Mom brain: it's real.
It's completely old news, but I don't want too much time to go by without writing about the day our family turned into a foursome. Unless you count furbabies, in which case...oy. Lots of babies, but I digress.
Towards the end of the pregnancy, I kept having just "off" days. I would feel woozy or dizzy or just completely on fire. I was told to take my blood pressure a few times a week to keep an eye on things so I wouldn't end up in a similar situation with pre-eclampsia like I did with the bub. When I would take it at home, it'd be through the roof, so much so that I called the on-call number one night. They told me so long as I could see straight and felt alright in other parts of my body, we could wait until the morning to get things checked out. Sure enough, I'd get to the doctor and it wasn't so bad.
Somewhere around 37 weeks, the blood pressure at the doc was starting to read high, and near 38 weeks, they started to find protein in my urine, another factor of pre-e starting. I was also up about 60 pounds at this point, and growing fast. Granted, I knew that the box of munchkins I was sometime eating in one day weren't helping that cause. Let's not focus there. mk? I love food, and donuts? Forget it.
I had an off day, I was reading really high blood pressure at home, went to a checkup and was reading high, they sent me to the WETU (I don't remember what it stands for at the moment, but essentially the ER you visit before getting admitted to a room when you're in labor or getting ready to have the baby.) Sure enough, my blood pressure was elevated. They had me rest on my side, drink plenty of fluids, etc. The blood pressure came down, but alas...I started having contractions. They were coming on fast, nearly 3 minutes apart. Go figure. Very glad I was not back at work when that happened. I would've been completely stranded. At this point, I had told some friends what was going on and that I for sure wouldn't be back at work, and more than likely little man would be making his appearance soon. I told the hubs to hang tight until I knew more and just stand by. Once the contractions started really getting intense to where I had to stop talking to the nurses, I called him and just told him to head over. I was done for.
The doctor on call gave me 2 options. I could go home and wait to see if I progressed more in a while or I could go ahead with a repeat c-section. As much as I really wanted to try for a VBAC with this baby, I couldn't imagine going home at that point. How would I know when to come back before I ended up having the baby in my bathtub? The contractions were already worse than when they tell you to go to the hospital and they wanted to send me home? I was in pain...get that baby out! Plus, I knew what recovery was like from a c-section. While not great, it was at least something I knew and could prepare for.
By 6:58pm, baby boy #2 was in this world. He weighed in at 7lbs. 2oz and 19" long. The usual nonsense like getting a spinal put in correctly and dealing with the miserable sickness from anesthesia was all part of the story, but the one thing I will never forget is hearing my baby cry. I was put to sleep when the bub was born, and managed to stay knocked out for a few days. I don't remember anything. That moment when your baby starts crying for the first time is something I could never explain. I was in tears, but very happy tears. He was healthy and finally here.
They sat him right next to me while they stitched me up and he rode with me back to my room where I'd be for the next 4-5 days. I unfortunately couldn't nurse him well while laying down and groggy. Plus, I continued to throw up everything in my system until about 3 in the morning. The nurses couldn't believe how nauseous I was. They really needed me to get up and walk around as soon as I could, but I could barely open my eyes without needing to reach for a bucket. Throwing up with a giant incision in your stomach...swell...let me tell ya.
The hubs was a trooper and I managed to get up and move a little more each day until we finally got to go home. I do have to say our experience at the hospital was awful in comparison to when the bub was born. The nurses weren't very attentive, we just sort of got left to fend for ourselves or constantly ask for things or ask questions about information I feel should've been given to us...things like when my child was fed in the nursery while I was throwing up and couldn't feed him that first night. They would run tests and not tell us results, etc.
All was going well until about 2 days after we got home. I totally thought...yes...I can do this. Not so bad. Thankfully no crazy surprises, and then disaster....dun dun dun.
I went to the bathroom and noticed that there was a big spot of blood on the pad they had me put on my incision so my clothes wouldn't rub. It was dried, so they chalked it up to maybe twisting while I slept and just irritating the incision. The next time I went to the bathroom about an hour later...it was full of blood, and it continued to run down my leg and all over the floor. I frantically yelled to the hubs and called the doctor.
Turns out, my incision had split and the bruising under the incision had started to find a way out. They had to completely split the incision to avoid any infection. Cue the next 8 weeks of daily visiting nurses who had to stuff the incision with various gauze and packing material until it finally healed from the inside out. 8 weeks! goodbye any hope of maternity leave dreams of strolling with my baby on a nice warm day in May. I was pretty much under house arrest, because too much movement would slow down the healing process. That first time I could drive and get out of the house...oh man. It was glorious!
So long story short...he's here and we are happily settled in 5 months later, not sleeping great, but not shocking considering big bro took about 7 months before sleeping through the night. My kids love them some momma milk, so they wake constantly to make sure they get it.
Welcome to the world Baby X. We couldn't be happier to have you in our lives.
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