My birth experience

Well, here is the story of how Michael arrived. It's a little long but I wanted to write down everything so I can have it to read in the future.

Justin and I dropped off our kids on Sunday night to my in-laws so they could babysit during our hospital stay. Justin and his Dad gave me a nice blessing before we left which I really appreciated. We came home and I tried to sleep but I was restless and nervous. We woke up at 5:30 AM and got ready and arrived at the hospital around 6:45 AM for my 7 AM induction.

We got checked in and headed up to the labor and delivery room. Before any meds were started, I was dilated to a 2. She checked my blood pressure and it was reading a little high but she said it was normal since most moms are a little nervous. At 7:30 the nurse put my IV in and it hit a block so she pushed through it and it hurt like crazy! I am still bruised from it! My blood pressure dropped really low so she put me on oxygen for 15 minutes so I didn't feel so light-headed. She then started me on the oxytocin and contractions started to come every 3-4 minutes although not too hard. My doctor arrived around 8:30 and broke my water and said I was at a 3. After that the contractions started to come every 2-3 minutes and they were pretty rough. The nurse asked if I wanted to epidural and I said yes, although I felt like a wimp since I was only at a 3 :) By the way, I loved all of my nurses, especially my delivery nurse.

It took probably 30-40 minutes before the anesthesiologist came in and gave me the epidural. It still wigged me out a little but was okay although it worked much better on my right side. I told the nurse I was still feeling some contractions and back pain on my left side so she had me lay on that side to help the meds flow that way. It definitely helped and later they let me turn and lay on my right side which helped also. I stayed at a 4 for a while and felt like the labor would be really long.

The nurse then upped my dose of meds and came in at 11:30 AM to check me and I was at a 7. She said I would be a 10 in 20 minutes and to plan on having the baby by noon. She came back around 11:50 and indeed I was fully dilated. She called the doc, prepared the room and put me back on oxygen for the delivery. My doctor came and had me push once and said the head was crowning. He told me I would tear a little and recommended a little episiotomy so I agreed. He then had me push again and out came the head. For my final push the baby came out and it was amazing because I wasn't really numb above my belly button and I could feel the baby leaving my body :)

He cried for a few minutes and then calmed down. His first Apgar test score was 8.9 I believe. He weighed in at 7 lbs 14 oz, 21 inches long and was born at 12:06 PM. He was bundled up and Justin held him while the doc finished up with me. I guess my placenta wasn't cooperating so he had to push high up on my stomach a lot which hurt quite a bit since I wasn't numb there. Finally he finished and stitched me up. I held the baby and he was sounding like he had fluid in his throat so we asked the nurse and she sent him to the nursery to suction him out better and warm him up. He was gone for about 2 hours so it felt weird to give birth and then not have my baby for so long.

After waiting the standard hour in the delivery room, they moved me to my private room and my lunch had arrived and I was glad, I was hungry! The meds were wearing off pretty quickly although I stayed numb and didn't need medication until 9 PM that night.

Well, that's the story of how I delivered my baby. Really easy delivery, and a wonderful baby to hold.

I will write another post about my hospital stay because I love the hospital, the nurses, the food (well mostly) and the pampering they give you. It deserves its own post.

Welcome Michael Benjamin McMurray

He's here and such a sweet little boy! We are so happy to welcome Baby Mikey into our family and here's a little bit about him. He was born 1 week early by induction (story to come) and weighed 7 lbs 14 oz and was 21 inches long. His hair is dark brownish red and his eyes are dark bluish/gray. He loves to sleep and I have to wake him up during the day to have him eat enough although he is still below the recommended 2.5 x body weight = total calories in a day. He weighs just under 8 pounds and if you times that by 2.5 he should have about 19-20 oz a day but he usually has 15. Oh well, we'll see if he's back to his birth weight at his 2 week appt.



We have been really cautious with germs when it comes to Mikey. Allison returned home from her stay with my in-laws with a bad cold. She has a runny nose, cough and chest congestion. When I mentioned this to the doc at Mike's 5 day checkup he believes she has RSV which is no big deal for a 3 year old, just a cold, but for a baby it is more serious. Allie has not been able to touch the baby, touch his binkies, blankets or bottles at all. Luckily she is coughing less, nose is running less and hopefully she will be illness free by next week! The doctor is a bit worried about this and says if he shows any illness at all to bring him back before his 2 week appt. He did have a very small runny nose last night, but nothing today. This is motivating me even more to pump breast milk to feed him to keep his immune system in top shape. The pain is worth it!

Welcome Mikey, we just love you and the sweet spirit you have brought into our home of 5!

New pictures

Allison woke me up this morning at 5:30 AM because she was whimpering in her sleep and I had a hard time getting back to bed because of my funky dreams of having the baby at home and having my doctor as my old boss from Lewis Young.

Well, since I am awake, I thought I would post some pictures from the past few months.

Allison with her Strawberry Shortcake Cake

The cake up close

Allison in her new Ariel dress

Allison with her play shoes

New Princess shirt

Treasure Chest of Dresses

New Princess Table & Chairs

Justin and Allie blowing out the candles at the Family Party

Allie's umbrella from Grandma Beth

New outfit from Grandpa Griggs

Cute new dress from Jer, Andrea and cousins

Allie is potty trained, yay!

My kids are best friends!

Allison's amazing fashion choices!

Last Doctor's Visit

This morning I had my last doctor's visit, hooray! No more weigh-ins and the baby will be here soon! I am still dilated to a 1 only (no change in 2-3 weeks) and he said I'm thinned out quite a bit (no percentage given) and the baby's head is really low. My doctor said my induction is set for 7 AM on Monday morning and to be there 15 minutes early. He also said I could eat a light breakfast which I'm glad about because I am still really nauseated and if I couldn't eat breakfast, I would probably feel ill during labor.

I'm glad that my induction is set for that early because last time I went in to be induced at 7:30, we arrived just before then and had to wait for a half hour to get everyone else going who got there before me. I'll probably shoot for being there 20 minutes early and beat everyone :)

I have so many things I want/need to get done this week, here's the list!

* Put together choir folders and deliver to my neighbor Rachel who is taking over my calling for the Easter program
* Car seat installed
* Batteries installed in the bouncy seat and swing
* Buy a present for my Dad's birthday
* Return library books
* Go on one last date night
* Wash everyone's sheets
* Wash baby bottles and pump parts
* Finish packing, including my kids stuff
* Wrap the gifts from the baby to my kids and put in my suitcase to give them at the hospital
* Deep cleaning including all 3 bathrooms, mop, dust, vacuum etc.
* Pay bills
* Grocery shop on Saturday so we are set

Wow, that's a big list, I better get going on it! You may think I'm nesting but really, I don't have a huge desire to do these things, rather I just feel they need to get done. Here goes nothing!

**Update**

Today I finished the following:

* Car seat installed
* Batteries in bouncy seat and swing and they both work, yay!
* Put together the choir folders
* Cleaned the basement bathroom and washed all of the towels
* Washed guest bedroom sheets and put the room back together for my Mom's visit
* Organized all of the kids toys and took most of them downstairs
* Brought up all of the bottles so I can wash them


I don't think I'll finish the rest of the deep cleaning til Friday or Saturday so it stays looking nice through next week.

Rough night

Last night I woke up a few times to use the bathroom and then Allie came in around 3:30 AM telling me there was a bad guy in her room that tried to eat her. I got her back to bed pretty quickly but unfortunately hunger set in and although I ignored it for a half hour, I had to get up and eat. I ate some wheat bread with peanut butter and finally got back to bed around 4:30 AM. Justin let me sleep in until 8 AM and then I woke up feeling so ill. I started to eat which usually keeps my nausea at bay but not this morning. I started to feel like I was going to throw up and hurried to take a Zofran so that I can feel well enough to have a productive day. Now I am sitting here trying my best to control myself so that the pill can kick in.

I sure hope I feel better soon because this morning is my last free morning without kids to go out. They both have preschool from 9-11 and it's my last day to go shopping without them. I don't really need anything, but it's still nice to go out alone during the day.

Anyway, that's all and I am so happy this is all ending in a week, I'm tired of feeling ill so often!

Stuff

Well, I really can't wait for March 14th, it still seems so far away even though it's less than 2 weeks. I am still nauseated every day and came somewhat close to throwing up this morning but I took a Zofran and rested until the feeling subsided. What a bummer to have to keep taking those blasted constipation pills! Sorry if I share too much information :) I am also feeling more and more awkward every day!

The only worry I have right now is childcare when I go to have the baby. My father-in-law was having his physical to get ready to turn in his mission papers. One of the tests they performed was a stress EKG and there was enough concern to perform an angiogram to check out his heart. He had the procedure done a week and a half ago and they found 3 blockages in his heart and ended up having open heart surgery this past Monday, the 28th of Feb. He is okay, out of the ICU but still in a lot of pain and of course weak and tired. We are hoping to be able to visit him in the hospital this week, possibly on Friday. We are so glad they were able to find this out before something more serious happened. It is possible he could have had a heart attack and died within a few months if they didn't find this out when they did.

Anyway, with that told, it's up in the air whether or not my mother-in-law can take our kids when I have the baby. She was planning on it, but with the new events that have taken place, she is not sure how Steve will be doing and if he's still really struggling, we will need to find someone else to take our kids. When we asked her about it, she said to see how Steve was doing a week after the surgery.

It seems I always have some sort of stress about childcare/help when having a baby. With my first baby, my mom left to England on the day I had the baby and didn't get back until he was a week old. Talk about the hardest week of my entire life! We were living in Virginia and had no family around and friends we had only known for 6 months. I had no visitors in the hospital but my ward members were certainly kind and helped out a lot. With Allison, my parents had a trip scheduled to Hawaii right before she was supposed to be born and they had a lot of ups and downs about going and ended up canceling the trip and were able to take Tim. Now, this new stress is once again added to the list with this baby.

Here I am 12 days away from baby time, and still no solidified childcare. Oh well, I'm sure I can ask a sister-in-law to babysit but for some reason it still makes me feel like I'm putting someone out. I could even ask my Mom to take the kids but she is still adjusting to her new house and life down in Wales, UT and is 2 hours away. She is however planning to come for a week after the baby is born to help out and I'm glad that she will be able to.

Also, the past 2 times my Mom has come to help with my new babies, she has been very sad and stressed about her relationship with my Dad. With Tim, she had just gotten back from a really rough trip to England and did not have a good time. She was so happy to see the baby but very sad and depressed too. With Allison, she was also struggling a lot with my Dad and not very happy. However, this time, she is very happy to be married to Dennis and her life has certainly taken a turn for the better and she is very happy to be able to come and help seeing as she is not working anymore. Dennis may even come and spend some time here too which is fine with me.

Anyway, that is what's going on here at my house. I'm sure things will turn out fine but I wish I just had things figured out for sure. I guess I should just make some phone calls.

Sudden Getaway!!

On Friday my Mom and Dennis took off for their cruise/honeymoon. I was excited for them but wishing I could go on a trip myself. The last 3 trips we have taken as a family have involved illness. We went to Bryce National Park last August and Timmy got sick with fevers and diarrhea. We were able to go out a little, but not as much as we planned. Then we went to Jackson Hole with Justin's family in September and Timmy ended up with a fever and threw up a few times so I had to stay home an entire day with him. Then we went to California in October and Allison got a really bad cold/fever and I got a flu bug or food poisoning and threw up and was worn out most of the time.

So, I mentioned to Justin on Thursday night that it would be fun to just go out and have one last hurrah before the baby comes. He actually went for it and said to search for a cheap hotel in Park City. After looking, we realized it's still ski season and there is nothing cheap up there, the cheapest room we found was $150/night. This was more than we really wanted to spend for a spur of the moment trip with medical expenses coming for the baby. So, I put aside my little dream and decided we would just go swimming Friday night instead.

Well, Justin surprised me on Friday by calling and saying that a friend/coworker had offered his condo up at Wolf Creek if we wanted to go for free, wow! I told him yes and the guy was so nice to drive all the way home to Ogden to get us the keys so we could go. I packed our stuff and off we went for an adventure. However, this trip did not go off without a hitch. The drive was fine, and the place was really nice. However, there were 3 smoke alarms going off when we got there. 2 of the 3 were easy to reach but the 3rd was at the top of the staircase extremely high up and impossible to reach. We went and bought some 9 volt batteries and then we tried to contact anyone we could and finally got a hold of a broker who was so nice to finally locate us a tall enough ladder to fix it. He came in and helped hold it steady so Justin could climb up and change the battery. It was so nice of him to spend an hour of his Friday night helping us out.

Well, after the alarms stopped chirping, we settled down to watch Spiderman but realized that the place didn't have any DVD players, only VHS players. For such a new condo, I was kind of surprised and there were no movies there to watch either. So, we turned on the Dish and realized that there were no channels to watch except infomercials and a Barbie channel. We watched that for a while for the kids and then sent them to bed. Since there was nothing else to do and we were worn out, we went to bed at 9 PM!

Allie woke up 3 times in the night and we finally got up around 7 and ate breakfast. The kids and Justin bundled up and then he went out and hooked our big tube up to a rope and hauled the kids around for a few hours and they had a lot of fun! I did the laundry and dishes and tried the TV again, and realized there are so many amazing products I could buy, lol! Then we packed up and went home and went swimming in the afternoon although it was really crowded.

All in all, it was fun to get out but I wish there would've been more entertainment there. I told Justin he should mention to his friend to either get DVD players or have some VHS movies available to watch in the drawer, or at least get a few more channels!! Hey, can't complain about a free trip and I doubt Justin will mention these to his friend, it's just me talking :)

The End is in Sight!

Well, after much debate and discussion and weighing of feelings, I am probably going to opt to be induced a week before my due date. I am still nauseated every day, and since week 32, I have been experiencing some painful small contractions when I'm up and around, and starting this week, I have been getting them when sitting also. They are not regular and usually don't last more than a few hours, but are not so fun either. The doctor has been checking me and I am dilated to a 1 and thinning out and the baby's head is low but not really progressing more than that.

There are a few things that have helped in this decision. First of all, I have an end in sight and it's less than 4 weeks away, March 14th! Second, both of my 2 previous babies have weighed over 8 lbs and with gaining an extra 10 pounds with this pregnancy, I worry about a too large baby which could mean a more difficult delivery or potential c-section. 3rd, I am just ready to move on to the next phase and ready to have my body back. Lastly, my induction with Allison was so easy and the delivery was just perfect so I'm hoping that this will be the case with this baby boy too.

Now, I am kind of funny about deliveries. I think it is way more fun to go into labor and call your family all excited instead of having a set induction date where everything is planned. I know it's silly, but that's just me. Perhaps I will be induced with this one and then try for labor with my last one!

Well, here goes nothing!

Introducing Mr. and Mrs. Dennis Roberts!

Well, my Mom is married! She was able to get her sealing cancellation to come through in order to get married last Saturday, February 5th as originally planned. It was very quick to get everything in order including flowers and a cake and photographer, but she pulled it off and it was a lovely wedding and a nice day.

We woke up bright and early, got our kids ready and headed to my in-laws to drop the kids off while we went to the temple sealing. As soon as we got to the temple marriage waiting room, my grandpa called us over to meet my new family. I believe there were 5 of Dennis' 8 kids there so we went around and met all of them which was fun. The rest of his kids showed up after us so we didn't meet them right away but we did taking pictures and at the luncheon.

The sealing was wonderful although it felt a little strange to see my Mom marrying someone new and meeting all of these people who are now my step-family.

After the sealing, we met outside and had pictures taken by my cousin Brad. My Mom had fun wearing red shoes and cowboy boots in her pictures. When my cousin posts some more pictures, I will have more to show but these are the few I was able to steal from my sister-in-law's blog. We brought our own camera, but Justin took the memory card out the night before and forgot to put it back in so we weren't able to take any pictures.

Dennis' Family

We went back to my in-laws and picked up our kids and headed to Archibald's Restaurant in Gardner Village for the luncheon. It was a small room and a little crowded but we had a nice lunch. We all went around and introduced ourselves and said where we lived, what we do, and congratulations to the groom and bride. Then my Mom and Dennis cut the cake, threw the bouquet and garter and it was over. We said our goodbyes and headed out.

Cutting the Cake

All in all, it was a really nice day and I'm glad to see my Mom so happy after a few years of extreme pain and heartache. It's also been strange to go from talking to my Mom on the phone every day for a few weeks to not talking to her at all while she is on her honeymoon to who knows where? That's okay, she is happy and I am glad to see her adjust to her new life in Wales, UT!

I loved reading this!

Someone on Facebook posted a link to this blog (I can't remember who) and I really enjoyed reading the article on why this particular woman loves her stretch marks. Here is the link and blog post:

http://www.mormonmommyblogs.com/2010/12/why-i-love-my-stretch-marks.html

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Do you remember that part in Gone With the Wind when Scarlet has just had her baby and is upset because Mammy can only get her corset laced up to 21 inches instead of her pre-pregnancy 19 inches ?

Mammy tells her, "Honey child, you done had a baby. You ain't never gun a be 19 inches again."

I think those are some of the wisest words of the entire show and lately they have been circulating through my mind a lot.

My little nursling will be 7 months old soon and my body is still not back to how it was before I was pregnant with her. Even though I've been back to my original weight for a few months (breastfeeding works wonders on my metabolism) my body is still different. I'm sure you wouldn't notice anything by looking at me, but I've lived in my body for a quarter of century and I can tell you that things aren't the same as before-- my hips are wider, my chest is a bit more saggy, my core muscles aren't quite as tight, and I have six purple marks on my side that remind me my belly really can stretch to an unfathomable size.

I just have to keep telling myself, "Heather child, you done had two babies. Your body ain't never gun a be the same again."

It has taken me awhile to come to terms with it, but it is true. No matter how hard I try my body is never gone to be the same as it was before I had my children. My children are literally parts of myself and they exist because my body sacrificed blood, cells, calcium, iron and millions of other particles to make them. I am literally missing pieces of my body that I will never be able to get back because they are now walking, talking, breathing, laughing, crying, and living in the form of two beautiful children. Becoming a mother, even if you don't physically give birth to a child, requires a huge sacrifice from your body and spirit. It is a sacrifice, that according to Elder Bruce C. Hafen of the First Quorum of the Seventy and his wife Marie K. Hafen, greatly parallels the sacrifice made by our Savior, they said:

"Just as a mother's body may be permanently marked with the signs of pregnancy and childbirth, [the Savior] said, 'I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands' (1 Ne. 21:15–16). For both a mother and the Savior, those marks memorialize a wrenching sacrifice--the sacrifice of begetting life--for her, physical birth; for him, spiritual rebirth"

It gives me strength to remember that just as Christ bears marks in his hands, feet and side as symbols of his blood sacrifice; I too have stretch marks on my side that bear testimony to my sacrifice of blood and my willingness to bring life into the world. I find strength to go forward with my mothering by remembering that just as Christ's body was resurrected, making him complete physically and spiritually, that my body is constantly renewing itself and that one day I too will be complete, physically and spiritually. I also know that my joy is more full because of my children and that because of the sacrifice my body has made life will go forward and my family will go on eternally.

So for all the mothers our there I want to remind you to rejoice in your stretch marks, to be grateful for your extra weight and wider hips, to accept your c-section scar, and to find joy in the tired bags under your eyes because they are symbols of your sacrifice.

For all you who have yet to become mothers I want to remind you to rejoice in the blood you shed each month because it is a beautiful symbol of hope and it bears testimony to the promise of continuing life.

And for all you women who are struggling with loving and accepting your body I want to remind you that anything or anyone that belittles, exploits, demeans, or mistrusts your body is not from God. Your body is beautiful, mind boggling amazing, and so deeply symbolic of Christ. Also, remember that in the eternal scheme of things--"frankly my dear, no one will give a damn" if you had a 19 inch waist or not. If you are shocked by my swearing, you need to watch the end of Gone with the Wind