Well yesterday was my first day back to work. I was so sad to leave my little girl. She woke up with me while I was getting ready and she started smiling like crazy. It made it that much harder to get ready as I wanted to just sit there and play with her. It wasn't so bad once I got to work. Thankfully my job is really busy that the day flies by and I have so many distractions that I don't really have time to sulk. For once I'm thankful for having a 45 minute commute and a commuter van to work. I show up, get on the van, put in my ear phones and go back to sleep. To and from work is an uninterrupted nap. It may help me keep my sanity.
She's sleeping a little better. The last few nights she only woke up twice and then in the morning with me. She's so gassy though that it isn't always that way. She also likes to let me know how much she does not want to lay by herself when I lay her down...she gets in these little crying spells.
She's 10 weeks tomorrow. It's amazing how fast time goes by. It's a bitter sweet feeling really. Last Friday I took her for a hospital follow up and she weighed 7 lbs, 8 ounces. She is now officially the size Caleb was when he was born. And looking at her I have no clue how I gave birth to him. Doctor says she sounds and looks great. Everyday I am so thankful that she was born healthy being so early.
I am so thankful I have a daughter. I kind of wanted another boy. I had boys, loved my boys and knew I would. But having her has totally opened my eyes. I think about all the things I get to do with her...tea parties, pedicures, dress up, girl talks. I love it! I think she is the most beautiful girl in the world and I cannot believe how much in love with her I am.
I have enjoyed my extra time with the kids so much. The other day I chased Hudson around the house almost all day. We played and played and played. He passed out early for his nap and took a long one. It's funny, that kid goes by routine so much. Every morning we'd get up, go to the kitchen, he'd hop on the bar stool in his seat and have breakfast and milk. He's just sit there as I did the dishes and picked up a bit then we'd play and talk. If I tried to change it up to the table, he'd run over to the bar.
Oh my gosh and Hudson has such a memory on him and pays close attention. He was playing with the screwdriver and then went to change his diaper. Well like two hours later Hud comes in to tell me something I don't quite understand so I tell him to show me. He runs to the changing table and wants up. I lift him up and on the side of it where you can't see he reaches and sure enough out pops the screwdriver. Then he runs to the dishwasher, get's on his belly and starts messing with it because he tried to help fix it like a month and a half ago. And then just the other night he was trying to open one of my chap sticks and was having trouble. He goes to the towel drawer, get's a towel and holds one part with the towel to get a better grip. He's either super smart or watched me do it a few times and remembered. I could go on and on, he's always doing these things. He has also become a master fit thrower. I'm talking throw himself on the ground fits. Luckily he gets over it relatively fast...until the next one comes, ten minutes later.
I took Caleb to the movies the other weekend and it was so nice. I love it when I get little moments to remember what it was like when it was just me and him. Sometimes the older he gets....he's so into video games and friends, he has an attitude like no one's business...I feel disconnected from him. So these mom and him times remind me that he is still my precious little first born boy and he still needs his momma now as much as he did when he was little.
Makayla is such a little mamma. She is very hands on with Hudson. Not so much with the baby, I think because she can't do as much as Huddie. I can't wait to take her for a pedicure herself. The other day we had fun and did makeup just because. And she went from a 12 year old little girl to a 16 year old teenager with a little mascara. She is turning into a beautiful young woman who truly has a good heart. She's really into her friends now too. I think that's the age.
So anyway that's it for now.
Tuesday 3/7
If it isn't one thing, it's another
I was supposed to go back to work this Monday. I figured I would take this week to get everything in place, all my laundry done for work, hang out with the kids, get my hair done and get Hanley's ears pierced.
Well instead one too many pieces of straw finally broke the camels back.
It started last Wednesday with a runny nose, rash and mild fever for Hudson. By Friday night his fever was 104 degrees and he'd hardly ate or drunk anything. He clearly was not feeling good. We called the pediatrician...she had us get him in the bath right away and if his fever wouldn't go down or it went higher with Tylenol/Motrin and the bath take him to the ER. If it continued, take him to urgent care. By Sunday when the medicine was wearing off his fever was still that high, he was not feeling good at all, no energy and hardly drinking or eating and a painful cough deep in his chest. So I took him to Urgent care. He got a little boost of energy while there and tried to get into everything and then completely wiped out. He fell asleep in my arms in the room. He woke up while she examined him and after she looked in his mouth he was saying, "Done. Done." in a pleading pitiful voice. I felt so bad. He had an infection in both ears and throat. She gave him medicine and sent us home.
Well in the mean time my sweet little girl developed the same cough deep in her chest. Then she went from eating every 2 hours to ever 6 or 7 and only nursing maybe 5 minutes. She was sleeping almost around the clock too. Her pediatrician said to get her into Urgent Care right away. Went to Urgent Care and because she was a preemie and less then 3 months old we had to go to the Children's ER (which is really cool btw).
Well she tested positive for RSV and couldn't keep her oxygen levels up and was admitted and they gave her supplemental oxygen.
Watching her get an IV and a catheter was one of the hardest things I've ever witnessed. I stayed with her and oh my gosh sleeping is next to impossible at a hospital and they start everything at 6 am when I was finally so tired I crashed but then was woke up like crazy. That night they tried to remove her from the oxygen with no luck. Tuesday she started to eat better but was SO done with being messed with.
If anyone but me messed with her she would freak out! They tried to take her off oxygen again that morning and no luck again. Doctor, after nurse, after CNA, after med student kept coming in to mess with her. I finally got to the point of requesting them to wait until she woke up and let me call them to check on her. They were constantly waking her up and it was getting harder and harder to calm her down. I was like, how can she get better if she can't rest. They were ok with that. About 7 that night they took her off the oxygen again and she did good. She went all night and we were released Wednesday morning.
She is feeling so much better and back to eating every 2 hours during the day and 3 at night. And Hudson is doing wonderful. VERY whiny but feeling much much better. You could see the sickness in both their eyes and now it's all gone.
She turned 8 weeks old yesterday and is growing still...she's at 7 lbs, 5 ounces. Funny, she's still smaller then Caleb was when he was born.
So with all that going on I requested one more week off from work. I need a week to recover from this week.
And now Hudson is also back to his normal ornery self....
So I just have to share....
My little Hanley
For Comparison
It's the same car seat and same pad underneath them.
Update on the kids
So my little girl has had zero problems since her little hospital scare. Last Wednesday, 2 weeks old, she weighed in at 5 lbs even and 18.5 inches. I was so excited when they weighed her!
She's doing fabulous. Her face is filling in more, she is now in newborn (the smaller ones anyway) clothing and diapers, no more preemie. Her hair is growing in more and it is a shade somewhere in between dirty brown and dark blonde. Her eyelashes are long and light and her eyebrows are light. She's gorgeous. I'm so so so in love with her.
She eats about every 2 hours on the dot which helps her grow but makes for tiring nights. The nights are hit or miss whether she wants to sleep at first or not. By 4 am I'm usually completely beat.
Hudson is doing good. At the doctor as well he weighed in at a whopping 25 lbs. His eye lashes are long as ever (see photo below) and he is so gorgeous. He always gets the old ladies attention at the grocery store or restaurants. He's doing pretty good with the baby. He likes to go up to her and rub her head and say, "baby". When he walks in a room she's in, he always wants to look at her and says, "baby". We've been taking him on walks, or should I say runs....he runs the entire time, wants to play in the dirt, throws rocks, such a boy. He is however, as I like to call him, a tornado. Goodness that child wears me out!
Makayla is doing good as well. All A's and B's so far except one grade that should be a B when her teacher posts the grade. Report cards come out at the end of this month and I know she's excited to have such good grades. It hasn't been easy to keep her at A's and B's and she's been very frustrated with me. But she did what was needed and succeeded. She has joined a Bridge Club (the card game) at school. She loves it! She's been going to birthday parties and slumber parties and talks about how much she loves having her friends.
Caleb's been struggling lately. He has always been the child that requires more attention and he so doesn't go with the flow easily. He also gets overwhelmed very easily. I have changed the saying from, 'if mamma ain't happy, nobody's happy' to 'if Caleb ain't happy, no one is happy'. He has been so disrespectful to us lately. I'm trying so hard but it doesn't seem to be working. He did this some when Hudson was born and so I'm sure it has a lot to do with Hanley being born. His grades are great, he has A's and B's. His have been easy to keep up, he's very smart and loves getting good grades. He's starting the Bridge club as well and is pretty excited about it. I'm very proud of him too.
So anyway that's our update for now...big little one wants lunch and little one is crying.
Scary!
So Friday my little girl scared the crud out of me!
Shortly after she fed she spit up. Then she proceeded to choke on the spit up...I got the bulb syringe and sucked out her mouth the best I could. It was really mucusy. Well after she quit choking, she quit breathing. She didn't breath for about 15-20 seconds and then would gasp for air. She did this over and over. She did it for about 10 minutes and then once she started to recover a bit she would hold her breath and then gasp for air some more (Not quite as intense as the first 10 minutes). She was rushed her to the ER. And let me tell you, when you show up with a premature 4 lb baby with breathing problems, you get seen IMMEDIATELY.
By this time she was back to breathing normally. They hooked her up to the monitors to watch. She They ran tests of RSV and the flu and took a chest x-ray, which all came out negative for anything thankfully. Her oxygen kept going down so they did supplement her with some. They were debating on whether or not to keep her overnight. I was so nervous to bring her back home. The doctor's were debating because even with her oxygen dipping some, she was doing good. And up in the Pediatric part there were several babies with RSV and the Flu and they didn't want her to get it. We ended up going home.
The Pediatrician thinks that because her body/nervous system are still immature, when she choked she "overreacted" and didn't quite know how to handle it.
I have never been so scared with my kids. Caleb did something similar once, which scared the crud out of me too, but he was a bit older and ended up having RSV.
I cannot tell you how thankful I am she is fine. And how tired I am.
A Birth Story
Tuesday went over like any other day. Went to work and surprisingly did not have a stressful day, it was calm rather. I came home and hung out thinking about everything I was going to accomplish this week to get ready for Hanley. Went to get some Chinese food and I went to lay in bed about 8:30 that night.
About 9 pm I got sick and proceeded to puke my guts out. I laid back in bed about 9:30 and went to sleep. I woke up sick again at 1 am thinking it was going to be a long day at work if this turned out to be a long night.
About 1:30 or 1:45 I woke up with a contraction but thought it was all in my head. I had been having braxton hicks a lot. Two days before this they really started to kick up at dinner and Monday they continued to happen a lot but they didn't hurt at all and weren't consistent. I went back to sleep and woke up to another one. I was thinking oh they are moving into the more painful braxton hicks, I just need to relax and go to sleep. Well they kept coming and when I timed them they were 7 minutes apart. Then they proceeded to take my breath away and come about every 4 to 5 minutes. Me being me still thought it was all in my head.
I called my mom to see if they'd drive over here. I figured they'd be here in an hour and dad could stay with the baby and mom could take me to the hospital if I was still having contractions. Well I had about two more contractions that I couldn't talk through and decided to call the sitter....I'd drop Huddie off and drive myself to the hospital. This was about 3 in the morning. I figured I could go get checked, and would be told to go home. Ya still wasn't convinced I was in labor.
I start the car, realize there is very little gas in it and was thinking, "crap out of all the times to have no gas". I put Hudson in the car and drove over there. My sitter's husband, bless him, comes out and says, "I'm going to drive you to the hospital". I didn't argue, hurt too bad. I knew better.
My contractions were coming, painfully, about every 4 minutes. I got to the hospital, walked up to labor and delivery and could barely talk through my admission. The nurse takes me to the room, hooks me up to the monitor and after my next contraction I say, "so are they really contractions or is it all in my head?" I know...I know...I just couldn't believe I was in labor. She tells me they're contractions and then tells me she could have told me that without the monitor hooked up. Then she checks me. I was dilated to 4 and 100% effaced. Shocked!
Less then 10 minutes later another nurse came in to check me, they wanted to be sure she was head down. I was at a 6. (Told you they go quick). I was in a lot of pain at this time and my contractions were coming, oh I don't know how often, but it was a lot.
When I first got to the hospital I asked for an epidural cause I had already done this twice naturally and really didn't want to again. She said I could get one but had to go through a bag of IV's, get my labs back and go through a thing of antibiotics since I hadn't been tested for step b yet.
My doc was on call that night thankfully and when he came to check me I was at a 7/8. He broke my water and all I could think was oh no these are going to hurt so much more. About this time I finished my IV and the nurse said I could have an epidural. I said screw it I had made it this far and figured she'd be born quick since with Hud I went from a 7 to 10 in like 7 minutes or so.
I was so so so nervous having her 6 weeks early. I kept asking what would happen, about how much she'd weigh, it was scary. They told me 34 weeks is borderline so it could go one of three ways...they'd rush her to the NICU, she'd have to go to the nursery right away to receive some extra oxygen and observation or she'd be fine and stay right there with us. There would be a respiratory and NICU doctor/nurse in there and he wasn't going to put her on me after she was born, he was going to give her to them. The nurse was so encouraging. The doctor said she'd weigh probably somewhere around 4 1/2 lbs.
So the time came and I was fully dilated, it took me about 2 pushes to figure out how to push and then I figured it out and she came out in 1 push. The doc held her up for me and then handed her to the nurse. About 3o seconds later she cried...talk about relief. She received no oxygen and got a clean bill of health. They wrapped her up and I held my precious baby daughter.
The only issues she had was keeping her temp up that night. Once they got it up good, she managed to keep it up. At first she nursed great but then got really wiped out. When her temp went down they had me pump and gave her some in a bottle to help give her energy. Once she ate and got warm she nursed like a pro and hasn't stopped.
Because she was so little and early, before I took her home she had to pass a car seat stress test. If she couldn't pass we would have had to get a different car seat, I guess one that lays down more. They made her sit in it strapped in for an hour while they checked her vitals. She passed with flying colors. If she was any smaller though she would not fit in that thing. She barely does.
I can't tell you how blessed I feel. All those mamma's and daddy's who have had preemies must have been so emotional. I am extremely thankful that she is healthy. I kept praying over and over she would be. Her brothers and cousin are loving her being here. And her mommy is very happy.
She will go to the doctor tomorrow and I'll try to be good about posting updates. Huddie goes as well, I'm excited to see how much he weighs but wish he didn't have to get shots.
Look what I got for Christmas!
Well shortly there after anyway.
Hanley Madeline
12/29/2010
6:43 am
4 lbs, 14 oz
17.5 inches long
5.5 weeks early
Head: 12 inches
33 weeks
I can't believe I'm at 33 weeks already...her due date is right around the corner it seems. I am so not prepared for her. I have absolutely nothing ready for her. She has very little clothes and no supplies. I have to get out the car seat and bouncer and sheets and stuff and start sanitizing and washing those. I need to make a list of things I need and start getting them. I've been so focused on birthdays and Christmas that all that kind of got put on the back shelf.
I had a minor scare two days ago...so yesterday I went to the doctor and he said everything is good and there is no concern. Whew! He did an ultra sound and her head is RIGHT there ready to go which would totally explain all the pressure. I'm tired of being pregnant and can't wait to meet her but I really would be ok with her staying in a bit longer.
I am ready for Christmas. Three more gifts to buy...which were already bought...but the store cancelled our order so I will be getting on that right away. Otherwise everything is purchased. I am celebrating Christmas tomorrow with Caleb since he will be with his dad for it. I think I have all his gifts ready to go but will double check before I go to bed. I have most everyone's gifts wrapped and just have a few more to do. I don't know if I've ever been so prepared for Christmas.
I STILL can't find my camera cord and it's driving me nuts! I keep wanting to go to Target to get one but for some reason it's hard to find time to go in. I have so many pictures to share, I will either have to have one long catch-up blog or a whole bunch of them in a row. But here are a couple to share with you. They're from adance at my niece's school. She looks like she's 16!!!!!!
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