A Very Big Baby

Things don't always go as planned - even when we have good plans and try to do everything right.  How do we react when our plans go awry?

Unfortunately, I don't react very well.

This last week we had an ultrasound for Eb since he is late.  At our last appointment I had expressed concern over his size and my midwife didn't think he was overly big, come to find out she was mistaken.  According to the ultrasound tech he was already 9 pounds and 6 ounces - huge for a first baby.  The news didn't get much better.  When the midwife checked me I was exactly where I'd been almost two weeks ago - with a soft cervix but no dilation and a still 'floating' baby (meaning he hadn't dropped yet).  Armed with this new information my midwife recommended that if nothing happens we induce sooner than planned, just because his size was going to make it much more challenging to come vaginally and if he gained any more weight it might not be possible at all.  She also recommended that I consider an epidural (something I had been hoping to avoid) because it could help me to relax and dilate sooner and it could slow down the desire to push which could reduce the severity of any tears experienced.

My Mom was with us and asked a lot of good questions... and also became very apprehensive for me.  She had a very hard labor with me and ended up needing an emergency c-section and doesn't want to see me have to go through the same thing.  We discussed options, pro's and con's all weekend... and I cried and cried because it was becoming clear that the delivery I so desperately wanted might not be what I get.  At the time we though an induction on Monday might still be an option (during my appointment we had scheduled for Wed.) and I was feeling a lot of pressure to make a choice.  It was hard because the longer we wait the more chances there are that I will go into spontaneous labor which is best for a vaginal delivery - but while we wait he continues to grow which could mean more need for a cesarean.  I am terrified of a C-section for lots of reasons, so it was a long couple days.  I spent a lot of time crying and praying that the Lord would help me make the right decision and that he would please make Eb drop and go into spontaneous labor so I didn't have to be induced.

Today we found out that inducing Monday is no longer an option and I am glad that decision is made for me.  Since then I have found a lot more peace that the Lord has this and that we will take it hour by hour, whether I have to be induced or not.  If I do have to be induced I am going to try to have him vaginally unless the midwife advises otherwise, even if I end up with a cesarean I will feel better mentally knowing that I was at least allowed to try and he really couldn't come that way. 

Why am I upset at my reaction?  It seems pretty normal considering I've spent the last 8-9 months thinking about what would be best for Eb and I, and trying to anticipate how things would go.  I think it was okay for me to be disappointed and mourn the loss of those ideas - but I think I crossed the line from what was acceptable to self-pity and a taste of despair.  During this weekend though, I was so distracted by my fear and disappointment about the possible changes to my delivery plans that it was hard for me to rejoice over the good things we found during the ultrasound, namely that Eben was moving well, his breathing movements looked great, he had plenty of amniotic fluid even though he's huge and that everything else looked 'normal' (I never thought such a small word could be so blessed!).  No matter how my delivery turns out God is going to bless Chris and I with a beautiful healthy son!  And with the medical experience surrounding this birth I will come out safely too.

So now I am trying to move forward the way I should have started - trusting the Lord for grace and strength to do what is best for my son, and trusting that the Lord has it all in His hands and that he wants mine and Eben's good, even if 'good' may not look like I think it should.

Pregnancy's Dirty Little Secrets: Part 4

A continuation of all the juicy tidbits I wish I'd known about pregnancy ahead of time!  If you are new to this series please read my Disclaimer in my first post so you are prepared for the likelihood that you will learn a little lot more about me than you ever wanted to!

1.) Your 'bubble' is much bigger!
      Again, this one seems pretty obvious - but in the latter part of your pregnancy your belly will hit things a lot sooner than you expected it to!  I cannot count the times I have reached for something on the counter and am surprised to find myself bumping the counter before I reach my intended target!  This makes a lot of activities I used to take for granted more comical (and sometimes impossible), like reaching across the bed to reach that pillow.

2.) I now can sympathize with the Michelin Man!
     Puffy, Puffy and Puffy!  Holding water is not a dangerous complication at all, but it can be uncomfortable.  Before I was pregnant and experienced this kind of swelling I only thought about the inconvenience of my shoes not fitting - come to find out it can be more uncomfortable than that.  When the swelling moved into my hands it caused me to get a temporary case of carpel tunnel.  While there isn't much that can help your hands right now, compression hose did wonders for my feet and legs!  I just got the knee highs because they were cheaper and I didn't need the full length ones at the time, but if you start experiencing swelling earlier in your pregnancy I highly recommend the investment!  They allowed me to stay on my feet/sitting much longer without me worrying that my feet were going to pop!  Fortunately, the swelling and all of its side effects will be sent packing not long after Eb makes his appearance!

3.) Sleep, oh sleep, why have you forsaken me?
     During the first trimester you often lose a lot of sleep due to the hormone changes which make you have to empty your bladder 24/7, that tends to go away during the second trimester and comes back with a vengeance during the third!  That combined with trying to stay comfortable at night as you get bigger and bigger, a full night's sleep becomes as rare as a unicorn!  During this time it is also best if you can sleep on your side.  This helps to keep your growing baby from putting too much pressure on you organs and helps your circulation.  Even with best intentions I can't count the number of times I've woken up on my back and quickly tried to reposition!

4.) Your skin can only handle so much.
      Stretch marks are common during pregnancy - but for some reason I thought I would be immune to them.  I was wrong!  I also thought that if I got them it would be on my sides, but apparently because of how I am carrying him, mine all occurred above my belly button.  What I was also surprised by was how quickly they appeared.  One morning I woke up and it almost looked like I had a big bruise above my belly button, upon closer inspection I realized there was a bit of a pattern and that I had finally succumbed to stretch marks.  The good news (or bad news) is they are hereditary, so if your Mom didn't have them you likely won't either!  If you do get them don't worry too much, I'm told they fade rather quickly.

5.)  Those wiggles, pokes and jabs become very comforting...
       While it really weirds some people out how much Eben moves (and how it looks and feels), I find it so reassuring!  Since I don't have a window into my belly where I can see how he's doing I have really come to depend on feeling his random movements throughout the day to know everything is okay.  I remember praying that I could feel him move earlier than normal just because I wanted so desperately to know all was well.  Even though the idea of someone moving inside of you, and independent of you, might sound weird at first, it has been such a sweet experience during this pregnancy!

Pregnancy's Dirty Little Secrets: Part 2

Welcome to part two of the many things I wish I'd known to expect about pregnancy!  In case you missed it please see the disclaimer in Part 1 before reading ahead, because you will probably learn a little lot more than you ever wanted to know about me and I want you to be prepared!

1.) Acne may return with a vengeance...
      Most of us were fortunate to leave our serious acne behind with high school.  But when you get pregnant it can come back!  The return of acne in pregnancy is for many of the same reasons it reared it speckled-y head in the first place - hormones!  As mentioned earlier, your body is dealing with a lot of different (and powerful) hormones that help your body handle the pregnancy, but also bring some undesirable side effects.  This isn't a problem for everyone, but I have noticed an increase in skin issues with this pregnancy, so just FYI, it could happen to you too!

2.) You might find yourself suddenly more voluptuous!
      In response to those wonderful pregnancy hormones, your mammary glands start getting ready for their created job - feeding babies!  In the process they get bigger... and bigger!  This growth can also be accompanied by some twinges and pains in your breast tissue, but apparently this is just part of that tissue changing and getting ready for their new job.  While this is great for your self-image (and can be really fun for your husband), it can be frustrating for your wardrobe.  Be sure that you keep bras your size(s) on hand, but don't get too many because you may change again in the process of your pregnancy, and you will definitely change again once the new bundle is born!

3.) Leaking, leaking, here, there and everywhere!
      While many of these are awkward, this one is more so for me, just letting you know!  Along about month six I found my body getting ready in a different way to feed our new baby, it started making a little colostrum - which meant I started leaking!  This was easy enough to prevent, nursing pads don't cost very much, but it was still a surprise.  Additionally, your body starts making a discharge to keep your cervix clean - good for baby and Mom's health - not good for underpants. Again easy enough fix, just unexpected...  Finally, in the vein of leaking, you might find yourself a little sweatier than normal too!  With all that extra water you've been drinking and blood you've been making, you have more water to get rid of and more of your body to regulate temperature for, thus more perspiration!

4.) Does anyone else feel like a pincushion?
      So its not really been that bad - but depending on how many tests you plan to, or need to, run there is a point in time where you kind of feel like a pincushion! Between that first draw to check blood type, iron levels and such, to the second glucose tolerance test, to the finger prick to make sure iron is staying where it should one can start to understand what being around a porcupine might be like!

5.) 'Pregnancy Brain' is REAL!!!
       I had heard a lot of conflicting reports on this subject with some doctors saying the absent mindedness experienced during pregnancy was just due to the new experience of being pregnant and the new concerns and thoughts that brings.  I am here to say they were WRONG! I regularly find myself wondering why I'm in a particular room, forgetting keys and losing my train of thought while still talking!  Fortunately I haven't found my mail in the fridge yet, but it wouldn't surprise me if I did!  I read an article that made me feel a little better though.  According to the authors, women's brains are 4% smaller while they are pregnant!  not because they lost brain mass but because the extra blood volume in their  system puts more pressure on the brain!  So my absentmindedness is medically justified!

I hope this installment was informative for you!  Tune in soon for more unexpected pregnancy side-effects!

26 Weeks Today!

It blows my mind that there are only 14 weeks left until Eb's due date!  We had a great check-up this week and learned that we have crossed an important threshold without knowing it!  If for some reason we were to go into labor and deliver Eb before 24 weeks, the doctors won't really try to resuscitate him or keep him alive because the success rate of babies born that early is so low.  After 24 weeks however is a different story.  At that point they will do all they can to keep baby healthy because he should be developed enough to have a much greater chance of survival.  Obviously the longer he stays in the better, and we don't have any reason to expect him to try to come early, but it was still a relief to know that should the worst happen our little man would at least have a fighting chance!

It is always exciting to me to find out what is happening in his development each week.  The things that were highlighted for this week were: Continued nervous system development, especially with his ears, so he can definitely hear what is going on in the world around him now - albeit a bit muffled; he is starting to put on fat in addition to all that muscle and weighs 1 and 2/3 pounds; he is now 14 inches from head to heel; he is practicing breathing the amniotic fluid around him and his lungs are developing at a rapid pace.

Some new things for me lately include more frequent Braxton-Hicks contractions (they don't hurt, its just like my stomach gets really hard and tight for a few minutes - its uncomfortable, but not painful).  Apparently these are completely okay and normal for the stage of pregnancy I am in and are like training for the real marathon coming up.  Eb has been a super active baby!  I will feel him move all throughout the day, especially after I eat something, and then for a little while at night.  He settles down quickly at night though and hasn't kept me up at all yet.  Painting my toenails has become quite a bit harder lately - not impossible, just challenging to get around my stomach!  I went through my closet and tried to go ahead and take out all the clothes that no longer fit - it was pretty bare when I finished!  Sadly, I had to say goodbye to my favorite pair of jeans (the ones in the picture) along with many other outfits.  Chris' Mom sent me a little money just for maternity clothes though and I'm looking forward to checking out the consignment shops around town soon!

What to call Grandparents?

Picking something for my parents to be called is a new challenge for me.  I have very good and immediate associations with most of the grandparent names I am familiar with, so having my parents called by those names seems a little odd.  For example, I have/had a Grandma, Grandpa, Granny, Granddaddy, Ma'maw, and Pa'paw, and those are all still present in my mind even though some of them have passed.

With Chris' Dad and Step-Mom the dilemma seems to have been resolved for us.  Since this is not their first grandchild, they have already been designated Mamoo and Papoo.  His Mom and Step-Dad don't have as firm distinctions yet, so we may get to find something new for them too.

Some people have said 'Just wait and see what they call them on their own'.  But I don't think a child would create one of these names on their own without first hearing them - and probably hearing them regularly.  I think it more likely that - like us - they will call someone by the name they are introduced as... so the questions still remains.  By what name will we introduce our parents to our new baby?

Any suggestions?  We would love to hear them!

What's in a name?

Much of our culture has a serious identity crisis, especially among people my age and younger.  They don't know where they come from in relation to their family or national history.  As a rule, having a past sheds light and purpose on your future.  It helps you see previous mistakes and take actions to avoid those in the future.  It allows you to see the purpose and direction of your forefathers, and then decide if you want to follow that or improve upon it.  It gives you a place in general, a context if you will, for the events going on around you and for the direction of your life.  You can see where you came from and why you are the way you are when you have the whole history of your family, nation, and preferably world, as context.

Without this context we have a generation who moves through life without much purpose, essentially lost.  I don't just mean spiritually lost, although that certainly does contribute greatly to context of life.  I mean these young people around me don't have a purpose, a calling for their life.  They mostly jump from one form of entertainment to another.  The reason they are in school is to get a degree, which will get them a job, which will get them better forms of entertainment.   Ask a young person sometime what their goal is and it will boil down to something like this.  Many of them have learned from their parents, or society, to push through most of life as fast as possible to get to retirement so they can enjoy themselves.  (Obviously this isn't everyone, and I don't have anything against retirement, but this is still the majority of young people I meet.)  These are the same people who daily vote away their freedoms and much of their income either because they assume it will make life easier or safer, or because they don't have the motivation to understand what they are doing.

Right now some of you are thinking I really need a pick-me-up and what on earth this has to do with names.  There's a purpose, I promise I'm not just being a Debbie Downer!

Chris and I have seen this tendency and don't want to repeat it in ourselves or our children.  We want to provide our children with as much history about their family, nation and world as possible.  We want to help them find significance and purpose in this life.  Obviously this will mostly be accomplished through their education, but we think it can begin with something more basic than that - their name.

Names are traditionally very important.  It is forever the title you as a person will be identified with.  Honoring the family name has been a goal of girls and boys alike for generations.  What you do reflects on you upbringing and family history.  In Biblical history, names always had a significance associated with them, often relevant to the events at hand.   Major life-changing events called for a name change (we see this with Abraham, Sarah, Jacob and many others).  We see name changes like this in many other cultures as well.

Sadly, this seems to have gone to the wayside in conjunction with life context.  This is evident in some recent and widely publicized child names, like 'Apple' (I'm sure you can think of many others!).

So then what names are we considering, you may ask?  Get ready, you may consider them a doozy, but at least now you have 'context' for our choices!  :)

For a girl we are considering Evelyn Hope.  Evelyn was my grandmother's name.  She had a huge impact on my life.  She effortlessly demonstrated hospitality to all her guests, made my sister and I feel important and took time to take us along and teach us what she could.  She was also an amazing Christian woman.  I saw her minister to anyone who was in need, older people in our community, poor and dirty 'Rainbow Children' that no one else wanted anything to do with and ladies in prison just to name a few.  She followed and respected her husband, becoming an exceptional example of what a lasting marriage looks like (they were married almost 60 years when she died).  For these and many other reasons, I would want to name our daughter Evelyn.  If she becomes half the woman of God her great-grandmother was, she will be beautiful indeed!  

We like the middle name of 'Hope' for two reasons.  One, we have great hope for the future.  In spite of my previous rant and concerns, we are seeing changes in the church and community around us that are promising, and we have great hope for what the Lord will do with these changes.  'Hope' is also to help us remember where our hope should lie - in the Lord.  Even if the future doesn't become as bright as we expect, that's okay.  We have a better and more eternal hope!

That's actually the more acceptable name, are you ready for the doozy?!?  Just remember, I don't make fun of your names... well not too much! :)

For a boy we are considering Ebenezer Jude.  I know, I know, the first thing you think of is Ebenezer Scrooge!  Remember the end of that story though?  He was a changed man!  Anyway...  Ebenezer means 'stone of help' specifically referring to the stone Samuel erected to honor/remember the help of God in an important victory over the Philistines (1 Samuel 7).  Ebenezer is also important in one of our favorite hymns 'Come Thou Fount'.  We desire to acknowledge that it is by God's help that we have come this far and by His help that we plan to continue forward.  We really feel this is true.  During our five years of being married with both of us still being in school we have had the privilege of seeing God's tangible provision time and time again.  We really feel that it is 'by Thy help I'm come, and I hope by Thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home' ('Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing').  

Jude refers to the apostle Jude, who also wrote the epistle of Jude.  We feel that the book of Jude is a timely reminder for the season we are in.  In Jude we find encouragement to stand strong in Christ and contend for the faith during a time when the church is in danger both from within and without.  With the memory of what God has done in our past and the challenge to stand strong in the present, we feel this name will give our son purpose and hope as he faces the future.

Before you ask, yes we are open to nicknames and even have some possibilities for both names already in mind.  Also, if our children find it easier later in life, we are totally fine with them going by their middle names.  Although it may be unusual, we feel strongly that naming with a purpose is important, and I am quite satisfied with our options.

Now we just need to find out which one we are going to get to use!  Stay tuned, because tomorrow we get to find out if we are having a boy or girl and I hope to let you know ASAP!

Little tastes of God's tangible provision!

Providing for our new little one is never far from our mind, especially now that it is more evident I am pregnant.  We have done extensive planning on how to fit necessary items into our small apartment, and figuring out what items really are essential on top of that planning!  There are several items that people often buy when they have a room that can be totally dedicated to baby that we are going to have to modify a bit.  For example, many ladies I know are able to have a dresser and a changing table, while we are hoping to use the top of our baby's dresser as the changing table and eliminate one of the pieces of furniture in that room. 

While I have always been confident that God will provide, I always expected that provision to be in the form of showers and forgot all about hand-me-downs!  We are blessed to be in a church with lots of young families and therefore lots of potential hand-me-downs.  Sadly, one of the families is going to be moving out of the country soon and in doing so there a parring down a lot of their belongings.  We have been one of several benefactors of this process!  

During my planning I always thought a co-sleeper would be nice to make nursing and feeding through the night easier, but as it wasn't one of our completely necessary items I wasn't planning on it.  But this family offered me theirs since their baby has almost out-grown its usefulness!  It was such an encouragement to me that God really provides, and sometimes for your wants, not just your needs!

So here is the newest piece of furniture we received!  It is kind of like a bassinet but made so that you can reach the baby while still in bed!  It straps around the mattress with clips so there is no danger of the baby rolling out the more open side. 

One side is lower to make getting baby easier.

Plus it is a nice brown which will go with either boy or girl colors!  We are so thankful and excited about our gift!

Straps will go under the mattress and attach here!