Tuesday, September 20, 2011

The Day I Became "Mommy"

Do you see this face?
This is the most precious, beautiful, sweet face I have ever seen.
 My heart is so full of love for this little girl, and it has only been 16 days since I laid eyes on her.  I can't believe how lucky and blessed I am to be her mommy.
Last week was my due date, but I am so glad she decided to come a bit early.  She is so much more fun on the outside than in! 

Our little adventure to get that sweet little girl here started Friday, September 2, 2011.  I had been experiencing a few contractions here and there for a few days, but nothing to be really concerned about.  Logan and I had been telling our nephew, Braxton, that we would have him over for a sleepover sometime that summer before the baby was born.  All of the sudden, September was here, and we decided we BETTER have that sleepover quick, because we were hoping that by the next weekend I would be in the hospital delivering our sweet little girl.  That day I guess Braxtie wasn't feeling so well, and wanted to stay home from school, but his mommy told him if he did, he would miss the sleepover, so he sucked it up and went.  That evening when we picked him up, he seemed his normal, energetic, happy self.  Before we left, his parents gave him some cough syrup to help him sleep through the night without coughing, and we took off to our little apartment. 

While watching "Over the Hedge" and baking brownies, Braxton said he felt like he was getting "all hot like a fever."  We gave him a half a Tylenol, wrapped things up, and got him all set up on the couch.  Nighty Night, Braxtie...

I wasn't sleeping well anyway, between contractions and having to go to the bathroom every hour or so.  Around 3:30 a.m. Braxton started to whimper, and the cough, and then cry.  Logan and I went to go check on him, and we found him curled up in a ball coughing so dang hard, lips turning blue because he wasn't able to breathe in really well with out coughing it all back out, and crying that his throat and head were hurting really bad.  He was burning up with a fever, and just shaking.  We called his parents, told him we were bringing him back, and Logan wrapped him up in a blanket really tight while I gathered all his things.  We got him home, laid him back down to sleep, and Logan and his dad gave him a Priesthood Blessing to help him through the night.  We got home a little before 5, and I was too awake to get back to sleep.

Later that morning, Logan was playing tennis with his friend Wyatt.  We headed to the park, where I was set up to watch with my camping chair, reading book, water, etc.  I was talking to my mom on the phone while they were playing, when a pretty strong contraction hit.  Afterwards, I felt a gush...and started wondering if my water had broken.  I told my mom I had to go, called my sister in law Brynn to see if she thought maybe I might be going into labor, and then decided maybe we should go to the hospital just to make sure.  I called over the boys, and told them they had to cut their set short (and that I was sorry).

We headed over to the hospital, they hooked me up, and we waited an hour.  My contractions were picking up, and we started to get excited that maybe we could be meeting our little girl that weekend.  They checked my progress, and I had gone from a 2.5 to a 3, so they wanted me to walk to see if I could progress enough for them to keep me.  So we walked for an hour.  Labor and Delivery at my hospital isn't that big, we must have done about 4 million laps around that place, all while some teen mom going natural was pushing in Rm. 9, screaming her head off, and freaking me out.  At the end of my hour, I was checked again.  Almost to a 4, and definitely in early labor, but they didn't want to keep me yet, so they sent me home to labor, and told me to come back "when it hurt so bad I couldn't breathe well."  (yikes)
We went home to pack our bags...our little girl was coming within the next few days!!  I finally was tired enough to fall asleep (kind of) for a few hours, and then we headed up to visit my parents, and to be closer to the hospital, you know, just in case.  We walked around the neighborhood a LOT, and my contractions were coming every 2 minutes, and they were starting to hurt pretty bad, so we thought maybe we should head back to the hospital.  We went back to my parents' house, and as I sat on the couch to catch my breath, my contractions STOPPED.  Not spread out, not get less painful, FULL ON STOPPED.  I cried.  We went back home to get some rest, and hope that maybe we'd have to go back to the hospital sooner rather than later.

The next morning we got ready for church, went, taught our lesson in primary, and went back home.  Nothing.  No more contractions, and I was frustrated.  We decided to visit Logan's parents and walk laps around the park behind their house to see if maybe we could get things started up again.  3 miles later, I suddenly had the worst back pressure of my life.  I was hurting so bad it was hard to breathe...hooray!!  And off to the hospital we went.

They checked me again, but whoops, she felt a "hand" and went to go get an ultrasound machine to check the situation out.  The plan was to break my water, push the hand back behind the head, and I would deliver like normal.  However, once they checked me with the ultrasound, it was not our little girl's hand, but her FOOT.  We had thought she had been head down this whole time, but it turns out every time they checked my progress and felt her "head," it was actually her little bum.  Not only were her feet down, but her umbilical cord had also pooled up at the bottom of my uterus, which could be a bad sign--if my water were to break, the cord would be flushed out, followed by a foot, which would pinch her oxygen supply off.

My doctor came and checked me out too, and gave me my options of where to go from there.  He thought maybe we could do an external aversion, where they turn the baby around by pushing on her on the outside, or I could have a c-section that night and get her out, or we could wait a few days and see if she would flip on her own.  However, after seeing that I was already dialated to 4 centimeters, "waiting it out" was off the table, as was an external aversion, since the chances of my water breaking were too high, and I would have to be put under for a panicked emergency c-section.  My only option to make sure our baby got here safely was to go through with the c-section.  Out of all of this, I will never forget how kind and loving my doctor was towards Logan and me.  I remember asking him, "If I was your daughter, what would you have me do?"  He assured me that they would keep both me and my baby safe, and that this was for the best.  (To my sister in laws--thank you for sending me Dr. Liddle's way, he really is the best)

My whole pregnancy I was scared of getting an episiotomy, and here I was facing a much larger, much deeper cut through my abdomen.  I was terrified!!  I called my daddy, and had him come down to the hospital to help Logan give me a priesthood blessing.  Amidst all this, Logan filled his parents in on the plan, and they also came down to the hospital.  There were twins being delivered before me, so we had about an hour to chat and try to calm down. 

At 11:40 p.m., Sadie Marie came into this world.  Logan, who had previously said he did not want to watch her come out, stood up and looked over the blue curtain thing and watched them pull her out of me.  I remember looking up at his face, and he was in complete awe.  He was smiling from ear to ear when he first laid eyes on her.  After she was out, he did not leave her side until she was back with me in my room.  He was already so protective and watchful over her.

Welcoming our Sweet Sadie into the world
Our first family picture

Our hospital stay after that was a bit of a blur.  Visitors came in and out, nurses checked my vitals probably about a billion times, and I was in quite a bit of pain from the c-section.  But I could not get enough of my little girl.  I could not stop looking at her, holding her, kissing her, snuggling her, loving on her.

On Thursday, September 8, we brought our baby girl home.  She is the sweetest, most precious and perfect thing I have ever seen.  Logan and I are so in love with her we can hardly stand it.  I knew I would love my child, but I did not understand HOW MUCH I would love her.  It is like a glimpse into how God must feel about us--I think Sadie is so amazing, smart, beautiful, and full of so much wonderful potential--I know God feels this way about us too, only to a much larger extent that I can not comprehend.

I love being a mommy.  I love waking up to her sweet face.  I love doing all that I can to make sure she is comfortable and happy.  I love watching her daddy with her.  I am trying my best to soak in all of the moments, to snuggle her and try to remember everything I can, because I'm going to blink and she'll be all grown up.  But really, there's not much I can do about that, so I am enjoying every moment.

Saturday, September 3, 2011

36 and 38 Weeks Baby Bump

I haven't been as dedicated at taking "Bump Pics" as I thought I would be. No real reason why...except laziness, and extreme pregnancy brain, where I forget EVERYTHING. I can't believe how much I stick out when I look at these. My body is stretch marked, sore, and exhausted from being pregnant, but I know this little girl will be totally worth it. I bet she's growing all cute in there. I'm almost done...I'm almost done...I'm almost done...


And then I start on Phase II, PARENTHOOD. Which I'm sure is going to be one heck of a ride!

36 Weeks
38 Weeks