Daddy's Girl

When Alex was born, my dad couldn't really be around him because he was sick with the flu. Ever since James and I have been married, my dad has been asking when we're going to have children and now that we have, he is so excited. It was a bit sad that he couldn't spend any time with Alex right when he was born, but now my dad is flying in tomorrow to see him! I'm very excited! My dad was in the army and he is all about the army pride. Before Alex was born, he even bought him an Army teddy bear. That is how he met my mother in Korea. He is a wonderful man with a giving heart and he is even happy with being called Hadabogee, which means Grandpa in Korean. When my dad found out that we were naming the baby Alexander, he immediately asked if he could call him Lex. And I told him of course, since it will be a special nickname that he will be called by my dad. I love my daddy and I can't wait for him to be here! Here is a picture of the men in my life. It was taken at Christmas. You can see where Alex gets his light eyes from. Starting from the left: James, My Dad, My brother Matt

Back on program

I am out of shape! Whew! I haven't had a decent workout since right before I got pregnant. I like going to the gym and just jumping on the elliptical and getting lost with my iPod. Well, I don't have a gym membership now, which is fine. I know plenty of people that got fit at home and that's what I hope to do. One thing I hope to invest in someday is the Wii Fit. But that involves buying a Wii first. As for right now, I'm sticking to running around the neighborhood and Comcast's ExerciseTV videos. With all the working out AND breastfeeding, maybe I'll get my prepregnant body back ;-)

Milk Donation

So we weighed Alexander two days ago and based on our home scale, we THINK he's about 16 pounds. He's in Step 2 diapers, but I plan on waiting for his next appointment before he's officially in Step 3. Did you know that you CANNOT buy Step 2 diapers in bulk? I've searched all of Walmart, Babies R Us and Sam's Club and there are not boxes of this stuff. Just as well, he's just a big boy.

I had my 6 week check up and talked to the midwives of getting Mirena. While I would love to have another child, I just want to wait a little while before we start again. So I have an appointment for it to be inserted in two weeks. Very exciting! No more pills! All the midwives were surprised of how BIG Alex is. And they were talking about how I'll be burning calories with all the breastfeeding I've been doing. In fact, to keep my milk supply up, I've signed up to donate my milk to the Mother's Milk Bank at Austin. I'm going to donate 150 oz and possibly continue bi weekly donations. Let's hope Alex slows down in growth or else we'll need to buy a convertible car seat soon!

Exhausted!

"Sleep when the baby sleeps" which is great advice. I can't say enough how important it is to have rest. I've been pretty tired and Alex can be a handful. I honestly DO NOT know how some women do it. I've never been a woman that has been depressed. I usually find content in almost every situation, but when you have a crying baby, it's REALLY hard to feel happy at all. Especially when you don't know why that baby is crying. I broke down in tears a couple times because Alex would be fed/dry/burped and yet he would still be screaming. I didn't know what to do so I just started to cry myself. A lot of it had to do with how tired I am. I never thought I would be a power napper, but that's how life is for me right now. I sleep for 2-3 hours at a time, then there is feedings, changings, and burpings. One thing I love again.. COFFEE!!

James was especially sweet to me yesterday. He noticed how tired I was yesterday and let me take a much needed nap while he tended to Alex. Of course, he only brought him in when Alex wanted food. Which is fine.. We haven't introduced the bottle to Alex yet. I just cleaned and sterilized the ones we have now, so we may try to do that this week. I am REALLY nervous about it.. I don't want him to get nipple confusion, so I may just slowly introduce the bottle to him. My mom got us these really great bottles by Playtex which have the wide nipple that helps with breastfed babies. Anyway, remember to sleep when the baby sleeps!

February 27th, Alexander is here!

So I finally have a few moments to talk about the arrival of Alexander! I’ve been getting a lot of questions and I hope that this answers some of them. First off, to start with a disclaimer, labor isn’t pretty. Hollywood made it seem so clean and easy, but the truth is, it isn’t. Ha ha! You see movies where the pregnant woman screams “My water broke!” and they rush to the hospital. After 2 minutes of pushing, the baby appears! Reality, it does not happen that way. Now, here we go:
On Friday, I was fast asleep till about 3:30am, then I woke up in extreme pain. How to describe this pain? Think about the worst poop you’ve EVER had to take and it decides to grow arms and punch around! For a moment, I thought I had to go to the bathroom, but shortly after I realized I was just in pain. I really thought I could work through the pain and go back to sleep. I even got in the bathtub to help myself relax, but it all seemed moot. Eventually, I crawled back into bed around 5am. James usually senses when I come to bed and he’ll cuddle me, but that morning, I screamed at him “DON’T TOUCH ME!” He realized that I wasn’t comfortable and that I was in fact having contractions. Right away, he started to time them. This part is gross, but a reality for most women, the pain got so bad for me that I had to run to the bathroom to throw up. Having taken a birthing class, we both knew that this was a signal I was in active labor. I couldn’t concentrate on relaxing during the contractions while lying down. I actually had to stand up for a lot of my labor. So, James calls the midwife after timing my contractions for an hour, and she said it was time to come to the hospital.
After one of the most painful car rides of my life (not blaming James, just the labor), we finally get to the hospital where I’m wheeled into my delivery room. I’m going to stop for a moment to describe this room. It’s like a little hotel room with a nice bed, couch, rocking chair, a Jacuzzi tub and TV. James finds this great channel on the TV that plays instrumental music and shows nature scenes, which played the ENTIRE time I was in labor. I kept the room especially cold, probably around 60 degrees or so. I felt bad for my mom (who arrived later) who doesn’t like the cold, and was wearing a blanket my entire labor. So back to the labor story, I got there and changed. The midwife checked and found that I was 5-6cm dilated and 90% effaced. To be honest, I was really surprised! I had wanted to be dilated quite a bit before I got to the hospital, and I did try to labor at home for as long as possible (before I started to throw up). I didn’t think that I was dilated as far as I was since we left the house around 6am (remember, I woke up only at 3:30am in extreme pain). So I was pleasantly surprised, but I still didn’t expect my labor to be short by any means. I stood around the room for a long time, dealing with contractions. Sometimes I would do a slow dance with James, or I would just lay my head on the bed and stay standing. I did throw up a couple more times, and at around 10am, my midwife checked me again and I was 8-9cm dilated. So I was officially in Transition Labor. I DID notice the contractions getting rougher and longer to deal with. The midwife suggested that I get in the Jacuzzi tub and relax. I loved it, and James even made the comment that I was falling asleep between contractions. My mom thought that was funny because she did the same thing when she was in labor with me. After awhile, the midwife comes to me and asks if I wanted her to break my water and try to get pushing started. I did not want that to happen, and asked my midwife if we could wait an hour to see if I could break my water on my own.

Well, I gave it two hours. I waited and tried my hardest, but my water wouldn’t break. So after the midwife checked me again, I was fully dilated and fully effaced, I let her go ahead and break the water. After that happened, Alex’s head went into zero station and I had to prepare to push. I pushed for 1.5 hours and finally, my son was here! The pushing was a lot harder than I expected, but the end result was more than worth it. That’s all I can type for now. If there any questions, let me know!

Slaves to NASA

SO, NASA's soonest launch has been delayed a couple times. The original launch was set for February 12th, then was delayed to no earlier than the 19th and now it is set for no earlier than the 27th. James' entire work schedule is based around the launch. His team does 24/7 monitoring of the thermal conditions of the shuttle. So he works 1 out of 3 eight hours shifts during the day. The last mission, it was a bit rough because he worked during the Thanksgiving weekend but he still was awake for dinner. He was burnt out by the whole thing, but it was a rewarding experience and now we know what to expect. The only problem is (of course) is that our son isn't here yet and we want the initial bonding time with James and Alex before he goes back to work. I really really really hope that the shuttle launch isn't till the beginning of March and he'll be able to spend the first week with Alex before he has to work hard for NASA. I'm extremely proud of James, I can't imagine the work he's doing. I just also want James to feel included with the baby.

Getting closer..and more drama..

So yesterday, I had my midwife appointment. And when Dawn checked his heartbeat, she noticed it was on the low end. It was about 110 bpm and she decided to do a non stress test, so I laid there in the office for about 20 minutes with the fetal monitor strapped to me. The big problem was that he was extremely active at this time, so they didn't get the readings that they wanted. So, Dawn sent me over to L&D to do more long term fetal monitoring. I went over, got hooked up and after an hour, she came by and noticed that his heartbeat baseline is still considered a little low. She talked with Dr. Mott and decided to just continue to monitor while I ate and drank (since I didn't have anything for almost 4 hours). Dawn told me that it seems that he just has a low heart rate and she even did an ultrasound to check that he was still doing "unique" activity, such as practice breathing and opening/closing his hands. They weren't freaking out, I suppose they just wanted to know what was going on. After a couple hours more of fetal monitoring, they decided to send me home. I'm going back on Friday (my due date) to do some more monitoring and Dawn said they are probably going to insert the prepidil gel so I won't go too overdue. The nurse at the evaluation room noticed that I was contracting a bit, and she said it was either due to the vaginal exam or I may go into labor soon. They couldn't quite tell, but I just seem to be 1 cm dilated.

After I got home, I cried. I knew there wasn't a lot to worry about. I wasn't really freaking out. I was just very emotional. I came home and cried my heart out. James comforted me wonderfully and even made me dinner so I wouldn't have to stress out. I love my son so much already, I'm so already attached, that if anything were wrong with him, I'd be terrified! I want him to be here, in my arms. My due date is tomorrow and I can't believe he isn't here yet. I wish he was. My life doesn't seem complete without him now...