Merry Christmas!

I've totally become "that" blogger. I blog, blog, blog...before pregnancy and during pregnancy...then, baby makes her arrival & I disappear into the blogosphere ;)

The truth is, these first few months don't lend themselves to much free time in the slightest. During the day, Ella eats every 2-3 hours, naps every 90 minutes or so, and craves attention and play time with Mama. When the little miss is napping, that is my chance to do chores, take a shower, and work. I'm (finally) back to working full time again from home, which is both a blessing and a curse. It's HARD to stick to any type of schedule with a 3 month old, but we're making it work as best we can. Some days, she's attached to me & refuses to go down in her cosleeper, so I put her in the Moby and we get through the day like that. Other days, she's a perfect angel and I can get a lot of stuff done while she's napping.

I hope you all had a very, very Merry Christmas! I'll leave you with a few photos...

It's Been A Whirlwind

I didn't intend to disappear for as long as I have, but, life had other plans. Without going into a ton of detail (for fear of a very, very long post...), bullet points will have to suffice:

• I had not been feeling well for quite some time after Ella's birth, but chalked it up to being a new mama & being sleep deprived. Turns out, I had plugged ducts, which turned into mastitis, which turned into an abscess. We had a lot of breastfeeding issues for the first 2 or 3 weeks, which resulted in a lot of pain & trauma to my breast tissue. Apparently, an infection had set in and I was none the wiser. I was admitted to the hospital on October 24th and spent 3 days and 2 nights there on IV antibiotics. I also had 2 procedures done to try and rid my breast of the abscess. The first night I was there, Ella nor Mr. Lukie were allowed to stay with me--I'm sure you can imagine my emotional state at that time. I was a complete wreck. Not only was my 4 week old going to be away from me for the night, but so was my husband, AND I didn't have a stash of breastmilk at that point, so she had to be fed formula from a bottle. I was discharged from the hospital with a PICC line and on IV antibiotics for 8 days, hoping that would stave off the infection and allow my body to heal itself so that I could avoid surgery. Thankfully, I avoided surgery and I can now say that my body is completely healed and we are STILL exclusively breastfeeding!

• Mr. Lukie had rotator cuff surgery November 9th, so I have been taking care of Ella and Mr. Lukie. I now think I was completely off my rocker when I swore up & down that I wanted twins. I fully retract that statement!

• Ella was diagnosed with GERD 2 weeks ago. She has been on Zantac to help manage the pain associated with acid reflux for just over 1 week, and we feel like it is definitely working, and we see signs of our sweet little angel baby coming back. Before the meds, she would scream & cry, arch her back in pain, projectile vomit, and stay awake for hours on end...we had no idea what was going on, and would just rock her & cry right along with her. My poor little baby.

• After 8 weeks, I can finally now say that I am truly enjoying being a mama! With everything listed above that we have dealt with, I was really struggling. I had bittersweet feelings surrounding motherhood--I was loving this sweet little girl who was all mine, but I was having an incredibly difficult time breastfeeding, which just seemed to spiral the rest of my emotions out of control. Ella has begun smiling at us & cooing at us--and the things we say & do to get her to smile is absolutely ridiculous and embarrassing, to say the least ;)

Our Girl

Ella's Birth Announcement :)

Modern Introduction Girl Birth Announcement

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View the entire collection of cards.

10.12.11

Thank you for all of your sweet comments on Ella's birth story! I hated to break it up into 4 posts, but it was far too long to have posted in just one entry. {That and...I needed a few days to finish it up, so spreading it out over 4 days worked quite well for me!}

Today is my due date--I would have been 40 weeks pregnant today, had Miss Ella not graced us with her beauty and sweetness early.

This also means that Ella is 3 weeks old today. How does that happen? How do days and nights blend together, feeling like one hugely long, drawn out single day when you have a fussy baby, but feeling like just yesterday when you are looking at a calendar? I'll never understand the conception of time as an adult. Is it not so, SO different than your conception of time as a child?

::sigh::

Regardless, I have a 3 week old. And I think you've all seen enough text in this post. You've probably stopped reading it altogether and have already scrolled to the bottom for photos of Ella. Trust me, I got the oh-so-subtle hints left in the comments ;)

Sleeping Beauty--17 days old.

5 days old...one of our favorite 'Ella Faces'

6 days old...Daddy is NOT a fan of her big flowery headbands!

Diva in the making...she "posed" like this completely on her own!

The Birth Story of Ella Grace - Part IV

{Part III can be read here}

I spent the next hour angry. I was angry with my body for not doing what I thought it should have been doing. I was angry with my baby for not presenting the way I thought she should be. I was angry with my midwife for not being able to “fix” the issue. I was angry with God for allowing me to go through this pain. I was angry for having gotten this far in my birth plan, only to end up at the one place I absolutely did not want to give birth.

Mr. Lukie and Karen helped me to get dressed, in between contractions that were lasting 60-90 seconds, coming just 1 to 2 minutes apart. Contractions I was still not allowed to push through. While I breathed through the millionth contraction, Mr. Lukie loaded the Prius up with our hospital bags, the car seat, a pillow, and a blanket. He hopped in the drivers seat, Karen hopped in the passenger seat, and I laid down in the back seat. Carol got in her car and followed us to the hospital.

The hospital was 25 minutes away. I still had my eyes closed and hadn’t opened them since I had dilated to 7 centimeters at 6pm. But I knew the route to the hospital, so with each stop and turn, I was mentally mapping where we were. Karen was holding my hand and counting the contractions down for me as I breathed through them.

We pulled into the hospital parking lot & Mr. Lukie ran to get a wheelchair for me. I always thought it was silly, on TV shows and movies, when they showed a woman in labor being wheeled up to L&D. I now know why a wheelchair is necessary during active labor!

We arrived on the L&D floor at 5:30am. Where we were told there were NO rooms and NO beds available, that I would be stuck in the wheelchair, in the hallway, until a room or a bed was freed up. I begged for pain medication right there, curled in the fetal position in the wheelchair.

At 5:45am, we were told a room had just become available and they would get me in there and check me immediately. As I was being wheeled into the room, Karen was giving the hospital nurses and hospital midwife my history and why we had chosen to transport to the hospital. My head was still wrapped around that pain medicine—I knew I was too far into it to receive an epidural, but I just needed some relief, something to help me relax a little and get this baby out.

A nurse checked me around 6:30am and informed me that I was fully dilated at 10 centimeters, the cervical lip had disappeared, and the swelling was no longer there—it was time to have a baby!

(I don’t remember saying this, but Mr. Lukie informed me later that at this point, I said, rather loudly, “Then why the $%&* are we here?!” How embarrassing, considering I do NOT use curse words!)

Hearing those words from the nurse, I completely forgot about wanting pain medication and as soon as my next contraction came, I pushed. And it felt SO good to finally push again.

After 2 more hours of pushing, Karen informed me that with my next few pushes, I would be pushing the baby’s head out. It was just the 4 of us in the room at this point—Karen, Carol, Mr. Lukie and me. It was shift change, so we had been left alone for quite some time. With the next push, I gave it my all, and Karen told me to reach down and feel my baby’s head. So I did. It was the most amazing thing; to feel her tiny, slimy head so close to entering the world. At this point, Karen told Mr. Lukie that if he wanted to deliver his baby, he should switch places with her.

At 8:42am, on September 21, 2011, Mr. Lukie ‘caught’ our baby, and placed her on my chest. Eyes closed still, I started asking over and over what it was—boy or girl? With a mixture of laughter and tears, Mr. Lukie told me to open my eyes and look for myself—and as soon as I did, he announced, “It’s a GIRL!”

The 4 of us laughed and cried, staring at this new little miracle in awe and amazement. She was here…she was finally here! We finally knew she was a she! She didn’t cry right away, instead, she just sort of lay there in my arms, blinking her eyes and looking around. She recognized my voice and her Daddy’s voice immediately, turning towards us when one of us spoke. After a few minutes, she let out the tiniest cry—it sounded like a kitten mewing.

I lost it, then. I had been waiting just over 9 months—37 weeks, to be exact—to see my baby, hold my baby, hear my baby cry…and I had done exactly that.

We left the hospital at 11am that same day and drove home, our baby in the back seat, a new family of three. We haven’t looked back since, and I know that we never, ever will.

The Birth Story of Ella Grace - Part III

{Part I can be read here & Part II can be read here}

I found myself in the birth tub just before Carol arrived, which greatly helped to relax me and relieve some of the pressure the contractions produced. The water was warm and I felt weightless (imagine—feeling weightless at 37 weeks pregnant, HA!) and buoyant in the tub. Matt poured water over my chest and down my back at my request.

I would start to get tired of being in the tub, so I would get out, dry off and do one of a few things: get in bed in a side lying or all fours position, kneel on the ground and lean on the bed, walk the hallway with Mr. Lukie, swaying my hips dramatically from side to side, sitting backwards on the toilet while resting my head on the tank (topped with pillows), or in a deep squatting position with Mr. Lukie holding me up by my underarms.

By 10pm, I told Karen that I felt like I needed to push. I was in the tub, and she told me to listen to my body and do as it told me to. With the next contraction, I pushed for the first time. It felt amazing to push, and so it was for the next several hours. 20 minutes in the tub, pushing while floating, pushing while draped over the side of the tub, pushing while on my hands and knees. 20 minutes on the bed, pushing while lying on my side, pushing while on my hands and knees, pushing while in the fetal position. 20 minutes on the ground, pushing while on my knees, leaning over the bed. 20 minutes on the birth ball, pushing while draped over it, rocking & rolling, back and forth, side to side.

Unbeknownst to me, I had been pushing for 4 hours. Every 20 minutes or so, Karen or Carol would take my blood pressure & pulse, as well as use the Doppler to monitor Baby Lukie’s heartbeat. Even during the strongest of contractions & pushing, Baby Lukie kept an amazing heart rate. Karen had anticipated the arrival of a baby around 1am, based on how things had been progressing in the beginning. It was now 2am and there was no baby in sight. I was dilated to 9 ½ centimeters, but was pushing against the smallest cervical lip. Even when Karen tried to hold the lip down during a push, baby just wasn’t descending as expected. With each push I gave, my cervix was beginning to swell, causing a regression in labor. {Of course, I never knew any of this until much later, because my midwife rocked & only shared positive, encouraging news with me to keep my morale up}.

Through an internal exam palpating the baby’s fontanels, Karen determined that the baby was presenting acynclitic (her ear was tucked to her shoulder, instead of her chin being tucked to her chest). In an attempt to get the baby to move her head into the birthing position, I spent from 2am-3am breathing through the contractions, instead of pushing through them, while Karen had me in several different positions. After an hour of no progress in getting the baby to change positions, I threw in the towel. 

It was decided at 5am on September 21^st, due to extreme exhaustion and the baby presenting acynclitic, that we would be having our baby at the hospital.

[Part IV to follow...]

The Birth Story of Ella Grace - Part II

[Part I can be read here]

Mr. Lukie called our midwife, Karen, to let her know that my water had broken. It was about 3pm at this point and I really had no idea what to expect next. Karen asked us to time my contractions and to call her when they were at least 5 minutes apart and lasting between 45 and 60 seconds. She also advised me to rest, hydrate and eat, because we were going to have a baby soon and I needed to save my energy for laboring. Of course, in my fantasies, I am Super Woman, so do you think I heeded her advice? Nope. Instead, I ran around, cleaning & preparing the house for the complete unknown.

Two hours later, we called Karen to let her know that my contractions were 5 minutes apart and lasting 45 to 60 seconds. She let us know she’d be at our house by 6pm.

It was at this time that I decided I wanted to go for a walk to the mailbox and back. Why, I’ll never know, because we had to stop every few minutes so that I could lace my hands behind Mr. Lukie’s neck, lean my head into his chest and sway sway sway my hips through a contraction. It was the longest walk to the mailbox I’ve ever taken.

Karen arrived right around 6pm and checked me; I was 7 centimeters dilated. She instructed Mr. Lukie to get the birthing tub set up in our bedroom & begin filling it with water, while she called her assistant, Carol, and told her it was time to come to our house. From this point forward, I lost track of time, as labor progressed and I had to dig deep within myself to find the ability to move through each contraction.

Mr. Lukie and I had chosen to use HypnoBabies to help manage the pain during labor. We were (and are) both firm believers in this method of pain management for a natural childbirth; however, I didn’t use HypnoBabies in the way that we had practiced and were taught to. When I reached 7 centimeters, I closed my eyes and didn’t open them again until my baby was placed on my chest. I went to a place I’ve never been before—deep, deep inside of myself—and I drew strength, energy, willpower, to battle through. I imagined my baby making the descent into the birth canal and with each contraction, I “Ahhhhed” her down further. The mind is a very, very powerful tool, and I used it to my advantage, only thinking and feeling positive things.

Yes, contractions were becoming more and more intense. The pressure was quite noticeable. There was no denying that labor was an all-consuming task. There was also no denying that at the rate I was progressing, we would be holding a baby in our arms in just a few more hours.

[Part III to follow...]

The Birth Story of Ella Grace - Part I

Monday, September 19th was the day that I wrote this post. I was an emotional wreck that day and anxiety had overcome me. I felt 'off,' but couldn't place the possible reasons why.

{Well, aside from the fact that I was mere weeks away from giving birth to our firstborn}

I went to bed that night, having gotten off the phone with my husband, feeling slightly better about our impending parenthood (who, exactly, decided we were ready to be parents, anyway?!) and was exhausted. It was 10pm and I was ready to get a good nights rest.

The last time I looked at the clock, wide awake, it was 3:45am. I had to be up at 6:45am to make it to the first MOPS meeting of the semester--it was my groups turn to bring brunch, and I needed to stop at the market to pick up some fruit & orange juice. In my heart of hearts, I just knew that this was the beginning of the end of my pregnancy--we would be meeting our little one very soon.

The first thing I did that morning, as I'm sure all 3rd trimester pregnant women can attest to, was use the restroom. It was then that the first, early sign of labor was upon me. I sent a text message to my midwife to let her know of my bodily happenings and she confirmed that yes, my body was preparing itself for labor; however, it could still be days, or even weeks, away. She advised me to go about my day as normal, so off to the market I went.

I was having irregular contractions throughout the MOPS meeting and continued to feel 'off.' The contractions were getting stronger and slightly more consistent, but still nothing to consider true labor just yet.

I got home from MOPS and we decided to head to the market and pick up some food, in case this was the "real thing." Walking through the market, I had to stop and breathe & slightly sway my hips through contractions. It was then that I knew we would be meeting our baby very soon.

When we got home from the market, around 2:45pm I decided to rest a little bit, since I was starting to feel the effects of 3 hours sleep the night before. I laid down on the couch while Mr. Lukie took care of some last minute details around the house. Because I was only 36 weeks 6 days pregnant at this point, we really felt that we would have plenty of time to finish everything before little Ella's arrival. (Hence the reason our master bathroom is still half painted, 19 days after starting it...)

I stood up to use the restroom and felt some pressure and then a gush of water. I looked up at Mr. Lukie, who was in the kitchen putting groceries away, and told him I needed a towel. He gave me a weird look and asked what I needed a towel for. I smiled and told him that my water had just broken, and that we would be meeting our baby soon.

[Part II to follow...]

Introducing. . .Baby Lukie!

 

Ella Grace

Born 9.21.11 at 8:42am

5lbs 10oz

19 3/4" 

SURPRISE!!

Ella decided to make an early appearance at 37 weeks! Mama was in labor for 16 hours, but Ella was worth every single second of it. 

Ella & Mama are doing wonderfully! We are spending lots of time getting to know one another. Daddy is insanely in love with Ella & she already has him wrapped around her teeny, tiny little finger.

Ella's birth story is being worked on & will be posted soon, but in the meantime, it's back to snuggling and loving this precious little girl for us :)

Stream of Consciousness

I cannot wait to see your face, little one...

          ...what features did you inherit from me? From your father?

          ...are you really a darling baby girl, as I've been feeling all along? Or are you a sweet baby boy?

I cannot wait to watch your Daddy, whose hands will be the first to ever touch you, pull you from my body and present you to me, using your name. 

I cannot wait to watch you take your first breath of air and let out that tiny, mewing cry.

Or to crawl up my body and find the nourishment that only Mama can provide. Such a beautiful moment in time, I am sure.

          But in all of this, I am desperately trying to push away a darkness that is lingering on the              periphery. 

Your daddy has been at work for 3 days. He comes home tomorrow.

          Thankfully.

I never realized before how much he calms my nerves. Lessens my insecurities. Rids my mind of negative thoughts. Alleviates anxiety.

          I'm realizing it all today, though. And you will realize it one day, too.

I'm not normally an anxious person. Excitable, yes. But never anxious. I'm new to this buzzing sensation flowing through my veins, my head pounding, breath shortening.

          Panic. Fear. Anxiety.

37 weeks. 2 days away. Full term. I want to meet you, precious one who has been growing in my womb, knit together there by our Creator for the past 9 months.

          Soon enough, I am sure.