Day 8: 1 Week Old, Anniversaries and Birthday's!

It doesn't seem like it's already been a week since little bean has been born! Thankfully I'm feeling better, still a little sore from not using those muscles for so long, but other than that, doing much better.

Mallory is doing great as well! We thought she was going to have an ultrasound of her head today, sometimes preemies will have brain bleeds, althought they didn't think she had one, it was just a routine thing. I asked Dr Singh this morning if she'd had hers yet and she said she didn't think she was supposed to. So she did a little checking and she isn't going to have one. Dr Singh said she doesn't schedule them unless they are 32 weeks or less when they are born or have signs of needing one, so Mallo Bean is good to go!!

Today is also our 7th Anniversary!! Mallory was going to be induced today, but she didn't want to share her birthday with Mom and Dad and Tucker too....today is also Tucker's 7th Birthday!

Ben and I celebrated last night and Mallory and I will celebrate in the hospital tonight and Ben and Tucker are going to grill Pork Steaks (yuck) to celebrate at home tonight!

Mallory's had a good day. She didn't gain any weight from yesterday but she didn't lose any either, so keeping even is good.

I can tell she's opening her eyes more, and they are just so cute!

We had another "feeding practice" session today. Attempt at the breast and bottle for about 30 minutes and then we give her the rest through the feeding tube. I can tell her sucking reflexes are getting better so hopefully by the end of the week she will be taking more orally. It just wears her out, so we only try once a day for now until she gets stronger.

I think I'm kinda settling into a routine now that Ben is back at work and I'm just here by myself to come and go as I like. So I try to get here a little before lunch, or sooner if possible, then have some feeding practice around 2 and then run a few errands if necessary and then back to the hospital until around 7 or 8 at night is the plan. That way I get plenty of Mallory time!!

A lot of time I'm just sitting here watching her, reading, on the computer like now or continuing to knit, just anything to sit here with her!

Here's a couple pictures from today, they were taken through the isolet because I'm not coordinated enough to take them while holding her, but regardless, it's always fun to see her little face!!

Day 4: All Moved to Louisville

Sorry for not getting this out last night, but I can tell I day WAY too much yesterday and I'm really feeling it today. I wish these muscles would function normally again. 7 1/2 weeks on bedrest means I can't do anywhere near as much as I did before and of course, throw in having a baby on top of that and I've got to slow down!

All I can say is it was heavenly to sleep in my own bed Wednesday night. I know I haven't slept that well in a long time!! I missed my tempurpedic mattress and I missed having Ben in the same bed with me. Even though I got up 2 times in the night to pump milk, it was still the best sleep in a long time!!

So, Wednesday's goal was to sleep in a bit, get up and go to Target to get a few things and then pack up our stuff for the camper so we can get set up at the Louisville South KOA campground which will be home base while Mallory is still at Kosairs hospital.

As much as I enjoyed very much being home, all I wanted to do was to get back to Louisville to be around Mallory!! We checked in with the nursery several times from yesterday afternoon through today and she's been doing really good! Sounds like her Jaundice levels are way down and they will leave her on photo therapy treatment for another day or two to ensure they stay down because if you take them off too early, their levels can come back up. So, its good that we've been away because it's best for her to stay under the lights as much as possible and get rest, so it has worked well that we've been away more than there the past several days.

We finally go everything packed up and I am absolutley exhaused and just want to get set up and go see Mallory! The campground seems good, they have wifi included so that works out great!

So we finally get it set up, grab some dinner and finally get to the hospital around 8 pm. They have taken the blue lights off of her and haver her on a photo therapy pad as they call it, so she's laying on a little pad the lights up blue. They said the overhead lights bring down the levels quickly and then once they are down they move to the mat for the maintainence treatment for another couple days.

They had just started feeding her through the tube, so they dumped that into a bottle and let me try to feed her with a bottle. I think she was more interested in sleeping, but I did get some down her and then they just put the rest back down the feeding tube.



I'm just in amazement as to how cute she is! I know we are biased, but looking back at my baby pictures, I was not a "cute" baby. I was pale, skinny and had very long arms and legs, yes even then! So I just wasn't a cute little baby, Susan was a cute baby, and Mallory is just adorable. Although she is small, she's proportioned well and looks more like a mini baby rather than some of the preemies you see, so all I want to do is just watch her!

Ben got to hold Mallory for the first time tonight! I think he's a natural! She's just so small its even a little intimidating for mee too! We will learn as we go. Watching the nurses handle them, you know you can move them around and they are fine, it's just getting used to it.

Here's some pictures of Ben holding Mallory and a video...excuse my voice, I've been about half losing it for a couple days now!

Day 3: Bicep pain and Freedom!

I know my blogs get a little long, but they are as much for me and future reference as well as the details the family wants to know, so feel free to just skip to the pictures if you want!

I have no idea what someone who just had a baby is supposed to look like, but apparently I don't! I can't tell you how many people are like, you look great, you don't look like someone who just had a baby. It just cracks me up! Really, other than being sore in the nether regions from the stitches, I don't think I'd have any pain, and it's just more of being a little sore than anything else, or so I thought until yesterday....my biceps were sore.

Why in the world are my biceps sore?? Then I recalled the instructions from Dr How to grab my legs behind my knees and pull as hard as possible when trying to push her out, so my biceps are sore, they haven't been used much lately!

Last night I went back down for a quick peek at Mallory before we ate dinner and then Ben and I went back down for a little while after we ate. We didn't get her out, she had one of her little breathing episodes....sometimes preemies just forget to breathe from time to time. As scary as that is, its perfectly normal at that age, but we got to see it happen and what they have to do, which is basically just stimulate her by rubbing her feet or picking her up a little bit, and then it registers with them again, I'm not in the womb, I have to breathe!

So, Ben was off to Hampton Inn to sleep last night and I was wide awake at 6:30 am, so I went down to the nursery around 7:30 am once the shift change was over. The nurse was just finishing up giving her another bottle! She was sucking it right down, so she's really taking to a bottle well!! They had taken her nasal cannula off, so even though that was nothing more than room air flowing into her, it's gone and she's breathing totally on her own and so far so good!

She said she does look a little jaundicy, if that's a word, and may need a little photo light therapy, which is just moving them to a bed with the blue lights which help with that, but they will see if it gets any worse or not.

I'm currenlty waiting on Dr Tabb to come by and hopefully give me my discharge orders and then I'm heading back down to the nursery for 1 1/2 hours of Kangaroo time!!

I got to go down to the Nursery at 10:30 to see about feeding Mallory, trying to see if she would breast feed and then getting some good Kangaroo time! But, first things first, I got to change her diaper! They are so teeny, but she just had a pee diaper, so nothing major. Since she had taken a bottle earlier, they decided to see how she would take to the breast, and she actually did better than Joy the nurse thought she would, so they let her try that for a while and then just fed her through the feeding tube for the rest. Then we got some good Kangarooing time....I just love that skin to skin time with her!!

While I was Kangarooing, Laura from ABAK came by because she was in town and got to see her too, it's always fun to have visitors! Then they called from up in the room and Dr Cuthrell was up there waiting for me to go through a final chat so I could get discharged, so I had to put her back, but they were wanting to get her under the lights for photo therapy for her jaundice, so it wasn't too bad timing. Here's the little "sun glasses" they put on her for when she's under the blue lights....how cute do they look!



So, back up to the room do see Dr Cuthrell, they said they are just still amazed I lasted 7 weeks and 2 days, most people with pProm don't last that long. So we went through a few things with them and the nurse and then they were still waiting on a few other things, so they said we could go off site for lunch, so Ben and I went about 2 blocks down to Calistoga's, essentially Panera named something else. It was almost weird to be somewhere other than the hospital!

We came back and checked in on little bean at the nursery, she was doing well under the lights....judge for yourself, but it looks like she might be a little too comfy, almost posing like she's in a tanning bed, LOL!



So we said our goodbyes until tomorrow and of course I teared up...first time I've cried through this whole ordeal, but I know she's in good hands!! Plus, now is actually a good time for us to be away because with the light therapy, she needs to rest and be in there as much as possible, so that will give her a good 24 hours without interruption from us.

Dr Singh also told us that if we wanted that since they, the Nortons neonatal unit, have Owensboro set up now with their own intermediate nursery for 29 weekers and more, we could actually transfer her there possibly as early as this weekend. As exciting as the option of bringing her closer to home is, Ben and I both were in total agreement that we feel she is best served in Louisville for now. Not that Owensboro isn't good, but I'd rather her be even more stable, maybe just needing to working on feeding/growing before we moved her back to Owensboro.

Dr. Singh said her week rotation to Owensboro would be in two weeks and if she was still in the hospital then, that might be a good time to transfer since she would be there all week with us as well, so we may do that then, just not ready to yet.

Finally we got everything all discharged, and with a Tetnus shot for me, we were off to head home!! When we got back to Owensboro I was off to town to go get a rental breast pump, get my perscriptions filled and a couple other things and Ben went to the grocery and to get Tucker.

When I got home Ben videoed Tucker's reaction to seeing me....I'll post it later but it was funny because I'm not sure he realized who I was for a minute. Then it finally hit him and he was jumping around and barking! I'm sure he's like, what happened to you for the past 2 months!!

So now I'm just kicked back and relaxing. I called to check in on Mallory around 5 and she said all was well and she was doing great. They gave her some caffeine to help with her breathing episodes and she hasn't had anymore since they gave that to her. I'll check in again before we go to bed, but she's in good hands, we just already miss her!!

Here's a few more pictures and I've got some videos that I'm having problems uploading at the moment, so I'll try again later:



Also, I'm LOVING being home!!!

Day 2: 4-6-2010 Update

Mom came back to the hospital around 10 am and her, Ben and I then went down to the nursery to see Mallory. I got to hold her again and them mom held her for a few minutes as well. Ben's parents came in a little while later and took more pictures and got to see her.

She seemed to be doing well but she's still having her temperature regulated, so when she's out from under the crib for too long her body temp goes down, so Beverly, her nurse, suggested that we try "kangarooing" this afternoon, which is basically skin to skin contact with baby, so we will give that a try later today.

All of us went off to eat lunch in the cafeteria and sat outside. I find it funny that it was like 87 degrees in Louisville today and the only clothes outside of pj's that I had at the hospital were the clothes I wore to the hospital the Saturday we went in when my water broke. They had been washed, but that was mid Feb, so I had on yoga pants and a big sweatshirt! Oh well, clothes were on the list for Ben to bring this coming weekend, not earlier!

After lunch, Mom headed back home and I rested for a while. The lactation nurse came by to talk me through this whole pumping thing....still reminds me of hooking up the dairy cows to the milkers as a kid on Grandad's dairy farm, but it's good for her, so we do what we must do!

Ben had gone out to find Mallory some more preemie clothes and a few other things, so i went down to the nursery where he would come by later. I got to Kangaroo for around 45 minutes which is just great, I think I could do that all day long! Basically they put her down your shirt so she is just in a diaper and her skin is right next to your skin. She loved it and we covered up with a blanket and after 45 minutes, her body temp really hadn't gone down, so that's the way to do it!

Then at 4pm it was time for her to be fed again. She didn't take to well to feeding around lunch, she didn't take to it too well, but it was her first time on the bottle, threw most of it up and it really upset her and shot her heart rate up, so I was anxious to see how it went now. The plan was to get 10cc down her and it took a little while, but she did excellent and took the entire bottle! So, Beverly gave us her first official bottle!

We left soon after, so I hope she kept it all down, we will find out after while, but she said she did great and much better than the first try! Dr Sing, who is the neonatal baby dr came by while I was with her too. She said she's doing great and although it's still tough to know yet how long Mallory will be in the hospital, they always tell you they will be there until their due date, which of course would be almost 7 weeks away, but in the same breath they tell you most go home well before that. My guess is 2-3 weeks tops, but who knows. The fact that she took to the bottle is a good sign!

Also, we no longer have to wear gloves and gown when we touch her, the MRSA testing I believe is what they were waiting to come back, came back negative, so we can really "touch" her now! Her infection tests they are doing ever day have come back negative as well every day, so she will probably be taken off antiobiotics in a day or two and her air cannula will come out soon as well, at that point I think all that will be left is just a feeding tube that they just use on occassion and then the iv which can be taken out when she is eating by bottle all the time. They have also moved her into an isolet, which is basically a totally plastic covered enclosed bed that helps to regulate her temperature more, so hopefully once she gains a little more weight she will move to an open air bed.

Here's a little video we took today when we were holding her before lunch.....love our little bean!!

Delivery Time!

If you have no desire to hear about Labor and Delivery, don't read any further! I'm not going to get too detailed, but here's the 8 hours that lead up to Mallory's birth!

Around 2:30 am early Monday morning I started having some contractions that I could actually feel. Not really painful, just knew I was finally having them. So, we called in the nurse and she hooked me up to the monitors. At that time it picked up that I was having contractions but they were not real regular, so after an hour she took me off and said if they got worse to let her know and they could give me some pain meds too.

Around 6 am or so they were getting stronger, still not horrible, but enough to call back to the nurse and get some pain meds to try to cut the edge off of them. So she gave me a percoset, which did seem to make them a little less harsh. She went on and put me back on the monitor and then at the shift change and Elizabeth came in and we just remained on the monitor and then determined they were coming around every 5 minutes but were still fairly tolerable.

Dr. How came by sometime around 9 or so and said it looks like Mallory will be coming later today or early tomorrow morning, so Ben started calling all the family to let them know I'm officially in labor and will be moved to labor and delivery soon.

We decided to go on and get the IV hooked up to me so I could get the bag of fluids in me before they gave me the epidural when we got to Labor and Delivery. Since I have such lovely veins, it took them a while to find a good vein to put the IV in. So by the time we got the IV in and started the fluids going the contractions were getting worse and I was ready for that epidural!

That's when Dr How came back in and decided to check to see how much I was dilated because they had not checked me at all since I was at Owensboro since they didn't want to risk the possibility of infection. So, around 9:30 to 9:45 she checked me and said she's fully dilated we need to go to L&D NOW!

So with that I asked just to confirm what I was pretty sure I already knew, no time for an epidural. Nope, this baby is coming and coming now!

That's when Ben hopped back on the phone with all the family and said they might want to hurry because she's coming sooner than later!

So we arrived into L&D around 10am or a little after, contractions were very painful by this point and thankfully there were plenty of people helping me to breathe through them, but it wasn't fun to say the least.

We got settled on the L&D table and once in the right spot was pretty much allowed to push right then. Dr How and the entire room full of people were great. Some of the nurses I knew, some I'd never seen before and there seemed to be a gallery of people just watching, but at that point you don't care who sees what!

Ben wasn't quite comfortable being right there beside me so he was at the side of the room sitting in a chair behind a curtain where he'd peek out from time to time an vocally let me know that he was there for me. Again, everything happened so fast I didn't care who was holding my hands or letting me scream a little!

It seemed longer than 20-30 minutes to me, but that's all the time it took for our little bean to enter the world once I started pushing. Dr. How immediately put her on my stomach and she started crying, which was a great sign! She looked much bigger to me than what I anticipated, so I was thrilled about that and of course you could tell how cute she is!

So once the tied off her umbilical cord they took her to the other side of the room and cleaned her up a bit and checked her over. She got an 8 or 9 on her aspargs or whatever you call those, so that was really good. They brought her back over to me to see and kiss before she was off to the intermediate nursery. I was thrilled she could go to the intermediate nursery instead of the full out NICU!

So, I thought, yeah baby is born the worst is over! I think the placenta was worse than having the baby, but either way without going into too much detail, that just wasn't much fun, but I made it through all the rest of the stuff that had to be done and could then have one big sigh of relief that our little Mallory Claire was here and doing good for a 33 week 1 day baby!

So, then Ben was calling back all the family again and saying, well she's already here and doing good and then calling all other friends and letting them know what's going on and that Mallory has arrived!

I think everyone was really amazed at how soon things progressed. No one ever dreamed it would have happened so quickly and let me tell you, with no epidural, I was glad that it did progress quickly because I didn't plan on the no-drug route and didn't want to endure it too long without drugs!

They finally got me cleaned up and resting in the L&D room and that's when Susan got there and then mom not too far behind her. Dad then showed up and they all went down with Ben to see Mallory in the Intermediate nursery. Ben's parents and Micah showed up a little later and they too went down to the nursery. I finally got to go down late afternoon and got to hold her then! Ben and I went down one more time after everyone else went to the hotel and just got to see her and spend a few minutes with her, so all in all is was a very good day, even without the drugs!

So a quick thank you to all the great nurses, doctors and others that I have no idea why they were standing around watching me in labor, but everyone was awesome and I'm glad I remembered to put on deodorant prior to leaving my room as we rolled into labor, but really wish I had remembered to brush my teeth!! Oh well, mental note for next time!

Here's a few more pictures that we took of her at 1 day old, she's just so darn cute, of course we are a little biased though! I told Ben, we make cute babies!! Oh yes, and of course, George got to meet Mallory as well!

Mallory Claire Has arrived 4/5/2010!!

More to come later, but here's a picture of our sweet baby born today at 10:36am, 4 lbs 1 oz and 16.5 inches long! She's doing great and went to intermediate nursery instead of NICU!!