Poor Baby

My wife took the little girl to the doctor yesterday morning. She'd been running fever and had been very congested. The congestion had persisted since she had her shots at 10 weeks, which was 3 weeks ago.

The doctor said she has an ear infection and a cold. The weird thing is that she hadn't really been that fussy.

We're using what my nephew calls the "snotty sucker" to try to keep the congestion at bay. The little girl definitely doesn't care for saline drops, I'll tell you that.

We're also giving her amoxicillin, which she threw up yesterday evening but kept down fine this morning. Her temp was normal this morning, too. Praise the Lord!

Right now, she's with the sitter, and I'm working on my Sunday morning sermon. So, I guess I better run. Just wanted to give a quick update.

Finding Her Voice

It really has been a while since I posted an entry, I know. The reason: didn't feel like there was anything post-worthy. However, I must say that today the little girl has been more vocal than she's ever been. Maybe she's finding her voice, but, then again, she might have just realized she's MY kid. Or maybe it's just that she's constipated. Who knows?

Her hand-eye coordination is getting better, too. She's reaching for the toys hanging from the baby gym, thing-a-ma-jig. She'll even take her foot and kick the post, which makes all the toys move. She really likes that. And she almost... ALMOST... pulled hard enough on the little thing to make the music play. I had to help her out just a little bit.

I'll let you know if she ever decides to roll over!

Thank You, Facebook

Thanks to Facebook, I found out that my little girl slept through the night for the first time last night. Emily put her down around 9:30 last night, and she didn't wake up for feeding until 5:00 this morning. Of course, she was in the swing and not the bassinet, but, then, she always sleeps in the swing. We'll celebrate this victory and work on the bassinet thing later.

In other news, we buried one of our church's deacons today. Mr. Clint Hutto died in a house fire Monday. His wife, Mrs. Charlotte, is really going through it. Their home burned completely to the ground. It was a total loss. She was not home at the time. I conducted the service today. There were lots of people here from our church, and there were lots of people here from Mr. Clint's family.

My little girl was rotten this morning, though. How rotten? Well, I started trying to get ready around 8:00, and didn't finish getting ready until right at noon. That's how rotten she was. Every time I turned around, she was screaming. I love her, though.

You should have seen her a few minutes ago. She was hungry, and my wife was... indisposed... at the time. So, I had to figure out a way to keep her from screaming until (keep the baby from screaming) my wife got un-indisposed. So, I'm playing with the baby, just trying to keep her occupied and not thinking about how hungry she was. I got right in her face and started giving her Eskimo kisses. What does she do? She latches on and starts nursing my nose! It was really hilarious.

Portraits and Progress

My wife had her six week doctor visit yesterday. He cleared her to go back to work, so now we begin a new phase in this whole endeavor: daddy day care! I've got the baby during the day. It's going to be interesting. When she gets a little bigger, I'm going to take her with me to make home visits. In the meantime, someone in our church is going to keep her 2-3 days a week, so I can do the things away from the house that need to be done.

We also took the baby to have her 6-week portraits made at Sears yesterday. I guess she did pretty good. She didn't really smile much for the camera, though. Oh well. She's been a fairly "serious" baby thus far, though she does have the cutest smile and dimples you've ever seen! When all was said and done, I didn't let my wife talk me into spending goboodles of money on pictures. I was pretty proud of myself, actually. I may live to regret not getting more, but I figure in this digital age, with all the pics we have on the computer, a digital camera, and a digital camcorder, there's not much point in paying a big bunch of money for some dude to take pictures of my little girl, when I can do it just as well with my digital camera and tripod at home.

In the last day or two, she has begun to take the bottles of formula MUCH better. She drank an entire 4-ounce bottle straight down on Tuesday. That was major progress. She's also holding her head up alot more. Last night, I was holding her on my chest in my recliner, and she just held her head up almost the whole time looking around. I gotta tell you, it was really sweet.

That's all for now, I suppose. Y'all have a good one!

Oops!

Why the title of the blog? Well, it looks like I've failed to blog for SEVERAL days (turning into weeks). The reason? Can't really say, except that not much is happening.

She's not rolling over yet. She's not walking yet (shocker). She's not talking yet (another shocker). She's not eating cheeseburgers yet (may be a shocker since she's MY kid). She does what most average babies do: eats, sleeps, poops, and cries.

Speaking of crying, this is probably the only notable thing that's happened in the last several weeks. Sunday night before last, we decided to move her into the bedroom at night. My wife and I had been taking shifts in the living room with the baby at night, and we knew we needed to move her into our bedroom eventually.

The only problem now is that she (the baby, not the wife) was a hard time getting settled at night. Almost the instant we put her down, whether in her bassinet or in her swing, she starts screaming bloody murder.

Tonight seems a little better... so far. She slept for about 30 minutes in her bassinet and then woke us up with a blood curdling, "LAAAAA!" I moved her into her swing, and she settled down. Praise Jesus! As I am typing, I just heard her cry for about 10 seconds, but she stopped. Lord Jesus, I hope she'll start sleeping through the night soon. For the record, usually by about 1:00am, she's gotten settled and sleeps pretty good until around 7:30... with the exception of the feeding in between.

Why am I up at midnight? Well, I'm glad you asked. I got a Depomedrol shot today, at least I think that's what it's called. It's like Decadron, and it's supposed to help clear up my sinuses while the antibiotics take effect. The side effect is that I can't sleep. So, here I am blogging.

Oh, this was kind of funny. We went to Meridian a couple weeks ago so family could see baby. My grandmother was holding the baby, and she said to my grandfather, "Would you like to hold her?" He said, "I don't believe." She said, "Have you ever held a baby this small?" He said, "No, I don't believe I have." She said, "Not even your own?" (technically, step-grandmother--they married when I was 4). He said, "No."

Oh, well. I just couldn't believe Grandaddy had never held a baby that small. I'm really glad he got to meet her, though. She never got a chance to meet Nanny and PawPaw. One day she will... One day she will.

New Nickname: High Maintenance Little Thing

I love my little girl! But, my goodness, she's a high maintenance little thing sometimes. Take, for instance, last night. I was going to take baby duty until around 3:00am, so momma could get some sleep, but baby girl would have none of that. I think she must have a tapeworm or something, because she wanted to eat every hour. Not every 3 hours, not every 2 hours, not even every hour and a half--but EVERY HOUR. And when she ate, she'd EAT... for at least 15 minutes. She'd go to sleep, and then 45 minutes to an hour later, she'd want some more. Not only that, but we couldn't get her to go to sleep between feedings. So, today, we're going to try to keep her awake a good bit and hope--against hope perhaps--that tonight we can say, "The buffet is closed," and she'll sleep between meals so momma can get some sleep.

Finding Our Way Home

Let me just say, first of all, that I REALLY wish I could remember more details and more of the order in which everything happened.

Yesterday evening, after everyone left for the day, and it was just my wife and I, that's when things started getting really good. (As I'm typing this, I'm really getting a kick out of how stubborn my little girl is. She'll take a pacifier, and after about 30 seconds, she'll spit that thing out so hard it ends up at the other end of the bassinet.) As my wife and I watched our little girl, we shared a good cry and marveled at the miraculous grace and wonder of our Lord. Then, it was time for my wife to go walking.

After having a C-section, they said she needed to walk. I finally convinced her to go walking with me. I think I said something like there was ice cream at the end of the hall, but I really don't remember. As we walked, she was in a great deal of pain from the incision. When we got back to the room, she got some pain medicine and felt better. Oh, I almost forgot. I got to roll my little girl down the hall in the bassinet while momma and I walked.

Sometime before that, I guess it was just after lunch time, a lady came in and asked my wife what she'd want to eat for supper, breakfast, and then lunch. She recorded my wife's menu selections. When supper came, it wasn't what she ordered. When breakfast came the next morning, it wasn't what she ordered. When lunch came, it wasn't what she ordered, and I thought, "As much as we're paying to stay here, you'd think they could at least bring her the food she ordered. The only meal we insisted on them getting right was last night's supper. She'd ordered a club sandwich and chips with sweet potato pie for dessert. They brought her salisbury steak, a baked potato, green beans, some kind of green jello fruit salad, and strawberry shortcake. My wife didn't really want me to insist on them bringing the right thing, but she changed her mind when she later got her hands on the sweet potato pie!

This morning, the pediatrician came by to check out the baby. He said everything looked good and gave every indication that we'd be discharged some time before noon. An hour or two later, the nurse came in and asked if the pediatrician had been by. We affirmed. She asked if he'd said anything about discharging us. We told her he had. She said there was no record of him even coming by. She finally got in touch with him. He'd forgotten to fill out the paper work. We WERE supposed to be discharged before noon, after all.

Let me back up a little bit. My wife had decided we were going to keep the baby in the room with us all night. I laid down on the couch about 11:30. By midnight, I was asleep, and I didn't know I was in the world again until 7:00am. She informed me that the nursery nurse had been in a couple of times through the night, once to take the baby for tests and once to bring her back. She also informed me that her doctor had come in at 6:30 but that I had been snoring the whole time and never knew it. Oh well, I guess I needed the sleep so I could drive baby and mother home.

Now, back to being discharged. My best friend from growing up came by and stayed until around 11:15am. By this time, we already had our walking papers and were free to go. After they left, my wife wanted to change and feed the baby one last time before we headed home. We started changing the baby, or rather, I started changing the baby. My wife wanted me to change my first diaper all by myself. I got that diaper off, and I kid you not, she wouldn't stop going to the bathroom for about 20 minutes! Somewhere between starting to change the diaper and finishing, I got sidetracked doing something else, and my wife finished. I'll be changing my first one solo here in a few minutes. It's been a couple of hours since we changed her.

We got all that taken care of, fed the baby, and called for a transport. By this time it's about 12:15. Forty-five minutes later, there's still no transport, and you can't leave without a transport. We still had to run by Walgreen's to have my wife's prescription filled, and then drive an hour home. We figured up that if we did all that, it would be about 4 hours between feedings, depending on how long it took at the pharmacy, so we called and canceled the transport, and I went to Walgreen's. Less than five minutes after I left, transport showed up anyway. Go figure!

It did take a while at the drug store, so I'm glad we waited. By the time we left the hospital, it was about 3:30, but we finally found our way home. One of the young men in our church helped me unload the car, which was super nice of him. He and his dad were here putting in a drain pipe for the new ice machine in the new kitchen. He had a little experience with babies, since two of his sisters had babies last month. I'm very appreciative that he helped.

I waited until around 7:30 to walk over to the church. I figured that's about when they'd be wrapping up prayer meeting, and I was right. When they finished, I invited everyone over to see our baby, and most of them took me up on the offer. They say babies aren't supposed to be around a whole bunch of people, but I just had to show her off!

I finally ate something around 9:30, and then we bathed the baby for the first time. Now, that was an experience. She hates baths worse than our dog does! She fussed the whole time, but it was totally worth it. Besides smelling better, we found out that her hair isn't nearly as dark as we thought. It's practically blond, and like I said before, she's beautiful.

As of right now, mommy is trying to get a little sleep, and I'm watching the baby. She's getting a little fussy, so I better check her diaper. Plus, it'll soon be feeding time. Oh, wait, I almost forgot. Blue Bell loves the baby. We thought she'd be scared, but she wasn't. She skipped the sniffing part and went right to licking her! And she's been super interested in every little thing we do to the baby. Well, that's all for now. Good night.

The Longest, Happiest Day of My Life

I recently started watching 24. My Dad has all the seasons on DVD. He's a huge fan. I really like it, too, and I'm part way through season 3. But one thing I'll always remember is the way the episodes started in season one: "I'm federal agent Jack Bauer, and this is the longest day of my life." I won't ruin the ending for you, but it's definitely bittersweet... probably more bitter than sweet.

Well, the longest day of my life so far was yesterday. It, too, was bittersweet... but definitely more sweet than bitter.

We arrived at the hospital about 5:10am after a restless night in a local motel. We settled into a delivery room, and they started inducing labor around 6:45. She started having regular contractions, and they started the epidural at 7:45. They broke her water at 8:00, and we were off to the races. So far so good. No pain. She was doing great.

Things seemed to be progressing just fine. There was only one little hang-up, something that the doctor and nurses were uneasy about. Every time she had a contraction, the baby's heart rate would drop. She'd started out on her back, so they moved her to her side and put her on oxygen. Then, the heart monitor wasn't picking up correctly, so they used a different kind. Then, the baby's heart rate looked good for a while, until it started dropping again, so they turned her over on her other side. The whole time, she's doing great. No pain. Everything on my wife's end was great. Like I said, she was progressing just fine. It was just one of those things you think you've fixed, and then five minutes later, you find out it's not fixed.

Fast-forward a little bit. It's noon. Monitor keeps skipping, just not picking up right. So, the doctor comes in to switch monitors yet again. As he's doing it, she mentions that her right leg is really numb and she can't even move it. He tells her the meds from the epidural are pooling in her right side and that she needs to lay on her left side. We had been monitoring the heart rate ourselves for the last 45 minutes are so, and we really thought the issue had been resolved. Well, it wasn't. After they put her on her left side, every time she had a contraction, the baby's heart rate would drop AFTER the contraction... and stay down in the 90s... for over a minute. At that point, I took it upon myself to turn the computer screen away from my wife, who didn't need the extra stress of watching the heart rate herself.

The doctor probably wasn't gone for 10 minutes when he came back. I guess it was about 12:15. He said, in so many words, that if she were already pushing, we'd go ahead and have the baby that way, but since she was still a long way from pushing, we needed to have a C-section. It would just be too much stress on the baby to keep doing what we were doing.

That's where the "bitter" part is for us. My wife really didn't want to have a C-section. But with so much stress on the baby, it was the obvious choice.

Well, I just asked the doctor, "Doc, how long before y'all do the section?" He told me it'd be about 45 minutes. So, I said, "I'm starving, and I've got to get a bite of something to eat." He said, "Well, just hurry." And I told my wife, "Don't you let them wheel you out of here unless I'm back in the room with you. Fight 'em, if you have to." So, I hustle down to the hospital cafeteria, get one chicken breast fillet and a piece of cornbread, take one bite of the chicken, and my phone rings. It's my sister-in-law telling me I needed to get back upstairs. They had gotten there right after they told us we need to have a section. In fact, I had passed them on the way to the cafeteria. Anyway, I put the whole piece of chicken in my mouth and took off, leaving my Dad holding my plate. He understood.

I got back in what I thought was just the nick of time, only to play the waiting game for 15 more minutes. They took my wife as soon as I got back, and they ushered me into the recovery room to get robed up.

In the meantime, my wife had about 8 different people doing things to prep her for the C-section. She was definitely experiencing information overload. She was having to sign stuff left and right. It wasn't an "emergency" situation, at least that's not the impression they gave us initially, but it sure felt like an emergency, the way they were rushing everything. All the while, she's still having contractions and is still on oxygen. They told her they were going to start the incision, but if she could feel it, they would have to put her under general anesthesia. If they had to use general anesthesia, I wouldn't be able to come in. And the whole time, I'm totally in the dark; don't have a clue what's going on.

Here's the deal, when they said I had 45 minutes, they meant 45 minutes until I'd be holding my baby. I thought they meant 45 minutes until they started the procedure. You can see where I got confused, I hope. Now, the truth is, it was more like 30 minutes before I was holding my baby, but that's getting the cart before the horse.

This whole time, I'm a total wreck. I'm mad, because I think they're not going to let me be in there with my wife. I'm extra mad, because nobody's telling me anything. Until finally, a nurse walks into where I am and tells me I can come in now. I walk into a room, and it looks like a scene from a movie or something. The doctor looks up, scalpel in hand, smiles, and says, "Oh, there you are." They put me behind the curtain with my wife's head and arms (looked like she was being crucified on a table). She's got the shakes so bad it looks like she's having detox withrawals. Actually, it was the meds from the epidural. I don't really remember much except that I was VERY supportive and VERY encouraging. Just had to throw that in there.

I'm up there with my wife's head, and she says, "Ow, it feels like somebody's standing on my chest." I say, "Well, the doctor's not that big; he may be!" Also about that time, about 3/4 of the way into the procedure, the anesthesiologist says, "Would you like to have something for those shakes?" My wife just about came off the table when he said that, like, "Why didn't you ask me that 15 minutes ago?" And it's never a good thing when you look around and see your anesthesiologist messing with his iPhone while you're having surgery!

About that time, we heard someone say, "Oh, there's the head." Someone else said, "That's alot of hair." Then, a minute later, we heard something like a suction cup. I actually didn't hear it, but my wife did. Later, we found out they had to use a vacuum to get the baby out. I'm not sure if it was an Oreck or a Bissel. A minute later we heard a short cry, then silence for what seemed like an eternity. Actually, it was only about 3 seconds, but it seemed like forever. Then, the baby started really crying.

They brought the baby around the curtain for us to see, but at this point, they'd not said whether it was a boy baby or a girl baby. We were praying hard that it was a girl baby... because that's what it was supposed to be, and the whole nursery is pink! And sure enough, it was a girl baby. We both breathed a sigh of relief. And the anesthesiologist was polite enough to lay down his iPhone and take a picture of the three of us.

They let me take lots of pictures in the OR. She weighed 8lbs 2oz, and was 21 inches long. My dad's cousin said it was the first time in history that a baby was taller than it's father.

I asked my wife if she wanted me to stay with her or go with the baby to the nursery. She wanted me to go with the baby, so I did, while they stitched her up, which took a REALLY... LONG... TIME.

The details are fuzzy, but I remember getting to hold my little girl and carry her down the hall to the waiting room to meet my parents, my wife's parents, my wife's sister, and our next door neighbors, who were awfully sweet to drive up to see us.

I just kind of hung out in the nursery for the next 45 minutes or so, while they finished working on my wife. She FINALLY made it to the recovery room, but it was still about another 30 minutes before my wife got to see the baby again. My wife stayed in recovery for about 2 hours total. She was in terrible pain and was terribly thirsty. I, of course, came to her rescue by bringing her diet coke and water. With the pain, though, I wasn't so helpful.

Fast forward again. It's about 4:00pm. We got settled into a postpartum room, and that's where we've been ever since, for over 30 hours. Our baby is healthy and beautiful. She's got a head full of brown hair with blond highlights. She's perfect, and that's really all I can say. She is perfect.

God has blessed us so tremendously. My wife and I shared our first good cry a few hours ago, just looking at our baby girl and thinking about how blessed we are. We came into the hospital expecting a very long day of labor, but by 1:00pm we had our little girl. My wife and I are looking forward to watching her and helping her grow up into a smart, beautiful, godly woman.

Normalcy, Nesting, and Postpartum Politics

It's been a few days, and for that I apologize. My laptop won't work unless it's plugged in... and my wife needed the outlet for her heating pad! If you've ever tried to tell a pregnant woman, "I'm sorry, honey, but I need to plug in my laptop. If you want to use the heating pad, you'll have to find another spot in the house," you're a braver man than I am.

My wife says to me the other day, "I don't think we're normal." I said, "I know, but what's on your mind?" She says, "Well, we're not having this big family squabble over who gets to be in the delivery room. Most people I know have a squabble about it, or at least have a pretty intense discussion. I don't want a bunch of people in there with me; I just want you to in there, and it seems that the trend these days is to have as many people as they'll allow you to have." So, we've decided we're just not normal. Further evidence that we're not normal: we don't publicize all the private details of her progress.

Along those same lines, we had a very short discussion about something I can only call "postpartum politics." She was all worried about people coming into the room after she has the baby and feeling like we have to entertain them, etc. I just told her, "Don't worry about it. I'll handle it." And that was that. It's good to know my wife trusts me when I tell her I'll handle something.

Now, the nesting part. The "nesting instinct" is something they told us about when we went for our class at the hospital. Apparently, it's a distinctive urge to clean, tidy, and organize that occurs during pregnancy, especially as you get closer to the end of term. My wife says she's not sure if she has it, but I respectfully disagree. I know firsthand that it came out yesterday. However, I was under the impression that a woman's nesting instinct was just that: a WOMAN'S nesting instinct. Boy, was I wrong! It's not just HER urge to clean, tidy, and organize. It's also her urge for ME to clean, tidy, and organize. Who knew?

To wrap it up, we've got the house as ready as we think we can get it. Now, all we need is our baby girl to come along and show us how un-ready we really are.

Our Trip to the Doctor in Hattieburg (and stuff)

So, today I went rabbit hunting for the first time. I really enjoyed it. Killed my first rabbit, and it only took one shot. I'm one for one. My wife cried when she figured out that we were actually going to shoot the rabbits, so I didn't bring the rabbit home. Gave it to one of the guys I hunted with. Now, on to baby stuff.

Picked my wife up from the school where she teaches and headed to Hattiesburg for her 3:40 appointment. I'm not the kind of person who likes to share all the private details, and neither is my wife. So, you'll just have to know that the doctor said everything looked good. Our next appointment is next Wednesday, just for days before our due date! Surely, by that time, the doctor should be able to tell us SOMETHING. He's kind of vague.

Sitting in the waiting room, the baby was moving around a whole bunch. On the way home, my wife said it felt like the baby did a handstand. Not sure what to think of that.

We went to Sam's and bought some things we felt like we needed, as well as maybe a couple things that we probably didn't need. That's the way it always goes at Sam's, huh? The good news is that once we finished applying all the gift cards we only owed Sam's $42.75.

We also shopped for a video camera at Best Buy. Didn't buy one, though. When I saw that Sam's had the same camera we'd been checking out at Best Buy, I called Best Buy, and they said they'd match the price at Sam's. Planning to look online to see what other kinds of deals there may be.

Oh, and on the way home, we thought my wife might be getting ready to go into labor. She had 4 or 5 contractions in a row, each 13 minutes apart. She'd already had at least 2 before we started timing them. Looks like I'm on Baby Watch from here on out!

Inaugural Post

This blog is intended to chronicle my experience as a dad. Our baby is due on the 24th, and I wanted to go ahead and set this up before she gets here. I've never been good at journaling, and my one previous attempt at blogging fell flat, too. Hence, the title of the blog: "Better Luck Next Time."

So, my wife just got home from teaching school. I worked all day on my sermon for this Sunday morning and finished it. She's hanging up laundry and telling me how her hands are hurting. We think--as does her doctor--that she's got "Pregnancy-induced Carpal Tunnel Syndrome." She almost got me to brush her hair this morning. I hope it goes away after she has the baby. She has an appointment tomorrow, and I'm going with her. I'm going rabbit hunting in the morning but will be back in plenty of time, so no worries.