It's time...

JuliaElizabeth has arrived! Born 4/10/12 at 1552 weighing in at 5 pounds 6 ounces! 19 inches (they measured length twice because 19 inches is long for a baby who is 35 weeks and 5 days!)
This is how it went down..
I went in for my weekly check up after a horrible night of contracting and coughing and what little sleep I did get I kept having dreams of an IUFD. urgh. On the NST after taking as much medicine as I could I was still contracting every 7 minutes. Of course my doctor was like "ok Megan, it's time". and I of course said "no thanks, this is a bad week for me. You see, my mom gets in tomorrow and Alex's nanny is on vacation all week! How about if my uterine scar is thinning on ultrasound I'll give up...if not send me home and I can manage these contractions because they were much worse last night!" So we had ourselves a deal. Off to ultrasound I went and lo and behold my scar was less than half want it measured the week before . :( My ultrasound tech said "Megan, It's time" urgh. So I gave up and went straight over to the hospital....and Julia Elizabeth was born...and she is beautiful.

 I've been doing a lot of thinking in the past week since Julia has been born...I was questioning if I should do this blog post at all..Then I figured there have been SO many people following this pregnancy that I should do one final post...
It's time that I finish up this blog and start diving into my real life.
It's time I stop ignoring the many many people who have reached out to me in the past 2 years.
It's time I start standing up for myself and my children.
It's time I start shaving again on a regular basis :)
It's time I start seeing my life differently...with a whole lot of normalcy.
It's time I start spending some money...because I believe  everyone could use a good therapist and housekeeper.
It's just time....

Easter Egg hunt!

Alex went on an Easter egg hunt today! He loved it! I loved being out of the house! Don't worry, I took extra medication so I wouldn't contract...I had fun even though I'm sure my heart rate was well over 110..The things I wouldn't do for that kid! He loved all the "furry animals" and this is the first year I let him actually touch them...Everything but the Easter bunny...Hopefully We"ll do that next year. The Easter egg hunt showed my what a passive kid Alex is...not a competitive bone in his body. His favorite part of the whole thing was seeing the firetruck...he is obsessed with firetrucks! He had a balloon which got away and he sobbed and sobbed as it floated out of sight. So, Feeling sad for the boy, we walked what seemed a half mile over to get another. The good news? Even after all that walking I still feel pretty darn good!
Alex has had a language explosion in the past month (I've been waiting forever for this). He went from almost no words to well over 20 in the past 2 weeks. I only "count" a word when he 1) says it on his own without prompting 2) is understandable by someone else who is not me. 3) uses it purposefully and appropriately.

2 Weeks?

2 weeks from today! I've been contacting on and off. They have added another medication to get the contractions to stop. So far, so good. It could, however, be "game over" at any point.
They have been paying close attention to my uterine wall and my classical scar. It remains a good thickness.
35 weeks! This means, born today I have a shot of having a take home baby! That's the ultimate goal: No NICU!
There are a lot of ways I've been counting down this pregnancy. One way is obviously in counting down the days and weeks. I also have been getting weekly progesterone injections. I get 20 injections from 16 weeks on. I finished my final one today! Success!
My mom is scheduled to fly in next week with an open ended ticket and the promise not to leave until I have things "under control".
My mom also asks me every week to post a pic of me pregnant. I have not one picture of my pregnant with the twins. So here goes...

The final countdown...

34 weeks! This is the biggest pregnancy milestone yet! This means I WILL NOT be hospitalized before delivery. At this point, if something happens (ie my water breaks, baby looks bad on ultrasound, I can't stop contracting and my cervix is changing) I would just get delivered. I will NOT get magnesium during this pregnancy! My goal for today is to pack a hospital bag...It's said this needs to include an outfit for the baby to come home in! To come home in WITH me...like I'm not coming back in 5-10 months to pick her up! I need to keep reminding myself to stock up on my sleep in these next two weeks...I hear there is no "sleeping when the baby sleeps" when you have a 2 year old!
oh and baby weighs in at 4#9oz! (50%) perfect.

You're going to do WHAT??

I'm going to change Caroline's name. Don't get me wrong, I love love love the name Caroline. I don't like when 75% of people mistake it for Carolyn. This causes me to have to repeat myself. Often. In addition, Carolyn is my ex-mother-in-law's name. (I don't think I need to blog further about that one!) Those two factors together, I have found a new name. Because there is so little time left with this pregnancy, I'm going to wait to announce the name until the birth...So from now on the "fetus formally known as Caroline" will simply be called "baby". (poll to the left)

OK...time to exhale!

32 weeks! In the world of preemies 32 weeks is a huge milestone...If born today, Caroline would not need a level 3 NICU..a level 2 would do...This means I get to deliver at Community South with my own doctors. I dont, however, feel comfortable with Caroline at CHS until I pass 34 weeks. So, if for some reason I need to deliver in the next 2 weeks I will insist of delivering at Community North. I know they have a great NICU. I know most of the staff and protocols. Plus, I'm sure Alex would love to see old friends.
In preparation for delivery, I did steroid shots at 32 weeks to make my amnio more likely to be mature. Delivery really feels close. I just realized that I have a bunch of things I need to get done before she comes home. Setting up her crib ( we cant find the bolts from LAuren's crib is anyone knows where they are!) I'm in no rush to really set up the crib because I plan to use a co-sleeper next to me for at least 6 months. I need to change out all the batteries from all the infant swings in the basement. Set up the pack and play. Figure out the car seat situation. Find the bottles (again, if anyone knows where these are tell me!) Luckily, I've already gone through all the baby clothes in early November when I found out gender. I have SO MANY girl clothes that Caroline doesn't have to wear the same thing twice. ..until she is 3...Caroline doesn't really need anything..Only her own baby book (which my mom is getting) and I already bought her her own lovey.
I've started struggling with weight gain... I had a goal of hitting 150# by the end of this pregnancy. I got to 141 at 26 weeks and everyone in my office cheered....now I weigh 139 boo! I'm telling you...very few pregnant people have the problem of TRYING HARD to gain weight! I've actually lost 2 pounds in the past 6 weeks. Urgh! Luckily, Caroline found those 2 pounds and measured in at 3#11oz...this is more than both Alex and Lauren weighed TOGETHER at birth.
In the world of Alex, he is FINALLY really to take off with his speech. First he mastered gross motor skills, then fine motor and now he's on to speech! I finally took another video of him where it took him almost 30 seconds to realize I was taping him and attack the camera..He also got a new haircut from a friend of mine who said he couldn't handle looking at Alex's mullet anymore!

Best big brother!

Alex is going to be the best big brother! We've had a 2 month old baby visit us a few times and Alex is so interested and gentle!
I've had a really hard time getting good pictures of Alex in the past few months. As soon as I see an opportunity, Alex sees me and the camera then stops whatever he is doing to grab the camera. Then, I mostly get a picture of his thumb, or half his face.
We made a change to increase his calories and we've really struggled. The increased calories have caused some delayed gastric emptying. After an hour long session with a dietitian, I think we've come up with a good plan...one that hopefully involves very little vomiting.
Also on a good note...I'm on the books for an amnio done by MFM (the high risk docs) on April 16. My doc felt uncomfortable doing it based on where my placenta is...Then those results get run stat and I SHOULD be good to deliver the next day (the 17th!) which I'm scheduled. If lungs come back immature we will repeat that whole thing the following week. I've gotten a bunch of questions about what the deal is with the delivery at 36 weeks.
It is all risk vs. reward.
Risk of 39 week delivery? If I kick into labor before that point my uterus has a vertical incision on it which is much more likely to rupture (read :death)
Risk of 36 week delivery? Breathing problems for Caroline if her lungs are not mature.
So if lungs are mature at 36 weeks the safest option for both of us is delivery.
If not mature we wait a week.