"I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life;
to put to rout all that was not life and not when I had come to die, discover that I had not lived." ~Henry David Thoreau

Monday, September 22, 2008

Happy 1st Birthday, Lauren!!

I blinked and this year has passed.

Where has it gone? Yesterday was Lauren's first birthday and I cried last night. I always have a very hard time when my babies turn one, and this was no different. It is the end of an era and the real end of her babyhood. Now she is the verge of toddlerhood and we have another chapter to look forward to! Here is a re-cap of the events that took place one year ago.

On Thursday night (9-20-07, three weeks before my due date) Hailey and Ethan were using me as a human jungle gym. I was lying on the couch and they were jumping up and down all around me. Well Hailey's foot nailed me right in the belly and it felt like I'd been stabbed by a knife. I laid there for a few minutes in tears because it hurt so badly. Then after the kids were in bed I got up and looked in the mirror, thinking I would see a bruise. Nothing. "Well that's a good thing" I thought to myself.

I checked several more times that night to see if I'd bruised and never did. It still hurt a lot though.I didn't sleep much during the night because I was in pain and I noticed the baby's kicked had decreased. So I was up a lot counting her every movement. By morning I was feeling a little better, but she was still less active than normal. I played around with the idea of calling my doctor, but I didn't have any bleeding or loss of fluid so I figured it wasn't anything to be concerned about.

Then at 1:30 p.m. my sister called me and I told her what happened and asked her if SHE would be concerned. She said "Uh, yeah I would!" So I paged my doc and he called back. I didn't even get through explaining to him what had happened with Hailey before he said "You need to come on in to Labor and Delivery and get checked out". He told me of some tests he would run and if he wasn't happy enough with the results, he would want to deliver the baby that day! Aaahhhh!!! So I called Cody, left the kids at my sweet neighbor's house (thanks a million, Jen!) and off we went.

I didn't have time to clean up my house, let alone pack anything to take. I did however grab both cameras just in case this girl debuted. I was so scared and nervous the whole way there, just praying that the baby would suddenly become more active and get back to her normal self. But she never did.

Finally at the hospital I was hooked up and monitored for 15 minutes, then moved into ultrasound. That was the longest U/S I've ever had! They looked and looked for everything. She looked in every knook and cranny to see if there was a problem. Although she couldn't find anything, during the hour long U/S we only saw the baby move about twice. That was scary.

So then I was sent back over to L&D and hooked up to an IV of sugar water. They were hoping that getting some sugar into my blood would wake up the baby. Still nothing even after and hour on the IV. Then they moved onto another test where a doc did another U/S to check for movement and breathing (apparently babaies swallowing amniotic fluid is called their breathing). She looked and looked for about 30 minutes and barely saw a movement from her, and never saw her breathing.

At about 8:00 that night she called my OB to give him the report and see what he wanted to do. They were a little iffy about sending me home, but decided that things looked good enough to let me go. But there was this nagging voice that wouldn't shut up in my head that said "That's not good enough!" It wouldn't stop saying that! So I asked to talk to my doc on the phone and told him what I was feeling. He said he was more inclined to listen to that voice and go ahead and deliver her. I felt very relieved, but very scared!!!

Luckily Cody had called my little sister hours before and told her what was going on, because she had planned on being here for the birth. It all worked out and she was able to get out of town and make it up here just in time. She walked into L&D as they were making the final decision.

They got me back to a pre-op room and got everything hooked up and ready. We sat around just waiting for the doc to get there and finally at 10:30 he showed. I was in the OR by 11:00 and at 11:37 p.m. on September 21 Lauren Elizabeth showed her cute little face. 6 pounds 10 ounces, 18.5 inches long. She wasn't as big as we thought she would be, but not bad for being 37 weeks gestation. She could have been a good 8 pounds if she'd waited that extra 13 days (until my scheduled c-section).

Leighann got to video tape the birth and I'm excited to get to have it all documented. Lauren was so perfect and healthy and we were so happy to have this new little person join our family. C-sections are certainly not for sissies, but things really couldn't have gone more smoothly. And now we have a thriving, happy, energetic, funny, independent, sweet, and beautiful one year old on our hands. What a year it has been!

By the way, last night Cody and I were talking about her birth story and he told me how scared he was on the day she was born as they did all the tests. I had no idea he was terrified because he seemed so calm and cool. But he said it was his job to stay calm so that I would stay calm. It's weird to think of him being scared of anything, but I guess even grown supermen have their moments too!

5 comments:

Carli said...

Thanks for the header! I wrote about you on my blog. By the way, where is my way hot picture of me eating cake?

Margo said...

Happy Birthday to you Lauren. I can't believe our kids are one already. Time sure flies.

Erin said...

What a great day for a birthday. Happy 1st to Lauren, she is such a cutie.

Joey and Nettifer said...

Happy birthday baby! I love birthing stories, your made me kind of nervous - thanks for the warning of not having Madelyn jump all over me, but glad everything turned out wonderful!

Living My Dream said...

What a wonderful birth! Happy birthday sweet girl. She is definately a beauty!

Kim