welcoming addison [part three]

{If you're just catching up with us, be sure to check back on the previous posts for part one and part two.}  

We moved to our postpartum room and shared the snuggles of our new baby girl.  We knew we couldn't wait for Lucas to meet his baby sister, but I don't think anyone anticipated how absolutely precious their meeting would be.  After dinner, Jon and Kelsey brought Lucas up to the room.  Addy was sitting with Brandon's dad in the chair in the corner because we wanted Lucas to be able to see me and Brandon first since we hadn't seen him all day.  He walked in the room and climbed up in the bed with me and before we could get our loving in on him, he immediately said "where's my baby sister?"

His eyes were scanning the room and he saw his PaPa had Addy.  When he saw her, his arms went out to her and we all started sobbing. 

He started talking to her so sweetly, telling her "I will share my toys with you baby Addy."  He talked and talked to her and was so sweet and gentle.  It was the sweetest thing I have ever seen in my life.

He stayed for a while and asked a hundred questions about her eyes, her bracelets, how mommy's tummy was empty and baby Addy was here!  So much excitement and love was coming out of his little two year old self.  I was still in disbelief as I stared at this scene of love, finding it hard to believe that here we were, a family of four.  Labor is over. Delivery is over. She is here. Lucas is here.  We are all together.

After everyone left, Brandon and I tried to rest.  Addy was nursing every two hours and we were having to work a little harder than expected at that, but that's okay.  We were still learning each other. The next morning, we were blessed to have a nurse that knew and respected our wishes to get the heck out of that hospital as soon as possible.

We FaceTimed with Lucas in the morning so he could see his baby sister.  I'm so glad mom took a screen shot of her view too!  It was precious.  Lucas was ready to have his baby sister come home.

 

We had a series of tasks to check off once she turned 24 hours old before we were allowed to be released, so at 12:30 the next day we powered through our list.  She got her bath, hearing screen, and newborn bloodwork drawn.  She passed with flying colors, so we got our little girl dressed and went through the discharge instructions and were out of there by 3:00!

 

When we got home, our entire family was waiting out front for us.  Brandon's parents, my parents, Lucas, Jon and Kelsey, and Farrin.  Some of the most important people in our lives were waiting to welcome Addison into the family.  Does my heart good.

Lucas was waiting with his present for Addy and darted to the car as soon as we came to a stop.

Lucas couldn't wait to get his hands on her. He wanted to hold her and give her the blankie he picked out for her.  He wanted to kiss her and talk to her.  My prayer for them is that they will always love each other unconditionally.  I think we are off to a good start!

It's so good to be home.  So so good.  Now the fun begins!

[And just for giggles, look at these two for comparison.  Obviously, Lucas in the blue, Addy in the pink.  Twins? I think it's safe to say we make pretty cute kids.]

welcoming addison [part two].

Ready for the action?  Let's go.

We got into the triage room around 3:45 a.m.  De ja vue hit me hard since this was the same late night timing as Lucas's labor.  I was so nervous, afraid we had come to the hospital too soon.  With Lucas, I was 7cm dilated when we arrived to the hospital and the level of pride and elation I felt was indescribable.  I was worried this time I wouldn't be as far along and for some reason that stressed me out.  Angie was the midwife on call, and as she checked me she grinned and told me I was 6cm and 100% effaced.  I smiled a big smile of relief and felt a boost of confidence that we had made the right decision.  They monitored me in triage for a while to make sure baby girl was tolerating labor, and she passed the test with flying colors.  Since she passed the test with no heart rate decelerations during contractions, I was allowed to stay off of continuous monitors during labor and not have an IV.  Brandon and I then moved into our labor room and called in the troops.

(This picture shows our early delirium and excitement, it was 4:54 a.m. and I was 6cm!)

Labor progressed pretty seamlessly as time went by.  My contractions hadn't ramped up to the intensity that they did with Lucas which was so surprising to me.  I should have known to just stop comparing the two labors, but that's impossible.  My contractions were hanging out at every 5 minutes apart but we had occasional spaces of 8 to 10 minutes in between some of them.  I was afraid this was a sign of a long long labor coming, but I was enjoying the brief reprieve between contractions to close my eyes and catch my breath.  At 7:00 a.m. the midwives switch shifts.  Kathy came in with my nurse Erin and they wanted to check me to see what kind of progress we had made.  I was 8cm!  I mentally prepared myself for transition to begin, aka hell on earth.  We talked to Kathy about the longer spaces in between contractions and how that worried us, but she told us not to worry.  She said, "every labor is different.  The point of labor is making progress.  Your body is making progress doing it this way.  Use the breaks wisely and rest. Your body is doing what it needs to do."  That made so much sense to me, so we did just that.  Kathy is the director of the group of midwives that work at UNC and she said she had to go to a meeting so Angie would stay and cover her until she got back at 9:30.  She gave clear instructions to our nurse to page her if I felt the "overwhelming urge to push" (a phrase we would hear numerous times throughout the day) or if my water broke and she would come back because that's when things could really speed up.  So we got to work, working through contractions like we were doing at home. 

In the meantime, one of the anesthesia residents came by the room to offer me an epidural.  I am not here to judge anyone on their birth plans so please don't hear it like that.  But I didn't want an epidural.  One of the main reasons I delivered with the midwives is to allow me to have a low intervention, safe, and natural delivery.  That was our plan with Lucas as well, but things didn't happen as planned.  The anesthesia team saw that this was my second delivery and that on my first I ended up with an epidural, so I understand why he came in.  What I don't understand is why he stayed.  I am trying to politely tell him through contractions "no thank you" to his offer, and he kept prying as to why.  Did you not have a good experience the first time?  Was it because you got one of those wicked headaches?  Do you suffer with chronic headaches now?  Why don't you want one?  No, no, and no sir please GET THE **** OUT OF MY ROOM.  I think he got the message, but he said "ok well I'll check back with you later."  NO!  GET!  OUT!  [please know I didn't yell cuss or take a swing at him, but he did get the picture and he did not return.]  As he left, we all looked at each other and just shook our heads in disbelief.  

Angie came in to check on us at 8:30 and asked if anything had changed.  I told her I was still feeling most of the labor in my lower back but was starting to feel some pressure down in my butt {one of the not so glamorous parts of labor that only your closest friends will tell you about}.  She checked me again and said those magical words, "with the next contraction if you feel the urge to push, go for it.  You're complete!"  What?!  Cue the tears.  All of us started crying out of pure JOY because this was so so good.  We stopped for a minute and mom prayed, it was a beautiful moment.  The next contraction came and I made myself push.  I pushed as hard as I could but it just didn't feel right.  I was trying to channel that "uncontrollable urge" thinking that maybe this was it and I just wasn't doing it right.  With Lucas, I had the epidural but I thought I still felt everything to push.  Was this what it felt like?  I was trying to remember.  Because they told me with Lucas that the spinal injection they did was gone and this is why it hurt to push.  So this is it, right?  I continued to push and we all knew something wasn't right.  Angie checked me again and found that in fact I wasn't quite complete. There was a piece of my cervix that was still there but was very posterior which is why she didn't feel it the first time.  She told us the update which explained why I still didn't feel that uncontrollable and undeniable urge to push.  She offered to try to stretch the last little bit as I was pushing, but was unsure if this would actually work.  Of course I said let's try because emotionally we had been in such a good place I didn't want to feel like the chance to have this baby now was just taken from me.  We tried for about 45 minutes with no progress so Angie said we needed to take a break, it wasn't time to push.  She left us alone to continue to labor.  

Guys, I can't explain how the mood of the room completely became deflated.  It was like we had been told that we won the lottery but then were told it was all a big mistake that we actually couldn't have our prize.  We all started remembering Lucas's labor, how I stalled at 9cm, and the hours and hours and interventions and scares that happened afterwards.  This can't be happening again.  It can't.

Kathy came back from her meeting and checked in with us.  My contractions had spaced back out to every 8-10 minutes apart, and we all felt defeated.  Kathy basically told us we needed to snap out of it.  This was not defeat.  We can't reminisce of the past, this was a different labor.  Don't compare it to anything.  Remember my body is doing work.  Making changes.  Rest between contractions.  She told us we needed to try some position changes in the meantime to get Addy to rotate from her posterior position.  Kathy left us with positioning instructions and said she had another laboring mom a few rooms down, so again she told Erin to call her when either the "overwhelming urge to push" hit or my water broke.  Same song, second verse.  So I was rotating from side to side for a while so I could rest between contractions and finally ended up on my knees facing backwards in the bed with the bed sitting all the way up.  I knew being on my hands and knees was the best position to spin a posterior baby, but the level of fatigue in my legs and hips was something I had never felt before.  I felt like I couldn't hold my weight up and anytime I tried my legs would shake uncontrollably.  I'm not sure how long I was on my knees in the bed, but something happened at noon.  To use the analogy from a friend, labor went from a ride on a trolley car to a ride on a freight train.

At 12:00 on the nose, my body went into birthing mode.  I feel like there are no words to describe the feelings that overtook my body.  It was like a beautiful mix of the most intense pain imaginable and an awareness of exactly what my body needed to do to get this baby out...and that was PUSH.  The whole "uncontrollable urge to push" phrase everyone kept using?  Yep.  This is it.  When the freight train hit I was still on my knees facing the back of the bed.  I screamed (which surprised me) and my water broke with a big pop.  My nurse took the doppler to check Addy's heart rate and I had already started pushing uncontrollably.  Kathy was still down the hall with the other mom, so Erin said "I'm going to have to catch this baby" and needed to glove up so Mom took the doppler from her to try to capture Addy's heart rate.  When mom took the doppler from her, another contraction hit and more of my water shot out all over mom's arm.  (Sorry, mom!) Somewhere in the mix, someone alerted Kathy that it was go-time for real now and another nurse came in to help Erin as I pushed and couldn't and wouldn't stop.  I was still facing backwards because I couldn't make myself turn forwards in the bed, and as Erin was trying to check me I heard the other nurse back there whose voice I couldn't recognize and I started yelling at her, "who is that back there!?? WHERE! IS! KATHY!"

Somehow I got turned around in the bed and Kathy appeared.  We found out later that she ran (literally) from the other delivery to our room.  The other mom delivered right at 12:00 and Kathy had to finish up with her, then she ran down the hall changing her gown as she went to get to us.  A bit dramatic, right?  She quickly grabbed my focus as I was pretty out of control yelling and pushing. She kept telling me, "ASHLEY. Look at me. Stop yelling. Stop yelling or this baby is going to shoot out of you like a torpedo.  I don't want to hear you yell anymore."  My eyes were wide open staring at her only in those moments and all I could do was say "yes ma'am."  You see, Kathy is pretty hard core.  She is quite intimidating and doesn't give off the warm and fuzzy midwife vibe that one would think.  She was an army nurse for a long time and that came in to play when she was whipping me into shape in those uncontrollable moments.  So really, all I could do was listen to her.  Every time I would start to yell she would make me focus on her again.  She coached me through controlled and directed pushing when all I wanted to do was push uncontrollably and get the baby OUT.  She slowed everything down and I'm very thankful for that.  When Addy's head was coming out, her left hand was up against her cheek like she was posing for a picture.  Although my body wasn't very thankful for that, I can't help but laugh. What a diva.  Sometime during all of this, Kathy said "get your baby!"  It took me a second to realize what she was saying until mom said "Ashley! Reach down and get her!"  I snapped my eyes open again and looked down and grabbed our beautiful girl and brought her up to my chest.  Brandon was right there at my head and we immediately were overwhelmed with every happy emotion in the book that she was here and she was perfect. 8 pounds, 1 ounce, 19 inches long of beauty entered our family at 12:26 pm as a little blonde Addison Elizabeth Hudson.  We delayed cord clamping and when it was time, Brandon cut the umbilical cord.  

The experience of a truly natural child birth was something that I wanted to experience with Lucas.  We didn't get to do that, and his labor and birth were both difficult and beautiful.  With Addison's labor and birth, it was also both difficult and beautiful but in a totally different way.  I know some people wonder why in the world you would want to subject your body to the most immense pain imaginable.  I don't know how to answer that question, only to compare it to those crazy people who choose to run marathons.  Is that my thing?  No.  Is natural childbirth your thing?  Maybe not.  To each their own, they say.  But one thing I do know is that I am so thankful for this experience.  My body did something I didn't know it could do but I know it was designed to do.  I can't help but allow this experience to point to our Creator, the one who designed the miracle of life and has blessed us so deeply to experience the immeasurable love a parent can have for their child. 

As we held this new life in our arms, we were overwhelmed with love.  

Welcome to the world, our sweet baby girl.  We love you more than you will ever know.

welcoming addison [part one].

I'm sitting here trying to find the words to type so that I can remember the details of this experience forever.  I feel like I need to write it down because every detail is so important, but part of me knows that I couldn't forget the details if I tried.  Child birth is amazing like that.  So take these posts as you want, I'm going to give the details because it's what I need to do.  Read on if you'd like, if not, that's okay too.

The days leading up to and starting my 39th week of pregnancy were busy.  I worked Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (3 12 hour shifts in a row, not my brightest move leading up to a hopeful delivery but I was determined to work this baby out). Then on Monday, I watched one of Lucas's little friends and had another friend and her 2 little girls over so that we could try to knock out the last craft for Addy's room (pictured below!) so between crafting Addy's artwork, we chased 4 toddlers around my house.

On Tuesday, November 18, a friend watched Lucas for a little while and I went and got a pedicure after lunchtime (because no one wants to go into labor with ugly toenails) and then went to my 39 week visit with the midwives late that evening.  Baby checked out great, and I was showing some progress but nothing to call home about.  I was hanging out at 2cm and 70% effaced which was great, but still with a posterior cervix which was a little discouraging.  I had the midwife strip my membranes which was uncomfortable because of my posterior cervix, but I was willing to try anything to avoid another overdue baby.  I wasn't expecting much of it since we tried it with Lucas at 39 weeks, only to have him bake for another full 2 weeks before he decided to make his appearance.  This time, I also started taking evening primrose oil at 27 weeks and started drinking red raspberry leaf tea.  I was willing to try it all, y'all. 

The next morning (Wednesday), I headed in to work ready to work my second to last scheduled shift.  At 39 weeks pregnant, 12 hour shifts are a force to be reckoned with.  I had it in my head that I could make it through this shift, and one last shift on Saturday...all the while hoping to have a baby on Friday after a day of rest after a shift and getting me out of that last scheduled shift.  Sounds like a good plan, right?  My shift began and as I waddled around I was noticing some pretty annoying contractions.  Nothing painful, but just enough of a change to be irritating since I was sure that this was the beginning of nothing.  At 10:30, I group texted my mom and Brandon. 

me: annoying contractions have increased in number today, slightly crampy but nothing to jump up and down about.

mom: drink a lot to see if it changes. can you change your activity to see if they stay the same? just for an hour or so.

me: it's nothing predictable and i'm working so i can't really change activity.

mom: could be early labor though. only way you'll know is time and the above things.  

{insert:  listen to mom!!!}

brandon: should i do anything? 

{apparently a while of silence, I'm at work after all!}

mom: B- not yet. just stay available.

brandon: don't leave me hanging

me: y'all are so funny. it's fine it's nothing.

mom: not funny. can you call me now?

So the morning text session sets the theme for the beginnings of my labor.  I kept brushing it off as nothing, mom and Brandon were on it.  Mom kept telling me to keep my antenna up, but I didn't want to make a big deal out of anything because we had so many false starts with Lucas's labor.  I was afraid to be wrong, especially when it came to coordinating with people coming from out of town.   

I worked the rest of the shift, nothing really changing.  The end of the shift came and I clocked out and called Brandon like I normally do as I walked (waddled) to my car.  We talked for a minute, then I called my mom like I normally do.  She began grilling me with questions of the day and I assured her that this was nothing, assuming my day had just been plagued with uterine irritability from the previous day's appointment.  On my 30 minute car ride home, I had 3 contractions.  These all happened while I was on the phone with my mom and I would joke saying "I just had another one...I just had another one."  I got home, kissed Lucas and Brandon, and Brandon took the phone from me to talk to my mom.  I shrugged it off and went to the kitchen to fix a plate for dinner, all the while those two were analyzing my every move, waiting for the cue for mom and dad to jump in the car and drive from Asheville.  I ate while Brandon put Lucas to bed, then I got in the bath tub to see if that would calm things down a bit because I didn't want to make a fuss and have people drive in all the hours of the night for this to just be false labor.  The bath didn't calm things down, in fact things moved from annoying to hey this is consistently 5-7 minutes apart and starting to hurt now.  Brandon called my mom back at 10:30 and they got in the car.  Brandon then called my brother to come stay the night with Lucas since it looked like we would be heading back to the hospital at some point before morning. Lastly Brandon called the midwife on call to give her a heads up that this was something and we would be coming sometime tonight. 

[Pause in the story for a minute...I have to give it to Brandon and my mom.  The two of them were much more aware of the situation than I was, which is quite unbelievable.  First off, Brandon is a man (no offense, B) who has only seen someone (me) in labor one other time.  My mom, an expert in childbirth education, was over 200 miles away and going off of Brandon's observations.  Pretty amazing, since I was convinced that this was nothing.]

Contractions quickly ramped up to "oh yeah I remember this, this is labor and this sucks!" Brandon called my mom back and told her I couldn't talk through contractions anymore, and dad stepped on the gas pedal.  They made it here from Asheville in 3 hours and arrived at our house at 1:30.  I was feeling contractions in my lower back and found the most comfort sitting on the birth ball with Brandon rubbing my lower back.  

Just like with Lucas's labor, my plan was to labor at home for as long as possible.  This time, things were so different I was second guessing myself on when to go to the hospital.  We live in Raleigh now and the hospital is in Chapel Hill.  Last time, we lived closer to the hospital, so now I had to account for a longer drive time.  Also, I know every labor is different and even though Lucas's was long and drawn out, this one could have been much quicker.  So all in all, I was still in denial that this was happening and trying so hard to trust my gut.  

When mom and dad got here, they both fell right in to place, rotating out with Brandon as the lower back rubbers.  Our team was finally assembled at 3:00 a.m. when Farrin arrived from Charlotte.  Mom had called her and woke her up, so she hopped in the shower and then headed our way.  Once she got here, we worked through a few more contractions then decided to go to the hospital...the hospital I just left barely 7 hours ago after working a 12 hour shift.  We got in the car and the gas light came on.  It came on on my way home from work and I thought to myself "I'm not stopping to get gas.  I'm tired. Brandon will do it tomorrow."  Ha.  Joke's on me.  We pulled out of the neighborhood and pulled in to the nearest gas station, all the while Brandon was shaking his head in shame.  Oops.

As we drove the familiar path to the hospital, I was filled with every emotion you could imagine.  Excitement...we are actually going to meet this baby soon!  Fear and anxiety...oh labor is hard.  It's really really hard and I remember now that this is HARD.  Frustration...did I really go into labor after working a 12 hour shift?  That means we aren't going to sleep tonight.  And my legs hurt.  And I'm tired, so very tired.  And I have to labor and push out a baby when I'm tired and that just doesn't seem fair.  And back to excitement...we are going to have a BABY!  Right now, 5 days before my due date, which is SO much better than being a week late.  We pulled in to the hospital and walked through the deserted lobby that was set up for the next day's radiothon fundraiser, and I said another thankful prayer that we were not walking through the lobby at 9am when there were 8 billion people everywhere.  

As we rode the elevators up to the 4th floor of the women's hospital, I was quickly running through excitement, fear, anxiety, excitement over and over and over again.  Like Kevin said on Home Alone..."this is it.  don't get scared now."

Stay tuned for the rest of the story, the best is yet to come.

halloween!

I should have known better when I asked Lucas what he wanted to be for halloween. He originally said "a dinosaur!" and I was so excited because there are some really cute dinosaur costumes out there.  We started looking online at costumes and everything that was cute and fluffy that I showed him he quickly told me "no mommy. That one's for babies."  Ok.  Well.  So what kind of costume are you thinking of then, Mr. Opinionated?  "I wanna be a T-REX!!!"  And he started pointing to these horribly frightening looking t-rex costumes!  I was appalled.  I thought for sure I had one more year of picking his costume and making him the cutest little dino in town.  Boy was I wrong. And so began our search for a t-rex costume (that didn't cost a fortune).  

We visited a few of the consignment stores around town and even tried to convince Lucas that an adorable dragon costume was way cooler than a t-rex, but that was a fail.  We went in to one last consignment store and I flippantly asked the lady working if she had any dinosaur costumes.  Lucas piped in, "not a dinosaur, a t-rex!" and batted those long eyelashes at the lady behind the counter.  The poor lady didn't stand a chance and quickly said "I actually do have a t-rex costume in just your size!"  She must have not seen my death stare at her because she scurried over to the display and pulled out the most hideous halloween costume I have ever seen. 

Lucas's eyes lit up with excitement as he saw the perfect costume (according to him).   

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you your t-rex.

Awful, isn't it?  I know I know let the kids have fun it's not about me anymore blah blah blah, but I was supposed to have one more year!  One more year of cuteness!  I mean yes he's cute and makes any costume cute, but this piece of junk costume is just...!  Anyway.  I digress.

We had to explain to Lucas that we had to wait for halloween to wear the costume.  Try reasoning with a toddler on that.  We decided to carve our pumpkin in celebration that we found the perrrrrfect t-rex costume.  Lucas wasn't that into carving the pumpkins because he was grossed out by the "nuts."  As we were scooping out the inside of the pumpkin I called them guts and Lucas called them nuts from there on out.

"Mommy, I don't want to touch the nuts.  The nuts are gross and slimy.  I don't want to touch the nuts.  Does that pumpkin have nuts too?"  On and on and on and we were dying.  It's guts baby boy.  Guts.

 Finally the day came that we could wear our beloved costume!  Our neighborhood has a halloween parade and all the little kiddies dress in their costumes and walk together down the street in a parade lead by a fire truck.  It was great.  Londyn and her mom Alicia came with us, and we met up with some neighbors and had a great time.

At the end of the parade route they had games set up with prizes and candy.

It was the first year we have been able to do the parade and it will definitely be something to look forward to every year.

 Our next occasion to wear our beloved t-rex costume was our annual Pullen Park day with my friends from work!  It's something we have done every year since our baby boom and definitely something we all look forward to.  Of course we rode the train:

And attempted a group picture of 5 toddlers and a newborn.  Yep.  Fail.

And then finally, finally, HALLOWEEN IS HERE!  We were lucky enough to wear our costume twice this day, first in the morning at Summit's staff kids party, then finally to trick-or-treat in our neighborhood.  

Nana and Poppy came in town to watch the cuteness that is Lucas trick-or-treating.  Uncle J and Aunt K brought Murphy too who was the cutest police dog.  

Lucas did so well trick-or-treating.  He would knock on the door and say "trick or treat thank you!" all in one breath.  We also taught him to say "I'm allergic to peanuts" which may sound funny but is necessary.  

Of course, Lucas had to find his buddy baby Colton.

Happy Halloween from the cutest t-rex in town!