A Grand Entrance

Luke arrived on 3/20/13 at 12:34 pm weight 6.9 lbs and 21 inches long, our birth story is a bit long and got scary, but in the end my little guy is perfect and we're so thankful he is here!!!

38.3 weeks pregnant, I'd been up all night with a searing headache that all the Tylenol in the world couldn't shake. I was working from home and thought it would be smart to check my BP since it had been creeping up, and with the swelling I had, a headache was worrisome as it's a sign of pre-eclampsia. I took my BP, and it was 140/95. I started to panic a bit, called my mom who told me to call the OB. I chatted with the nurse who decided it was best for me to come into the office to get checked out as a pre cautionary measure. I made an appointment for 10 that morning. Mark had been gone on a trip and was scheduled to arrive home that morning as well around  the same time as my appointment. That week I had decided I was going to do whatever I could to make Luke come sooner rather then later! I resolved to walk, walk, walk him out... well, I never had to do that :) 

I arrived at my appointment with my home BP cuff in hand (I wanted to ensure my cuff was accurate and not just giving false high readings). A check of both the office BP cuff and mine confirmed  my BP was very elevated. I wasn't spilling any proteins yet, which was good though. My doctor wasn't working that day, but her PA Ashley was in. She came in to chat with me, look at my swelling and numbers and went off to call my OB to consult. I figured if anything they would monitor me closely the next few days before birth, and maybe schedule an induction for 39 weeks (which would have been Saturday). Ashley walked back in and said she spoke to Dr. Abi and, I was having a baby today. I literally started panicking! I wanted Luke to come soon but I NEVER expected it to be that soon. Ashley said Dr. Abi was pretty concerned at my increasing BP and the only way to ensure it would come down was to deliver the baby. Ashely checked my progress and was still only 1cm dilated. She originally wanted to send me straight over to the hospital from the office. I asked nicely if I could have a few hours to get our things together and re-group with Mark since he just got home, and she asked us to check in at 7pm that night. So we had 8 hours to do EVERYTHING we had planned to do that coming week! 

I texted Mark from the table and said "Hi love, we're having a baby today"... he had JUST landed in Austin, and was pretty shocked himself! His first response on the phone was "Well, I need to get my hair cut!" hahah, I think we were both in denial. Since we got a few hours of clearance, I told Mark to get his hair cut, and I rushed home to shower, pack, clean, etc! I called my mom who immediately left work to get on the road to Austin. When Mark got home, we rushed out the door to Costco for toilet paper and.... a big screen TV!! ??? yeah, I have no idea what we were thinking. For months we have been wanting a new TV, the one we had was like 24 inches and drove Mark crazy. We had talked about getting one before Luke arrived and now it was now or never! I mean, what crazy people go out and buy a 50" TV the day they have a baby, we do! It's the important things in life :) 

My mom arrived around 6, just in time for us to say hello, give her instructions on the cat, and rush out the door to the hospital! She planned to get settled and come up later that evening. 

Last family picture without Luke!

7pm- we checked into the hospital, I have to say it was kind of nice to walk up to the check in desk not in pain and get my paper work in order :) they walked me to my labor room which was down at the end, nice and spacious and introduced me to my nurse. She reviewed paper work with me, showed me all of the monitoring equipment, had me change into my gown and they started to hook me up. My BP actually was higher at this point then earlier in the day, I don't remember exactly what it was, but I know she talked about possibly giving me magnesium if it didn't come down. That freaked me out as I've heard horror stories about how awful magnesium makes people feel! Luckily it dropped back down to around 140/95 again and I was able to avoid it. 

She explained how the induction would go, they would give me two doses of Cytotec, a small pill placed next to the cervix to help me dilate (I had asked what the Cytoec would do, and if it would send me into labor. The nurse assured me that would be very rare, and that it would just dilate my cervix and labor would start the next day when I got pitocin), and then in the morning they would start pitocin as soon as Dr. Abi checked on me, and break my water. That would get labor moving along at that point. 

9pm- The gave me the first dose of Cytotec, Mark and I were just relaxing and my mom was there. I was hooked up to the contraction monitor and was having contractions although I couldn't feel them. Within the hour I started having an increase in contractions, both in duration and intensity. The nurse was pretty surprised as that was rare that it put me into labor like that. I was supposed to get another one around 1am, but that never happened. It seemed the one dose of Cytotec sent me into full blown labor on it's own (looking back Dr. Abi told me I probably would have gone into labor on my own the next day given how I reacted to the meds). I was feeling pressure and was uncomfortable during the contractions but they weren't terrible yet. My mom left to go sleep, Mark was napping as he had flown a red eye the night before, and I took an Ambien to get some rest. 

3am- my water broke on it's own. I called the nurse before waking up Mark, and as he hears me telling them I think my water broke he popped up in bed! I felt a rubber band snapping feeling and noise! I knew something happened... sure enough my water broke on it's own, also pretty shocking for an induction! I called my mom, and immediately after my water broke, I started having pretty terrible contractions. The pain was awful! I truly never expected it to be that bad because I had anticipated having an epidural by that point! Unfortunately I was only dilated to a 2-2.5 at that point and they wouldn't give me an epidural until I was 4cm. It was torture, at this point Luke heart rate started dropping with each contraction. They weren't sure why, but were having me change positions to get it back up and put me on O2 for the rest of my labor. I was in SO much pain, I was begging for anything... I never expected to be one of those screaming labor ladies, but... I was. My nurse Sarah was incredible, she helped Mark and my mom manage my pain through counter pressure, and coached me herself. Finally at some point I got fentenyl followed by morphine... both of which only lasted temporarily... 

7am- I was FINALLY at 4cm, enough for an epidural. The anesthesiologist came in and went over the paper work... I was willing to give him whatever he wanted for the drugs, ANYTHING! Then the kicker, he was ready to administer, but he needed a doctor on the floor to sign off due to pre-e and being high risk. OMG.... at that point I think I was yelling at everyone in the room to FIND A FRIKIN DOCTOR NOW! 5 people searched the floor for someone, and thank God, finally I got my drugs around 7:30am. The anesthesiologist gave me the good stuff, but oddly enough I could still move my legs, I could have walked if they would have let me. I didn't realize at the time this meant trouble for pushing.... 

The next few hours we're good, felt much better with the epidural in place. I was progressing faster at this point. 

11am- My nurse checked me and I was at 9cm. Almost there. At this point I started to feel some pretty intense pressure down below, it wasn't painful yet, but I could definitely feed something happening. My nurse told me probably about an hour to get to 10cm, and then we would start pushing. 

Literally 10 minutes after she walked out the door to eat her lunch, it was game over. I felt the worse pain/pressure every!! I knew something was about to happen. I called the nurse and the nurse covering for mine came in... she was AWFUL... she pretty much ignored me, refused to check me even though something was different then 10 minutes before.. FINALLY after screaming she checked me and guess what, I was at a TEN! I knew it... although I was shocked how much pain I was in suddenly as I had expected the epidural to mask a lot of the pain at this point. The nurse started walking around getting things ready but honestly wasn't in too much of a rush. Luke HR was still dropping at this point depending on my position. I was screaming in pain asking for more drugs, it turned into chaos quickly. 

I kept begging for my nurse Sarah to return, and finally Irl, a student nurse who had been with me, went in search for her. My mom followed him into the hallway to ensure he knew he MUST find her and bring her back! This other nurse was AWFUL! Finally, Irl returned with Sarah, who was livid as the one covering for her never called my doctor!!!!! Sarah started preparing the room, getting me ready and told me we would start practice pushing... I pretty much said no, we're just going to do this because I was in so much pain, no way I had time for practice pushing, I needed him O U T. 

My doctor bursts into the room in full gear, I believe she was prepping for a c-section when she was called for my delivery, thank goodness she was close! She got in position and I started pushing, almost instantly Luke HR dropped... more people flooded into the room and thats when details get a bit fuzzy for me. I know I pushed a few more times, and suddenly I hear Dr. Abi yell for the vacuum, and she got in my face and told me "you have 3 tries to get him out, then I'm taking you for a c-section". He was in distress and time was of the essence. I pushed for a total of 11 minutes, and he came out! 

At this point I had no idea what was going on, all I knew was normally they put the baby on your chest after delivery, and they took Luke away across the room to a team of people. I was exhausted, in pain, and overwhelmed. I just laid there and watched. At some point someone filled me in, Luke's heart rate had dropped to 40 for over 2 minutes during pushing, thats when she gave me the ultimatim. When he came out he wasn't breathing... they were working on him in the room in an incubator. His initial APGAR was a 2. Thankfully, after some O2, he came around and his APGAR went up to an 8! I think they had him for over an hour ensuring he was stable before they FINALLY gave me my baby! Up to this point my mom and mark were showing me pictures of him from across the room. 

He was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. I honestly was in shock from the chaos that was going on, and wouldn't fully understand what happened until days later. 

Luke was born with a true knot in his cord, and it was wrapped around his neck. A true knot occurs in 1 in every 2,000 births, and of those, only 10% of those babies survive. The majority are still born. Luke is my little miracle baby :) If not for my pre-e and being monitored throughout my entire labor, we could have lost him. God knew what he was doing when he sent me to the hospital early. He knew I needed to be monitored the whole time in order to save my little guy. 

Luke is the most amazing miracle I could every ask for, he is such a blessing to his daddy and me!!! We are SO in love with this little guy, and praise God for him daily!!! His entrance wasn't nothing like we planned, and was scary, but in the end we were so blessed with a perfect baby boy! ! ! Welcome to the world Luke William Segaloff! We're honored God chose us to be your parents! 

 

A letter to my son before his birth

March 8, 2013

To my precious baby boy,

I cannot believe that in just 3 short weeks you will join us in this world! What an incredible gift God is giving us in you. I remember the months leading up to finding out we were pregnant, my whole life all I wanted was a family, being a mommy was my dream job! And each month that passed, I hoped and prayed next month would be it! That one night in July when I realized I had seriously been eating WAY more at night lately then I am used too, I was curious if maybe that was our lucky month! Your dad was on a trip, but I just couldn’t wait to find out until he was home the next day. I took a test and it was positive, and I was in disbelief. I had waited SO long for this moment and my emotions were all over the place! I was thrilled and wished your dad was with me at that moment, but I knew I had to keep it a secret until I could share the amazing news with him the next day when I picked him up from the airport. I went to bed that night knowing God has blessed me and I was going to be a mommy, and I hardly slept thinking about you all night!!!

Here we are almost 9 months later preparing for your arrival. Everything is done, your room is ready for you, and your dad and I are prepared and ready to welcome you home any day! I’ve organized, washed, decorated, put away and purchased just about everything I can think of! I hope you like planes, since your daddy is a pilot I’ve gone a bit plane crazy assuming you will love airplanes as much as him! Every night daddy and I are together, we keep talking about how “in X number of days we’re going to have a baby!”, it’s such an exciting yet strange feeling. I keep asking your dad, what will we do with you once your home from the hospital? I assume take a lot of pictures!  I’ve been sheltering you, growing you for the past 9 months, and one day soon I’ll share you with the world! I’m trying to cherish every move you make, and our alone time together. It’s so special to be able to be your provider for everything for these 9 months. I hope I’ve kept you comfortable!  I always wonder if you can feel me rubbing you through my belly and if it’s comforting to you, will you remember that when you’re outside the womb? When I get down about what I look like at 9 months pregnant, I remember how worth is this all is, to be growing you inside of me! And what a sweet blessing it is. We got to see your face on the ultrasound screen 2 days ago, and it was such an amazing sight! It was like suddenly, it all made sense, there you were, a perfect little boy, the most adorable face I’ve ever seen! I feel so hard in love with you, I had no idea I would ever feel that way!

I have anxious thoughts about you joining our world; will I be able to protect you enough? Love you enough? Will I constantly worry about you? I know God will ease my fears, and with his help we will do our best as parents. I will try my hardest to be the best mommy to you that you could ever ask for! I know your daddy feels the exact same way. I pray that we give you everything you need in life to grow into an amazing man one day.

It’s funny, only God knows how you will make your grand entrance into this world, I’ve been anxious for you to come lately. Will it be soon or late? Will labor be quick or long? Will you dad be home or will he have to rush home from across the country? Will you look the same as the ultrasound picture? Will you have hair? Will you be a good eater? So many questions, and soon we will know the answer to them all!

I sit here right now, and all the aches and pains of pregnancy dissipate as I think about your sweet face, and holding you so soon. Luke you are so loved, you’re about to make us a family, me a mommy, my lifelong dream, and I couldn’t be more excited!!! I love you!

Mommy

End of pregnancy only a few months late :)

So it's June and I've had a baby for about 3 months now :) although my blog world wouldn't know it because I went MIA around mid February! Let me recap the end of pregnancy, and birth will follow in it's own post.

Around 32 weeks I started to swell pretty significantly. I seemed to be following in my moms footsteps as she got fairly swollen both of her pregnancies as well, although not as early as I did. My BP started to creep up around the 32 week mark as well, so I monitored it closely at home as well as at my biweekly visits at that point. Mark was still traveling quite a bit being based in Newark, NJ still. I started to get pretty worried about him actually being home or close enough to home come birth time! Many many hours were spent strategizing with  him, my "backups", and in my head about all the different scenarios that could play out!

Luke's nursery was pretty much complete around 34 weeks, and we were just buying the last odds and ends we needed, like pack n play and a few smaller items. I actually had everything pretty much completed around that time, so I started re-washing previously washed baby clothes just to keep busy! Bags were packed, plans were made, work had started to wind down with my replacement taking over. Around 34 weeks I started feeling pretty uncomfortable daily, sleeping was non existent, and I was pretty crabby most of the time! I felt like Luke was HUGE and every movement started to hurt! I would get frustrated and want him to stop moving, but in the same breath WISH he was moving so I knew he was alright! :)

Mark got his schedule for the month of March, it had him off the week before I was due, and going back to work a day or two before my due date. We had decided that if I hadn't given birth by my due date he definitely wasn't going back to work! It wasn't worth the high possibility that he would miss it at that point! My swelling was still getting worse and my BP was kind of all over the map. I hadn't tested + for any proteins yet to indicate pre-e, but I was watching myself pretty closely mainly due to my severe swelling. I had to buy special support hose from a store filled with elderly people getting fitted for them as well! They helped, but were incredibly uncomfortable and ridiculously hard to get on with a giant belly!

Lovely swollen feet with trendy support hose! 

36 weeks came and I decided to just start working from home mostly. I was getting exhausted just walking short distances, and driving was uncomfortable due to the lack of room. We had my 36 week appointment which had an US to see Luke's position and size, that was so exciting! We got to see a profile shot in 3D and see his face! I seriously melted... he was so adorable! From the looks of the US he seemed to look like me with chubby cheeks! He was estimated at around 6 1/2 lbs, so if he was full term it seemed he could be 8 lbs or larger! That freaked me out a bit! My brother was almost 9 lbs though so I knew it wasn't out of the question. Everything on the US looked great, he was in position, and I learned I was dilated to 1cm! I was pretty excited about that 1cm... even though from all my reading I knew it really didn't mean much.

37 weeks and looking huge! 

37 weeks didn't come with much change, I went to my weekly appointment, same swelling issues and elevated BP. My OB didn't seem to concerned at the time though. Same with 38 weeks, I was waddling around, panicking about Mark being home for the birth, and just trying to pass the time! I was 38 weeks on a Saturday, and I actually never made it to my weekly 38 week appointment which was scheduled for that coming Wednesday, because Luke decided it was time for his arrival!

around 38 weeks 

I got my hair done right at 38 weeks to last through maternity leave, smart decision! 

It was a very chaotic and crazy arrival he made into this world. Birth story coming up!

Baby gear!

It's getting closer! Time is flying and reality is hitting this little boy will join us  in the real world soon! We've had our stroller and car seats sitting in the boxes for weeks now, and I kept getting excited to get them out, and then I would get too tired... note to self, try to do all baby stuff in second trimester!!! We did finally go out to the garage and get it all out though, and here is the setup!

My mom got us our BOB stroller and Mark's mom got us the car seat. I love it! The BOB is so far to push around, it's a smooth ride and I can't wait to take Luke on walks when he is here!

We also finally finished the nursery, and once I take some pictures this week I'll dedicate a post to Luke's nursery! 

The rest of pregnancy...

So I left off at 18 weeks pregnant, man that feels like FOREVER ago! The second trimester was a breeze! I felt really good almost daily, enjoyed Luke moving around more often each day, and feeling good over all. We had another ultrasound at 20 weeks at my doctor to look at all of the anatomy and everything checked out well! I haven't seen him since 20 weeks and I can't wait to see what he looks like! Since then I've been going to the doctor monthly, until 28 weeks when I started going bi-weekly. NOW, in 2 weeks I'll already be going weekly to check for labor progress! We also get a final ultrasound in 2 weeks to measure his current size.

The third trimester kind of caught me off guard, it started with a few bad feeling days here and there. The return of first trimester exhaustion, and occasional nausea. At about 32 weeks things really took a turn and I live in a state of no sleep/bad feeling/exhaustion. I do have some good days, normally days where I just sit at home all day, I feel great! It's when I go into work, or am busy doing things I feel pretty terrible. My worst symptom so far now though is (what I consider) extreme swelling in my legs and feet! at 32 weeks it hit me like a ton of bricks, I woke up one morning and lost my ankles! My calves soon followed after, and now my feet are toast. I've had to go up a shoe size but only can fit comfortable into flip flops. Keeping my feet up doesn't do much to help, so I've resigned to the fact that this is the way it is until after delivery... Luke is SO worth it though! I'm hoping to just coast until delivery day, without adding any more major symptoms to the list (high five for my awesome blood pressure thus far!)

 I haven't been great about remembering to take belly pics each week, here are the weeks I remembered!

Week 23

Week 24

Week 25

Week 26

Week 29

Week 31

Week 34

Week 33

Showered with Love

A little over a month ago, I was blessed with a wonderful baby shower thrown by my BFF and my moms BFF! Ashley and Malinn threw me (and Luke) and incredible shower, it was such a fun day! There was a great turn out of friends and family, and we all had so much fun visiting and I had fun opening up all the goodies everyone brought for baby Luke and I!

Last few months- a review

So, I realize I've completely neglected my blog over the last few months, shame on me. I seem to blog in cycles, then life gets crazy. Over the last few months a lot has changed for both Mark and I! I continue to grow, 34+ weeks pregnant now, 5 weeks 5 days to go! Everything pregnancy wise has gone generally well, we're blessed thus far with a healthy little guy and can't wait to meet him soon! This late in the pregnancy I've started to just not feel well, I'll recap my pregnancy woes in another post :)

Changes:
Mark got a new job! That's right, I'm officially an United Pilots wife! Working for United (Continental) was always Mark's dream since he was a little boy, and now he has officially achieved it! I am SO proud of him, my heart is just overflowing with pride! He started back in November, and completed training at the end of January. He returned home from his first flying trip today! He's loving every minute of it! The change couldn't have come at a better time for us, with him being able to complete training before Luke arrives, and just better job stability being with United. Here is a picture of my hot man leaving for work!

Secondly, we moved! Moving is so hard, and we are SO done moving until we buy our dream house, we hope... We decided after much debating and frustration that our current living situation just wasn't cutting it. We had been serving as missionaries for an apartment ministry for about 6 months, and things just weren't happening like we were told they would. We had horrible neighbors, and couldn't even function due to all the chaos and noise around us. We (along with the help from my amazing dad Skip) were able to get out of our lease/contract and found the perfect place for us to call home for now! It's in the subdivision we want to buy in, and it's a town home rather then an apartment. We love it so much, it feels like home! Can't wait to bring our baby home there! 

So, now things are finally settling down, the calm before the storm of childbirth and parenting :) We're so excited!!!