Oliver's Birth Story

Hey all, I know I have been pretty silent in sharing the details on the arrival of my sweet baby boy. I swear to you that when I got to the hospital, I was planning out the blog post in my mind the whole time. Per usual, though, when I am planning things everything seems to go exactly the way I never expected, so I have been putting off posting until I was A. out of the hospital and B. had enough story not to leave you hanging (completely). So, here we go…Oliver's Birth Story:
6:15 Thursday morning, I woke up to discover that my water had broken, but I was having NO contractions, so I thought maybe I was crazy. And I had just had a prenatal appointment on Wednesday where my doctor told me I was 80% effaced and dilated to a 1 (and still 2.5 weeks away from my due date), so I wasn't expecting action any time soon. But I called the hospital and asked if I should come in. They said "yes" and we were off (well after I spent a good twenty minutes trying to remember my check list of things to add to the hospital bag before we went). We got checked into the hospital around 7 AM and they double checked me to make sure that my water had in fact broken (which it had) and to see how far I was dilated. I was at a 1.5 (I think they just said .5 to try to make me feel like I'd made some progress in the 20 hours since my last appointment). To move things along, they got me set up on an IV. After about three hours, my contractions were starting to get pretty painful and so I had them bring in the anesthesiologist to do my epidural. After he took care of that, I was feeling great so Tommy and I started watching movies and playing cards. 
Around 1, I was measuring at an 8, which I was very excited about. Literally right after the nurse left from checking me, I threw up, so she checked me again cuz she said sometimes that can actually help you move along. Yep, I was at a 10 and ready to push. So they called the doctor and it took him an hour to get there and then I started pushing. I only had to push for 15 minutes (which was crazy amazing and not what I was expecting) and our Oliver was here!
 Pretty quickly they realized that his breathing wasn't as strong as it needed to be. He was breathing, but they were recording his breaths and they were staying right at 80 (they're supposed to be between 90 and 100), so they had me do skin-to-skin contact with him against my chest for a couple minutes and then said they were going to take him to the NICU to take care of him and thought he would only need to be there an hour or so to get his breathing where it should be. I had Tommy go with them to the NICU while I ate some dinner. A few minutes later, the doctor came in and told me that Oliver's breathing was getting under control, but he was exhibiting some behaviors that made them think he was in distress. Only a few minutes after the doctor left, Tommy came in and told me that Oliver had HIE, which is a condition where at some point in utero or during delivery (they don't really know which), Oliver's brain wasn't getting enough oxygen. The lack of oxygen can lead to strokes, brain damage, or death, so they were taking immediate action to put him into a cooling blanket for a 72 hour, medically induced hypothermia treatment that is supposed to slow down the body's functioning while they correct his levels and allow his brain to develop without getting damaged. What we learned later was that Oliver was very borderline--they debated doing the treatment or not because his case was not very severe, but he did have some symptoms that made them decide treatment was the best option to make sure that he wouldn't suffer brain damage. They also told us that the best results come if treatment starts within 6 hours of birth, and they got him started in the first hour, so that was really good. We had Tommy's uncles come to the hospital and they gave us both a blessing and then they let us into the NICU to give Oliver a blessing. Me and Tommy were really worried we were going to lose Oliver at this point, but in all of our blessings the spirit was so strong and we both looked at each other after Oliver's blessing and said we knew he was going to make it. The neonatal specialist then came up to us and said she was very optimistic that he was going to make it and that she thought there was only a 20% chance that he would suffer any brain damage and, even if he did have brain damage, it may only be in areas of the brain that wouldn't impeded his development, but make it necessary for him to create connections in a different way then we normally do. We felt much better after talking to the nurse, though brain damage was still very high in our minds.
The cooling process was no fun for us or for baby. Oliver was pretty heavily sedated the whole time, which was pretty sad. We were happy that it was helping him just sleep and not be super aware of how uncomfortable he was, but it was hard to look at my shivering baby who I wasn't really allowed to touch since touch is uncomfortable/painful to babies when they're that cold. His oxygen levels were up and down a lot during those three days too. It was pretty emotional every time we went to visit him and I was constantly counting down the hours until they were going to warm him back up.
Now that he's off of cooling, he is doing a lot better. His breathing and blood/oxygen flow has dramatically increased, way faster than the doctors had expected. We got his MRI and EEG results on Friday. The EEG showed some slight abnormalities in the frontal lobe, but they are pretty sure that it is just from irritation because the MRI was normal (no areas of concern in the brain). They are going to do another EEG before Oliver is discharged in order to make sure the abnormality isn't a sign of seizure activity, but they are pretty sure it's not since he hasn't shown any signs of seizure activity. We are very happy the MRI was normal! The doctor said we'll just have to continue to watch his development for the next couple years and work with a neurologist to make sure everything is normal.Yesterday they had to put him on a lighting blanket for his jaundice and they already took him off because his numbers had gone down where they needed to be. At this point, we are working on nursing and digesting. They're steadily increasing how much they are feeding him when I'm not there and letting me try to nurse twice a day. Yesterday he did really well with nursing and has been digesting almost all of his food, which is great. I am very impatient to get nursing down because I am very, VERY impatient to get him home, but he has been doing so well and we have been so blessed. We're so thankful for all the answers to prayers we have had the last 10 days and are so thankful for our Oliver James.

 Here Oliver is sleeping in his Daddy's arms…^

^ Oliver loves to have his hands up by his face and he also loves to keep his pinky, ring, and middle fingers up on his right hand…Here he's throwing up a gang sign (Tommy says it's his Cave Creek sign)

^ Look at my happy baby!! I love his awake time, it's so great to interact with him now that he's off that stinky cooling blanket

Going to the Caribbean

This month, our trip was to the Caribbean! For our dinner, we had Hawaiin (or should I say Caribbean) Haystacks and lots of pineapple. For dessert, we had Strawberry Daiquiris with tiny umbrellas :)

Virgin Strawberry Daiquiris

Ingredients:

14.5 oz. can pineapple chunks (in juice)
12 oz. bag frozen strawberries
2 Tbsp. granulated sugar
2 medium limes, juiced
Fresh strawberries (for garnish)
Cool Whip (for garnish)

Directions:

Combine pineapple, frozen strawberries, sugar, and lime juice in a blender and puree until smooth. Pour into glasses and garnish with strawberries and cool whip, if desired. Serve immediately.

Then we watched Pirates of the Caribbean. Even though this was my first time watching this movie in a loooong time, I still had the whole thing memorized from the days when I watched Pirates like everyday to feed my Orlando Bloom addiction haha.

Trip to Italy

For this month's travels, we went to Rome, Italy!! We dined on some very authentic pasta (me copying the recipe from the super Italian restaurant The Cheesecake Factory haha). Again, forgot to take pictures (which is too bad cuz I even plated them really well), but here's the recipe!

Louisiana Chicken Pasta

First, CHICKEN

Ingredients:

• 4 tablespoons vegetable oil

• 6 skinless boneless chicken breast halves

• 3/4 cup bread crumbs

• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

• 1 cup milk

• 2 tablespoons flour

Directions:

1. Wash and drain chicken breasts. Pound until very thin, as thin or thinner then 1/4-inch thick (the thinner the chicken breasts the better).

1. Mix breadcrumbs, flour, and Parmesan cheese together. Place milk in dish for dipping.

1. Dip chicken in breadcrumb mixture and then in milk and then back in breadcrumbs.

1. Place in fry pan that the oil has been heated and fry at medium high temperature until golden, crisp, and cooked through. Add more oil as needed. Remove and drain chicken. Keep warm.

Second, SAUCE

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon butter

• 1 small yellow bell pepper, chopped

• 1 small red bell pepper, chopped

• 3/4 small red onion, chopped

• 3 whole garlic cloves, minced

• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper

• 1 1/4 pints whipping cream

• 1 cup low-salt chicken broth

• 4 tablespoons fresh basil, thinly sliced

• 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

• 1 package bow-tie pasta

• 1 cup mushrooms, sliced

• salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Melt butter in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Add yellow and red bell peppers, mushrooms, and onion to same skillet and saute until crisp-tender, about 4 minutes.

1. Add minced garlic and crushed red pepper to skillet and saute 2 or 3 minutes.

1. Add whipping cream and chicken stock. Simmer until sauce re-heats and thickens slightly, about 5 minutes.

1. Add basil and 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese to sauce, stirring to incorporate. Season sauce to taste with salt and pepper. Reduce heat to low, simmer. Sauce will reduce and thicken.

1. Meanwhile, cook bow-tie pasta in large pot of boiling salted water until tender but still firm to bite. Drain and return to pot. Add sauce and toss to coat.

1. Place pasta with sauce on plate, and top with chicken breast. Serve, passing additional Parmesan separately.

After our meal, we watched Roman Holiday! Neither of us had seen it before, but it's Audrey Hepburn, so we knew it'd be good :)

15 Days 'til Christmas

Well, with 15 days til Christmas, I thought I'd post some pictures of the Christmas decorations we put up with Tommy's sisters the day after Thanksgiving...

We can't wait for Christmas to come even though we still aren't sure if Tommy will have to work on Christmas day or not and haven't made any Christmas plans...but we are super grateful he has a job that he may be working on Christmas day and we're enjoying the wonderful Christmas season while it's here :)