2 weeks & Newborns

It's been a little over two weeks since Jillian entered our lives and while I am still  trying to get the hang of this parent of two, newborn awake all night thing I honestly can say it's difficult for me to remember her not being here in my life. 

Every year it's a family tradition to go see The Forgotten Carols and every year it puts the Christmas season in perspective   This year was no different. Numerous times throughout the show I became overwhelmed with gratitude that my Heavenly Father blessed me with a wonderful husband, a job that I love, my adventurous and sweet son, and now this beautiful little girl. The show made me appreciate what a gift from heaven she truly is and resent the all night feelings and endless exhaustion that a newborn brings a little less. So here I sit at 3 am wide awake, but with my heart full of love that I get to be wide awake with my daughter. Here's to you. The best  Christmas present I've ever had. Winston, you're a close 2nd. 

At Jillians 2 week appointment she is almost back to her birth weight. 6 pounds 3 ounces putting her in like the 3%. Newborn clothes still drown her skinny limbs, but she's such a good eater I'm sure she will start to chunk up here shortly. By some miracle she has been a good nurser and by an even bigger miracle I've survived nursing over two weeks.  Many have asked how nursing is going since it was awful with Bennett and I only lasted like 10 days, many of those days supplementing with bottles and I have said that I dislike nursing. Well let me elaborate.  For me at least I miss the sure knowing how much she's actually eating eat feed and the alternating of who is feeding the babe at 3 am with Lance. I also miss the convenience bottles give when you are trying to go out in public or drive in the car. The last few days I've given Jillian a bottle in the evening as we head home from somewhere/as her last feed before we venture to bed and it's helped her sleep a little longer and given me back some of those freedoms all while keeping her a breatfed baby. The positives of breastfeeding for me this far have been not making a bottle, washing them, and buying formula as well as the convenience that not needing to pack these items in her diaper bag bring. It is so nice to know when she's hungry, I've got the "goods" and as for missing Lance help me feed her, I'm just grateful he's been home everyday to help with Bennett and keep him on schedule/make sure I get a nap in at some point.  

I am surely blessed to have him and his schedules flexibility that allows him to be home everyday giving me time to adjust to being a mom of two under 13 months. Bless those who are able to do it on their own without the additional help. The 4-6 hours each evening that I do have them out numbering me is entirely exhausting. Thank heavens it isn't all day every day... At least not yet. ;) 

Jillian Christine Gummersall

::Photo credit to the amazingly talented Laura M. Collard::

Sunday night i called the charge nurse to figure out what time we would be coming in.  I knew from looking at the induction schedule that I was 2nd on the list of 8 people to be induced and the odds of me getting to come in around 7am were pretty high.  Stacie was charging and told me to expect a call around 6:30am and I also informed her that Shelley, (the nurse who trained me to labor & delivery) would be my nurse.

Trying to go to sleep the night before you know your going to have a baby is like trying to get a little kid to sleep on Christmas Eve... impossible.  Somehow after folding 3 loads of laundry, showering, doing my hair, and getting the house straightened up I climbed into bed at 10pm.  At 2:30am I awoke to the pups barking and my dad up and about and wrestled myself back to sleep until 5am when I heard Bennett awake in his crib.  I jumped up, grabbed a banana & some water thinking he was gonna be up for good all while resisting the urge to barge into his room and spend the next hour cuddling with him.  Needless to say he went back to sleep and I did not. From 5-6am I anxiously finished packing my hospital bag and getting ready for the day.  I ventured to Einsteins to pick up bagels for everyone and sat on my bed, phone in hand, until Stacie called me.  6:24 the phone rang and she told us to get there around 7 or as close as we could.  Lance and I headed out into the garage only for the battery on his plow truck to be dead of a doornail inhibiting him from pulling out the truck to get his worker set up for the day  After a half hour of attempting to jump it we left the truck and Bennett in the care of my dad and went on our way to the hospital.  We arrived and checked in only to be greeted with smiling faces and congratulations from my co-workers and managers.  Then the fun began.

Prior to starting anything my body was already contracting every 7 minutes.  They weren't painful but obviously helped a little.  My IV was placed at 7:45am fluids running, Melissa (or Dr. Brown) came in and broke my water at 8:00 while Shelley (my nurse) started the piton at 4milliunits/hr.  I was dilated to a 1cm, 50% effaced, -2 station, mid-position.  (I later joked about how impressive it was that she was able to break my water while I was only a 1cm/50% and Melissa said her mom said her long skinny fingers would make her a great piano player, but they really just make her an awesome OBGYN!)  Right after my water was broken I had Shelley call the anesthesiologist and give him a heads up that as soon as the c-section was over I would be wanting my epidural.  Little did I know that within the next couple of minutes my contractions went from 7 minutes apart to 2-3 minutes apart... talk about starting things up quickly! At 8:45am my pain level was creeping up to a 5/6 and I started to have to think and breathe through contractions.  Just as the anesthesiologist walked in to place my block I had about HAD it with my contractions and was able to ask for some IV pain medication.  At 9:15am my epidural was in and I couldn't have been happier.  At 9:40 I was already dilated to 3cm, 70% effaced.  We increased my pitocin to 8 and I continued to contract away.  Lance called Laura (which I felt was jumping the gun, but luckily he did) and she headed down from Bountiful to be our memory catcher.  At 11:10 I was having some early decelerations, dilated to 3cm, 90% effaced and the head had dropped to -1 station and we found out she was facing sunny side up (posterior) with a little caput (or cone head forming).  We decided to stick me in the funny position known as high sims in hopes to open the pelvis and get her to rotate on her own.  By 12:48 I was starting to feel some pressure and was then dilated to 6cm and completely effaced. I let Lance & Laura finish their lunch as each contraction meant increased pressure for me.  Finally at 1:10 I was complete and her head was at a +2 station.   Shelley paged Melissa and Melissa called back and exclaimed "you won you won!" which meant I was the first of her 3 patients to be ready for delivery.  Melissa came in and got dressed.  She checked me and Jillian was indeed still facing the wrong way.  With a little manual rotation Melissa was able to turn her head to face the correct position for delivery.  I began pushing at 1:20 and pushed through 2 contractions.  After the 2nd set of pushes her heart rate remained low and wasn't recovering like it had the previous time and Melissa instructed me to just keep pushing and get her out.  After a regular fist push she told me to do small half strength pushes which caught me off guard because I didn't think we were that close yet, haha but we were.  Jillian was born just 1 minute later at 1:24pm!!  A total of 4 minutes of pushing.

It was at that moment between seeing her in Melissa's hands and her being placed on my chest that it hit me.  I just had a baby.  I just became a mom of 2.  For whatever reason I wasn't able to fully comprehend that until she was there. Alive in my arms.

Jillian came out a little stunned and took almost 20-30 seconds to finally breathe and begin to cry.  She was a little floppy and didn't cry continuously like we like so we had her go over to the warmer to get a little more mad and pink before cuddling skin to skin.  1 minute APGAR was a 7 for color and tone and at 5 minutes she had perked up to a 9.

I of course has consistently high blood pressure throughout my labor. It hung out for the most part in the 140/90-100 range which just validated the fact that I was meant to be induced. While it was a rather fast labor of 5.5 hours and 4 minutes of pushing I am so grateful for my amazing nurse and coworker Shelley for taking such good care of me and so grateful to Dr. Brown for her skills and for being such an amazing doctor for me personally and making my delivery experience perfect. Also thanks to both of them for being such great examples to me in the work field of labor and delivery.

To my sweet little ones

 I thought having a plan would allow me enough time to get my to-do list checked off, enough minutes spent with Bennett and enough hours of sleep before the arrival of our sweet baby girl, but the truth is there are still things on my never ending list, there are never enough minutes spent with Bennett and sleep? Well we all know how that is in your last month of pregnancy, nonexistent.   So many times throughout this pregnancy I have been asked if I'm "so excited" about becoming a mom for the second time. Sometimes I've answered with yes other times I express my worries, but I want to

clear the air that I feel truly honored blessed that Heavenly Father has enough trust in me to grant me with another one of his precious heavenly spirits. After having a fairly easy pregnancy end with the shocking news that my induction would take place at 37 weeks instead of 39 and a scary trip to labor and delivery at 3 am, I am grateful to my Heavenly Father for blessing me with health and blessing this little girl with health to continue growing. I am also grateful, yet absolutely terrified that this is my LAST day pregnant. she's so easy to care for, feed, and nuture while she is on the inside, but the clock is ticking and while I have endured the last (essentially) 2 years of pregnancy, I'm done! 

Dearest Bennett- I hope you know how much I love you. How much your father loves you and how much your family loves you. Your fiery personality makes us all giggle daily. Your never ending dancing and bobbing when a song comes on you like or a food you love enters your mouth. How you sprout your teeth in groups  instead of one at a time. You walk all over our house and roll onto the dogs to show them how much you love to cuddle them. How you wake up happy saying hi and allow us to sleep through the night. How much you love to splash in the bath and eat ice. All of these new skills you've learned and developed make your father as I so proud to be able to call you out son. You are such a good sharer and I hope you continue to be with your baby sister. I hope that you show her how to love, how to laugh, and how to be a good person because you are truly a wonderful person. I am so so sad to have to share myself between you and another, but I hope and pray that you love your sister and protect her. I love you Bennett boy. You will always be the boy who stole my heart. 

Dearest Jillian- How excited I am to get to hold and snuggle and love on you tomorrow. How excited I am to have a mini me a little girl I can dress up as my twin, teach to be a strong woman of great worth and watch melt her daddy's heart. I am excited for you to have such an amazing brother. I'm sure you will love him and be like I was with my brother constantly trying to follow his footsteps. I pray that you are big and your lungs are strong and that we can avoid any NICU visits. You are one lucky girl to have Bennett as your brother and such a huge family so excited for your arrival. Here's to tomorrow, your birthday. Love you already and excited to love you even more once your officially here. 

November Rewind

 Bennett's first trip to the rec center to swim.  We walked in and sat down on the cement bench.  Bennett turned around and saw all the slides and water and his jaw dropped.  He tried so so hard to climb down and jump right in. He was crawling around EVERYWHERE splashing, kicking, and smiling the entire time.  Luckily I convinced my dad to go with us so he got the majority of the soaking and splashing while I was able to enjoy taking pictures.

Bennett getting into the pantry, this time actually opening a package of ramen and sharing it with Winston.

Enjoying countless evenings of the Lion King and Frozen from the comforts of our couch.

Sheetrock and mud finished. Painting also completed.

Dinner with the Collards @ Wingers

 Finishing my closet project: Lance and & I have way too many shoes. I got a piece of MDF, had it cut at home depot and installed shelves in our closet to house all of our shoes.

Completing our Christmas Cards before finding out we are going to have this baby a week earlier than anticipated.

Grandpa's 58th Birthday celebration: Dinner of choice spaghetti and meatballs with cake and ice cream for dessert.

Bennett being so tired he was willing to take a nap on me for over an hour.

Cheesecake Factory with our friends where Conor and I were treated to cheesecake decorated for our birthday.

Bennett digressing back to his baby toys as I got them all cleaned for the baby's arrival.

Basketball season has started. Bye Bye Lance.

 

Enjoying my leave of absence a little too much with Bennett Boy.

NST #1

Surprise Party

 NST #2 and my birthday date including dinner with Landon and Nicole followed by the Taylorsville vs. Lehi game aka Garrett's first game head coaching.

NST #3

Finishing Bennett's bunkbed- stain and assembly.  We moved most of his furniture into the nursery so his room has looked a little homeless with just a crib and a tiny dresser.

Thanksgiving Day @ Lance's Dads house

Setting up our Christmas village. I accidentally left one of the lights under the "snow" and it burned a quarter sized hole in our carpet.  eek.  Luckily we noticed it before the house caught on fire.

Faux Thanksgiving @ our house including an intense game of Logos Party--- we get a little intense with games in our family.

Bennett enjoying bedtime songs from Lion King and Frozen with Kenzie while Lance watched the Jazz game on the TV.