Mama Post #2, Two weeks old

         

          Jake is two weeks old, and I keep saying, where has the two weeks gone? Which is funny, because I've been awake for a lot of these two weeks. I knew there would be a lot less sleep, but I'm not sure I was physically ready. What's more, I think my nesting phase may have made this part harder on me. I am used to there being order and cleanliness more than I ever had been. The first week or so, I was trying to keep up, and to an extent succeeding, but either way something had to give. I was way more exhausted. Yes I'm still tired, but not like I was. Thank god for the help we've had. 

         So last week, we had an appointment to follow up our going home from the hospital. We got readmitted so Jake could be put under the lights due to Jaundice. This was just another thing to mess with my already hormonal emotions...yes I'm aware it's common, but it still messed with me. This also has been a hindrance to breast feeding him. We're still fighting for that one. So let's do the math, lack of sleep (I have never been able to function on little sleep) + stuck in my house + my house getting messy + jaundice+ having trouble breast feeding...I was having a hard time. Thank GOD for our company who has come by. 

         Last weekend Uncle Peter and Aunt Elanna came by and while dad and I were doing our routine of feeding, changing, burping, pumping etc, they tidied my living areas and I felt like I could breath again. Then On Wednesday Gramma showed up. While we're trying to get in as many cuddle sessions as possible, dad and I have been working at our routine, and we're doing really good. Gramma has been that extra set of hands, if bottles need to be cleaned, or laundry needs to be done, or we need to twist her rubber arm to cuddle him while we get stuff done. But she has also done SO much more of my cleaning, and has been cooking. Cale went back to work today, and everyone is still sane! Gramma is sitting here with her lexicons, while I do my blog. Jake is napping and making enough noise every so often I think my blog post is over, so we're going to cut this short.

        Let me stress that we knew that this would be hard, not sure we were ready for this hard, but we have great people around us. And let me stress, I just spoke about the people who have cleaned our house. There are a lot of people who have been helping us emotionally with a text message here and there. Let me say that if I haven't responded,or messaged you, it's not that I don't want to, I'm trying to sleep. LOL

        K, Luv ya, Bye!

         -Nancy 

Mama Post #1, Labour Story (long post)

          So another series has come to an end on my blog. Unlike the end of the Christmas series, the end of the pregnancy series was welcomed with open arms. Jacob was born March 10th at 9:22pm, weighing in at 7lb 10oz, and has changed our lives completely. I'm wondering where this past week has gone, though we were awake for a LOT of it. My kid is over a week old. I haven't really had any down time of my own needless to say, but today we have no appointments, and my boys are asleep, ( my girl is snuggled into me). I thought this would be a great time to share on my blog. I should put a warning, I'm going to talk about my labour story, which can be gross. Let me stress, this is not a woe is me post, this is an "I'm a Tiger and earned my stripes" post. I'm proud of what I did to get him here, and I would do it a million times over to get him if I had to. No this is my tale of Triumph.

        Right off the bat, I want to say, I made some predictions through the course of my pregnancy and I was right on every one of them. One was the weather, I predicted bad winter weather because he was a March baby, and we live in Canada.

       First off, I was induced, and I knew I was going to be on the Monday, but we got things moving the Thursday before. We had an appointment with Fetal Medicine, and something told me, we weren't coming back home until he was born. So we packed everything in the car, and sure enough before noon that day, they had the gel on me, and I was having small, but contractions. Because of how well that went, the decided the second dose wasn't necessary, and let me go over night to see if I would just progress on my own. Through the night I had a roomate brought into my room, she had just had the shortest labour and delivery time I had ever heard of, but she was having a rough night...which unfortunately meant, we weren't sleeping. Let me stress how great she was to room with because she kind of became our cheering section when she heard we were laying there waiting for something to happen.

       Friday morning they took me in to see what progress I made during the night, the answer, none. I was 1 cm dilated, and this had already brought me to over 24 hours in hospital, which as far as I'm concerned made me hit prediction #2, a long labour (because I was a long labour, payback time). I'd like to stress we weren't even half way at this point either. So here comes a gross part, they decided to try and use this catheter balloon type thing to get me to progress to 3cm. Let me stress the deal with this, they're supposed to leave it in for 12 hours, or until you can push it out, in that case you're 3cm. So I had a day of trying to walk around to get this going, contractions about 7 min apart, and the odd chance to dose a little. Now Friday morning at one point Cale went to grab coffee, and ran into our obstetrician, who informed him he was on in Labour and delivery that night, so when I was supposed to go back at 8:30 pm, it would be him I would deal with. Well 8:30 rolled around, then so did 9:30. My nurse informed me that they had two women in active labour so when they were done, I would be brought over. We decided to nap. So the good news with being later, I got the catheter out myself, which was a triumph for me, I actually made Cale get up to walk with me around the department, referring to it as my victory lap. The downside, we got to actually go back to labour and delievery at 4:00am...yup, that late.

       My doctor was at the very end of his shift when he went in and broke my water. Saturday was actually the day that seemed the longest. Thursday and Friday weren't terribly painful, and we napped where we could, but Saturday, we were tired, and tired of being there, pain was getting worse, and once your water is broken, things get gross. I tried to nap as best I could but by the afternoon came and they discovered I had only progressed to 4 cm and a bit, I needed some drugs. The Anesthesiologist  wasn't around, so an epidural was out. Instead I was given morphine. Sorry, my story isn't a funny one with the morphine...I still felt every contraction, it did little for the pain, but I would be asleep by the end of every contraction...so there was that. Need to take a step back too and recognize how amazing Cale was, especially just before the morphine. I was in enough pain, I was tensing up and forgetting to breath. Not that Cale said anything to make it better, but he took my hand, and when I looked at him, he was doing my breathing, so I followed his lead, that's pretty much how I got through that part.


      They had through my day increased my drip, and actually passed the normal dosage, so around 4pm, when I was only 5cm, the final prediction I had made confirmed itself...C section. These ran in my family, like there have been a LOT of C sections, what's more, both my brother and I were. I was trying to avoid it, but at this point, I wanted him out, that was it. We needed to wait for them to get everything and everyone together, but once they did things started to move faster, and this is actually when I got nervous. Because I didn't have an epidural, it was going to be the spinal injections for me to do this part, which scared me the most because how many freakin horror stories are out there for these?! Let me start out by saying, my Anesthesiologist was amazing. He told me exactly how to sit, how to breath, and what to expect. So when he did my first injection I felt it, but it didn't hurt as much as I expected, and it went numb so fast, the rest felt like pressure, that was it. PS weirdest feeling of my life not being able to feel anything from the ribs down. I was also told if I feel any kind of uncomfortable to tell him, and he would handle it. I was nauseous a couple times, but he made it so it lasted like 30 seconds. They had me prepped and brought Cale in. I don't remember much from this part except he was right beside me, and I told them I was sleepy and going to take a nap. I was dosing when I heard Jacob cry for the very first time, that woke me RIGHT up. I was already in tears (and am still as I type this) when they laid him,crying on my chest. No sooner did I say hello to him, and the crying stopped. What was the highlight for me though was when they took him and he began to cry until Cale got him and said hello, this is when he stopped crying again. I had a long labour, but I'm not going to say I had a hard labour, what has come after has been much harder. Maybe being only a week later it's too early for me to say, but I'm not sure I agree with what they say, you forget the pain. I remember it all, but it's a shrug now, whatever. It was all 100% worth it, and I haven't forgotten, but it has blurred into the distance for sure.

         So I guess that's it, how my son came into the world. I'm not even going to begin to say I'll have something resembling consistency with my blog posts now, I'm a little preoccupied to be blunt. I do hope to continue with them though, because I enjoy them. There won't be anymore pregnancy posts (well not for a long time anyway), and the Christmas ones are pretty far off at this point (but if you were a fan I do plan on bringing them back), I think we'll be seeing the Mama, and some lifestyle posts going forward.

K, Luv Ya Bye,

Nancy, Cale, Alice and for the Very first time, Jake

     

Pregnancy post #19, Not in pain, And cleaning again

          Between strategic laying and some massage from my Husband, I woke up not in terrible pain, and I feel motivated to be productive...which for me means cleaning. Yesterday we went out and picked up some cleaning stuff, so I got a little more motivated. I've always admitted to being addicted to Pinterest, but Youtube is becoming an addiction too. I have certain youtubers I always watch and some of them do cleaning routine videos. I'm now addicted to them, they motivate me. So I made a play list of  about 25 cleaning videos, (the list has dwindled because I couldn't stand some of them) and I watch a couple, and get going. I also made a list of music that keeps me pumped so I can play that while I clean. But in the cleaning videos, multiple people were using the same floor product, and I became intrigued.

          It was the method squirt and mop floor cleaner. I needed floor cleaner, so I thought I'd give it a shot. This morning I cleaned both of my bathrooms (in 15 min intervals so I don't kill myself), and used this stuff on the floor. So you legit spray a little on the floor (a little goes a long way) and I used my microfiber mop. There is no water, no wringing. I spray, I wipe. And it did an AMAZING job. I seriously think that it's the best my floors have looked. What's more I can use it for all my floors, it's not one product for the wood floors and one for tile, this is one size fits all. As you can tell I'm super excited about this stuff!


          Anyway, 6 Days to go now, and I have 2 appointments tomorrow. I have my early one with fetal assessment, and the one with my obstetrician, when we will OFFICIALLY book my induction. Of course we have this storm warning in effect, so that will be fun. I'm actually not concerned, because Cale is actually a really good driver in the winter. I will have our stuff in the car though, just in case we end up staying...because it was a possibility last week. We also have an appointment Friday at the diabetic clinic. All of these appointments should be the last ones before Jake...which is insane. Even when we didn't have appointments, we've had blood work every week...starting to wonder if we're going to know what to do without being at the hospital at least once a week. I'm not even sure I was this comfortable at the IWK when I stayed there for two weeks.

          K, Luv Ya, Bye!

          Nancy

Pregnancy Post #18, 1 Week and a Look Back

        I'm giddy today! We're 1 week from induction, and I can see the finish line. I kid you not, every night right now, my mind is making up symptoms of labour, giving me the hope that tonight something might happen. Then I wake up the next morning with something new sore, and facing the reality, I'm still in the countdown. It's funny though, because it comes at night, I'm sure it's partly that I get in my head at night, but my Mother in-law keeps telling me how she keeps picturing him coming at night. The two main women in his life have this thought, let's see if it's a coincidence.

        I'm giddy today because it seems all the loose ends are getting tied up. Things I would stress about are working themselves out, and there is this weight off my shoulders. Things people warned me about are turning out to be not so bad and it's fantastic...now he just needs to get here. I'm not going to lie, I keep trying to help labour start.

        I'm asking to get out and walk from time to time. I used to walk for fun when I was younger. I know when I was a teenager, that's what my friends and I would do, walk around our area and talk...until some of us could drive. But I'm asking to get out and walk...not that I can a LOT, but hopefully this will be a bit more of a habit too, because after that's going to be the extent of my exercise for a bit. I'm also bouncing and rolling around on a big ball, that I am pleased to say Alice has left alone. When this came into the living room I expected her eyes to get huge and her to destroy it. Nope, she is well aware that it's my ball and leaves it alone...now we'll just need to do that with Jake's toys.  Apparently bananas can help too...no worried, bananas are basically part of my daily diet because of my potassium issues. And Pineapple. So pineapple was the BIG food I ate while trying to get pregnant...it kind of fell off the radar after, because I got sick of it honestly, but it's back in my morning smoothies again.

       Speaking of when we were trying, I posted my last blog post about how we tried for 2 years, and what ended up working. Anyway, I posted it on the board I used to frequent when we were trying, and got MASSIVE amounts of feedback. Most was inboxed to me, but there was even a woman who posted about her journey that lasted almost 8 and a half years, and had FAR worse hurdles than I could have even wrapped my head around. People have told me, about how difficult my pregnancy has seemed to be, and I gotta disagree. I knew I had my kidney disease going in, and knew there could be SOME difficulty (to be fair my specialist when I was a kid said I would have no issues...yeah I didn't believe that for a second). But it's nothing I couldn't handle. Then the Gestational Diabetes, again, so crazy common I've been in total control...except now where it's getting weird but they told me it probably would get weird at the end. Beyond that, I have had a pretty easy pregnancy...which scares me for labour. But seriously, I have had friends who have had issues with back pain for their entire third trimester, or couldn't sleep for all of it. Had to pee every 10 min. Been sick the ENTIRE pregnancy, or had heartburn slowly eating away at their will to live. My heartburn has been minimal, my nausea, predictable. Aches and pains are within basically the last week, and sleep, I've had my moments, but Cale is really good at helping me get back to sleep. I can't complain. Not to mention the support system we have. The people I can talk to, or have just been there, it's been amazing. I've had my complications, but don't feel bad for me, I've had a reasonably easy pregnancy...AND IT'S ALMOST OVER!

Pregnancy Post #17, How we made it Work

       As we sit here 9 days away from being induced, I have looked back at how long this process has actually taken. I'm not talking about the 9 months I have had this person growing in me, I'm thinking about the 2 years that we were trying. Yes, 2 years...okay it was one month short of that. I feel like the next thing I'm going to say, may not be terribly popular, but here it is. I'm going to say what I wanted to say to everyone in the two year process who ever said, "When are you going to have one", "Oh do you guys want one", or worst of all, "You're running out of time". Shut up, and mind your damn business. These things were said to me all the time, as month after month I had negative tests. Thank you so much for rubbing that in, and making me feel like I'm a huge failure, because that was super helpful. I say this now on behalf of those who are still getting this, because I know of friends of mine, who are still getting this. I also want to add, because every time I've ever talked to some one about this, they assume my Mother in-law was part of this group that pushed. Let me stress, she was NEVER this person. That's right, she didn't push at all, and let me stress, this is her first grandchild. She was actually the opposite, she would (a lot nicer than I just did), tell people to back off. So shout out to Bev for that!

        Okay, so that was therapeutic, let's get to the more positive theme of this post. We got there, and we're almost on the other side. I will mention now, we also had people who were supportive through this process too, one friend started me onto the what to expect when you're expecting site, and I joined the trying to conceive group. This was a double edged sword. In some cases, this was helpful to know I wasn't alone, and see what others were doing. On the other hand, I spent days wasting away on this board, and coming up with new things I wanted to try and excitedly telling Cale.

        Temping is a typical practice when you're trying, and I did it, but give no credit to it in my process at all. I had such an irregular cycle, I wanted to be able to use an ovulation test, luckily I found some super basic ones that cost a fraction of what they cost at the drugstore...which was good because I was using them four times as much. I give credit to these, they played a role in everything, and what's more in the discovery. The BIGGEST thing I give credit to is when one day, on the TTC board, some one told me to go to Youtube, and check out Natural Fertility Info. I watched their videos, religiously, did my research to see what would fit best for my situation and implemented a daily  routine, and eventually a couple supplements. I avoided supplements for a while, just in fear it might mess with something, and make it harder to get pregnant. It didn't. Instead I had long stint of positive ovulation tests...longer than I should have. That's when it happened, I took a pregnancy test, and FINALLY got my positive.

          I was prompted to finally do this post because I went to Natural Fertility Info's website today, and found my thank you letter to them. If you want to see it, check it out here. I'm one of the posts there...the one that is signed Nancy.

          This is a long post, and honestly could have been a LOT longer, because this info basically covered 4-5 months in the journey, not the whole 2 years. But these are kind of the highlights.

Pregnancy Post #16, A Relaxing Weekend

         Yesterday was an interesting day for sure. Thursday mornings, I now go to the fetal assessment unit in the hospital and they check the baby's heart rate and they do an ultrasound. When they do the ultrasound they measure my amniotic fluid. It's always been in the low normal range. Between that and a discussion the nurse and I had, she wasn't sure if perhaps my water had broken. So I had my third trip to Labour and Delivery where they eventually concluded, no, my water was not broken, or leaking or anything. I laughed though, because my Brother in-law was born on my Mother in-law's Birthday...yesterday was my Father in-law's Birthday. I was sitting in the room waiting for the tests laughing, there is no way he is ACTUALLY going to be born today right? Anyway, they talked to me about things to REALLY watch for in the next 12 days (now 11), and said do not hesitate to come back if I need to, better safe than sorry.

           Now, let me stress, there are definitely points where I am OVER being pregnant, and just want this kid out of me. However, yesterday was a little bit of a wake up call. Today we got his mattress into his crib, bought some food for Scott while he stays with Alice when we're in the hospital, and I'm realizing just how hard going out and even being productive around the house is getting for me. Between waking up a LOT at night and increasing pressure, which gets worse at night, I'm getting limited to maybe an hour of up and about, if I'm lucky, and if there is a bathroom near by. I got limited a WHILE back, that's why I had to stop working when I did, but this is a WHOLE new level. The resounding chorus of people telling me to slow down, and take time to relax while I still can has been heard, but not really acknowledged, until today. So my BIG plan this weekend is to relax. When I told Cale this, his exact words were, "Holy Crap, you're actually going to listen to me"? Yes, I am going to relax this weekend. I plan to sleep in tomorrow, have a leisurely breakfast...considering I have meds to take and have been diabetic for the last several months, I hope I remember what that is. I plan to lounge, and read, and do NO house work at all. I will do a little pampering, take a long shower and just take the day as it comes. The plan is to do this without guilt from a lack of productivity (wish me luck). If I remember how, I plan to relax...because it might be a while before I can again.

   

This Weekend's Reading Selection 

          K, Luv Ya, Bye
          Nancy