Monday, July 31, 2006

my boys

Here is a pic of Arik taken before we left the hospital and below it is Aidan's hospital pic. The blanket they are both on was the blanket I had behind me in my baby photo taken before I left the hospital also. I think you can tell they are brothers. I will try to find a better scan of Aidan's or I'll get a new one and I will look for one of mine too.

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Thursday, July 20, 2006

More from the photo shoot



Dont worry, I wont quit my day job, oh wait, I have no day job. Maybe I should be a photographer. LOL!!! Posted by Picasa

Family of Supers

I have decided to nickname all of us as superheroes. Daddy is Batman cause he used to say "I am Batman" when we were in high school. I am WonderWoman cause Batman says only WonderWoman could give birth without pain meds.
Aidan is Spiderman cause he watches the movies all the time and bounces off the walls. He does a great web shooting impression too.
Arik is Superman cause he made it thru my surgery and all my pain meds like the man of steel. Nothing can hurt this kid. He is super. He probably saved my life. I just hope that he doesnt think he can fly. ;)
So here are the amazing Spiderman and Superman in a WonderWoman photo shoot on my bed the other day.



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Thursday, July 13, 2006

The Amazing Superman!

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Superman is here!!

Well hello everyone! We got home today around 1pm and we just crashed. Hopefully I can remember everything for you all.
Tuesday morning I went in for my NST at 11am and the OB said my blood pressure was too high. It was 144/102. I am normally a 108/86. So she said she wanted to induce TODAY. I asked if I had time to run back home to get my bag and she said she just wanted me to get started on the pitocin ASAP so I needed to get someone else to pick it up for me. So I went straight to the hospital with my sister and Aidan with me. I called DH and told him to leave work and go home and get the bag and a list of other stuff and get to the hospital. We also called our moms and MIL left KS as soon as I left her a message. She had had a bag packed in her car for weeks and was ready to come. She left there at 1215 on her way to IL.
I get in a little labor room and they hook me to the belts and after two attempts they get an IV going in one arm. The pitocin starts to drip at 1230pm. Shortly before that DH arrived at the hospital. My BP is still high thruout everything.They told me that around 5 or 6 the midwife or the OB would be in to break my water. So I laid around and waited for the contractions to start gaining strength. I was contracting good between 1 and 4pm. The contractions were every 2 minutes and I was still pretty comfortable. The IV fluid was going right thru me and I was up to pee every half hour and I thought my water was going to break on its own a few times. Between 4 and 5pm the contractions were really strong so I told them to call the epidural lady on up. They said I had to be at 4cm to get an epi and they would check when they break the water.The midwife comes in to talk to me at 5pm. She got me a shot of something in my IV to relax me and then she broke my water at 515pm. She checked me and I was only 4cm when she broke the water so the epidural lady can come in. Yay! The MW also attaches an internal contraction monitor and fetal heartrate monitor. I have cords taped to the inside of my legs now instead of around my belly.
Up to par with my last delivery, the pain gets stronger after my water breaks. So I am saying OW thru every contraction and trying to talk to the epi lady. A nurse checks me and thinks I am at 8cm so the epi lady cant give the nice epidural and instead I get some spinal shot that didnt do a bit of relief. Might as well have not had anything there.
Then my friend Carol gets there. Carol is a nurse/lactation consultant at the OB office who I started scrapbooking with and she agreed to be my adopted mom until my mom or MIL got into town. She arrived right before 6pm. I am laying on my left side and trying to breathe thru contractions and she is figuring out how to work my camera so she can take pics til MIL shows up.
Well I feel the need to push all of a sudden and the MW looks at me and says that if I feel it then do it. So I am being told to slow down my breath and blow out a candle and just keep breathing. I am laying on my left side and DH is kinda behind me holding up my right leg. I push and kinda yell at the same time and the MW tells me, "no noise, just push hun." She says it a few times and I get a little annoyed but try to comply.Well I push and push and scream and tear and then at 612pm, out pops Arik! I tore on top, a labial tear. I had watched a few pushes in a mirror and on the last one I pushed until I just let out a huge scream.
So I get Arik laid on top of me and rubbed down while DH cuts the cord and they start stitching me up and delivering the placenta. Arik then decides to pee on me so my gown gets ripped to the side and I am given what they call the mandatory Sacred Hour. As long as baby keeps good color and breathing then I get skin to skin contact for at least an hour after delivery, uninterrupted. Well we get a little over 2 hours which was fine with me. I loved it!MIL arrived at 630pm and was so disappointed that she just barely missed it. :(So Carol grabs my boob and Arik's head and helps us latch on real quick. He took to suckling so well. I was just so thrilled at how good he was so fast. Then Aidan and my sister come in the room and get to see Arik. I am kinda oblivious to what else is going on in the room cause I am still in a lot of pain and I have the baby right on top of me so I dont know what all anyone is doing. After 2+ hours of skin to skin I finally realize that I dont know how much he weighed and stuff and my sister who has been on the phone is giving me impatient looks cause she has NO information to tell anyone except that I did it without pain meds and what time he got here. LOL
So they bring in the scale and weigh and measure him and wipe him off and put a diaper on him and everyone else gets to hold him for a few minutes until I get him back to nurse again. They took the IV out of my arm and moved me to a private room then. So the rest of the night I just work on nursing and pain control and my blood pressure is still high.
It feels like every muscle around my lower back and butt has been stretched and pulled and bruised and I feel like my pelvis and tailbone are broken in a million pieces. They give me some perkoset and motrin. Still a far cry from an epidural. They started me on BP meds Wednesday night and today my BP is down to 130/98 so they said I could choose whether I stay in the hospital another night or go home on bedrest, so guess which I chose?
I dont get as good of pain meds since I came home, but I did get better sleep in my own bed this afternoon. I hadnt slept while in the hospital Tuesday night and barely got an hour nap all day Wednesday between all the visitors and baby stuff. My mom got there late Tuesday night (430am) with one of my sisters and hung out for a while. My dad and stepmom and stepgrandma and stepcousin visited Wednesday afternoon and they all headed back for KS before I even left the hospital. MIL headed back this afternoon after we got home.
What else? My sister Hannah is staying 2 more weeks to help out. I am on bedrest because of my BP for at least a week. Its quite thunderstormy here too. But other than that, we are glad to be home with our new bundle of sweetness. He is such a great baby. He has barely cried his big brother just loves him up. He is nursing so well. He looks like his daddy and he has the same chin as his big brother.

Arik Daniel
Born 7/11/06 at 6:12pm
Wt 6lbs 11oz and 18" long

Here's a link to some pics I have uploaded so far.
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v13/soccermom/Arik/

Sunday, July 09, 2006

I have THE cutest kid!

I don't care what you say. He is the cutest. And he is gonna be the best big brother.
His aunt Hannah is here with us for the month until the baby comes and she gave him a mohawk in the bathtub the other night. I just love his little expressions and his grown up grin. You can tell he is used to having his picture taken by his psycho-scrapbooking mommy....so when a camera is around, he knows how to hamm it up! Posted by Picasa

Friday, July 07, 2006

Maybe Good news

At the sonogram today we found out that Arik weighs around 6lbs and is measuring smaller than he should be for a 38 weeker. He is about 2 weeks behind. I have no doubt that when he comes out and gets some good milk that he will catch up in no time.
So also with me being on the small side, the OB doesnt want Arik to get much bigger so if I dont go into labor on my own before next Thursday or Friday then we will be induced one of those two days. The OB isnt worried about the baby's health. He said the heartbeat and lungs and everything look good and he should be fine if he came now.
Yay!! I will definitely have a new baby to hold by next weekend.
We are going to try our own labor inducing techniques cause we want to have him on Sunday, but no sweat if it doesnt work. At least we will get to see him soon and I will be able to be more comfortable.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Relaxin by the pool

I think this was taken around 36 weeks.  Posted by Picasa

Oh yeah, I have a blog!

Sorry its been a few days since I've been around. I have only a few readers and I'd like to keep them entertained enough to come back and read me so I guess I have to actually give them something to read.

I've been thru false labor now, which makes me totally feel sympathy for anyone who ever felt they were in labor and then were sent home without giving birth. Monday morning I woke up at 3am with contractions that took my breath away and were coming every 10 minutes. So after about 3 hours of that, I called the OB floor and they said to come in so they could check me. So I woke up everyone and we went in to the hospital a little before 8am. I finally got hooked up to the monitor and my cervix checked and found out I was still at 3cm. I had been checked at my last 2 NST appointments and was at 3cm then too and was 50% effaced. So they kept me on the monitor until 11am and checked me again and since my contractions were not making my cervix open anymore, they sent me home. So I have another appointment tomorrow and my contractions have pretty much gone down. I have maybe one an hour so I guess I am still pregnant until baby decides to come out.

I have decided that I don't play the pregnancy card enough. We went to watch the fireworks last night and parked really far from the stadium and then when we were leaving, these girls just kinda pushed in front of me like it didn't matter that I was pregnant. I dont know about the rest of society, but when I see a pregnant lady, I let her park closer or go before me in line or sit down first or hold the door for her. Whatever makes things easier for her. But I dont think I have received the same treatment from anyone except the people at the doctor's office and my family. I really wanted to get all hormonal on the girls at the stadium last night. One almost stepped right on my foot and I got ran into by the guy behind me because I had to halt in order to not get hit by the rude girls. They didnt say excuse me or anything. I just really hate people like that. I wanted to be like, Hey watch out, I'm really pregnant here and you need to get out of my way!

I heard once that a woman pled not guilty to murdering a guy and won because she was hormonal at the time. I dont know if that meant she was pregnant or just mensturating, but I use that line as much as possible when people tick me off while I'm pregnant.

I dont think that there is anyone who would win an argument with me over why a pregnant woman deserves special/polite treatment. When else in life do you get the chance to have your nearest and dearest dance to your tune and attend to your every need? Why would a pregnant woman deserve this above average treatment? Well let's just think about the agonies of pregnancy for a moment…

Starting at the bottom, we begin with the toes. Tending to toenails becomes one of life's greatest challenges in late pregnancy. When trying to maneuver yourself into a position that allows you to comfortably paint your toenails, you will produce some interesting, primal grunts and you may even pull a muscle. You might ask your loving partner's help to get your tootsies looking good - but remember, he's probably more used to painting the kitchen walls with an eight-inch paintbrush, so the chances of him doing the job to your satisfaction are not good. Do the sensible thing - book a pedicure or bribe your best girlfriend...Although you shouldnt have to...

We now move on to the ankles. Or perhaps I should say the cankles (calves merged with ankles). They arent a pretty site. On the off chance that I catch a glimpse of them around my huge belly, I usually get depressed that they arent there and then more depressed at my swollen sausagelike toes.

Onwards and upwards and apologies in advance for the next topic of discussion - it's the bikini line. As with the ankles, you won't actually see your bikini line for a good four or so months. Do you see where I'm going with this, girls? If you can't see it, then how are you going to keep it tidy? You may be the type of girl who is happy to let her lady-garden run free, or you may feel that you want to tame the area in preparation for the world and his dog (that's what it feels like at the time) to have a look. After the birth and subsequent stitches of child number one, I was so used to people checking my bits that I would automatically 'assume the position' for anyone who looked even remotely medically trained - You dont want it to look like a bat could fly out of the bushes. So the question remains - how best to keep things trim? Shaving is a VERY risky option, as it can only be achieved with the use of a skilled, steady hand and a mirror. While you will probably A) give yourself a minor flesh wound, B) give your midwife a good laugh and C) earn points for Creative Design in the Pubic Area, it's unlikely you'll do a top job. Your partner could help you - but are you really going to let him loose down there with a razor? If you have unlimited money, the best way to go is waxing - 'Aaarrggh, too painful,' I hear you scream. Sister, you're gonna have a baby. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it's too late to worry about the pain, so you might as well break yourself in easily and get waxed. I havent found a hair remover cream that cuts thru the thickness of even the edge of the mess, so I dont even want to tell you about my own personal choice.

Shaving your legs is also quite the workout. So I found that a big bottle of hair remover is the easiest option. Its much easier to slather on some lotion than to slather on shave gel and then guide a sharp razor on every surface of your legs. Its difficult to reach your calves and bending and stretching produces those grunting sounds again. So unless you want to look like a guy, or you can afford the waxing, Nair for short shorts!

One of the most alarming things I've noticed is that I'm becoming almost indistinguishable from my 79-year-old granny. It's scary - we both wear clothes with elasticated waists (admittedly, not from the same shop), we can't get out of cars without the help of a tow truck and we both have a very snazzy waddle in place of graceful walking (mine is blamed on my expanding girth and hips, while Granny's waddle is due to arthritis).

Unfortunately, I haven't developed her ability to bake, but we can spend leisurely afternoons comparing ankle size and berating those who refuse to give up seats on buses for us.

So while pregnant women are busy creating the miracle of life, they also have all these unspoken issues to contend with. I tell you, it ain't easy - in fact, I think it's time to rub my bump tenderly with a pained expression on my face and wait for my family to bring me some tea…