Please forgive me for taking so long to get this blog posted. I have attempted to finish it several times, but have had no luck. So it's going to be pretty lengthy in order to review the week's past events.
Monday night (6/14) after we went to Cracker Barrel for my last meal before Kerrigan arrived, we came home and got everything ready to go. Luckily, the house had been cleaned so we didn't really have to worry about things along those lines. We just had to get the car packed because Tuesday was going to be an early day. Aaron's coworker, Tyson, agreed to watch Marley while we were in the hospital, so he came over to check things out and get the 411 on taking care of Marley. Thanks, Tyson, for taking care of Marley for us! It was definitely a big weight off our shoudlers. After everything was said and done, we tried to get some rest and the alarm went off at 5:00 a.m. Tuesday morning.
It was hard to sleep Monday night, but the next day was going to be pretty exciting, to say the least! We got up, got showers, put the last minute things in the car and set off to Brookwood Hospital. No food or drink (caffeine was much needed) for me, but Aaron stopped for a coffee, some snacks and a couple of daily newspapers to have as keepsakes. As we were pulling out of the Shell parking lot, Aaron reached into his bag and gave me a box with an envelope on top that said, "DO NOT OPEN UNTIL WE ARE ON THE WAY TO THE HOSPITAL!!!" I opened it and there was a two page typed letter. Immediately I started crying because it had a lot of words of encouragement and it was so sweet and thoughtful. I won't go into any details, but we've been through a lot in almost 6 years of dating/being engaged/being married. It was just something that I needed to read before I had a baby. :) After I read it and tried to get rid of the tears, I opened my box. Inside there was a beautiful necklace--a heart shaped necklace with round diamonds and sterling silver swirls--called Love's Embrace. It was really starting to set in that we were about to add one more to our family and how lucky I am to have such a wonderful husband. Here's a picture of the necklace:
We got to the hospital a few minutes before 6:30 a.m., checked in, I got weighed and then we went to our room. After going over some things and signing lots of papers, Aaron went ahead and moved the car to the parking deck. When he came back, I learned that I was 3 cm dilated. Dr. Tamucci came in and broke my water around 7:00 a.m. The nurse started me on Pitocin to start contractions. My parents arrived around 7:15 a.m. and we were all in for a pretty long day.
Tonya was my nurse most of the day. She was super nice and helpful and helped make the day go by a little bit quicker. My blood pressure was high...higher than it had been. But luckily it didn't effect Kerrigan. Contractions started pretty quickly after the Pitocin was given to me. They weren't so severe at first, but then finally, they were getting pretty bad...pretty quickly. Dr. Tamucci said she was pretty liberal about when to get an epidural. So I decided that I would get it around 9:00 a.m.. It wasn't so bad, but I wouldn't say it was the most comforting feeling in the world. I had always heard the numbing part was the worst, but I thought the worst part was getting it threaded up my back. It started to kick in pretty quickly. I knew I was having contractions because of the machine I was hooked up to, but I definitely wasn't feeling them.
The day was definitely long. Around lunchtime, I was up to 5 cm dilated. Mom stayed in the room with me while Aaron, my dad and Megan went to get something to eat. Aaron figured he should go before I dilated anymore so that he wouldn't miss anything! Megan had to leave around 2:00 or so to go pick the boys up from school and take them to swimming lessons. She predicted Kerrigan would be born at 6:12 p.m. and had planned to bring the boys back to meet their new cousin.
The epidural held on until around 3:00. I could start to feel a lot of pressure and it was pretty painful. The anesthesiologist came back in to add some more meds to my IV. A little bit later, I started doing some "practice" pushes. Then right at 4:00, my parents were asked to leave the room. I got a little emotional--I was afraid that it was going to really hurt. But there was really nothing I could do about that, right? My contractions were about 2 minutes apart and I pushed for almost an hour and a half. Aaron and my new nurse Nicole were really helpful in making it as pleasant as possible. Aaron kept saying he felt bad because he didn't feel like he could do anything. Little did he know, him helping to hold my neck up while I was pushing was great. I was relieved when Dr. Tamucci finally came back in the room because I knew that labor would be over soon. I was really anxious to see my baby!
Finally the moment came when they said that she was about to arrive because they could see her head. Aaron said at one point, he saw her ear. It probably wouldn't have lasted as long, but Kerrigan was turned a little bit to the side. They were trying to "adjust" her, but she kept turning. When Kerrigan came out, Dr. Tamucci said that the cord was wrapped around her neck. This probably played a role in it taking a little longer in her making her appearance. She wasn't crying, which kind of worried us, but she did let out a little whelp. They showed her to me and that was a moment I will never forget. She was wide eyed and looking right at me. Then they took her over to clean her off and she still wasn't crying. But as Dr. Tamucci was tending to me, she looked over and said that she was wide eyed and her skin tone was good, so she wasn't worried. Below is a video of Kerrigan getting cleaned off.
When she was finished, they brought her over to me so we could have skin-to-skin contact. As she was lying on my chest, she kept looking up at me. I couldn't believe that I was holding my baby. The moment was so surreal and labor was definitely worth it!
They checked Kerrigan's blood sugars three times throughout the evening and they were all normal. So luckily my gestational diabetes didn't effect her! My blood pressure shot up after Kerrigan was born. So instead of usually going up to the postpartum floor in an hour or so after delivery, we had to stay in Labor and Delivery until 10:00. They gave me two rounds of medicine in my IV and a blood pressure pill to try and help it come down. My pressures never went down to normal, but the doctor thought they went down enough for me to be transferred to our new room. We had Kerrigan stay in the nursery the first night. The nurse told us she pooped and did well. She had lost some weight when they weighed her the first night. She was down to 6 pounds, 15 ounces. Aaron and I didn't really get much rest because we didn't get to bed until late and nurses kept coming in our room. Plus we were so excited to be new parents.
During our stay in the hospital, I tried to breastfeed. Since my milk wouldn't come in for a few days after giving birth and colostrum is so thick, it was hard for Kerrigan to get much to eat. I started pumping and was getting a little bit of colostrum. We fed her with a syringe with what I pumped out. It just wasn't enough because by Wednesday (6/16) night, she was down to 6 pounds, 9 ounces. On Thursday (6/17) morning, a pediatrician from Greenvale came by and said that Kerrigan was a bit jaundice and they were checking her bilirubin level. They learned that it was 11.4 and told us that we needed to go see the pediatrician on Friday (6/18) to get things checked out.
While we were at the hospital, we had a lot of visitors! My parents, Megan and the boys were there a lot. Unfortunately, Brad was not able to leave Georgia to come meet his new niece. Aaron's parents and brother are going to come visit in a couple of months. But we had a lot of friends come to see us! We appreciate everyone who came to visit!!
Our experience at Brookwood was great. We had wonderful nurses throughout our stay who took very good care of Kerrigan and me (and Aaron, too!). I definitely would have another baby there. Not anytime soon, though!!
We got to go home on Thursday afternoon. My blood pressure was still a little high, but not over the level they considered alarming. My mom came to help us get everything packed up from the room. We got the car loaded up and I sat in the back with Kerrigan. Daddy drove really, really slow on our way home. It was pretty funny to see so many people pass us on the interstate. But hey, we had precious cargo with us! When we got home, my parents were already there to help us. Aaron went in first with a blanket that Kerrigan had been swaddled in. He let Marley sniff it first. I then walked into the house with Kerrigan and sat her carseat on the couch. Marley came up and gave her a few big licks on her face! But he really wasn't as interested in her as I thought he may be. He was definitely intrigued, but I think that he was more excited that Aaron was back home!
Kerrigan in her carseat for the first time...getting ready to go home!
Marley checking out his new baby sister
We went to the pediatrician (Dr. Dudgeon--or Dr. Brian to his patients) on Friday morning (6/18). Kerrigan had lost some more weight--she was down to 6 pounds, 2.5 ounces. So total she had lost 13% of her birth weight. Her bilirubin level had also crept up to 18. So Dr. Dudgeon suggested that I stop trying to breastfeed for now and just pump, then chase the breastmilk with formula. Since my milk hadn't yet come in, he felt that would help Kerrigan gain her weight back, as well as have a bowel movement (which she hadn't had one since Wednesday). As far as the jaundice, he said that there were 2 ways to get bilirubin out of your system. The first is through sweat glands, which she hasn't developed yet. Secondly, it is through your poop. So since she hadn't been eating much, the supplement of formula would help fill her up more, thus making her have a bowel movement. Additionally, an at home nurse would bring a UV light to our house and Kerrigan had to lie on that whenever she was not eating or getting a bath. With the combination of those things, he felt that she would put some weight back on and her bilirubin levels would come down. We didn't think the nurse would bring us the UV light until Saturday, but they ended up coming Friday (6/18) afternoon. The nurse showed us how to put Kerrigan in the little outfit that was placed on the light. There was a mesh portion at the bottom that would expose her backside to the light. She could only wear a diaper while lying there. It was really sad because the only time she could get out was to eat or get a bath. So we had a 3 day year old newborn that we could not hold. :( It was pretty hard. We had to check her temperature after every other feeding (it had to be between 97 and 100 degrees). We also had to keep track of when she ate, how much she ate and whether or not she peed or pooped. If she pooped, we had to write down the color. Hahah! Once we started feeding her more, she started to pee and poop A LOT more! There have been a few times that either me, Aaron or my mom have changed her diaper, and she has had a major blowout. I guess it's all a part of having an infant. A nurse came to our house on Saturday morning. She had to prick her foot again to get blood in order to check her bilirubin level. She weighed her and she weighed 6 pounds, 8.5 ounces. So she gained 6 ounces!! That was comforting. The nurse had to make another at-home visit and then she said she would go to the lab and call us in the afternoon with the results of her bilirubin test. We got the call around 2:30 and her level had gone down to 12.9. The nurse told us that we could go ahead and take her off the light and that we needed to make an appointment to see our pediatrician again on Monday (6/21). It was such a relief that she had to only be on the light for a little over 24 hours.
Sunday (6/20) was Aaron's first Father's Day! He got a picture frame that I made that said "First Father's Day - June 20, 2010" with a picture of him and Kerrigan. He got a little photo album with some pictures. He also got a tie because every dad should get a tie on Father's Day, right? We went to my parents' house for lunch. Everyone went swimming afterwards. My mom, Kerrigan and I tried to hang out under the umbrella, but it was just too hot so we went inside. After Brad, Megan and the boys left, my dad and Aaron came back inside. Before too long, Aaron and I fell asleep on the couch! It's not easy being a new parent!
Now, that brings us to today, Monday (6/21). We got an appointment with Dr. Dudgeon this afternoon. He seemed agitated that we had to come in to bring back the light. He said some doctors do things differently and he apologized for us having to come in and pay a copay. He thought the nurses would have come back Sunday morning to check on Kerrigan. But they didn't. We did find out that she had gained some more weight. She was up to 6 pounds, 12.5 ounces. Also, her bilirubin level was down to 10.8. So she is doing well and we must be doing something right!
We definitely are having to make some adjustments in our lives, but it has been so exciting for us at the same time. With jaundice, babies tend to sleep a lot more, so we have been trying to wake her up a couple of times during the night so she can eat. But last night she woke me up once on her own, so hopefully she's beginning to make her own schedule.
I know that I have left out a lot of details, but I tried to hit the high points. We are in love with our little girl. She is perfect in so many ways. Everyone says that she looks like Aaron, which isn't a bad thing. :) I'd like to set our baby pictures next to a picture of Kerrigan to compare.
We're in for the time of our lives, that's for sure! I'll try to update as often as I can. Once we have our routines set, I think it will be a lot easier. But I have probably been on the computer for a total of 30 minutes in the past week!
Below are some pictures that we have taken. I wish I could upload all of them, but that would take forever!
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