3 weeks

It's been a while since I've had the chance to post. I start writing then get distracted and never end up finishing the post! I'm going to try to write at  least once a week. I really want to remember these days the best I can.

I weighed and measured Lauren on Tuesday ( her 3 week birthday)

She now weighs 11.3 lbs and is 23 inches long.
That means that she's gained just over 3 pounds and grew 1.5 inches ini 3 weeks!

Dan's mum went back on Tuesday and while it was great having her here she held Lauren ALL THE TIME. This means that I'm now struggling to get her to fall asleep in her basinette or even stay asleep when she's placed in her basinette. I don't really like the idea of co sleeping, mainly because I don't really trust me or Dan not to roll over but when it's 5am and you know your husband's getting up in 2 hours it's just easier. Up until last night I was having her lay on my chest but this morning I breastfed her while lying down and we both fell asleep. It was kinda nice having that quiet cuddle time with her. It's not a habit I'd like to keep but I'm starting to get really tired. She has a lot of gas and the only time she slept last night besides in bed with me was just after she let out some gas. I bought gripe water today so hopefully that'll help her feel better.

Picture of the week:

Routine

With Dan's mum still visiting it's hard to get into a daytime routine but I think we've gotten the night time one down. Dan stays up later then me most nights so what we do is I feed Lauren when I'm about to go to bed, normally around 9-9:30, then after she's fed I'll hand her to Dan who burps her and has his cuddle time. She pretty much just sleeps on either his chest or lap until she wakes up a few hours later. When I've given her to Dan I'll go and pump an ounce or 2 which I give to Dan to feed her when she wakes. Normally this isn't quite enough so I'll still have to get up and feed her but it's only a 5-10 minute feeding and she gets very full so she sleeps the full 4 hours. Last night Dan and I fed her at 1am and she woke at 4:30 for her next feed. When she wakes up I take her out of the room and into her nursery where I feed her and get her back to sleep. This allows Dan to get the full amount of sleep he'd normally get. Then she wakes again at 7am, I'll give her a quick feed (she's not really into that feed but she'll drink for 5 minutes) and then Dan will take her until he wakes me up when he's about to leave for work.

I'm so lucky to have Daniel. He's an amazing father and absolutely loves Lauren to death. We walk 20 minutes most days to go pick him up from work and he always takes control of the pram.  Last night his mum offered to stay up with Lauren so he could sleep and he refused saying he needed to give her the bottle. His mum didn't push as he seemed very much into getting to give her the bottle. While I didn't want to introduce a bottle this early it's given Lauren and Dan a great chance to bond. I could tell he was starting to feel left out as he kept wanting to try holding her while she was feeding (which never worked well.)

Oh Dan's mum and I took Lauren to the beach today. She wasn't very happy when I put her feet in the water though.

Emotions

I've been getting a little behind on my writing. I've been wanting to write about how I felt seeing Lauren for the first time and the range of emotions in the days afterwards.

I was fairly detached with Lauren's pregnancy. Although I would've been heartbroken had anything happened to her I didn't allow myself to feel that connection or bond.  The problem with this is that when she was born I also felt nothing for her. I hate to say that. I was so worried that I would continue to be emotionless toward my baby. I kept saying how she looked nothing like I expected her to look. The truth is I expected her to look like Hailey. She has a few of Hailey's features like her long fingers, toes and legs. Lauren also has my chin which Hailey also had but that's where the similarities end. Hailey was so small and young too it's hard to tell what she would've looked like at 8 lbs. I'm so glad that as time went by I started to feel something for Lauren. Slowly over 2 days I grew more and more attached to her. I now fully love her but I do feel a bit guilty that her mother was probably the last person to fall in love with her.

Dan and I went up to the cemetery when Lauren was 2 days old. It was so hard. I just stood there looking from Lauren to Hailey's stone thinking we could've only ever had one of them. I mentioned this to Dan and he said that he knew but wished there was a way we could've had both. Ask me now and I couldn't choose. I love them both so much and my heart will always ache for Hailey. Having Lauren here makes me feel like we made the right decision for Hailey. She'd only have lived for 2 days and it would've been so much harder to watch her go through everything. I looked at Lauren when she was 2 days old and realized it would've hurt so much more to lose Hailey at this stage then when we said goodbye. As much as I would've LOVED to have cuddles and spend time with Hailey before she passed away I know ending the pregnancy when we did was not just in Hailey's best interest, but in ours as well. It kills me that I have to write that.

Birth story

I've been meaning to write this for a few days now and really want to get it all down before I forget too many details, so here's the birth story for Lauren (yes, we've decided on the name!)

I was scheduled to be induced Monday Aug.1 and called the hospital at 7am to make sure they were able to do the induction. They said yes and asked if I could be there for 8am. I was a little surprised at how quickly things were moving but said of course! I had a quick shower and breakfast and we left for the hospital. They started with a 20 minute non-stress test and after that the OB on call arrived, examined me and put in the cevidil. He said I was already 2cm dilated and that it was likely this would start labour. If not I'd go back the next morning for pitocin. I stayed hooked up to the monitor for another hour as they wanted to make sure the baby's heart rate was ok as the cervidil causes minor contractions right away and some babies react badly to this. We were sent home an hour later.

Dan and I spent most of the day out in the garden. Dan cut down branches from a tree and I took them and moved it into a pile to be taken to the yard waste centre. I started getting contractions around 1pm but they were pretty much 5 minutes apart. I always thought labour was a gradual process and that contractions started at 10 minutes apart and slowly got closer together and more painful so these confused me and I was worried I was in false labour again. Slowly the pains got more intense though. Dan's mum and aunt cooked us dinner and we sat down at 7:30 to eat. The contractions were now every 3 minutes and I had to stop what I was doing to breathe through them. It was at this point that we decided to head to the hospital.

When we arrived at the hospital I was examined and told that I was only 3-4 cm dilated which is the point where they keep you in if you want. They phoned the OB and he was happy either way. I said I wanted to go home but I was worried as they contractions were close together and I didn't know at what point I should come back. The nurse suggested we walk around the hospital for an hour or 2 and come back to get examined again because I may be progressing quickly and that's why they're close together, so at 8:50 we started walking around the parking lot. My mum and sister went to get tim horton's and Dan, his mum and myself walked around in circles. At 9:15 I had a contraction and felt liquid come. I told Dan and his mum I think my waters broke so we made our way back up to the ward. They took me into a room right away and the nurse came into the bathroom with me to get changed. When I took off my clothes we realized it wasn't my waters, I was bleeding. I started to panic as it wasn't a little bit of blood and more came with each contraction. Then they asked me if I'd felt the baby move recently and I started crying saying I'd been focusing so much on the contractions I hadn't been paying attention to movement. They laid me on the bed and put the fetal heart rate monitor on. The whole time I was just crying saying "I can't lose another one" over and over. It was such a great sound to hear her heart beating away. They phoned the OB who said that they'd have to monitor the heart rate from this point onward and as long as the bleeding didn't get worse then it was ok. Apparently they only check the heart rate every hour in a normal labour. The contractions kept getting worse and worse and eventually I was given gas to help with the pain. I was glad that Dan and my mum both stayed at the hospital as they took turns sleeping and supporting me. I was a little annoyed with Daniel a few times as he'd start to nod off while I was having a contraction! At 4am I was given something through an IV to help take the edge off the contractions. When I first came to the hospital they asked about pain control and I said that I was open to options but I wanted to be able to feel the delivery, so no epidural. Whatever they gave me through the IV slowed down my contractions and they started getting further apart. At 7am they phoned the OB on call to come in to break my waters as they expected this to speed up my labour. The OB was going to do rounds and would come at 8am to break them. 7:45 they broke on their own during a contraction. The nurses were right. As soon as my waters broke I started the transition phase. The pains got really intense and the gas was useless at this point. I actually started begging them to make it stop, which I never thought I'd be that women :( The OB came in at 8:30, examined me and told the nurses I could start pushing. This was by far much easier then the transition phase and I was actually really relieved to be pushing through each contraction. I remember thinking as I'm pushing "this parts easy!" Lauren was born 1hr 43 minutes after I started pushing at 10:12 am. I had a second degree tare which is quite painful at the moment!

The baby has arrived!

Our baby girl was born on August 2 at 1012. She weighed 8 lbs 2 oz and is a very long 54.5 cm. She seems to be completely healthy and perfect!

Still deciding for certain on a name. We'd decided on Makayla right up until a few days before she was born when I started to question if it was the right name. After seeing her it definitely wasn't. I think we've decided on Lauren but have yet to fill out the birth certificate or any legal documents that would make us commit to the name just yet. Good thing we have 30 days to file the paperwork!

I'll post the birth story later but for now here's a picture.

In labour!

Well I think I can officially say I'm in labour! I've been having contractions for close to 5 hours and they're getting more painful. I'm just starting to time them again but they were around ever 5 minutes lasting for 50 or so seconds. We'll see where they are now. Dan and I are a little confused as we don't really know when to go into the hospital. My OB told me that I'd know when and I guess I'm just going to have to trust my instincts. I'm thinking I'll either go in when the contractions are 2 minutes apart or if the pain becomes unbearable. I've had slight bleeding which the doctor told me may happen. I'm not too worried about it at the moment as it's very minimal but will keep an eye on it. That's about it for now. Just finished a contraction that lasted 55 seconds and the next contraction....... 4.5 minutes apart!

Induction

I phoned the hospital this morning at 7am like I was told to and they asked me to come in at 8am! I had a shower and breakfast and then we left for the hospital. They did a 20 minute non-stress test to see how the baby was doing and then called in the OB who checked my cervix. Apparently I'm 2cm dilated! So he used the gel to induce me and seems to think that it might work. If not then I'll have to come back tomorrow and I should be far enough along to get pitocin tomorrow. They then monitored the baby for an hour to make sure the cramping I was getting from the gel wasn't putting the baby in distress. All looked good and I'm not at home. I'm supposed to relax as much as possible and go for a walk if I want. I need to go back straight away if my waters break or I start bleeding, otherwise I'm home until the contractions are 3 minutes apart or tomorrow morning to see how I'm progressing. Lets hope I go back due to contractions!!!! I'll try to update if anything happens.