Ian is just a few days away from being 6 months old. So, this update is way overdue. Here is a current pic of my almost 6 month old and his big brother who is 18.5 months old. Yup, my babies are 13 months apart.
Ian was born one day before I turned 37 weeks preggo on December 29th 2012. And up to that point my life was extremely busy. Not only was I teaching a new subject at a new school, I was in the process of moving my classroom to our new school building which was not at all close to my current room.
I must have taken more than a dozen trips back and forth pushing carts of files, boxes of supplies, books etc. I remember getting some sharp pains in my belly, but I refused to believe that they were contractions mostly because I desperately needed them not to be. I needed to get my room set up and my plans for a sub finalized before our new addition could come.
On top of moving at school, we decided that we needed to move out of our 850 square foot town home into a bigger space with a garage in the town that I taught in. This way I could safely put babies in and out of the car, and I wouldn't have to commute with two little babies in the back seat.
Although Ian came before we actually made the move, we were having a ton of showings on our place, so I was constantly cleaning and packing up our place getting ready for the move. Just typing all of this is making me exhausted. :)
Thank goodness it is over, and now that I have made it clear that Steve and I were crazy for doing all this so close to my due date...let's zoom in to the day/days of.
By God's awesome design, my dad happened to be visiting us on the day I went into labor and I was on Christmas break from school. Right when he came into town we went to eat at the Yard House at a local city center. It was so nice to see all the beautiful Christmas lights, eat great food and talk with my father. It was just the fun I desperately needed. The only people missing were my sister who had to work and my mom.
The next day, we had a scheduled showing plus I wanted to give my dad a tour of my classroom and around town. So, we cleaned the house, backed Ev's diaper bag and headed out for the day. That morning, I started to have what I thought were braxton hicks contractions. Again, I think I was in denial that Ian might be making his entrance early. I didn't bother timing them or seeing if they were coming closer together, because to me there was no way that Ian was coming on that day.
That evening we celebrated a late Christmas with my dad, and let Ev open all his gifts. It wasn't until that evening when I could barely walk around the house without having a contraction that I started to be honest with myself. "Linda, this might be the real thing."
Due to this, I rocked Evan a little longer before putting him to bed. "Will this be my last night being a momma of one?"
Then around 11 o'clock, I started to have extremely painful contractions. I now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was going into labor since visions of epidurals were danced in my head.
Steve drove me to the hospital and dad stayed home with Evan. The nurse confirmed that I was going into labor hooked me up to some antibiotics since my Strep B test results hadn't come back yet and put me on the waiting list for an epidural. Which by this point couldn't come fast enough.
As soon as the nurse left the room, the tears started to flow. Steve was as surprised by them as I was. Due to my life being so crazy up to that point, I don't think I had had the time to mentally process Ian's approaching birth like I wanted to, and then BAM it was here. So, I let the tears flow for a few minutes, then I wiped them off my cheeks and gave myself a mental pep talk. "You can do this!"
A few minutes later, the nurse came in kind of frantic like talking about my blood pressure, and I thought "Oh boy, here we go again." It was dangerously high just like with Evan. More about this later.
I started to pray about my blood pressure and began sending mental messages to the anesthesiologist to get his butt in my room ASAP. I don't know how my mom gave birth to both Marylin and I without one.
After what seemed like forever, I finally got relief. And again just like with Ev I ended up with two epidurals, but this time I had to convince the anestegiologist to give me another one. He seriously did not believe me when I told him that my contractions were feeling exactly like they were when I first came in. I remember him giving the nurse a look like I was faking it when I started to wince in pain. If I hadn't been in such pain, I might have jumped off the bed and punched him in the face.
He said that he feared I wouldn't be able to push if he gave me another epidural, and that it is normal for my contractions to get stronger the closer I come to delivery. Seriously...? Doc, this isn't my first rodeo. I know what I am taking about. P.S. You're a man. I don't know why this was the case for me both times, but it was. I'm no drama queen, but I wasn't trying to be a hero either. If I was paying for an epidural, it had better work. (Can you tell that I am still a little upset about this?...) Eventually, I convinced him to do the epidural again and guess what?...I pushed like a pro! :)
Precious baby Ian! We loved you at first sight. You were so tiny and cute! I love the pic of your little feet on Daddy's scrubs.
After, snuggling for a few minutes. It became apparent that I needed some close attention. My uterus was clamped onto my placenta and would not release it. When the doctor told me this I couldn't wrap my mind around it..."Wait...what?"
It literally took 20 minutes of the doctor trying to pry it off and the nurses pushing on my stomach to get my placenta out. When it finally released, I immediately became extremely light headed, had an intense headache and I thought I was going to pass out. Luckily, I didn't and the doctor said "Thank goodness you had your 2nd epidural. There is no way we would have been able to have done this to you without one and you would of had to have surgery to remove your palcenta."
Meanwhile, my blood pressure was still dangerously high. With Evan, my blood pressure naturally regulated itself. Sadly, that wasn't the case this time. My blood pressure was so high they thought that I was going to start to have seizures. Due to this, I couldn't eat anything for 48 hours because of the risk of aspirating the food if I did have a seizure. Also, I was put on the much dreaded Magnesium that gives you cotton mouth and makes you feel like you have the flu. Talk about hot flashes and my mouth feeling like it hadn't seen a drop of water for days.
Needless to say, I had pre-eclampsia. I was told that I am one of the luckily women who develop this condition because it happens at the very end of my pregnancies. They don't have to make the decision to either put my life at risk or deliver a pre-term baby. I feel for the women that become this way much earlier in preganacy.
I am so thankful for a healthy baby boy and that nothing traumatic happened to me. Modern medicine is a wonderful thing!
Ian, you are such a sweet baby boy! Nothing brightens my day like watching you and brother "play" (as much as you guys can at this age) and your sweet, blue-eyed smile. My life changed in the best of ways the moment you entered it. I love you!
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