Claire's Birth Story (Part 3): First Few Weeks at Home

Picking up where I Ieft off to finish out Claire’s birth story and journey home.  Luckily Claire’s jaundice was quickly resolved and only had to be on the bilirubin blanket for less than 24 hours.  Unfortunately, my follow up appointment for my blood pressure wasn’t as smooth.  We ventured back out for my recheck and it was high.  My doctor 'scared' it back down though, she told me to lay down and relax and if it doesn’t go down in the next 10 minutes, she was going to readmit me back in the hospital and put me on magnesium sulfate to bring it down.  Okay, I know people who have had mag sulfate and I’ve also read horror stories about how bad mag sulfate is and how you basically lay in bed and vomit continuously for 24 hours (sulfate is rough on the stomach).  So I concentrated on relaxing as much as I could and the nurse came back in 5 minute intervals checking my blood pressure and within a half hour it was completely normalized and I got the green light to go home with strict orders to take it easy and continue on my blood pressure medication.  Wheew!  Last thing I wanted was to go back to the hospital.

The first week, Aaron stayed home to help out with Claire.  I was still in a lot of pain and moving slowly and my blood pressure was making me feel less than great.  We sent Annie to daycare and kept her as close to her normal schedule as possible.  Claire pretty much slept for the first 2 weeks, only really waking to eat.  She was being a pretty easy baby for us which helped as we adjusted back at home. 

Aaron and I both were surprised how much more relaxed we were with baby #2.  I remember the first night we brought Annie home, I didn’t sleep a wink, I checked on her probably literally every 5 minutes and was so nervous about that first night.  With Claire, we had her set up in our room and I slept soundly, setting my alarm every 3 hours to feed her but had no troubles sleeping or worrying about her.  Aaron commented on how much more relaxed he was and how much more easily he was able to enjoy just holding her.  We both felt so nervous as parents the first time around that I don’t think we really fully appreciated those sweet newborn moments and taking in their tiny little selves.  

The newest of Claire has yet to wear off for Annie, which is great.  She wants to be the biggest helper, which is sweet.  The first thing Annie does when she walks in the door from daycare is run thru the house looking for Claire.  Claire is usually in the swing, the Rock N Play, or in the Pack N Play.  And when she finds her, she wants to hold her right away.  We are working on Annie with being gentle, her help is a little forceful at times.  Shoving a paci into the baby’s mouth forcefully is not being gentle.  Annie likes to go get the diapers and wipes and wants to change Claire’s diaper all the time.  And then if she is sleeping, well she wants to wake her.  When Annie is clapping along to Dora the Explorer, she will reach over and clap Claire’s hands for her.  When Claire is in the swing, Annie is pointing to the tummy time mat, wanting her down where Annie can play with her.  It is incredibly enduring but then there are times if I’m hold Claire and Annie is being ‘needy’ then Annie gets pretty upset.  We try to have a good balance of Aaron and I trading off between kids but sometimes Annie is very particular on who she wants at a certain moment.

My recovery overall has been going well.  I actually started feeling really good 2 weeks out and ended up over doing it and popped a stitch.  That was pretty painful!  That put me back in bed for a good week but now I feel like I'm on the homestretch of my recovery and am almost fully recovered now. Recovery the 2nd time around has been much easier than the first time. 

All in all, we are getting along okay.  Claire sleeps a lot still and waking up every 3 hours to feed her is tiring.  I don’t remember being this tired with Annie but I’m hopeful she will be sleeping thru the night by 8 weeks old like Annie did (fingers crossed!).  Our evenings are the most chaotic with Annie home from daycare, dinner, clean up, bath nights, the struggle of putting Annie to bed and just feeling overall fatigued by end of the day but we managing and thriving so far! 

After Claire's Birth (Part 2): The Hospital Stay

Despite having an elevated AFP during pregnancy that could result in an open tube defect, a closed tube defect, a placenta that stops delivering nutrients, a baby born early, or growth issues… Claire was actually born HEALTHIER than Annie was!  My prayers of desperation, my prayer warriors, my recommended changes in my diet, staying on top of my prenatals, etc all paid off.  God answered some of my biggest prayers to date and it is so humbling and rewarding to now have Claire here in perfect health.  She actually weighed slightly more than Annie (no growth issue here!), our Pediatrician was able to confirm that she doesn’t have a closed tube defect (the one thing they couldn’t tell in ultrasounds).  And although she had jaundice, it was a lower level of jaundice than what Annie had so really all in all, this baby surpassed even Annie’s health at birth!  It’s amazing and humbling.  I really can say that over the past few years I have been mindful not to take my family’s health for granted but Claire’s pregnancy and birth has really just amplified that even more.

 

The afternoon after she was born, was actually a pretty tiring day.  My blood pressure was fine all day long, I was allowed to have some ice chips mid-afternoon and the nurse kept telling me to slow down on them or I’d make myself sick.  Ice chips never tasted so good and all I wanted to do was eat them by the handfuls.

We had lots of feedings with a little trouble getting the right latch.  I didn’t breast feed Annie skin to skin for very long for similar reasons.  It’s not that either babies had troubles eventually latching, but getting that perfect latch was incredibly painful and I had blisters on the first day.   I also feel like getting the baby into position is really awkward for me, I needed practically 6 hands every time to help get it right.  I breastfed the entire hospital stay but we did have to supplement with formula a few times as she went back to the nursery and acted hungry again right away.

The lactation consultants are incredibly helpful but a little too passionate about breastfeeding.  One was going on a rant about how breast milk provides so many healing benefits.  She went as far as saying that if my baby develops pink eye that I should squirt breast milk into her eye to help heal it and if my husband gets a cut working around the house, forget Neosporin, put breast milk on it.  I’m all about organic natural solutions but I’m not going to chase my family around trying to throw my breast milk on their every wound.  I think I’ll stick to Neosporin thank you.

  

Later in the afternoon, my Mom and Annie came to visit.  Annie right away was very intrigued by her new baby sister.  Staring at her and wanting to reach in and touch her.  It was really sweet to see her soaking Claire in.  Surprisingly, Annie really didn’t want much to do with me, which was fine by me as I was still pretty numb and sore from surgery but she sat on Aaron’s lap and got to hold Claire.   It was a very precious moment that I’ll remember forever.  About the time they left is about the time my blood pressure started creeping back up again.  I found this very frustrating and it was starting to get late in the day and I was also really getting tired but every time I’d try to rest, a nurse would come in to check my vitals or Claire would need fed.  It just was never ended!  With both pregnancies, I found the hospital stays to be extremely tiring and finding the time to rest is nearly impossible. 

First moment watching my family together for the first time

We had a plan with the nurses that I would try to get up and walk to the bathroom late that evening.  By 8 pm I was still so numb that I couldn’t lift my legs.  We rescheduled for 11 pm.  11 pm rolls around and I’m just now starting to get the feeling back.  The nurse commented that I must have gotten a really good spinal because I should have had full feeling back hours ago so we delayed getting me out of bed until the next morning which was a bummer to me because it’s highly recommended to get out of bed as soon as possible after a c-section as it speeds up the recovery.  4 am rolled around and I finally got out of bed.  This time around, the terrible feeling of surgery was not too foreign to me, I remembered how it felt and I was able to cope with it better, last time I was completely shocked at how hard it was to move after a c-section and really struggled with the pain.

We never watched Annie get her first bath, it actually was cool to see Claire's first bath

The next day my blood pressure yo-yo’ed. I tried to walk the hall and got a little too ambitious and ended up in a lot of pain trying to walk too far.  We also had the hospital photographer stop in.  With Annie we declined having her picture taken at the hospital, we already had newborn pictures on the calendar scheduled and didn’t feel the need to pay for a hospital one.  With Claire, I thought sure let’s get a picture.  Well… things certainly have changed from what I perceived as a hospital picture!  The photographer came in and got pretty professional on us.  She started taking pics of Claire and then started to pose Aaron and I and I was like whoa… I didn’t realize we were all taking pictures?  She goes oh ya these are lifestyle photos I’m taking.  Whatever happen to just snapping one picture at the hospital?  I guess it’s very nice for people who want the convenience of pictures without having to schedule a photographer but since we had newborn pictures already scheduled, we didn’t order any of these but I will say the photos weren’t bad, but not nearly as good as my photographer’s.  If I would have known in advance how involved they would have been, I would have declined taking them but it is a nice service for those who don’t have a photographer already. 

Great Grandparent visit

The following day my blood pressure remained mostly high and it sent me into an emotional roller coaster where poor Aaron had to handle me in tears and I was feeling completely helpless as to why my blood pressure was so high. 

  

My sweet little Annie brought me flowers in the hospital

Sunday was finally going home day.  The Pediatrician came in told me that Claire’s bilirubin levels jumped quite a bit over night but luckily she said she could release her as long as we went home with a bilirubin blanket.  Her levels still were not as high as Annie’s were so it really was nothing I was too worried about.  My doctor came in and suggested I stay in the hospital until my blood pressure came down.  I was not on board, I honestly thought being in the hospital was what was driving my blood pressure higher so we agreed that I would be sent home on blood pressure medication and would come in for an office recheck in the following days.  Whew, homebound we were!

Grandparent visit 

As it did last time, it took forever to get us formally discharged.  I knew Annie would be napping and I told my nurse it was important that I get home during my 2 year old’s napping window so we could get settled before I got bombarded by her neediness.  We finally got released and got home and I was very relieved to find that my parents had everything under control and settled for us.  My mom had washed up all our sheets, made the beds, the house was just as clean as we left it and I actually felt like I could relax and finally get some rest.  Claire slept like an angel all the way home, we got her set up on the bilirubin blanket and was a perfect baby the rest of the day.  And even Annie took an extra-long nap that day, both kiddos must have known Mama needed a little rest!  

Annie's second hospital visit to Claire.  Love my girls!

Claire's Birth Story: PART 1

Did you notice that Claire was born a day earlier than scheduled?  Slight change in plans occurred in my 38^th week.  My blood pressure started to creep up and at my last doctor visit it was high and given my history of preclampsia with my previous pregnancy, my doctor decided it wasn’t worth waiting even a day later so she bumped me up to a Thursday delivery.  No big deal, it was a day earlier than expected and ultimately given my blood pressure continued to increase after Claire’s birth, it definitely was a wise call by my doctor.

 

My doctor wasn’t scheduled to perform surgery that Thursday and I think she knew how unnerving that was for me to have a doctor I wasn’t familiar with so she accommodated her schedule to make herself available for my c-section.  Dr. McEntaffer has been an amazing OB thru both of my pregnancies.  Only downfall to our change was that I would have to wait until noon for surgery, when typically, they are done early in the morning as they don’t want you to eat or drink after midnight, not even water.  It was worth the starvation though to have my preferred doctor do the surgery.
 

I surprisingly slept okay (not great but not bad) the night before, I was allowed to take some Unisom to help me sleep, which always helps.  My mom came down the night before and we decided it would be best to take Annie into daycare, mainly because she naps better there and I didn’t want her grumpy that afternoon when she came to meet Claire.  Sending her off was kinda bittersweet, it was our last moment as a family of 3. 

I felt pretty calm that morning but was antsy to get the surgery behind us.  We decided to deliver at a different hospital this time just so we could be close to the children’s hospital, it only took that one scare during my pregnancy to make me change my delivery to the full service hospital.

We got checked in relatively quickly, settled into our tiny room (the main drawback of delivering at this hospital is the c-section rooms are tiny!) and got my IV going and my vitals were great, my blood pressure was just fine.   At this time, I asked my nurse if everything goes as scheduled, I should be able to have lunch a few hours after, right?  Um no.  Come to find out, no food/drink for a few hours and then mid-afternoon if I wanted to try some ice chips, we could and if that went well, I could have a popsicle for dinner and maybe by 9 pm I could consider some pudding.  And for breakfast the next day I could order solid foods.  WTH?!  Now that was super disappointing to find out!  With Annie being delivered so late, I was too tired to even think about food and fell asleep a few hours after she arrived so I guess I didn’t realize the whole no eating part would be long.  Ugh!   

Just waiting around for the doctor

My doctor was about 30 minutes behind schedule, no big deal, especially after finding out I wouldn’t be eating after all.  Once my doctor arrived, things happened fast.  I walked back to surgery and got up on the table, anesthesiologist put my spinal block in, which really didn’t hurt, no different than what I felt when I received an epidural for my previous pregnancy.  Like a bee sting.  Laid down and they pulled the curtain up and put my catheter in.  I’m really not sure when they started cutting but as promised, baby Claire was born very quickly, doctor had told me it would generally be 5 minutes after the start and it seemed to be the case.  It was hard for me to see her from where I was but they cleaned her up and did whatever they all do when babies are born.  I had asked to try skin to skin right after birth.  My anesthesiologist was not fond of the idea to allow this during surgery but I got the okay to do so.  It honestly was super awkward because the curtain was so high up on me that she was practically laying across my neck so after about a minute I asked that they take her and let Aaron hold her.  Surgery was supposed to last an hour, it felt quick and long all at the same time. 

 

7 lbs 7.4 oz -- a few ounces bigger than Annie!

Skin to skin during surgery 

At one point my doctor said things are moving along but my uterus was being ‘lazy’ for them.   I still have no idea what that meant exactly but at the time all I could think that must be code for complication so I started to panic a little but from what I understand, they put some medication on it and my uterus did whatever it was supposed to do but it made me feel off and I told my anesthesiologist that I was feeling faint and he said oh that’s just the normal reaction for the med they gave your uterus so that is how I know they had to do something that was a bit atypical.  I wanted to say take the damn thing out if it’s being ‘lazy’, I don’t need it anymore anyways!

When surgery was over, it was a huge sigh of relief for me.  I got wheeled back to my room and a lot of nurses were in and out and had our first feeding.  It was surreal how procedural it was, when I walked back to surgery I was like holy cow, we are going to be back in this room within an hour with a new baby, crazy! 

This delivery was way different than Annie’s.  It’s hard to even compare the two and I’m still getting comfortable with the admission that Annie’s birth may have been the worst day of my life (I hate that it had to be that way).  But I try not to blame myself for it because they had me so drugged up, I hadn’t had any food in 50 hours, was totally exhausted, it was late in the day when she arrived and I remember barley even being able to keep my eyes open the first time I held her, it felt awful to have that be my first moment with my precious newborn to be that way so of course her birth wasn’t as joyous for me with all those factors.  This time, my hunger was manageable, minimal drugs, I wasn’t too tired and I was mentally cognizant the first time I held her.  I was actually able to hold Claire and feel a lot more aware of the moment than I could with Annie’s birth, exactly how a Mother imagines meeting their new baby, I felt like what I was robbed of before, I got to experience this time around.  Much, much better experience overall!  

More blogging details to come… Part 2: After birth in the hospital (Annie meets Claire, yay!).  Part 3: The first week at home. 

Claire McKenna Hyde

Claire McKenna Hyde joined our family on Thursday April 28th at 12:58 pm, weighing in at 7 lbs, 7 oz, she is doing great and we are all home now.  Annie is in love with her little sister already!