On April 19, 2016, I woke up from yet another nightmare, not feeling great and not having slept well -- again. The nightmares, nausea, and general "not feeling great"-ness seemed familiar, so I got up and took a pregnancy test. It was positive! I ran into the bedroom and woke Darren up to tell him the news. We were both so excited and SO nervous.
The timing of finding out this happy news couldn't have been better: Darren was graduating from BYU in just a few days, so both of our families would be in town. We were glad to be able to tell them right away and celebrate this little life for every second we had together.
It felt like we had been waiting so long for me to finally be pregnant again, but now that I was, what if something went wrong again? Would we actually get to keep this baby? The first few weeks, waiting until we could get to our first midwives' appointment, were filled with lots of excitement and incredulity, mixed with a lot of nervousness and hesitation.
Darren's graduation went great, by the way. I'm so incredibly proud of him for pushing through all of his health challenges and so many difficult courses to get his Bachelor's in IT. He worked his butt off for it, and we are all so happy he is done!
At 8 weeks, we had our first appointment. The preliminary ultrasound looked good! We got to see our cute little peanut! Everything looked just fine and the midwife had no concerns about my health or the baby's, but I was still very cautious. No heavy lifting at work; only gentle exercise and yoga; lots of resting. At our next appointment (12 weeks), we were able to hear a heartbeat nice and strong! That was something so new and exciting. (Our previous baby hadn't lived long enough for us to hear their heartbeat, so this was a HUGELY reassuring step for us.)
The pregnancy continued to go well. I never got really sick (which was worrying for the first few weeks -- was everything going ok if I wasn't having morning sickness? Turns out, yes; I'm just lucky) but I did get reeeeaaalllly tired. I was surprised that none of my coworkers seemed to notice that every afternoon I fell asleep on the couch at work! The tiredness probably wasn't helped by my diet, either -- the only things that consistently sounded appetizing were sweets and ice-cold water. I had pretty bad heartburn starting around week 12 that stuck with me through the rest of pregnancy, but otherwise I felt pretty good overall.
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| 13.5 weeks |
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| 18 weeks |
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| 20 weeks - the night before our ultrasound |
At our 20 week appointment, we got to see our little peanut again -- but he wasn't much of a peanut anymore! It was so cool to see that he really was a little developing human. We got to see his arms and hands (and his tiny fingers!), his legs and feet (oh my goodness, those feet! Check out the picture below), his head and face (!!), and even his organs! The ultrasound tech explained everything as we went along, and I was amazed that we could see his spine, his kidneys, his nose & lips, and even all the chambers & blood flowing in his heart!! We also found out during the ultrasound that we were going to have a BOY! I was honestly kind of surprised -- for some reason I just thought we were having a girl (maybe because most of my friends have little girls?), but I was still so excited. We were going to have a little son! Maybe he'd be a little mini-Darren -- how cute!
During September (when I was about 24 weeks), we went on a couple trips. We did a whirlwind one-day trip to Disneyland with my work, which was exhausting but really fun, and then we went to San Francisco for a conference. After the conference, Darren and I headed out to stay with my family for another week or so, including a baby shower with family and friends.
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| 24 weeks - Baby's 1st Disneyland trip! |
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| 24 weeks - getting home from Disneyland around midnight |
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| 25 weeks - Baby shower at Mom & Dad's house |
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| 25 weeks - after baby shower - 3.5 generations! |
At about this point, I started to really feel pregnant. I couldn't reach my feet very well, I definitely waddled when I walked, and doing anything took so much energy! Darren and I started taking childbirth classes at some point in here (I honestly don't remember when we started). We chose to take Hypnobirthing classes, which aren't nearly as hippy-ish and "out there" as it sounds; it's basically learning deep relaxation techniques (self-hypnosis) so that your body can relax and just kinda do its thing during labor and delivery.
My good friend April threw a baby shower for me with all the ladies from work, and it was a ton of fun! I feel so lucky to know so many generous and caring ladies, and they had tons of great advice to share, too!
The holidays kept us plenty busy. We hosted a small Thanksgiving dinner with people from our ward, since we weren't able to travel to be with family. Then I immediately started on Christmas prep -- I didn't want things to not get done if baby decided to come early! I was determined to have the tree and decorations up, the presents wrapped, and the cookies baked (we won't talk about how many I ate....) so that we could have a "real" Christmas regardless of how I felt at the very end of pregnancy or if our little guy decided to show up earlier than planned. I also (sort of) finished the quilt I was making for him; I got the quilt top pieced together and purchased the backing and batting, then I took it to a quilt shop to have them do the machine quilting. It turned out so cute! (I still, as of late January, have not finished binding the quilt, but that's the only step left.)
Mid-December, I began my maternity leave from work. It was very strange to not be working, but I loved having time to finish up projects before baby came! We finished decorating the nursery and assembling the baby gear -- crib, rock-n-play, stroller, bouncy seat, hanging bookshelves, etc. After much, ahem, reminding from my mom, we finally got the car seat installed in our car, which made our little guy's impending arrival seem oh so very close. I also baked at least 7 dozen Christmas cookies, but at least most of those actually made it to the neighbors (unlike the cookies I made for/got from a cookie swap earlier in the month..... Did I mention that baby liked sweets?).
Christmas day I got so incredibly sick and spent most of the day throwing up. I really, really prayed that I wouldn't go into labor, since I couldn't imagine dealing with all the puking AND having contractions. Luckily, I felt better in about a day or so, and I ended up getting a whole day to rest and recover before I actually DID go into labor!
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| 39 weeks - I thought I'd get at least one more bump picture before delivery, but our little guy had other plans |
Around 4:30pm the pain started getting worse and I was having a hard time breathing through the contractions. I tried taking a warm shower to get my back to relax, but all it did was get me all wet and cold. So not worth it. So back onto my hands and knees I went to help relieve the pain. Eventually the contractions got to be almost continuous -- about 3-5 minutes apart, lasting for over a minute each -- so we headed to the hospital.
And it was a good thing we headed there when we did! I was in so much pain that I was having a hard time breathing evenly, so all my limbs and my face were getting a bit tingly from lack of oxygen. When we got to the hospital (at 6:00pm), Darren had to grab a wheelchair to wheel me in to the front desk because I was shaking so much I couldn't walk. They got me checked in and changed into a hospital gown. I was dilated to about a 5 or a 6 (depending on who measured, I guess). Within about 10 minutes of getting into the room, my water broke; there was a concern that our little guy may have breathed in some meconium, so they told me that as soon as he was born they'd need to check his lungs and possibly suction them out. That got me a little worried, but I didn't have much brain power to devote to anything other than trying not to push until they said I could; the midwife was on her way to the hospital, and I wasn't fully dilated yet, so they told me to "hold on" -- like I had much choice in the matter! This baby had decided he was coming, and he was coming NOW. Darren and the nurses were all helping me to stay as calm as possible, reminding me to breathe and helping me move around a bit to cope with the pain, and they had me on oxygen to help with the limb-tingling situation. (I guess I should mention that I had decided on an unmedicated birth, so there were no IVs or epidurals, which was nice. I hate needles!)
The midwife got there very soon and told me at that point that I was fully dilated, so go ahead and start pushing. I don't know quite how long I was pushing for, but it couldn't have been terribly long. What felt like both an eternity and just an instant later, at 7:45pm, our son was born: 8lbs, 20 inches long, and absolutely perfect. It was completely surreal to see him come out of me, a perfect (if slightly green) little human being in miniature. He seemed so big! I remember being confused as to how all his long limbs and his whole body had fit inside my belly. (Had I really been that big? Or was he just really good at curling up and compacting?)
The midwife quickly cut the cord and handed our little son off to the doctor to check his lungs; he was fine -- no complications and no concerns about his lungs. Hooray! Darren was right there by his side from the moment he was born, reassuring our son that Daddy was there and that everything would be just fine. Even with me being pretty preoccupied with all the pushing and the pain and whatnot, it was so incredibly sweet to see his immediate love and concern for our son.
Everything after that is a bit of a blur. I know that I got stitched up (from an episiotomy & a small tear) and they cleaned up the bed so that I could get comfortable. The wonderful nurses brought me heated blankets, which felt like absolute heaven. Every muscle in my body was sore and I was shaking almost uncontrollably, so having a few heavy, warm blankets was so nice. Once they got Joseph cleaned up and measured and all that, they brought him over to me and I got to snuggle our precious little boy. It was the best feeling in the world!
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| My first time holding Joseph. Look how tiny he was! |
My mom got in on Saturday afternoon to stay with us for a week and help with ... well, everything! She was wonderful to have around, and not just because I missed her! At the end of the week, my dad flew in to stay for a few days as well, so Joseph got to meet his Grandma & Grandpa Symmons.
I think this post has gone on long enough, and I plan (hope?) to blog a bit more regularly now that we have something exciting going on in our lives! Thank you to all the friends and family who have given us love, support, and well-wishes during this whole journey, and for all the help we have received as we try to figure out this whole "being parents" thing!
What a beautiful baby! I love the picture of you holding him the first time. I may also feel a little tired reading about being in labor and delivering a baby again. Phew, that's hard work!
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