Well my maternity leave is officially over and I find myself asking the question, "If we lived in a VW bus, could I get away with not working?" My friend Lauren points out that if I hadn't "made" Matt get sell "Camper's Camper" then I would never have to work again. For those of you who are not familiar with "Camper's Camper" it was a 1970's Shasta camper, kelly green and white. Needless to say it wasn't exactly the prettiest vehicle on the road. It wasn't the fastest either. On my one trip in the ol' beast we were passed by a little girl in a Barbie Power Wheels Jeep. Well, not really, but it could have happened if Power Wheels were allowed on the interstate. But, I digress. The point is that the first week back to work was a little rough and I found myself wishing I could just stay home with my sweet little angel!
My first night back, last Monday, I walked in on a Cor Zero. For those of you who enjoy Grey's or ER, a Code Blue. Thank goodness, the baby is okay, but it was a rough start to a rough night. Torrey, my coworker for the evening, recently returned from her own leave of absence. She spent the summer in the Philippines. It was her third shift back and my first, so it was the blind leading the blind that evening. We ran our rear ends off. Neither one of us ate, I did manage to pump but that took precedence over eating or peeing. I think I ate my string cheese while I charted, and my yogurt while I tried to fix the printer that prints out the stickers we put on our labs. Not exactly a nice lunch break. Torrey was a trooper and took care of the sick baby and took an admission. I had one patient, was in charge and ended up taking care of Torrey's admission as her sick baby needed quite extensive care that night. We made it through the night and I am proud to say I started a sweet IV on Torrey's patient at 6:30 am just before day shift arrived. The two good things about our crazy night are that I was mostly too busy to miss Ella and the night flew by.
Ella went to stay with our friend Joy, who is a stay at home mom that lives just 5 minutes away. She had a great day and took a nice long nap when we got home which allowed me to veg out on the couch a bit longer.
My next night back to work I had to float to the pediatric floor. Not my idea of a swell night, I sometimes say I would rather hang upside-down by my toenails. Luckily that night was quite a bit more pleasant than toenail torture. The crew of nurses up there was made up of a few of my favorite girls from the floor and I had a nice easy assignment. The only trouble was that the kids up there are not intubated, so they cry and every time a baby would cry my boobs would ache and I thought I would spring a leak. Don't worry, those lovely little cotton pads under my nursing bra are quite absorbant.
Ella spent that day with our friend Heather and her little girl Lily, who is almost exactly one year older than Ella. Heather fell in love with Ella, of course! We are very thankful that we have so many great friends willing to help with caring for her!
So, I survived the first week, but I sure do miss my little monkey while I am gone. I like to think she misses me too.
Monday, September 22, 2008
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Ella at 2 Months
Okay, I am a major slacker and there were probably lots of things I could have written about over the last two months, but I was too busy enjoying my baby girl so I will try to be better about this now!
Ella had her 2 month check up today, she is now 10 lbs, 4 oz and 23 inches long. So she is definitely growing! She has these cute little rolls at the top of her legs but the bottoms are still so skinny which is a pretty funny look especially as she loves to stand up on her rolly polly toothpicks! She got a bunch of immunizations today and screamed bloody murder. It was really horrible and now I know why parents freak out so much when we stick their kids in the PICU! But I would rather have some one stick her with a tiny needle than drill into her head because she had meningitis and her brain was swelling out of her skull. I tried to explain this to her but she couldn't hear me over her wailing.
Not much else exciting to report from today. I am way exhausted and our new bedtime is now a lame 9 pm ish, so I will sign off for now!
Ella had her 2 month check up today, she is now 10 lbs, 4 oz and 23 inches long. So she is definitely growing! She has these cute little rolls at the top of her legs but the bottoms are still so skinny which is a pretty funny look especially as she loves to stand up on her rolly polly toothpicks! She got a bunch of immunizations today and screamed bloody murder. It was really horrible and now I know why parents freak out so much when we stick their kids in the PICU! But I would rather have some one stick her with a tiny needle than drill into her head because she had meningitis and her brain was swelling out of her skull. I tried to explain this to her but she couldn't hear me over her wailing.
Not much else exciting to report from today. I am way exhausted and our new bedtime is now a lame 9 pm ish, so I will sign off for now!
Welcome to the World Baby Girl!
Wow, I meant to get this up and going 2 months ago, but alas, taking care of a newborn and keeping the house clean and the husband fed have kept me quite busy! So I will try to get caught up and keep up on things!
So, we will start with the birth, hopefully I will remember the details!
We went into the hospital on Saturday, July 5th for a scheduled induction. During the last few weeks of my pregnancy my blood pressure was pretty high and I wasn't allowed to work. For the safety of Ella and me we decided to go ahead and get her out of there at 39 weeks.
We arrived at the hospital at 9 pm and after all the usual rigamarole they placed a cervical ripening agent on my cervix and hooked Ella up to the fetal monitor. I got and Ambien and we tried to catch a few z's. Not much changed overnight so in the morning I had a nice breakfast before they got the ball rolling. My nurse, Glenda, who was fantastic, said she didn't like our room and thought we should have a better one. So she put me on the portable fetal monitor and let me walk around and go shopping for a more suitable room. We found a better room and they got me settled in and started up the pitocin. My contractions got pretty regular, but they were nothing to write home about. My good friend Jess came to be with us as an extra support person and photographer for the event. So we all hung out and chatted and watched my contractions on the monitor.
Around noon I thought I would go for a walk again so I ordered a light lunch and thought I would stroll around the hallway while we waited for room service to arrive. Well I stood up and found myself standing in a large puddle. No walking for me! The nurse asked if I wanted my epidural and I thought I wanted to feel the "real" contractions so I would know how they felt. That hair-brained scheme lasted all of about 10 minutes before I was begging for the anesthesiologist. It took a few minutes for him to get his supplies and get set up and in the mean time I truly thought I might die. Pitocin contractions are even more "unpleasant" than the normal ones and I was not a fan. Matt was awesome and helped me breathe through them, but by about the time the anesthesiologist was introducing a large needle into my spine I was about done with the whole thing.
The epidural was fantastic! I was quite loopy on the Fentanyl, feeling no pain. I went to sleep for an hour and a half! I was four centimeters dilated when I fell asleep and when I woke up I was 8! About 10 min after that I got the urge to push and the nurse said I was "complete". So she helped me figure out how to push for about 20 minutes and then I pushed for another hour and then we met our beautiful baby girl! The doctor arrived about 20 min before Ella made her appearance.
Ella had the cord wrapped around her neck twice, called a nuchal cord X 2, which can be a very bad thing. Luckily it wasn't tight and she never showed any signs of distress. They put her on my chest and her little eyes were open and she was looking right at me. I was the most amazing moment of my life. Matt was right there and he cut the cord and didn't even need a chair or smelling salts or anything!
It was 5:05 pm on July 6th when she was born. She was 6 lbs, 12.5 oz and was 20" long.
We stayed in the hospital for a few days and went home on Tuesday, July 8th. It was a chilly day for July, but we were all exhausted and snuggled up on the couch, Happy Campers indeed!
So, we will start with the birth, hopefully I will remember the details!
We went into the hospital on Saturday, July 5th for a scheduled induction. During the last few weeks of my pregnancy my blood pressure was pretty high and I wasn't allowed to work. For the safety of Ella and me we decided to go ahead and get her out of there at 39 weeks.
We arrived at the hospital at 9 pm and after all the usual rigamarole they placed a cervical ripening agent on my cervix and hooked Ella up to the fetal monitor. I got and Ambien and we tried to catch a few z's. Not much changed overnight so in the morning I had a nice breakfast before they got the ball rolling. My nurse, Glenda, who was fantastic, said she didn't like our room and thought we should have a better one. So she put me on the portable fetal monitor and let me walk around and go shopping for a more suitable room. We found a better room and they got me settled in and started up the pitocin. My contractions got pretty regular, but they were nothing to write home about. My good friend Jess came to be with us as an extra support person and photographer for the event. So we all hung out and chatted and watched my contractions on the monitor.
Around noon I thought I would go for a walk again so I ordered a light lunch and thought I would stroll around the hallway while we waited for room service to arrive. Well I stood up and found myself standing in a large puddle. No walking for me! The nurse asked if I wanted my epidural and I thought I wanted to feel the "real" contractions so I would know how they felt. That hair-brained scheme lasted all of about 10 minutes before I was begging for the anesthesiologist. It took a few minutes for him to get his supplies and get set up and in the mean time I truly thought I might die. Pitocin contractions are even more "unpleasant" than the normal ones and I was not a fan. Matt was awesome and helped me breathe through them, but by about the time the anesthesiologist was introducing a large needle into my spine I was about done with the whole thing.
The epidural was fantastic! I was quite loopy on the Fentanyl, feeling no pain. I went to sleep for an hour and a half! I was four centimeters dilated when I fell asleep and when I woke up I was 8! About 10 min after that I got the urge to push and the nurse said I was "complete". So she helped me figure out how to push for about 20 minutes and then I pushed for another hour and then we met our beautiful baby girl! The doctor arrived about 20 min before Ella made her appearance.
Ella had the cord wrapped around her neck twice, called a nuchal cord X 2, which can be a very bad thing. Luckily it wasn't tight and she never showed any signs of distress. They put her on my chest and her little eyes were open and she was looking right at me. I was the most amazing moment of my life. Matt was right there and he cut the cord and didn't even need a chair or smelling salts or anything!
It was 5:05 pm on July 6th when she was born. She was 6 lbs, 12.5 oz and was 20" long.
We stayed in the hospital for a few days and went home on Tuesday, July 8th. It was a chilly day for July, but we were all exhausted and snuggled up on the couch, Happy Campers indeed!
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