Sunday, February 14, 2016

Valentine's Day 2016

Happy Valentine's Day!!!


It's Lelo's first holiday since being born and Gabby's first holiday as a sibling!
ALSO! It's me and Leland's first Valentine's Day lol.


A lot of "firsts" going on here so it's pretty amazing. Of course I'm still on postpartum recovery so I can't do too much. But my hunny has a nice dinner waiting me and delicious cookies :) mmmmmm!
My gift to Leland was a box of my personal favorite chocolate covered strawberries from Edible Arrangements.
His gift to me was a jumbo sized card with a picture of all of us attached to it and he gave me bags of my favorite candies!


Me and Leland's relationship has not been easy at all. Even though we fell in love at first sight, we each had problems we were dealing with which made the trust level in the relationship just flat out bad. But we managed to try to work through it. To be honest, it wasn't until January, after new years, that I finally came around. I had to be honest with myself and realize that he loves me like no other man did. He had done so much to show me that he cared and loved me and I guess that's probably what made it so hard for me to accept him. (Dummy!)
I love him to pieces though. I know we have a long way to go but this is a really great start from where we were. I only see it going up from here :)

Friday, January 29, 2016

The Birth Story of Lelo Alexander

Lelo Alexander was born into this world on Friday, January 29th at 12:35am.
And this is his birth story :)



So i'll start it off with Tuesday January 26th at my check up with my doctor. I was hoping and wishing and praying that I would hear some good news such as he is dilated or at least showing signs of readiness. Well, I got what I wished for! She checked my cervix out and said that he had dilated 1 cm. I knew that meant that he is coming soon! She went on to tell me that if he didn't come by February 2nd, she would sweep my membranes to partially induce me and get labor started.

I remember what it was like with Gabby. I was over-anxiously waiting and doing everything I could to possibly induce my labor but then as soon as I gave up on trying, she came on her own. I knew better this time lol. I knew that I wanted him to choose his own birthday and I would just (somewhat) enjoy my last days of pregnancy.  




What I experienced this time with baby#2, is probably one of the biggest anxieties or worries that every pregnant woman has: I went into labor at work.  Lol. And no it wasn't all dramatic like the movies made it seem. But it was still pretty bad. As you all may know, I work at a call center dealing with very whiny people all day and some calls run over time and I also don't get off until 7pm. Well all day on January 28th, I felt what I thought were Braxton Hicks contractions. Around 6pm, an hour before I got off work, they started coming more frequent and became stronger. At 6:30pm, I knew labor was coming soon. My stubborn self thought it would be a good idea to finish my shift and then go straight to the hospital.
Lucky me, I get a call at 6:50 and it ended up being a long, whiny member call that lasted for 20 minutes overtime which only consisted of the member being whiny about is experience on the plane, which by the way is not a problem that my department handles. About every 5-7 minutes of that call I got contractions that were so strong, the man was making me mad with word he spoke. I was ready to go to the hospital. My desk partner was so worried about me that she was ready to take over the call for me. I was being so stubborn thinking this man would shut up and get over his so called horrible flight experience (he was delayed..... -___-). When he finally got off the phone, contractions were 5 minutes apart exactly. I had to get a couple of co workers to walk me down to the parking garage (my last time parking in Expectant Mother (; ), and yes, I drove myself to Leland's apartment which was, thank God!, right down the street.


It was sooo hard trying to walk up the stairs while having contractions, but dammit, I did it. Also, THANK GOD that the door was unlocked because he was asleep so he could go to work that same night. I woke him up out of his sleep and said "It's Time!". His eyes got big like an ostrich and he got up immediately lol. I sat on the couch because the contractions got worse of course. I called my mom and my aunt and my dad and my entire family while Leland called his job to let them know what was going on. I was pretty sad because he wasn't supposed to come so early. We were barely ready for him and thank God we bought the travel system just 5 days before! I also didn't even get a chance to pack my hospital bag yet (which I know I should have packed way earlier, I just wasn't ready). But I had to get over it. Baby boy was coming whether his parents were ready or not!


Every bump and hump and construction pothole down highway 183 to the hospital made me want to rip Leland's head off because he seemed to hit every single one while I was having contractions! By the time we got to the hospital, I caught myself trying to "take it like a G" and walk up to the maternity ward like I did with Gabby. I got to Labor and Delivery and told them everything and had all my information and requests ready like a pro. But unfortunately the nurse wasn't amused... I'll get to her later. I was hooked up to the heartbeat monitor and the contraction monitor, and it got so much worse from there. The nurse kept checking me, which I really don't think she was trying to check me properly because I guess she was annoyed at the fact that I wasn't screaming and crying (remember....my pain tolerance is on the high side) and of course I was putting on makeup. She said that I wasn't dilating at all and that she was gonna give it another hour.


Waiting for another hour just made things so much more worse and so much more painful. I couldn't move my legs at this point. She came in and "checked me" again, and said I still haven't dilated so she was gonna send me home. What!!!!!!!! I told this woman she was crazy and asked for an explanation as to why she felt the need to send me home when I was clearly in excruciating pain. Well... her explanation was that I "was not enough pain", I'm supposed to not be talking, I'm too relaxed.....I swear I wanted to slap this woman across her face and lock myself to that bed because God knows I was in way too much pain to go home.


She sent me home anyway and I struggled so hard to stand up and get out of that bed. I felt like I was opening up as soon as I stood up. I didn't even want to put on clothes. But luckily I got a wheelchair to take me downstairs. Again, every bump and hump in the floor pierced through my body and I wanted to go back so bad. When we got to the doors to outside, I wanted to turn around so bad because I could barely get in the car. We still drove off back to Leland's house. I hated it. He tried to get me up those stupid stairs again! By the time we got back in the house I was screaming. Literally. I took off my pants because it hurt to have them on lol. I tried to lay down on the bed and make sure I kept my legs open but it hurt so bad to open them too. I was back and forth between the bedroom and the bathroom screaming my head off!


It went on for about an hour and a half. Me screaming and squeezing the life out of Leland. He had the nerve to try and take a shower and if anyone knows Leland, you know he takes the longest showers in the world. I kept telling him let's go, let's go, we have to go back now! But I swear to you I couldn't move. It took us another 30 minutes to get out the house, down the 3 flights of stairs, and back into the car because I kept stopping at each contraction that lasted 1 minute and a minute apart! I was about to have the baby in the grass! When I got in the car, my legs were all over the dashboard and damn near on the window. I couldn't close my legs and I swear I couldn't stop screaming. I got pain meds with Gabby so I never felt this pain lol. Leland didn't even care anymore about the humps and bumps and potholes 183 lol. I screamed and squeezed all through them until we made it back to the hospital.


Leland found a wheelchair infront for me because there was no way in hell that I would be walking up to maternity ward "taking it like a G" this time! As soon as I sat down in the wheelchair, my water broke! It felt like a water balloon that was placed inside me popped and gushed everywhere. As soon as Leland saw that, he said forget the car and raced me all the way to the maternity ward. When we got to Labor and Delivery, I was screaming, I saw that idiot nurse and wanted to be like yeah you see what you did!!!! Nurses swarmed me and cleared a room. They got me on the bed and the midwife introduced herself and checked me and as soon as she opened my legs, she said so calmly "Here he is. You're 9 cm dilated! It's time to push."
I couldn't help it. I freaked out. I could barely breath because of the pain. I was screaming at the top of my lungs. The midwife was so patient and calm with me trying to tell me to relax. I was so pissed because all I could think of was that stupid nurse who ruined my entire birthing experience because she wrongfully sent me home. I pushed by instinct without the midwife telling me to do so. I wanted Leland to hold my hand so I called him over and he held my hand and kissed me...then a nurse moved him out of the way lol. I kept pushing because I felt EVERYTHING. I couldn't believe what I was doing. I was doing this the old fashioned way how God intended childbirth to be. No meds. Pushing by instinct. I really couldn't believe it. Then out comes his little head. And one last push to get the rest of him out.
And there he was. My beautiful boy. My second angel I just gave birth to. The gave him to me instantly with skin to skin. I couldn't help but think to myself that all of this pain was definitely worth it. I had the worst pregnancy ever with him. So much stress. SO much back pain. I was soooooo sick. Almost 4 months of morning sickness. I experienced prenatal depression. It was just so much I went through with him. He's my strong baby boy and I'm so in love.