We have a baby!!
Well, actually we have two babies now, but as of last week we have a brand new tiny baby!
Last Thursday, August 11th I woke up early in the morning feeling really sick. I was 36 weeks, 6 days pregnant, so we'll just cheat and say I was 37 weeks.
I wasn't going to be induced for two more weeks, but waking up that morning I just knew I would have my baby that day.
I felt super nauseous and was having contractions about every ten minutes.
I tried to play it off like it was nothing, because I had been having contractions (nothing regular or close together though) for a couple months at that point. I tried really hard to tell myself it was nothing, so I let Jeff go to work and told him I'd let him know if anything changed.
Well, I guess I should have known better than to let him go, because I ended up throwing up several times that morning.
Side note: I NEVER throw up.
Morning sickness......
Not a thing for me.
Get the flu.....
Nothin.
I never throw up.
Seriously never!
Ha ha ha ha.
So throwing up all morning turned into me calling my OB's office and they told me I needed to go to labor and delivery.
Lucky us (not), Jeff was doing an audit down in West Valley (45 minutes away, ha ha) that day, so we called my mom and she came and rescued me and Grace.
My mom, Grace, and I went up to the hospital and got all checked in.
It wasn't even a question of if I should stay at that point....the nurses checked me and I was still dilated to a 4 (I had been dilated to a 4 for a couple weeks), plus my contractions were closer to 5 minutes apart.
I was staying.....I was going to have a baby!
Pre birth pic, yay for epidurals!
Jeff came home from work and by the time he got to the hospital I had gotten my epidural and was hooked up to all the lovely things they hook you up to in labor and delivery.
I was group B strep positive (look it up if you don't know what that means, ha ha) so I had to have 4 hours of antibiotics pumped through me before baby could be born.
I guess I was never meant to be a natural birth kind of person.
Cause if they wouldn't have given me the epidural and slowed down my labor to get those antibiotics through me, I'm sure I would have had him A LOT quicker!
Since we had to wait for several hours though, we knew he'd be born more in the evening.
If I've re-learned anything over the past week since Hunter was born it's that we have the most amazing and willing family.
Seriously, we would not have been able to do what we had to do this past week without our moms, Jeff's sisters, and our sister-in-law. We have a really good family!
AND....I need to mention, that I'm SO grateful that Grace feels so comfortable with all of these family members. It gives me so much peace of mind that she feels comfortable being taken care of by all of her aunts, and actually that she really just adores all of them too. If we ever say she's going to be watched by any of them she'll happily say "Okay!!" and then usually will start listing off their children's names that she'll get to play with, ha ha.
So Jeff's mom came and took Grace to one of his sisters and after that it was pretty much just a waiting game till we were clear from the antibiotics.
It was kind of nice that the Olympics were happening, cause we could just sit and watch those all day! Ha ha
Around 4:00 in the afternoon they started pitocin and a little after that they broke my water.
Once all of that happened I was on the verge of being dilated to a 5....but I quickly jumped up to 10!
I was pretty determined not to over do my epidural medication, because I knew if I could feel a little bit of what was going on I'd be able to push him out easier and faster.
As I progressed I started feeling lots and lots of pressure. Towards the end I was in quite a bit of pain.
I'm sure my epidural was still working to some extent....but I definitely felt a lot more pain than if I would have kept it running at full and total numbness.
I felt a huge urge to push every time I had a contraction. I was almost afraid the doctors wouldn't get there fast enough before I just couldn't help but push him out, ha ha. They got all set up pretty fast though and before I knew it I was having my baby!
It only took three contractions of pushing and he was out!
The main thing I was concerned about was that I wanted him to cry when he was born. Grace didn't cry for the first half hour of her life (super scary experience), so I just hoped and hoped that he would. I wanted that "normal" kind of birth where the baby comes out and cries and gets laid on the mom. I didn't get that with Grace and it has always made me sad.
At 8:06 PM Hunter Jeffrey was born and he cried!!
Hooray!! We were so happy to hear that cry!
Newborn cries are the cutest.
They wiped him off while he was on my chest and then we were able to do skin to skin for a little bit.
That was a dream come true for me. To have that sweet little baby on me and know he was okay and he was safe in my arms. I'll always remember and cherish those moments.
One of the first things I thought of right after he was born was "oh my gosh, he's SO little!"
Fighting diabetes hard for 9 months of pregnancy and keeping that boy healthy was such a draining thing.
I mean.....I guess I fight diabetes even when I'm not pregnant.....but when you have a sweet little soul growing inside you, I think it ups the motivation to maintain good control by a million fold.
One of my biggest fears was that he'd end up huge or unhealthy/suffer from any complications that can happen from my diabetes. So when he came out so small it was kind of shocking!
He was 5 pounds 8 ounces and 18 inches long when he was born. Such a tiny little baby!
After we did skin to skin and they took him over to weigh/measure him they started to realize that he was having a hard time breathing.
Deja vu started to sink in!
They wanted to take him to the transitional nursery to check him out and decide what to do with him.
We had already experienced that with Grace, so we were like.....okay....it won't be that bad, see you in a little bit baby!
We got moved to post partum and were told to wait to hear what they were going to do with Hunter.
Three or so hours went by and we kept not hearing anything. Our nurse was finally like....okay, how about we just walk down there and see what's going on?
As we rounded the corner going into the transitional nursery we could see the NICU doctor in full on surgical scrubs using instruments on our baby that was covered with surgery blankets on a little bed.
We were like.....WHAT IN THE WORLD!?
The doctor was putting an IV type thing in Hunter's umbilical chord. It ran all the way up to his heart. It was mostly used to draw blood and things like that. We had no idea about any of this though, so we were pretty concerned.
After they explained about a million things that mostly went over my head it was determined that Hunter needed to be in the NICU.
The biggest thing was his breathing problem. He had to be on a ventilator for several days and slowly got weaned off of it so he could learn how to breathe on his own.
Another issue was they were worried he had an infection.
They ended up telling us that they think that's why I went into labor and had him early was because he had an infection and both of our bodies decided he needed to get out of there!
Aren't our bodies just amazing things? To just naturally go through that process?
So that night we ended up going back to our hospital room without our baby. :(
It's really hard having absolutely no control over your own baby -- having no say in what's happening. Even though obviously the medical professionals know what is best in that situation, whereas I have no clue...it's still really hard.
The next morning we were told that he was doing way better than they thought he would do. His risk for infection was gone and they were just giving him lots of fluids and antibiotics in an IV that they stuck in his head.
Oh my goodness....I hated that thing. It looked SO sad!!
The next couple of days were the saddest. He had two IVs, his oxygen in his nose, a feeding tube, all of his wires to measure his vitals, bandaids all over to cover pricks and pokes they had to do, tags with his name and my name on his little ankles....
He had a lot going on.
He has this look on his face a lot. He opens his little left eye a tiny bit while the right stays closed.
Sweet baby
Baby toes!
His horrible IV got moved from the front of his head to the side! Still looked so sad. :(
Grace came and met him on Friday, the day after he was born.
Jeff's mom brought her up to the hospital and it was the SWEETEST thing of my whole life when she saw me and Jeff.
We were walking down to the NICU from our hospital room and Grace was waiting at the entrance with Jeff's mom. I yelled down to Grace from a ways down the hall and when she saw it was us she started full on sprinting as fast as her two year old legs could go to us.
That little scene will forever be a special memory for me.
She was SO happy to see us. I could tell she knew a lot was changing and a lot of new things were about to happen.
She ran up to me and fell into my arms. She put her head on my shoulder and didn't want me to put her down.
I love that sweet girl. It's amazing how special of a bond we have. She's my best friend.
I've had quite a bit of guilt this week as we've been gone up at the NICU so much. Grace has definitely had a hard time and we've all cried over it multiple times. She's tried to be really understanding, especially for a two year old, but it's just been hard on all of us.
I was worried that she'd have a hard time when we took her in to see Hunter for the first time, because he was hooked up to so many things, but honestly, I don't think she even noticed any of it. She focused solely on the baby.
We took her in to the room at the NICU and I think that was the most overwhelming part for her. She said her classic escape phrase "I go this way!!", asking us to take her out, but we tried to keep her calm and we took her over to his bed.
At this point we weren't able to hold him, because of the IV that was in his umbilical chord. Because it was threaded up to his heart it was extremely sensitive and if it was messed up at all it could have made him bleed a lot and fast.
So that day Grace, along with the rest of us, just got to look at him in his little box.
She got excited and thought he was really cute. She squealed and giggled a couple times which was super adorable.
The next day she came back up and was able to see him out of the box! She got pretty shy and didn't really know what to do. She mostly just tried to play with all of the buttons and chords everywhere, ha ha ha. We finally got her to come over to the baby though, and tickle his feet. She thought that was super funny. She loved looking at his little fingers and toes.
Over the next couple of days he continued to get better. He slowly started losing chords and monitors and as you can see from those pictures, we got to hold him after that IV came out of his umbilical chord.
First outfit/onesie!
He was finally able to attempt breastfeeding on Sunday, when he was 3 days old.
Overall, he's actually done really well with breastfeeding, considering his not so great start at everything else!
He's tongue tied, which one nurse discovered not too long into our feeding journey.
Grace was also tongue tied, but we didn't figure that out till she was 2 months old and after we suffered through 2 months of not being able to feed her like we wanted to.
So in some ways the NICU was maybe a blessing for us?
I got tons and tons of help on feeding and was able to talk to several lactation specialists, many nurses who helped, and nurse practitioners who had professional opinions on things.
Tender mercies.
I think it's possible to find the good in everything that happens.
When it's all said and done, I guess Jeff and I just make tongue tied babies who don't like to breathe.
Ha ha ha ha....
Oh man....they are worth it though. Every little bit worth it!
By Monday he was completely done having IVs and from then on we were just working on getting him to eat well and turning down his oxygen a little at a time.
So many monitors!
My view for days and days. This was when he was moved to an open crib. The first several days he was in the sad little box.
He also had a little episode of jaundice, but that's pretty typical in situations like this. I felt bad he had to have his little glasses on his eyes! Poor baby!
So Monday through Friday I was up at the hospital, pretty much constantly because I was determined to do everything I could to get him out of there, which pretty much meant I was feeding him all the time.
I truly think doing skin to skin and me holding him helped him SO much.
Whenever I would hold him his oxygen needs went down significantly. I honestly think he got out of there faster because I was there so much.
One of the nights I was there I had been in the room with him for several hours, but I was going to take a break to go get some dinner. The receptionist ladies were telling me goodbye and I kind of laughed and said "Oh, I'm actually coming back in an hour!"
One of the ladies looked at me and said pretty seriously "Make sure to take time for yourself."
When she said that I thought it was sweet....and I knew it was true, I needed to make sure I was okay.
Honestly, it was one of the hardest weeks of my life.
Being SO out of control of everything going on, was really difficult.
Going back and forth between the hospital and home, feeling bad about leaving Grace, and just overall being sad that my baby had to have such special care was all really hard.
We made it through though, and he was able to come home yesterday on Friday!
Dressed to go home!
Ready!
He's on oxygen still, but it's a very low flow. He's barely needing the tiniest bit, so I'm thinking it won't last long.
It was a little nerve wracking bringing him home on the oxygen. They gave us a little pulse machine to measure his oxygen and heart rate, also.
We boarded with him in a room by ourselves the night before we brought him home just to see if we'd be okay taking him home like that. That was a stressful night! Jeff didn't sleep at all. I only slept because I was too exhausted not to. Whenever the alarm would go off on the pulse machine we'd get stressed out. We kind of know now that it's a little touchy and it's okay to go off every now and then.
So he's official home and has a lot of baggage with him! He can't be moved around very much, because of his oxygen chords.
He was eight days old when we brought him home and is still SO tiny.
When we got home Grace had a little bit of a hard time, but I don't think that really had a lot to do with him. I think it had everything to do with mine and Jeff's lack of attention ever since Hunter was born.
She cried for a bit and just wanted us to hold her.
She eventually warmed up to what was going on and went and sat by him while he was in his carseat.
She's been doing a lot better ever since.
She thinks he's really fun and loves just watching him. She likes to sit with me when I hold him. She'll bring him all of his toys and just set them next to him, ha ha.
If he ever makes a noise (which he rarely does....he's a very content baby) she'll smile so big and run over to see what's happening.
It's definitely been a whirl wind, but we are home!
Seriously, that's all that matters to me right now.
My stress levels have gone from sky high to almost nothing since we carried him through the door.
I am so happy he's here, safe with us.
And like I said, so far he's a rockstar baby. He eats really well for a newborn, and I know he'll just get better and better. He sleeps all the time, like most any new baby. He smiles all the time (I know....probably not TRUE smiling yet... :) ) and makes the sweetest noises. His little squeals and grunts are adorable.
We really really love him!
The next little while is going to be really interesting.
Since he was in the NICU and was born early we have to be a lot more strict with him than we ever were with Grace.
We were told not to take him places for about 3 months.
My heart kind of sank when they told us that.
I'm the kind of mom that loves going places. I love taking Grace places and giving her lots of experiences.
That's not going to be how it is for a while though. Cause really....3 months will put us into November, then after that it's cold and flu season. So we may be on lock down till the spring!
I want what's best for Hunter though. I'm sure we'll still get out and do things. I don't think we'll be completely isolated, it'll just be a lot more than ever before.
I should also mention, that my blood sugar has done amazing through all of this. Stress can raise blood sugar levels very easily, but overall my blood has been top notch! It was excellent through all of labor and delivery too. It stayed right between 90 and 120 the whole time!
This is from the other day, which is kind of amazing cause I was so worried and stressed out!
Jeff has been so supportive and nice through all of this. I think he's worried about me just as much as he's worried about Hunter, which is saying a lot. He's been the cutest dad with him. I can already tell they'll be best buddies!
I don't know what I'd do without his support. I think I'd be a complete basket case! He's definitely my better half and always will be. He makes hard situations easier.
Heart eyes!
I sincerely know that I have a Father in Heaven who has looked out for me through all of this.
We are so blessed to have this precious little baby in our family. The miracle of life and birth is amazing to me! I know without a doubt that God lives and is caring for me and my family every day.
