Tag: pregnancy

The Arrival!

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Dearest babies,

YOU’RE HERE! You are actually here!!! So let’s tell the story!

You guys arrived via planned cesarean section on March 1, 2019! Katherine Melissa came first at 7:15 AM weighing 5 pounds 2 ounces and measuring 18 inches long! Elizabeth Susan arrived at 7:16 AM weighing 6 pounds even and measuring 18 inches as well! The doctors let Daddy and I meet each of you in the OR before you were off to the nursery to have some extra checks and oxygen.

Having a c-section was nothing like I expected, although I can’t put into words exactly what it is that I did expect. I was strapped to a table, numb from the chest down, and I was SO NERVOUS; that is until they brought you to the other side of the curtain. You were here! And you look nothing alike! We later found out that you’re definitely fraternal twins as you have different blood types. When the doctors told Mommy that you were both headed to the nursery due to having some low oxygen saturation, that just made Mommy more nervous. Thankfully my own mom, your grandma, was able to watch from outside the OR. I was VERY scared so Daddy stayed to hold my hand and grandma came to the nursery to keep you company until Daddy could be there.

Once they got me sewed up and transferred to my room, the nurse from the nursery came in to talk with me. She let me know that it could me 3-5 hours before I was able to see you since I couldn’t leave my room until my spinal block wore off and the nurses were sure I was okay. That news was heartbreaking because I needed to know you were ok, I needed to hold you! Thankfully, we’d gotten a fancy new camera in preparation for your arrival and Daddy came in right after the nurse left to show me the 100+ pictures that had already been taken of the surgery and you guys in the nursery.

Elizabeth was the first out of the nursery after only an hour. Mommy got to hold and snuggle you! Then, Katherine came in after another hour and a half – again, to snuggles and loves! Both of you immediately made moves to latch and breastfeed. I was so happy! We’re still working on breast feeding, and we’ve been doing some supplementing to make sure you guys are getting enough food. In fact, that’s what I’m doing up writing at 5 AM. Tonight, when you and I (and Daddy!) woke up for your 3 AM feeding, Mommy couldn’t get back to sleep and the 6 AM feeding that’s going to happen very soon, seemed like not enough time to get some sleep. I keep doing this from time to time – I think Mommy is a littttttle sleep deprived.

We spent 4 days in the hospital total. Sometimes, and I was told to expect this, twins’ hospital stays are a little longer than moms for a variety of reasons. Since you are both sugar babies, meaning Mommy had gestational diabetes (woof, we’ll write about that someday), the doctors warned me that you might need to stay longer to have your blood sugars monitored, to get your weight to have a maintain or gain (all babies lose weight initially but sometimes sugar babies lose too much), or perhaps other issues that may arise. To all the doctor’s and nurse’s surprise, you were cleared to go home with us when I was released! You just keep beating the odds and surprising everyone!!

We are home now, and doing feedings every 3 hours. We’ve made it through a whole night and day and now we’re closing in on another night. Daddy and I made a deal to hopefully allow ourselves to get a little sleep tomorrow, so we will see if we can make that happen!!

We love you so much munchkins!

❤ Mommy and Daddy

Trimalleolar Fracture

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Dearest Babykins,

What were Daddy and I doing the night before you guys arrived? Well, if you arrive on time, I plan to have a nice steak dinner with Daddy and maybe even go see one last movie; one last date night before you guys join us. But then I think that whatever we do the night before will be perfect. For instance, if you were to get here today, Daddy and I would have spent last night watching Mommy’s favorite TV shows, having a great dinner, and spending time together. 

Mommy and Daddy have been lucky the last month in the getting to spend time together department. And that has been heavenly! But the reason maybe isn’t so favorable… you see one of the last (hopefully) major events in this pregnancy happened mid January at 30 weeks. Mommy got suddenly hot and dizzy while she was standing and realized she needed to sit down, right away. I started walking across the room to get to a chair to sit; except I didn’t make it. I lost consciousness mid-step. I don’t remember falling. When I woke up, I was on the floor, and my right ankle was at a funny angle.

I was alone at home and injured. What I should have done was immediately call the ambulance. Instead, I called Shannon (Daddy’s aunt who is our age). I had gotten myself into my rolling desk chair and when Shannon got there she started grabbing the things I needed to bring with me and started loading the car. While she was outside putting things in the car, I lost consciousness in the chair again. Shannon said she came in and I was slumped back in the chair with my eyes rolling back in my head and my body was convulsing. She yelled my name several times. I remember coming to and her face coming into focus. She told me she thought I was having a seizure. I don’t remember saying this, but apparently I told her , “No, no I was just dreaming.” Thankfully, she had a level head and called an ambulance. 

So for the second time in this pregnancy (and my life!) I was loaded into an ambulance and brought to a hospital. I got to the ER and it was hours before I could get pain relief. They took X-rays and there was a lot of waiting. And finally, they gave Mommy some meds for the pain. Just as that happened, the orthopedic surgeon on call came in. He let me know that I had broken my ankle – IN THREE PLACES: tib, fib, and talus, what they call a trimalleolar fracture. On top of all that, the angle we were seeing was because it was also dislocated. The ortho guy was there to put it back into place and he promised I would be in much less pain once it was stabilized. Turns out he was right, but whoooooo Buddy was it tough to watch.

Eventually they got me up to the OB floor to have you guys monitored. You had not a care in the world about any of my pain: you were moving away, hearts beating, being perfectly happy healthy swimming-in-the-womb babies. The doctors were so pleased that you guys were unaffected. All in all, nobody is really sure what happened, but it’s assumed that I had a sudden loss in blood pressure which caused the fall and the subsequent loss of consciousness was due to my body going into shock. 

We got scheduled to have a surgery to fix it 10 days later (because the swelling needed to go down first and we didn’t have the aid of Advil to help because you can’t take that while pregnant). Something Mommy didn’t know is that doctors can do major surgery while you’re awake. Woofta. The podiatrist who did the surgery was so kind and so nice, and Mommy was so scared. Turned out they kept me very calm and comfortable, but also definitely awake! The surgery was pretty quick, and everything got all fixed up. But they put me in a cast for the rest of the pregnancy.

So, long story short, Daddy and I might have to work really hard to have that last date because getting around in a wheelchair is really tough. But Daddy has been working SO HARD to make sure we are all alright and everything is taken care of. Daddy got the crib set up, he got your clothes folded and hung up, he’s done the cooking, the cleaning, taken me to appointments, managed the hospital go bag, and been ready for anything. 

It’s two weeks today til our scheduled meet date! We are ready though if you come early – Dr. Sprengeler has a hunch you might surprise us sooner! We love you little loves!

Mommy and Daddy

23 Weeks

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Dearest Babies,

Whoo buddy, this is a tough letter to write. 23 weeks was scary. In fact 23 weeks to 29 weeks was scary. BUT WE ARE 35 WEEKS AND 3 DAYS TODAY SO WE BEAT THE ODDS!!

At 23 weeks and 5 days, Mommy’s body decided it might be eviction day. Mommy’s body ejected her mucus plug; it sounds gross, and frankly it was, ha. Mommy took pictures of it because what else do you do but take pictures when this happens at 10 PM? You send it to your friend who is a Labor and Delivery nurse. Mommy’s friend said, “Well probably no big deal, just call in the morning.”

Mommy woke up the next morning to a text from her friend to call and get an appointment to come in that day. When I called, they slammed me onto the schedule and said the OB coordinator said to her, “Ok honey, hurry your little buns in here.” Thank God Daddy was home. He whipped into gear and got us all in the car and to the clinic.

We were immediately roomed and met with the clinic’s midwife. My OB was in surgery. The midwife called the surgery center and the OB said do an ultrasound and I’ll be up between surgeries. So we got into an ultrasound. The tech was Jess again (seriously, you’ll never know how amazing this woman has been throughout my pregnancy) and Jess did the special ultrasound. Mommy had no idea what was going on, but Jess was super calm and reassuring. But Mommy could tell Jess saw something that wasn’t right.

They put me back into a room and we waited about 15 minutes before our OB doctor came up. She said, “Ok, well, I was afraid of this. And I am so glad you came in. I really am sorry to have to do this, but your cervix is giving out. We really can’t see much of it on the ultrasound, it’s pretty much non-existent.” Those were the words I dreaded hearing. I didn’t even really know what it meant, except that something was wrong. Everything that happened after came so quickly.

Suddenly there were 10 people in the room. Someone was taking my blood pressure, someone was grabbing Mommy’s nurse friend who came and held my hand and wiped my tears, someone asked Daddy some questions and gave him some instructions, someone put in an IV, and then there was an ambulance crew. We were going for a ride to the cities – 2.5 hours away to Abbott NW which is connected to Children’s Hospital. They were preparing for you guys to come any minute.

We got to Abbott and were whirled into a room. Daddy had been sent home by me to grab things and meet us down there, so it was just me and a lot of nurses, doctors, and PAs. They asked a million questions and Mommy answered the best she could. I learned a lot about how labor works and the scary things that we could be expecting in the coming time. They gave Mommy some steroids to help develop your lungs in case you arrived soon, and then put me on a Magnesium drip for 12 hours (TORTURE!).

You did NOT arrive, by the grace of God. We were there for a total of 10 days. I’m not going to go into the details really, but it was 10 days of being poked and pricked and careful close watching. After 10 days of no changes, the doctors offered two choice: You can stay here in the cities in the expectant mom dorms (they were like the size of closets!), or we could go halfway back home and stay with family in St. Cloud until 28 weeks. The doctors were adamant that they were really HOPING we would make it to that point but that it wasn’t likely. The doctors said it would be a miracle to make it to 32 weeks and we definitely wouldn’t make it to 34. Little did they know you goofs had other plans 🙂

We chose to go to St. Cloud to stay with Mommy’s aunt and uncle who lived 5 minutes from the hospital there. The St. Cloud hospital has the same level of care and NICU as Abbott NW after 25 weeks so everyone was very comfortable with Mommy being in St. Cloud. Everyone, except Mommy. I went in for the 26 week appointment and scan with Daddy in St. Cloud and after we heard that again there were no changes, Mommy asked if there was ANY WAY we could go home? That I would be so much more comfortable there and that we were still within an hour. I could tell the doctor wasn’t exactly comfortable with this plan, but she advised Mommy of the risks and what to watch for. The doctor in St. Cloud said she would work with our OB at home and they let us go home.

Getting back to our house after 3 weeks of being gone brought me so much relief! I was put on modified bedrest: no driving unless to appointments, no over doing it, don’t lift things, don’t bend over, no stairs if possible, try to spend as much time as possible relaxing – meaning I wasn’t confined to bed, but I was relegated to the quiet life.

Well, it worked. Here we are at 35 weeks, and the St. Cloud people discharged us from their care at 33 weeks. In fact, at 29 weeks, the St. Cloud people said, “Well… we didn’t think we would see this day, but at this point, I think you’re going to make it to term, or at least very close to it!” That was some exciting (and relieving) news!

Now this wasn’t the last of the troubles in the pregnancy (we’ve got one more big event!), but we are still safe at home right now and still, to everyone’s shock and awe, pregnant.

Stay safe in there my babies! We love you so much!

Mommy and Daddy