for completing the 6-week Lamaze class. I woke up with contractions at 2 a.m. The first two were about 15 minutes apart. Then they started coming 8-53 minutes apart in no particular sequence. I woke George up at 6 O’clock. I couldn’t wait any longer to tell him I was having contractions. ”Call the doctor.” I said no you just get up and get ready for and then we will call the doctor. The contractions were not consistent and I kept thinking, “no this can’t be it – they started too close together.” We called the doctor at 7 and checked into the hospital a little after eight. I still kept thinking the nurse who examined me was going to say that I hadn’t dilated anymore and to go back home. But I was dilated two centimeters and went into the birthing room while Good Morning America was still on. George sat in a chair with his feet up & timed my contractions while we watched TV. I can remember the contractions started coming no longer than 2-3 minutes apart about the time All My Children was going off. George went to eat (finally) about 2. The contractors were becoming a little more than uncomfortable. From 3 o’clock until the time of birth I was contracting only on the pain of the contractions & grateful for the short rest in between them. Because the baby was posterior (his head) there was a lot of pressure on my back & the top of my legs. When I did start pushing about 4:15 or so the pain was so intense I felt like I couldn’t stand it. But, of course, I had to. George stood by the side of the bed now so I could squeeze his arm during the contractions. The Lamaze breathing was beginning not to be helpful in getting through the contractions. I threw up after some especially strong contractions. Mostly George and I were by ourselves with the nurse and the doctor coming in every once in a while. Once again Dr. Song’s predictions that the baby would be born around six was correct. As much as I wanted the nurse’s prediction of 5 to be closer to the truth the baby was born at 5:35 pm. I knew the moment he was finally coming out. George (who was supposed to be staying near my head) was right down there watching as the baby came out. I remember first seeing the look on his face and him saving “That’s amazing” the moment before the baby was placed on my stomach and I saw how beautiful our baby boy was. I have heard women say that initially the baby on them felt like a stranger – ” was that what was inside of me?” – in other words, some kind of distance to this new little stranger. I felt an extreme closeness, an instant strong emotion and bond to the baby placed on me.

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Benjamin More Eubank

May 4, 1983, weighed 9 lbs 13 1/2 oz, 21 1/2 inches long with dark brown hair. His eyes were open when he was on my stomach after the birth. He had grabbed a pair of forceps as the doctor pulled him out & George had to help release them from his grip

~~~

The first week I was exhausted. I could have used help, help I thought I wouldn’t want for a while. It wouldn’t have been nearly so bad if I wasn’t extremely sore from the birth. I couldn’t sit down, I couldn’t raise myself up with him in my arms. Ben woke up every hour and wanted to nurse. I would nurse him for about 20 minutes, soothe him for about 20, he would sleep for about 20 minutes and be right back up. I wasn’t sleeping at all. He and I were sleeping on the pullout.

About the third week Ben started sleeping at night a little. He would sleep about four hours and then two hours and another two hours. He pushed himself off my lap for the first time & at night when I lay him down to sleeping on his stomach, he would somehow push himself all the way to the of his crib where his stuffed animals are.

—

Benjamin likes to fall asleep in the middle of everything - not in his crib.

He likes to be entertained – meaning to be held and talked to. He rarely is content to sit in his chair or lay on a blanket. He is Mr. Motion, always moving his arms and legs – even in his sleep a lot of times.

At almost five weeks now he seems most fascinated by night shadows. He watches them intently behind us, his eyes wide.

His grandmother Eubank is coming to see him this week & the other grandparents are  counting the days until we come to Texas.

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7 Weeks

I started giving B. formula at 6 weeks. In only one week he has adjusted pretty well, although we went through three nights of his schedule being messed up, stomach cramps, and finally, a new formula. (Isomer-soy bean formula)

He is smiling a lot now (he started at about six weeks) & tries to communicate by going and sometimes lets out kind of a yell.

He is much more relaxed, taking both a morning and afternoon nap and last he -almost- slept through the night, sleeping 7 hours. His eyes have already turned brown. He and I have been going out ot the pool now & then. He wears the blue striped “Bing Crosby” hat we bought him he was two weeks old. It fits him snuggly now – it was huge on him.

He stills prefers not to sleep in his crib during the day. Since he can’t fit in the borrowed Moses bed anymore I have just been laying a quilt down on one of the couches & he sleeps for hours through all kinds of commotion.

We live on the third floor.  There are two lights in the stairway coming up the steps. Already George is teaching Ben about the universe around him. He always says as we come up the stairs (and B. is looking at the lights) “this is the sun, Ben (the first light) and this is the moon.” (the second light.) This is probably more than enough universe for BME.

Right this moment he is lying on his red checkered quilt asleep (on his stomach) with his nursery rhyme-pictured blanket over him while King Kong is on the TV and Gomez is out of his cage carrying on about something in parrot.

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8 Weeks – 12 weeks

At 8 weeks, Ben made his first trip by jet plane. He was great and slept through the landing. His ears did seem not seem to be affected at all. It was in Texas, while visiting my parents and brothers that Ben’s personality blossomed. He waited (it seemed) for the boys to do or say something to make him laugh. He loved the ceiling fan in their living room and would by lie & watch it and smile. He also started watching TV (especially the rock video cable station). He stopped fussing before he fell asleep at night, instead we would just simply doze off while looking at the fan or being held.

Ben looks at everything now. He will contort his body trying to watch George or I as we leave the room. We bought a mobile for him when we got back from Texas to take the place of the fan. He loves it, but everything catches his interest now.

He turned himself over for the first time when he was 11 weeks old.

His babysitter’s name is Richie Eby, she likes to play bingo & watch “soaps”. She talks a lot and does to Ben all day too. He hasn’t seemed to have any problem adjusted to a sitter. I miss seeing him during the most alert times of the day but we still have some pretty good times when George and I get home. I have to keep him awake sometimes but he doesn’t seem to mind.

Ben will look at books with me now. I noticed he kept looking at catalogs or magazines I was reading and so I got out my big Cinderella book & showed it to him & told him the verbal story line. He was interested, I think.

He is getting mouthy. He thinks he is really saying something. Sometimes at night he sits in his chair & makes a rhythmic sound like singing just before he goes to sleep. He has been sleeping 7-10 hours at a time, and still takes good naps during the day. Usually a couple of hours in the morning and afternoon. He takes only his Isomer, his vitamins & fluoride.

Everyone says Ben looks mature for his age because he is so aware and conscious of his surroundings and also his physical prowess.

He looks at George now the way he looked towards his uncles - just waiting for him to do or say something so he can laugh. And just about anything his father does makes him laugh.

Ben moves swiftly in his walker. Swiftly backwards, but swiftly none the less. The first time he was placed in it he looked so proud of himself. He smiled & laughed & stood up. Just thought he was hot shit in general.

Ben likes his crib very much now & takes his naps there too.

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Ben 12-17 weeks

Baths are great stuff. The image in the mirror is funny looking. And standing up while holding mom/dad’s fingers or the walker is
living dangerously. Ben would rather play than eat. He is eating a little bit of rice cereal and drinking some juice.

On George’s 29th birthday, a few weeks ago, Pam & Phil had a surprise party for him. As a gift, they hired a belly dancer. we were all out on the patio when she came. Ben was in Adam’s walker, the woman came around from the side of the house & started dancing around George. She had long dark hair & a gold sequined costume on. We were all laughing. suddenly I thought to look at Ben to see how he was reacting to all of this. He was standing on his tip toes, his hands waving in the air, his head shacking – was literally trembling from head to toe. I picked him up – was stiff as a board & I tried to calm him down. It was as if, for him, it was a nightmare figure come to life….

It’s September 12, it’s getting to be Ben’s first Fall.

BME 4-6 months Nov. 2, 1983

One night a few weeks ago Ben discovered his universe had other rooms. It doesn’t just encompass the living room or his bedroom. He manipulates his walker to go wherever he likes and he knows which room contains what. “The study has the long curtains that sometimes just might be left draped down; it has the books, the birds and the little boy in the mirror; it used to have Dad’s bike until I pulled it on top of me and now that’s in the front room closet.” “The bathroom has magazines, the soap (sometimes) and the slick floor.” “The back room where Dad is usually sleeping when I get up has nice blue curtains with pink flowers; it has the closet door always open that I like to play with (even though my walker won’t go in the closet) – and right next to the closet door is the great big jar of change that I play with all the time; there’s the old swing I used to have to be in once in a while and I didn’t like – sometimes I pull on that – I’d like to see it fall down & crash one day if I could; There’s a the chair blocking off the area by the plans (unfortunately!). My room I pretty much stay away from unless my mom is cleaning it or something – I’m in there enough.” “And there’s the Kitchen with another big slick floor the boy in the over door and the towels I always put on top of my head; the trash is there too and if I can get to it I will.” “The living room has new things all the time I can get in too- one day I can’t reach the magazines on the table, the next day I can; one day I can’t pull the phone off the table & the next day someone has put it down in a different place yea! I can pull it right on top of me; I can terrorize Gomez by pulling on his to or his cage- I can play the stereo – I can see if the blinds have been left down by mistake & grab them – I can eat paper & try to pull out plugs- I can talk to the little eboy in the windows when it gets dark – I can watch TV – can grab soda cans – the boundaries of the living room are haphazard & limitless.”

My toy keys open up my universe every morning.

—

Ben has just started to hold his bottle, he sits up at an angle & then falls back down. He is more interested in learning to crawl than sitting up. He’s up on his knees rocking but that’s all. In the last couple of months the only word he has accidentally verbalized were “mom-mom” and & “mommy.”

He plays very hard during the day and his usually ready to go to bed around 8.

He is not afraid of the dark. the other morning he was up playing in the middle of the night with his busy box. In the morning I found all his little stuffed animals scattered all over the crib. Unless he wakes up crying (which is rare) he will go back to sleep if it looks like no one is awake.

Ben wants to eat, or at least taste, everything. The only thing he’s tried that I can say he didn’t seem to like was pumpkin pie & the hamburger in some stew George had made. He eats his cereal & also has some fruit. He loves bananas. The other night he insisted on eating dinner with us. He had little tastes of stew bread & grape kool-aid. I was afraid he had eaten so much he might get sick from the spices, etc. – but he didn’t. He loved it.

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Ben 6-12 months

Ben started crawling when he was six months old. For a very short time… He was barely 7 months old when he first pulled himself up on his play-pen. He was still in his seventh month when he, remarkably, simply, walked across his playpen one day. As Ben does with everything – his first discovery that he can do something new – only leads him to almost obsessively repeat the performance over & over again until he gets it right. Soon he was pulling himself up on the table, the couch, his high chair. And, of course, he had lots & lots of bruises. When we went to Danville at Christmas, Ben was taking several steps, unassisted. He was an excellent traveler – as always. Unfortunately, Ben was just getting over a small cold which had been causing him to have some trouble sleeping (I thought) & even though he was better, he would still awaken a couple of times during the night. in fact, he did that from his very first day he stood up to a couple of months ago. He screamed whenever I left the room when we were on vacation. I’m still not sure why exactly but it made our trip difficult in that sense. even when we first got back he would scream with Richie & cry for me when I left for work. But he got back o normal before his first week home was out. Richie thought he was mad at her for leaving him, and without his routine, he was worried I was going to leave him too.

The weather had just started getting nice enough for B. to play outside – he loves being out. We are moving to a house in Homewood the end of this month (May, 1984). It has a big backyard. Ben will have a pool in the backyard this summer.

He had his first birthday Friday. I made cupcakes that were decorated different colors & said “Happy B-Day Ben.” But I knew he wouldn’t really be interested in the cake. He doesn’t eat stuff like that - bread doesn’t interest him at all. He still eats & tries many different kinds of foods – yogurt, fish, spaghetti, pizza, ice cream. He has little desire to feed himself, however.

But – back to his birthday – he received many presents. Jody (Aunt doe-doe as she wants him to call her) gave him one of her huge teddy bears & also bought him a little piano that plays “This old Man” and then the magic man – a neat little man who sits permanently atop a blue & yellow ball – as it rolls he always stays on top. Great grandma Erthel Jones (his grandmother by friendship) got him a big red punching balloon and a little shopping cart. Pam & Phil & the kids got him a dashboard driving machine that you can shift gears & makes noises & lights up when you use the turn signals. Richie got him a practical gift – a toilet & Elmer, her husband bought him a little cart on wheels that carries four funny-looking plastic animals. He picked this out himself at the toy store. It’s also one of
his favorite toys over at Adam’s house so I wasn’t real surprised that he chose it. And George and I got him a Brio caterpillar toy, a top that has race cars zooming as it goes around & planes flying the opposite direction above them. We also got him a soft train that animals fit into. I want to get him a rocking chair but we are going to wait until we move.

Ben can say many words. Of course he has said many words once or twice & uses others frequently. He says (to name some) ”crackers, all gone, momma, Da Da, Pa Pa, Bath, George, Bye Bye, hi.” He seems very interested in how words sound. What he says, he says very clearly. He over emphasizes to get it right sometimes – like “George” he says “Geor——GE!”

Ben has quite a temper & gets furious when he can’t have what he wants – particularly if it is something he has worked very hard to for - a book of matches he has painfully labored for in a drawer just above his reach. I think he gets very frustrated thinking he hasn’t made himself or his wants understood. he will be happier when he can communicate more verbally it seems. He has a temperament a little like his uncle Jason. And always has that look in his eye as if he has just done something he shouldn’t have or is just about to.

When he laughs, he really lets loose. Ben laughs when his father laughs & sometimes he laughs for no apparent reason at people in the grocery store or on TV.