Thankful

I am so blessed. I have a husband who loves me and provides for us. I have three beautiful, healthy children. We have a warm place to sleep and food to eat. We have clean water and enough clothes.

We have family who love us and are willing to fly or drive hours to help us adjust to life with a new baby, not once, but three times. They prepare food for us and stock our freezer. They make late night runs to Wal-Mart to stock up on paper goods before they go home.

We have friends who also help take care of us and were given God’s discernment to stay with us, so the girls did not have to be present at the birth of their little brother. They celebrate birthdays with us when our family is too far away to do so. They bring us meals and give us gifts for our children.

We have a Savior who loves us and a heavenly home awaiting us.

Girl-isms

(baby edition)

In one of Kate's favorite books it states, "Pirates sleep with one eye open just in case.

Looking at Nate sleeping...
Kate: "He's a pirate! He's sleeping with one eye open, just in case!"


Gabby says insists that Nate always be referred to as 'baby'. Baby brother, baby Nate, baby boy.

After hearing me call him, "Little Man..."
Gabby: "Hi, Baby Man."

And Then There Were Five

Life has been quite busy around here. We've had a little over a week with my mom here and my dad came over for a few days too. Justin took a few days off work last week too.

There are now three little people vying for my attention. My parents went home yesterday and Justin is at work today, so it's my first day alone with all three munchkins. We just have two days until he's off for Thanksgiving break.

I've succeeded in showering; getting everyone fed, dressed, and teeth brushed; and dinner is thawing in the fridge. Our big challenge for today will be gymnastics class, since Gabby can be a bit rambunctious while we're waiting. So far so good!

Birth Story

I woke up at 3:30 in the morning with some contractions that quickly moved from 20 minutes apart to about 5 minutes apart. I got up and took a shower and got dressed. At about 4:30 I woke Justin. He got a shower too. At about six I called a friend to come and sit with the girls.

By the time she got here my contractions had slowed down. I sent Justin on to work and tried to send her home. She decided she and her son would stay, and sent me up to take a nap.

About 10:30 I had three contractions about five minutes apart that were quite intense (they had been 10-20 minutes apart before that). I called Justin to come home. I had time to get on my shoes before he walked in the door. I called the midwives' office, where the nurse asked for me to come in to their office. Not what I really wanted to do—I thought we should go straight to the hospital. Then my water broke! As we were on our way up I called back and said I didn't think we'd make it to the office with broken water and contractions now 2-3 minutes apart. We got stuck in lunch hour traffic for 10 minutes or so.

We got checked in, two nurses working to get a lock in, and vitals taken. They started the water in the tub for me. I had an intake time of 11:20. The midwife came in to see me right away—the doctor I saw for my discharge said Lindsey took off running with the call I was here (their office is just across the street). I had a few minutes in bed for the line to be put in and basic evaluation, then they let me get on the birthing ball—I had maybe five contractions there, they were still trying to get a good baseline on baby when I felt the urge to push, so in to bed and maybe 10 pushes (27 minutes after arrival), Nate was born. The tub had been forgotten and nearly overflowed—Justin remembered it. How does he remember that and not the garbage? :)

I still wasn't finished with the admission questions, so I finished those after delivery. We did a one day discharge and we were home Saturday evening.
We’re enjoying our little man. Happy one week Nate!

Your sisters love you too!

It's a...

BOY!

Nathaniel Michael was born Friday November 13th. He was 8 pounds 1 oz. and 19 inches long. More details later!

Still Here

Yep. I'm still here. This baby has decided that he/she wants to hang out awhile longer.

I had a very lengthy appointment today. There evidently was a bit of a mix up (or three) with the gals in the front office, so we had a late start. I saw two different midwives and a student midwife today, due to one of those little mix ups. I had another NST. The baby fell asleep though. This made that test take a little longer, since we have to have an awake baby to see if the heart rate increases appropriately with movement. I was contracting through out the test, but that's not exciting, as that's how I spend the last weeks of all my pregnancies.

After the baby finally passed on the NST, we discussed the induction date and moved it up to Monday. First, I am pretty sure that regardless of how long we give baby we're going to end up in the same place anyway, as is my midwife at this point, though she is ever hopeful that we'll have a spontaneous labor. Second, she has mentioned several times that she thinks this baby may be a pound bigger than my previous babies, despite the gestational size ultrasound (which can be off up to two pounds in either direction) from a few weeks ago. So rather than allowing the baby to get even bigger, and since we'll likely end up in the same place (an induction) within a couple of days anyway, we'll go ahead.

After that I waited for the very busy ultrasound room. The gal there checked to be sure the baby had enough fluid. She can't tell me anything, but as no one called and told me to get to L&D, we'll assume that all was well with that too.

So baby is happy and healthy, mama is tired, and the eviction date has been set, unless of course, with all our plans laid the baby decides to come earlier--no complaints here, other than the headache it may cause in getting my mom here/care for the girls, but I'll gladly take that one.

Over Due

It's so interesting that if someone says that her baby was three days early, or even two weeks, no one blinks an eye, but once you reach your due date people start questioning your practitioner's sanity with allowing you to continue your pregnancy.

I will admit there are some nice draws to an induction...I could pick the date of my child's arrival (at least probably--with a third, it's not likely we'd continue to the next day). I could have child care arranged. There's no mad dash to the hospital.

But, with every intervention there is extra risk. If I wait it out, perhaps I will avoid Pitocin...

I'm also kind of hoping to avoid an IV, which will be placed if I go in for an induction. I used to be hugely needle-phobic, and I'm sure that doesn't really help the situation, but over the years I've been poked and prodded several times with out running away in terror or even crying. The real reason for not wanting this is that evidently placing an IV in the forearm (where they like them for labor) for me is very difficult. My arm hurt as much as the labor did last time because they blew out several veins in my left arm before the nursing supervisor had to come and try for a second time in my right. I looked like a junkie for a good month. It wasn't just unattractive--it was quite painful.

That said, at some point in the next week and a couple of days, this baby will have to be born for safety's sake. We're looking forward to meeting him or her, but I'm trying to be patient. I am so very thankful that the end of this pregnancy has been so comfortable. I have the occassional late pregnancy malidies, but nothing that is so difficult I can't stand it another week (at least once the moment of discomfort has past!).

The baby looked great on my first NST (non-stress test) yesterday. I will go back on Thursday to check the fluid levels and have another NST. We will re-evaluate again then, but at current, the date is November 19th, unless baby decides to come more quickly.