Why we stayed...

I really wanted to go home after 24 hours at the hospital when Owen was born.  Not only do I not sleep well in the hospital bed (does anyone??) but I had three other kids at home and my mom had to leave on the 13th and I was really hoping that we would be home to see her off.  As it was we were "allowed" to leave by noon on the 13th so I did get to see my mom for an hour before she had to go home.

For the record they "had" us stay because Owen had some risk factors that put him in danger of having severe jaundice.  This is mostly my fault.  You see my blood type is O negative. Brady is A positive.  Because of this I have to get Rhogam shots to prevent my body from developing antibodies to Brady's positive blood type that could cause me to miscarry future pregnancies.  I have one shot during pregnancy and then I receive one after birth if the child is born with positive blood.  So I have had 8 of these shots total now.  :o)    All this I knew about.  What I didn't know was that my O blood could also develop antibodies to Brady's A type (regardless of our positive or negative status).  That is what had happened and Owen (poor kids) has A positive blood and some how MY antibodies against A blood had made their way over to Owen.  Nice.  This puts him at a higher risk for jaundice that can become extreme rather quickly.  Sigh.

So they wanted us to stay for at least 48 hours to keep an eye on him and do bili level checks off and on.

At this point I need to say that ALL of my kids have been jaundiced.  Rory was by far the worst and had to be checked at least 6 or 7 times (that lovely heel poke...7 freaking times...so fun).   All three girls turned yellow/orange before leaving the hospital.  None of the girls needed to have light treatments or hospital stays because of being jaundiced.  In an effort to help prevent Owen from having jaundice I did quite a bit of research and had asked the doctors if we could leave him attached to the umbilical cord until it stopped pulsing.  They told me as long he was fine and I was fine that they could do that for us, no problem.  I asked for this because I wanted Owen to start life on the outside with all his stuff from the placenta.  It has been known to help with infant anemia (they start with all their own blood volume and the iron stores from the cord and placenta) and despite there being no link with helping with jaundice I figured it couldn't hurt.  My Doctors were all for it and because everything went well with his rather fast delivery he got to cuddle with me and they waited until his extremely long cord stopped pulsing to have Brady do the cutting.

After the news of Owen having my antibodies to his own blood type we waited for him to turn yellow.  Figured there was no way to avoid it at that point.  I was annoyed that I had to stay in the hospital for another day, that I was probably going to miss my mom going home, and all because Owen might get bad jaundice.  But I am all for using caution.

So imagine my surprise when Owen didn't turn yellow.  At 24 hours after birth he was a lovely rosy color and his bili levels were on the very low (and normal) side.  Still couldn't go home. Just to be safe you know.  Of course the next day was Friday the 13th and by 4am the maternity ward was PACKED.  My nurse came and woke me up and explained that they might need to move me to a different floor because they were going to need my room.  Nice.  Can't I just go home instead??  I pushed hard (and with help from my awesome nurses who recognized that I was more than capable of recognizing if there was a problem and bringing Owen back if I thought he had jaundice) they decided I could leave by noon.  Yay!

Owen didn't start turning yellow until his third day of life.  It didn't reach the whites of his eyes until his fifth day of life. He got his heel poked at his first appointment and had "elevated" levels which went down two days later.  And that was the extent of his experience with jaundice.

Because I am who I am (read easily amused), I find it all very amusing now.

Owen is doing very well.  He is a little gassy here and there, most annoyingly late at night.  He eats like a champ and prefers to sleep in my arms, but will sleep in his swing too.  It's looking like he will be a blond in the way Cadence was.  I have some newborn photos I need to get up on the blog so you can all ogle his cuteness. His sisters love him so much!  Beckah loves him a little too aggressively at times.  She loves when I will lay on the floor with him so she can lay there and "ooooo!" at him for a while.  Been working on her ability to be soft and gentle.  So far she (and I) are doing well and she hasn't injured him or made him cry.  Cadence is super helpful and is always willing to cuddle him for me when I need my hands and Rory is becoming a pro at holding him and is learning from her big sister how to be helpful.

I am loving on him as much as I can.  Our home, while very crazy at the moment, feels full and complete. It is a feeling I can't really describe and, while I will be very happy never to be pregnant again, there is a little corner of my heart that is sad to know he will be my last baby.  So I am trying to drink in every moment I can.  He reminds me so much of the girls when they were small, and at the same time he is very much a little boy.  I can tell he is growing and changing already, as he should, but he still looks crazy small to me when Brady holds him or Beckah lays down next to him.  The time is already passing to quickly.

My girls are doing wonderful.  Cadence is so grown up!  She reads so very well now and enjoys books.  She is slowly figuring out writing and is constantly drawing books and writing stories for us.  I love nothing better than a little note from her on the fridge or my bedroom door. She is sweet, helpful, and kind.  I see a lot of myself in her and I have to try and remember not to put to much responsibility on her shoulders.  It is harder than it sounds because she is insanely capable and willing to help.  Brady made the observation that she is going to make a ton of money babysitting one day.  Kids just flock to her and she has a calming effect on most of them that is very nice in our home.

Rory is coming into her own.  Potty training seems to finally be mastered much to my relief.  Rory is my little firecracker.  She loves to play and hates to pick up when she is done. She loves to cuddle and is my very emotional girl.  She often forgets that she can ask for help and instead will burst into tears.  We have been working on asking for what we need before we throw a fit.  I can always count on Rory to tell my a silly joke and to laugh at just about anything.  She is also very willing to help when I need her too and loves help me with "big girl" chores.  She is very much my girlie girl and is currently in love with She-Ra.

Beckah is every bit 16 months old.  She is into everything, never stops moving, and has no internal caution meter.  She is also running now.  I know.  It's totally awesome.  Want to know if you successfully baby proofed?  Invite us over!  Beckah will find anything you wouldn't want a baby to have in about 5 minutes flat.    Lost something?  Invite us over!  Beckah will find anything that was deemed lost forever in about 10 minutes.  You think I am joking...but I'm not.  She will climb anything, put anything in her mouth, can run faster than most people twice her height and has a never ending supply of energy.  I don't remember Cadence and Rory being this bad...oh yeah...that's because they weren't this bad.  She is growing up to fast too.  Her vocabulary is exploding right now.  She repeats everything and surprises me with new words, sentences, and games all the time.  If Cadence and Rory can do it, she figures she can too (and 90% of the time she can do it).  When I went to the hospital to have Owen I left behind a little baby girl that seemed so small to me still. I came home to a giant toddler who could now scream no at everyone.

Brady and I are coping better than I thought.  Things are settling into a good little pattern.  My house is loud, crazy, stressful and happy.  Most days are good and every now and then we have a bad one.  I am grateful for good friends who remind me how capable I am and help me out when I need it.  I am healing well and I am getting good sleep most nights as well.  Mostly I think Brady and I have accepted that it is going to be crazy for a while.  It makes it easier to appreciate the non crazy days if you expect insanity from the start.  :o)

We hope that you are doing well and enjoying your summer.  We are looking forward to a visit from Grandma Suzi next week and then summer break will be over and Cadence will start first grade!  I can't believe how quickly this year has gone already!

At little story about Owen...

Owen Brady Lantz was born on July 11th, 2012 at 3:39pm weighing 7lbs 1oz and was 21.5 inches long. 

Starting about 2 weeks before I was due my feet started itching. My hands had been itching pretty much my whole pregnancy.  Itching happens when you are pregnant and I didn't think much of it really.  My doctor new about it but it was pretty much annoying more than anything. When my feet started to itch I was very annoyed but it wasn't anything I thought much of at the time.  Then 4 days before my due date it got crazy.  My feet itched so bad I couldn't sleep.  So I looked up things I could do to help with the itching and discovered that it was a common symptom of Cholestasis of Pregnancy.  Turns out that I had more than one of the symptoms.  I had all but two of the symptoms actually.  So I called my Doctor.  

While I waited to hear back my mom and I took care of getting some documents notarized for the house in Vegas and tying up some loose ends at the house.  We made plans for what needed to be done the next day.  I was concerned about what this meant for little boy blue but since it was my due date I wasn't sure what they were going to do about any of it.  I had an induction date for the 17th set up (it's hard to get into the Medical Center we wanted to deliver at on short notice) and I figured unless this was really going to be dangerous my doctors would just leave things until then.  

My Doctor surprised me by sending me to the Medical Center to have a work up done since I had so many symptoms so fast.  My initial blood work looked good but the test specifically for Cholestasis took at least two days to come back.  The head doctor decided that my symptoms were severe enough to move my induction date since the only way to make everything go away and to protect the baby is to have the baby. They moved my induction up to the next morning and gave me a script to help with the itching in my feet so that I could get some much needed sleep that night.  

The prescription worked and I was well rested the next morning when Brady and I arrived at the Medical Center and checked into the Maternity Ward. We arrived at 7am and they tried to get my IV started.  IVs are hit and miss for me.  My veins are small, roll and are prone to rupture which I am very open about with the nurses.  My nurse blew one in my hand and decided to call for another nurse who was known for getting hard veins to cooperate. Nurse #2 blew one in the other hand and side of my wrist and during her third attempt I got nauseated and then almost passed out.  That was a new experience for me and not one I want to have again.  So they sent for the anesthesiologist.  He blew one more, couldn't find another and finally gave me a little bit of local in my upper arm and finally got one in!  It was crazy.   

As you can imagine that all took a little bit of time.  So my pit didn't get started until 9am.  I was at a 3/4 and 50% and they decided to let me labor through to a full 4 before breaking my water.  I warned them that I don't move to fast until they break my water, but once it's broken I go quickly.  So from 9am to 1pm I had little to no change.  So they decided to break my water.  I had decided a while a go that I was going to try and do this delivery with out pain medications, specifically an epidural.  I have had an epi with all three of the girls, though the one with Rory only worked a little bit and the one with Beckah only worked on one side.  I figured with how quickly I went when my water breaks I could do it. 

So they break my water.  There was so much water!  I even my Doctor and nurse were saying, "Really? more?"  No wonder this boy thought he could just spread right out in there!  I had close to an Olympic swimming pool in there! 

Then we got down to business.  It was impossible to talk through the contractions. I was hurting.  A lot.  But I was proud of myself because I was breathing through them well.  I got to a 6 in half an hour.  I got up for a bit and then asked for a birthing ball.  That's when the shaking started. I had hit transition. My nurse was awesome.  She kept reminding me that I was doing so well, to keep breathing.  Brady was there doing what I asked when I needed it.  At one point I knew that I needed to get back in the bed.  My body was starting to shake so bad that I couldn't be stable on my feet and my hands had started to tingle and go numb.  I got in the bed and I remember thinking that I knew that this was it and I was nearing the end.  My mind was still working and I honestly was trying to do what people were asking of me, but my body was screaming that it was either baby time or I was going to die.  I kept breathing, mostly because it was the only thing that I could get my body and mind to agree on.  I remember telling them that there wasn't any pressure to push and then with the next contraction I HAD to push.  The doctor said I was only at a 9 with a lip and not to push.  I tried not to but my body finally won.  My feet were tingly and going numb too at that point.  They put an oxygen mask on and everyone was all over the place getting the bed torn down and gowns on and tools out.  They tell me to push when I feel like it and I gave it my all.  Everyone is telling me I am doing fantastic and all I can think is I needed to push the kid OUT NOW!  

The baby's heart dropped and then they lost it completely.  The head doctor tells me that he can let me have two more tries and then he will have to use the little vacuum to help me get him out since they can't find him on the monitor. I tell the Doctor to just do what they need to do.  So I pushed with everything I had and the Doctor pulled.  Next thing I know Owen was up on my chest and I was suddenly back in control of myself again.  I was worried about Owen since he was a bit blue, but after some rubbing he gained color quickly.  It was amazing!  

I took my time with him and then let them clean him up while they finished up with me.  He was so LONG! The baby nurse even held out his legs and made everyone look at how long they were!  

I remember commenting to Brady that I couldn't believe that I had just done that.  I mean, I know I had done it three times before, but Owen's birth was...something else entirely.  I still look back and wonder if it really happened.  

He is a good boy.  Eats on his own time table and has the saddest sounding little cry.  His sisters love him to death and I am so glad that my mom got to meet him before going home.  

We are home now. I will type up more about why we had to stay later.  For now we are enjoying our perfectly sweet new addition and look forward to adjusting to our new family of six.