The Emotional Aspect

Having a baby is the most amazing experience. That is also the biggest understatement of the century. I had been so nervous about it until right before I went in. We had a blast dancing our hearts out at ULX so that probably helped distract me. Miranda came over on Sunday to help me finish some things up before I had to go into the hospital and she couldn't believe how calm I was. I think she was freaking out far more than I was. I'm so grateful for priesthood blessings that allowed me so much peace about the whole thing.

Because of the c-section, I couldn't see Lindy when she was born. However, that didn't stop the wave of emotion that washed over me when I first heard her cry. I was not expecting it. It hit me so hard and it was so overwhelming (not in a bad way) that all I could do was cry. I had tears streaming down my face. I had no idea that I could love someone SO much and so quickly. I knew I would do absolutely anything for that little girl that I hadn't even laid eyes on. It was amazing. I know Allan felt it too because he started tearing up as well. He was just stronger and held the tears back. Our little family had finally started and it felt wonderful!

It's mind boggling to think that this child was so recently in heaven and is so perfect. I was in awe that I could be trusted with the responsibility of taking care of someone so precious and teaching her the right.

A few people have asked me how it feels to be a mom and all I can think is that there is no way to explain it to someone who doesn't have children. You can try, but no words will ever sufficiently explain the absolute love you feel for this new little person in your life. But it is wonderful and I love it.

The NICU Experience

After I was all sewn up from the c-section, the nurse brought Lindy into my room to nurse her. Her blood sugar was only 48 when she was born. After feeding her, her blood sugar dropped to 29. It was scary! They took her to NICU and put in an IV to give her a sugar water drip. Later that night she also developed jaundice. It was SO hard to see my baby in NICU with so many tubes and wires attached to her, especially in her head.

The first night in NICU we were able to come in and hold her and Brad & Miranda came in and got to hold her as well and take pictures. However, the next couple of days were not so good. The NICU nurses we had were AWFUL! They wouldn't let me hold Lindy. I could hold her to feed her and then they would take her away and make me leave the room. They wouldn't let anybody else in and one even told me that Allan couldn't hold her. I was so incredibly frustrated. It was hard enough to have Lindy in NICU but to not be able to hold her almost killed me. I could understand that if she was premature or had a serious illness that people shouldn't hold her, but she didn't! It was just low blood sugar! It was such a terrible experience. One nurse even yelled at my mom for taking Lindy out of her bed. It was so stupid. She told me to come down to feed her but when we got there, the nurse just sat in her chair. She didn't come in to get her and didn't even say anything to us like, "Just give me a minute and I'll come get her for you." So after sitting there for a few minutes, my mom took her out and gave her to me since I wasn't able to do so. The nurse wigged out. She told my mom that it was her (the nurse's) license that she was messing with. Once again, so stupid. She should've said or done something to prevent it then, right?

I finally broke down on Wednesday night when they kicked Allan out of the room. He started to doze off in the chair and the nurse told him he couldn't do that because he could fall out of the chair and so she kicked him out of the room. She also said to him before he left, "Why are YOU tired? You got a good night's sleep!" I was LIVID! He actually had stayed up with me all night and then gotten up early to go to work so he had plenty of reason. But even if he didn't, she has no right to say that.

So after the feeding I went back to my room and starting bawling. My mom was there and she is very feisty and definitely a mother bear and she took me right back downstairs and had a little chat with the head nurse who apologized profusely for everything.

After the chat with the head nurse, we didn't see either of the bad nurses again and things got infinitely better. The new nurses were so helpful and encouraging and let me hold Lindy as much as I want and the same for Allan. They didn't object when my parents wanted to hold her either. The best thing about this is that since we've been holding her so much, Lindy has gotten so much better! Her blood sugars are very stable and breast feeding is going a lot more smoothly.

We found out just tonight that Lindy will be coming home on Sunday at the earliest. Keep your fingers crossed for us. I'd really like her home.

My Baby Story

Our baby is finally here! Lindy Faith was born at 4:06 p.m. on January 18th and was 7 lbs, 3 oz and 19 inches long. A few people have asked how it went so here is my baby story. This is just the physical process of what happened. I'm going to post my emotional story later.

I went into the hospital on Sunday night so they could put me on an IV overnight to start softening my cervix and they were going to start the induction on Monday. Around 4 in the morning, the medication they gave me to soften my cervix really kicked in and I started having contractions. This was a good sign! Things were progressing really well. I held out until I was at a 5 to get my epidural. I'm telling ya, I will never do it naturally. I have no desire whatsoever.

We did have a scare. I had about 4 contractions very close together and she couldn't get enough oxygen in between them so her heart rate dropped drastically. I didn't even know what had happened. All of a sudden there were about 5 nurses in there moving very quickly. They gave me an oxygen mask and even started to wheel me out of the room when her heart rate came back up.

Because her heart rate came back up, they decided to wait it out and see how she held up. Her heart rate never dropped that drastically again, but it did drop with every single contraction. Because I was only at a 5, they estimated I'd still be in labor for another 8 hours or so because I wasn't dilating quickly enough and just didn't want to risk Lindy being without enough oxygen that long. They told me they were going to do a c-section and I heartily agreed. I knew from the very beginning that a c-section might be necessary so I had already come to terms with it. However, Allan hadn't.

Allan was by the bedside telling me that everything was going to be ok. I told him I knew. I was completely calm. He told me not to be scared and I told him I wasn't. He responded with, "I am!" After getting his clothing on for the surgery, he started doing the running man. He definitely had some nervous energy. It was pretty funny.

During the c-section, they put me on a table and then put a big tarp like thing up right at my chest so I couldn't see a thing, nor feel a thing. I was numb from the chest down. It's kind of weird to not feel a thing but know that you're being cut open. Allan was the only one who could be in the OR with me. My dad and I were both telling him how jealous we were that he could watch the surgery. He didn't agree. He didn't want to look. He kept his head down right next to mine until he heard, "Here's her head!" At that point he just had to look so he did get to see her come out.

From the time they started the surgery to the time she came out was all of about 5 minutes. After she came out they took her over to clean her off and all that jazz. It then took them about 15 minutes to sew me up. So Allan took the camera & took pictures of her since I hadn't seen her and brought them back to show me. About 10 minutes after she was born he got to hold her and bring her to show me. My first thought was, "It's just not fair! I should get to hold her first. I carried her for 9 months and gave birth to her. Isn't it just a right for the mother to hold her first?!" I wasn't really THAT upset, but it was a little disappointing. After I saw her, it all went away. I was just thrilled to see her finally.

Lindy right after birth

Our first family photo

Nesting

With only 5 days left, things feel a little hectic. My nesting instincts are definitely kicking in and I've desperately been trying to get my house cleaned and put together before Baby gets here. It's hard when we can't get the baby furniture until this Saturday at the earliest. Talk about cutting it close! But at least I got the nursery all painted. I'll post pictures when it's finally done.

This morning I realized that I'm going slightly crazy when I got up at 3 a.m. because I couldn't sleep and started ironing and rearranging some furniture. I think Allan was a little bit confused when he got up and saw the room because he didn't know I had gotten up. The first thing he said to me was, "I see the nesting powers are kicking in." Hopefully they stay until it's all finished!

36 Week Update

Last post of the day, I promise! It feels like there's just so much going on! When does life start slowing down? Not anytime soon, I'm sure.

I'm now at 36 weeks and am really starting to feel it. Ok, pregnancy has actually been really easy for me and has somehow agreed with my body. I do feel huge though. My only complaint is that I'm having trouble breathing. I'm in the "stand up or lie down to breathe" phase because sitting for more than 5 minutes makes it nearly impossible. My ribs ache all the time. Other than that, I'm doing great. I know that I've been really lucky throughout this whole thing because I've had almost no side effects except feeling healthier.

I got to schedule my induction a few days ago so it is now official. Baby is coming January 18th. It's now less than two weeks away! I can't believe how close it is. I'm not sure where the time went. It's now becoming real. I'm not quite at the "Get this baby out of me!" stage, but I am a little bit more ok now with the whole thought of giving birth. :) Still nervous, but getting excited. I'm so excited to meet my daughter and see what she looks like and get to know her personality. We've had fun guessing. Allan's family all thinks she'll get my blond hair and blue eyes. My family, Allan and myself think she'll have the dark hair and hazel or green eyes. We also think she'll be like I was as a child and ALWAYS have to be active and doing something and looking around. Please feel free to leave your own guesses in comments!

My last ultrasound is this week. It's weird to think that it'll be the last time I see her in black & white. The next time will be in full color and 3-D! Exciting. I'm hoping she'll be pulling faces again. The last time, her tongue was out almost the whole time. It was cute, but I'm thinking she's got an attitude now. Scary! But my tongue was out in almost all of my baby pictures and I turned out ok, right? So it can't be that bad. ;)

For those wondering, we don't have one set name picked out. Allan wants to wait until he sees her to pick one, which I'm 100% ok with. However, if I send myself into labor during the Lindy Exchange (Yes, my Dr. gave me permission to go and dance my little heart out - I love him!), her name will definitely be Lindy. Otherwise, we'll just see.

2010 Goals

Allan and I both set our big individual goals for 2010 and just laughed when we shared them with each other because they are the same! I'm putting them up here to remind us about them. Everyone else can feel free to remind us to follow through on them as well. :)

1. Get back to school (summer semester for Allan & probably fall for me)

2. Lose weight & get in shape

The best thing about goal #2 is that we want to lose about the same amount of weight. We got a kick out of that. It's going to be so much better to have a partner to work on it with. And hey, a little friendly competition might just help us push a little harder too. Ok, it'll help me for sure. We'll see about Allan. He's not anywhere near as competitive.

We haven't sat down and set our family goals for the year. I think for now we're just trying to make it through having the baby. Maybe after we get through that, we'll figure out what we really need to work on as a family. I think Baby will keep us busy for a while just trying to figure out how to be parents to a newborn. It's exciting and nerve wracking all at the same time.

Goodbye 2009!

December came and went in a flash! I can't believe how time flies. Our holiday season was full of family, parties, Christmas lights at Temple Square and fun. We got to go to my family Christmas party which was a blast. My extended family is HUGE (my dad is 9 of 10 kids)! Allan is still working on getting names down, but is getting better. We always eat and play games and one specific tradition is playing Seven On The Line at the end of the party. It's a game where you all get in a line and shoot once from the free throw line. However many people in a row make it is how many points there are on the line. If you miss, you subtract that many points from your original 7. When you're out of points, you're out of the game. Allan doesn't play sports, but I was SO impressed with his shooting skills! He managed to stay in for a long time, even under my little brother's constant heckling of "NO PRESSURE!" He even stayed in longer than Chelsea, who is on a basketball scholarship! Who knew?! My dad won this year (and last) so I was proud. :)

It was a blast to have Chelsea home for the holidays. We got to meet her boyfriend, Andrew and we all love him. He's really patient with her and takes all our teasing in stride. He started to tease us about getting Baby U of U clothing but we told him we'd get him Yankees apparel in return (he's a die hard Red Sox fan). He got the point pretty quickly. Ha ha! It was nice for me to have someone to hang out with during the day as I'm home all day by myself. She even went to a doctor appt with me and got to see an ultrasound of Baby for the first time. I think she's about as excited for Baby to come as we are. She likes to use my belly button as a microphone and talk to her. She also like to get after her and tell her to be nice when she was kicking me. I loved watching. I'm excited for Chelsea to come back home right after Baby is born.

We spent Christmas with Allan's family this year up in Smithfield (Logan). From what I understand, it was the first time all 4 siblings were there for Christmas in about 8 years or so. We taught them how to play Nertz and played it a lot! It was a lot of fun to watch them learn and get mad at each other when they beat them to a card. But we're definitely up for a rematch anytime! (Hint to Liz & Isaac)

For New Year's we went dancing (of course!) and had a great time. I'm surprised I had the energy to dance AND stay up until midnight, but somehow managed. We're so glad to have dancing in common. It really brings us together.

HAPPY 2010!