Happy Holidays!

Just wanted to wish everyone Happy Holidays, whichever ones you may be celebrating!

Here are a couple more pics of our little linebacker to hopefully put a smile on your face!

The Greatest Gift

Sorry for the long wait everyone. Surgery went ok, but our little guy turned out to be a linebacker so it was rough getting him out. Caused quite a bit of trauma inside and my recovery has been slow and painful. Not to mention that my spinal wore off during surgery and I ended up having a huge panic attack, resulting in something being put in my IV that basically knocked me out. I was seriously in a stupor when he finally made his arrival. But I was alert enough to hear the nurse say "It's definitely a boy and he has a full head of black hair!"
Possibly more details later, if anyone wants them, but for now I'll leave you with these pictures and some stats. Our little linebacker was born at 8:46AM Monday December 10, weighing in at 9pounds 6.6 ounces and measuring 21 inches long. He is truly everything we've hoped and prayed for and we couldn't be happier!

Game Plan for Baby Boy

Had my pre-op appointment Thursday and got my labs drawn today. If everything goes according to plan, baby boy will make his arrival sometime between 8 and 9am. Here's how it should go down...
Call hospital at 4:30am to check we are still on schedule (meaning they haven't been bombarded with women in labor). We better still be on schedule!
Leave house around 4:45am.
Arrive at hospital at 5:30am, begin all the preparations. They'll check on the baby (non-stress test), shave and prep me, iv me, give me a spinal, and whatever else they need to do.
Hopefully we'll be in the OR by 8am. Since this is my second c-section it will take around an hour and be slightly more complicated than the first.
Once baby boy is stabilized, hubby should get to hold him so I can get a good look at him before they whisk him away.
Hubby will go with baby boy while they do all the things they need to do to him back in my room. I'll be stitched up and sent to recovery for 1-2 hours.
Once the spinal wears off I'll be taken to my room where I will hopefully get to hold my son in my arms for the first time! At that point, hubby will leave to pick our daughter up and bring her to the hospital to meet her baby brother!
I'll be in the hospital until Wednesday or Thursday, depending on how things go.

So, unless you hear from me sometime Monday you can safely assume our son is being born! I can't say for sure when I'll be able to update here.... not until I get home for sure. Sorry to leave ya'll hanging, I promise to post as soon as I have access!

Unless the plan changes, my next post will be a birth announcement!

It's a scary world we're living in

I just read this news story and it scared the crap out of me. 2+ years ago we were living in Nebraska. We lived in the same town as the shooter in this story. We shopped at that mall. Some friends of ours just moved from there a few weeks ago. We have other friends who still live there. Hopefully, they were all at work and not shopping. Hopefully none of their family or friends were there either.

My thoughts and prayers are with the people affected by this tragedy in Omaha. Please lend yours as well. I really don't know what else to say right now, I'm a little bit in shock.

Big and small

Just for fun, here are some pictures of our biggest cat laying on top of our smallest cat. These two adore each other and lay together a lot. I just happened to catch this photo-op the other day...




See that bit of black sticking out from under his stomach? That's her tail! He's literally laying on top of the entire lower half of her tiny body!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

We (finally) finished putting up our Christmas decorations this weekend. Here's how the house turned out this year:



It was a lot of work, but we're pretty happy with the results!

We also went this weekend and cut down our own Christmas tree. It was my first time ever doing that, though my husband said his family did it all the time growing up. We had a lot of fun choosing our tree, then my husband (with our daughter's 'help' of course) cut it down, they shook it for us and wrapped it, then we loaded it on the van and brought it home!
We had a hard time getting it to stand up in the tree stand, even going so far as to buy a different stand with no more luck. Finally, I looked it up on the web and discovered you should pound the stand into the base of the tree with a hammer (there are little spikes in the base) before tightening the screws and standing it all up. That finally did the trick!
Put the lights on it and decided to wait until the next day for ornaments because it was pretty late by then. Good thing, because we got up Sunday morning to find the cats had gotten into the tree, pulling 1/3 of the lights off and leaving some flattened spots where they were laying on the branches. I suspect it was our biggest cat laying in the tree because the flatted area was pretty big! So, we've decided we won't put any ornaments up. Hopefully the lights will stay on the tree from now on... we've been spraying them with water every time they go by it. I've tried some other 'remedies' to keep them away and it hasn't worked, so we're just going to have to rely on prayer to keep our tree standing!

Whining time

If you don't want to hear me bitching and moaning a lot, read no further...

I feel like crap. I've basically been sick for half this pregnancy. No idea what it is, except that my head always feels stuffy, I have headaches a lot, I can't ever breathe easily and I've had a cough for all but a couple weeks since around July. Did a round of antibiotics to no avail. Still taking my allergy meds. Cough medicine did nothing. So I suffer. Most mornings I feel like I've got the flu... by the evening I'm feeling better, but never normal. Also have a lot of heartburn. And have I mentioned the dreaded H word thanks to my screwed up system? Those of you who have been there know what I mean.

I'm exhausted. I barely sleep at all. The baby keeps me up until after 2am every night because he gets super-active and beats the crap out of me from the inside. Once I finally get comfortable enough to fall asleep, I have to pee. And so it begins again. Numerous times throughout the night. My daughter doesn't nap, so I can't either. A pregnant body needs more than the maybe 5 hours I'm managing most nights.

I'm in constant pain and discomfort. This kid feels huge and though my weight gain is right on track I'm huge. And it's all belly, all out in front. I can't get up from sitting without doing the as-seen-on-tv-rise (you know the one, where you skooch to the edge of the couch, then push your belly up in front of you), which I always thought was not real. I have to roll on my side and push up with my hands to get out of bed yet I still manage to hurt myself most times. Finding a comfortable position sitting or lying down is impossible. The baby has been pressing on my sciatic nerve for a long time so I constantly have pain, though oddly enough the worst of it runs into my thighs. Which makes it hard to stand and walk. Getting up from the floor is a joke. But I still have to do it several times a day. I can't bend over to do anything so I have to squat - which means it hurts like hell getting back up because my thighs hurt so bad. To empty the dryer I have to get down on my knees and press my belly into the dryer door to reach everything and pull it out. I have to squat down to help my daughter in the potty several times a day. It sucks.

Despite all that, I've gotten everything ready for the baby (nursery, washing and organizing clothes, making blankets and hats, recovering the glider), done all the Christmas shopping, wrapped and packed it all up and gotten it shipped, gone through all the stacks of mail, magazines, etc, re-organized drawers, done some much needed dusting (though not all), gotten baby announcements and Christmas cards ready to mail, done my best to keep up with my hyper-active 3 year old, and now at almost 38 weeks pregnant I've been outside helping put up all the Christmas lights and doing all the inside decorating, which still isn't done. It's crazy.

It's so hard to walk around stores and handle my daughter when we're out, that we are basically homebound. I'm sick of eating toast and chips for lunch every day the last several weeks when we used to go out for lunch a couple times a week. I'm starving, but I'm sick of the same crap all the time. And I'm going stir-crazy being stuck home all the time. My daughter and I are used to going out a couple times a week, even if just to walk around Target or something. The key is just getting out of the darned house on a regular basis. But it's too hard to do now. And she's suffering too, because I haven't been able to get down on the floor to play with her for some time now. She needs a change of scenery now and then too. She has taken to begging to go out to eat all the time, but we don't eat out very often. Macaroni & cheese and pizza have become the standard dinner food around here. Yuck.

I also attribute a lot of her attitude problem lately to not getting enough attention. She has been terrible to deal with and I'm sure a lot of it has to do with her barely getting played with and rarely getting out of the house. I know I get depressed spending all of my time in our living room, so I'm sure it affects her too. But it's not like I can just let her get away with being a snot, so I have to discipline her. Which turns into a huge ordeal every time. Which is hard on both of us.

Oh yeah, did I mention the swelling has gotten worse? I get this weird thing where my hands and most of the fingers turn a reddish color, but the knuckles look white. Like my fingers are striped. For the heck of it I tried to put my wedding ring on. Yeah, it goes about halfway to the second knuckle. Tried in on my little finger and it won't go all the way down.

I almost have everything arranged for the day we're scheduled. The bags are packed and I have the early morning shift covered for my daughter as well as the second shift running from when she wakes up to around 1pm. I haven't worked out after that yet, in case my husband can't make it back to pick my daughter up by then. Considering there's no absolute guarantee we won't get bumped until later in the day or to another day altogether, I'm pretty worried. It's not like I can just call my Mom or something last minute to watch my daughter. I have to work it out with friends and neighbors who need definite times on things because they have their own families to take care of. It's causing me quite a bit of stress worrying about this. I'm a little worried I'm going to end up alone in the OR and no one will be with my son while I'm in recovery. I'm also worried about being in the hospital after the baby is born. I'm having a c-section so I will be completely bedridden until at least the next day and then will still have a very hard time getting around. But I'll be alone at the hospital most of the day and all of the night. And the baby will be with me the whole time - there is no nursery, you are expected to keep the baby with you at all times. How am I supposed to care for a newborn when I can't get out of bed? Did I mention they also won't let you sleep with the baby in bed with you? Um, hello, what other choice will I have?

Damn it, I'm tired! I'm supposed to be taking it easy to prepare for after the baby comes, which is a tough time with no sleep and plenty of pain. Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy about the baby, it's just that I am so ready to have this over. I want to be able to relax like I did with my first pregnancy, not constantly be on the go and doing stuff. And worrying about everything. It was so much easier the first time around. All I want to do is crawl into bed and not move for several days, but there's too much to do.

I'm ready for my reward now. If I had it my way, this baby would be born tonight. Once he's here and healthy, it will all be worth it.

Okay, I guess that's it for now. I can't promise there won't be more, but I promise I'll try not to unload too much. I know no one wants to hear me whining, especially when I'm lucky enough to have this to whine about.

I got it!

Went back to T@rget around 10am.... they had 5 of the tvs I wanted sitting in the front of the store! See, you don't have to wait in line all night! Apparently people who waited in line and got a number never picked up the tvs. I imagine some people just got numbers for a bunch of stuff and then decided what they wanted after getting in the store. Or perhaps gave up on waiting in line.

We were able to get a couple of other things we had wanted from the early bird specials too. Not everything, but we're pretty happy with the deals, considering the time we showed up at the stores. And we didn't even have to wait in line long! Actually, not at all at T@rget - we went straight through the express checkout. But K0h1s was still ridiculous after brunch at noon.... walked in, started towards the back and saw that the lines were still wrapped throughout the whole store, so I turned around and walked back out.

Crazy!

Bl@ck Frid@y

I've never gone out for the 'early bird specials' on Black Friday. Seriously, never once.

This morning I made an attempt.

Boy have my eyes been opened wide! I have come to the conclusion that Black Friday sales are for the clinically insane. Seriously, you must be insane to wait in those lines. I expected long lines at places like Be$t Buy. We drove by last night around 8:30 and the lines was already wrapping around the store, with tents set up and all that. This morning the line wrapped around the entire store and behind, down past the backs of several more stores. I expected that. I did not, however, expect there to be just as long of a line at T@rget this morning, almost an hour and a half before they opened. I definitely did not expect to arrive at K0h1s an hour after they opened to find the checkout lines wrapped all the way around the store. Seriously, there must have been 300+ people in line just to checkout!

Considering that there were probably 500 people (no joke people!) in line at T@rget, just waiting for the store to open, I opted to drive out to the other Target in a smaller town, hoping to catch a break. The line there was shorter.... by maybe 200 people. But still, 300+ people waiting in line before the store opened was too much for me. I opted to come home. Ye, if I had gotten in and gotten everything I wanted, I would have saved a couple hundred bucks. But to my 9 months pregnant a$$ I just didn't see how I could possibly do it. I value my time and sanity more than that.

So, being as that I am hopped up on caffeine (as is the little guy!) I'm going to see if I crash soon (doubt it)... and if not, the plan is to wake our daughter up a little early (maybe 8am), not too early because she went to bed late, get her a quick breakfast and head out as a family. If anything on our list is still available, awesome. If not, oh well, we'll grab some IH0P and maybe drive out to the cool yarn store some people we know own. Then hopefully we can come home and start pulling out the Christmas decorations! Or I'll take a much-needed nap.

So, that is my Black Friday experience. And may I just add that I will NEVER AGAIN make this mistake. At least not until my kids are older and I need to get the 'it' item. Maybe then.

Anyone want to share their experience with Black Friday? Good or bad?!

Just call me Suzy Homemaker...

Well, not really, since I don't really cook or clean very often. But hey, look what I can do:

I finally got the glider done! For someone who had no idea how to use a sewing machine, I think it turned out ok. Not perfect, but I'm happy with it! There's actually a second set of covers in a different pattern that isn't shown.





Here's another blanket I made for J... this one worked up so nice and quick! It took me less than a week to make...




I have to admit, I am very relieved to have the glider done. That was my biggest project for the nursery and I was concerned that I wouldn't be able to do it. Now that it is done, I can breathe a little easier - everything that technically has to be done before the baby comes home, is done. Of course, that doesn't mean I haven't started other projects! ;)

We have a date!

We scheduled my c-section at my appointment on Friday. I'm the first one on the schedule for December 10, so hopefully we will meet our little guy that morning. The doc did say that because of the shortage of doctors and such, it's not uncommon to get 'bumped', especially if there are emergencies, but since we are the first of the day we will take priority aside from emergencies. Hopefully, even if there is an emergency we will still be able to have the c-section sometime that day.

So, 3 weeks from today this little guy should be in my arms! I can't wait!

The proof is in the shoes....

My feet are usually quite skinny, so they may not look swollen to most people.... but when you see them in my favorite comfy sandals that I've had for a year and a half you can tell something is wrong!

See how they are bulging out? They don't normally do that!

See the imprint they left?

My poor sausage feet. Think I'd better prop them up!

35 weeks (Correction at bottom)

Today is the 35 week mark for Baby J....

I am definitely feeling ready! I can't walk for long without being quite uncomfortable and in pain. Mainly in my thighs, oddly enough. And lower abdomen of course, where the baby is pushing down. I thought it would be my back... which does hurt, but not nearly as much as my thighs and abdomen always do! Sleep is very difficult to come by... once J finally settles down, usually after 2am, I still can't get comfortable. When I finally do, I have to pee! It's a never-ending cycle and I'm ready for my reward, this beautiful baby boy in my arms!

I've avoided taking my blood pressure when I've been out.... I suspect it is still a bit high, but I don't know that it is over the mark for preeclampsia. I'll find that out at my appointment next Monday. I'm definitely having more trouble with my feet and ankles swelling, which I remember being one of the things my doc noted the day I ended up being induced with my daughter. But my blood pressure was also high that day and ultrasound revealed my amniotic fluid level was low. And that was at 39 weeks.

I imagine I will probably be stuck hanging in there for another few weeks... but a hugely pregnant girl can dream right? ;)

Here's a pic I took last week, at 34wk4d:


CORRECTION: Turns out my appointment is this Friday! Good thing I double checked! ;)

My Story

This is my contribution to the My Story Project, as part of Infertility Awareness Week. As hard as I tried, I couldn't make it any shorter because it was a long, hard journey that had a huge impact on my life.

When my husband and I got married, we decided we wanted to start our family immediately. We both dreamed of having a family. We each even had a name picked out for our future children. Almost 2 1/2 heart-breaking years later, I finally got a referral to a gynecologist who specialized in infertility. Almost immediately she discovered what was wrong - I have PolyCystic Ovarian Syndrome, which causes irregular hormone levels, anovulation and various other health problems. I had officially received my diagnosis, and with it another one - infertility. My husband and I were absolutely crushed. Luckily, the doctor had an idea - Clomid. However, after 3 cycles of increasing doses and increasing side effects, I was still not ovulating. The gynecologist had exhausted her knowledge - we needed a reproductive endocrinologist.

When we first saw the RE, we were obviously excited... but we were also terrified. Because we had to see a civilian doctor, our milit@ry insurance was very limited in what it would cover in regards to Assisted Reproductive Technology. However, we found a loop hole, because based on their definition ART did not mean fertility medicine, it meant assistance in the physical process of reproduction, ie IUI and IVF. As long as we were relying solely on intercourse to put the sperm and egg together, then medication, testing, doctor visits, everything would be covered. The RE proceeded to do another trial of Clomid at the highest dose, combined with an injection of hCG to force my body to ovulate. I responded poorly to the Clomid again, but we went ahead with the hCG shot to try. As expected, we didn't get pregnant. At this point, the RE believed our only shot at pregnancy was through IUI, using injectable fertility medicine. However, the cost of the medicine alone was astounding and we didn't know how we could afford it. We decided to try one monitored cycle of injectable medicine before proceeding with the IUI. We figured that if I responded well to the new medication, we could justify the debt we would incur for the IUI next cycle. As luck would have it, after 2 straight weeks of injecting myself in the stomach every night followed by the hCG shot, I got pregnant and our beautiful daughter was born later. Our dream had come true. The RE was amazed that we had managed to conceive without the IUI. We were amazed that we were finally parents, 3 years after deciding to start our family.

Two years without birth control later we knew we needed help again. I went to see my doctor about my depression (caused by infertility) and left with a referral. Thankfully, we were now living near one of the few milit@ry hospitals that has a fertility clinic. Because we would be going to a milit@ry treatment facility, and not a civilian doctor, IUI would be covered. Another trial of Clomid revealed what we expected - I still did not respond well - but we did manage one IUI on Femara before I stopped responding to it as well. I ended up needing injectable medicine again. Because my husband was on short deployments a lot, it was very difficult trying to schedule my cycles around when he was home. Combined with the 'intercourse on demand only' and not having childcare for appointments, we were under a lot of stress. On our fourth IUI, we were told that after 3 cycles on the injectable medicines, we would not be allowed any more IUIs - our only option would be IVF, a good portion of which would not be covered by the insurance. Yes, it would be cheaper than what most other couples pay who have no coverage at all, but still a hefty amount. We knew there was no way we could do it. In other words, this cycle was our last chance.

Can you imagine the joy and relief when I got a positive pregnancy test that last cycle? If it hadn't worked, we would obviously have still been blessed to have our daughter, but our dream was to have two children. Thankfully, because of our insurance, our dream has come true. For the average couple, it is an easy dream. Having a family is taken for granted, because everyone assumes it will happen easily. When you learn that you may never have the family you have dreamed of, it is like someone has ripped your heart out and torn it to pieces. Both times we went through treatments it was painful and stressful - emotionally and physically - but compared to the unnecessary pain and stress that other couples without insurance face, we know we got off easy. Without our insurance coverage, we would not have the beautiful 3 year old girl who can make any day better with a silly grin. We would not be expecting the baby brother she is so excited about getting this December. We can't imagine our lives without our children and we can't believe that in this 'modern age', in a country so defined by family, so many people have to face a life without their dream because through no fault of their own they were given a medical condition rendering them infertile. Having children isn't necessary to live? Without my children, I wouldn't want to live.

Have I mentioned I have 4 cats?

Yeah, that's right, 4 cats.

Why am I stressing that? We got the results of my daughters allergy testing Friday.... she's extremely allergic to cat dander! And highly allergic to dog dander... not that we have plans to get a dog. Oh, and she's also moderately allergic to mice, which probably means she's allergic to our hamster. Great, we're just surrounding this poor girl!

For now, the new allergy meds seem to be working. Doc says as long as that is the case, and we are keeping the cats out of her room (we always have), we're ok. But if the meds stop working at some point.... which may be what happened to cause the doc visit this time, where we added a second allergy med.... then we'll have to take more extreme measures, because we are pretty much at the limit of what a 3 year old can take for allergies.

I love my cats....

but I love my daughter a lot more!

If we have to, we will get rid of the cats. For now we are keeping our kitties - she refuses to consider getting rid of any of them too, even the not-so-friendly one. She cries whenever we mention it. We do, however, plan to get an air purifier for downstairs, where we spend most of our time. I believe we already have some kind of central filtering system in the house too. And we'll have to be more diligent about cleaning the hamster cage (apparently the allergens get into the air when the urine dries - who knew?), and vacuuming. I used to vacuum every day, but the pregnancy has caused me to slack off big time. So, I'll be doing it more often again. I'm also planning to hit the pet store this week for some special shampoo or wipes that help eliminate/lower the amount of dander. According to the internet, they work.

Hopefully everything will be ok. She's been doing a lot better since we started the new meds. But God, am I dreading the day she starts becoming immune to those meds too! Pray that never happens!

Congratulations to....

Furrow! Miss Zora made her arrival on Nov 1. Please head over and take a peek at the beautiful baby girl and leave some congrats for the proud Mama!

Happy Halloween!

I have no idea what time trick-or-treating starts, but we're already excited and ready to go! My daughter loves Halloween! I think I have one of the few 3 year olds on the planet who thinks monsters are great and really isn't afraid of much. She's always been that way, so Halloween has always been lots of fun. There's a neighborhood not far from us that really gets into Halloween - lots of houses decorate and set up spooky stuff, monsters will scare you when you come up the walk, stuff like that. Can't wait to see what they do this year!

I think I'm going to miss out on the fun though.... walking for any length of time is getting very painful. So odds are that Daddy will take her through our neighborhood while I hand out candy, then I'll pick them up and drive over to the other neighborhood... and probably crochet or something while they trick-or-treat.

:(

I'll leave you with some pictures of our jack-o-lanterns. The 'cutesy' one was the closest I could get to a Care Bear face. That was my daughter's request and I'm just not that good!

Who knew? (Breast pumping dilemmas)

I sure didn't...

My daughter was breastfed and since I had planned to return to work I purchased a good breast pump. However, I basically never used it because no matter how much time I spent I would get either no milk or very very little. I finally just gave up on it since I didn't end up going back to work. Considered it a nice big waste of money.

This time around, I would really like to make use of that pump. I'd like to be able to involve my daughter in the feedings and also allow my husband to bottle feed sometimes so I can have a break to sleep or whatever. So I've been researching possible problems that would cause me to not get any milk when pumping. Especially considering that I spent hours trying when it should only take 10-15 minutes!

Turns out that most breast pumps come with a 'standard' size breast shield, which doesn't fit many women. Some women need smaller ones, most women need bigger ones. Wow, sure would have been nice to know that before! I just went online and ordered the next size up... hopefully that will make a difference this time!

So, for any other women out there who are struggling with their breast pump, wondering why they can't get any milk out, or are barely getting any out, consider doing a little research on breast shield sizing - you may not be a 'standard' fit!

A bit of advice....

When you're almost 33 weeks pregnant, don't spend 6 hours walking around Se@ W0rld! You will be hurting long before the day is through.... and for how long after, I dread to find out! My goodness, my back, thighs and pelvis(?) have never hurt like this!

But, we had a great day. My little snickerdoodle had a blast, and even went on her first rollercoaster.... about 12 times!!

32 week update

I had my checkup on Friday so I thought I'd post the latest info....

BP 134/88 - nurse said this was a little high but not too high, yet. We may be heading towards another early delivery if it continues on this trend. Fine by me as long as he's healthy!

Weight Gain - 16 pounds, though it's been really picking up lately. I wouldn't be surprised if it hit 25 or 30 pounds by the time he's born.

Fundal Height - 33cm, so I'm finally starting to measure normal again. I was almost 32 weeks at the appointment so measuring a week or so ahead is no big deal. Unfortunately I can't continue my hope for a 37 week c-section because of measuring so large anymore. We're still looking at around 39 weeks, which would be December 10. Personally, I'm hoping for the week before, but I don't know how likely I am to get that wish. I really want to be well on my way to recovery so I can enjoy Christmas. I'm afraid I'm not going to be able to get down on the floor with her to open presents and play like I usually do. So, let's hope something non-health-threatening happens to allow for a slightly earlier than 39 week delivery!