Before I forget...

I just realized that I never recorded the full details of Grace's birth like I did for Morgan's. Before I forget all the fun details, I need to write it down. This may be a little more detail than most need to know but too bad. These are the things I want to remember.

SATURDAY (June 6)

Brad, Morgan and I went for a walk that morning to check out some of the annual neighborhood garage sales that were happening. Around noon I noticed some contractions but didn't think much of it. I'd been having some off and on for weeks and my doctor had said that my repeated urinary tract infections (UTI) might be causing them. Just in case I started to track them. By about 5pm, the contractions were coming every 3 to 5 minutes so we decided to call my doctor. At my last appointment on Thursday, I had been dialated to 3cm and had lost my mucas plug so the doctor said go ahead to the hospital. At this point the contractions were not very painful. Sort of like bad menstral cramps. I might need to take a deep breath but could easily talk through them. We call Tiffany to come watch Morgan and also call my mom and Brad's parents to let them know we are on the way to the hospital.

6pm - we arrive at the hospital and are taken to a triage room. They hook me up to monitors and confirm that, yes I'm having contractions. I'm now dialated to 4cm. However, the nurse tells me that I don't appear to be IN ENOUGH PAIN. They will come back in a few hours to check on me and see if I've progressed. If I haven't, they might send me home. So Brad and I settled in to watch the Stanley Cup finals and wait to see what happened.

9:30pm - the nurse checks me again and I'm still at 4cm with contractions every 3 to 5 minutes. They will call my doctor to confirm that they should send me home. The nurse comes back and says that Dr. Palabrica told them to send me home. I also get a perscription for sleeping pills since it might be hard to sleep while I'M IN LABOR.

10:30pm - We are home again. Send Tiffany home and my mom soon arrives. By now, Brad's parents are on their way back to Newburgh since nothing is going to happen anytime soon. Mom has decided to stay.

SUNDAY

Had a great night with little sleep. I didn't take any sleeping pills in fear that I might go into full labor and not be able to wake up. By that morning, the contractions has slowed down to every half hour or so. That continues for most of Sunday.

MONDAY

I stay home from work and go to a previously scheduled doctor's appointment with my mom in tow. They can't induce me until I'm at 39 weeks (I was at 38.6) so my doctor decided to "scrape my membranes" in hopes of starting up labor. This had been planned before the Saturday trip to the hospital. On the way to the doctor's office we travel down North Ave which is under construction. I think all the bouncing around started up contractions again. By the time we got to the office they were about 15 minutes apart.

A fun bit of information... My doctor asked me why I wanted to go home on Saturday night? WHAT!?! I was not given an option. I was told by the hospital staff that my doctor instructed me to go home. Turns out she never said that. She was ready to come to the hospital and break my water but the staff told her I wanted to go home. I guess they were so busy that night that they didn't want to bother with little old "not in enough pain" me. I'm never having another baby at that hospital again.

So the doctor scrapes my membranes. NOT A PLEASANT EXPERIENCE. By this time, I'm at 5cm. She then tells me to go have lunch and go for a walk. Also I should schedule an appointment for Wednesday. If this doesn't work then she will break my water at her office on Wednesday when I'm officially 39 weeks.

My mom and I go to lunch and within a half hour, the contractions are back. This time it's every 2-4 minutes and still not really painful. I decide to wait this time until I'm in real pain. By 9pm that night, the contractions are slowing down again. Back to every half hour to an hour.

TUESDAY

I go into work. Why sit around the house and wait for something to happen? I was a little on edge by now. Tired of waiting and being uncomfortable. It's rather hard and painful to go to the bathroom. Not that this is a new experience for me after having one UTI after another for the previous 3 months.

I work all day and have mild contractions every 30 to 60 minutes. I was glad I went to work because I tied up a lot of loose ends and the day flew by.

WEDNESDAY (June 10)

9:30am - This time I bring my bag for my stay at the hospital and Brad with me to my doctor's appointment. As soon as I walk in, I see Dr. Palabrica behind the receptionist's desk. She tells me there is a slight change in plans and she has a proposal for me. What now?!?

We get into the exam room and my doctor checks me over. I'm now at 6cm. She says that she is concerned that if they break my water at the office, I won't make it to the hospital in time to give birth. NOT MY IDEA OF FUN! Instead, she noticed there is an open slot on the hospital schedule for 1pm. What do I think about having my water broken at the hospital then? My question to her - Can I still have an epidural? YES! She will make sure I get set up with an epidural as soon as I walk in the door. Sounds good to me!

So Brad and I go run an errand (I think we went to buy some dog food) and head back home. We eat lunch with everyone (Mom, Tiffany and Morgan) and then head over to the hospital. I remember Brad saying that there was something wrong with this situation. Everything is too planned out. It's very different from Morgan's birth. I'm all...TOO BAD! I'm ready to have this baby!

1:00pm - I again go through the admission process but this time I bypass triage and get sent directly to a room. They knew I was coming. A few people come in and ask me questions to fill out some forms. One question I remember very clearly, "Why are you getting induced?" My response, "Because I've been in labor FOR FIVE DAYS." They start setting things up for the epidural. At this point, I'm not having many contractions and the are very mild.

2:15pm - epidural is in place and numbing up quite nicely. The anesthesiologist notices that it's taking effect rather quickly and asks if I have been exercising. I say that I've been working out about 3 times a week. She comments that women who exercise tend to numb up faster and also the effects wear off faster once the epidural is taken out. Hmmm.

Then they break my water. I don't feel a thing (YEAH!). The doctor says that he thinks I was double-bagged because he had to break the membrane twice. Maybe that's why I'm 6cm and NOT HAVING A BABY. Labor starts to pick up a bit but they decide to give me a little pitocin. Labor kicks in pretty quickly after that.

4:00pm - I notice that I can still feel contractions in my lower right abdomen. The same problem I had with Morgan. They send for the anesthesiologist. Two of them arrive to talk to me about it. She says that some nerves are immune to an epidural. It's probably the case since it's the same problem I had last time. The doctor then asks how close I am to giving birth because there are a few options depending on timing. By now, I'm at 10cm and we are only waiting for my doctor to arrive. She gives me a shot that won't last a long time but is quite effective in numbing up my problem spot.

4:45pm - Dr. Palabrica arrives. She asks me to get set up on the table and push a bit. She then starts to get suited up in her scrubs and glances over at me as I'm doing my practise pushes. All of a sudden she says, "WAIT A MINUTE! DON'T PUSH!" I guess the head is already crowning and she starts to quickly get her scrubs on and the nurses hurry to get all the equipment in place.

My doctor along with an intern coach me through the birth. At one point, Dr. P asks if we were expecting a blonde baby. Since Morgan is a blonde, I'm not surprised. She then mentions that it looks like I'm going to tear so she is going to make a little incision to prevent tearing. But nothing like my last incision. I guess my scar is rather large. That explains some of my problems last time recovering from birth.

5:00pm - After pushing for about 10 minutes, the baby arrives. Dr. P asks me what her name is. I look at Brad and ask him. Since I decided on Morgan's name, I've given him the choice this time. We had narrowed the list down to Gabrielle, Grace or Taylor. He listed off the three options and Dr. P thought Grace was a great choice. Brad's response - then her name is Grace. I decided then that I got to pick the middle name and had chosen Alexis.

So Grace Alexis had a name within a few minutes of birth. Much different from the 1+ day it took to decide on Morgan's.

One other funny thing that happened was during the "cleanup". Dr. P was instructing the intern on sewing me up. Then she started asking the intern what his plans were upon graduation. I was just odd to hear them talking about career plans while cleaning and sewing me up.

This birth was easier and harder than Morgan's. Morgan was a month early so there were concerns with her health and it was a huge surprise to us. My water broke so there were no discussions on sending us home from the hospital. Labor was gradual but only lasted for about 12 hours (not 5 days!) and pushing was longer (~30 minutes).

If I didn't have to go through pregnancy and the first 8 weeks of infancy, I'd be tempted to have another child. But I'll be at least 2 years older and I just have to remember that Grace's pregnancy was more difficult so the next one will probably be even worse. And remember the agony of sleep deprivation while dealing with a 2 year old Drama Queen. Thoughts of a 3rd child soon seem A LOT LESS appealing.

Tragedy

I found out over the weekend that some people I used to be close with lost their 18 month old son. My first thought was, what a tragedy. My second thought was, what happened to him and how can I prevent that from happening to my child?

They put him to bed on Friday night as usual and he never woke up. He stopped breathing at some point and from what I've heard, they don't know why. I think that would be one of the hardest things to deal with. Not knowing exactly what happened. I've know people who have lost babies to SIDS but not a child that was 18 months old.

Short post because I get all choked up just thinking about this. Remember to give the children in your lives extra hugs and kisses. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

The good and the bad

Good - Mexico was great! Warm weather, plenty of sunshine and relaxation. I was ready to plan day trips to make sure Brad had a good time, Brad had prepared himself to do absolutely nothing so that I could have a good time. We ended up meeting in the middle but skewed to the "do nothing" side. We went for walks, snorkled one day and I even stayed up past 9pm to hang out with Brad and some other guests at the Tequila bar. We both came back with nice tans and prepared to deal with the remainder of winter.

Bad - Even though I brought a bunch of suntan lotion, I missed a few spots. First day I burned a strip on the inside of my leg from my knee down to my ankle. Hurt to even walk for a few days.

Good - We returned to 65 degree weather in Tosa! It gave us hope that spring would soon be here.

Bad - We received 4 inches of snow last weekend to remind us that winter is not done with us yet.

Good - I don't have gestational diabeties. I have been feeling very antsy and jittery after eating and thought it might be related. Turns out it's not. My blood sugar is normal.

Bad - I have a bladder infection. If this pregnancy is anything like the last one, it's the first of many.

Good - I've switched gyms to the one located at my office. More convenient and MUCH cheaper than my old gym. It has also gotten me back into working out (took a break while dealing with all that nausea). I've also started doing pre-natal yoga with some other pregnant ladies I work with and I really enjoy it.

Bad - I've packed on almost 10 pounds in the last 6 weeks thanks to overindulging on vacation and being lazy. Hopefully, joining the gym will help keep the weight gain under control. If the average weight gain is 1 pound a week, I still have a ways to go and the thought of weighing 10+ more pounds than I do now, makes me nervous. Mostly because it will be that much more work to shed the pounds after baby is born.

Good - I'm in my 3rd trimester with 11 weeks to go.

Bad - I don't feel like I have enough time to get everything ready. Even though we now have Miss M in her toddler bed and doing really well with that, we haven't made much headway preparing her new room. Still need to decide on paint colors and new linens. AND we need to order a new crib since Miss M is taking hers with her. There are also a bunch of weekends we will be out of town over the next month.

Cravings

It is 9:30am and for some reason I am smelling buffalo wings sauce. WTF??? The smell is also very close to the smell of Ketchup chips - a Canadian delicacy (in my book). I now have a huge craving for Ketchup chips.

I haven't talked to Firecracker or Mel in a while. Maybe I should call them up and see if I can convince them to take pity on a pregnant woman and send some to me. I may have to wait until baseball season starts. I know Firecracker can't stay away from the Cubbies for too long and it's been a looong off-season.

If you read this Firecracker, I'm sure you know that the Cubbies are playing the Brewers at their home opener on April 10th. Free place to stay at my house! I'll even provide the ticket (assuming there are still some left) if you bring me chips. Is that a deal or WHAT?!?

4 days until Mexico. :)

Countdown has begun

There are 2 things I'm counting down...15 days until vacation starts and 18 weeks until my due date. The weather has warmed up a bit so I'm not cursing as I pile on the layers every morning. There are no temperature drops or huge snow storms predicted for the near future so I can patiently wait my 15 days.

Same with the 18 weeks. The nausea has pretty much disappeared. I can even eat sugary food without feeling sick which wasn't the case with my last pregnancy. I'm finally starting to enjoy pregnancy. The baby is kicking quite a bit. It started around Christmas and has been gaining strength since then. I don't feel like a blimp (yet). I can still fit into some of my non-maternity clothes although I don't expect that to last much longer.

BOOKED!

Our vacation is officially BOOKED! B and I will soon (but not soon enough) be enjoying the hot weather, beaches and waters of Mexico. I should be extremely happy but now I'm anxious. It's not exactly what either of us wanted...we are both compromising. I also have this sinking feeling that something is going to go wrong. Our flight will get delayed or we will have a nightmare of a trip from the airport to the hotel or our reservation will get lost or one of us will get sick/injured. All of these things have happened on previous vacations. Usually I'm the optimistic one but I can't seem to stop seeing disaster on the horizon. B's pesimistic vibes are rubbing off.

I also feel like I have a lot riding on this trip. I know that sounds ridiculous. In the grand scheme of things, a vacation isn't a big deal. But focusing my anxiety on this vacation keeps my mind off other things I could easily start worrying about (I won't bother to list them all).

I think there is still some residual guilt on my part because the last 3 or 4 vacations we have taken were to destinations of my choice, visiting my friends or family. I did give him a chance to plan a trip last fall but he couldn't decide on a destination so we didn't go anywhere. This adds to the anxiety. If this trip doesn't go well, B won't want to go on a vacation ever again. If B enjoys himself, many other vacation opportunities open up.

It's been many years since I've gone somewhere hot in the middle of winter. Every year I think about it but something comes up or the location we go to isn't as warm as I was hoping it would be. I also know B isn't a huge fan of sitting on a beach or water activities so I haven't really pushed the idea.

This year, the extreme cold weather and snow have changed that. I need to thaw out and soak up some sun. Also, baby #2 will make travel that much harder for many years to come. This may be our last change to escape to a warm climate for a long while. It's hard enough to leave my baby behind and I know it will get even worse when there are 2 of them.

I would have preferred to bring Miss M with us but I know it will be more difficult to travel with a toddler in the middle of her Terrible Twos. She definitely prefers her life to run on a schedule (like most kids) and gets testy when something changes. I also know B prefers to vacation without the limited schedule of a toddler. Leaving her at home is one of my compromises.

I just hope I don't compromise so much that I don't enjoy my vacation too.

Support Group

There are more pregnant ladies out there than I realized. Through the grapevine I discovered that there are some other ladies at work that are early in their pregnancies and haven't really announced it to the world yet. While talking to one preggo (CC) we thought it would be fun to go out to dinner and commiserate/swap stories with the other pregnant ladies.

It was a blast! We all had virgin daiquiris and shared stories of how our husbands and families are reacting to the pregnancy. Two of us are on our second baby so we gave the first timers some insight and advice on what's to come. Our husbands also seem to be reacting very similarly to the latest pregnancy (or maybe a better description is not reacting) so we each rolled our eyes often in understanding. The other two have husbands that are very excited and into the pregnancy. I told them that they should be thankful for that at least. Although I am thankful that B isn't the type of guy who would announce the pregnancy on Facebook before you are ready to tell anyone. The grass is always greener for some things.

We stayed out a lot later than I thought we would. Especially since most of us go to bed around 8 or 9pm these days. It was so much fun I hope we do it again.