Suck

Tonight is a sucky mommy night.

The short version is: I had Rylan's IEP meeting today. Not "we" because, understandably, they didn't want Rylan to sit through it so Jim was at home waiting for the buses. It was just your basic, see what his improvements were this year and talk about the plan for next year. He's on an IEP for speech and his speech IS improving. This time last year, he had 36 phenome errors. This year he had 19 during the assessment. He's still having trouble with his blended sounds, he drops his s's quite often, etc. etc. none of it came as a surprise to me but it was nice to see the actual number improve. So, yay! Great job Rylan and good job Speech Language Pathologist!

He's very intelligent, gets along with others, has incredible fine motor skills...

But... "you know, he licks his lips, stutters, chews on his fingers and clothes, blinks his eyes a lot, has a tough time keeping his voice at a reasonable volume..." Um, yah. We've noticed that a. lot. and I guess I asked for it when I requested that we address ways to help him diminish those nervous activities. So instead they just repeated what they told me when I asked about how to help those things earlier... 1)respond to what he is saying NOT how he is saying it 2) give him your attention when he has something to say 3) get down on his level 4) reduce stress/discipline. Here's the thing... we do all of that all the time unless he's interrupting and that should be expected. Plus that's one of the areas he needs to work on when we discussed social skills, but I digress...

As the SLP elaborated, the solution that I heard: quit being so tough on him, don't send him to timeout so much (doesn't matter what he's doing, pick just one thing that is punishable - ok, right, so timeout for hitting but I guess we'll just allow the spitting, yelling, talking back, throwing toys, kicking the dog, ignoring us, being defiant - he's 4, trust me, the list goes on) stop stressing him out at home, make sure things around him are peaceful and organized and calm...

It's a good thing that calm, mellow Stella was sitting so quietly in her infant seat as usual.
Oh wait, that's right... she screamed.
the.
entire.
time.

She started crying as soon as I set her down. So I took her out and she started fussing and crying louder. The principal (who was the district representative for the meeting) took her and walked her around the classroom while the other two talked to me but she just got herself all worked up.
By the end of the meeting, I was sweating like a pig and just wanted to sob with her. Instead, we calmly walked back to the van and I let her suck ;)

Anyway, they're cutting him back to 3 days a week next year... speech days and library day. If the schedule is the same as this year, that means Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. After some thought, I'm actually OK with that. It'll give us some non-Karleigh time (which has proven to be very good for him since she's a "tad" bossy) plus, that'll be two week days that I'll be able to get Karleigh off to school in the morning and not have to worry about getting home until almost 4pm. It will be fine. Plus, things need to change around here. I don't know how, I feel like I've tried everything but you know... if timeouts are out...

*cough cough* perhaps IEP meetings should not be attended when you're six weeks postpartum... mom could be a little hormonal. But it's there in black and white, hormones or not.

I feel like such a sucky mom. He's smart as a whip because HE'S smart. He has speech problems because of things that I'M doing wrong.

Awesome.

Wordless Wednesday

Oh... it's not Wednesday huh? Yah. I was hoping no one would notice. :) Hopefully it's a great Thursday!

Being Thursday, Stella's now 5 weeks or 35 days old... that sounds younger right? What's she up to? She's becoming more animated and starting to chunk up. I do think she's just about the cutest 10 pound bundle out there. Her eyes are getting lighter, her hair is filling in, her days are spent more awake though she's got a great schedule going on already (all her doing, I would have no idea how to put a kiddo on a schedule and probably wouldn't even try). She's sleeping anywhere between 6 1/2 and 7 1/2 hours straight at night. I certainly don't take the fact that I've been blessed with 3 really great sleepers for granted. She thoroughly enjoys the outdoors but at this point is much more content walking/hiking than she is to just lie out on a blanket. Could be that there's some slight fear for her own life between the the two bigguns and the dog bouncing all around her... but who's to say? ;-) She gets the hiccups every day and isn't a fan of them. She enjoys her swing when she just wants to chill but would prefer to snuggle. She loves listening to stories and hates pacifiers - if you know how the big kids were you're probably thinking "wha? wha? WHAT?!?" Yes it's true. Detests them. Spits them out and glares at the offender. She however loves to suck on an index finger or mommy... and I'm a pretty slow one handed typer but this blog post is proof that it can be done. She's awesome.

The big kids have 20 days of school left - not that they're counting... and then the summer fun can start. It's been hard to get out much this year with a bus coming at around 11, one at 12, one returning close to 3 and the other at 4. The kids sat down yesterday and wrote a "summer ideas" list of things both big and small from jumping rope to go to the beach. I really don't want to hear a lot of "I'm bored!" this summer. So, we'll check out some new parks in the county and hopefully get out a lot more than we have during the school year. But that's the point of summer vacation isn't it?

Also, if we get out more... perhaps these blog posts won't be so dang boring!

Catching Up

Snuggling... sure doesn't leave a whole lot of time for blogging! Although I always seem to find just enough time for Facebook...

Life with Stella is still a wonderful blessing. (of course it is!) We have slipped into a routine that works for us and feels totally natural and like it's the way it always should have been. That part leaves me feeling a bit strangely conflicted at times. I'm SO glad to have her here. She fits wonderfully into our family. That doesn't mean that I'm "glad" for all the losses that we went through but at the same time I know that without them, she wouldn't be here. That's where the conflict lies. I also feel like (and I really shouldn't let this next part bother me at. all.) but I do feel like people may look at this and think "gee, you've totally forgotten the boys and the others. Well, no I haven't, but I really don't want to miss one single moment of "what IS" pining over "what COULD have been".

I think because of what we've gone through, we are a bit more thankful, joyful, and bonded to Stella than if we hadn't gone through it all. Sure, she's (living) baby number three but far from the 'oops!' that someone at the grocery store might assume and we're far from the 'baby making machines' that someone at the park might scoff at. We fought long and hard for her. Because of that fight I find that I'm much more patient with her. I don't grumble when she needs to eat in the middle of the night (although she's also treating me quite kindly and sleeping really well. She went from 11pm - 5:30am this morning... until I prodded her to make sure she was still breathing) so I'm sure that not being exhausted helps my coping skills. Anyway, I am really enjoying every little thing about her. Being a more experienced momma and really working so hard to get her here has been a good (mental) combination for me. But a bad combination for blogging! ;-)

As you might imagine, Mother's Day this year was so nice... a sigh of relief really. The weather was beautiful, Stella started passing out little grins first thing in the morning which was an incredible gift. Jim gave me some flowers, Karleigh made a card and a bookmark, Rylan made a card and a couple of magnets (love the handmade gifts!) and my momma got me a darling Coach purse perfect for spring and summer. I know, right!?! It was so much better than last year when I ended up crying myself to sleep.

I've just been spending a whole lot of time doing... nothing. We cuddle. A. Lot! I'm trying to stay on top of the house work though I will confess that laundry is tough for me to keep up with so I haven't been using our cloth diapers as much as I had hoped but now that she's getting a bit bigger we'll be able to use them more. (fingers crossed!)

It's really strange to be moving on from such a long chapter of our lives. We've basically been thinking "kids" since we were married almost 11 years ago. It is strange knowing that we (probably) won't have another pregnancy and each day we move one day further away from labor and delivery and all things newborn. Granted, she IS still a newborn but she changes and grows every day. I'm just going to continue working on doing my best to embrace every single moment and appreciate the excitement of moving forward and watching her grow and change.

I'm hoping to share some more pics asap, Stella's getting a set of cheeks on her, Karleigh's finally growing in that other front tooth and Rylan is just cute as usual!

Changes

It's really incredible how much can happen in one little week, the changes that take place, the growth...

This last week Stella had her 2 week appointment. She weighed 8 pounds 5 ounces and was 20 1/2 inches long. That's a gain of 8 ounces and 1/4 inch. Not too shabby for 14 days of growth! The day before her 2 week appointment she had a photo shoot which was an absolute blast. A gal who I've known for 4 years now offered to bring her props out and we both got some really cute shots along with me getting to have some grown up chit-chat. It was much appreciated. This is one where we used the doll cradle, from the girls' room, that my great grandpa made and our family has passed down.

The big kids are doing really well with Stella. Rylan's going through a bit of an acting out, crazy boy phase but that started before Stella arrived. Karleigh's been a bit more emotional but really, they're doing quite well all things considered. Having a new baby in the house is a big adjustment for them, it could be going so much worse.

Stella changes every. single. day. This week... she stayed awake for longer periods during the day, met her Uncle David and her great aunt and uncle, started giving us one good 5 hour stretch of sleep at night, successfully took her first pumped bottle, went to her first Daisy Scout meeting, she grew teeny tiny eyelashes...

...and gained her new belly button...

So, What's It Like?

I know that's the question that would run through my head when I would read about my friends and their rainbow babies / take home babies. For me? It's totally amazing, incredible, wonderful, blissful...

Seriously. I love it. I love her!

Honestly, I had a lot of anxiety that I might have bonding issues, or emotional issues, or that the grief would all come rushing back. It hasn't been like that at all, thankfully. I mean if it was like that, I would work through it but I feel very blessed to not have to, and so thankful that I can just enjoy Stella and the miracle that she is. OK... I did have to choke back tears as we were walking in the house for the first time. The sun was shining, we were buzzed by two hummingbirds and Jim said "Say hi to your brothers, Stella!" And also as we climbed the stairs to bed that first night. More so for the fact that without all the loss I wouldn't have been snuggling our day old daughter at that point but there was also a small pang of grief in my gut. With a sigh, it lifted.

Transitioning her into our family has been pretty easy. The "big kids" were a bit off for the first couple days but I chalk that up to being tired as much as anything else. Now, 12 days later, they're helpful and back to their "normal" selves. We'll keep normal in quotes :) Stella's a mellow, easy going kid so far. She generally lets us sleep in 4 hour stretches at night and naps for a couple hours at a time during the day. Nursing is going really well which is a relief since I was so taken aback when, after a great experience with Karleigh, Rylan was so difficult.

I realized that I don't think I mentioned that her hear murmur was undetectable by the pediatrician on her second day. So we were very, very thankful for that. Our newest concern with her is that when she spits up, it often comes out her nose and/or she chokes it back down. She sounds stuffy quite often but that's probably from the spit-up. She sneezes a ton, again probably the spit up. She's generally a really happy, content baby so I'm hoping it's really just newborn-getting-used-to-the-outside-world stuff and not something more like reflux or a milk protein allergy but those are both on my radar right now and I've been praying about it.

But really, she's simply wonderful and everything about our new family feels really, really perfect.

What a Week!

I didn't know it was possible for a week to go by with such great speed. I realized that I should probably write down Stella's birth story before I forget the details. I could, and HAVE, just spent hours on end holding and snuggling her without any regard to time. I do wish it would slow down just a little bit (I guess that makes up for all the times I wished time would speed up).


Wednesday night, April 14th, my water broke on its own a little after 10pm. I was lying in bed but on blankets because I had just been feeling "off" the whole day. I had spent the last 2 weeks with off and on contractions that would be around 5 minutes apart but after 6 hours or so, they would peter out. But on the 14th, emotionally I just felt different too. It was actually a bit of a depressive state which was odd. Anyway, after my water broke I came straight downstairs and Jim was headed up. He said that he heard me jump off the bed and knew that something was up. So, we gathered our things, I called my friend Jamie who had so graciously offered to take Karleigh and Rylan regardless of the hour. I called my mom and let her know. Turns out that she would be able to get a sub for her class but only if she needed her on Thursday, Friday or Monday. That worked out well! Then we called the hospital to let them know we'd be heading in. Jim woke the kids. Karleigh sprung out of bed totally excited. Rylan looked at him said "OK", rolled over and went back to sleep. :) We walked out to the van, Karleigh holding my hand and telling me I could squeeze it if I had a contraction. And that's when I had my first one. Since we didn't lolly gag around like I did when my water broke with Rylan, the ride to the hospital was actually not all that uncomfortable for once! They were probably about 5-6 minutes apart but not too terribly strong yet. We got the kids to Jamie's house and she had set up a whole area in the living room for them to try to sleep.

We checked into L&D at 11:15pm. Everything was ready for us. My nurse commented that she would need to do a pH test just to make sure it was my water and then she laughed and said "yah, I'm not going to need that" as she checked me out a bit more. I KNEW there was a reason I was so uncomfortably huge those last couple weeks! We sat on the monitor a bit, got checked out and I was around 4 cm so I decided to walk the halls for a while. Believe it or not, this type A, have everything planned out, person did not go into this delivery with a single plan in place. I had a few thoughts in the back of my head but my birth plan merely consisted of "get her here, alive". Anyway, I labored for a while on my own, with tons of kudos from the nurses, but ultimately I opted for the epidural. I wanted everything in place in case of an emergency. It is a bit sad how history played a part in how it went but my ONLY goal was Stella's safe arrival. I got my epidural around 2am and my mom showed up just as he was finishing up. My contraction pattern was great on its own so I didn't need any pitocin which was nice. For the next few hours, Jim cat-napped and mom and I chatted and tried to rest a bit (yah, right!).

Around 6:45 I decided it was baby time. Pushing though my first contraction felt a bit useless. I could feel it all in my face and I knew that wasn't where I needed to be pushing. We let a second contraction pass and then I pushed through the next three contractions. Between the second and the third, I could hear the nurse on my right side, talking to a nursing student about heart rate decels, I turned and looked at the heart rate tracing and my head went to "that place". Needless to say, Stella was born at 7:00am with the next contraction. :) She was beautiful, and cheesy, and had a ton (speaking from a baldy) of almost black hair.

And she was perfect...

(don't forget to pause the music at the bottom before you click play and sorry about the format difference between the way I created it and the way Blogger publishes it... good gravy! it took me way. too. long. to figure the video portion out!)

Welcome Stella Claire!

Stella Claire

April 15th, 2010

7:00am

7 pounds 13 ounces

20 1/4" long

She is beautiful (and has a ton of nearly black hair under that hat!) and happy and everything that we had hoped for and more. We are drinking up every new moment with her and looking forward to the future with such joy. She does have a small heart murmur that we are praying will resolve itself and I'm not going to worry unless I'm told that there's something to worry about. I will write up her birth story in the next few days (mainly so I don't forget!) but right now we are relaxing, getting ready to eat a little cheesecake and then turn in for the night.

This is bliss!