Our Little Will

Ok, I am finally able to add a new post and let everyone know what has been going on this week.

First off, Will was born on Sunday January 25 at 7:59 pm. He weighed in at 5 lbs 15 oz and is 18 inches long. Seems small, I know, not so small for a baby born at 36 weeks though. As you all know, I had been put on bed rest on January 5th...and I hated it. BUT I followed the rules. I only got up to use the bathroom and shower, and of course my weekly doctor appointments. At my last appointment I had, I had not progressed at all, so my doctor gave me permission to go to our baby shower on Saturday. I did really well there too, didn't get up except to use the bathroom, and then as soon as it was over, I went and laid down on my in-laws bed. I had started having more contractions then normal, but it was never more then 6 in an hour. So, I didn't worry. Later that night, after we were home, I started feeling worse and worse. My contractions were getting more and more frequent. I didn't sleep well at all. I was up and down, I even went to the sofa to try to get more comfortable. In case you ever wondered, The Fresh Prince of Bele Air plays on NICK @ NITE at midnight. I slept for a little bit, then woke up to worse contractions. I still had some of my medicine left over, I was finishing the perscription. So, when it was 4 am, I took my medicine. Then Andy started timing my contractions. I had 7 contractions in about 30 minutes, so we decided to leave for the hospital. We arrived there at about 5 am and I was immediately addmitted. When the doctor came in to check me, I was still at a 3 1/2. They decided to only give me a small dose of pain meds if I asked and to have me stay on the monitors and laying down, in the hopes that I wouldn't progress. I was getting very uncomfortable, so after a few hours, they let us go for a walk and use a birthing ball. I was stubbornly refusing any pain meds. The walk and the birthing ball were great. They made me feel so much better. Once I was laid down again, the doctor came in to check me and I had dialted to a 5. There was no going home for me now, so my doctor decided to go ahead and break my water. It was such a weird feeling, I felt like I had peed my pants. Well, I guess my bed...haha. After that, I really started feeling the contractions, I was having really horrible back labor. The nurse gave me some pain meds, and I was allowed to get them every hour up until an hour before I delivered. My doctor came in and checked me a couple more times and I was at a 6 1/2 for about 3 hours. My doctor decided to give me some pitocin, and I that's when I knew the contractions were going to get even worse. I decided I needed the epidural. My back felt as though it were splitting in half. I had been in labor for about 18 hours by then. Not including the three weeks of bed rest. I was exhausted. Once I decided to get the epidural, my doctor checked to see how far down Will was, she then discovered he was turned facing the ceiling. That explains my back labor. She turned him, and I got the epidural. I loved it. It was the best thing I did. I was so tired, and hurting so much, I was having trouble even shutting my eyes for a second. I loved it because I could still feel everything, it just wasn't such pain and I was able to get some sleep. I slept until I was about a 9, which was pretty quickly. When my doctor came to check me, she caused me to dilate to a 10, which is obviously when I started pushing. I pushed for about an hour. Then Little Will was born! The cord was around his neck, and so the doctor cut his cord. She left it long, so Andy was able to trim it. As soon as he was born, he was handed to the NICU doctors. I didn't even get to hold him right away. The doctors checked him, cleaned him off some and brought him to me. He was so darling, he was making these grunting noises, he was trying to breathe. I was able to hold him for about 2 minutes, and he was taken to the NICU. Andy was able to go with them and I got stiched up. I had torn on the inside and my doctor decided to give me an episiodomy. While Andy was with Will, all I could think about was how beautiful he is. Andy came back and we were taken up to recovery. We were told Will was just going to be gone for about 2 hours. At that time, the NICU doctor came up and we were told they were going to be keeping Will for about a week. He had been hooked up to an osilator to help his breathing. He was also on antibotics to help his lungs more. We were able to go see him at 11 pm that night. We weren't allowed to touch him though because he was struggling keeping his body temp up. It was so sad, he had tubes down his throat to his lungs and IV's. The nexk day he was able to ba taken off the osilator and put on oxygen. He was doing really great. We were able to go see him and I was even allowed to finally hold my little boy. The next day, he was taken off the oxygen and breathing on his own and keeping up his body temp amazingly! He has been doing those things great! He now has to start eating and gaining weight. The original thought was he was going to be coming home on Sunday. I was able to talk with the doctor yesterday and we discovered Will is possibly lactose intolerant, I've been pumping breast milk, but it has been slow coming in. So, they were feeding him formula. He kept spitting it up though. So he wasn't eating or gaining weight. He stayed at a steady 5 lbs, 13 oz for two days. I finally was able to give him some breast milk and he takes that much much better. The only big problem is he gets very tired when he eats. He isn't able to finish his bottles. For now he is on a feeding tube. He gets a feeding with the bottle at every other feeding and that is when they give him breast milk. Then he gets a feeding with a feeding tube at the opposite feedings. He does really well with the breast milk. Now if we could just get him to stay awake.

Tonight we are going to go see him and Andy and his dad are going to give Will a blessing. I saw him all day yesterday, but I have to start taking it easy. I'm giong to end up sick if I don't slow down. I wish I could bring him home so much. I miss him a lot. But maybe it will be best if We give him a break and let him just focus on getting better. I need the break too. I can't keep running back and forth. I get so stressed, I forget to eat, which is not good for my milk supply.

I would like to ask everyone to please pray for Will, that he will be able to become stronger and come home next week.