It's Not That I Haven't Had Time...

It's just that I haven't had time to post!!! I'm sorry and things will be better from here on out! I spent the last week getting my new classroom (we moved into the new school last week) unpacked with my substitute. When Wyatt wasn't sleeping and I didn't have two hands available, I was transcribing lesson plans from my chicken scratch to something legible for her! So I've been recovering/killing myself with work. What's new right? But now that responsibilities are taken care of I'm back to taking care of myself.

I have a ton to post so I'll break in down in order. First, here are a few pics of my little man before we left the hospital:

Staring at daddy

Ready to go home. The plug already comes in handy.

The day after we arrived home we had another baby - of the four-legged variety:

By the weekend I was having serious cabin fever so we drove to the Dunes where I chilled out in the shade.

Love the baby sling. It's awesome! I do chores in it - shop - go walking...

Wyatt is a great sleeper even though he gets me up multiple times a night. He also wants to be held almost all the time. He loves his carseat however and I can generally sit him in it while he checks out his world...as long as he has something to suck on. I'm sensing an oral fixation. Oh well, as long a he isn't using me as the pacifier it's all good.

I didn't have to pose him for this. He's a natural in front of the camera.

Welcome Wyatt James Cornum!

August 15th at 4:47 am ~ 7lbs 14.5 oz ~ 20 inches long

There's quite a story to this (isn't there always?), so I'm going to break it down into abbreviated steps:

1) Woke up to contractions Thursday morning at about 2:30 am. Were between 15 and 30 minutes apart, and mildly uncomfortable all day. Not really sure if true early labor.

2) By 11 pm were consitantly at 7 minutes apart and a little stronger, timed them until 3 am when I called the OB Ward and was told you can be comfortable at home or here - your choice. We waited until 6am to head in as they kept getting stronger.

3) Admitted and hooked up to a moniter that showed I was indeed having contractions 5 to 7 minutes apart, 2 cm dialated and 100% effaced. My doctor who's leaving is out of town until the 20th (when he planned on inducing me) so the midwife left in charge of his patients checked me out. I didn't change in dilation between 6 and 10am so there was some questions to whether I was in true early labor - but they were still strong and regular. Told to go home with a sleeping pill and when I woke up they would be gone. I was VERY sceptical, but hey - what do I know? So I went home. Big mistake. The damn midwife should have had a doctor look at me - or perhaps paid attention to the fact I was in pain. Contractions continued, getting stronger through the night - so basically I'm going on night 3 of no sleep and combined with the pain I'm getting stressed out.

4) Total wreck by Friday morning, refusing to go in only to be sent home again, in a ton of pain but still only 5 to 7 minutes apart. Nate talks me into heading out at 11 am, whereas I inform the admitting nurse I'm not leaving this place again (they teased me about it all day yesterday). Now here comes the Midwife's BIG mistake in play:

5) I'm hooked to the monitors only to be informed I have dangerously high blood pressure, the babies heartbeat is sky high, but dropping dangerously low with each contraction and taking a long time to recover. I'm still only at 2cm! But so stressed out from the last 30 unnecisary hours of contractions...the doctor on call makes the decision from the phone to get me leveled out and get me going. He then comes in and tells me because of the babies heartrate dips and slow recovery we need to think about a C-Section. I really wanted to deliver so asked him what would change his mind, and he said if the baby leveled out soon and stayed there. And that's exactly what happened.

6) Hooked to Picosin to jumpstart my dilation, water breaks on it's own at 3cm where I jump to a 5 quickly. Get an epidural which rocked. Moved to an 8 in a few hours. Epidural quits, next dose doesn't work, about ready to die after 2 hours, get a dose of lidocain, works immediatly, dilate to a 9...9...9...9...losing the pain meds, get a new dose and told to take a nap - only at 9.5cm. Almost there! Stuck at 9.5...still stuck...still stuck 4 hours later. Doctor comes in and decided we probably need to do a C-Section as the baby is starting to stress again, not bad but I should have moved forward 5 hours ago. He asks if I have the control to push - I do, he decides I'm going to deliver and he's going to move the last little bit of cervix over by hand. We start, pressure, and the baby stops. Try again, no go. Doctor doesn't know why but decides we're all tired of this and goes to tell the staff to ready the OR.

7) He no more than walks out the door and we lose the babies heartbeat completely. The nurses are turning me back and forth, calling for the doctor, prepping me for emergency surgery, pushing the baby up further - it was choas. They had me in the OR in less than 3 minutes and the heartbeat was back to normal.

8) Short umbilical cord wrapped around his neck. In short, when we went to deliver we were hanging him.

9) Baby bounced back great with a stress test score of 8.5/10. Hung out with dad until mom was recovered and then latched right on for his first feeding. Everything's been fine since!

10) I'm also bouncing back and should be let go tomorrow! So I got to experiece a full labor and c-section! Lucky me! I'm assuming I can blame the midwife who blew me off as another's patient for much of the occurances. I loved the doctor who was on call, and I was treated wonderfully. He, however, no longer works here full time but only covers 2 weekends a month as he works full time for the Mayo Clinic. I get to follow up with my regular doctor before he leaves for good. My RN through this all came to visit today and was pretty disappointed to hear what had happened but was so glad I ended up in good hands.

Oh - You So Know I Wasn't Giving Up...

...riding for 10 months did you? Seriously? I think I've given it up now until the baby is born (because I can't get my foot in the stirrup), but this was me last Wednesday. Not sure what I'm saying - or if I'm surprised - or what to explain my facial expression - and why the picture is a little washed out, but Maggie and I had a nice ride bring up calves for a calf roper that evening. Don't worry. I wouldn't ride if I didn't know she would take complete care of me.

If you have a problem with that come deal with her:

Thought we were having a baby yesterday. When we got out of the rodeo, Nate and I walked around the carnival, ate some good carni food and just were hanging out when I started feeling a little 'wet'. Not really abnormal, but by the time we walked to the truck it definitely felt abnormal. As I couldn't see I asked Nate to take a look - and my shorts were soaked. We were like, "um, I think we need to go to the hospital..." So we went and the admitting nurse was sure I broke my water (there was that much) - but in checking, the tests weren't coming back as amniotic fluid, even though they aren't 100%. My Doctor was on call, sent me home and told me I could have a rupture but there was plenty of fluid in there and the baby's head could be blocking the rupture because it's "RIGHT THERE!" - which coincidentally is making it hard for me to walk. Anyway - went home to see if contractions started or had anymore leakage, and 24 hours later nothing is out of the ordinary so I guess we had a total false alarm. Oh well.

Speaking of babies here's my baby from last year chillin' with his mommy. He's been weaned for about 7 months, and is incredibly independent for a herd animal, but still loves to spend time with his mom from time to time. She's not really protective of him, but I catch them together from time to time in a mother/son pose. It's sweet to see how animals still have affection for their offspring.

And these little buggers flew the coop the day after I got this picture, but I just thought they were so cute to watch grow up. It was hard to get a picture because the nest is up under the roof of the house and there's only a few inches between the bottom of the roof and the top of the nest. They were hanging out over the edge this day so I snapped a picture while mom and dad dive bombed me. I think I was ducking while I took this - which is why it's a little blurry.