Owen's Delivery Slideshow

Here are some better pictures from Owen's arrival yesterday!  Hope you enjoy them!  He's having a great day today.  We've all just been relaxing and visiting with friends.  Trying to soak up every minute with this little guy.  He is so sweet and has such a calm, laid back, personality!

Morning Day 2

Owen did so great last night! He slept really well and ate pretty descent, too. It was a little bit hard for me to get some sleep at first since I was having a lot of pain, but once I finally gave a stronger medicine a try, the night went so much better. Today we are just resting and visiting with some friends and our little guy will have his circumcision at some point this afternoon. Things are going really well! Owens's eating and peeing and all that great stuff perfectly. Already have a call into his Urologist to get him in for his tests sometime hopefully next week. Until then, everything else is checking out nicely. None of the Doctors have been able to hear a heart murmur so that's awesome! We will rule that out once we see the cardiologist. Last night they did another "naked weight" and he was at 8lbs 15oz which is totally within normal loss.

We're so thankful for this little guy. We've known him less than a day and already he has our little family wrapped around his finger :)

Hello World

I just finished a nice feeding and now I'm wide awake! Just wanted to say hello!

First Stinky Diaper

Daddy was a trooper and just got Owen all fixed up from his poopy diaper!

First Bath

Owen just got all cleaned up. We moved into our recovery room where we'll be until Saturday. Baby boy is doing so great! He's sleeping peacefully now in Mama's arms. We're so blessed!

Ella loves her brother

Hanging with Daddy

Owens all done with his first meal and just relaxing with Daddy now. Just got his first shot and some eye goop and he's good to go!

Stats

Owen is busy nursing away, but here are his official stats:

Owen Matthew
Born at 1:44pm
9lbs 7oz 21in long

And the picture parade begins

Ella approves!!

Oh my goodness

Laci doesn't mess around. Only 5 pushes and he was out!! So quick. Perfectly healthy!! The siblings are happy!!

Well, that was quick

And we're....

Pushing. Doctor is here and it's about to go down. Pray for her now. She's in a lot of pain but we're so close.

Contractions comin'

So they're starting to get a bit more intense. Gonna hop in the ginormous tub that's in the room and see if we can take some of the edge off. Breaking the water kinda started to move things along. They're getting closer together and everything like they're supposed to so we may be cooking with peanut oil here in a little while (had to throw in a Duck Dynasty reference)

Breakfast is here

Well, she can't eat, but she got some sprite. Oh, and they just broke the water so he's officially received his eviction notice. She's at 5cm and things are progressing along. Contractions are getting stronger but still not too bad. She's still smiley, so she knows she's not there yet. So we'll keep on truckin. We're ready.

How I know my wife is awesome...

I'll have you know that this is what my wife said to stop in when we were trying to find something to watch. Yes, she is that awesome. And she's still smiling.

Bouncin'

Let the gravity work!!

And we're off

So now we're walking laps around the hospital. The slippers are my favorite. She rocks them pretty good though. Contractions are still slow, but they're getting a little better.

Maybe we need more patience

I think Lora is ready for business. She's sick if waiting. They're about to go in there and get him.

We found it

We found where they hide the baby station!! Kinda looks like something from an alien movie.

The drugs

The nurse just started the Pitocin so there's no turning back now. She's been having contractions all morning already so hopefully this will get things moving pretty quick.

Now she gets to sign all the paperwork that says it ok to do all this. Baby is doing good on the monitor and he's moving around really good in there. Now, we wait!

Here we go

Here we go. This is the last belly shot of the pregnancy. Just got checked in and we're getting ready. She's a trooper. A little nervous, but ready to kiss on those sweet baby cheeks!!

Bed Time

Ok, dad has officially taken over the blog for the foreseeable future (or until Laci kicks me off). Bed time here. Lots of pics to come tomorrow and updates galore. Live blogging births has really become a forte of mine over the last two kids, if I may brag a bit!!

Haha!!!! I can't wait for tomorrow. Gotta rest up though. Laci needs me on my A game! Lol. Love y'all.

Big Day!

Tomorrow is the big day!  This afternoon I had a procedure done to help ripen my cervix from 2cm where I currently was up to 4cm.  This will work it's magic hopefully overnight and I will be induced in the morning.  I'll be 39 weeks on the dot, but they really feel Owen is ready and that with his kidney issues and size, it is certainly time :)  We would appreciate any and all prayers for an uncomplicated birth (and easy would be nice!!)  and a healthy baby boy when he arrives!  Randy will take over and give you lots of updates and pictures as time allows tomorrow so check back in the morning to see how it's going.  So thankful and blessed by all of our wonderful friends and family! Xoxoxo

Whoa Baby!

This morning I had my monthly visit at the Perinatal Clinic.  This was supposed to be my last scan of Owen's kidneys and growth that would help them to determine how much longer we could wait out a natural delivery and at what point we would just induce.  I had been told that they may actually schedule an induction first thing next week and that this appointment would help them decide if it was necessary.   We met earlier this month with Owen's Urologist and found out that he will most likely have his surgery sometime within his first month of life.  They are nearly positive he has a UPJ which is just an obstruction in one of his Ureters leading from his kidney to his bladder.  He will have a couple tests to confirm this and then they will schedule the procedure.  It should be a simple surgery where they just remove the block and insert a temporary stent that will be removed 6 weeks later.  After leaving there, we really feel like the scariest part of the surgery will just be having our newborn put under anesthesia, but other than that it seems to be a "simple" procedure.  So things are going well on that end.  Today they were still able to see some tissue around the kidney which is very good since it's so severely dilated.  We wont know until some testing after surgery just how much kidney function he has lost, but the Doctor reminded us that even partial function is still good since he should have full function on the left side.

So that was all pretty much stuff I knew already.  But I did get some news that really threw me for a loop and brought on all sorts of emotional pregnant lady emotions!!  The first thing that caught me off guard is that by ultrasound (which could be off....possibly) Owen weighed in today at 10lbs 4oz.  Yep. That would be TEN. POUNDS.  So that alone was enough to scare the heck out of me and just about bring me to tears.  The Perinatologist is concerned that I may indeed have Gestational Diabetes that was undiagnosed and therefore untreated this entire time.  I had failed my first test, but passed the second one so they stopped looking into it.  This could be what has caused him to not only get so big, but apparently his growth literally spiked and he put on a bunch of weight very quickly.

So where does that put me now?? Well, the plan they have for now is that I will go in on Monday for a glucose test.  I'll have to fast starting at midnight the night before and will have my blood drawn at 8:45am when I get there.  Then I will eat breakfast, wait an hour, and then have my blood drawn at the one hour mark.  They just want to see how my body is responding to the sugar I guess.  I'm not really sure what will happen after that.  The Perinatologist has passed this on to my OB who I haven't talked with yet (except the nurse that scheduled my glucose test).  They did tell me today at the Perinatal Clinic that there was a much higher chance now that I could need a Csection because of his size, but also that either way they would recommend induction by/at 39 weeks.  They said I'm in the grey area where as of today they wont insist I have a C section, but if he gets much bigger I won have a choice.  So we may be having a baby next week sometime.  Hopefully.

I'm feeling a little more at ease as the day goes on, but this morning was rough for me.  Some people will understand this and some wont, but I was just totally overwhelmed with all these wrenches being thrown into the "birth plan" I had in my head.  I really would prefer a natural birth vs a C Section.  Ella and Noah's births were both very different, but they were also both so wonderful and special.  After having Noah without an epidural and seeing how much easier my recovery and time was with him, I was really looking forward to duplicating that with Owen.  Even though it's hard and I dread it in some ways, I was actually looking forward to when Owen makes his arrival.  It's the most difficult but yet rewarding moment and I just started feeling like I was going to be cheated of that by being forced into a csection. Especially just going by ultrasound for his weight which could be off.  Do not get me wrong:  I know some of my closest friends have had C Sections and swear by it!  I'm not trying to say that it isn't as fulfilling of a birth or anything.  It's just something that's important to me.

So for now, "my plan" (which you know how well that ever works out), is to still try for a natural delivery (except for the induction meds) and see if I can still deliver without C-section.  I'm a nervous wreck, but I have to try because I will be so upset if I don't and the measurements were somehow off. I've heard of plenty of moms delivering babies that big before without problems.  So we'll see how it goes!!

For now, you can join me in specifically praying that Owen will come on his own sometime soon so that I don't have to be induced and also pray that I am able to have a normal delivery without having to have a C Section.  I feel like I have just "gone with the flow" the whole time through all of these ups and downs.  We've just tried to take them in stride and trust whatever God's plan is.  I have to admit though, I'm getting tired and I'm ready to just have my baby here safe and sound.  This morning kind of felt like enough's enough.  We are so ready to welcome this chubby little guy into our family!  2 weeks or less either way is what I have to keep telling myself.  But it's hard when I already feel so huge and uncomfortable!

Here are some pictures from today.  He's obviously really smooshed so they are harder to make out than the others.  He has his hands by his face and in his mouth every time I have an ultrasound and today they were really in the way so thats whats all over by his mouth and chin.  He was sucking on his fingers the whole time.  Sweet baby!