Madi's Progress

Because Madi was born so early, I was ready to be discharged the next day, but I asked to be discharged later that day. I was anxious to get home to be with Makaela and Mia and to sleep in my own bed; however, I was going to miss the convenience and comfort of having Madi right down the hall from me. After I had my morning visit from nurse and doctor, I headed down to the NICU to see how she was doing. Sometime during the night, the neonatalogist decided Madi was doing well enough to take her completely off the oxygen so when I saw her, her nasal tube was taken off. They moved her stomach tube to her nose but this seemed way more comfortable for her. The neonatalogist came through so I got to hear the progress report from the previous day and night.  She had eaten approx 100 mls of formula on the first day she was born and gained 40 grams (about 1.42 oz) since birth.  She had experienced no apnea (breaks in her breathing) and there were no signs of jaundice at this point.  The doctor was very pleased, but also made sure he mentioned that while preemies make amazing advancements, it is not uncommon for them to then take some steps back and regress.  I had already been warned about that so at this point, while I am ecstatic over her progress, it is more of a cautious optimism. After the doctor's visit, the nurse handed her over to me and the two of us curled up in the recliner in the NICU and took an hour nap together. It was heavenly.

  When Matt came up to pick me up, we took one more visit to the NICU.  At this point, the nurses had taken her off the warmer and put her in clothes and blankets to see if she could regulate her own body heat. She had also had her first bath so she was pretty tuckered out and napped soundly in Matt and my arms.

After I was "sprung" from the hospital, Matt and I went out for a nice dinner at a local Italian restaurant before heading home.

Madison's Birth and Labor Story

On 12/27, I had started getting contractions and by 5pm, I was having 4 contractions an hour.  I started timing them but they were pretty random.  I notified my nurse and doctor and they told me to let them know when I starting having 6 an hour.  So the next few hours went on and my contractions fluctuated from 3-4 an hour.  By 2am on 12/28 I had 5 and they were pretty painful so I let my nighttime nurse know. She came in and put me on the monitor and wouldn't you know it, I only had one on the monitor during the entire 35 minute monitoring session and the contraction I thought was so painful, only registered in the 40s. She had asked if I ate anything that would make my stomach sour and since I had only been eating hospital food we joked that I may have gotten food poisoning.  I had texted Matt to come up to the hospital to keep me company but he never received the text...he was sleeping and I didn't think it was entirely necessary to call him and wake him up. I tried to go to sleep and ending up getting a 45 minute nap in before the contractions came back.  At this point they were way worse and I found myself sitting on the toilet, wondering if I had food poisoning or if the baby was really coming.  By 5am, they were really bad so I called Matt.  Even if it was food poisoning, I needed someone to cry to. 

By 5:40, I rang for the nurse and she and Matt walked in at almost the same time.  I was basically squatting next to the bed and the nurse was asking, "Why didn't you tell me you were in this much pain sooner!" They got me back into the bed and she put the monitor on me and NOTHING was registering. The monitor was reading a nice 20-23 reading all the way through.  The nurse was utterly confused.  Here I am begging for an epidural because my contractions were right on top of one another and yet, there were no contractions registering. I just started crying because now I thought something was really wrong with me, like my placenta tore or something else that could be causing the pain but not the contractions. She ran to get the doctor and at 5:55am, the doctor came in, checked me and said, "We are having a baby". I looked at Matt and told him, "Whatever happens, I need that epidural".  Like a great husband, he promised he would make it happen, even though (he confessed later on), he already knew it was too late. 

The doctor and the nurse wheeled my entire bed to the operating room (I had to deliver in an operating room because Madison was going to be a preemie) and while the doctor stopped to put on her paper scrubs, I told matt to go back to get the camera. While he was gone, I asked for the epidural one last time and the doctor looked at me pitifully and said, "This baby is coming right now. Two pushes and she will be out", so basically I got my answer.  By the time I was shifted over to the operating table bed, the doctor asked if I wanted to push, but Matt hadn't come back with the camera yet. However, as soon as I saw him enter the room, the pushing began.  On the second push, her head came out and by the third, we had a screaming baby.  It was over by 6:18am. 

I don't think I have ever been so excited to hear a baby scream.  It meant her lungs were functioning and that was all we were hoping for during the two weeks I was on bedrest.  We had made it to 33 weeks and 4 days gestational age so she was a good 6 week premature. She weighed in at 4 lbs, 5oz and 17 3/4 inches long.  We were so grateful she was that big.  I didn't think I was going to get a chance to hold my baby after delivery, but I did. It was an amazing feeling.

She was taken to the NICU right after and Matt got to see her while I was in recovery. Look at how small she is comparied to Matt's hand (yet still at great size for her preemie status).

 After my one hour recovery time, I was wheeled back to my room and because I didn't have an epidural, I was given free range, so I showered and both Matt and I headed down to see her.

 By that night I was able to hold her and they had reduced her oxygen support.  They had already introduced her to formula and by that night, she was eating 30-35 mls (about 2 oz) of formula.

We are so grateful for all the love, support and prayers we have received over the last 2 1/2 weeks.  I'm not sure Matt and I could have gotten through it without our moms coming down to help out and all the texts, emails, gift packages, phone calls and FB comments from our friends and family.  It definitely strengthened our resolve and helped us maintain our sanity at time.

We are so excited to have her here and to see that she is doing so well in spite of being premature. She is such a strong willed little girl already. She is going to fit in wonderfully :-)

Hospital Christmas

After I watched the girls get their Santa gift at home, Matt gathered all the rest of the gifts and brought them up to the hospital so everyone could open their gifts together. A man after my own heart, he showed up bearing coffee and gifts :-) The girls dove right in, opening up their gifts. My hospital room was covered in wrapping paper. Makaela was thrilled with all her gifts and Mia opened up her gifts very daintly and wanted to open up and play with every gift after she unwrapped it. We had a great game of Barbie memory before Matt packed up all the gifts and the girls went home for naptime. Linda made Christmas dinner and the whole family was back again a few hours later so we could all eat together. There was a lot of packing, unpacking and driving back and forth to the hospital and I'm sure it was a lot of work for both Matt and Linda, but I am so grateful they did that. It made Christmas in the hospital a bit more bearable.

 

Christmas morning

One of the worst things about being in the hospital was missing out on Christmas morning when the girls woke up to find their presents. Santa was bringing them a big Barbie house, and Makaela made sure she told Santa that was what she wanted EVERY time she saw him, so I wanted to make sure I was able to see her face. Matt set up Skype and didn't let the girls downstairs until I was online. I was so glad I got to see their reaction because it was priceless. Makaela made sure she narrated everything to me as well (you can hear me talking through Skype on the video).

Santa's visit to Murabella

On Christmas Eve, Santa drove through our neighborhood on a firetruck and tossed out candy to the kids.  Matt and Matt's mom, Linda, walked the girls around the corner to wave to Santa before he visited everyone's houses that night :-)  

After seeing Santa, everyone went home to bake cookies to leave out for him, but Makaela decided that Santa didn't need any cookies. According to her, Santa is a bit overweight and needs to start eating healthy so at my house, Santa got apple slices and milk.

Getting Santa's apple ready

32 weeks 5 days

Since I have gotten to the hospital, I have continued to leak fluid. My once large pregnant belly is now starting to shrink down in size.  The nurses have commented that my belly looks so tiny compared to the other women on the floor.  Unfortunately I haven't been taking pictures periodically of this pregnancy so I don't have much to compare it too, but I feel like I look more like 24 weeks pregnant than 32.  There are 6 women (including myself) who are staying on this floor to prevent early labor.  The woman who is in the hospital room next to mine has been here since Thanksgiving and they plan on keeping her here until 37 weeks (she is only 34 now).  Her water hasn't broken yet, so they are trying to get her to deliver as close to term as possible but she has a placenta abruption which can cause the baby to miscarry.  There is another woman on the floor who doctors are trying to get her to 24 weeks just to give the baby a fighting chance in the NICU.  So right about now I'm feeling very grateful I am in the situation I am because there is always a worse spot to be in.  The baby still proves to be a wild one and is constantly moving.  Her heart rate has been perfect and if anything, she will probably be a quite adaptable child.  She seems to be comfortable in  her little shrink wrapped home right now so I think she is going to be a kid that will go with the flow and make the best of it (sounds like an Aquarian already :-)  

Keeping myself busy

 So there is only so much before you start overthinking a hospital stay.  I started getting creative and began adding my own comments to my patient plan board to amuse my nurse.  Apparently I am growing more sarcastic :-)

32 Weeks!!

We have reached the 32 week mark!  Yeah for small victories.  Doctors thought I would have probably gone into labor by now, but we are holding fast.  At this point (according to babycenter.com), baby has more suckling reflexes so hopefully that helps us jump one more hurdle in the NICU.  Everyday counts.  She is bouncing up a storm in my belly and all our scans, bloodwork and whatnot continues to look great.  Doctors and nurses are very pleased.  I am down to half the the fluid I was admitted with (approx 2.3 mls), but doctors will let her hang out in there with no fluid so long as she is still happy and there is no sign of infection. 

As I mentioned before I am super busy with grading and lesson planning so there has been little downtime (I am watching an entire season of Parenthood, but am using it as a reward after I get another thing crossed off my "To Do" list). The biggest problem is me missing the girls so Matt and my mom have been trying to bring them up as much as they can, but it's not the same. My mom got a bunch of toys for the girls to play with while they are here and my friend Kristin sent up a care package with other toys and decorations for the girls to hang all over my room. Other than that, we have been creative with some of our activities. They love it when the nurses come in.  Makaela is always grilling them about my next "needle". Thanks kid- I already look like  a pin cushion.

Playing with princesses in mommy's mechanical bed

This is Matt's usual position when he brings the girls up. Poor guy.  I'm glad I can "babysit" them so he can get a bit of shut eye. 

Making my room more festive for the holidays

coloring and coloring some more!

Practicing to hop over the line- trying to stay as active as we can.

It's another girl for the Hoffmans!

While I really wanted to keep the gender of this baby a secret, the change in our situation made me want to find out.  I was having a difficult time referring to the baby as "it" or  "the baby".  Then when the grandmas (both of them both said this at different times, mind you) "We need to know the gender so we know who we are praying for", it got me thinking. 

 

Because we thought we had a few more weeks to go, we still have a lot of preparation.  When I was admitted, one of the first things I did was ramble off a list of all the items we needed to clean and get unpacked for baby (of course, I didn't think about how long our NICU stay would be and my baby would probably not see a swing until February.)  Anyway, I realized how difficult it would be to plan, prepare and get set up now that I am stuck in the hospital.  If we were having a boy and we needed to buy some things, we probably should get moving.  Also, picking out the name was on that list, so now knowing the gender, we have been focusing on the naming process.  The final thought I had on finding out the gender was that I wasn't going to get that crazy celebration delivery I wanted. This being the last baby, I wanted to go out with a big bang.  I think this delivery will be a joy, but an anxious one to say the least and odds are the baby will be whisked away to NICU before I can hold him/her and I really didn't want to be the last one to find out if I had a boy or a girl.  The celebration will come once we know if baby is as healthy as can be, not about the gender.

 

Matt told me what the baby was while my mom was in the room and his mom was on speaker phone and then I got another ultrasound yesterday just to confirm it.  We are looking at another baby girl!  I am thrilled.  I felt I was having a girl from the moment we got pregnant.  Personally, my house is full of princesses and Barbies, so I was unsure of how I was going to squeeze in space for Tonka trucks and action figures.  Now, though, there are more practical reasons why I'm glad she is a girl and it just reaffirms my belief that God has everything planned out. The doctors and nurses here (when I was still in the dark about the gender) had mentioned that we should be hoping for a girl because girls do much better in the NICU- statistically preemie girls strengthen up, learn survival skills and learn to breathe on their own quicker than little boys do. My neighbor had triplets and her smallest girl (at 3lbs 8 oz) was the first one off oxygen and the first one released from the hospital.  This is, for me, a glimmer of hope.  Secondly, my unexpected maternity leave is going to hit us a bit harder financially than we had expected, so I am grateful we have plenty of clothes, pink paraphenalia, and no major redecorating to the nursery has to be done. We did register at BuyBuyBaby for some preemie items and health related items that were recommended to have. 

 I do want to say that I am feeling fine.  Baby's heart rate looks great and from the scans, she is growing right on track: kidneys and bladder producing urine, plenty of blood flow from the umbilical cord, etc.  We had to wait a bit to watch her practice using her lungs though, which was scary.  When I had my u/s, she must have been sleeping so she wasn't practicing with her lungs.  After some jostling, we were finally able to see her start moving them.  I am hoping my next scan on Monday shows some more growth in that area.  I won't be told how big she is for another week or so because they are worried about margin of error and don't want to freak out parents just in case a different tech gives us a different size. I will also not be checked for further dilation until my contractions start.

Crazy that this is me at 31 weeks.  Since losing my amniotic fluid, my belly has shrunk significantly.

 What is reassuring is that I am in a private hospital and feel totally at ease with the doctors and nurses here.  I love my group of doctors- great bedside manner and while they are optimistic, they are honest. The care so far has been superb.  My neighbor is a NICU nurse here as well, so that makes me feel better- I won't mind leaving the baby for a bit knowing that Irina is on shift and I'll be notified immediately if anything happens.  My neighbors have come up to visit, baked cookies, watched my kids and passed along preemie clothes.  I did have fun going through all the pink onesies again, but it was a bit overwhelming how small they are.

I am in awe of how small preemie clothes are.

As difficult as bed rest is (especially for someone like me who needs to stay busy constantly), not being around Makaela and Mia has been tough.  My mom and Matt are amazing and coordinating their care but it's been difficult.  I got to skype with them last night and Makaela got to ask the nurse what we were having.  When the nurse said a "girl" Makaela started screaming and running around the livingroom.  I'm so happy she is thrilled, but I wish I had be there to see it in person.

Matt is holding in there, but with the holidays, his command is undermanned.  He is being asked to take on more supervisory roles and work varying shifts to make up for the people who are going out on Christmas leave.  Not the best time to have a wife stuck in the hospital, a potential emergency delivery in the future, having to maintain a home and care for 2 kids. Again, so happy my mom is here to help, but this is taking its toll on Matt. Still though, we managed to have our Thursday TV date night here at the hospital and he slept next to me on the couch here in the room. The little things like that will keep us going and hopefully keep our sanity in check.  I'm hoping he can get out for the neighborhood poker game tonight so he can have some fun "guy" downtime (did I just write that?  Those words would never have come out of my mouth- me encouraging poker :-)

On a last note (yes, this is an epic post), we are looking at two names right now: Madison Hope (she will be called Madi though) or Emilia Hope (called Emi for short).  The middle name came from a friend of mine when I told her we needed a name that would get us through this ordeal.  Madison means "child of Matthew" and Emilia means "rival, excel or emulate".  We are still open and the discussion is still on though. 

Thanks for all the love, support and prayers you have been sending!  Keep them coming.

Be patient Baby #3!

 The Hoffman house experienced a bit of craziness today. My water broke and I am only at 31 weeks.  I noticed some leaking this morning but kind of disregarded it as normal pregnancy symptoms and then as a psychosomatic issue (my friend just delivered her new baby a few hours earlier and my sister in law is being induced tonight, so I was convinced my mind was faking labor). I really didn't want to be an annoying patient so I just headed to school.  Anyway, I got to work, decided the fluid was a bit too much but went inside to tell them to call me a sub and get lesson plans together.  By the time I got in, my water broke and my female co-workers went into a crazy panic.  They got the school nurse who wouldn't let me leave campus (even though all I wanted to do was to drive the 10 minute distance to the hospital).  At this point I was in full blown embarrassment mode (and also freaking that I may have just peed myself as well) so the nurse brought me a towel to wrap around my pants since it looked like I did pee myself (oh and she gave me an ice pack...what is with school nurses and ice packs?)  I was desperately trying to reach Matt but he was in training and his phone was on vibrate, so that just led to unnecessary irritation.  I really just wanted to talk to him and see if he could come pick me up.  Unfortunately, my school staff had another plan and they called an ambulance.  As if having your water break at school is bad enough, having them wheel you on a gurney before the actual school day starts and all the kids are out and about to watch this was mortifying.  I actually asked them to drape the sheet over my head but they didn't want the students to think there was a dead body under it.   It was my first ride in an ambulance and hopefully my last.

 I finally got in touch with Matt and he met me at the hospital. I got a steroid shot to help mature baby's lungs just in case contractions started and we had to deliver.  I am 3 cm dilated and baby is head down, but luckily there have been no contractions.  As a result, I am stuck in the hospital on bed rest until I go into labor or until we reach 34 weeks which, at that point, the baby will be induced (around New Years Eve/Day).  The risk ratio gets higher for leaving baby in at that point and he or she will have a better chance in the NICU.  Right now we are just praying baby stays put and while I am going to go nuts on bed rest and in the hospital for the next three weeks, we want baby to develop as much as possible before delivery.  I am so bummed that I will spending Christmas in the hospital and I will miss the girls' faces when they see what Santa has brought them, but this option is the safer one.

My mom will be arriving tonight to help out with the girls while I'm in the hospital and while Matt is at work (we want him to take leave when the baby does arrive).  We feel very lucky that she can be here. This will definitely put a damper in our Christmas plans to head up to NY but, oh well.

 Matt is holding up okay- tired and stressed, but good.  The ladies on our street are amazed at how he has everything under control at home already.  They admitted their husbands would be going through panic attacks if they were in Matt's shoes, so I'm very lucky he is such an amazing dad, husband and drill sergeant :-)   We were thoroughly unprepared for a baby (considering we thought we had 9 more weeks to prep), so we are mentally going down checklists of what to set up, buy and wash before baby arrives (not to mention a preemie baby).  We hadn't even taken our hospital tour yet.

Polar Express Night at Murabella

Tonight our neighborhood hosted a "Polar Express" Night for the families.  Santa visited at 5pm and then there were activities set up in the fields for the kids.  There were hamster ball races (which I steered my kids clear of), bouncy houses, lit Christmas trees, hot chocolate stations, a Smores roasting pit and plenty of crafts.  The night culminated in an outdoor viewing of "The Polar Express" so we all gathered 'round and watched the Christmas movie.  Mia lost interest in the movie fairly quickly but had no problem spending the majority of the time on the playground swings.  It was so funny watching Makaela hang out with her girlfriends...they were miniature 16 years olds, hopping up every few minutes or so to some some activity and pop back down to watch another few minutes of the movie.  They were mingling with all the other neighborhood kids and frequently I heard, "Oh, there's ___. Let's go say hi" and off they went.  I had an interesting time trying to keep an eye on them in the dark, but we managed- all the parents were sharing babysitting duty.  Great night overall and I am so glad I live in a community that organizes events like this.  The next event is a luminary night, where all the homes light up sanded candles.  People pay money to ride on horse drawn carriages to see the holiday lights and our community lit up and all the proceeds go to a food bank.  

movie time

Makaela and her girlfriends chatting it up while everyone was watching the movie.

Our new master bath

Matt has a thing with blue...always has.  I had found a picture on Pinterest of a shocking blue color (the hallway stairs pictures for those who follow me on pinterest) and Matt fell in love with the combo of the blue, white and dark wood, so he decided he would try it out in our bathroom.  At first I didn't like it, but after some time (and me scouring Pinterest for ideas to soften up the room), I got used to it and am enjoying it now.  I went out to Hobby Lobby and found a paisley fabric that matched the dark wood and the blue perfectly, so I covered the stool seat with it.  I also bought white towels and stitched a band of the fabric into the towels to make them more decorative (since we really had a tough time matching towels up with this color).  I had a war with the sewing machine and so for the past few weeks I have been hand stitching towels while watching my DVRed shows (and I only have a few pin pricks to boot).

Need to get some large brown vases for the crazy blue flowers I bought and need to find a large piece of art for over the tub but for now, this works.

another pinterest inspired creation.  I took pictures of the fabric, isolated the paisley and make photos out of them for wall art.

A better close up of my towels and my newly repainted clock.

Sea World

We didn't have a big birthday party for Mia this year but we wanted to do something special for her so we did a family weekend at Sea World with a special dinner show as well.  Mia was amazing.  A perfect angel- she was so thrilled at seeing all the marine life and interacting with them.  She loved all the rides and I now have two little dare devils on my hands.  

Getting a better view of the dolphins from Daddy's shoulders.

Mia was all about trying to touch a dolphin...takes after me!

 

Matt got the honor of going on all the rides with the girls.  My belly prevented me from boarding any of the rides.

Our dinner show got us in to see Sesame Street's Christmas show. 

Mia was so entranced in the Sesame Street show...until she passed out.

like literally, passed out!

She slept right through the Santa show and almost through dinner.

She did perk up to meet Santa.  She was very excited about that.  Makaela made sure that Santa knew that she wanted a Barbie house too. 

At one point, it started "snowing" (soap snow) and it was so festive.

Makaela trying to catch the "snow" in her mouth until she found out it was actually soap.

Shamu Christmas show

Had to sneak a few more rides in before we left.  I am so impressed with Mia- this one was pretty scary.

Cheese!!

Mia kept saying "val-rus" and he kept popping his head out of the water.  A crowd of people started gathering around and got a kick out of her.  She really thought he was listening to her.

A great time was had by all.