Random pictures for Papa

Sleep

So I realize that it was our idea to have a baby, and yes I know that new borns do not sleep when you want them too... but I am sleepy. I need 1 night of full sleep. I am going to go crazy soon. I am getting super frustrated with the fact that the baby is not nursing like I want him to do. He is doing this thing where he just does not want to nurse. He just flat out chooses to not nurse. He will take a bottle, and is happy after that... but will not latch on. He just freaks out until I get him that bottle. I want to be a nursing mother, but if he will not latch on, then what the heck do I do?!?!?! I put too much stress on myself when it comes to breastfeeding, I always have. I don't know why. I just feel that it is so important to make the first few months good, so that maybe whatever I do will stick. However, I did everything perfect with Bella, and it is just like I haven't, so I guess it just doesn't matter.

Anyway, if I could just get 1 good nights sleep... uninterrupted, I would be doing a little better. I might not be stressing so much about how or where Jack sleeps, or what and when he eats.

Little man Tenney

My new baby boy is 4 weeks old today. That makes me very sad. I wish I could stop time and just enjoy the new born stage a little longer. I will not miss the sleepless night however. I am getting sick of him only sleeping 1-2 hours at a time without eating at night. He can go for hours during the day, but the second I want some sleep he wakes up. I think the last 2 nights I have gotten a total of 6 hours sleep. Not enough for this person!! He is staying awake longer during the day now, so why is he not sleeping more at night? Oh well, only a few more weeks until he sleeps longer at night. I will move him into his own room really soon. I have to get him use to sleeping flat on his back so he will like his crib. Actually I put him in his crib one day while I was in his room doing somethings, and he did not seem to mind it too much. His crib is super comfortable, and there are lovely colors to look at in there, so I think that is why he liked it.

Perhaps I will work on keeping him up longer in the evening, not that it is easy to do. It just seem like the only time we go anywhere is in the evening, and he sleeps in the car. It is hard to wake that boy up when you do want him up, and even harder to put him to sleep!!

Today is going to be hot. We are going to be playing in the pool this afternoon. I am going to get up and make lunch in a minute, put Bella to bed and then when she wakes up we will all go out back. The sun is the hottest out back around 5pm, but there is more shade back there in the afternoon. I am not a big fan of hanging out in the back yard, there is no where to sit, and I always get burnt through the leaves on the trees. Maybe I will sit out in the sun and work on my tan. Now that I am drug free, there are no side effects from them and I wont burn.

Life and getting through it

So in the last few days I have managed to take my 3 kids to the store all by myself. For now it is really not all that hard. I think when Jackson gets older it will become a bit more hard. Now I just put the car seat in the shopping cart, and Bella in the seat part of the cart. Spencer, of course, is a big help and runs along beside the cart.

The last few days have been weird. Ashley and Tim's wedding is tomorrow, and my kids are in it. I have spent the last few days looking for an outfit for me (finally found one that fits this squishy body), going to the tux fitting, getting shoes for us all, getting the small details for Spencer and I, and just running around like a crazy person. Jackson has gotten off any sort of schedule that I may have been close to because of this. Today we have more things to get, as well as go to the rehearsal tonight. Tomorrow is the wedding, so it is an all day event for the kids. I just hope that the lack of being home doesn't mess with Jackson too badly. Last night was horrible from 9-12. He cryed and cryed for ever. I still don't know what was wrong with him, I can only assume that it was lack of food and sleep from the days combined.

On the bright side of things, I found some rad shoes for Spencer, Bella and I yesterday. We ended up spending 65.00 on 4 pairs of shoes, and only 3 pair were every day shoes. My shoes are for the wedding. I hope to get some use out of them other than the wedding, but I am not too sure. Today we go to Walmart for jewelry for me for the wedding and to see what they have for school clothes for the boy. I still would like to find an outfit for Jackson for tomorrow, but it is really hard to find anything other than onsies for a boy this small. I want an outfit for him, but again, they are either too big, or for the fall and I think it is going to be on the hot side tomorrow.

Places to go today...
Walmart
Wellsfargo
Wedding Rehearsal
Depending on how much time I give us... we may go to JCPenney's for school clothes too.

I will be doing all the school shopping this weekend. School starts in just 2 weeks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And we are going camping next weekend, so that leaves no time. I don't want to take the chance of running out of money. or time, before the boy gets his clothes.

Back to real life

It is nice to be getting back to normal. It was nice to have my mom here, but now that she is gone things are getting back to normal. Jackson is fitting in really well. I was worried about how Bella was going to deal with him, but turns out she likes him. Good thing too. There was one time where Spencer had to stop her from hurting him, but I don't think she did it to hurt him. She was going to lay on him, just like she does with Spencer. She just does not realize how small the baby is. Other than that she is doing fine. There is a time or two a day where she is jealous of the baby, but that is normal. She wants to sit on my lap when he is. It can be overwhelming some times, but that is something that I will just have to deal with.

I am looking forward to the day when he sleeps for longer than 2-3 hours at night, but at the same time I don't want him to get too big too quick. This being my last baby, I am really wanting him to grow REALLY SLOW. I love the baby stage. John likes the older baby stage, like 9 months. I dig new borns. I feel this connection with Jackson, like he knows what I am saying to him. I did not have that with Bella, and Spencer and I did not mesh well for like 2-3 weeks after he was born. I was afraid of babies when I had Spencer. Jackson is going to be mommies boy, for sure.

The breastfeeding is going really well. There is the occasion now and then where he gets a bottle. Sometimes he just does not get enough milk from me, and then I will give him a bottle. Like last night. I nursed and nursed and he was still hungry. I almost wonder if he was over sleepy, and the bottle acted like a binky. He usually only drinks 1 oz, at the most, the rest is breast milk. Then when John gets up with him on his days off, he gets 1 bottle a night then. I am not that good at nursing in public, so I find myself packing a bottle for back up. I always try to nurse first, but if I am shopping at the Walmart, I am not going to whip out a booby. I can say that I am already getting tired of being the only source of food for him though. On call every 2 hours. That will change when he gets a little older, and needs to eat less often.

We are thinking about going camping in the next few weeks. Well, John and Spencer are going, and Bella, Jackson and I are thinking about tagging along. I think John is ok with us going. I have not been camping forever. It was before Spencer. I may have been pregnant with him, but I don't think I was. That was 8 years ago!! Now when I say camping, I mean I slept in a van. Roughing it huh?!?! Any who, I don't know where John is thinking, but I found a rad campground near a lake. I think it would be a good place to start out camping with the family. I am not really down with taking Bella into the middle of the woods. I would worry the entire time about her running away. We need to buy a few things in order to go. We have a small tent, but we would need a second one, and air mattresses for both. We have everything else we would need. Sounds fun, I hope we actually go along with it. I need to get out of this house.

My new baby

So Jackson and I have been 2 people for just over a week now. He was one week yesterday. I love that little boy so much. He is so beautiful, and on top of that, a really good baby. Or am I just a really good mommy. Tough call!!! I am sitting here typing at 1:35am waiting for him to wake up, because I was not sleepy when he went to sleep at 12ish. Today was not a normal day. I ended up back in the hospital last night because of high blood pressure. What a crappy night. I was hooked up to an IV all night and all day and given blood pressure meds that made me feel all weird. On top of that med, I was also given multiple narcotics for the headache that took me to the ER in the first place. There was a point this morning that I could not move. At all. All the meds had taken it all out of me. That being said, John and Jackson stayed in the room with me last night. I had to have John stay there if Jackson was going to stay because I could not take care of him on my own, and they were not responsible for him any more. That was fine because I did not want John to go, and I really did not want Jackson to go. The poopy side... John had to go to work today, so the baby had to go home. My mom has been here since Tuesday taking care of the me and the kids (side note... John did not think I could do it alone, cute huh??), so she had to watch all 3 kids alone. Had it not been for the drugs and being in a coma all day, I would have worried all day long.

My milk had come in in the last few days, but you don't really realize it until you can not feed your baby every 2-3 hours. I was able to pump at one point during the day, but by the time John came to pick me up, I was leaking all over the place. When I got home, Jackson was sleeping and was not hungry. I leaked forever!!! When he finally woke up he just snacked all night, and then when it was time to put him down for the night, he was not hungry. Damn it. That leaves me where I am now. Number 1... I could not get rid of that freaking headache that sent me to the hospital in the first place, so I drank a Mt. Dew and loaded up on ibuprofen. Now I am not sleepy. Number 2... I slept all day at the hospital and again, now I am not sleepy. The only thing getting me through this... my mom is here until Saturday night, and I can nap tomorrow when Bella is napping. Nice.

I have been sleeping on the couch since Saturday when we came home. Our bed is too high and with the c-section I could not get in or out without John's help and a ton of pain. Not to mention the heat. It has just been the best place for me. I wanted to move back up stairs tonight, but with the mix up in our little schedule we sort of had going until yesterday hit the fan, the baby was not having it. I guess I will try it again tomorrow night. I really want a good nights sleep in my bed. Maybe John will stay up with the baby one night this weekend.

My birth story

I guess I will start with my 39 week ob appointment on Tuesday last week. I talked the doctor I saw into seeing if there were any appointments open at the hospital for an induction. She said they would call me if there was, and there was. I was super excited that I had a 7:30 appointment Wednesday morning. You would think that I would have been up all night, but I actually got a few hours of sleep, thanks to some sleeping pills. I called at 6am to double check that we were still on, and we were.

We got to the hospital at 7:30 on the dot, after rearranging cars and kids. I checked in, and was taken right to my room .I wad hooked up to all the machines, and given my IV and by 8:30 was getting the pitocin. I really started feeling the contractions around 11, but was dealing with them rather nicely. I had a visit from the doctor on call around 9, and was told that I was still 2-3cm and that the baby was really high still. She did not want to break my water because of it.

After a few more hours of laboring, the nurse checked me again, and said that I was about 4cm, and that the babies head was still really high. I was doing good, and did not want to get the epidural yet, so I kept laboring. She was sure that my water was going to break soon, so I was not surprised when I felt a gush about 30 minutes later. This is where it is going to get icky, so if you don't want to hear the details, don't read on any more. When I felt my "water" break, I felt other stuff coming out too. Lots of stuff. It did not feel like water, and I was terrified. I called my nurse and she came right in. She lifted up my blanket and I quickly asked if it was clear water. She only said no. She stood there for a minutes just looking, I could tell she was thinking what to do. I was really worried because I thought that there was meconium. Turns out what I thought was my water, was a huge gush of blood, and the stuff I felt was huge clots. She changed my bedding, and said she was calling the doctor. The doctor checked out my last ultrasound and said there was no reason for the bleeding except for my placenta detaching. The doctor said she would be there soon, the clinic closed at 5, and she was there at 5:30. By this time I had gotten my epidural and for the first time EVER it worked. It was the best! I felt some pressure at the peek of my strongest contractions, but no pain. It was nice. The nurse had talked me into thinking that everything was ok, so I just relaxed and spent some quiet time with my mom and Husband.

Around 5:15 John's mom wanted to come in the room, so I sent him out to get him, and while he was gone the doctor showed up to check me. She said that I was almost 5, but that my water had not broke. She pulled out a huge clot while checking me, and the look on the faces of the nurse and doctor freaked me out. She said that she could break my water but that we took the chance that the cord would rush through as the water did. That has always been my biggest fear about my water breaking, but if the doctor was comfortable with it, then I was to. John at this time was in the hall just outside of the door with his mom, my mom had her back to us so she did not see my stuff, and the doctor broke my water. Now keeping in mind the extra amount of fluid I have had in this pregnancy, I knew that when it broke it was go everywhere. Oh my god, did it. The doctor and the nurse were sitting on my bed when the did it, and I have never seen 2 people jump up so quickly. The doctor grabbed my legs, concerned about my socks (funny right) and the water flowed. She checked me right away, and she started to freak out. She kept saying to the nurse "that's the cord isn't it! is that the cord?!" The nurse checked me and agreed that the cord had come out.

That is when it hit the fan. There were so many people in that room so quickly. My nurse had to physically hold Jackson's head off of the cord. She was on the end of my bed, and she was scared. I yelled for John and he ran in. Looking into his eyes I did not have to say a word to him. He and I were terrified. They unhooked me and started pushing me out of the room, to the operating room. My mom was at the door and she grabbed my hand and hugged me as they rushed me by. The OR was just a room or two away, and they told John to get dressed and to wait at the door. When they got me in there, they had to give me a spinal block, luckily I had gotten the epidural when I did, or they would have had to knock me out. It took over 10 minutes for them to get their stuff together and to get me numb. When they started cutting me, John was told he could not come in. I later found out it was because I was not numb and because I could feel them cutting into me. They had him locked in a room directly across the hall from me. I could see him through the window on my door, and through his door. We kept eye contact and it was like he was right there with me. I have never felt so close to him ever in my life. They were in had had my beautiful baby out within 5 minutes. That is when I finally went numb all the way, and they let John come in the room. They cleaned Jackson up, and John carried him to me. I have never cried when I was handed my new born baby before. I was so scared, but when I saw how beautiful and healthy he was I just let it all go. John and I and our son were alone at that point, or so it felt. John was told it was time to go clean up the baby, and they finished the operation. It was all over from the doctor checking me to being wheeled into recovery in 1 hour.

I thought I was going to die on that table. I was afraid of leaving my husband, and my beautiful babies. I was thinking of my mom, and how I did no even said goodbye. When it was over and the baby was ok, I felt relaxed.

When I was rolled into recovery the nurse that I was with all day was still in charge of me. She saved my babies life, and I can not ever forget her for that. I was in recovery for 2 hours. Because I could feel them cutting me, he over numbed me and it took 2 hours longer than normal to come out of it. John and Jackson came in to visit me about 45 minutes into it. I could not hold him, because I could not feel all of my arms. I did not get to hold him until 8:30 that night. My mom was waiting for me in my room when I was ok to go there. I have yet to talk to her about this all yet, it is still too new and it makes me sad to think about it, but I hope to hear her side of the story someday.

This is not the birth story I intended on, but the outcome is. My baby is one of the most beautiful things in the world. I love him so much.