Pure Love

This is pure love...holding my little girl while she sleeps.  Makes my heart smile!

Never Ask a Lady Her Weight

The last two weeks have been fairly routine for me: breast feed, pump, rest, repeat.  All day long every two hours. However, even with this schedule little Elsa wasn't gaining "enough" weight.  Based on set norms, she should have been back to her birth weight at her two week appointment.  Well she was just shy of that.  Her birth weight was 6 pounds 8 ounces.  She dropped to 5 pounds 12 ounces in the hospital and was 5 pounds 13 ounces when we left. At her two week appointment she was only up to 6 pounds 3 ounces. They say she should be gaining 1 ounce per day. So they decided we needed to supplement her feedings with either breast milk (pumped) or formula.  Of course I am trying to breast milk.

At her appointment today she gained 5 more ounces, which we got excited about, but that still isn't 1 ounce per day. The ANRP that we have been seeing sent us to a lactation consultant at Shands. At that appointment we had some information confirmed that we had gotten at the hospital, she has a tight frenulum.  So what's a frenulum? It's that little piece of skin under the tongue that holds the tongue towards the front of the mouth. This is causing her to not feed efficiently.  So my little girl had a frenotomy. Basically, they split the frenulum to allow the tongue to have more movement forward and up.

Now we have to retrain her on how to latch and suck. We weigh again next Friday.  Here's hoping this works!

More info: http://newborns.stanford.edu/Frenotomy.html

The Sleeping Adjustment

I find it funny that as a pregnant woman I went through several months of uncomfortable sleep. People constantly were telling me "get your sleep now!" As if I could bank that sleep to draw on it later.
Then our little cutie showed up and we have spent some time figuring out new methods to get our sleep. One thing people say now is "nap when she naps, you;ll need it."  Ha! Easier said than done.  I would love to know how many of these advice givers actually took there own advice.
Steve and I seem to have evolved our sleep patterns into something that works for us.
At night I cater more to Elsa's needs, feeding and soothing, and Steve helps with diapers. With this method he gets a little more sleep at night.  Then when she wakes up in the early morning I feed her and Steve takes her out of the room to let me sleep a little longer.  He will take a nap late in the day.  And this seems to be working.
For me to feel refreshed from a nap it takes me about 20 minutes to fall asleep and I need a minimum of 2 hours down time.  An hour or a half hour just won't cut it. So I have a real hard time napping during the day.  But it doesn't mean I don't try.

The bad thing with our method is that Steve goes back to work in 2 weeks.  So I will have to get up in the mornings instead of going back to sleep.  I guess I may have to learn how to nap more efficiently then.

Sleeping Elsa

Reflections on Week One

Today marks a big milestone, week one with our little girl. Seven whole days.  I thought I might make some reflections on the wonderful week we have had with her.

Falling in love instantly is possible.  It took time for me to get to know my wonderful husband and eventually fall in love with him.  With Elsa, it was instantaneous. One look and I was hooked!

I have fallen even more in love with my husband.  Didn't think that was possible, I loved him so much already.  Watching him be a daddy is an amazing sight. Elsa will definitely be a daddy's girl.

My fear about the dogs with her have so far been unrealized.  They really don't mind her. If she is crying really hard, Brisco gets a little concerned but otherwise they leave her alone. I will not let my guard down with them though, We are waiting for our new baby gate to get here so I can have some separation between the them and Elsa and let her do things like sit in her swing.

I was so worried that Keegan's barking would surely keep her awake. We worked hard with him, but it was a failure.  She is completely unfazed by his barking, or the vacuum, or load speaking people.  This is AWESOME! Unless something changes I am hoping we won't be a "Shhhh baby is sleeping" household.

Everything takes practice.  Swaddling, breast feeding, baths, all of it takes a little patience and a lot of practice!

Baby Burrito

It's more than the fundamentals. I may have nannied for eons while growing up, but it only prepared me so much.  Being a momma to this little girl is going to take way more than basic fundamentals on how to change diapers. Figuring out how to shape her into a young woman that can conquer anything in this world carries way more weight than a few dirty diapers.

Each day teaches us something new about her. I wouldn't trade this for anything!

The New Norm

Steve and I have been adjusting to what I like to call our new normal.  Adding another human to our family was not only a long lengthy process, but also one that has enriched our lives tenfold and it's only been 7 days.  Our new normal includes: lots of snuggles and kisses, changing diapers, cute tiny clothes, constantly making sure the animals don't use the baby's stuff as their own, late nights, sore breasts (for me only), and a myriad of other things.
SInce we are off work right now our new normal isn't quite normal yet.  Once we both go back to work (which will be awful) then the daily routine will be established. I like the new norm! Actually I LOVE the new norm!

The Arrival

The story of the arrival of Elsa Anna Ladendorf.
Born April 7, 2012
6 lbs 7 oz, 19" Long.

Woke up on April 6th at 2:30am with some idea that something was happening. We were 4 days past our due date, and I was really getting impatient. By 9:30 am my water had broke and we knew we were headed to the hospital sooner than later. We were at the hospital by noon, got checked in and were waiting for progress.
Contractions began and by 3pm our doula, Kym, was there to help us with our labor.
The first thing to not go as planned was that my blood pressure was high enough for the nurses to limit my mobility. Basically, I was allowed to only labor while laying on my side.  We were not allowed to walk around, use the birthing ball, use the jetted tub, or anything else. The contractions were intense, and prolonged and eventually got to a point that I was not getting a break. I had about 3 in a row with no break that lasted about 10 minutes.
The second thing to go not as planned was that once the pain and contractions were no longer able to be controlled naturally, I had to get an epidural. This was a decision that was difficult and against everything I wanted.  Not being able to manage the pain using the techniques we learned because of the high blood pressure was a major disappointment. We had been in labor for about 5 hours and had only progressed to 2-3cm so the epidural was not going to be avoided.
After the epidural we were finally progressing but very slowly.
The third  thing to not go as planned was pictocin to try to get some progress.
We made it to 6cm, but at 2am after being stalled for some time, the doctor asked us to consider to plans: 1. c-section and 2. redose of epidural, sleep, and let them spend an hour adjusting the pictocin.  In that hour we progressed to 8 cm, and by 6 am we were ready to push. 21 hours of labor, then the pushing began.
The fourth thing to go not as planned was that after 3 hours of pushing and excruciating pain we made no more progress. The doctor decided it was time for us to make the call on the c-section. This was a horrible emotional decision, that was the one thing I had wanted to avoid from the very beginning. The doctor was predicting that Elsa was face up and stuck.  After the decision was made, there may have been some crying. Then off to surgery. She was in fact face up AND chin down and stuck on my pubic bone.  But she was here and she is beautiful and healthy!

I have to be thankful for the most supportive doula ever.  With every decision she supported us and talked us through it, and helped us come to terms with the changes that were made that upset us. She was not judgmental against the fact that although the plan was to go all natural we were heading down an unintended path of the exact opposite of a natural birth.

I have learned that plans are great, but never are foolproof.  Life will get in the way and the best you can hope for is a safe outcome.

And this is the best outcome ever!!

Waiting....

April 2nd (this past Monday) was our due date.  All along I have said, that I want Elsa to come naturally when she is ready.  These babies know when it's their time to be born.  But I had no idea that as soon as the due date passed I would start to get super impatient!  Luckily, my belief in the bun in the oven timer is strong enough for me to not resort to medical inducement, but it certainly doesn't keep me from looking for natural inducement.  Kind of a hypocrite, but I just want to see my little girl....NOW!

I feel pretty good.  Very tired, starting to feel bigger, but overall good.  So although I would love to get this show on the road, I;m not so uncomfortable that medical inducement is an option.  Of course the doctor will probably only let me go to 42 weeks.  But I will insist on the biophysical profiles to monitor her fluids and let her cook as long as she needs to.

Pregnant Chicken

What a brilliant blog!! http://www.pregnantchicken.com/

I just read a great post about visitors after birth.  Hilarious and so true!!!