Baby Bear's Birthday

So here's the story of my sweet little man's debut into this world. (and there's a million pictures too!)

It started on Thanksgiving at 12:30 am. I woke up because I was sure my water had broken (I still have really good bladder control, so I was certain I had not just wet the bed. However, it was definitely what they call "a slow leak") I had also started having more intense and regular contractions than I'd had before. I timed the contractions for a couple of hours and since they were only between 2 and 7 minutes apart and really painful, I woke Neil up to go to the hospital just in case.

We checked in at about 3:45 and they got all the monitors hooked up to me. I was still contracting regularly, but there was still basically no dilation. We stayed there for about 6 hours, but when I had still only dilated to a 1 and because they couldn't ever confirm that my water had actually broken, they sent us home. That was super disappointing and frustrating!
Here we are sometime between 3:45 and 9:30 am on Thanksgiving Day. We went home after this and I tried to get some sleep, had a couple of nice baths, and Neil went a picked up some Thanksgiving dinner for us from Grandma CC's.
We went back to the hospital around 4 or 5 the same day for all the same reasons we went in the first time, but mostly because I KNEW my water had broken. They hooked me up to the monitors again and just waited and watched. Around 6pm the baby's heart rate dropped a lot and 6 or 7 nurses rushed in to start IVs, take blood, give me oxygen, get consent for an emergency C Section, and give me a shot of medication to stop my contractions. Luckily, all these things helped and the baby's heart rate went back up quite quickly.

We watched Harry Potter and The Simpsons for several hours while we waited to see if the baby's heart would drop again and waited to see if I would ever dilate.

At 11:30ish, my doctor came in and inserted a foley catheter to make me start to dilate, I got my epidural, and they started me on pitocin.

They took me off pitocin after only an hour or two (I don't know why) and by about 4:30 in the morning I was dilated to a 4. Unfortunately at about the same time, the baby was not doing well with my contractions. His heart would drop a little during a contraction and he didn't have enough time in between contractions to recover. Luckily, his heart never dropped as much as it did the very first time, but the labor was not easy on him.

At that point, we had to decide whether we wanted to keep going with this route and just wait and see whether the baby could handle it or not OR just go with a C section while the baby was still relatively safe and happy.

We decided to have a C Section. This is right before we went back to the operating room.


This is Barrett's very first picture although he's pretty well hidden.

You can see him a little better in this one.

After he'd gotten cleaned up a little bit.

When we first got back to our room.


None of these pictures really need an explanation- they're all just me, Neil and Barrett. I wanted to do a collage since there are so many pictures, but I couldn't remember how. Maybe next time.

Introducing...

Barrett Neil Johnson

Born on Friday, November 25th at 5:21 am via C-Section

7 lbs 4 oz

20 inches long

Perfect in every way!

Tidbits

Max and Liv had some history presentations they had to do at school, so they came over to Pops and LaLa's house the other night to practice.

Liv's presentation was on Clara Barton. She had to do a report on her, dress like her, and give a 1-2 minute presentation about her life. Liv did a GREAT job!

Max chose to do his report on Theodore Roosevelt. You might not be able to tell very well, but he has a mustache to go with the costume. Max was AWESOME as Teddy Roosevelt!

On another note...

Today is my due date! No baby yet though... In fact, after yesterday's discouraging appointment (i'll probably write more about that later), I'm pretty sure I won't be having him until I get induced on Sunday.

Lastly, I made it through this short week of work which I really wanted to do! We took one last pregnancy picture of the 3 of us today.

Nicole- 28 weeks, McCall- 40 weeks, Kacey- 30 weeks.
The three of us won't all be back at school together until MAY! That is way too crazy!

Almost There!

How Far Along: 40 Weeks (on Tuesday)

Size of Baby: Last Tuesday, he was measuring about 7 lbs 6 oz, but the doctor said he didn’t think he was really quite that big. He did mention that my baby had a big head though, great news for me!

Maternity Clothes: Not for too much longer (I hope).

Gender: BOY

Name: We’re getting closer on this, but still not there yet.

Movement: He’s a very active boy- I’ll definitely miss this a lot when he’s born.

Sleep: It took me a VERY long time to get used to sleeping on my left side, but eventually I did, so that’s good! I still wake up regularly through the night, but usually it’s not for too long and I can go back to sleep.

What I Miss: Moving in general- it is really hard to move at all these days! I’ve pretty much quit going to the gym and I miss that. I’d been going throughout my pregnancy until about 37 weeks when I was too busy with appointments and stuff to go that week, then I got sick, then I did go once or twice, but now I’m just trying to take it easy so I don’t go into labor yet.

Cravings: I’ve been pounding down the pizza the last few weeks.

Symptoms: I’m like, as pregnant as ya get now, if there’s a pregnancy symptom that I’m NOT having, I’d be surprised! Heartburn, waddling, peeing all the time, back pain, Braxton hicks, itchy stomach, calf cramps, being hot all the time, swollen hands and feet- I’ve got ‘em all. I never had any of the crazy pregnancy dreams though.

Weird Things: I think it’s weird that I am so incapable of moving around. I swear other people don’t struggle as much as I do- I’ve seen really really big people who can get in or out of a car 10 times faster than I can! I also think it’s weird that I’ve been getting wicked heartburn for the last month or so- it seems to me that that would be something that would happen all through pregnancy or not at all, but what do I know.

Worries: I’m worried that I’m going to go into labor and not going to be able to go to work on Monday and Tuesday this week. I know that’s a stupid worry at this point, but it would work out so much better for my maternity leave if I could go the 2 days we have school this week!

Best Moment of the Week(s): Just hanging out with Neil and getting things ready.

Appointments This Week: Last Tuesday when I went in, I was still completely closed, but on the plus side my cervix had started to soften just a little bit. I’ll go in tomorrow and we’ll see what he says then.

What I’m Looking Forward To: I’m having this baby this week no matter what! If the baby doesn’t come on his own, I’ll be getting induced NEXT Sunday. That’s actually very intimidating as well!!

Something I've Learned/Realized: This baby is just so easy to take care of right now that I really don’t mind going a little bit over 40 weeks. As my friend at work recently told me, “That shirt is a really good babysitter!” I agree Amy!

Pictures:

Even though the furniture was 4 weeks late, it made it here before the baby did and it looks great!

We're not quite done with the nursery, but it is pretty close! Maybe I'll post a few more of the nursery when it does get done, but we'll see.

38 weeks (up in Park City)

39 Weeks

And practically 40 weeks

Breaking Dawn Part 1

We got invited to Dr. DeDecker's annual Dental Twilight party thanks to my dad and this years party was even cooler than usual because of the fun theme.

The Invitation

The entrance into the theater that he rented out.

DeDecker's staff all wore corsages and passed out mini wedding cakes.

This is Dr. DeDecker and his wife (he dressed up as a vampire and it was hilarious!)

For the very first time, we weren't first in line! We were 3rd, but it still worked out okay and we still got the back row.

I didn't want to sit on the floor while we were waiting, so I actually brought my own folding chair. Unfortunately, the chair was old and breaking and I didn't think my self-esteem could handle it if the chair broke underneath me so I used this other chair (if you look at the chair, you'll see it had a ribbon tied around it- another wedding theme detail DeDecker had).
In our perfect seats.

Berrie kept her hoodie and puffy parka on the WHOLE time during the movie while I sat next to her literally dripping sweat!

The best parts about this screening are that its free for us and we still get to see the movie first but we don't have to stay up as late!

My baby must've gotten some bad ideas from the baby in the movie because during and after, he was moving and stretching so much that I swear he was trying to escape!

Why My Man Rocks:

This was taped to my bathroom mirror when I woke up the other day.
He does stuff like this all the time to make my life easier!

Not to mention that he helps my mom make dinner AND wears an apron :)