A New Story Begins

Hello from Mommy-land. It is totally UNREAL to have this perfect little guy in my life. I've been wanting to update for a while, but I don't really even know how to put into words how I feel about everything, from labor to coming home, and now just over a week since I met my son. It's just unreal.
I have SO much to write about, but I'll dedicate this post to the labor and hospital stay... it's a long one, sorry in advance. On Thursday the 6th I had an appt in the morning. My doc told me that I hadn't made any change in the past two weeks... still at 1cm, and 60% effaced. I was totally bummed. Pat and I went to lunch, and I jokingly put on facebook that I was wallowing in self pity. During that day, even when we were at the docs, I kept telling Pat that I felt like I had bad gas pains (sorry, TMI lol). They weren't horrible, but just kind of persistent all day. Later that evening I felt what I thought might be a contraction, but it was just a quickish, bad pain in my back, so I wasn't sure. When I talked to my dad that evening I told him I'd maybe had a contraction or two, but was still not really sure. About 6pm I started having regular contractions... all in my back. I probably should have guessed then that things would get painful fast haha. By 8pm my contractions were definitely regular, definitely painful, and still all in my back. I tried various positions to help, sat in the bath, sat on the exercise ball... all that good stuff. Our plan was to go to my moms, who lived closer to the hospital, once I felt like I couldn't be at home. That happened around 11pm. By time we got to my moms, around 11:40ish, I was in a lot of pain. We stayed there as long as I could handle it, and headed to the hospital around 1:15am. At that point my contractions were 4min apart, which was our goal for going from home to hospital.
By time we got there I was pretty out of it. I threw up a couple of times, and the pain was really bad. I hadn't felt any of the contractions in the front because the back labor was SO intense. The doc did a check and LUCKILY I was dilated to 5cm. She also confirmed what I guessed as soon as I realized what I was having was back labor... Drake was "sunny side up". I got the epidural as soon as I could.
Once the epidural set in it was smooth sailing for quite a while. I progressed pretty fast from 5cm-9cm, and then everything stopped. My contractions, which had been off the charts were suddenly barely registering on the monitor. That lasted almost 5 hours!! They put me on pitocin, which didn't seem to be doing anything, and finally discussed a c-section. They said they'd turn up the pit one more time and then in a half hour make the call. Luckily things decided to pick up again.
I started pushing at about 1:30pm and 2 hours later, at 3:33pm, my beautiful son was born. He was immediately perfect and immediately the best thing that ever happened to me. Even though everyone had told me that it would be amazing, I just had no idea. Amazing didn't, and still doesn't even begin to describe it.
After I got all stitched up (blah) we moved to our room. The next few days (from Friday afternoon to Monday) are kind of a blur and mostly just all run together. The best thing I did, by far, was send the Husband home for two nights so that he could get some rest! We did have to stay an extra night because Drake had jaundice, but luckily we didn't have to spend an extra three days with him in the NICU because his labs began to even out.
Getting discharged from the hospital was the point where things got real, haha. I just kept thinking that at any moment I'd wake up from the amazing dream I'd been living in, or that the hospital staff would decide we really didn't get to have this perfect little guy all to ourselves. But, they basically kicked us to the curb with our baby, our bags, and our stockpile of stolen hospital supplies.
Overall we couldn't have asked for a better experience. It was amazing. My husband was amazing... BEYOND amazing. I don't think I have ever been so proud of him. Our son is unbelievable. I'm just so in love. It's hard to imagine life without him now. It's hard to imagine when he wasn't in our lives. He's perfect, and beautiful... and yes, all the crap we went through to have him was TOTALLY worth it.

Amazing

Drake Patrick 10/7/11 3:33pm 8lbs 7oz, 20.5in long




I'm totally in love :D
I'll update more later this week.

Ummm, Hello?

Baby!! Hello!!! Today is October the 4th! Today you should be bursting forth into the world!! But alas, you are staying put. I almost don't blame you. It's gotten a bit cold outside over the last couple of days, and I am sure you are nice and snuggly and warm. But, you move so much, all the time, and you would have SO much more room if you were out here. More room than you can even imagine... and there are blankets, so you could be snuggly and warm too!! We are anxiously awaiting you baby boy!! Take pity on your poor parents and show up soon!!
So, yea... still pregnant. I feel crappy, but not horrrrrible. I think I could definitely feel worse. Mostly I'm just impatient!! I mean, come on kiddo!! We waited forever for you, don't make us wait PAST when you should arrive! I haven't really gone crazy with the "how to induce yourself" stuff. Mostly I've just been eating some spicy foods, walking and sitting on the exercise ball. I know there are other things I could be doing, so maybe I'm not desperate enough... or I don't think I'm lucky enough for those things to work. One of those.
I have an appointment on Thursday, and my fear is that I won't have any progression past where I was before (1cm and 60% in case you forgot). I guess it wouldn't be the end of the world, but I'd be sad. I'm not sure if they'll discuss induction at that point, or just say they'll see me in a week. I guess we'll see.
Here's a pic from today... hopefully the last weekly pregnancy pic I'll take!!

Oh Em Gee

I remember a few months ago talking to a friend and saying "wow, I am in the 100 day count down to this baby!" and her response was "wait until you are in the 10 day countdown!" Guess what!?!? That is where I am today! 10 days until my little guy is due. Now, I know that he could come anytime at this point (please Lord, after all we've been through, get this baby here ASAP) or it could be a couple weeks past that date (in which case I will probably totally lose my mind). But in general it is just totally UNREAL! After nearly 3 and half years, we am less than two weeks away from becoming a family of 3... it blows my mind. I had my 38 week appointment last Tuesday, and was really hoping for some good news from my pelvic exam... even though I know at this point that dilation and effacement can stay the same for weeks. I was really hoping to be at least a couple cm dilated, which didn't happen. I'm only at 1cm. But, I was 60% effaced. So, although it's not crazy progressed, it's at least a start. I will say that I still have quite a bit of anxiety. As excited as I am, and as much as I have no reason to think that anything is wrong... I still worry. I worry that something horrible will happen to him in the next couple of weeks. That's part of the reason that I just want him here NOW!! Even though I know that just starts a whole new kind of worrying. I am trying not to stress too much, but man, after waiting SO long, it's hard to not be constantly nervous. I don't have too much else to update. I'm really uncomfy, but that's to be expected with only a WEEK AND HALF LEFT!! AHHHH!! I'll leave you with a picture :)

3 Weeks Left

So... I started writing this post over 2 weeks ago!! I am such a blog failure right now. I'm unmotivated about pretty much everything. I'm keeping most of what I had previously written, so... when I apologized for not writing, really I'm double apologizing for then and now :)

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Oh my goodness! Sorry I haven't been writing more frequently, but I'm definitely getting to the point where I am pretty unmotivated to do anything.
The phase where I loved pregnancy and had the glow is officially over. Now I'm just huge and uncomfy. Don't get me wrong, I'm still happy and feel SO incredibly blessed and excited to be getting close to meeting this little monster... but wow... pregnancy at this point is just yucky. I do think my body will be partially trained to run on exhaustion by time Drake arrives, because at this point if I get one and half hours of uninterrupted sleep at any given point, I am lucky.

On a more positive note, I had two AMAZING baby showers!! I am so so so grateful for all the friends and family that showed up (and those who didn't) to support the Husband and I. The first shower was thrown by one of my bff's and my mom and was terrific! The other was thrown by a couple of Husband's cousins, and was also amazing. I can not believe all the thoughtful gifts that we received. It's easy to see that Drake is already very loved :D

I can't say that too much else is going on. I've been semi-nesting lol. Basically I'll get short bursts of energy to do tons of stuff, and then I just want to sleep. Or, I'll get a huge burst of cleaning/organizing energy and work all day and into the night on stuff... and then barf because I've totally overdone it...yuck.

We have started our childbirth classes which are pretty much exactly what I thought they would be. Our last one is on the 22nd. I'm secretly hoping that Drake arrives before then, but I'm sure that's wishful thinking.

I'm still plugging away at my Masters work, and hoping over the next week that I can get a few weeks of work in, so that I'm not worrying about that too much right when Drake arrives. Luckily my professors are really cool and I'm sure they'll be fine with me taking some extensions.

Otherwise things are just moving along... slowly. We have everything we need to take care of this little dude. We are excited and anxious beyond all belief. At this point I'm not too "worried" or "scared" (people keep asking me) about labor... because obviously it's not going to be pleasant, but what it will be is the end of a 3 year journey to hold this little miracle in our arms.

Can the next three weeks please go by super fast...

(p.s. I'm not even entertaining the thought that I'll go past due lol)

Is This Real Life?

Is it possible that I really only have 8 weeks left of this pregnancy? Mind. Blown.

I think things are finally starting to get real... like, really real. Real enough, in fact, that we finally painted the nursery and even got the furniture. I still keep thinking that I need to slow down...that I shouldn't be rushing into it, but I guess at 32 weeks, I'm not really rushing.

The most exciting thing to happen recently was our 3d/4d ultrasound!!! Is technology amazing these days or what. It's like, almost too amazing, like scary amazing. We ended up getting to go twice because the little monster in my belly had the umbilical cord in front of his face, and when prodded just moved it more in front of his face. When we went back he had changed his body position to head down, but guess what was still right by his face in EVERY shot... yup, the cord. We did get some really cool pictures though... really cool, mildly creepy, pictures :)


Holy baby!! His eyes are open in this one, and yup... there's that cord, right there by his chin.


UH oh!! Frowny face :( The weirdness by his eye is the distortion from the umbilical cord... erggg, that cord, it better just stop giving me issues now!


We got a bunch more, but those are two of my faves :) So, needless to say I am totally in love. Not that I wasn't before, but this made it a bit more real.

Also, here is a picture of what we've got in the nursery so far... Really exciting I know. There is also a dresser, but it's apparently impossible to get the entire nursery in one pic.

We are planning on doing a pirate theme, which kind of just includes a lamp shade, and a small wall mural of a treasure map... maybe a couple pillows, haha. Kind of a theme.

Other than that, not too much is going on. I didn't get hired back to work, which is frustrating. It's rough being a teacher right now. Teachers in our district who have been there for five years didn't get hired back this year, so sad :( I can only hope things will get better, when I decided to be a teacher I definitely didn't see myself being 8 years into my education and not having a job. BUT, I'm sure once my little guy bursts onto the scene I will be happy to not have a job to worry about.

Other pregnancy things... The two biggest are general discomfort and insomnia. The insomnia is out of control. I can usually bet that at least a couple times a week I won't get to sleep until 3 or 4am, not fun. The discomfort I can deal with, even if that means I sometimes get nauseous in the evenings, not my favorite. I also have crazy dry skin that is horrific on my feet. YUCK!!

OH!! I have a baby shower next weekend, and one the weekend after that!! AHH!!! Then we'll really need to figure out space issues in our house! I think after those things will really start to go fast. Or they'll just go by horrifically slow for the next 8 weeks... ugggg!! HURRY OCTOBER, HURRY FAST!!!

No new belly pic this time... hopefully once soon!! Also, sorry for how rambly this post is. Today has not been my favorite day for a few reasons... erggg... trying to keep the pregnancy crazy inside... not easy!

Welcome to the Third Trimester...

Here's a full body rash as a welcome gift. Yea... because what every pregnant woman needs is more crazy medical shiznit. On Monday or Tuesday (I really can't remember which) I noticed I had an itchy rash on my upper arms... the next day it was on my legs... now it's down my arms, down my legs, all over my thighs and starting on my belly. NEAT. Real Neat. I went to my doc and my OB... both of whom weren't really sure what to make of it. They think it COULD be contact dermatitis, or PUPP (preggo rash) OR a medication reaction... so really, it could be many things, they just aren't sure which. I did get a referral to a dermatologist, so we'll see how that goes. Mostly now I'm just itchy, and it's hot out, and I look kinda like a lizard.
Okay, not that I have gotten that out of the way... let's get to the exciting stuff... I'm in my THIRD TRIMESTER!! HOLY WOW! 12 weeks-ish left until I get to meet this crazy little monster. I absolutely love, love, LOVE feeling him moving all the time. Even if that means I am awake at 3am while he kicks my tummy hard enough to make it sore to the touch. It is SOOOOO worth it. We are hopefully painting the nursery within the next week, and maybe getting the nursery furniture within the next couple of weeks.
I still feel like, in a lot of ways, I am stuck in infertility/loss mode, and am putting stuff off that I should be getting together. Even though it is all feeling more real, I still wake up every day thinking something horrible will happen. I REALLY hope that feeling goes away soon. I have been steadily increasing the dose of meds I am on for a health issue over the past few weeks after I totally got caught by my OB for not taking the dose I was supposed to, I was just taking a couple (hundred) mg's less that prescribed... oops. Taking these meds while pregnant FREAKS me out to no end. But, I have reached the dose I'll be staying on, so that makes me fairly happy.
How am I feeling otherwise? Pretty decent. Sleep is crappy still, but it's Summer, I'm not working so it's manageable. In the last couple of weeks I have started to get a bit uncomfy, I def have a pregnancy body. As my husband so eloquently put it the other day "you totally look pregnant now, not just fat". Thanks husband :)
My mind is still pretty much broken, which made writing a research paper to finish up this semester of my Masters program super fun. Otherwise I'm feeling decent, and being super thankful that the last week has been relatively cool for a California Summer.
I can only assume that the baby is doing well... Like I said, he moves around like crazy, and I'm measuring correctly, and his heartbeat is good, and he's head down... so all those things bode well :)
Coming up in my future (other than the arrival of my little boy, hehe):
3D/4D ultrasound, hopefully within the next couple of week
My baby shower at the end of August
Childbirth classes, hospital tours, pediatrician picking... OH MY!

Things are definitely starting to get interesting!!
And, before I go... here is an new belly shot... also, sorry for not updating for a month... Oops, I'll try and be better about that!!