Monthly Archives: April 2009

The “Night Before Oprah” Day

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I thought Oprah day would feel different. It was exciting to do it, but I watched the show with my husband in our infant son’s hospital room. Not the viewing party I had envisioned.

Early Sunday morning, Rex felt hot and was needy. He didn’t want to sleep alone. We took his temp and seeing a temp of over 101, we gave him Baby Tylenol. He seemed better but drowsy most of the day. In the afternoon, I noticed the fever had returned. I gave him Tylenol and held him for two hours. When I checked, the fever was still there. Odd. When I got ahold of his doctor, I was a little surprised that she said, “Take him to the emergency room.”

At 8:30p.m., Rex and I waited for an hour, and then Mark showed up. He had to wait for our babysitter to be with Vivien and Oliver. The ER waiting room is bleak and dirty. Rex was sleepy in my arms. Sometimes, I could get him to nurse. I looked like hell and was pretty sure some of the sketchy and forlorn folks were getting a glimpse of my breast, but the ER wears us all down so even naked flesh is not appealing.

Mark and I were shocked when (after an hour in the ER exam room) the doctor told us plainly that Rex needed to be hospitalized for 48 hours (I said, “Well, I’m going with him”), have a catheter take his urine, have an IV and blood drawn, and have spinal fluid extracted. Doc, he is 7 weeks old. I just left a hospital after delivering him. Isn’t this an ear infection?

We learned that any fever for a baby under 2 months is a red flag for Meningitis. And I learned that we could all get through what the doctor told us would be “one of the roughest nights of our lives;” he wasn’t making that up.

They wheeled Rex and I on a gurney to another room off the ER. By now, it was close to midnight. Before everything began, I said to Mark, “I’d feel so much better if I could do this instead of him.” “Yes,” he agreed.

I lay on the gurney, sometimes nursing Rex, always holding him. First was the catheter to get a sample. Not pleasant, but not the worst. Now the IV and a blood sample. I knew from Cool Mom readers to ask for the best stick, and one nurse said she was. I felt she was too young to be, but another nurse agreed. I lay Rex down on the gurney, and he was already crying. He knew. As I went to his feet, I saw my husband move Rex’s side. I have never seen Mark cry, but now his face was red, and his eyes filled with tears. We tried to reassure Rex as the needle went in his tiny arm.  But no, all she did was bruise him. Not the best stick after all. I picked Rex up and started to nurse him. Within minutes I heard “Ready, mom?” from a middle-aged, stone-faced nurse who had taken the other nurses’ places. “Oh,” I said. “Are you good at this?”

“Yes,” she answered, and she was just old enough to make me believe her. She put the IV in the top of his hand. It worked. They taped a little board covered in gauze to keep it in place. After that, Rex was ready to nurse, which was a relief to me, and it meant we were two-thirds over with this torture. New shift brought a new nurse whom I really liked: a slender man who seemed very bright and compassionate. Later I would learn he was a former Marine who had done two duties in Iraq, which made me trust him more. He and the doctor wanted to wait while I nursed before the spinal.

When the time came, Mark and I wanted to get it over with. The former Marine said we could stay or leave the room. That “different parents do both.” Mark asked me what I wanted to do. I said, “If Rex has to go through this the least we can do is be here with him and let him know we haven’t left him.”

The Marine put Rex gently on his side and held his body in place while the doctor–who I liked- shot Lidocaine into Rex’s back. I got down on the floor and put one hand on his head, stroking, the other to his hand. Rex gripped my finger with his whole fist. Strangely, when the doctor extracted the spinal fluid, Rex stopped crying and his face took on a look of resignation, like, “Oh good, they are just going to keep doing stuff to me.” It broke my heart, and yet I thought him so brave. Then it was over. The Marine said the fluid was clear, and he doubts Rex has Meningitis. But we have to wait 48 hours for the cultures, and while Rex is in the hospital, they will give him the antibiotics by IV in case he does have Meningitis.

It was 3 a.m., and we were still in the little room when the residents asked us the same questions about Rex’s illness. I finally told mark to go home. No point in both of us being ruined. He left to return in the a.m. to bring me breakfast. And he needed to be home when Viv woke up. I had called my sister Carole’s house after midnight, and her dear husband Kevin said right away, “What can we do?”  I asked them to take care of Viv the following day, which they did.

I nursed Rex as all our bags and car seat, were loaded next to me and we were finally wheeled into our own room on the pediatric level. Our new home. I so was tired I had to stare at the crib for a minute before I realized I wouldn’t fit. They kindly wheeled a regular bed in as they knew I needed to hold Rex all night.

And I did.

Mommy’s on the Phone!

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So this video was about how kids talk to you when you are on the phone, but what’s the deal with husbands? I was talking to a girlfriend recently, and we both found our husbands started chatting with us when we were on the phone. Not a quick, “Is the rice done?” but long statements, and then they get a little bent when we look at them like, “Dude, shut up. I’m on the phone.” She said, “My husband can go hours without speaking to me, but as soon as a friend calls I’m his new best friend.” Are they insecure that we are yucking it up more with our friends than with them?

Sometimes my husband wants in on the phone conversation. After one of my “No ways!!” to a friend, he’ll say, “What?  What?!” I can’t recount this story when I’m on the phone. If it’s good I’ll tell him later, or it’s nothing that he would care about anyway.

Rough Red Carpet

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No, not the tale of me as a lonely mom… but as a reporter on a red carpet. I was covering “Valentino: The Last Emperor” at the LA County Museum of Art for my TV guide network show, “The Fashion Team.” It was a Who’s Who of who didn’t talk to me… or most of the press. Nancy Reagan, Gwyneth Paltrow, Anne Hathaway (a couple people nabbed her), Rachel Zoe, Tom Ford. (Who, I might brag, I met once, and he told me I had great legs and that I had worn the perfect shoe that night. The shoe was a Sonya Rykyel) It was one of the harder red carpets I have worked. It wasn’t the biggest event but still not a lot of press avail, as we say. In general, working a red carpet is miserable for both sides of the carpet, but far worse for the press.

Here is how it goes: I arrive early and join a producer, cameraman, and sound man. We get in position, which in this case meant being sandwiched between InStyle magagazine and some German reporter. Normal, no prob. But then the stars were few and far between. And normally a PR person comes up to you and says, “Would you like to speak to ___ ?” That way if you say “no,” the star is not offended. But the only rep who was working was for the director of the movie and while he was literate and gave good sound bite, he wasn’t my first pic for my fashion-oriented show.

Part of the problem was being after InStyle. I always wondered how they get those round-up pages in their mag. You know, like “What’s in your medicine cabinet?”  Did they really call up Blair Underwood to ask him that? And it’s a bunch of stars. Well, it turns out, one reporter grabs a celeb and banks enough questions for 6 months worth of issues. By the time it was my turn, the celeb was pooped and moved on.

I was snubbed by Janice Dickinson. What?? Janice who loves press. Janice who is pulled and stretched to the nth. Janice who claims to be the first ever supermodel (not sure about that one). Janice who had a Tyra rip-off model search reality show. She wouldn’t talk? I’ve interviewed her before; she is usually hoppin’ for press. But not tonight. It reminded me of years ago at my first red carpet when I was snubbed by Tom Arnold at the “Titanic” premiere. You don’t know what humble means till you yell in vain “Tom, Tom, Tom Arnold!” as he speeds by. To be blown off by Gwyneth Paltrow I get, but Tom Arnold and now Janice Dickinson?

Who did talk to me? I got a tiny, uncharismatic sound bite from Nicky Hilton. Valentino spoke. But God love him, he doesn’t speak in sound bites but long chapters; don’t know how they will edit it. Joan Collins was lovely, and let me say, she looked great. She was wearing a long, narrow black skirt with a big slit with which she was flashing some fab senior gams. (My dad said if I could arrange a hook up, he was in). Rita Wilson (Mrs. Tom Hanks) was a delight in her Lanvin coat. She was ebullient and our favorite for sure. Very nice to the press.

Seeing all that haute couture and glamour blaze by me was probably a tad harder for me than normal as I am still wearing my maternity clothes.

One-Handed Blogging

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I’ve got to write quick. Rex just entered “quiet alert” after lots of nursing and copious amounts of Pooh. While Viv pretends she is in school, I stick Rex in his swing. Thank goodness he likes it more than Viv did at this age. She would last about 2 minutes.

But if my comments or postings seem short these days, it’s because I am often in the above pictured mode and blogging with one available hand. It’s even harder if Rex is nursing on my right side. The nursing is going well. The baby nurse who comes once a week so I can get one good night of sleep says I’m “pumping half and half”. He’s getting big so maybe she is right.  Side bar, hard to write the check for such aid, but boy, oh, boy is it worth to have that night of sleep. I just wake up twice to pump and go back to bed immediately.

I’m also counting on this one-handed life to help me to lose weight. Since often I can only eat with one hand. And it’s a great excuse not to clean.

Driving Averse

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I have to give fellow parent Mike (Amy’s dad) credit for this title. One day he said he was “driving averse,” and I thought, “That’s what I am.” It sounds so much better, “I hate to drive.”  ‘Cause it’s not hate. And in my life I have been happy to drive. Gosh, I use to drive between San Francisco and LA (almost 400 miles) every other week at one time in my life and thought nothing of it. (Sidebar: I used to get books on tape, mostly novels. One time I decided to get something to educate me, and it was something like “Make Your Life Financially Healthy” or “How the Stock Market Works,” something like that. It was so dull I almost drove off the road.  And then lost money in the stock market. Go figure!)

Happy to have a car, just don’t want to be in it a lot…