Kaitlyn Amber

Kaitlyn Amber was born on February 14, 2008 at 12:27pm. She was 5 lbs 9 oz and 17 1/2 inches long. My water broke at 4am, we were at the hospital around 5:30 or 6am, and once it was finally established that it was amniotic fluid via ATI (ultrasound to determine the level of fluid in the uterus), we set up a c-section. Kaitlyn was breech. It's actually incredibly lucky that she was breech, because I ended up having a condition called placenta accreta, where the placenta grows into the uterus. Once she was out, the doctors had to do surgery to remove the placenta and do extra suturing to my uterus. I lost a lot of blood, and but they were able to save my uterus. Had we done labor and she come out vaginally, they wouldn't have known until I was hemorrhaging and I would have had to have an emergency hysterectomy, and that's the good scenario.

Since Kaitlyn was only 36 weeks at the time, she was born prematurely. She has had premature lung disease, which she has since been able to recover from. She's still tired and not fully recovered, but is off of oxygen, out of the warmer, and we are able to hold her. Those first few days of not being able to hold her and watching her go through that were horrible, to say the least. She is still in NICU at the hospital. Since she was premature and has has to recover from the lung disease, she is having a hard time getting the feedings down. Once she has eaten enough in 24 hours she can have her feeding tube removed, and after she eats consistently for 3 days straight she finally gets to come home. It has been very hard, leaving her there, and so this is all that will be posted until she gets home. I know lots of people want pictures, so I did put up a few here, but until she gets home there will be no more. We are at the hospital as much as possible, and only come home to sleep and do things like pay the bills and laundry as needed. It's just too hard not to be with her. A lot, if not all, of you know about the other tragic events going on in our lives right now, and I just want to say thank you for all of the support. We're doing okay, just need to step back and take care of ourselves and Kaitlyn at this time. She's more of a miracle than I ever could have imagined.

I've been told that these pictures don't do her justice. I'd have to agree. We've even had nurses say that yes, they tell lots of people that their babies are adorable, but that Kaitlyn truly is. She has many expressions and I hope to get them all. The first two here are on the day she was born, when she had all of her tubes on. The last three are from today. All she has on are her feeding tube and monitor leads. Tony is holding her in the last picture, so you can get an idea of how small she is.

Oh and...

A quick 36 week shot of me (I'm 36 weeks exactly today). And the look is just because I didn't think he was ever going to take the picture!

Pictures!!

Here are her 35 week photos. :) See the post below, if you haven't already, for details on last week's ultrasound.







This last one is the 3D image. If you look to the right side, you can see her face.. the nose right in the middle, her one eye above it and her little mouth below. Her arm is in front of her face, so we couldn't get the full image. She wasn't feeling too cooperative that day. :)

Appointment and ultrasound update

First off: yes there are pictures, but no they won't be up tonight. I can't promise them this weekend, either, but I hope to. They will be up sometime soon.

The appointment went well. Started off with an ultrasound, and I admit, I was really looking forward to this one, more than the other one. It was easier to believe everything would be fine. :) She is over 5 lbs already, has some peach fuzz for hair, and looks great. Oh, and is definitely a girl (I asked her to check before we start cutting tags off of the clothes). She's hanging out breech right now, and the OB said we'll just watch and hopefully she'll flip again in the next couple of weeks. Otherwise we'll have to discuss having a cesarean. I admit, I'd like to have her natural, but as long as she comes out healthy I'm happy, however that is. She scored 8/8 on her biophysical (I'm not sure what that is, but the OB said we couldn't ask for anything better). I'm going to weekly appointments now. My OB will be out of town next week and then the last weekend of February. I will continue taking my anti-contraction medication until the 37th or 38th week, and he's back for good in my 38th, so that will probably be when I go off of it. Hopefully she will cooperate and wait.

I may think of more, but for now I'm very tired.

Contraction update

I did have to up my dose on Friday. I was still having some cramping/contractions, and had 4 in an hour. The nurse told me to do a pill every 5 hours instead, and if I was still having it then one every 4. So far every 5 seems to be working. I still have a couple, but not all in an hour, no where near where they told me to be concerned. All of my cultures came back negative. I'll have my ultrasound on Wednesday and then see the doctor. My best guess, from what he said before, is that I'll be on this until my 37th or 38th week. Who knows, maybe we'll have a February baby. :) I'm only 2 weeks from being 37 weeks and full term!