Lila Dawn Ware

I guess I'll start where I left off in my post about itching and try not to forget any of the details!

The hospital called me at around 6:30 Wednesday morning and said that they would be ready for me to come in between 7:30 and 8 to be induced. I had some toast and double checked that I had everything ready to go. I gave my sleeping boys each a kiss and then went and woke up Mikey and had him go get in my bed, so the boys would find him when he woke up. I think I must have woken Kyle up with my kiss because I heard him talking with Mikey and went to say goodbye before I left. I told him that I was going to go to the doctor and have baby bun and that I would see him later. He then told me, "Baby Bun's shoes are hiding in a secret place. When she comes home she will find them." I thought that was pretty funny because I was the one who had hid the baby shoes because the boys kept going in the nursery and opening and rearranging her things.

We headed to the Intermountain Medical Center in Murray and got all checked in then went in to the labor and delivery room that would be mine. The nurses hooked up all the monitors and poked and prodded and did all their things they had to do to get me ready to have a baby. They checked my cervix and I was only at a 1 so my doctor ordered a medicine that would get my cervix ready before they started any pitocin. I took that medicine and waited for the next 4 hours having some minor contractions and watching Downton Abbey. The nurse said because I wasn't on the pitocin yet I could eat and so she got me a sandwich around lunch time. It was amazing! She was seriously the best nurse ever and my worries about this day being long and miserable like when I had Danny were slowly being alleviated. After that they started me on a low dose of pitocin and said they would increase it from there as needed. My doctor came in and checked me and broke my water; I was at a 3. My contractions had been pretty mild and I didn't want to be stuck in the hospital bed if it was still going to be a long road ahead, so I hadn't got my epidural at this point. After my water was broken things picked up a bit and I got my epidural when my contractions were about 5 minutes apart and getting pretty uncomfortable. I was glad I asked for the epidural when I did because by the time it was kicking in I was not wanting to be as uncomfortable as I was. Even with my epidural I was uncomfortable because I could feel quite a bit of pressure down low because baby had been sitting really low in my pelvis for weeks and pressure though uncomfortable is different than pain and you still want to keep feeling that while in labor.

The nurse who had been with me all morning was almost done with her shift and I was having contractions every 2 minutes and she checked me again and I was still at about a 3. She decided that we could turn off the pitocin which we had never turned up and see how my body did from there. This was all at probably 3 or so in the afternoon. Because my pitocin was off my contractions had gotten weaker and kind of irregular, but I would still have a strong one occasionally. I have been fighting a cold for about a week and still have a bit of a stuffy nose and cough. Jon and I were talking and he said something that made me laugh and so I started coughing and after that I would break into random little burst of coughing. Around this time with one of my random weaker contractions I felt something change with the pressure down in my crotch, it felt weird like a couple gas bubbles moving and then I felt like I needed to have a bowel movement. I pressed the nurse button and my new nurse came in. She had come in a little earlier to introduce herself, but hadn't gone over things with my previous nurse yet about me and how things were going. When she came in I told her that the pressure had changed a bit and I was now feeling kind of like I needed to go to the bathroom. She left to go see if she could find my old nurse and get the details on me, but came back a few minutes later because she was taking care of another patient. While she was gone I was resisting the urge to push with the occasional contraction because I did not want to do anything that was like pushing while there was no one there. The nurse checked me and was surprised to find me fully dilated with a baby's head practically coming out. I coughed a little while she was checking and she said "whoa don't do that" she called my doctor down and got all the stuff set up while I resisted all urges to push.  When everyone was ready my doctor said next time you feel the need to push do it. I had another contraction and I started coughing and the baby came out. My doctor and the nurses were very amused by how easy I had just made delivering a baby seem. It was very very easy. They wiped her off a little (she was all covered in the white goo because she was early) and handed her to me. When they put her on my chest I almost cried because she was perfect and in my mind I knew her name should be Lila Dawn. I held Lila while the doctor and nurses took care of what they needed to with the placenta and everything, but I didn't have any tearing at all with the delivery. Jon took a few pictures and I told him that I thought her name should be Lila and he responded after a little bit "Yeah, Lila Dawn." I hadn't mentioned what I thought her middle name should be and was very happy that we both came to the same conclusion even though Lila hadn't been very high on our list of names previously (Lila is Jon's maternal grandmother who died before he was born). 

I fed and held sticky baby for about an hour after she was born before the nurse took her over to the little baby station to be weighed and measured and everything. She was born at 15:55 and when they weighed her they said she was 6 lbs 1 oz and was 19.5 inches long (but on her paperwork they have 6 lbs even). I was still bleeding for a while after the delivery and so the nurse kept me down in the labor and delivery room rather than getting me ready to go up to the mother baby unit. During this time my heart rate and blood pressure were really low so they kept checking my vitals and did an EKG which was normal. 

At around 7 I made it to the mother baby unit and I had some dinner and Lila went to get all checked out and have a bath. We have been hanging out in mother baby ever since and are getting used to life outside the womb. I love our new little family member and I can't wait for the boys to meet her in real life when I go home tomorrow. 

Thanksgiving

I just saw this in my list of posts and it didn't publish before for some reason, so here is thanksgiving:

This has been a very busy week. We had a Thanksgiving party for the grandkids with grandma Ware. It was cute and the boys had fun. 

I guess the pictures of Danny from the party are on Jon's phone, so I just have Kyle here. 

We also chopped our Christmas tree and had a good time doing that. I was excited and started decorating before Thanksgiving. We even had a visit from the Christmas luchador. 

We found out this week that we are having a baby girl! We are very excited and I have so far resisted the urge to buy frilly and pink stuff. 

Thanksgiving was great. We went to the Ware's and had dinner with Jon's parents and it was quiet and delicious. Mikey was sick over the holiday and it was kind of a bummer because he couldn't join in the merriment and feasting. He is on the mend now and we are hoping the rest of us don't get sick. 

My mom, two of my aunts (Jenny and Kathy), and I sang in a choir that performed tonight. The concert went great and it was awesome to sing in the tabernacle. 

It has been a crazy week and it's not over yet because Jon and I are speaking in church tomorrow. Hopefully that goes well because we haven't had a whole lot of time to prepare. Our topic is charity so I think it will be a great topic to talk about at the beginning of the Christmas season. 

Itchy thoughts

I figured I should document the events of the past few days because lack of sleep does not help my memory. It is currently 4:20 am and I'm laying in my bed with a bag of ice on my feet. I haven't been able to get comfortable enough to fall back asleep since I woke up an hour ago maybe to pee or maybe because I kicked my previous bag of ice on the floor and so my feet started to bother me. 

I am currently 37 weeks pregnant and waking up to pee and having a hard time getting comfortable at night are really not uncommon at this point, but throw uncontrollable itching in there and an already uncomfortable time gets even more fun. About 4 days ago early Sunday morning I woke up for one of my usual night time trips to the toilet and was having a hard time falling back asleep. In my exhausted delirium I realized that my feet were really itchy and I was trying to rub them on the bed or do whatever to relieve them. I got up and found some anti-itch lotion and went back to bed, and after another hour of continued painful itching I thought "maybe this is a pregnancy thing?" Turning to the trusty google I found that there were some things that can result in itching during pregnancy and I decided to call the on call provider from my doctors office to see what they recommended. The groggy doctor said to try Benadryl and that there were some labs we could do tomorrow or Monday to see if it was related to my liver. The Benadryl didn't really relieve the itching but I think it eventually made me drowsy enough I was able to fall asleep. 

Sunday morning Jon kept an eye on the boys while I tried to sleep a little more and since the boys and I have had a nasty cough and runny noses I figured we would have them stay home from church. I went and taught sharing time in primary then came back home after church. At this point I was feeling fine: no painful itching in my feet, no weird tingling sensation in my hands like after giving someone a really hard high-five, just tired. I took a nap and during my nap the itching feet thing came back. I called to doctor again because I wasn't sure if I was supposed to do lab work that day or what. There was a different doctor on call at this time and she said the doctor the night before must have been slightly out of it because they couldn't order labs on Sunday and to call back Monday morning and talk to my doctors nurse and have them order the labs for me. I had texted my mom earlier in the day and told her I had this itching that kept me up the night before. She said my cousin had something like that with her recent pregnancy and it was related to her liver and sounded pretty miserable. I texted my cousin and got her insights and recommendations of what helped and what didn't. 

That night I went to bed with a bag of ice on my feet at it helped so much! I still woke up to relieve my bladder and refill my ice, but I was able to go back to sleep. Tender mercy! 

I called my doctor again Monday morning and talked to the nurse and she ordered the labs for me. She said since I was coming in on Tuesday I could just wait until then to have them done, but I didn't want to wait and figured if I had my blood drawn Monday I could talk to my doctor at my appointment about the results. After dropping Danny off at preschool I stopped by the hospital and had my blood drawn. Again during the day I didn't really have any irritation or discomfort. That night before bed I started itching again, so I got my ice and went to bed. This night wasn't quite as blissful as the previous after refreshing my ice in the middle of the night I couldn't go back to sleep for a bit and I started having some random itching on my legs and arms but not nearly as painful or irritating as on my feet. Eventually I fell asleep and was able to sleep until 8 when Danny woke up. Both boys didn't wake up until after 8, another small miracle!

The boys and I did some normal morning things: had breakfast, tried to clean the kitchen, played, fought, cried, colored a little, read a book with Mikey, etc. After getting lunch for everyone I went to my appointment and Mikey stayed home with the boys (as a side note it has been so nice having Mikey, my brother, living with us especially when I have had doctor appointments or wanted to pick Danny up from preschool without waking Kyle up from his nap). I waited quite a while for my appointment, but as soon as my doctor came in she asked if the nurse had already called me. She hadn't, so my doctor told me she was glad I had the labs done because I did have cholestasis of pregnancy and my levels for that were 57 (you have cholestasis if you are above a 9). We talked a little bit about my symptoms and she said typically you have itching all over and it's not just in your feet. Again so grateful that it wasn't all over and that it wasn't constant. Because I was already 37 weeks along and my levels were so high my doctor thought it would be best to induce me this week. She called the people who schedule those and they were able to get me on the list for the next day. 

I came home from my appointment slightly in shock, but feeling surprisingly calm about the whole thing. I went into plan and prepare mode and packed some things for the hospital and talked to family members about who was going to watch the boys and when. Jon came home from work and helped me clean up the house a bit, we had dinner, and the boys watched wall-e and were wild until bed time. 

After the boys were in bed I did some more last minute preparation and nesting-type things then Jon and Michael gave me a blessing. I started itching again with new random itches on various parts of my body and decided to go to bed. I slept for a few hours then got up and slept a little more and couldn't sleep, so I started spewing my thoughts of the last few days and here we are. 

Hopefully everything goes smoothly in a few hours and we can meet our new healthy baby girl. It has been a crazy few days, but I have been kind of paranoid this whole pregnancy and I think that has helped get the anxiety out of my system because I am very calm now.