Sydney Kate || One Month

Well, if this hasn't been the fastest month EVER?! How is it possible our sweet girl is already one month old? She showed us from day one how much of a fighter she is! We went through a scary first week of life, but thank you, Jesus...she is doing great!

We got to bring Sydney home at 8 days old. One of the benefits of a NICU stay was that her eating and sleep schedule was set...and awesome! She has the sweetest spirit and is so far, an all around perfect baby! (ok, so I'm a little biased) 

Sydney Kate || One Month Old

This month you've...

*Met lots of family who are so in love with you (Gigi, Papa, Aunt Lindsey, Natalie and Beatrice, Great Grandma and Grandpa...am I leaving anyone out?)

*Gone to the doctor 3 times

*Visited your mama's school (and met a lot of teachers!)

*Had your first accident that required a outfit change (but you made it 3 1/2 weeks before this happened)

*Gone out with your mom and your dad alone in public...and we all survived

*Taken your first set of professional pictures 

You are now 8 lbs 10 oz and 21 inches long. That's the 27th percentile for weight and 43rd for height.  (and your head is in the 42nd percentile) You are still wearing newborn diapers just fine. We'll move you up to size one just as soon as we finish these last few packages. :) Newborn clothes are just about over with around here...they're getting snug. I've started putting you in all your adorable 0-3 month summer outfits. They're still a little big, but you look SO cute in them! You transition extremely well back and forth from nursing to bottles. (another bonus from NICU) It also allows your daddy to get to feed you too (especially in the night) You love to lay on our chest and snuggle into our neck. Speaking of necks, you have had the strongest neck since day one. You hold it up and have great control already. Paci's are not your thing so far...unless your daddy is giving it to you and then of course you're all for it. You love to be swaddled when you're sleeping...as a matter of fact, it's the only way you'll sleep for longer than 30 minutes. Most mornings we wake up to find your arms out of the swaddle...and above your head. :) You've started smiling at us when we talk to you, which makes my heart melt. Bath time is not you're favorite thing just yet...I know you'll learn to love them. (eventually) You've become very observant and alert. You love to look around you and take the world in. You're not a fan of getting into your car seat...but once you're in and we're carrying you, you're good. One of my most favorite things you do is get completely silent when you here your Uncle David sing Great Are You Lord. (All Sons and Daughters) You can go from an all out fit to tranquil silence at the first beat of the song. It's a pretty amazing thing to witness. 

A day in the life of Sydney (at one month)

You wake up for the day around 6:30 or 7:00am. We eat and cuddle. This is usually when you love to give out smiles when I talk to you. You usually fall back asleep by 8:00am. You wake up again between 10:00-11:00am to eat. This time you usually stay up for an hour or two. By 12:30-1:00pm you're usually eating again and then sleeping. 3:30-4:00ish...we're up and eating again. From here it varies from day to day. Sometimes you're up until our bedtime routine, sometimes you'll go to sleep again around 6:00, other times you take a few 30 minute naps. This is all probably dependent on if we're eating out or at home...or running errands. My greatest scheduling accomplishment this month is your bedtime routine. It's been working for 2 1/2 weeks straight! We usually start between 8:00-9:00pm. You take a bath (and scream) then get a full body massage of Aveeno calming lotion (which totally calms you) then we put your jammies on and eat. If you aren't already asleep at the end of eating, we sing lots of made up songs and rock until you're out. This whole process takes about an hour until you're in the pack n play. You will sleep anywhere from 5-6 hours now, which means we're only getting up with you once in the night. Somewhere around 3:30-4:00am we feed you and you usually always go right back to sleep. And then we start it all over again the next day. :)

I never knew how much my heart could grow by meeting you. I still can't believe I'm a mom, but I am loving every minute of this! You are by far my greatest accomplishment, Sydney Kate! I can't wait to see what all this next month will bring.

My Birth Story...

I know I am going to be in the minority (only one?) when I say I wanted to have a C-Section. As a matter of fact, I mentioned this to my doctor very early on in my pregnancy and she thought I was crazy. We continued to visit this topic as the weeks went on, but I could tell she was politely steering me away from this "birth plan." So at about 28-30 weeks I accepted the fact that I would be having this baby the regular way. Part of my negotiation for no c-section was that we could induce. I'm a major planner and I just needed to have this mapped out contrary to everyone telling me there's no way you can plan it out, I was determined.

Fast Forward. July 12th. Pre-Induction Day. My mom and dad drove down for Sydney Kate's big day! We met them at our favorite Babe's Chicken House for dinner and then came home to get our bags. We checked into the hospital around 8:00pm. We didn't waste anytime getting started. I was at a one when I arrived, so we went ahead and started a medicine that would soften my cervix so that we could start Pitocin in the morning. Coincidently, Knocked Up was one the TV, so we watched that and waited. :)

We were only about 2 hours into this process when it got fun. Apparently, my little girl wasn't a fan of the medicine. (I'd like to argue, she wasn't a fan of me laying on my side aka ribs she dislocated!) Here I thought our super nice nurse just loved us (or Seymore's jokes) and that's why she kept coming in. It really didn't hit me anything was wrong until the head nurse would rush in while my nurse was tending to me. Long story short...I spent the next 9 hours flipping from side to side to my back, with oxygen/ without oxygen ALL. NIGHT. LONG! Somewhere in there they started the Pitocin (I think around 4:00am) but same story. Her little heart rate would drop when I had a contraction. Not every one, but every few- which of course was concerning. My doctor came in at 7:00am to break my water. Funny. (not really) She broke it, and nothing really came out. Secretly, I was excited to feel this sensation, but I was robbed of the gush of water. They said maybe she was blocking it. (Come to find out there was hardly any amniotic fluid left. Miracle #178 that she made it safely) Around 9:00am, they checked me and I was at a 4. Whoo hoo! The nurse asked me the usual rate my pain level question..so I let her know I'm the kind of girl who takes 4 Advil the night before I start my period so that I don't have to feel cramps. Ever. So this was definitely a 12. It wasn't screaming, pulling my husbands arm off painful...just really bad cramps. So naturally, I said I want the epidural! The Anesthesiologist was in surgery so I had to wait on him...45 minutes. That didn't hurt either. I remember sitting on the side of the bed, the nurse standing in front of me and Seymore's head peeking around to see my face. It was a little poke and a cold sensation running through my back. Again, nothing like what I expected from watching 325 episodes of The Baby Story. That man was my hero, because after that I got so sleepy and wasn't feeling the contractions anymore. I rested my eyes, assuming we'd have some down time for a while since I was only at a 4. My dad went to get his oil changed, Seymore went to quadruple check that the car seat was installed properly and my mom was hanging out, updating everyone on her phone. And then my doctor walked in like 10 minutes later. I forget all the small talk...until she said these magically words "Looks like you're going to get your wish, I think it might be best to do the C- Section" It took me a second to make sure I heard her right, I'm pretty sure my mom thought she was joking by the look on her face. I was so relieved! 1. I could get this over with ASAP  2. I could eat again soon  3. (and most importantly) we could get my baby out safely! I asked her when and she said now. So...my mom called my husband who had just made it to the parking garage and my dad who had just gotten to the dealership and said its time. Seymore got into his fancy outfit and they rolled me down around 11:00am. I wasn't the slightest bit nervous or scared, I'm not really sure why since this was major surgery, but I never was. My doctor even joked that Seymore was more nervous than me...sure enough he was- when he came behind the curtain his hands were a sweaty mess! I never felt a pull, tug or anything uncomfortable the entire time. I watched the digital clock on the wall when I could hear they were close and it was totally 11:11 (which I thought we would be so cool...11:11, make a wish??) 11:11 and 52 seconds to be exact when I heard her scream but they said 11:12am, so that's her official time of birth.

Sydney Kate

11:12am

7lbs 4 oz

18 1/2 inches

Seymore got to cut the cord which was really cool. He stayed with her and took pictures while they put me back together. 20 minutes later, I had her on my chest and we were being wheeled back to our room.

Time seemed to fly by from here. I fed her and let her lay on my chest for a while...my mom, dad and Seymore held her some more and then they took her to the nursery to be cleaned up. I (of course) was starving and asked if I could eat. They brought me some Jello, Chicken Broth and Apple Juice...you would've thought that was my favorite meal! I was SO hungry. While she was getting cleaned up, I was taken to our new room where we'd stay the rest of the time. I was already requesting to get up and walk around. Pretty sure that nurse thought I was crazy too. She laughed and asked if I could even feel my legs...to which I responded that I could. :) But she said I had to wait 12 hours before they'd even attempt it. Lame. Sydney came back to the room around 2:00pm and we all just admired her beauty for the next few hours.

 Around 6:00pm her pediatrician came through to check her out. She was perfect. Minus the fact that he wanted to retest her Bilirubin levels. He thought it had to be a mistake because they were at a 19. He thought maybe they missed the decimal and it was 1.9. I wasn't worried. Pretty much every baby I knew had jaundice and we'd probably just have to put her in front of the window. Well, not so fast...the retest came back around 10:00 and they were at a 17. The nurses came in and took her down to the NICU to go under the lights. Immediately following the Neonatal Doctor came in with papers I needed to sign. She said that they need consent to do a blood transfusion on our little girl and we didn't have a lot of time. If she didn't get this done asap, she would more than likely be brain damaged for the rest of her life. I think I was in complete shock. As was Seymore. I kept looking over at him and we just stared at each other trying to process what she was saying. I quickly signed the papers and she took off. Thank goodness our nurse stayed with us for a little while longer and explained the process a little more in-depth. Our blood types are different. She got her daddy's blood type which I guess caused my red blood cells to actually kill off her red blood cells. This was the only way to stop it. I still don't understand if this was a separate issue or if its what caused her Bilirubin levels to escalade. To be honest, I was trying so hard to hold back the tears and all I wanted was to call my mom..so I just needed this nurse to leave. Finally, I got a hold of my mom and explained the situation. We immediately started praying and started the chain to have people all over praying for Sydney as well. I was determined to get up and walk around because I knew as soon as the transfusion was over, we could see her and I was not going to be pinned down to a bed! Around 7:00am, the nurse came and got us and we went down to see our baby. It was tough to see her like this, but we knew she needed us to be there with her as much as possible. 

She wasn't able to get the full transfusion because her platelet levels dropped form 150,000 to 32,000! This caused us to have to do a brain scan to make sure that didn't cause bleeding on her brain. (Did I mention, this isn't the best case scenario for her worry wart mama!) Praise the Lord, her brain was fine! We ended up having to do a big fancy word that meant bond her new blood to her old blood so the red blood cells and platelets could start multiplying. It wasn't until about day 2 that we knew she would be ok. No talks of brain damage or other life long problems. It was just a game of "fighting fires" as her nurse called it, until we were in the clear with her Bilirubin levels. The doctors and nurses in the NICU were amazing! They did a great job of keeping us up to date on every step of the process. 

Each day my brave little girl made more and more progress! She was such a little fighter. She spent 8 days in NICU before finally getting to come home. We got to room in with her the night before just to make sure everything was A-Ok before having her at home. Ever since leaving the hospital, she's been great! Bilirubin levels were never an issue again and there were no complications with her new blood. We finally got a clean bill of health at her one month appointment! What a rough way to enter a new world, but she's been completely unfazed by it all! It's like it never happened! (Well, until you see the hospital claims coming in, then it brings back all the memories. lol. I play, I play.) We love you baby girl!!!