Keira: One Month Moments

Wow,
It has been a month already since Miss Keira Elizabeth arrived! It has been a month of many changes and joys that is for sure. We are beginning to get into a schedule (I think) and it is fun to see how she changes each day. She is now sleeping about 3 hours at a time at night. She goes to bed around 11:00 pm and then wakes up at 2:30 am and 6:30 am to eat. She is definitely helping us to get into bed earlier! We have discovered that she does not like to sleep in her crib, bassinet, swing, etc. She likes sleep being held or in her carseat. The car is a lifesaver and she falls asleep no matter what withing minutes of the car moving. So, we have begun the tradition of taking a late night drive and then letting her sleep in the carseat. :) It is usually that or she somehow manages to end up in bed with me when I give in after lack of sleep around 3 am!

She is a great nurser, and I am so thankful that is going well. She is very expressive, often times frowning and moving her mouth in a variety of different motions. Recently she has begun to smile as well...which is adorable even if it is just a reflex. When she is waking up she will stretch her head back as far as possible as wrinkle up her forehead like an old man. We call her our little analyzer and she always has her brows furrowed as if she is solving the world's problems.

Her lungs have developed more as her cries are now much louder than when she was first born. However she still has a whimper that just pulls at mom's heart! She is a pretty good baby though and usually only cries when she is hungry or fighting sleep. We also have discovered that she is not a fan of baths. It takes two people to give her one as she squirms and screams bloody murder the whole time! She is very strong as she is already picking her head up when I put her on my shoulder to burp her. She also kicks her legs very pointedly when she is upset. One way to calm her down is to let her hold onto your thumbs with whole hands. She will grib so hard that her little knuckles turn white. But hey, if we are distracting her from crying it is a good plan!

We have been enjoying my maternity leave by going to many basketball games and out and about shopping with other moms. I have decided that she likes noise better than quiet as she will sleep through anything including sports announcers and high school band music! It has been fun to spend more time at home with her as well with other girls from the church who stay home! I plan to go back to the office in two weeks, I am not excited about this but am hoping if we are on a schedule the transition will go smoothly!

The Story of Keira's Arrival- January 26, 2009

This is the story of how our precious daughter entered the world and our arms.

Her due date was Sunday, January 25, 2009. We had anxiously awaited her arrival for nine months and were anxious for her appearance. However, she did not seem to feel the need to move from her cozy home in the womb! When I went in for an appointment at 39 weeks, the doctor said that he would not allow her to go past my due date because he didn't want her to get too big since I was a small person. I went in 3 days later and he said he could induce the next day or wait until Monday, one day after her due date. He said that he thought it would be best to wait until Monday as he thought for sure that she would come before then naturally. So, we went with the plan to induce on Monday January 26, 2009 if she did not arrive before then. In the meantime we spent the weekend going to a conference at church, out to dinner, and spending time with friends before her arrival, all the time awaiting the contractions in the middle of the night signaling her arrival.

Well, Monday morning arrived with no signs of labor yet. We had packed all of the bags the night before, and got up around 5 am so that we could be at the hospital by 7 am to be induced. I showered and finished picking up the house so it was all ready for you to come home to. Then Austin and I headed to Panera to get some breakfast as I knew it may be the last meal that I had for awhile! I ordered, but was so nervous that I could not even eat my bagel. My stomach was in a huge knot as I thought about all of the horror stories that I had been told over the past nine months about labor. For some odd reason I could not remember any of the good things that I had heard, but all of the awful stories! I packed up my bagel and we headed to the hospital.

We arrived around 6:50 am to a light snow falling. The day was cold with a forecast for a couple inches of snow. We rode the elevator up to the birth center with another girl who was being induced at the same time and was expecting a girl. Once we arrived at the birthing center they admitted me and took me to my room.

Once I was admitted the nurse checked to see if I was dilated at all as they planned to induce me using pitocin. However, I was only dilated 1 cm and about 50% effaced (the same that I had been for the past month). The nurse did not think I was ready for pitocin as that would be really hard on me, so she wanted to give me a cervix softener first. That would take up to twelve hours to work and then if needed after that they would give me the pitocin. First of all though, we had to wait for the doctor to approve the cerivix softener. By the time he got back to us, it was around 10 am. In the meantime I had pulled out my laptop and started working and checked my facebook, because I assumed that I was in for the long haul and labor would not start until at least midnight. I also begged the nurse for some food, as I was less nervous now and was starving! She finally gave me some toast and juice. :)

Once they gave me the cervix softener I started getting cramps after 15 min. Soon they were very painful and I just curled up in a ball. I felt like I needed to get up and go to the bathroom, but I had to stay laying down for the first two hours after having the cervix softener. Towards the end of the two hours I asked Austin to time my contractions as they were getting really bad. He said that they were about a minute long and a minute apart, and I thought for sure he was wrong but apparently he was right and the medicine was working incredibly well and quickly without any help from the pitocin! Once the two hours were up I was in alot of pain and was getting ready to page the nurse when she came rushing in, saying, " The baby does not like the medicine, we need to try and stabilize her" She made me turn onto my other side, flat on my back, and finally on my hands and knees in order to stabilize her heart. None of this was working so they took the medicine out and made me stay on my hands and knees for about 45 minutes. Soon, Dr. Sotolongo came rushing in and said that he wanted me prepped for a C-section as the baby's heartrate was dropping and he thought we may have to deliver her that way. However, first he wanted to check and see if I had progressed.

He checked and said that I had dilated to 3 cm, and decided that was far enough along to break my water. He wanted to try and speed labor along without drugs and see if her heart would stabilize and I could give birth to her vaginally. This was around 12:30 pm.

Soon after the anesthesiologist came in to give me the much anticipated epidural. They told me the risks and I quickly agreed! Once they gave me the epidural around 1:30 I began to feel much better. I told Austin to call my mom and see if she would come up, as I still thought I would be there for a while and I wanted her company and support. Soon my parents arrived. My mom and I just sat and chatted, as I was feeling good at this point since the pain was under control. Around 3:00 Steve and Lea stopped by as they had been out and about. They came up just to see how things were going. I told them things were going good, but it would be late at night before she was born. By this time my dad had left to go take a nap as we thought it would be a late night!

Around 4:00 I started feeling contractions fairly strong again. I asked my mom to go ask the nurse about upping the dosage so that I could stay on top of the pain. Soon the nurse came back in and said that was as high as they would up the dosage and that I must be progressing since I could feel the pain again. She checked me and said that I progressed to 9 cm in just a matter of a few hours! She said that I would be ready to push and started trying to contact my doctor. However, we found out that my doctor was across the street at Jennie Edmundson doing a c-section and would not be back in time to deliver our daughter. They found another doctor in the hospital who was available and paged him to come. In the meantime we called my dad to make sure he was on his way.

By 4:30 I was dilated 10 cm and ready to push. I started pushing, with my mom holding my head and Austin holding my leg. They were both very supportive and encouraging along with my wonderful nurse Courtney. Around 5:00 I was getting fairly tired and I asked Courtney how long most first time moms pushed. She answered "at least two hours" and I responded with, "Are you kidding me???" However, I continued to push as I realized the harder I did this, the sooner she would come. From 5:00 on Austin and the nurse kept telling me that they could see her head. At 5:36 pm on January 26, 2008 she finally arrived. The thing most vivid in my memory is looking at Austin and seeing the tears in his eyes as he saw her for the first time. I started crying the second she was born, mainly out of relief that labor was over! The first thing that I remember when I saw her was the gorgeous head of dark hair that she had. I also remember that she looked smaller than they had estimated her weight at, which was around 7.5 lbs. She also had the most pathetic little cry. Instead of the piercing scream that I imagined it was a weak cry. Her little chin quivered as she got more upset. It was adorable! When they weighed her she was smaller than they estimated, at 6 lbs. 10 oz. and 20.5 inches. We noticed that she had very long arms and legs and fingers and toes like her daddy! :)

We had not told anyone her name, and took a few minutes to look at her. We decided that she looked like the one we had picked out, and announced her name to all of the grandparents....Keira Elizabeth Diehm. We liked the sound of the name Keira because it was unique and named her Elizabeth after me.

They asked what I wanted to eat and I said Godfathers Pizza! Steve went and picked up pizza for all of us. I was so thankful that God had given us a beautiful little girl who arrived with a very smooth delivery. By looking at her I became all the more convinced that there is a God...evolution could never have created something so intricate with no problems! :)