2 Months Old!

We're here and all is well. Sorry it's been so long between posts. Days pass and weeks just sort of blend together. After having so much to look forward to for so many months, we're really just taking it day by day and trying to enjoy every moment right now.

Today was a big day for Miss Megan. She had her 2 month appointment and that included 3 shots. Poor kiddo. She did fairly well with the shots and I had timed a bottle pretty well to fall during her appointment time, but it was taking them so long to prepare the shots that we ran out of time and patience. Luckily they came in before she had finished so she had a bit left to help comfort her after it was all said and done.

I was anxious to get her on the scale to see how she's doing. I had an idea of where she'd be because I saw a LC a few weeks ago and she put her on the scale with clothes and a diaper on and she was about 8lbs 9ozs.

Here are her updated stats:
Height: 21 3/4" 25%
Weight: 8lbs, 14oz 10%
Head size: 39.2cm 50-75%

These are the numbers from her Day 3 appt:
Height: 18.5" 5-10% (not sure about this as the hospital recorded her as 19" at birth. I doubt that she shrunk.)
Weight: 5lbs 9oz 5-10%
Head size: 34cm 10-25%

Of course one of my questions was are we feeding her enough? We're doing expressed breast milk in bottles for the majority of her feedings so there's a little guess work in figuring out how much she should be taking. As long as she's gaining, they're happy, even if she is only in the 10th percentile for weight. I guess she's just gonna be a peanut. That's okay. Keep her smaller for a little while longer that way.

Our nights just keep getting better and better. Since she had surpassed her birth weight at her 2 week appointment, we were given the okay to let her sleep without waking her for feedings during the night. That meant we were getting 4 hour stretches almost right away. Now a normal night is anywhere from 5.5 to 7 hours. She's pulled one 8 hour night and that was so nice.

She's been smiling for a few weeks now. I love going in to get her in the morning and telling her "Good Morning" because she always flashes one of her big smiles. Sometimes she'll coo and make noises back at me, but that's really just starting. It seems like everyday is something new even if it's something that seems so small like actually holding a rattle that we place in her hands.

We usually take a couple of walks around the neighborhood each week. At first the stroller rides lulled her to sleep, now she's getting to the point where they'll settle her, but she doesn't usually fall asleep anymore. She's still riding in the bucket to the travel system so she really isn't taking things in, but it's still nice to get out for a nice walk.

Here are some recent pictures. I have flickr linked in at the top, but posting pictures will keep something here in the timeline.

6 Weeks - Already!

How is it possible that our baby girl is 6 weeks old already?  I know, that's what I was thinking when I was posting that she was a month old.  It's just amazing after having time just drag for so long that it can possibly be going this fast.   It doesn't seem possible.

This week I had my postpartum OB appointment.  I was able to schedule the appointment with the doctor that did our delivery.  She was great.  She just kept gushing over Megan saying how cute she was.  *blush*  I don't know how many babies she's delivered in the last 6 weeks, but she remembered how small she was and how much hair she had.  She even mentioned that she thought her hair was darker when she was born.  Which is totally true.  

As for me, everything is going really well.  Of course I cried happy tears when she asked me how things are going and how we're adjusting to life with a baby.  After all we've been though, how could I be anything less than happy?  Physically, I'm pretty much fully recovered from delivery.  I felt like recovery was fairly easy, but with the delivery I had, there wasn't much to recovery from.  So I guess this means it's time to return to life as usual.  I'm not sure I know exactly what that means, but I do know that it means it's time to start working out again.  We've made arrangements for my parents to watch Megan 2-3 times a week so we can go workout.  Our fitness center has childcare available, but not until the baby is 3 months old.  This will work out well.  Grandma and Grandpa will get their baby fix and we can do something good for us at the same time.  

I'm breast feeding and in the last few weeks I've started pumping.  I don't need a huge freezer stash or anything, but it's nice to have expressed milk available to take if I'm going to be away from home for several hours at a time and of course grandma will need something if she's going to be watching her for a couple of hours at a time.  Luckily Megan has been going back and forth between the real thing and bottle with no problem.  I have to admit, more often that not,  she's getting a bottle lately.   It's just so much easier, so much quicker and most importantly, daddy can feed her too.  Also, with breast feeding, you really have no idea how much they are eating, so this way at least we have some control over what she's getting and can see that she's getting enough.    

In 3 weeks Megan goes back to her doctor again.  This appointment will include her first shots.  Eeeks.  I'm sure it will hurt me more than it'll hurt her.  I tried weighing her on our bathroom scale last week and she was 7lbs 9oz (give or take).  I'm curious to see what her official weight from the doctor's office will be.  She still seems like such a peanut, but she's definitely getting bigger.  Some of her newborn stuff is just starting to get too short in length.  

  

Below is a slideshow from her newborn photo session.  She was only 3 days old here.   I'm so glad we have these pictures from her first few days.  She's looks so peaceful.  Thanks again to Jessica for capturing our little peanut.  Those of you who have the FB My Little Lamb Cradle and Swing might recognize this tune.   

1 Month Old!

This has to have been the quickest passing month I've endured in the last 3 years.  After month after month dragging on, this was a pleasant passing of time.  Actually, I wanted to slow it down a little.   How is it possible that our baby girl is already a month old?
We were lucky to have daddy home for the first 2 weeks.   Just long enough to get settled into some sort of schedule.  Megan has been a pretty good night time sleeper almost from the start.  It wasn't long before she was sleeping 3-4 hours at a time and just the other night slept for a 6.5 hour stretch.  At least daddy isn't going into work like a zombie.  
When we brought Megan home she had dropped from 6lbs 1oz down to 5lbs 8oz.  Our first mission was to plump up that girl!  When we took her in the day after she came home, she was already up an ounce to 5lbs 9oz.  Because they were concerned about her weight, we had a home healthcare nurse come and see us on our 3rd day at home and according to her scale, Megan was up to 5lbs 13oz.   She really seemed to be gaining well after dropping almost 10% from her birthweight.  We didn't go back to the doctor until she was 2 weeks old.   At that time she was up to 6lbs 6.5oz.  I wish we had a way to accurately weigh her here at home.  She still feels like a little peanut, so I'm curious what her weight is now.  We don't go back to the doctor until she's 2 months old.     
As for me, I had a great recovery.  I took Ibuprofen for the first few days, but it was more for the sore muscles that I was getting from using my holding, carrying, lifting muscles.  My poor arms and back!  It's funny how 6 pounds really adds up when you are constantly tending to a new baby.  My follow-up appointment is 2 weeks away.  Oh, and I've lost all but about 12lbs of my pregnancy weight.  The scale hasn't really moved since the first week.  Oh well, that will come.
We're starting to work on tummy time.  She usually does pretty well for about 5 minutes at a time.  So far she only has a few really bright toys that we take out to show her to try to get her attention.  We'll keep working on this in the coming weeks building up the time she spends on her tummy.  
Besides being a stinker about day time naps, and cluster feeding at night, we really have been blessed with an "easy" baby.  She is pretty easy going.  I guess my OB was right when she predicted that a quiet baby inutero would turn out to be an easy baby.  I hope this characteristic stays with her for many years to come.

And now, in honor of her 1 month birthday, some photos.  I have to throw in this 3D u/s picture because it seems to have captured one of her "looks".  When I saw the photo with her mouth open, I felt like I had seen that picture before.  Her hair is getting crazier the longer it gets!  

 

Where to go from here

I feel like I'm at a crossroads.  I've been blogging as PsychedForBaby for a little over 2 years now.
When I started the blog, I really didn't know if I'd get into it, but blogging has been very therapeutic and definitely helped me through some very physically and emotionally rough times.
Honestly, I don't know how I could have gotten through everything I did if it wasn't for the love and support that I got from friends and strangers that I know only through the online world.  There have been so many wonderful comments left over the last 2 years.  Somehow the strangers always had the power to pull me out of my darkest moments.  I guess that's mostly because it was the strangers that could most closely relate to what I was posting about.  
I feel like I'm at a crossroads because I don't know what to do.  I love the idea of keeping a blog to continue to document our new life with Megan, but I don't know if this is the place for it.  Even to this day, not all of our friends and family know the extent of the struggle that we went through to get our precious Megan.  It doesn't seem right to share this blog with them now that we're through all the "bad" stuff and they had no idea it was happening.  Also, I don't really feel like I can leave it all behind either.  This has been my safe place for so long, it just feels natural to come here and leave updates.    
Over to the right there is a link to another blog that I created thinking that would be where I would turn after baby arrived.  What I might do is share that blog with family and friends and keep this blog for the select friends and family that already know about it and all my "other friends" who only know me through the online world.  I just can't see deleting this blog.   I cry just thinking about it.  So much so that it's taken me days to get this far in writing this post.  This blog has too much important information and such a thorough documentation of our journey and ultimately my pregnancy.  Hopefully someday I can share this with Megan so she will know what we went through to have her.  So she will know just how much mommy and daddy wanted her and how much we love her.  
I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has been a part of my story for the past 2 years.  Anyone who has ever left a comment has left an impact on my heart.  For that, I am eternally thankful. 
If you have an opinion on the future of The PsychedForBaby Blog, I'd be happy to hear it.

The Infamous Wall Letters

Since Megan's name was a secret up until her arrival, I wasn't able to post a picture of her wall letters. Now that she's here and the secret is out, here they are.

The letters came unfinished from http://www.woodenletters.net/ We painted them a chocolate brown and then used scrapbook paper in various colors to coordinate with different elements of the room. The paper on the M and n are my favorite. There's a bit of glitter on those and they add so much character pulling in all of the colors. This was a fun project and a fun way to personalize her space.

Last Belly Pics - what was 39w3d

These photos were taken on Sunday, June 7th in the afternoon. Just about 36 hours before our little one was born. I'm so glad I requested one more set of photos be taken as we really had no idea just how soon the belly would be a thing of the past. From the look on my face in the last photo, I think it was fairly clear that I was ready to be done.

Megan's Speedy Arrival

For some reason new moms like to exchange all the gory details of their birth stories. Ours is one for the books, that's for sure. And definitely something I won't soon forget.

Monday, June 8th, I was having some contractions throughout the afternoon. I timed them when I could and they were about 12-16 minutes apart, but not really strong and weren't lasting for long. Because I wasn't really experiencing any abdominal cramping along with the contractions, I had kind of written them off as more Braxton Hicks contractions.

Throughout the evening things didn't really change, so we decided to go to bed early in case things changed over night.

By about 9pm, the contractions were averaging 9 minutes apart and getting more intense and accompanied by cramping. We called Labor and Assessment at the hospital and asked when we should come in. Their answer was when the contractions are less than 4 minutes apart.

I tried to rest, daddy stayed up and we measured again a few hours later. Contractions were now more like 6-8 minutes apart. I don't think there was any rest after that. Contractions started to get stronger and stronger and definitely were starting to hurt. By 1am, the contractions were 4-5 minutes apart. I got into the shower and by the time I was out, I could barely function through them. I needed help getting dressed and thankfully daddy got me out the door and into the car.

The car ride to the hospital is only about 10 minutes in which time my contractions were coming on every 2 minutes. We pulled up at Emergency at 2:25am and security wheeled me to Labor and Assessment. I no more than got to the room and was changing out of my clothes when my water broke. The triage nurse did an internal and I was 9+cm dilated and fully effaced. This baby was ready to be born!

After a quick panic that I was too far along to get any drugs, I was transported to the delivery room. By this point contractions were coming one on top of the last and getting much worse. When the labor nurse found out I was 9+cm and fully effaced they wanted me to try a couple of pushes. Baby was right there, and I was probably only 10 minutes from delivering.

Because I was already way more than 5cm dilated I couldn't have an epidural. Luckily I still had the option of an intrathecal which is the same drug that is used in an epidural, given as a one time shot in the back instead of being administered through an IV.

By now it was 3:05am and thankfully those meds took effect right away and took just about all the sensation of the contractions away. I could still feel them, but it was so minor. The meds helped slow things down a bit and bought us a little time for me to relax a bit and most importantly, wait for the doctor.

At 3:30am I started pushing through the contractions. This was a piece of cake after what I had already endured before even getting to the hospital. It was only a few pushes and her head was right there. I pushed for about 30 minutes and then we slowed things down again as we waited for the doctor. Once she was in the room, it was only a couple more pushes and Megan Hope was born at 4:34am on June 9th.

We couldn't believe what a peanut she was. 6lbs 1oz and 19in with a full head of dark hair.

I never in a million years imagined that I would go through labor nearly drug-free. Apparently my pain tolerance is way higher than I ever expected. Who knew I had it in me?