Week 1!!

I can't believe our Elizabeth is already 1 week old! We took her home from the hospital Tuesday, March 12 around 10:30 in the morning and couldn't wait to introduce her to our dog Oliver. As soon as he saw her he greeted her with lots of kisses. We got it all on video--it was very sweet.

Well, the first couple of days were pretty rough-not going to lie. As to be expected I guess. I am breast feeding so there is always a certain amount of frustration that comes with that (the tenderness, is she getting enough, why won't she latch, when is my milk going to come in? what if it doesn't!?). Elizabeth was also getting her days and nights confused which is common so during the day she would sleep and it would be IMPOSSIBLE to wake her up to feed. I would try every hour and she would keep falling asleep, barely getting anything to eat. I tried everything to wake her-changing her diaper, undressing her to only her diaper, tickling her, rubbing her head, etc. and no matter how mad she got, she would still fall asleep! Then when night came she would feed good but when it came time to put her back to bed it would take a whole extra hour to get her to stop fussing and fall asleep from all the gas pains she was in. Luckily, my mom was here to help with that so I could catch up on my sleep. Thank God for Grandma!

She had her first pediatrician's appointment on Thursday at which she weighed 1 lb less than her hospital weight (which I guess is somewhat normal). Any less than that, the Dr. would have been very concerned. I told the Dr. of my feeding frustrations so she set up a lactation consult for the following day since the weight loss was obviously attributed to that. She also hadn't had a stool since we left the hospital, which is also linked to lack of food and she had a touch of jaundice (which I learned breast fed babies tend to always have a yellowish tinge anyways) that they said eating and pooping will fix quickly. Going home knowing the health of my child depended on her feeding and then not being able to wake her up for feedings or if she was awake, she would be too fussy to take it...you can imagine my frustrations! Finally, my mom just happened to think of using a wet washcloth to wet "things" and sort of make things more enticing if you will because she was getting dehydrated and wa-lah!!! It worked! We had a breakthrough! She fed great that night and for our lactation consult, she did fabulous! The lactation specialist also recommended to use a wet wash cloth to wake her up (which works like a charm) and she could tell my milk was coming in and she was right, it came later that night! As far as the gas pains, she recommended I give up dairy which I knew was coming--for it is very common with breast fed babies to be sensitive to lactose. Friday was the first day I tried giving up dairy and the first day my milk was really in and Elizabeth is a whole new baby! I started feeding her every 2 hours during the day (to make up for lost time and get her to poop) and every 4 hours at night and she is now so alert during the day and so content during the night. Hallelujah! And I never thought I'd be praying for poop but I did and it finally came on Saturday! Twice! Woo hoo!

Amongst all of these newborn changes and frustrations, there is still the ever looming day that daddy will be leaving us (which we still don't know the exact day yet) so we have been trying to soak up every moment and even smile/laugh when our soundtrack for the last hour has been Elizabeth screaming. Ahh the sound of life! The important thing is that we have our family here and everyone is healthy :)

Speaking of family, we have had many relatives come down this week to meet Elizabeth for the first time and spend some quality time with John before he leaves. We are so thankful for their love and support (and for the food that they brought and cooked!) Here are some pics from the week!

Our "Sunday's Child"

Our beautiful baby girl, Elizabeth Rose Finegan, was born Sunday March 10th at 4:07pm with the weight of 7lbs and 11 oz, length of 20.5 in, head measuring 14 cm (ouch), chest measuring 13 cm wide, and surprisingly with a lot of red hair. Since the last time I posted, the whole "plan to be surprised" thing came into practice once again when John was told he will be flying out to Afghanistan between March 22 and March 25 so in order to have his 10 days guaranteed paternity leave, we realized we needed to have this baby born by Tuesday March 12. We were told this past Friday morning so I instantly called my drs. office to tell them of the situation and ask what my options were regarding the inducing process and they told me to come in right away to get checked. I got checked and I was 50% effaced and 2 cm dilated and since I was already 39 weeks, these provided the perfect conditions for an inducement; however her head had not engaged yet which isn't ideal so we were hoping an inducement with forced labor contractions would be just enough to force her into engagement. Lucky enough the dr that ended up squeezing us in on Friday to check me just so happened to be on call the whole weekend, only had one inducement already scheduled and is one of the only drs. that even does inducements on the weekends (so to have there be only one scheduled knowing she was on call this weekend was pretty rare). So we really felt blessed and things were really starting to seem like they were meant to be.

We scheduled my inducement for 7:30 am Saturday March 9th. We called all family members the night before and they were either already there or were already on their way. They started me on pitocin at 9am. I was on the highest dosage by 1:30 and they checked my cervix at 5:30 and no progress had been made at all. So they disconnected the pitocin and the dr. gave us the option of going home and coming back in a few days to try again or trying another method of induction with a drug called sidatec (spelling?) We decided to give the sidatec a try since we were already there--might as well exhaust all options right? This procedure involved a half of a pill inserted vaginally and then a 6 hour waiting process. This method definitely worked better than the pitocin in that it got my uterus irritable and moving but after 6 hours (which was 2am) they checked me again and I had only dilated to 3cm and my effacement was the same. After my body basically telling everyone it wasn't ready, they unhooked me from the drugs and allowed me to stay the night and were going to discharge me in the morning. You can imagine how incredibly defeated we felt but we knew a healthy baby is worth the wait. If my body wasn't ready, it was for a reason.

Then came another surprise. After the sidatek wore off, I continued to have contractions and they started to get worse. I paged the nurse at 4:15 because I had to pee (and you have to bring your whole bedside with you of course) and as I got up my water broke. (Insert a huge amount of relief/praising the Lord here). Now we knew we were not leaving the hospital without our child in our hands one way or another. Real contractions came on fast! And they were always at 1 to 2 minutes apart. The nurse checked me at 6:30 and I was still 3 cm but my effacement had changed to 80% which at least showed progress. My contractions were already at a pain level of 9 out of 10 at 3 cm dilated and since I never really had a big break in between each one, as soon as they asked if I wanted the epidural I said yes. I really wanted to join the club of natural birthing moms but it did not go as planned. If there was no epidural option in the picture, I don't believe I would be having any more kids and I really do consider myself having a high tolerance for pain. I just really believe the inducement drugs had an effect on the power of the contractions and I had already technically been laboring for 24 hours.

The epidural was placed at 7:00am, internal contraction monitors and a catheter were placed at 7:30am, and the dr. did another check and I was already 4cm, her head was engaged more but had swelled from all the induing so we knew to expect a cone headed baby for a few days. The epidural provided a huge relief and I was finally able to sleep for about an hour or so for the first time since we had gotten to the hospital.

Then the pressure contractions came which an epidural does not help relieve. It felt I had not gotten an epidural at all! But I know it was still doing its job with the lower abdomen contraction pain but gosh the pressure pain was close to being unbearable and still coming at 1 to 2 minutes apart. Definitely didn't expect that with the epidural.

At 9:30 am, they hooked me back on Pitocin because the contractions weren't consistent in strength. I'd have a strong one and then a weak one. At 10:00am, they checked me again and I was 6 cm and 90% effaced. At 12:40 I was 9.5 cm and 100% effaced and by 2 pm we were ready to push!! Oh and by the way, I was the only patient in labor and delivery all day Sunday. Talk about meant to be! It was so nice and it felt like the entire staff was cheering us on!

After having maybe 1.5 hrs of sleep in 31 hours, by the time we were to the pushing part I was exhausted. I was literally pushing and then I closed my eyes and fell into REM right away and then woke back up in 2 minutes to push again. My energy level was at 0. At one point I did stop to take a break because I thought I was going to faint/throw up but the pushing sensation was too hard to refuse. After 2 hours and 7 minutes of pushing her 14 cm head out, 3 seconds later she was born!! She is happy and healthy and beautiful. We feel so blessed to have her here early and love that she will now get to have her time with Daddy before he leaves. It still feels so surreal to have a daughter but I somehow already can't imagine our lives without her.

After being so positive March 9th was going to be her "D" day (delivery day), we realized a Sunday's child is probably best, after my mom pointed out a rather well known poem.

Monday's Child is fair of face.

Tuesday's child is full of grace.

Wednesday's child is full of woe.

Thursday's child has far to go.

Friday's child is loving and giving.

Saturday's child works hard for a living,

But the child who is born on the Sabbath Day

Is bonny and blithe and good and gay.

(note: bonny means healthy, sweet and lively and blithe means joyous, merry, and carefree--all adjectives that surprisingly already describe her pretty well.)

Here she is!!!

We will be going home from the hospital tomorrow morning (Tuesday, March 12). More pics to come!!!

Plan to be surprised! (or at least try)....Week 40!

Anyone remember the movie "Dan in Real Life" starring Steve Carell and Dane Cook? Well it was the first flick John and I ever saw together (it was our Junior year of college, Oct 2007 to be exact). We had just started dating and it was one of those things where we weren't really expecting to find each other, it just sort of happened. Well in the movie the same thing happens with Steve Carell and his love interest who is actually unknowingly already Dane Cook's love interest (who happens to play his brother). Let's cut to the chase: The movie ends happily and they sum up the morale of the story by saying at the end, "You have to plan to be surprised." If I had to sum up my and John's relationship in one sentence, that would be it. That would be it on day 1, day 8, day 462, and even today.

Now those of you who know me, know that I am very much a planner. I consider myself a pretty organized person. I live by lists. I never walk into a grocery store without a list. I never pack a bag without a list. I even started this blog by listing out the points I wanted to highlight (no joke). So "planning to be surprised" is very difficult for me. What is that even? How can you plan for a surprise? The whole point of a surprise is to catch you off guard because it is something that is unplanned. It's an oxymoron-a combination of contradictory terms. So needless to say, planning to be surprised is something I struggle with every day. And trust me, life in the Marine Corps combined with carrying our first child, John and I get lots of practice planning for surprises.

I guess we succeeded in that we planned for the surprise of Elizabeth--to some degree. I mean we planned it in that we talked about starting a family soon after we were married in the Church but there was always the whole question of timing--which was the surprise factor. Then we learned his deployment date would be some time in March and my due date was pushed up by a month (from April to March) which was a HUGE unplanned surprise-I believe the intervening of God had something to do with it. If it stayed in April, there was a good chance John would miss the birth all together. Being in March, at least gave us a chance. So things seemed like they were working out almost as if we had planned it that way.

Now that my pregnancy is winding down, I'm really struggling with the planning part! Since we live far away from everyone, I know that as soon as something happens, both sides of our family will be traveling south at the drop of a hat. Meaning our house will be swamped with relatives all awaiting to shower Elizabeth with their love. This to me equates to 1) the house needs to be clean--for some family members this will be their first time visiting us! 2) Our hospital bags need to be packed! Duh! 3) The "plan" is that my mom and step dad will be staying with us in our bedroom, so fresh clean sheets need to be ready for them-not to mention all other laundry should be done! 4) The house should be stocked with groceries and some meals planned out and frozen so that my mom or whoever can easily whip up something for bfast/lunch/dinner (and something that John will eat--anyone who knows him, knows he can be picky!) Now also throw in there that John is packing for a 7 month deployment as I am packing for a 7 month trip to MD (where I will be going from maternity wear to sweats to hopefully normal size clothes and it will be over a season change) with baby and dog in tow so it has been quite a chore to get everything straight! I don't know how many times I've said, ok this is my last grocery trip before she comes, this is the last time I'm going to dust or vacuum, the last time I'm going to clean the bathrooms-because I thought (hoped) she'd be here by now! The whole not knowing when she is coming is driving me crazy!

Now the plan for John all along was that there really was none. We hoped it would go this way: Either his unit would be deploying after her due date (March 13), or if they were deploying close to her due date, as long as I was a completed 39 weeks (which is today) by law they can induce me, or she would just come late Feb, or really early March and there would be no problem at all. Then, we got word that his unit was deploying March 9th. That is the official date. And we had reason to believe (I don't want to go into too many details) that they were going to allow him to stay until the birth and fly him out separately since their departure date was so close to her due date. Relief set in! But it had not been confirmed. We needed to know by my appointment yesterday (March 5th) if we needed to induce and so the fact that nothing had been confirmed by week 38 was frustrating!! Then our world was turned upside down when last week he was told to just assume that he was leaving March 9th with everyone else. Now if I were to be induced at 39 weeks, March 6th or 7th (assuming it's not a big deal to get an inducement appointment fast) you're in the hospital 48 hours after the birth of the baby putting us right at March 9th so he would be saying goodbye to us in the hospital. This was not a surprise that we had planned for. It wasn't one of our options. Not only was it heartbreaking to think there's a chance he's going to miss everything, but also the fact that it wasn't an option we had explored made it even harder to swallow. March 9th was a lot earlier than we thought THE DATE would be, or heard it was going to be. And having basically a week to prepare ourselves for these circumstances was a lot to handle. Insert lots of prayers here.

In the 5 days that have passed since we've received that news, John got promoted to corporal (hooray!), I had some leakage issues that at 38 weeks we felt we had to make sure it wasn't amniotic fluid so we went to the ER to find out it was a false alarm, and we finally received confirmation that they are allowing John to stay until the birth! They will be giving him his 10 days designated paternity leave as soon as she is born, whenever that may be, and then finding him a flight that will send him over to meet up with his unit. Praise the Lord!! Let down after let down, we certainly weren't planning on that surprise (but we were hoping). Despite the delay in his unit's response to us, I can honestly say I am impressed that they didn't just drop him. It would have been very easy for them to just say, "This is getting way to complicated, let's just let him stay home." As nice as that would be, John joined the Corps for this reason and thus has been looking forward to this adventure in his life for a long time. I was afraid that they were going to take it away from him but instead they fought for him and found a way to make both things work out and that tells me they really see something in John that they want to utilize him for on this deployment. Which makes me really proud, really thankful, and really happy!

So here we are, at week 40, dealing with surprise after surprise, and trying to plan as best as we can for the big one! I am a good 2 cm dilated and more than ready to meet Elizabeth. All the packing is complete and the chores are done (for the 3rd time) and we can relax. Since it has been 9 months, being pregnant has become my new normal so I almost have to stop and say "oh yea, there is an end to this and oh yea, it ends with a PUSH." Reality check! And you would think after 9 months I'd be prepared for that PUSH but I get nervous every time I think about it. I mean I've taken all of the birthing classes, read the books, but I still feel unprepared. Since it is my first, I guess the feeling is normal. I don't have a birthing plan, which you would think I would, but I figured I would plan to be surprised..... and I have a feeling I won't be disappointed! Hopefully it won't be long now! The next post will be the big reveal!!!

The ever diminishing belly button!