Our first week home

All in all everything has gone rather well. I was SO nervous at first — how would I handle two kids, how will Amelia handle not being the only child any more, how will we ever figure everything out? I quickly learned that we will just figure it all out day by day. And so far that's working rather well.

We came home on Friday around 11am. This gave us a few hours to get acclimated before Tyler picked Amelia up from school. I was SO excited to see Amelia again; I waited outside on the front porch (Oliver was sleeping) for the two of them to pull up the driveway. Amelia got out of the car, ran up the stairs, gave me the biggest hug ever and said, "I missed you Mommy!" I was a basketcase! She is the sweetest child ever!

She came inside and sat down next to baby brother immediately. So far so good.

Then Oliver started to cry — it was time for him to eat. I'm breastfeeding so I picked him up, explained that I was going to feed him and proceeded to try to get him to latch on. Oliver kept crying, Amelia is sitting next to me and she starts crying and said, "Stop mommy. Don't hurt baby brother. STOP." This just broke my heart. She had no idea what I was trying to do no matter how I explained it. Tyler took her aside and explained things to her and then took her outside to play. I joined them outside. Amelia got out her chair, sat down next to me and said/asked, "You feed baby brother from your boobs? There's milk in there." Shocked at what she just said I simply replied, "Yes, that's right." To which she replied, "Oh, okay." And that was that! Now when Oliver cries she just looks at me and says, "Mommy feed him. He's hungry."
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Oliver has been sleeping and eating rather well. We were quite nervous the first few days home because he didn't have a dirty diaper for nearly 3 days. We knew being jaundiced was more likely for him since Amelia was (I didn't know it "ran in the family" till the doc told me so). For those of you who don't know jaundice refers to the yellow color of the skin and whites of the eyes caused by excess bilirubin in the blood. Jaundice occurs when bilirubin builds up faster than a newborn's liver can break it down and pass it from the body ... hence why we were hoping for poopy diapers! On Sunday night he finally had his first dirty diaper — yes we practically celebrated this occassion. I was still concerned on Tuesday because his skin and eyes were still yellowish so we took him to the doc yesterday. He told us not to be concerned and to keep track of his feedings, temperature, weight gain and dirty diapers. So far I think we are doing okay. He has regained 3 of the 7 ounces he lost since birth and the dirty diapers are starting to appear a little more frequently.

Right now he sleeps 3-4 hours at a time — boy do I hope and pray this continues! He opens his eyes a couple times a day and stays alert for 30-60 minutes at a time once or twice a day. Typical newborn activity. Yes, we are going for typical and ordinary at the moment.

Amelia has been going to school and has maintained her routine thanks to Daddy. Right now we are doing more of a man-to-man approach, hopefully we can move to a zone defense in the next few months. :-)

Amelia checks out Oliver

Yesterday Amelia wasn't too excited about baby brother but today Daddy brought her to see me and Oliver and everything went very well. Actually, Amelia told me Oliver was HER baby! She couldn't wait to hold him ... she's been practicing with her baby doll for months now. 

It's amazing how much Oliver looks just like Amelia when she was born ... only Amelia was much chubbier (she gets that from her mommy).

Amelia has been very understanding about this whole situation and has been a big girl about everything ... she is truly amazing. I know tomorrow holds a whole new beginning for us but we're ready — as ready as we can be. 

Wish us luck!

Oliver Charles Harris

Our Earth Day baby...

7lbs, 6oz

19 1/2 inches

1:37 pm

I can't believe it, he's finally here. He's healthy and so beautiful!!! Mommy and Daddy are doing well and we are so happy.

IT'S TIME!!!!!!

We're at the hospital and all set up in our labor and delivery room.

I started having contractions at 3:30 a.m. and they hadn't stopped all morning. I finally told Tyler at 6:30 that I thought this was it...next thing I knew the contractions were maddening and it was all we could do to get ready, get Amelia breakfast, pack up and get out the door. We left the house by 8:05, took Amelia to school where her teacher Niki came out to meet us, and we were on our way to the hospital. They took me right back to my Labor and Delivery room, got me all set up on IVs, gave me some Nubane to take the edge off (it makes me giggle like a little girl...pretty funny - the nurse said she loved me - we'll see how long that lasts).

Now we're just waiting for an anesthesiologist (they all got called back to an emergency) so I can get an epidural. Hopefully I don't miss my window of opportunity.

For now, we'll just sit here and listen to the baby's heartbeat.

a helping hand...

It's hard to get the things done you need to with a kid and two parents, but when you're down one parent it's obviously even harder. Tyler's mom has been coming over a few nights each week and helping out with whatever Tyler asks her to and it has made things go a lot smoother. She's helped with Amelia's dinner, playtime, bath time and goofy time (she's really good at that ... she makes Amelia laugh all the time) and Amelia loves spending time with her. Actually Amelia is out to dinner with Granny right now — just the 2 of them. It was so cute watching Amelia walk out the door holding Granny's hand ... she turned around, waved and said, "Goodbye Daddy. Bye Mommy," and went on her way. Sometimes I look at her and I see an 8-year-old, not my little 2-year-old. She's growing up so fast. 

Granny helped us get the baby's crib all ready yesterday, took me to the doctor's today and dusted and vacuumed our whole house today ... who could ask for more!? Thank you Mama!

My time is almost up...

My (almost) 36 week check up today went very well. I was still 3cm and 70% effaced ... I guess bed rest has really done the trick! I'm allowed to start doing a little more now and by the weekend I'm off of bed rest! Yeah!!! 

Not that we can dictate exactly when we have the baby, but ideally he'll be here by early next week. Even my doctor is hoping I go around 37 weeks since we're all pretty sure I'm gonna have a rather large baby (especially if I go to 40 weeks!) and if that happens I'm actually going to be a little mad!

Bed rest hasn't been all that fun. Actually it's been tiring. I've been working from home the entire time and trying to get comfortable in bed with a laptop and do design work is quite complicated. As soon as I would finally get comfortable and get everything just where I needed it I'd have to pee again. I've been going like every 30 minutes!

Tyler has been amazing and Amelia has been so sweet. She has finally gotten accustomed to me being in bed all the time. When Tyler brings her home from school she runs upstairs and jumps in bed with me. But when Daddy says it's time to have dinner or her bath she listens very well and does what he asks (most of the time). Tyler has even let Amelia have dinner upstairs in our bedroom with me. He brings up her highchair and she sits next to the bed on the hardwood floor (in case she makes a mess). 

I've been missing out on giving baths and putting her to bed and it's really made me sad. So the other night I decided we'd try something new ... Amelia got to pick out her 2 bedtime books and bring them into bed with me and we'd read them in our bed and then Tyler would take her to her room, say her prayers with her and tuck her in. It's worked really well and it gave Tyler a few moments to himself. 

I am blessed to have such a wonderful daughter and husband.

At least our dry-run went well...

I had my (almost) 35 week checkup yesterday and my doc said not much had changed. I had noticed decreased movements from the baby so she hooked me back up to monitor him and also watch the contractions (I really didn't think I was having that many). Apparently I was wrong. I have been so used to feeling all my contractions in my back as cramps that I wasn't recognizing the typical uterine contractions (felt in front). Doc said that the baby's activity and heart beat looked good and she wasn't concerned. She made no mention of my contractions and their frequency though. She even said that if I wanted to try for modified bed rest that would be fine. Tyler was still quite skeptical so we decided we weren't going to let up on the bed rest until at least the weekend.

I did do a little more activity yesterday than I had in over a week and around 6 or so I noticed that the contractions and back cramps were becoming more prominent. I didn't think too much of them until around 10:30 when I had a doozy of a contraction. And then another. And then another and another. At 11 o'clock we started timing them. They were coming every 4-6 minutes — more than 10 in an hour. We hesitated for almost 2 hours if we should call the on-call doctor or not. We even tried to close our eyes and relax. When the contractions brought tears to my eyes I knew we had to call.

We still weren't sure if this was the real thing or not but we also knew there wasn't anything else that we could do. Tyler's mom came over around 1am and we headed to the hospital. The contractions were still coming hard and fast and I was now dilated to 3 1/2 cm.

Apparently week 35 of pregnancy is the grey zone. The doc at the hospital was more of the opinion to let me go through with the contractions and possibly have the baby. The on-call doc at my OBGYN office said to try medicine to get my contractions to stop. Had I been 34 weeks they would've both agreed to use the meds. Had I been 36 weeks they would've both agreed to admit me. I was only 35 weeks. Just my luck.

The meds eventually slowed down my contractions and we were on our way back home around 4am. They gave me Ambien to help me sleep (because the meds to stop my contractions make your heart race and you fell all edgy and jittery). Within 10 minutes I felt like I was drunk!

I went home and slept like a (drunk) baby. Tyler on the other hand couldn't fall asleep and then when he did he soon had to get up with Amelia when she did at 6:15. I swear, my husband is super-human sometimes. I couldn't make it one day without him. I am constantly asking myself how I got so lucky. There aren't many husbands who would do what he has done. I love you Tyler.

Now it's back to strict bed rest for 6 days. Although at least this time I have the medicine at home so that if the contractions start like that again I can hopefully stop them.

I also owe a special thank you to Darcy who came over on Saturday and helped me pack my hospital bags (amongst many other helpful things!) Thank you Darcy! You're always there for me! I'm blessed to have you in my life.

Hopefully the next story like this will end with a healthy, beautiful baby boy.

when it rains, it pours

It never fails — crappy things in life always happen in 3's ... and hopefully no more than that! Tyler's car needed repaired, again. Another $1000. I practically go into labor with full out contractions and I'm dilated — at 33 weeks and I'm put on bed rest. Then we find out that our God bless-ed water line on our fridge has been leaking for God only knows how long and has soaked through our ever-so-lovely peel and stick vinyl flooring all the way to the basement. Tyler moved the fridge out and I could all-to-easily lift all the flooring right up. The sub-flooring was already soaked through. We're f#$%ed. I give up. I'm going to bed.

Bed rest it is....

After my sweet encounter at Target I picked Tyler up and we headed over to my appointment. My doctor said I had progressed to 2cm dilated and 70% effaced. I told her I was pretty sure my contractions were coming a lot more frequently and with a lot more intensity .... they hooked me up to the monitor again and they were in fact doing just that ... my contractions were coming 2-3 minutes apart. They gave me an injection and within 10 minutes the contractions stopped. It was crazy. Apparently my activity levels were still too much so she put me on full time bed rest. 

And that's where we stand (or lie) now. So, I'm working from my bedroom now on a laptop. I've got a decent setup so it's not all that bad ... it's just that my butt and hips hurt from sitting and lying down so much! Oh well. I know it could be worse so I'm not going to complain anymore.

My renewed faith in human kindness

So not only have we been dealing with me being on partial bed rest but Tyler's car had to be worked on again...after we'd already spent $1100 on it in January, nonetheless! Friday his car wouldn't shift out of first gear... apparently it went into fail-safe mode because the sensor was bad. Needless to say, we were down to one car for 6 days. So on Tuesday we took Amelia to school, I dropped Tyler off at work and decided I would stop at Target to get a few items that we needed before I went back to pick Tyler up so he could go to my doctor's appointment with me.

I looked around for a motorized cart at Target (I'm not supposed to be doing "active" things) and didn't see one so I attempted to walk through the store. I only had 2 items in my cart and I started sweating and having contractions. Being the stubborn person that I am I insisted on finishing my shopping so I headed to the front of the store and asked if they had a motorized cart that I could use. The lady offered to get one and bring it to me. In the meantime the other store clerk asked if  I was okay and if I'd like a water. As she walked away I apparently looked quite pathetic and this absolute sweetheart of a woman that was in line to checkout nearby asked if I needed help doing my shopping. She said she had nothing to do on Tuesday's but kill time while her husband was at the hospital.

I told her she was so sweet for offering and then she insisted on helping me. I figured I could probably use the help and the company seemed nice too. Her name was Heather. She walked all throughout the store with me reading the prices of the items to me and grabbing the stuff off the shelves and putting them into the little cart for me. She was an angel. She runs a small daycare in Yellow Springs ... too bad she wasn't much closer, I'd pass my kids off to her in a heartbeat! At this point I wanted Heather as my new friend. She was awesome. 

As we were nearing the end of my shopping list (I was looking for hair dye...I can't stand my hair anymore) I remembered earlier she had said something about her husband being at the hospital on Tuesdays so I asked her where he was a doctor. He wasn't a doctor at all. He was having chemo therapy like he does every Tuesday. She said it's been going on for so long that she just couldn't take sitting in the hospital anymore so she tries to save all of her shopping for her Tuesday trips to Columbus. I felt like a worthless person worrying about my hair color as we carried on this conversation. I asked what his prognosis was and she said they don't ask. They never have. They just want to be able to live each day without that knowledge in the back of their mind. I guess his cancer had spread to all sorts of organs over the past 2 years. And prior to this he had no health issues.

Heather didn't have any kids of her own but loved them all like they were hers. You could tell she had a lot of love to give. She even helped me pick out sunglasses for Amelia (I had been promising Amelia a new pair for about 4 months now). Heather checked out in front of me, then help me with my stuff and walked out to the parking lot with me. As we were walking out I said to her, "See that red Jeep Cherokee over there?" She said, "Yes, that's my car. I'm guessing you're right next to me?" We both smiled and laughed and knew we were meant to meet each other that day. She put all the stuff in my car for me and we both reached out to give each other a hug at the same time.

I know most all of you reading this are laughing right now and thinking "typical Galen story." But seriously there aren't many people who would stop and help a perfect stranger like Heather did. The kindness she showed me only makes me want to be a better person. I hope I have the pleasure of running into Heather again. I might try Target on Tuesdays just for that chance.