SHE's HERE! Part 4 - Recovery

Once we were settled, we had a slew of nurses come in to introduce themselves. The "mom nurses" came in and showed me/us the things in our room, the restroom, and how I needed to rinse down-there, etc. And how to make (what I like to call) my Pizza-Pad. I was going to take a pic of it, but decided against it. :) hahaha... basicallly, I had a pair of soft crochet-like granny-pants that I wore with a HUGE pretty-much-a-diaper-Pad, with: a small ice-pack placed inside; two witch-hazel Tuck-like-sheets on top of the ice pack; on the sheets, I needed to add two small dollops of prescription cream AND two small sprays of anti-itch-whatever. Phew! Tim had to help me out a couple of times... until I found a simpler combination for myself to use.



Also met the Nursery Nurse that would help us with olivia that night, and the technician...or whatever.



After a nice dinner (which i already posted pics of), some relaxing, and some time with Olivia, we had some friends stop by.



Let's see...I don't think i'll necessarily do a day-by-day recap...



But we had some more friends stop by the next day.



And some photos shot by Our369.com. Tim bought the 8 pics on a disk.

Here's a pic of my point-of-view of our room. It was nice!

Here's Olivia and our doctor the day after birth.

Hmmm... anything else that was eventful during my recovery? Not that I can really remember... The second night, I had Tim sleep with me in my hospital bed b/c his poor back was all out-of-wack after sleeping on the small cot. We kept Olivia in the room with us until late in the evening, then had the nurse take her to the nursery.

The lactation nurse came in a couple of times to work with me on the breastfeeding bit. Too bad I hadn't read-up more on breastfeeding BEFOREHAND b/c after Olivia was born, I tried having her latch on. She didn't latch right. And NO ONE TOLD ME YOU HAD TO PRY THEM OFF WITH A FINGER FIRST!!! Hahahaha... So I think the most damage to my boobs were done THEN instead of later. Sigh... oh well. Asked for (and received) some nipple covers...we had called them something else, and it took the nurse a little bit to realize that we were talking about two different nipple-things.

Olivia's pediatrician stopped in to say "hi" and to give her her first checkup.

Tim got me an AMAZING 30-min massage...it was only $30 bucks or so... it felt SO NICE!! And it turned out that the lady giving me my massage was also LDS. We had a nice convo with her about immunizations and waiver forms.

Doh! See, now I've waited TOO long to finish up this post, and I don't remember what else I've been wanting to post about.

On the last day of my hospital stay, our friend Lilian helped us pick up my fam from the airport. They came to hospital to "pick me up", and we carpooled back home. It was cute to see my niece interact with Olivia...she was a bit nervous and didn't really know what to do about her.

Food food food

Tim always loves the strangest pictures of me. Here are some that he took a week or two ago when he brought some hamburgers home for lunch. They are HUGE burgers from a shop just down the street... huge and messy!

I guess I was getting sauce all over my face (thought I can't really see it).

Lovely... :P

Wedding

Last Saturday--a day before hitting the "safe zone" (meaning 36 weeks)--our friends got married. It was nice to REALLY get out of the house and go do something. :)

It was a really good wedding... the bride was gorgeous! Here are the bride and groom "at the altar" of their Methodist church:
*Note: The organist was a Korean girl... she played well, but was off-tempo a LOT! ESPECIALLY for the bridal song at the end! Maybe I should practice my organ... I hear you can make buko-bucks playing it...

Here I am outside of the church after the ceremony:
(Look how huge my belly is!!!)


We then headed over to the reception. Here's my place setting:

Here's the bride and groom entering the room:

After lunch, the bride and groom made their way around the room. Isn't her dress beautiful?

It was quite refreshing to attend such a traditional reception. (With so many people not wanting to have a "traditional mormon reception", you end up attending some very interesting "non-traditional-mormon" AND "non-NORMAL-traditional" receptions.)

The wedding ceremony was also very nice.

Elephant

I totally feel like an ELEPHANT! hahaha...

Even though I measure myself each week, the numbers don't seem to be increasing very much... but my belly feels HUGE! And so do my thighs! Hahaha! Strangely enough, I don't think my boobs have gotten any bigger. According to Tim, maybe it's because I "milk" myself. J/k.

I'm still lounging around a bit... but my feet and hands are slightly swollen. My ring HURTS to put on AND to take off...so I leave it off.

I purchased an exercise/birth ball the other day from TJMaxx... but I think it might be too soft. How soft/firm are they supposed to be?? I tried pumping it up with more air, but that doesn't seem to help...I think the plastic itself is just soft.

Today I go in for another appointment...I'll let you know how it goes.

Oh! Have had regular BM's all week. Nice! :)

This is how I still wear my "normal" clothes...

Look how far my belly is sticking out! My sister asked me if I'd be taking me pics of myself... Don't know yet. Maybe... it just takes some time and thought, and slight work... but then again, I guess I don't have TOO much to do...just wait...

See how big I am?!? Rolling over in bed is starting to get annoying...well, REALLY annoying. :)

Hospital Tour

This past Sunday, we went to the hospital for a tour. After running around a bit to find the classroom, we joined a huge group of people there for the tour. We missed the first half of the "presentation", but still got some valuable information. Then we were off to see the Labor and Delivery floor and rooms.

I had a wheelchair. Yeah! :) When I had signed us up, I requested a wheelchair since I'm on bedrest. I think some of the other moms-to-be were a little jealous. Hahaha... ;)

The hospital was really cool! It's a hospital that has been around for a while, but they have recently built a new wing, and are in the process of renovating the rest of the building. Nice! First we went up and looked at the standard recovery room, and then one of the upgrade suites. Nice, typical hospital room. Poor Tim... the bed/couch/cot looks like it'll be a little small.

Then we headed up a floor to the Labor and delivery area. We went into one of the LDR rooms and our "tour guide" (who was pregnant herself) told us how things would typically go. I guess she also teaches childbirthing classes, and she recommended that once you arrive at the hospital, try and stay off your back (and out of the bed) for as long as possible. She recommended leaning against the bed, or using a birthing ball, or just walking around the room a bit... she told us that the belly monitors had really long cords attached to them, so unless you had an epidural already administered to you, you should try and stay up and about. (Hmmm... as she talked, I got the feeling that she would be a "natural" birther...)

She also went over the "rules" of the hospital (i.e. only 3 guests can be in the delivery room with you), how the nurse-patient situation would work (i.e. one patient per nurse...if you don't "click" with the nurse, request another one), and what exactly might happen after you've given birth (i.e. you can request to hold the baby immediately after birth, or you can have them clean it up first).

As we walked down the hall back to the elevator, we could hear some lady moaning out. :P Ick. hahaha... At one point, we paused in the hallway and a nurse came out of an LDR room. Tim looked in and said he saw a lady with her legs up and everyone surrounding her. He was like, "Woah, I want to watch." hahaha...so maybe he WON't faint. :)

Just before leaving, I asked the tour-guide-lady some questions. She was pregnant with her third child, and her first two did come naturally (w/o an epidural). She said she just used a "wait and see how I feel" stance, and decided that her contractions (aka "birthing waves") weren't too bad, and so declined the use of the epidural. She told us that once we got to the hospital, the nurses would most likely automatically start prepping for an epi, but that we should let them know that I want to "wait and see", or whatever.

As we were leaving, I ran into a coworker of mine who's wife just gave birth (via c-section) to twins that past Wednesday.

I brought my camera...but OBVIOUSLY forgot to take a pic of me in the wheelchair. Darn! Tim says we'll get a picture later. :) it would have been a good one, though...we both had some nasty bedhead.

Slap-Happy Belly Dancing

So I had posted a pic earlier of this same situation... anyway...

Here I am getting our girl to dance. :) I'm really not hitting my belly very hard! It just sounds that way! (Don't worry, Tim scolded me once he realized what I was doing...hehehe).

Kinda gross looking, eh? And don't you just love the commercials playing in the background.

Random LIFE pictures... during my bed rest...

This is me (well, my belly) lounging on the couch watching T.V. (Good Eats, to be exact). There's Tim playing WoW with his new "brotherhood". :P hehehe...

Speaking of Good Eats, here's something good we ate recently... Greek food!

And for some reason, I got a bloody nose in my left nostril the other day. Wierd! I haven't had one of those in...forever!

33 Week Appointment (Bed Rest Day 7)

So yesterday we went in for my weekly checkup. The wait was loooong. Oh well.

Everything was good!
Weight: 130lb
Blood Pressure: Good.
Baby's Heartbeat: Good...she kept moving around, so it was hard for the nurse to find it and "read" it.
Uterus Size: Good.

I guess I'm dilated 1 cm, and still effaced at about 80%. Still in bed rest...

My doc said that if we can make it to 36 weeks, then she'll take me off the drugs and bed rest.

I must say, it was SO nice to get out of the house. But even then, I started to get tired and just wanted to go home and lay on the couch. :P I guess I should have taken a pic of my "outing". Oh well...

Bed Rest Day 5

I'm laying in bed right now. Munching on some cold red grapes. Mmmm... I have my work Remote Desktop open so I can see if I have any new emails.

Not too shabby. :)

It's actually quite nice and relaxing to be able to work from home. Though, I think if I thought about it TOO much (being in bed rest for several more weeks), I might start getting antsy and crazy... but I just take it one day at a time. It reminds me of running on a treadmill (since I hate running outside). Once I get on a treadmill, I can't think about how long I'm going to run/jog for...I just have to do it. I have to focus on the T.V., or music, or something. The moment I start thinking, "Ah! 30 more minutes!", I feel like I can't do it.

So I try to space my day out so that it's still relatively "normal". I've been able to wake up easily at about 5 or 6am...usually I'm begging the alarm clock for more time, but maybe b/c I'm working at home, it's actually fun to wake up. :)

Anyway. Then I'll read some scriptures, then get up and brush my teeth, then head back to "bed" and login to work on my laptop. If nothing's going on yet, I might start working on a project...or grab something to eat. Then I try and do job-related stuff for a while... I basically try and stay in the bedroom until about lunchtime when Tim comes home. Then I get back into bed. Find something to do, and just keep myself busy till about 4pm. Then I usually feel better about going into the other room and watching T.V. (as if I had just returned home from work).

The days ususally go by w/o any problems... it's when it starts getting dark...and I have to stay inside. And just sit there. :P

Today I set aside some time to clip my Sunday Coupons and put them away in my coupon-folder-thing. I also registered online with my hospital, and went through other paperwork that I have to complete.

Pic of my setup...

My point of view...

Bed Rest Day 2

Day 2. This is how I spent most of my day. Hmmm... I'm "back-posting", so I don't remember what I was going to write about this...

Anyway, it's me just lying in bed with my laptop.

Bed Rest: Day 1... and just one more shot...

Should we always reserve a couple hours when we visit the hospital? For some reason, it always sounds like we're just going to a quick in-out thing. Nope. We went to the hospital for my second shot, and were there for at LEAST an hour and a half. I guess part of the hold-up was that there weren't any standing "discharge" orders for me...so they had to call my doc (or the person on standy-by) to see what they wanted to do with me.
So I guess this was a stress-test for the baby. Everything went perfectly fine. Got the shot in my hip. Ouch. And we were good...

Oh, and this was Day 1 of my bedrest. Went very well! Got setup to remote access my computer at work...nice.

On our way to the hospital, we stopped by my office building and Tim ran up to grab some of my stuff (i.e. my birthday flowers, some of my snacks/treats, my rice heat pack, etc.)