Three Month Reflection

The past three months have been a bit of a blur. The first few months were a little difficult because I ended up back in the hospital 6 weeks after Mr.Man was born because of complications with my gallbladder. The best thing to come of that whole ordeal was it took the focus off the sadness from my mom and step-dad moving to San Diego, CA and my sister and brother-in-law were able to come down to stay with us for 2 weeks to help care for Brody while I was in the early stage of recovery. We had so much fun with them and Brody was in love with his auntie Teresa & uncle Eric.

Brody has grown so much over the past months. I believe he is going to be tall when he grows up because he has my long legs and Larry's long torso. He is such a beautiful baby and I am not saying that just because he is my son, he really does have a gorgeous color to his skin and such beautiful blue eyes. The jury is still out on what his hair color will be. I am thinking it will be dark brown with red tones, but we will see.

It is amazing to me how fast he is growing. It is sad and exciting all at the same time. Recently he has become super fascinated with the T.V. He also started to laugh a little, which is adorable and it makes me laugh which makes him laugh and then when Larry is there it just turns into a big laughing game. I love it.

Being a mom is so much more than I ever thought it would be. There are those moments when I think how much easier it was just the two of us, but then those thoughts are erased when I pick Brody up and he looks at me with those deep blue eyes and he smiles that I am just filled with joy. God has truly blessed us with an all around wonderful baby.

Well my little is man is wanting my attention so I must be going. Until next time, God bless.

Love,
Kristina

Labor & Delivery

I have been meaning to start this blog for quite awhile but time and other things have preoccupied my mind. Let me start where my pregnancy blog left off:

On Wednesday, July 21, 2010 we received the call from the hospital at 5:45 in the morning letting us know that they would have a room available for the induction to take place and we should check in at 6:45. That hour seemed to go by really fast and we were soon on our way to Stevens Hospital. After getting checked in, I was so excited to see that my nurse was Gillian, who a few days prior was the nurse who assisted with my non-stress test.  I was monitored for the next 3 hours while waiting for the doctor to come in and get things started.

At 10:00 a.m. Dr. Carder came in to do the exam and to everyone's surprise (especially mine) I was already at 5cm, 80% effaced, and at 0 station. Although things were already in motion, they decided to start the Pitocin anyways around 10:30. For the next 4 hours we (Larry, my mom, and my mother-in-law) just sat around talking and we watched Sabrina and Funny Face. Around 2:30 the Dr. Checked me again and said I was at 6 and asked if I would be okay with allowing them to break my water and I agreed. At about 3:00 my contractions were starting to get stronger but were very tolerable. In fact I was doing great until 3:30 when my blood pressure started to spike and was put in bed.

Around 4:00 the contractions were a lot stronger and despite resting, my blood pressure had spiked to 190/106+ (can't remember the exact of the 2nd number) so it was decided that I needed to be put on a magnesium drip so I wouldn't seizure. And let me just say that magnesium drips make you feel like you are on fire, while everyone else was shivering in my 50 degree room I was sweating and so hot in what felt like 110 degrees. Anyways, around 4:15 the contractions became pretty unbearable and it started to feel like I needed to push, so the nurse sent for Dr. Carder. I was at 9.8cm and it stayed that way until about 4:45.

That 30 minutes was the worst part of the labor because I had to try to stop my body from pushing and it is not that easy to do when you are in pain. Finally at 4:45 I was at 10cm and I was ready to push! After 32 minutes of pushing the baby's head crowned at 5:17. At 5:18 Brody Alexander Pascual made his entrance into the world and into our hearts. He weighed 7lbs 8oz and was 19.5 inches long. After making it through 7 hours of labor with no pain medication I was informed, with many apologies, that I would need to get a spinal because there was no way she could do that type of repair without one.

We spent the next 4 days in the hospital, me to heal and Brody in the Special Care Nursery because he was not eating well, his blood sugar would not stabilize, and he had some slight breathing problems. His nurses were amazing, especially Kurt & Peggy (we love them and they loved us, they said Brody truly was their favorite baby!).We ended up back in the hospital less than 24hrs after release because his Jaundice levels shot above 18. After 8 hours under the bili-lights his levels dropped down to 10 and six hours after being off the lights his levels were down to 8 so we got to have a 2nd homecoming on Monday.